Overview
The final project brings together the concepts and analytical methods developed throughout BIOET 533. You will select a renewable energy or sustainability case connected to your professional interests, academic work, or another area you would like to investigate more deeply.
The case should involve a reasonably focused technology, policy, project, program, controversy, or decision for which ethical analysis can clarify important choices, impacts, risks, and responsibilities. The final paper should not be a general report on an energy technology or sustainability topic. It should be an ethical analysis of a defined case.
Final Project at a Glance
Requirement | Final Project Expectation |
|---|---|
| Case | A focused renewable energy or sustainability technology, policy, project, program, controversy, or decision |
| Research | A focused cluster of credible sources synthesized as a brief literature review |
| Ethical analysis | Meaningful use of Ethics Matrices A, B, and C |
| Additional method | Stakeholder Analysis Matrix or life-cycle assessment concepts |
| Sustainability indicators | A final portfolio of approximately six to eight operational indicators |
| Final paper | 2,500-3,000 words, excluding references, tables, figures, and appendices |
| Recommendations | Specific, evidence-based, and connected directly to the analysis |
| AI disclosure | A brief AI Use Statement identifying tools, purposes, verification, and revision |
Learning Objectives
- Define a complex sustainability problem clearly and at an appropriate scale.
- Assemble and evaluate a focused body of credible evidence.
- Identify relevant stakeholders, system boundaries, assumptions, and uncertainties.
- Apply the course ethics matrices and at least one additional analytical method.
- Use sustainability indicators to make important conditions and consequences visible.
- Distinguish evidence from estimates, assumptions, projections, and value judgments.
- Develop defensible recommendations grounded in the analysis.
Building on Earlier Course Work
The final project should build on work completed during the course, especially Assignment 7. That assignment should provide a finalized topic, a preliminary project boundary, a clearer understanding of stakeholders, a portfolio of sustainability indicators, and possible evidence sources.
You may revise any of these elements as your research develops. The final project should be a coherent analysis, not a collection of earlier assignments placed together without revision.
Selecting and Defining the Case
Choose a topic that is sufficiently focused for a 2,500-3,000-word paper.
A Workable Case Usually Includes | Avoid Topics That Are Too Broad |
|---|---|
| A specific technology, policy, project, program, or intervention | An entire technology or global issue |
| An identifiable decision, dispute, or problem | A general descriptive survey |
| A defined geographic and temporal boundary | An undefined or constantly shifting scope |
| Stakeholders with different benefits, burdens, risks, or responsibilities | A case with no identifiable decision-makers or affected groups |
| Enough credible evidence to support analysis | A topic supported mainly by opinion or promotional claims |
For example, “solar energy,” “climate change,” or “artificial intelligence and energy” would be too broad by themselves. A defined solar siting dispute, regional climate policy, or data-center energy strategy could provide a workable case.
| Contact the instructor if you are uncertain whether your topic is sufficiently focused. Questions raised early are much easier to address than a major change made close to the deadline. |
Research and Source Requirements
Develop a focused cluster of credible sources that establishes the case and supports your analysis. Use sources with different functions: some may establish technical conditions, while others provide stakeholder perspectives, policy context, environmental effects, economic information, or evidence of uncertainty and disagreement.
Appropriate Source Types | How to Use Them |
|---|---|
| Peer-reviewed research | Establish methods, evidence, and scholarly debate |
| Technical and scientific reports | Provide data, models, assumptions, and performance analysis |
| Government and regulatory documents | Establish policy, legal, and institutional context |
| Industry or project documents | Clarify plans, claims, costs, and implementation details |
| Community and stakeholder materials | Represent affected perspectives, concerns, and local knowledge |
| Recognized standards and indicator frameworks | Support definitions, metrics, and comparison criteria |
| High-quality reporting | Document recent developments, controversy, and public response |
The literature review should synthesize the evidence. Do not summarize each source separately without showing how the sources relate to one another. Where sources disagree, identify the disagreement and explain its significance. Verify all factual claims, citations, links, and data sources.
Required Analytical Framework
Use all three ethics matrices and at least one additional course method. The matrices are analytical tools; the final paper should explain the most consequential findings rather than reproduce every matrix cell.
Method | Primary Focus | Questions It Helps Answer |
|---|---|---|
| Ethics Matrix A | Integrity, evidence, validity, transparency, uncertainty, and communication | What can be supported? How reliable are the methods and claims? |
| Ethics Matrix B | Broader impacts, justice, public policy, risk, precaution, and transformation | Who benefits, who bears burdens, and what larger effects matter? |
| Ethics Matrix C | Embedded assumptions, boundaries, categories, proxies, and recommendations | How do technical choices construct the problem and preferred solution? |
| Stakeholder Analysis Matrix | Interests, influence, power, benefits, burdens, and responsibilities | Who is affected, who decides, and whose interests are weakly represented? |
| Life-cycle assessment concepts | Goal and scope, functional unit, boundaries, allocation, impact categories, and data limits | Which upstream and downstream effects are included or excluded? |
Completed matrices may be included in an appendix when they help document your process. They should not replace the written analysis.
Sustainability Indicator Portfolio
Include and apply a final portfolio of approximately six to eight sustainability indicators appropriate to the case. The indicators should help evaluate important aspects of the project rather than appear as a disconnected list.
For Each Indicator, Establish | Portfolio-Level Questions |
|---|---|
| What the indicator represents | Does the set cover the most consequential impacts and risks? |
| How it would be measured or assessed | Are multiple stakeholder perspectives represented? |
| Its geographic and temporal boundary | Are short- and long-term effects included where relevant? |
| The stakeholder or system function it makes visible | Does the set reveal tradeoffs rather than only favorable outcomes? |
| The evidence that could support it | Are the indicators sufficiently distinct and plausible to assess? |
| An important limitation or risk of misinterpretation | Do the indicators reflect the ethical analysis? |
You do not need to collect complete original data for every indicator. Explain how the indicators would support evaluation of the case and use available evidence where possible.
Required Final Paper Structure
Section | Purpose | Include |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Introduction and Case Definition | Define the case and central ethical question | Decision or problem; boundaries; stakeholders; significance; thesis or guiding argument |
| 2. Case Background and Focused Literature Review | Establish the evidence needed to understand the case | Technical, environmental, social, economic, and policy background; established evidence; uncertainty; disagreement; missing information |
| 3. Ethical and Stakeholder Analysis | Apply the course methods to the most consequential issues | Matrices A, B, and C; Stakeholder Analysis or LCA; power; benefits; burdens; risks; assumptions; boundaries; burden of proof |
| 4. Sustainability Indicator Portfolio | Show how the case could be evaluated | Six to eight operational indicators; definitions; methods; evidence; stakeholder relevance; limitations; portfolio rationale |
| 5. Recommendations | Develop specific actions grounded in the analysis | Who should act; what should be done; evidence; affected stakeholders; remaining uncertainty and tradeoffs |
| 6. Conclusion | Return to the central ethical question | Most important finding; significance for technical decisions, responsibilities, stakeholders, and sustainability evaluation |
What the Final Project Is Not
| The final project is not a general overview, a series of article summaries, a completed set of matrices without interpretation, a list of stakeholders without analysis, a disconnected list of indicators, an unsupported opinion, or a paper containing unverified AI-generated claims or citations. |
Use of Generative AI
You may use Penn State-approved generative AI tools to support brainstorming, research planning, source discovery, organization, comparison of interpretations, revision of indicator definitions, and review of clarity or structure.
AI May Support | You Remain Responsible For |
|---|---|
| Brainstorming and research planning | The final argument and analytical judgments |
| Source discovery and comparison | Verification of sources and factual claims |
| Organization and outlining | Application of the course methods |
| Revision of indicator definitions | Selection and interpretation of evidence |
| Review of clarity and structure | Identification of uncertainty, limitations, and conclusions |
Include a brief AI Use Statement at the end of the paper identifying the systems used, the general purposes for which they were used, how outputs were verified or revised, and which parts of the work represent your own final analytical judgments. Do not upload proprietary, confidential, restricted, or personally identifying information.
Submission Process
Stage | Action | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Topic confirmation | Confirm the final case and scope | Ensure that the project is focused and workable |
| 2. Draft or working paper | Post or submit the draft as directed in Canvas | Receive feedback on evidence, methods, and organization |
| 3. Revision | Respond to feedback and make appropriate changes | Strengthen the argument, analysis, and recommendations |
| 4. Final submission | Submit the completed paper in the designated Canvas folder | Complete the course project |
Refer to the Course Syllabus and Canvas for dates and submission links. Responses to requests submitted less than 48 hours before a deadline cannot be guaranteed.
Evaluation Criteria
A Strong Final Project Will | A Weaker Final Project May |
|---|---|
| Define a focused and significant case | Remain too broad or mainly descriptive |
| Use credible and relevant sources | Rely heavily on unsupported claims |
| Synthesize evidence rather than summarize sources one by one | Use the matrices only as labels |
| Distinguish facts, estimates, assumptions, projections, and value judgments | Ignore major stakeholders, power relationships, or system boundaries |
| Apply Matrices A, B, and C meaningfully | Treat sustainability indicators as broad goals rather than usable measures |
| Use Stakeholder Analysis or LCA effectively | Overlook important uncertainty or disagreement |
| Present a coherent and operational indicator portfolio | Offer recommendations unsupported by evidence |
| Acknowledge uncertainty and competing interpretations | Rely on unverified AI-generated material |
| Connect recommendations directly to the analysis | Present disconnected sections without a coherent argument |
| Demonstrate independent judgment and clear professional communication | Leave factual claims, citations, or links unverified |
Questions?
Post general questions in the course Questions discussion forum so that responses can be shared with the class. Contact the instructor directly when your question concerns your specific topic, unpublished work, personal circumstances, or another matter that should not be discussed publicly.