Energy Courses
Stanford offers over 300 energy courses. Link below to current listings.
We hope to see you at the weekly cross-campus Energy Seminar on Mondays during the academic year at 4:30-5:20pm in NVIDIA Auditorium. Students may take the Energy Seminar for credit or drop in for talks of interest.
Incoming graduate and professional school students may enroll in a week-long energy course Energy@Stanford&SLAC, that runs September 8-11, 2015.
For lifelong learners, the Stanford Center for Professional Development offers an Energy Innovation and Emerging Technologies Certificate.
If you notice any omissions or inaccuracies in the listing please email: precourt_institute@stanford.edu. Thank you.
2015 - 2016 Academic Year
| Department | Course Code | Course Title | Description | General Education Requirement(s) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| PHYSICS | 41 | Mechanics | How are motions of objects in the physical world determined by laws of physics? Students learn to describe the motion of objects (kinematics) and then understand why motions have the form they do (... | GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-SMA |
| PHYSICS | 43 | Electricity and Magnetism | What is electricity? What is magnetism? How are they related? How do these phenomena manifest themselves in the physical world? The theory of electricity and magnetism, as codified by Maxwell's... | GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-SMA |
| PHYSICS | 45 | Light and Heat | What is temperature? How do the elementary processes of mechanics, which are intrinsically reversible, result in phenomena that are clearly irreversible when applied to a very large number of... | GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-SMA |
| PHYSICS | 61 | Mechanics and Special Relativity | (First in a three-part advanced freshman physics series: PHYSICS 61, PHYSICS 63, PHYSICS 65.) This course covers Einstein's special theory of relativity and Newtonian mechanics at a level appropriate... | GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-FR, WAY-SMA |
| PHYSICS | 63 | Electricity, Magnetism, and Waves | (Second in a three-part advanced freshman physics series: PHYSICS 61, PHYSICS 63, PHYSICS 65.) This course covers the foundations of electricity and magnetism for students with a strong high school... | GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-FR, WAY-SMA |
| PHYSICS | 65 | Quantum and Thermal Physics | (Third in a three-part advanced freshman physics series: PHYSICS 61, PHYSICS 63, PHYSICS 65.) This course introduces the foundations of quantum and statistical mechanics for students with a strong... | GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-FR, WAY-SMA |
| PHYSICS | 81N | Science on the Back of the Envelope | Understanding the complex world around us quantitatively, using order of magnitude estimates and dimensional analysis. Starting from a handful of fundamental constants of Nature, one can estimate... | |
| PHYSICS | 120 | Intermediate Electricity and Magnetism I | Vector analysis. Electrostatic fields, including boundary-value problems and multipole expansion. Dielectrics, static and variable magnetic fields, magnetic materials. Maxwell's equations.... | GER: DB-NatSci, WAY-FR, WAY-SMA |
| PHYSICS | 121 | Intermediate Electricity and Magnetism II | Conservation laws and electromagnetic waves, Poynting's theorem, tensor formulation, potentials and fields. Plane wave problems (free space, conductors and dielectric materials, boundaries). Dipole... | |
| PHYSICS | 172 | Solid State Physics (APPPHYS 272) | Introduction to the properties of solids. Crystal structures and bonding in materials. Momentum-space analysis and diffraction probes. Lattice dynamics, phonon theory and measurements, thermal... | |
| PHYSICS | 220 | Classical Electrodynamics | Special relativity: The principles of relativity, Lorentz transformations, four vectors and tensors, relativistic mechanics and the principle of least action. Lagrangian formulation, charges in... | |
| PHYSICS | 240 | Introduction to the Physics of Energy | Energy as a consumable. Forms and interconvertability. World Joule budget. Equivalents in rivers, oil pipelines and nuclear weapons. Quantum mechanics of fire, batteries and fuel cells.... | |
| PHYSICS | 241 | Introduction to Nuclear Energy | Radioactivity. Elementary nuclear processes. Energetics of fission and fusion. Cross-sections and resonances. Fissionable and fertile isotopes. Neutron budgets. Light water, heavy water and graphite... | |
| PHYSICS | 450 | Quantum Chaos and Quantum Gravity | Course reviews aspects of classical and quantum chaos; discussions of recent connections of these topics to the physics of black holes and scattering experiments in AdS/CFT; and estimates of a bound... | |
| POLISCI | 19N | Politics of Energy Efficiency | We will examine the political context of energy efficiency and climate change. Why are some countries, such as Japan and France, able to achieve high levels of energy efficiency, while others, such... | WAY-SI |
| POLISCI | 134L | Introduction to Environmental Ethics (ETHICSOC 178M, ETHICSOC 278M, PHIL 178M, PHIL 278M) | How should human beings relate to the natural world? Do we have moral obligations toward non-human animals and other parts of nature? And what do we owe to other human beings, including future... | GER:EC-EthicReas, WAY-ER |
| POLISCI | 136R | Introduction to Global Justice (ETHICSOC 136R, INTNLREL 136R, PHIL 76, POLISCI 336) | This course provides an overview of core ethical problems in international politics, with special emphasis on the question of what demands justice imposes on institutions and agents acting in a... | GER:DB-Hum, GER:EC-EthicReas, WAY-ER |
| POLISCI | 215F | Nuclear Weapons and International Politics (POLISCI 315F) | Why do states develop nuclear weapons and why do some states, that have the technological capacity to build nuclear weapons, refrain from doing so? What are the strategic consequences of new states... | WAY-SI |
| POLISCI | 336 | Introduction to Global Justice (ETHICSOC 136R, INTNLREL 136R, PHIL 76, POLISCI 136R) | This course provides an overview of core ethical problems in international politics, with special emphasis on the question of what demands justice imposes on institutions and agents acting in a... | |
| POLISCI | 421K | Questionnaire Design for Surveys and Laboratory Experiments: Social and Cognitive Perspectives (COMM 339, PSYCH 231) | The social and psychological processes involved in asking and answering questions via questionnaires for the social sciences; optimizing questionnaire design; open versus closed questions; rating... | |
| POLISCI | 25SC | Energy in the Southwest (CEE 16SC, ENERGY 11SC) | The technical, social, and political issues surrounding energy management and use in the West, using California, Nevada, and Arizona as a field laboratory. Students explore energy narratives, such as... | |
| PSYCH | 231 | Questionnaire Design for Surveys and Laboratory Experiments: Social and Cognitive Perspectives (COMM 339, POLISCI 421K) | The social and psychological processes involved in asking and answering questions via questionnaires for the social sciences; optimizing questionnaire design; open versus closed questions; rating... | |
| PUBLPOL | 121 | Policy and Climate Change | Science and economics, including recent findings. History and evolution of local, state, regional, national, and international policy. California's recent landmark climate change bill. Future policy... | |
| PUBLPOL | 194 | Technology Policy (PUBLPOL 294) | How the U.S. federal government promotes, uses, and regulates new technologies; tensions between representative governance and the need for elite expertise in policymaking; contemporary debates over... | |
| PUBLPOL | 294 | Technology Policy (PUBLPOL 194) | How the U.S. federal government promotes, uses, and regulates new technologies; tensions between representative governance and the need for elite expertise in policymaking; contemporary debates over... | |
| PWR | 1KD | Writing & Rhetoric 1: The Feature Article: Writing and Change | Rhetorical and contextual analysis of readings; research; and argument. Focus is on development of a substantive research-based argument using multiple sources. Individual conferences with instructor... | Writing 1 |
| PWR | 2KM | Writing & Rhetoric 2: A Planet on the Edge: The Rhetoric of Sustainable Energy | Prerequisite: PWR 1. Further work in developing skills in argument and research-based writing, with emphasis on both written and oral/multimedia presentation of research. Focus on the rhetoric and... | Writing 2 |
| SIS | 103Q | Stanford Introductory Seminar : Pros and Cons of Energy Options in the 21st Century | ||
| SIS | 125Q | Stanford Introductory Seminar: Fundamentals of Energy Processes | ||
| STRAMGT | 356 | The Startup Garage: Design | Startup Garage is an intensive hands-on, project-based course, in which students will apply the concepts of design thinking, engineering, finance, business and organizational skills to design and... | |
| STRAMGT | 574 | Strategic Thinking in Action - In Business and Beyond (II) | This six-session 2-point Bass seminar will involve students (maximum 18) in analyzing the emerging global electric automotive industry by focusing on: (1) The electric automotive industry in the U.S... | |
| THINK | 8 | Sustainability and Collapse | What does it mean to live sustainably? How do our different definitions of nature ¿ scientific, literary, cultural, and historical ¿ shape the way we answer that question?... | THINK, WAY-A-II |
| THINK | 40 | Meeting the Global Sustainability Challenge | What are the most critical sustainability challenges facing us in this century? How can natural and social sciences, humanities, and technology fields interact to contribute to their solution? How... | THINK, WAY-SMA |
| URBANST | 132 | Concepts and Analytic Skills for the Social Sector | How to create and grow innovative not-for-profit organizations and for-profit enterprises which have the primary goal of solving social and environmental problems. Topics include organizational... | GER:DB-SocSci, WAY-SI |
| URBANST | 165 | Sustainable Urban and Regional Transportation Planning | Environmental, economic, and equity aspects of urban transportation in 21st-century U.S. Expanded choices in urban and regional mobility that do not diminish resources for future generations.... | GER:DB-SocSci, WAY-SI |
| URBANST | 167 | Green Mobilities for the Suburbs of the Future | Much of the recent academic discussion of the future of urban mobility has stressed the likelihood of a concentration of all urban functions in dense urban centers. The need for sustainability, so... | |
| URBANST | 145 | International Urbanization Seminar: Cross-Cultural Collaboration for Sustainable Urban Development (CEE 126, EARTHSYS 138, IPS 274) | Comparative approach to sustainable cities, with focus on international practices and applicability to China. Tradeoffs regarding land use, infrastructure, energy and water, and the need to balance... | |
| URBANST | 163 | Land Use Control | Methods of land use control related to the pattern and scale of development and the protection of land and water resources. Emphasis is on the relationship between the desired land use goal and... | GER:DB-SocSci |
