In 2009 Governor Phil Bredesen proposed creating a joint UT/ORNL Center for Interdisciplinary graduate education and research and an interdisciplinary PhD program in energy sciences, which would involve up to two hundred faculty appointments and four hundred graduate assistant positions. He also proposed an initial $6 million venture capital appropriation for the center to recruit the beginning class of graduate students, pay their stipends and tuition, and equip a physical location for the center. Governor Bredesen led the way in establishing the new academic unit during a special called legislative session on education. In January 2010 the General Assembly established the center and allocated $6.2 million for its creation. It opened in fall 2011 with 19 graduate students; and in October 2011, upon the recommendation of Chancellor Jimmy Cheek, the UT Board of Trustees named the center for Bredesen. Dr. Lee Riedinger, professor of physics, was named the first director.
The center was first located in temporary space in Temple Court (a building razed for construction of the new student union) and then moved to its permanent home—the fourth floor of Greve Hall.