Benjamin WeilBenjamin Weil

Extension Assistant Professor, Building and Construction Technology

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Office: 321 Design Building

Phone: 413-545-1820

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Primary Interests

Dr. Weil teaches courses in energy efficient buildings. With primary responsibility for the Extension program in building energy, his research program is responsive to the needs of various stakeholders in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, including home builders, architects, weatherization companies, energy utilities, state government agencies, town governments, environmental and community organizations, and homeowners. He is particularly interested in the social and behavioral dimensions of energy efficiency. He is a building analyst certified with the Building Performance Institute, and continues to enjoy building diagnostics.

Current Projects

  • Program validation and quality assurance for residential building retrofit programs
  • Reducing energy losses and building durability issues from recessed lighting
  • Improving ventilation estimation standards for working with the blower door
  • Retrospective evaluation of actual energy savings in the Mass Save program
  • Breaking through the cost barrier for deep energy retrofits

Courses Taught

  • BCT 150 – The Built Environment
  • BCT 211 – Energy Efficient Housing
  • Building energy retrofit and optimization (under development)

Selected Recent Publications

“Solar City, Bike City, Growth City: Local Governance and Renewable Energy in Davis, California.” in Ecologies of Hope, S. Ravi Rajan and Colin Duncan, Eds., School of Advanced Research Press, New Mexico, (forthcoming 2011)

“The Rise and Fall (and Rise?) of Renewable Energy Policy in California.” Energy Policy, Forthcoming

“Conservation, Exploitation, and Cultural Change in the Indian Forest Service.” Environmental History, April 2006

“The Rivers Come: Colonial Flood Control and Knowledge Systems in the Indus River Basin, 1840s- 1930s.” Environment and History, February 2006

“Solar City, Bike City, Growth City: Local Governance and Renewable Energy in Davis, California”, Society for Social Studies of Science Annual Meeting, Montréal, QC. October 12, 2007

“Forest or Flood: the Ongoing Conversation Between Foresters and Engineers in British India”, American Society for Environmental History Annual Meeting, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, March 1, 2007

“California Energy Paths: Changing Values and Renewable Energy Policy”, American Society for Environmental History, Houston, TX, March 19, 2005

“Renewable Energy and Rural Development: Questions of Scale and Governance in India and America,” Society for Social Studies of Science, Atlanta, GA, October 16, 2003

“The Engineer’s War with Nature: A Comedy of British Flood Control and Navigation Schemes on the River Indus, 1840 – 1927,”American Society for Environmental History, Providence, RI, March 29, 2003

“Conservation and the Imperial Indian Forest Service,” The University of California Multi-Campus Research Unit in World History, Riverside, CA May 18, 2002