Bio

Tess Hegarty is currently a PhD candidate in the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department, and she’s passionate about building decarbonization as a part of addressing the climate crisis. Her PhD thesis research explores the intersection of probabilistic life cycle assessment (LCA) metrics and industrialized construction through ongoing collaborations between industry and academia. 

Her undergraduate degree focused on structures, architecture, and design via MIT's flexible 1-ENG program, and she spent her junior year studying abroad at the University of Cambridge. Directly after graduating from MIT, she started her MS/PhD at Stanford, with fellowship support from the NSF GRFP and SGF.

While at Stanford, she co-founded a volunteer student organization called Engineering Students for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (ES4DEI). She’s also interested in design thinking and has taken four d.school classes while at Stanford, including Designing (Ourselves) for Racial Justice, Transformative Design, Creativity in Research Scholars, and Print on Purpose. She enjoys applying her graphic design skills for Scientists Speak Up, a student organization dedicated to combatting science misinformation.

Honors & Awards

  • Rising Environmental Leaders Program (RELP), Stanford Woods Institute (2019)
  • Stanford Graduate Fellowship (SGF), Stanford University (2017)
  • Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP), National Science Foundation (NSF) (2017)

Education & Certifications

  • MS, Stanford University, Structural Engineering (2019)
  • BS, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Civil and Environmental Engineering (2017)

Service, Volunteer and Community Work

  • Co-President, Engineering Students for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (ES4DEI) (2020 - Present)

    Location

    Stanford, CA

  • Graphic Design Chair, Graduate Society of Women Engineers (GradSWE) (2017 - 2020)

    Location

    Stanford, CA

  • Graphic Design Chair, Scientists Speak Up (2021 - Present)

    Location

    Stanford, CA

Personal Interests

mind: reading, meditation, mindfulness
hand: graphic design, architecture, painting, mending clothing
heart: DEI in STEM, mental health, minimalism, family, friends
body: skiing, hiking, camping, yoga, travel

Contact

  • Academic
    hegartyt@stanford.edu
    University - Student Department: Civil and Environmental Engineering Position: Graduate

Additional Info

  • Mail Code: 4020

Links

Projects

  • Creating Sustainability-focused Value through Industrialized Construction: The Role of Organization-related, Process-related, or Product-related Strategies and Technology Interventions, Center for Integrated Facility Engineering (CIFE) at Stanford (2020 - Present)

    Location

    Stanford, CA

    Collaborators

    • Michael Lepech, Associate Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Senior Fellow at the Woods Institute for the Environment, Stanford University
    • Joseph Louis, Assistant Professor of Civil & Construction Engineering , Oregon State University
    • Ankur Podder, Buildings Advanced Manufacturing and Integration Science Research Engineer, US DOE National Renewable Energy Laboratory
  • CARBONHOUSE: Probabilistic Life Cycle Assessment for a New Carbon-Composite Building Material Paradigm, Precourt Institute for Energy at Stanford (2019 - Present)

    Location

    Stanford, CA

    Collaborators

    • Michael Lepech, Associate Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and Senior Fellow at the Woods Institute for the Environment, Stanford University

Lab Affiliations

Work Experience

  • Environmental Health and Safety Intern, Clark Pacific (June 2020 - September 2020)

    Mapped out the data tracking systems currently in place at Clark Pacific, and how the data currently tracked relates to data required for automated Environmental Product Declaration (EPD) and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA).

    Location

    Woodland, CA

  • Visiting Scholar, EPFL's Structural Xploration Lab (SXL) (June 2018 - August 2018)

    During summer 2018, I joined EPFL's Structural Xploration Lab (SXL) to work on the ‘Build-Unbuild-Repeat’ project, a smart living lab initiative.

    Location

    Fribourg, Switzerland

  • Student Researcher, Structural Biomechanics Lab at Imperial College London (June 2016 - August 2016)

    Location

    London, UK

  • Undergraduate Researcher, MIT Structural Design Lab (June 2015 - August 2015)

    Location

    Cambridge, MA