Thomas Culhane

Growing Up with Community Scale and Home-Made Biogas: Living the “Vortical Economy”

Dr. Thomas Henry Culhane is an environmental technology systems engineer, urban planner, and educator specializing in renewable energy, sustainable development, and industrial ecology. He is currently an Associate Professor of Instruction and Director of Climate Mitigation and Adaptation at the University of South Florida’s Patel College of Global Sustainability.  

Dr. Culhane holds MA and Ph.D. degrees in Urban Planning (Regional and International Development and Environmental Analysis and Policy) from the University of California Los Angeles and earned his undergraduate degree with honors in Biological Anthropology from Harvard University. 

With over two decades of experience in the field, Dr. Culhane is recognized as a National Geographic Explorer and recipient of two prestigious National Geographic Blackstone Innovation Challenge Grants. He founded and directed Solar CITIES (Connecting Community Catalysts Integrating Technologies for Industrial Ecology Solutions), an organization that developed practical, low-cost renewable energy and waste management systems for impoverished communities worldwide. 

Dr. Culhane’s expertise centers on home-scale biogas digesters, DIY solar thermal and photovoltaic systems, water recycling, and integrated food production and waste upcycling and transformation technologies. He champions what he calls “The Vortical Economy” as an improvement on “The Circular Economy”. He has conducted field work and training programs across multiple continents, including Alaska, Egypt, Palestine, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Nepal, Brazil, Mexico and numerous other countries. His work demonstrates how waste-to-fuel-and-fertilizer systems integrated with soil-free food production can create closed-loop ecological solutions at household and community scales. A passionate educator, Dr. Culhane believes these accessible renewable energy and waste management technologies are logical first steps toward creating grassroots sustainability movements that unite people across cultures and faith traditions.