The Built Environment coalition develops practical knowledge to improve the resilience and sustainability of built and natural environments.
We work with communities, government agencies, nongovernmental organizations, and other partners to develop, assess, and implement innovative approaches and effective strategies. The resulting analytical methodologies, tools, and learning modules are publicly distributed through the Built Environment Coalition, a research and education nonprofit (510(c)3).
We recognize that built and natural systems are the basis of civil society and commerce, and ensure the health, safety, and well-being of individual citizens. Sustainable systems advance economic opportunity, social justice, and environmental regeneration, and resilient systems accommodate changes and disruptions to maintain critical functions and relationships of interdependent systems.
Board of Directors
Dr. Sarah Slaughter is the founder and CEO/President of the Built Environment Coalition. She is a recognized expert on resilience and sustainability for the built environment, and currently advises several federal agencies on strategies for improving resilience. She was a Visiting Lecturer in the MIT Department of Urban Studies and Planning, the Associate Director for Buildings and Infrastructure in the MIT Energy Initiative (MITEI), and co-founder and faculty head of the Sustainability Initiative in the MIT Sloan School of Management.
Previously, Dr. Slaughter founded and was CEO of MOCA Systems, Inc., a software-enabled construction program management company. Before founding MOCA, she was a professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and earlier was professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Lehigh University. She received her Doctoral, Masters, and Bachelor’s degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Dr. Slaughter is currently a member of the National Academy of Engineering (NAE), and the National Academy of Construction. She currently serves on several committees for the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine, and also serves on the US General Services Administration’s Green Building Advisory Committee (GBAC).
Dr. Val Livada has consulted on issues of technology and strategy with Global 300-type companies, and on entrepreneurship with startups, universities and regional entities around the world. Dr. Livada has been a Visiting Lecturer, Research Associate and Senior Lecturer at MIT and has taught the “Corporate Entrepreneurship” course at the Sloan School. He has participated in regional entrepreneurial efforts in Romania, Switzerland, Mexico, Russia, Portugal, Georgia, West and North Africa, Turkey, England, Chile, and New Zealand.
He currently serves on the Board of Directors of the AutoHarvest Foundation, the Built Environment Coalition, Aphios Corporation and Polynva Composites. He participates on the Board of Advisers of United Technologies Innovation Council, the Building Global Innovators accelerator in Portugal, Greentown Labs and numerous startups. Val received a BS degree from MIT and his Masters and PhD degrees from Tufts University.
Rear Admiral David J. Nash, CEC, USN (ret.) has over five decades of experience in building, design and program management for both the U.S. Navy and the private sector. His experience includes the management of multi-billion dollar physical asset programs, including the U.S. Navy’s shore installations worldwide and the reconstruction of Iraq’s infrastructure. He currently serves as President of Sustainable Biofuel Solutions, LLC. Nash also has his own project consultancy, Dave Nash & Associates, LLC.
Rear Admiral Nash’s service in the U.S. Navy spanned thirty-three years as an officer in the Civil Engineer Corps (CEC). Among his many leadership positions, Nash served at the top of the CEC as Commander, Naval Facilities Engineering Command and Chief of Civil Engineers.
He holds a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the Indiana Institute of Technology, an M.S. in Financial Management from the Naval Postgraduate School, and an Honorary Doctorate from the Indiana Institute of Technology. He is a registered Professional Engineer in Michigan and Pennsylvania.