The following article has been adapted from the NCSU College of Engineering website. Please click here to read the original article.

The 2016 Alcoa Foundation Engineering Research Awards were presented to Dr. Joseph DeCarolis, associate professor in the Department of Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering, and Dr. Jan Genzer, Celanese Professor of Chemical and Biological Engineering, during the spring faculty meeting of the College of Engineering at North Carolina State University.

DeCarolis was awarded the Alcoa Foundation Engineering Research Achievement Award, which recognizes young faculty members who have accomplished outstanding research achievements during the preceding three years. Genzer received the Alcoa Foundation Distinguished Engineering Research Award, which is given to a senior faculty member for research achievements over a period of at least five years at NC State.

DeCarolis combines domain knowledge in energy systems with different methodological approaches, including numerical and mathematical modeling, life cycle assessment (LCA) and energy economics. He has developed an open-source energy modeling code, Temoa, which stands for Tools for Energy Model Optimization and Analysis, that was noted by external referees during his promotion and tenure review as a significant contribution to the field. He has also contributed to SWOLF, which is a life cycle assessment framework for optimizing solid waste management. In the past year, he has led a successful faculty cluster proposal on Sustainable Energy Systems and Policy and is coordinating this multi-disciplinary effort based on his strong desire to propel NC State to a leadership position in energy analysis.