Project ISF: Understanding worker preferences for decarbonized manufacturing jobs Program DUIRI - Discovery Undergraduate Interdisciplinary Research Internship Term Summer 2023 Status Accepted Research Area Global Sustainability, Mechanical Engineering, Sociology Description The shift toward electrified steel production, leading to a greater reliance on utilizing renewable energy, has the potential to increase variability of steelworker schedules and job quality. This would allow steel producers to use clean energy when it is readily available and cheaper, produce and store intermediate goods, and finish the manufacturing process at a later date. Doing so, however, introduces temporal and seasonal variabilities into the steel production process that would impact the jobs of steel workers. This phase of the research project will focus on interviewing steelworkers to learn more about how they make decisions about job attributes like wages, schedules, and flexibility. Faculty Collaborators: Jeremy Reynolds, Partha Mukherjee Supervisor Rebecca Elaine Ciez Mentor Rebecca Elaine Ciez Type of work required Student researchers will assist the research team with scheduling interviews, conducting interviews, processing interview data, designing a survey instrument, pretesting the survey instrument, and recruiting survey participants. Some interviews may require travel with the team off campus to other locations in Indiana. Websites https://sloan.org/grant-detail/10118
https://engineering.purdue.edu/ME/News/2023/human-power-how-steelworkers-could-makeorbreak-the-renewable-energy-transition Qualifications Experience with qualitative methods, especially interviews, is valued. Prior experience with data analysis tools (e.g. Python, R) is a plus but not required. Credit Hours 0 Weekly Hours 40 (estimated)