About the Nicholas Institute

In short, the Nicholas Institute’s mission is to become the nation’s leading source of effective solutions to critical environmental problems—by providing decision makers in the public and private sectors with unbiased evaluations of policy risks and rewards, and innovative, practical ideas for meeting complex challenges.

- Tim Profeta, Director, Nicholas Institute

The Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions at Duke University is a nonpartisan institute founded in 2005 to engage with decision makers in government, the private sector, and the nonprofit community to develop innovative proposals that address critical environmental challenges. The Institute will address the demand for high-quality and timely data relevant to these pressing environmental problems. It seeks to act as an “honest broker” in policy debates by fostering open, ongoing dialogue between stakeholders on all sides of the issues and policy-relevant analysis based on academic research. The Institute’s staff leverages the broad expertise of Duke University as well as public and private partners nationwide.

The Institute is in the process of hiring its core staff, consisting of experienced professionals that will bring years of experience and context to the Institute’s work. The staff will work in conjunction with Duke faculty and students, as well as partners outside Duke’s walls, to produce the research and policy design that best informs decisions by the government, private sector, and nonprofit community on environmental matters.

The Institute will be housed within the Nicholas School in the Levine Science Research Center on the Duke campus, and later will move with the school into its new facility Nicholas Hall, which is still in the planning stages. The state-of-the art facility will be designed to meet the highest standards for "green" buildings. The Institute also will soon open an office in Washington, D.C.

The Institute is made possible through a generous gift from Pete and Ginny Nicholas of Boston. They pledged $70 million in December 2003 to launch the Institute and to provide resources to allow the Nicholas School to push ahead in its efforts to assume environmental leadership and to achieve world-class status and impact.