August 21, 2012

Davidson College invites the public to a high-level panel discussion on energy and sustainability on Wednesday morning, September 5. The event is being held in conjunction with the Democratic National Convention, and will consider Charlotte as a rising energy hub, and how sustainability initiatives are becoming major economic drivers of the future.

Davidson President Carol Quillen will introduce the four panelists-Eric Spiegel, CEO of Siemens Corporation; Charlotte Mayor Anthony Foxx; Vincent Davis of Duke Energy and Envision Charlotte; and Graham Bullock, assistant professor of environmental studies and political science at Davidson.

Bloomberg.com sustainability editor Eric Roston will moderate the discussion, which will begin at 9:30 a.m. in the Duke Family Performance Hall of Knobloch Campus Center. There is no charge to attend, but tickets are required. They can be reserved for a small fee at www.davidson.edu/tickets, or obtained at the door on the morning of the event if any remain. For information call 704-894-2135. A reception for the public and panelists will immediately follow the presentation.

ERIC ROSTON

Eric Roston is editor of Bloomberg's Sustainability News website, bloomberg.com/sustainability. He is also author of the book The Carbon Age: How Life's Core Element Has Become Civilization's Greatest Threat. The book contends that the fastest way to learn the most about the world is through the carbon atom. Roston joined Bloomberg.com after serving as a senior analyst on the National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill.

ERIC SPIEGEL

Eric Spiegel is President and CEO of Siemens Corporation, the U.S. subsidiary of Siemens AG, one of the world's largest electronics and engineering companies. Siemens has more than $21 billion in annual U.S. sales and has 60,000 American employees representing all 50 states. Spiegel is responsible for growing the U.S. business in the industry, energy and healthcare sectors. An expert on the global energy industry, Spiegel is co-author of the 2009 book Energy Shift : Game-Changing Options for Fueling the Future.

ANTHONY FOXX

Anthony Foxx was first elected to the Charlotte City Council in 2005, and was elected mayor in November 2009. He is now chair of the steering and host committees for the 2012 Democratic National Convention. Raised in Charlotte's Lincoln Heights neighborhood, Foxx earned a bachelor's degree in history at Davidson College in 1993, and was the first African American elected as student body president. He earned his law degree from New York University, and has served in all three branches of federal government-a judicial clerk for the U.S. Circuit Court for the Sixth Circuit, a trial attorney for the Voting Section of the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice and counsel for the House Judiciary Committee.

VINCENT DAVIS
Vincent Davis is director of Smart Energy Now Community Partnerships at Duke Energy, and also serves as Duke Energy's spokesperson for the Envision Charlotte sustainability initiative. Envision: Charlotte is a collaborative partnership among major employers, building owners, municipal representatives and technology leaders. It will employ Duke Energy's "Smart Energy Now" program that uses digital grid technologies to display real-time energy data throughout uptown Charlotte. Envision: Charlotte intends to make Charlotte the most measurably sustainable community in the nation, with a goal to reduce energy use in Uptown by 20% in five years. Envision: Charlotte promises economic benefits by attracting cost-conscious, green-minded companies to Uptown.

GRAHAM BULLOCK
Graham Bullock teaches political science and environmental studies at Davidson. His Ph.D. thesis at the University of California, Berkeley, concerned product eco-labels, corporate sustainability ratings, and other forms of information-based environmental governance. Bullock has served as The Nature Conservancy's ecotourism coordinator in China, where for three years he helped develop community-based ecotourism enterprises. He is also a co-founder of GoodGuide, which provides information about the social, environmental, and health performance of more than 100,000 consumer products through both an online database and an iPhone application. At Davidson, he teaches courses on environmental policy, and a seminar on citizens, consumers and the environment.

Davidson is a highly selective independent liberal arts college for 1,900 students located 20 minutes north of Charlotte in Davidson, N.C. Since its establishment in 1837 by Presbyterians, the college has graduated 23 Rhodes Scholars and is consistently regarded as one of the top liberal arts colleges in the country. Through The Davidson Trust, the college became the first liberal arts institution in the nation to replace loans with grants in all financial aid packages, giving all students the opportunity to graduate debt-free. Davidson competes in NCAA athletics at the Division I level, and a longstanding Honor Code is central to student life at the college.
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