Issue 002
Spring 2022
A Magazine from the Earth Commons—Georgetown’s Institute for Environment & Sustainability
Fallowed Ground
The treaty governing the Colorado River turns 100... and faces a fraught future
Letter from the Editors It is with great pleasure that we present the second issue of Common Home, a Georgetown student-led magazine on all things environment & sustainability. The publishing of our second issue falls in the aftermath of COP26, a landmark summit that, though not without certain advancements, revealed the lack of sufficient momentum to mitigate the climate crisis. More than ever, COP26 demonstrates what is still required of us—the next generation of leaders. Our articles travel near and far. Drawing from stories from right here on campus, we investigate our school’s water and electricity supply, we feature our very own faculty’s critical environmental research, and present new courses, programs, and clubs. Reflecting globally, we digest the outcomes of COP26, outline the importance of climate finance, and discuss activist burnout…and more. In these pages, we explore the work of Georgetown professors Matthew Hamilton and Gina Wimp on salt marshes; Patricia Vieiria on an artistic interpretation of plants; Natsu Onada Power in performance art meets activism in Japan, and Martha Weiss on the ecological impact of insect memories. A special thank you to our guest writers Daniela Fernandez, Jillian Dyszynski, Claire Catenaccio, Madeleine Babin, and recent graduates Clara Chiu and Erin LeGoff. We are delighted to share your voices with our readers. In a spirit of care for our common home, we hope this issue will serve as a step towards a more sustainable planet. Sincerely, The Common Home Editorial Board Marion Cassidy, Sadie Morris, Maya Snyder, Mark Agard, and Alannah Nathan Undergraduates at Georgetown University
Cover Photo: Tim Romano 2
Table of Contents 6 More than Meets the Eye: Why Salt Marshes are Key to Climate Mitigation With Professors Matthew Hamilton and Gina Wimp, Department of Biology, Georgetown By Alannah Nathan, SFS ’24 8 COP26: A Fragile Win, but Who Will Pay the Cost? By Madeline Babin, Research Associate, Climate Change Policy, David Rockefeller Studies Program, Council on Foreign Relations 10 Fallowed Ground By Kyle Paoletta, Common Home Correspondent 16 The Future for a Healthier Planet Begins with Us By Daniela Fernandez, Founder and CEO of Sustainable Ocean Alliance; COL ’17 18 How Campus Works: Water and Power By Mark Agard, SFS ’23 20 Pens and Voices Gathered Round: Georgetown’s “Voices on the Environment” Events By Maya Snyder, SFS ’24 22 The Minds of Plants With Renata Buziak, Prudence Gibson, and Professor Patricia Vieira, Department of Spanish and Portuguese, Georgetown By Marion Cassidy, COL ‘23 and Sam Cormier, COL ’21 24 Burned Out on a Burning Planet: Reflections from a Disillusioned Climate Activist By Sadie Morris, SFS ’22
30 Growing into Leadership By Piper Conway, COL ’21 32 The Breakdown: Climate Finance By Jillian Dyszynski, Director of Market Development at American Forest Foundation; COL ’06 34 Going GREEN at Georgetown By Sadie Morris, SFS ’22 36 The Making of Maladaptation By Clara Chiu, COL ’21 and Erin LeGoff, COL ’21 40 A Field Trip to Okinawa With Professor Natsu Onoda Power, Artistic Director of the Davis Performing Arts Center, Georgetown By Marion Cassidy, COL ‘23 42 What We’re Reading: Under a White Sky: The Nature of the Future by Elizabeth Kolbert Review by Maya Snyder, SFS ’24 44 What We’re Reading: Journal of Solitude by May Sarton By Professor Claire Catenaccio, Department of Classics, Georgetown 46 A Flutter of Memory: How Insects Learn and Why It Matters With Professor Martha Weiss, Co-Director, Environmental Studies Program and Director, Major in Environmental Biology, Georgetown By Maya Snyder, SFS ’24
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Editorial Board Alannah Nathan Sophomore in Georgetown’s School of Foreign Service studying Global Business with a minor in French. Her interests in the environment space include the energy transition, climate economics, and sustainable economic development. Born and raised in Seattle, WA, she now calls Brooklyn, NY, home. Marion Cassidy Marion Cassidy is a junior in the college studying History and Art History with a minor in Theater and Performance Studies. She is from Brooklyn, NY and is passionate about the intersection of sustainability and the arts.
Sadie Morris: Originally from (the real) Northern California. Currently a Senior in Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service studying Culture and Politics with a focus on political economy and the environment.
Maya Snyder: Sophomore at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, majoring in Science, Technology, & International Affairs and minoring in English. Originally from San Diego, California.
Mark Agard: Mark is a Junior at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, majoring in Science, Technology, & International Affairs with a minor in French and Environmental Studies. His hometown is Vancouver, Washington.
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Photo: Marha Weiss 5
More than Meets the Eye
Why salt marshes are key to climate mitigation By Alannah Nathan, SFS ’24
Students engage in fieldwork for Gina Wimp and Matthew Hamilton’s lab. Photo: Matthew Hamilton. 6
Often overlooked, salt marshes serve an essential role in protecting the environment and mitigating climate change. In 2016, Matthew Hamilton, the Founding Director of the Environmental Biology undergraduate major at Georgetown, and Gina Wimp, the Director of Graduate Studies in the Biology Department, set out to study salt marshes and, more specifically, their genetic variability. Not only do salt marshes act as an important buffer between land and sea—safeguarding against storm surge, sea level rise, and erosion—salt marshes are among the most efficient carbon sinks. In fact, coastal wetlands, which include salt marshes, hold 30% of soil carbon, despite accounting for just 5% of the Earth’s landmasses. These marshes fulfill other important roles too: they protect against nutrient overload, filter out pollutants such as heavy metals, and serve as a nursery ground for fish and shellfish. Despite their vital role to the protection of the planet, the world is currently losing salt marshes at an alarming rate as a result of nutrient runoff and industrial and residential development. Today, roughly half of the world’s salt marshes are at risk. As biologists work to restore these salt marshes, an understanding of their genetic makeup is essential. Genetic makeup ultimately determines their ability to sequester carbon, filter out pollutants, or protect against nutrient overload. Genetic variability in salt marshes is key. As Wimp notes, “The more genetic diversity you have [in an ecosystem], the more tools you have in your toolbox” to adapt against sea-level rise, protect against erosion, filter toxic pollutants, etc. Therefore, a measurement of salt marsh genetic diversity proves key to understanding their role in ecosystems. Over the past five years, Dr. Hamilton has laid a groundwork for a methodology to explore genetic variability in salt marsh ecosystems. To do so, he’s developed two key tools. First, he has designed genetic markers for salt marsh grasses and several insect species that live within the ecosystem. Genetic markers are labels that distinguish genetically distinct individuals. These genetic markers allow him to measure patterns of genetic variation—that is, how salt marsh DNA difference amongst individuals. Second, Professor Hamilton has developed a novel computational approach to estimate the rate of clonal reproduction
in marsh grasses. His model is based on information of how genetic makeup and difference varies across space in an ecosystem. With this tool, they can answer determine how, for example, genetic variation of salt marsh organisms differs from the outer edge of the ecosystem versus its interior. Such genetic markers and computational approaches are used to understand how genetic variation amongst plants explains how they respond to their environment—including human-induced changes such as nitrogen pollution. Their research has also focused on eco-evolutionary dynamics within salt marshes. Eco-evolutionary dynamics refer to the study of how genetic processes interact with and influence ecological variation. In particular, Dr. Hamilton and Dr. Wimp have studied how insect populations affect salt math populations. Using genetic markers, they can test if and to what extent genetic variation in salt marshes influences insect populations. They can also test how changing ecological conditions— including predator density, nutrient availability, and human-influence factors—impact insect and plant populations. An understanding of salt eco-evolutionary dynamics within salt marshes is important in the restoration of these habitats. The researchers’ work has important implications for conservation efforts in a changing environment. Too often, habitat restoration takes the form of uniformly planting genetically identical plants. Genetic uniformity limits organisms’ ability to play diverse roles in their respective ecosystem—including their ability to adapt to changing environments. Unsurprisingly, such genetic variability is essential in a rapidly changing environment. Dr. Wimp and Dr. Hamilton’s work is critical in two of the 21st century’s greatest challenges: the preservation of biodiversity and the mitigation of climate change. Interested in learning more about Dr. Wimp and Dr. Hamilton’s research? Further reading: • Wimp GM, Tomasula J, and Hamilton, MB. 2019. Putting the genes into community genetics. Molecular Ecology 28(19):4351-4353. doi.org/10.1111/mec.15209 • Gina Wimp’s Lab Website • Matthew Hamilton’s Lab Website
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COP26
A fragile win, but who will pay the cost? By Madeline Babin, Research Associate, Climate Change Policy, David Rockefeller Studies Program, Council on Foreign Relations As delegates from 197 nations prepared to convene in Glasgow, Scotland, for the 2021 UN Climate Change Conference (COP26), the stakes were high. Before the summit, scientists projected the planet would warm 2.7°C by the end of the century, soaring far beyond the 1.5°C threshold experts agree the world must keep warming below to avoid the most catastrophic impacts of climate change. World leaders described the COP26 summit as the “last best chance” to keep alive the 1.5°C target set by the Paris Agreement. Many hoped COP26 would mark a pivotal moment in which developed countries, which bear greatest responsibility for human-caused climate change, at last addressed the needs 8
of developing nations, which endure the most severe climate impacts though they contributed the least to the global crisis. In many areas, COP26 generated significant advancements. Countries agreed to adopt the Glasgow Climate Pact, which includes a historic provision that explicitly mentions fossil fuels and urges a phasedown of coal power. Delegates also resolved measures in the Paris Rulebook that will facilitate full implementation of the Paris Agreement with enhanced transparency. This will promote accountability: a core challenge that has impeded global climate action since nations first gathered for COP1 in 1995.
The failure to meet the initial goal has set a damaging precedent and undermined trust from the developing world. Moreover, this $100 billion goal is intended to be “a floor and not a ceiling,” which means richer nations will be expected to establish more ambitious aid targets in the near future. A majority of developing countries, including China and India, have urged richer countries to collectively deliver $1.3 trillion in finance annually beginning in 2030.
Artwork by Justine Bowe
Beyond the pact, nations made commitments to reduce methane emissions, end deforestation, cease finance of international fossil fuel projects, and hasten the phase out of coal power. By the end of COP26, the countries that contribute over 70 percent of global emissions had set net-zero carbon emissions goals. Still, the collective progress did not yield sufficient momentum to limit warming to 1.5°C. Based on countries’ most recent promises, the world remains on course to reach 2.4°C warming by 2100. While this keeps the 1.5°C target alive by narrowing the gap between countries’ commitments and the Paris goal, many pledges remain contingent upon developing nations receiving adequate climate finance. In 2009, developed countries promised to mobilize $100 billion in climate finance by 2020 for developing nations to mitigate and adapt to a warming planet. However, when developed countries failed to meet this deadline, they extended the target to 2023 and left poorer countries to confront ever-worsening extremes without sufficient resources. The looming crisis poses an existential threat to developing and small island nations such as Tuvalu, where rising seas threaten to erode coastal lands and submerge entire islands by the end of the century.
Another setback occurred in the final hours of the negotiations when India, the world’s third largest emitter, piloted a change in the Glasgow Climate Pact’s language from a “phase-out of unabated coal power” to a “phasedown.” This one-word modification could give coal-intensive nations license to continue use indefinitely and further jeopardize the survival of the most vulnerable countries. Beyond climate finance, developing nations have advocated for compensation from developed countries for “loss and damage:” the irreversible destruction inflicted by climate-fueled extremes. Poorer nations had signaled their intent to establish a loss and damage facility to deliver this funding through COP26. Developed countries resisted the call to create a funding facility and agreed only to establish a “dialogue” starting in 2022 to discuss the possibility of future financial aid for climate losses. In many ways COP26 was, as UK COP26 President Alok Sharma described, “a fragile win,” one that will rely on governmental follow-through to mobilize funding and marshal increasingly ambitious global action that emphasizes the needs of the most vulnerable. Recognizing the shortcomings, COP26 concluded with a call for nations to return in 2022 with strengthened emissions reduction goals for 2030. The next twelve months will provide a preview of countries’ capacity to fulfill the promises made in Glasgow. However, with the dearth of current policies in place to align actions with pledges, world leaders need to do much more to meet the Paris target and confront the greatest existential threat facing humanity. 9
One of thousands of ditches carrying water through Phoenix from the Colorado river. © Tim Romano 10
Fallowed Ground
The treaty governing the Colorado River turns 100 years old—and faces a fraught future
by Kyle Paoletta, Common Home Correspondent
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Landing in Phoenix. None of the pooling water or green fields of agriculture would be possible without the Colorado river. © Tim Romano 12
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hen viewed from above, California’s Imperial Valley appears as a brown and green checkerboard, stretching north from the Mexican border for a half million acres. The juxtaposition is no less jarring on the ground, where every road features a split vantage: on one side, luscious fields of spinach, cabbage, or melon, while across the street, bare dirt bakes under the brilliant sun. Though the Sonoran Desert’s warm winters make its climate ideal for many crops, agriculture is only possible in the Imperial Valley because of the network of canals that ferry water there from the Colorado River, 50 miles to the east. And the Imperial Valley is far from the only portion of America’s most arid corner that relies on the Colorado. From its headwaters in the Rocky Mountains to the Gulf of California, the river runs for 1,450 miles through seven states, the homelands of 29 tribes, and across one national border. Over the past century, the United States has spent billions of dollars to transform the once mercurial river into a reliable plumbing system providing water for 40 million people and five million acres of agricultural land. After two decades of unrelenting drought, that system is faltering. On January 1st of this year, the first ever mandatory limits to the use of Colorado River water went into effect in response to the massive reservoirs of Lake Mead and Lake Powell falling to below a third of their capacity. John Fleck, the director of the Water Resources Program at the University of New Mexico, says that, while many assume that the explosive population growth of the Southwest is draining its reservoirs, “water use in the Colorado River Basin has been declining for a long time. It peaked in 2002. It just hasn’t been going down fast enough.” Indeed, the climate crisis has prolonged and exacerbating the current drought to the point that some scientists are now labeling the situation with a term that carries a connotation of permanence: aridification. In a strange accident of history, this moment of acute crisis just so happens to coincide with the centenary of the signing of the 1922 Colorado River Compact, the document that formally governs the allocation of the river’s water. While the compact was initially supposed to last only until this year, in 2007 the signatories agreed to interim guidelines that detailed the schedule of mandatory cuts that were activated in January, as well as to a delay of the compact’s expiration until 2026. That extension has given the region time to hash out how to adjust their claims to the Colorado, a fraught task given that researchers like the University of Colorado’s Brad Udall now predict the river’s flow will shrink by 20 percent over the next three decades. Nobody knows quite how the negotiations will shake out. “From an engineer’s or economist’s point of view, the Colorado Basin would probably be seen as a mess and a disaster because 13
you can’t optimize anything,” says Mark Giordano, a Professor of Geography at Georgetown. Still, he notes that the compact has “been functioning for 100 years. What else has functioned for 100 years?” That track record is enough to give a lot of observers cause for hope, both in and outside the region. After all, the Southwest’s attempts to hammer out new revisions to the compact over the next few years will be the first concrete test of America’s ability to adapt to the climate crisis. ------So far, the clearest fault line that has emerged in the negotiations is between the Colorado’s urban and agricultural users. Allocations of the river’s water are tracked in acre-feet: the volume of water necessary to flood an acre of land to a depth of one foot. While one acre-foot is enough to sustain three households in a city like Phoenix for a year, growing a single acre of alfalfa, which is cultivated throughout the region, can require more than four feet of water. Cotton is a similarly thirsty plant and is the second-largest crop in Arizona. In 2015, an analysis from ProPublica found that if the state’s cotton farmers switched their fields entirely over to wheat, they would save almost double the amount of water used by the entire Tucson metropolitan area. All told, as much as 80 percent of the Colorado River is estimated to be devoted to agricultural use. “A few thousand homes are really a small amount of additional water demand compared with a new pecan farm,” says Sarah Porter, the Director of the Kyl Institute for Water Policy at Arizona State University. “If it came down to cities versus agriculture, it’s hard to imagine agriculture winning.”
Phoenix and Tucson, typically receive 25,000 acre-feet from the Colorado River every year, but in 2022 they’ll only get 8,700. Next year, they probably won’t receive anything from the Colorado at all, making them entirely reliant on the county’s overtaxed reserves of groundwater. “It’s going to be a struggle,” one farmer told the Arizona Republic. “The only chance we have is it needs to rain or snow.” To prevent these sorts of steep, localized cuts becoming commonplace, Arizona, California, and Nevada announced in December that they’d attempt to stabilize Lake Mead by voluntarily reducing the amount of water they draw from the reservoir this year by 500,000 acre-feet. “If we have the same water year as we had in 2021 than this plan isn’t going to work,” says Andrea Gerlak, a geography professor at the University of Arizona. “If we get lucky, if we get a good couple of water years, then this plan will keep things at bay for a little bit and help push us forward.” One of the main constituents of the so-called 500-plus imitative is subsidized fallowing, the practice of urban utilities paying irrigation districts to not cultivate some portion of their land — indeed, many of the barren fields of the Imperial Valley have been left that way on purpose, to free up water for urban users elsewhere in California. Through 500-plus, the agency that supplies water to both Los Angeles and San Diego will
To her point, the overall decline in the Colorado Basin’s water use is mostly attributable to the astounding efficiency of urban utilities. Between 2007 and 2020, San Diego’s water use declined by almost a third, even as the city added tens of thousands of new residents. Metropolitan Las Vegas, which added more than 300,000 people over the last decade, now recycles 99 percent of the water used indoors. While cities can treat and recycle wastewater, agriculture faces far greater challenges when it comes to conservation. Josué Medellín-Azura, who leads the Water Systems Management Lab at the University of California, Merced, explains that around 70 percent of the water used on farms is lost to evaporation from soil and transpiration from plants. Even when growers invest in “more efficient, lower volume irrigation infrastructure,” Medellín-Azura says, they’ll often use whatever water they saved to plant more acreage, leading to “an expansion in consumptive use.” All of this helps to explain why the water cuts that went into effect in January are almost exclusively affecting agriculture. Farmers in Arizona’s Pinal County, which lies between 14
Cleaning the boat ramp with water at Lake Pleasant, north of Phoenix. © Tim Romano
pay farmers from the Quechan Tribe of the Fort Yuma Indian Reservation in Arizona to fallow their land through 2023, and in December, Arizona Senator Mark Kelly introduced legislation that would allow the Colorado River Indian Tribes, a confederation of Mohave, Chemehuevi, Navajo, and Hopi, to forge similar agreements. Sarah Porter describes fallowing deals as a “win-win, because there’s a reliable revenue stream for the farmer and a reliable water supply for the utility.” Juggling these competing interests—cities, farms, tribal nations—is no small task. “We didn’t build institutions focused on scarcity,” says Mark Giordano, “we built institutions focused on how you get more water.” To his point, Gary Wockner, the leader of the environmental advocacy group Save the Colorado, is concerned that amid all the wheeling and dealing, the health of the river itself is being overlooked. The Colorado River Delta, which once formed a two-million-acre network of wetlands that was home to hundreds of species, has shrunk to a tenth of its original size. So much water is diverted from the river that, in many years, nothing makes it to the Gulf of California at all. When I asked him about the current negotiations, Wockner observed, “They’re trying to continue their ability to one-hundred-percent drain the river dry, every year.” Instead, he’d like to see 10 percent of the river’s annual flow be set aside to replenish the Delta.
While the 500-plus plan proves the Southwest has some appetite for the slow consensus building that will be necessary to adapt to aridification, it’s difficult to imagine the basin’s leaders stomaching even more drastic cuts being made in the name of conserving the Colorado. Some researchers are likewise concerned that the current agreement is so reliant on fallowing, which Mark Giordano calls “a second or third best solution to the problem.” While fallowing may be a good way “to start moving the process forward,” Giordano wonders, “Are we incentivizing people to do the wrong thing through our own policies? We could change some incentive structures without making farmers worse off that would help them switch to crops that are more sustainable.” How much flexibility water managers in the Southwest actually end up having remains an open question. As John Fleck points out, the 500-plus plan is based on cutbacks, and “cutbacks that you make to deal with a temporary problem in the midst of climate change have the potential to become repeatable. If Lake Mead keeps dropping, they’ll have to keep finding ways to use less water.” Looking at the current state of the negotiations over the Colorado, Andrea Gerlak can’t help but ask, “Have things really changed? Or is it like water’s leaking out of a hose and you’re trying to patch it with a piece of tape? I don’t think we know yet.”
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The Future for a Healthier Planet Begins with Us The promise —and need—for youth leading the way
Daniela Fernandez, Founder and CEO of Sustainable Ocean Alliance; COL ’17
Our generation has inherited a planet facing the largest crisis in human history: climate change. The 2020s mark a critical tipping point and it is now crucial that we tip the scales back in our favor. Now more than ever, young people must commit to re-imagining how to solve our most critical climate challenges. Between our collective consciousness, global networking capabilities, and modern technological advancements, this generation— our generation—has the opportunity not only to reverse the damage done but to create a new era: one in which the bottom line of every business includes the protection of our planet. 16
When I attended Georgetown University as an undergraduate in 2014, I realized how few opportunities my generation had to participate in conversations about climate change. When it came to shifting the paradigm and status quo, we had even less power. If climate change will affect the youngest generations most severely, then why were we so far removed from the issue? Why weren’t we actively advocating for the development of better, more modern solutions? Growing up in Ecuador, I directly saw the impacts of climate change. Since then, I’ve become determined to make the fight against climate change my life’s mission. Along with that mission, I have been committed to helping younger and
and inclusive community. I’ve seen these values firsthand at the Sustainable Ocean Alliance—across the board. Because youth recognize that this human-made climate change affects every living thing on this earth, inclusivity and diversity are essential tools. We embrace the power in our diversity—it offers us wisdom from places we could not find from insular perspectives of the past. When tackling a crisis with a global impact, it will be absolutely necessary to include solutions and perspectives from across the world. The youth also value and prioritize transparency and the hard facts that come with it. In the past, generations have chosen to shirk environmental issues, ignoring both the facts and circumstances. However, we’ve shown as a generation that we value science, information, and transparency—even when we’d rather not face those issues at all.
Daniela Fernandez working to reach broad audiences on the importance of ocean conservation.
similarly passionate voices get involved as well. With hopes to fill the vacuum for youth-driven solutions and platforms, I started the Sustainable Ocean Alliance as a freshman at Georgetown in 2014. The United Nations defines the youngest generation, or “youth” demographic, as the 1.2 billion individuals between the age of 15-24. This generation makes up approximately 15.5% of the world’s population. Already, the youth are the most engaged in the climate cause with the strongest push behind climate action. To effectively meet the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and the Paris Agreement, the voices and support of the youth will be essential. Youth’s participation is so pivotal, in fact, that it is even mentioned in the Paris Agreement’s preamble. The agreement also states that intergenerational equity must be a guiding principle shaping climate action. In a recent UN survey regarding climate change, 73% of surveyed youth say they currently experience its effects, 84% of young people agreed that they needed more information to prevent it, and 89% agreed that young people have the chance to make an impactful difference. For me, however, the reports’ most startling metric was that a mere 9% of youth felt “very confident” that the world will act quickly enough to address climate change. Despite this lack of optimism, youth leaders bring a unique set of values that may very well hold the keys to effective action. Young people are known for fostering a global, collaborative,
Perhaps the most significant factor that sets the younger generation apart is that we are willing to redefine the zeitgeist and steer society towards prioritizing the health of our planet. Older generations have consistently dismissed the necessary steps towards fighting climate change out of inconvenience and a lack of economic incentive. Simply put, fighting climate change often works against the status quo of capitalistic gains. However, younger generations express a deep willingness to prioritize the well-being of our planet and its inhabitants over short-term materialistic gains. To me, this is what truly sets us apart and makes us the necessary leaders in the fight against climate change. We are solutions-driven. We value transparency, inclusivity, and sustainability above profit, competition, and secrecy. Agreeing that talk is not enough, we now strive for actionable change. To any Georgetown students looking to engage in this pursuit, in whatever form that might be, I offer you this advice: be decisive and act promptly. Don’t hesitate to seize the opportunities around you, and make sure to use your networks and resources to the fullest. At times, the tumultuous state of modern times and the fight against climate change can seem overwhelming. It can seem like such an enormous feat that our small individual efforts are futile in the grander scheme of things. However, since founding SOA, I’ve learned that this assumption could not be more incorrect. Our capabilities and combined efforts can truly make a difference. I want to remind you that it is truly up to us. There is so much strength and power in our combined effort: our ability to evolve, adapt, connect, and unify. Together, we are abundantly resilient and resourceful. The betterment of our planet and ocean can only begin when we, as individuals, decide to commit to the change that’s needed right here, right now. The future for a better and healthier planet starts now, and I invite you all to join me in it. 17
How Campus Works: Water and Power How does Georgetown keep its lights on and taps flowing? By Mark Agard, SFS ’23 & Common Home Editor Students and faculty rarely worry about where their water and power comes from, but ensuring constant electricity and water access to thousands of people on campus is not a simple task. Let’s take a closer look at how Georgetown keeps the lights and water on for everyone. Tap Water at Georgetown University How often do you use tap water in a day? Between showering, drinking, cooking, and everything else, the average American uses more than 80 gallons of water a day. 18
The Georgetown Office of Strategic Communications noted that Georgetown University uses a staggering 200 million gallons per year. Managing such volume requires a labyrinthian system of pipes, heaters, and pumps for every single drop. The process starts with the water intakes at Great and Little Falls in Maryland. There, water from the Potomac River feeds into the Washington aqueduct, which carries it into the city. The aqueduct is run by the US Army Corps of Engineers, who provide water to institutions like the DC Water and Sewage Authority (DC WASA). DC WASA then delivers and sells the water to customers like Georgetown University.
directly from local systems and only through the cooperation of federal, municipal, and private organizations. Though we have the privilege of treating tap water as routine, we should still appreciate it and be mindful of our usage. Where does Georgetown University get its electricity? The university has an extensive history of policies and projects that aspire to reduce the campus’ energy footprint. Students can observe some of the university’s prior efforts to around sustainable energy, such as solar panels on the campus Intercultural Center. However, many smaller projects, like the solar panels, have been shut-down in favor of more comprehensive, less piecemeal approaches. Recently, the university moved to source all electricity for its Main and Medical campuses sustainably, rather than source its energy from separate and of smaller renewable energy projects that only supplement traditional power generation.
Artwork by Justine Bowe
The water Georgetown buys from DC WASA arrives from five different pipes on the edge of campus. From these five feeds, the university distributes the water to campus buildings via several loops of piping. There are multiple feeds and loops to ensure that there is always reliable water access, and water can be rerouted if something goes wrong with a particular set of pipes or a water feed. So, what happens if something goes wrong? The first step of any water problem is to identify its location. Ideally, workers schedule a planned repair, so they don’t have to turn off water. However, some issues are too urgent to wait, and workers must start immediately. These are called unplanned repairs. Next, flow is shut off to the problem area. The repair itself can be as simple as fixing a leaky valve. However, the specifics of the problem and its location can make things a lot more complicated. Sometimes, the university must even hire outside contractors who can handle tricky underground issues. Even something as seemingly-routine as reliable water access takes an immense amount of effort to maintain, on-campus or off. It’s important to acknowledge that our tap water comes
An example of one of these larger projects was a proposed solar plant in Southeastern Maryland. The plant, MD Solar 1, was set to generate 32.5 MW of electricity—enough to meet half of campus consumption. However, the permit for the plant was rejected by the Maryland Department of Environment, partly out of concern for the ecological effects of the plant’s construction. Among the more severe of those ecological concerns was that the proposed plant would have required clearing a valuable woodland ecosystem. The university found an alternative way to power the campus sustainably. In October 2020, Georgetown signed a 15-year agreement to purchase two-thirds of its electricity from 11 existing solar power plants between D.C and New Jersey. The remaining third of electricity is still green: Georgetown requires Renewable Energy Certificates for all electricity purchases to power the Main and Medical campuses. Energy certificates like these are commonly used to ensure that buildings have a minimized energy footprint. In other words, all energy used to power the Main and Medical campuses is green, whether directly through the 11 plants, or indirectly through the purchase of green energy. Sustainably powering the campus has taken decades of iterative progress, at-times ineffective projects, and now relies on power plants more than a hundred miles away from D.C. Even still, it can and has been done. The amenities we’ve come to expect without a second thought are worth a closer look: they show us that most every feature of modern life requires an interconnectedness far more complex than meets the eye. We shouldn’t take any part of our relationship with each other or nature for granted, because even seemingly mundane systems can have a world of impact. 19
Pens and Voices Gathered Round At Georgetown’s “Voices for the Environment” events by Maya Snyder, SFS ’24 & Common Home Editor The arts and humanities play a critical, though often overlooked, role in environmental advocacy. To showcase these vital efforts, the Georgetown Environmental Initiative, the Georgetown Humanities Initiative, and the Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics hosted the first annual “Voices on the Environment.” The digital four-event series featured journalists, writers, and filmmakers as guest speakers. “Truth, Lies, and Trust: Environmental Science Journalism in a Misinformation Era” Journalists Kendra Pierre-Louis, Jeffrey Burnside, and Christina Larson discussed the impact of misinformation on scientific journalism, with host David Malakoff. 20
The rise in misinformation struck all journalists as worrisome. One consequence is that readers have become especially wary of certain forms of scientific journalism. As a result, Christina Larson argued, explaining science’s constantly-developing nature to some readers is a new responsibility for some journalists. As an example, Christina Larson noted the CDC’s changing mask guidelines early in the pandemic. “There’s rarely a final answer in science. It’s a process of gathering information and testing hypotheses. There’s always new research coming in. Answers build upon each other. If the first answer you have is not the same as the last one, it does not mean that something is
Ashanee Kottage, who is researching the implications of colonialism on the environment, addressed the intersectionality of environmental activism. “Where I’m from, people just don’t take public transport or walk or (do) the more sustainable option because of sexual harassment and rape culture,” Ashanee Kottage said. In the future, Kottage hopes that climate advocates recognize the importance of intersectional issues. “A Literacy of the Land: A Conversation” Literature has also proven to be a powerful method of environmental advocacy. English professor Nathan Hensley hosted a discussion with award-winning author Robert Macfarlane about how language and imagination should play a crucial role in environmental advocacy by showcasing the beauty of nature on a larger scale. “English...is heavily invested in a grammar of objectification that is dedicated to naming the world beyond a certain kind of white, technologically empowered being into subjugation and resource,” Macfarlane stated. At the same time, literature can also combat the misinformed narrative of nature as solely a resource. For example, Marfarlane noted that language can also be constructed to recognize a reciprocity between humanity and nature in Robin Wall Kimmerer’s Gathering Moss. Artwork by Susha Roy
wrong. But I feel that is something we have to explain to the public,” Larson asserted. How might journalists rebuild this trust? By holding themselves to even higher standards, argued Kendra Pierre-Louis. “The biggest thing that headline writers could do is read the headlines as though you have bad intent.” By submitting their work to higher levels of scrutiny, journalists could correct any inaccuracies or misleading writing before it causes damage. “We Hear You: Earth Day Roundtable Discussion” How might environmental advocacy movements inspire more action and interconnectedness? Caitlin Nasema Cassidy moderated a discussion between youth artists and activists Ashanee Kottage, Eliza Palter, Pauline Owiti, Beatrice Ann Dolores, and Myiah Smith. Communication is critical, emphasized Myiah Smith, an ESL educator at Baltimore City Public Schools who promotes environmental stewardship to her students and the local community. “People think solving these huge problems takes huge solutions, and sometimes it’s as simple as having a conversation. When you’re coming to enact change... first spend a lot of time letting the community tell you what is needed.”
“Writing Climate Change: A Roundtable” Literary and cultural critics Sukanya Banerjee, Ursula Heise, and Min Hyoung Song discussed the significance of writing in combating climate change. Nicoletta Peireddu and Israel Hernandez Luna moderated. When producing productive, impactful literature in the field of environmental advocacy, Heise emphasized that choice of genre is especially important. “I’ve been a little bit downcast by the overwhelming majority of the dystopian post-apocalyptic scenarios in science fiction that deal with climate change. That genre used to have a certain power that I believe it has lost. I don’t think it really incites most people to action.” Instead, she looks forward to genres which successfully inspire hope of an alternative future. Min Hyoung Song argued that science fiction remains a useful genre in the fight against climate change. “It really does act now as a kind of realism at the present. It’s hard to contemplate the kind of enormous changes to the planet that climate change is creating without feeling… that you have entered into a bad science fiction novel. I think reading science fiction really helps to grapple with the changes all around us.”
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“Linden in Scottsdale—Tasmania” Biochrome art by Dr. Renata Buziak. 22
The Minds of Plants
Around the world, artists have made plants their muses By Marion Cassidy, COL ‘23 and Sam Cormier, COL ’21, Common Home Editors
It can be easy for people to go about their days without truly taking in the nature around them. Whether the trees on their city block or even their cup of coffee, we rarely question the origins of our natural surroundings and products. Patricia Vieira, professor in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese, and her team of artists and scholars are inviting their audience to consider the plants behind our favorite plants, foods, and landscapes. The Mind of Plants is a collective body of work that unifies artists, researchers, and academics to reflect on how plants affect and interact with humans. Vieira had written books about plants and the relationship between humans and plants before, but her previous works had been academic. With The Mind of Plants, Vieira explained “we wanted to reach a different audience and explore how plants affect the lives of humans and determine the lives of humans, but from a more personal side.” Vieira asked people to write chapters, or in some cases create poems or art, about a plant with which they have a close relationship to show that plants have an active role in peoples’ lives. The chapters are even alphabetized by plant name, as “plants really take center stage in the book and we even credit them as co-authors of each chapter.” The book has a wide range of contributors including herbalists, scientists, anthropologists, and artists that make it truly interdisciplinary. “Some people talked about the way a certain plant had accompanied them from childhood to adult life, others talked about the way a plant influenced their career decisions, and some reflected upon how a plant has influenced their artwork.” The book also has chapters on, “plants that not only have a mind of their own, but that also impact the human mind,” like cannabis and tobacco. But rather than have contributors discuss whether these should be legal or illegal, they talk more about their personal relationship to the plant. There are also many connections to food. Items like beans, olive trees, teas,
and cacao are all naturally found in the environment, have an impact on peoples’ lives, and are featured in the book. “It was one of our goals that the book wouldn’t be boring and that people would just flip through the book and find a story that they can connect to.” Vieira emphasized that it’s important for people to realize the fundamental role that plants play in people’s lives particularly at this moment of mass deforestation when so many of the world’s plants are threatened. She explained The Mind of Plants is meant “to draw people’s attention to their relationship [with plants] that in many cases, people are not even so aware of, but everyone has, and hopefully this book will raise that awareness.” Two contributors to The Mind of Plants shared their artistic meditations on plant life (image left and poem below).
“Ugly Hornwort” By Prudence Gibson Spell 1 For the Hornwort. Coolant of stings and comfort of swelling Green pendant swinging on a string of barbed envy, These pages are too heavy to turn alone. Help me find the spell to return to watery depths Where friendly mosses and liverworts comfort in the change Single celled spores and swimming biflagellate, Plants that moved from sea to shore May return without ressentiment poison Clutching at their roots.
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“Activist Burnout” by Susha Roy 24
BURNED OUT ON A BURNING PLANET Reflections from a disillusioned climate activist By Sadie Morris SFS ’22 & Common Home Editor
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The Phenomenon Of Burnout
Activists are the essential elements of political-social movements. It is the work of activists –over months, years, even decades– that is responsible for the radical transformation of society. Burnout is a threat to the long-term success of movements, in ways less visible, but, at times, even more detrimental than pushback or suppression. When activists burn out, they are no longer doing the work that is pushing society forward. Burnout is the feeling of energy depletion or exhaustion that can lead an activist to stop engaging in activism. Sometimes the cause is working too many hours or taking on too many responsibilities is to blame. When growing sense of disillusionment is to blame, burnout takes a more serious form. Often, a sense of ineffectiveness and lack of accomplishment confront activists. Fueled by the urgency and importance of their cause, activists believe change isn’t happening as quickly or at a large enough scale. Though the phenomenon of burnout is getting more attention these days –especially after the World Health Organization offered an official definition in 2019– it has long been recorded anecdotally among activist circles. I, myself, enter this discussion of disillusionment as a somewhat defunct climate activist. Not only have I felt the conditions of burnout myself, but I have watched peers cycle through the climate circles I have been a part of at rates that are unsustainable as a movement. Friends and acquaintances–many of whom are no longer involved in climate activism–have repeatedly expressed the same feelings of despair, hopelessness, and eventually apathy in the face of the climate crisis.
“Community” by Susha Roy
capitalist system are inherently linked to the cause of the crisis.
While burnout is consistently a problem for many movements, some conditions for burnout are particularly acute for climate action.
“Other movements felt urgency in a different way. Other movements have not challenged the logic of growth,” explained Michael Kazin, a Georgetown University professor who specializes in the history of social movements. Essentially, capitalism is predicated on the idea of positive growth: the goal is for businesses to get bigger and the people wealthier through the continued exploitation of resources and labor. It fails to consider that natural resources are finite or that every product produced has an environmental footprint.
Activists have always confronted deeply entrenched structural problems. But climate activists are confronting a challenge that differs by scale: the assumptions that underpin the globalized
As awareness of this dynamic grows, it is taking a toll on mental health. The term eco-anxiety was even coined to name the “chronic anxiety and stress from feeling a sense of doom
This prompted me to ask: what causes burnout in the climate movement? Is it different from other movements? How have other movements addressed the threat of burnout to their activists?
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and gloom in face of the enormity of these global issues” faced by activists and nonactivists. It can be assumed that activists are particularly attuned to the gap between rhetoric and the radical reframing of the logic of growth that the climate crisis requires. This constant awareness of both the scale of the crisis and the gap in action is a lot to carry, especially as climate change becomes more of a day-to-day experience. A 2018 study from the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication and the George Mason University Center for Climate Change Communication, found that “a majority of Americans are worried about harm from extreme events in their local area including extreme heat (61%), flooding (61%), droughts (58%), and/or water shortages (51%).” Real people and places, even
in the wealthy United States, are feeling the climate crisis at home. These stories can be powerful organizing tools and are often the very motivation activists call on to continue their work; but, they are also heavy. I have often told people about the now-charred moonscapes of my California childhood. I have said I am fighting for the people I love and the places I call home– a phrase penned by the youth-led climate movement, Sunrise. Is it motivating? Yes. Do the months of ash-choked skies and scared calls from friends get to you? They do. It is little wonder that many activists feel a sense of ineffectiveness in the face of the scale and personal nature of climate change.
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Jewish Talmud teaches, “Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world’s grief. You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it.” Echoing these words, Professor Mark Lance laments, “this is a lifetime project, one of the sad things to say is that there will still be injustice in the world when you die.” One truth: climate change is destructive and unstoppable. Ecosystems and species have been lost that are not coming back. Some fallout from warming is unavoidable. People will continue to lose their livelihoods and lives in climate disasters. A second truth: there is still a lot to save. The worst possible outcome is not fated. Organized people and social movements make a real difference. How can we hold these two truths? “Every 10th of a degree [of warming] impacts people on such a grand scale,” shared Liskar, the activist. He grounds himself in the miracle of life and beauty of human experiences–in doing whatever he can to preserve that for others even in our changing world. It’s urgency on the one hand and patience on the other. “I think as urgent as it is, it’s just a fact,” says Professor Lance, “that unless a very large number of people work for quite a few years, you’re not going to make fundamental change.”
Avoiding Burnout The climate movement is not the first to struggle in supporting activists, which is lucky in the sense that climate activists can learn from the activists who came before them. From my conversations with activists, former and current, I offer two principles as a guide for preventing burnout: 1) cultivate the mindset of a Lifer; 2) find community. The mindset of a Lifer Jeremy Liskar (age 22) is a self-proclaimed Lifer. That’s someone—in his own words—who is dedicated to working on climate justice the rest of their life. Liskar recognizes that “it is impossible to do this work without going through serious sh*t” but what is fundamental to his ability to hold all of the understanding that can lead to disillusionment and still keep working, is the capacity to hold two truths at once.” Holding two truths at once means to accept both one’s ability to affect change and one’s limitation. Put another way, the 28
Annie Sanders, director of GreenCorps, a field school for environmental organizers, calls this playing the long game. Integral to playing the long game is storytelling. The stories of the people we love and the places we call home are powerful so it matters what stories activists tell. It’s not only about sharing the dread that motivates activists –the reasons they are fighting– “It’s about sharing the victories too. It’s about helping people understand how this work can be effective and is effective if you stick with it,” Sanders explains. The climate movement has come a long way over the decades and especially in the last several years. It can be easy to forget the positive results amidst all the tragedy. There is power in recognizing what good has been done. Professor Kazin reminds us that likely all structural change felt impossible until it happened; but, more importantly “small victories do matter: if you think it’s all or nothing, you get nothing.” Finding community Of course, activists as individuals do not make change; activism is inherently collective work. Social movements at their best are a community for activists: a place for holding the weight of the two truths communally, a place where joy and grief intermix as an anecdote for disillusionment.
When activists are grappling with the stakes and pressures of activism, there needs to be space within the movement community to identify these sources of stress, hold them, and reground activists in their belief for change. Liskar uses the term collective processing. It requires “deep vulnerable solidarity together” (in Liskar’s words)—for activists to bring their stories to the table, collectively acknowledge the grief of what has been lost and what will be lost, and to move forward together, with the knowledge they are not in this alone. Processing grief is only half the battle. Activists–and their organizations–must also take action. Community provides the opportunity for joy and fulfillment in the process of doing the work itself. Sanders from GreenCorps finds that “people who tend to not feel disillusioned as much are the people who have found a good role for them, a way of making an impact that plays to their strengths, and, frankly, stuff that they enjoy.” Historical and current movements have shown that there is room for any talent, be it art, music, creativity, that activists bring to the table. Being able to grieve together goes hand-in-hand with being able to laugh together. People who do not feel supported by their community–to play a role that fits them well, to take a break when needed, to celebrate together–cannot enter the space of vulnerable solidarity needed to go through the hard stuff together too. Communities that can find joy together stave off the disillusionment which comes with the gravity of their work.
The Lifer Within Their Community The worst possible outcome for a movement is for it to lose an activist. Activists are the building blocks of change, the source of continuity amidst political cycles, and the reason other activists in their community keep going. Ideally, every activist is a Lifer. The activist’s work is to cultivate the mindset of a Lifer–to balance the weight of the two truths, to recognize that the work will never be done but that they are not allowed to sit it out. The work of the activist community is to support the activist through the process and through the inevitable ebbs and flows of human life; to be a place of support, connection, rest and joy for the movement.
Notice that neither of these principles contains the word hope. Activists are often told to be “hopeful,” to be patient because change does not happen overnight. Jasmine Ashby, a Graduate Justice Intern at the Georgetown Center for Social Justice, asks, “How do you continually ask someone to be patient while harm is still being done? It is exhausting to live in hope and not see it being realized.” Instead of hope, the two truths of the Lifer and the support of the community can foster “Active Hope.” Active Hope is an idea developed by Johanna Macy, an anti-nuclear and ecological, Buddhist activist. In her words, “Active Hope is a practice. Like tai chi or gardening, it is something we do rather than have. It is a process we can apply to any situation, and it involves three key steps. First, we take a clear view of reality; second, we identify what we hope for in terms of the direction we’d like things to move in or the values we’d like to see expressed; and third, we take steps to move ourselves or our situation in that direction.” In a supportive community, activists can practice Active Hope when they see the two truths of their situation and still organize for the outcome they want to be realized.
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Growing into Leadership
A recent graduate reflects on her unexpected lesson By Piper Conway, COL ’21 & Common Home Editor I never thought a nonexistent program at Georgetown would teach me my most important lesson in college. In the Fall of 2021, the Sustainable Business Fellows Program launched at the McDonough School of Business, a year after fellow students and I created the vision behind it. It will impart future business leaders with the knowledge and practical skills of how to navigate environmental challenges with complex social and economic dynamics. Even prior to its launch, the program taught me how to turn a problem into an idea and then into tangible change. 71% of global emissions originate from just 100 companies. Business schools across the country should seize the challenge and opportunity ahead and support their students in pursuing these topics. Georgetown is no exception, and this program is a major step in the right direction. The seed for the Sustainable Business Fellows was first planted when a member of the GUSA Sustainability Policy Team, Scott Kase (MSB ‘23), pitched a project to me that aimed to increase undergraduate engagement in the intersection of sustainability and business. We pictured a future where Georgetown students could dive deeper into this critical area and acquire the tools to make meaningful change. Together, we had a goal in mind but no idea on how to achieve it. We gathered a team of students through GUSA who shared this passion. Several brainstorming sessions later, we set up meetings with professors within the MSB, members from the Dean’s office, the directors of Business for Impact, and the Office of Sustainability. Through their feedback, we strengthened our proposed program. 30
Our idea was beginning to take shape, but it wasn’t yet sufficient. While our meetings delivered small pieces of advice, we had no concrete action or next steps. Should we push for Georgetown approval to make the Sustainable Business Fellows Program a reality? Should we secure commitment from faculty who would help run the program? Or should we just hope the university would pursue it on their own? We realized it was up to us to be advocates for change. Confident in our vision, we adopted a bolder tone and crafted a well-defended plan—not just an idea. We created a presentation on the proposed curriculum, analyzed precedents within Georgetown, researched similar programs at peer institutions, conducted a survey to gather data on student interest, and provided a 5 year plan. We now had a road map and a clear student will. Gaining faculty support was a critical milestone. Vishal Agrawal, professor of the Fellows Program’s core course: Environmental Sustainable Operations & Business Models (OPIM 271), committed to serving as the academic director. On the extracurricular side, we also gained support from the directors of Business for Impact, who will help connect fellows to important opportunities beyond the classroom. Presenting to the MSB Executive Council was the makeor-break next step. If they did not support our initiative, we
Nathan Dumlao
would have almost no way of getting it off the ground. Scott Kase, Katie Fouss (MSB ‘23), and I had been preparing for months and were confident the case was compelling; but would others agree? When our presentation ended, we were thrilled to hear the resounding support from faculty members and administrators. In hearing their applause we knew all of our hard work had been worth it. Only a few short months after I would graduate, our program would become real. In a community like Georgetown, with so many driven students, we truly do have the power to create change. Working on the development of the Sustainable Business Fellows Program has truly been one of the most rewarding experiences of my time at Georgetown. It empowered me to advocate for changes that I believed in, that I knew were attainable within the Georgetown community. But it taught me more than student activism. It taught me how to create change, more broadly — that I need diligence, perseverance, and collaboration. It helped me find my purpose in the passion that I have always had for sustainability. As a now-graduated senior, I feel lucky to have helped build something that will outlive my own time on the hilltop, and more importantly, will shape even more students into sustainability change-makers.
Piper Conway (COL ’21) is a founding editor of Common Home and the Executive Chair of Sustainability at the Georgetown University Student Association (GUSA). She now lives in New York and works as an Associate at AlphaSights, a business and investment information services firm. ------In October 2021, the first cohort of forty-three students were admitted to the Sustainable Business Fellows program. In addition to the core Environmentally Sustainable Operations and Business Models course, the program currently offers six electives of which students must complete a total of 6 credits. Current electives include Global Supply Chain Management (OPIM 262), Moral Foundations of a Market Society (STRT 255), ESG Investment (GBUS 444), Energy Finance, Policy and Markets (STIA 382), Environmental Economics (ECON 275 or 475), and Climate Science and Policy (STIA 412). In addition to the 9-credit course requirement, fellows are required to complete a capstone project of either independent research, a tutorial with a faculty member, or a senior thesis. Sustainable Business fellows and faculty are eager to begin the program’s first semester this spring. Afterward by Alannah Nathan, SFS ’24 31
Artwork by Katryn & Justine Bowe 32
The Breakdown: Environmental, Social, and Governance By Jillian Dyszynski, Director of Market Development at American Forest Foundation; COL ’06 What is “climate finance”? ‘Climate finance’ is a catch-all term that in its broadest sense constitutes public and private investment intended to mitigate and adapt to climate change. Under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), developed, high-income countries responsible for most historical greenhouse gas emissions, committed to mobilize climate finance to address the needs of developing countries. Together, they pledged to invest approximately USD 100 billion by 2025 (after the first 2020 deadline for the goal was missed). Why is it so essential for achieving long-term sustainability goals? Humanity is currently in unprecedented territory. Atmospheric CO2 concentrations are higher than at any time in at least 2 million years. Finance is imperative to safeguard global food systems and precipitation patterns, stabilize ice sheets and glaciers which maintain current sea levels and provide drinking water for millions, and avoid catastrophic levels of climate refugees and forced migration. Climate stability remains the cornerstone of achieving long-term sustainability. How has climate finance been used in an innovative, powerful way? The scale of the climate challenge has led to creative and impactful financing solutions at local, national, regional, and global levels. California has played a leading role locally through a cap-andtrade program for greenhouse gas emissions, setting a statewide limit on 85% of sources. It sets a clear price signal that ramps up over time as the state reduces annual emission allowances (the cap) at an accelerating pace. At the national level, Rwanda has developed the Green Fund (FONERWA) which has mobilized USD 216 in finance for innovative climate and environment projects. Funded projects support electrifying Rwanda’s fleet of moto taxis, zero-carbon affordable housing, wetland and watershed restoration and agroforestry and mini-hydro power projects among others. And at the global level, 25 countries, including the United States and Canada, recently announced a pledge to stop public
financing of overseas fossil fuel projects by the end of 2022. This critical commitment is a step forward to transitioning global investment away from carbon and towards clean energy. What recent trends have you seen, and how will they shape our future? Tracking the Growth and Flow of Climate Finance Based on the Climate Policy Initiatve’s (CPI) Global Landscape of Climate Finance 2021, tracking, global climate finance flows have grown steadily over the past decade from $364 billion in 2011/12 to $632 billion in 2019/2020, but have started to plateau in recent years, even prior to the impacts of COVID-19. Mitigation investments focused on renewable energy consistently dominate adaptation efforts. In 2019/2020, 90% or $571 billion went towards mitigation and only 7.4% or $46 billion towards adaptation. The 2.5% of remaining funds went to projects with multiple objectives. Three-quarters of tracked climate mitigation and adaptation investments flowed domestically. This highlights the importance of strengthening national policies to encourage domestic investment in risk reduction and low-carbon transition opportunities. Geographically, almost half of global climate finance went to East Asia & Pacific, with 81% concentrated in China due to its significant public spending, and only a quarter to Sub-Saharan Africa and all other regions. A Slow Progress in Renewable Sector Although renewable energy represents approximately 60% of global mitigation financing, renewables investments need to at least triple to keep warming within 1.5 degrees Celsius by mid-century in line with the Paris Agreement. Private sources continue to provide most renewable energy finance. Future Trends Low-carbon transport is the fastest growing sector, driven by battery electric vehicles and chargers, while investments in rail and public transport are lagging. It will be critical to address this latter area as public transport networks are underdeveloped as alternatives to private vehicles and road freight in many countries. 33
Going GREEN at Georgetown
Georgetown Renewable Energy and Environment Network By Sadie Morris, SFS ’22 & Common Home Editor On Tuesday nights a crowd of nearly sixty students convene in one of Georgetown University’s oldest buildings. Buzzing with excitement, the students are there to discuss and organize around far-reaching environmental and sustainability issues. This is the weekly meeting of the Georgetown Renewable Energy and Environment Network, known as GREEN. The meeting starts with ten to fifteen minutes of announcements or presentations from group members. After that, the club breaks off into smaller groups arranged into Education, Gardening, Energy+Water, Environmental Justice, Zero Waste and Beekeeping committees to do more specialized work. The wide-net is intentional, says Anu Lamshal, the current GREEN president: “The large amount of things that we do 34
within GREEN allows us to kind of put our hands into a little bit of everything—both student life and the administration.” GREEN sees itself as a checking mechanism for the university administration, advocating for more sustainability on campus as well as transparency around both current conditions and previous environmental promises. For example, two important initiatives that GREEN is working on are a follow-up to the university’s 2020 commitment to divest from fossil fuels and efforts to reduce the amount of single-use plastics in campus dining options. Though GREEN has a longstanding relationship with campus administration, cooperation can still be strained and frustrating: “It’s often quite hard to actually get a response from the
A campus clothing swap in December hosted by GREEN (Georgetown Renewable Energy and Environmental Network). Photo courtesy of GREEN.
administration. We have to send an email, a follow-up email and other follow up emails. It takes a lot of persistence” Anu explains. It is important to remember, she adds, “We do work with the administration, but we’re advocating for students and not necessarily trying to become a partner with the administration.” On a more structural level, GREEN is working to reckon with the perceived historical whiteness of the environmental movement—on and off campus—by grounding the organization’s work in environmental justice. Three years ago, a new environmental justice committee was formed to discuss and organize around the intersectionality of environmentalism, though GREEN is working to integrate environmental justice principles and practice into all levels of their work. GREEN strives to meet the needs of its members by adapting to reflect the current student body and the environmental movement at large, embracing all of the diversity and complexity in environmental activism. One way GREEN engages with this task is by partnering with other student organizations across campus to create opportunities for students to engage in environmental topics in new ways.
For example, GREEN recently co-hosted a discussion with the Native American Student Congress on Land Back and indigenous environmentalism. Another event focused on the intersection of environmental and disability justice. The series has opened up some important discussions but it can be challenging, Anu says, “to keep people engaged and prevent people from shutting down when they are faced with the harder issues.” As the organization works to break down barriers around entry to the environmental movement, the makeup of GREEN is also beginning to shift. Their board is now majority POC—a visible move towards creating a more inclusive and comfortable space. “I think people should be optimistic,” Anu concludes. “GREEN is becoming a lot more of an accessible space for a lot of different students and it’s fostering community in a way it hasn’t in the past.” Key to this change has been the willingness to explore how environmentalism interacts with other components of our identities and livelihoods. All the while, GREEN has still made progress on more traditional environmental efforts like community gardens, single-use plastics at Leo’s, and more.
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Photo by Michael Krahn 36
The Making of Maladaptation
When projects to reduce the impacts of climate change make things worse by Clara Chiu and Erin LeGoff, both COL ’21
Many projects that seek to adapt to climate change—while well intentioned—are actually making people more vulnerable to its impacts, a phenomenon known as “maladaptation.” Given that people most frequently experience climate change through droughts, floods, hurricanes, etc., the majority of adaptation responses and consequent maladaptive outcomes relate to water. Why do projects that set out to do good unintentionally make matters worse? How can we stop this from occurring? As important as understanding maladaptation is to our ability to combat climate change, there is distinct disagreement on what exactly maladaptation is, how we should conceptualize it, and which metrics should be used to measure it. Finding some sort of consensus is a crucial first step to mitigating it in our response to climate change. Challenges in Conceptualizing Maladaptation Maladaptation is generally defined as interventions that leave people or places in a worse-off position than if no planned adaptation had occurred. The concept slowly gained recognition within environmental circles in the twenty years since it was coined, fueled recently by a groundbreaking article in the journal World Development on how commonly internationally-funded adaptation projects backfire. However, the literature is unclear about how broadly the term should be applied. For example, if a new technology is brought to a community for an adaptation project and works as intended, but the technology required resource exploitation elsewhere, should that project be considered maladaptive? Additionally, since maladaptation exists on a spectrum, there is no clear-cut understanding as to when an adaptation project goes from simply being ineffective (also known as a “benign adaptation”) to actually being maladaptive. There is also no predominant framework to analyze maladaptation, and existing frameworks can be difficult to reconcile. For example, the World Development article categorizes maladaptation based on whether a project reinforces, redistributes, or creates vulnerabilities. But vulnerability itself can
be assessed from different perspectives. Social vulnerability frameworks, for instance, consider impacts in areas such as gender, class, and ethnicity, whereas environmental vulnerability can be assessed by its effects on different environmental sectors, from agriculture, to energy, to sanitation. From an economic perspective, indicators such as income inequality and GDP growth can expose financial vulnerabilities as maladaptive outcomes. Other frameworks focus on the “how,” distinguishing between the active processes through which adaptations can become maladaptive. Mr. David Michel, Senior Researcher at Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, identifies two such phenomena: the rebound effect and the backdraft effect. The rebound effect occurs when gains from the use of more efficient technology are reduced or offset entirely due to behavioral or other responses. For example, a more efficient drip irrigation system may be introduced to farmers with the intention of reducing water use, but this new efficiency may lead the farmer to produce even more crops, putting a further strain on water and land resources. The backdraft effect, in comparison, may negatively impact sectors other than the intended target. For example, green technologies may require scarce materials, or excessive water to extract or refine. To further complicate analysis, maladaptation can be thought of temporally (as in success in the short term but harm over the long term), across different geographies, or include impacts on culture, institutions, among other elements. Practical Challenges in Measuring Maladaptation Measuring and evaluating the success or failure of an adaptation project presents yet another challenge. Each project has a unique goal, cultural context, and timeframe that will determine its own criteria for success. But often maladaptations arise out of the criteria not considered in the project design. A short-term irrigation project, for example, may achieve its desired goal of improving crop yields upon completion but erode the soil over the long term. 37
Since there is no fixed criteria for maladaptation indicators, many agree that evaluation must be recurring and continuous—an adaptive process itself. At the bare minimum, practitioners should “do no harm.” Unfortunately, this can be a misnomer, since a project that has no apparent harmful effects in the present may have the risk of severe harm in the future, arguably a worse maladaptation than an easily identifiable problem. Takeaways for Practitioners Given that these systems are constantly interacting and evolving, so too must the policies meant to address them, a process known as “adaptive policymaking.” The implementation of the policy will give rise to a new situation that will, in turn, require a new policy approach. Mr. Michel explains that, essentially, decision-makers must understand that successful 38
adaptation not as a static endpoint, but rather as an iterative process that incorporates feedback as changes occur. In designing adaptation projects, practitioners must ask themselves who is defining success, according to climate change researcher Dr. Megan Mills-Novoa. If the ultimate purpose is to help vulnerable populations confront the escalating impacts of climate change, it is crucial to incorporate the perspectives of those the project is designed to help. To date, very little work has been done to ask local people about their experiences or how they would define adaptation success and failure. Even so, institutions financing adaptation initiatives will still play a powerful role in spearheading these changes. Dr. Sandra Ruckstuhl, Advisor at the International Water Management Institute, explains that institutions can provide
Photo by by Cristina Gottardi
leadership by deploying a common risk framework, monitoring and evaluation systems, and foresight analysis. By implementing these strategies, development organizations can better account for and respond to intended and unintended impacts. Climate change adaptation is a predictive exercise, by definition, argues Dr. Lisa Schipper, researcher at the University of Oxford’s Environmental Change Institute. The uncertainty of future climate variability means there is no way to fully mitigate the risks of maladaptation when designing an adaptation project. Therefore, recognizing this uncertainty is critical to creating flexible, long-term solutions.
themselves aware of potential maladaptive outcomes when designing, implementing, and evaluating climate change adaptation projects. Rather than intimidating us, this newfound awareness should empower us to take bold, transformative climate action going forward. Clara Chiu and Erin LeGoff received their master’s degrees in Conflict Resolution from Georgetown University in August 2021. For their capstone project, they partnered with the International Water Management Institute to study global water insecurity and build a typology of maladaptation.
As we respond to the changing climate with more adaptation projects, we also run the risk of maladaptations becoming more frequent and severe. Thus, practitioners must make 39
Dugongs, the central animal of the performance activism work “Okinawa Field Trip” by Professor Onoda Power. Photo by Natsu Onoda Power 40
A Field Trip to Okinawa
Professor Onoda Power brings the endangered animal to a virtual stage—in the shadow of a US military base by Marion Cassidy, COL ‘23
Creating virtual community experiences has been quite a challenge throughout the Covid-19 pandemic. Particularly for theater, which gains so much of its impact from the in-person experience, engaging audiences has been difficult over Zoom. Yet, Professor Natsu Onoda Power seems to have the secret. In her show “Okinawa Field Trip,” which premiered at the tailend of the 2021 spring semester in the Georgetown Theater and Performance Studies Department, Power engaged her virtual audience by using theater to highlight environmental concerns. The interactive Zoom play touched on US-Japanese relations as well as the resulting environmental destruction. Natsu Onoda Power originally planned to create a play about Okinawan music during her Fall 2019 sabbatical in Japan. She sat in on classes at the Okinawa Prefectural University of Arts and met local artists. As soon as she arrived, she noted she was “really struck by the issues that I had never thought about before, primarily, the US military presence in Okinawa and its history with Japan that’s characterized by so much colonialism.” The longer Professor Onoda Power stayed in Okinawa,
the more she realized she wanted the project to focus on the Okinawan people. Each performance of the play was considered a “field trip.” Audience members toured Okinawa virtually by seeing different sites around the city, talking with fellow students on the trip in breakout rooms, and even learning about the native food, with a dugong named Doug as their leader. Dugongs—a marine animal in the manatee family—are an endangered species and an Okinawan cultural icon. There are many folkloric legends about dugongs and they are symbolic of the natural environment and biodiversity in the area. The construction of an American military base was so dangerous to the small dugong population, that the Okinawan dugong, along with environmental advocacy groups, was actually a plaintiff in a United States court case against the U.S. Department of Defense filed in 2003 (the dugong was later dismissed as a plaintiff because animals have no standing under the National Historic Preservation Act under which the case was filed). 41
The American military bases and endangerment of these dugongs is still a point of contention today. Onoda Power does not shy away from bringing up these issues in her art. As the play proceeds it’s clear Doug and his fellow dugongs have incurred trauma due to the American military presence in their environment including the destruction of Doug’s community and family separation. The incorporation of the local Okinawans’ environmental knowledge was vital to the play. Onoda Power explained, “I just don’t think you can do anything about a place without the people there, I think it would be wrong to do that and that’s something that I’m really passionate about. I love listening to people’s stories and I could not have done this project without the support of my Okinawan friends.” 42
Anthropologist and Okinawan native Hideki Yoshikawa was an instrumental member of Onoda Power’s research team. For instance, he noticed in the first version of the script Doug ate seaweed, when in actuality, dugongs eat seagrass. It’s this attention to details and local culture that make this play so special. Yoshikawa grew up in Okinawa and completed his education in the United States. His unique background allows him to help advocate for his hometown’s environment. Yoshikawa shared that the impact of the bases on Okinawa is so significant that locals grow up knowing about the ‘base issue.’ He said, “the Okinawan environment is so rich, we have so many endangered species at Henoko-Oura Bay (where the U.S. and Japanese governments have tried to build a base), and we thought ‘hey they can’t build a base here,’ now I am here after 20 years still
A still image of a protest from the innovative streaming performance.
fighting and it’s been very difficult.” Aside from scientific or historical knowledge, those who worked on the project felt a personal impact as well. Yoshikawa said, “being a part of this experience has been pretty reflective, it’s sort of debuting what I’ve been doing. I feel like I have a renewed spirit for another fight and it has encouraged me to seek more creative ways of being an anthropologist.”
her realize she could do her play virtually as well. The virtual nature also allowed Okinawans and Americans to collaborate on this project –– a true embodiment of our 21st century, globalized and connected world. Onoda Power concluded, “every theater performance is a flawed project because it cannot possibly be a perfect product, but I really do think that the greatest value of this project is in our field trip.”
An unlikely consequence of the pandemic was that people everywhere were able to experience the ongoing conflict in Okinawa due to the virtual nature of the show. Onoda Power certainly faced many difficulties. Due to the time difference, she taught class at 3:00am and lived in ten different locations throughout the pandemic. Once conditions were safe, she started live streaming from environmental protests to her peers in the States, which was the lightning bolt moment that made 43
Photo by Nariman Mosharrafa via Unsplash 44
What We’re Reading: Under a White Sky: The Nature of the Future by Elizabeth Kolbert Review by Maya Snyder, SFS ’24 & Common Home Editor
“[It’s] not so much the control of nature as the control of the control of nature,” Kolbert writes. In an age where human activity is the dominant influence on climate and the environment, humanity is facing the consequences. The solution to the repercussions of humanity’s attempt to control nature? Kolbert argues, more control. Kolbert researches fascinating experiments of environmental control around the world. At the Great Barrier Reef, the solutions to the man-made problem of coral bleaching are also man-made. They include deploying underwater robots to reseed damaged reefs, producing artificial fog to shade reefs, and administering marine probiotics to make reefs more bleaching-resistant. While nature may be past the point of healing on its own, we learn recovery is still possible with humanity’s help. Kolbert makes these experiments a delight to read and learn about. I laughed out loud several times (“First you ship a species around the world, then you poison it from helicopters!”). While still emphasizing the urgency of climate change, Kolbert also paints an uplifting picture for our future through the unique efforts of environmental rehabilitation. Favorite quote: ‘I cannot continue to hope that our planet is not going to change radically. It is already changed.’ People could either ‘assist’ corals in coping with the change they’d brought about, or they could watch them die… ‘Our project is acknowledging that a future is coming where nature is no longer fully natural.’ 45
Photo by Joe Pohle via Unsplash 46
What We’re Reading: Journal of Solitude by May Sarton By Prof. Claire Catenaccio, Department of Classics, Georgetown
I recently read a beautiful, slim volume by May Sarton, called Journal of a Solitude. Sarton is most famous today for her poetry, but she was also a prolific diarist and nature writer. From September of 1970 to September of 1971, Sarton, then nearing her sixtieth birthday, lived alone in a cabin in rural New Hampshire and kept a journal recording her thoughts and feelings. Her entries wrestle with questions of art, aging, sexuality, and solitude, but she also acutely observes the natural world around her as it changes over the course of the year. For Sarton, solitude is necessary for the creation of art. She suffers bouts of boredom and panic, but she also enjoys periods of happy and fruitful isolation, where she can quiet her mind enough to think and work deeply. Solitude has its joys, chief among them the opportunity to pay close attention. If one looks long enough at almost anything, Sarton writes, “looks with absolute attention at a flower, a stone, the bark of a tree, grass, snow, a cloud, something like revelation takes place.”
Reading Sarton’s book encouraged me to appreciate the natural wonders that are all around me. The splendor of cicadas is a gift. I dance to the beat of rain on my roof during a summer storm. Sarton reminds us that at any age, under any conditions, we can enlarge our consciousness by looking at the world in new ways. Her journal is full of entries where she stumbles upon something ordinary, but transformational. On October 8th, for instance, she writes: “Later on when I was wandering around watering flowers, I was stopped at the threshold of my study by a ray on a Korean chrysanthemum, lighting it up like a spotlight, deep red petals and Chinese yellow center, glowing … Seeing it was like getting a transfusion of autumn light straight to the vein.” I wish all students, professors, and staff back on campus that same life-giving rush!
I think many people have had this transcendental experience in the contemplation of nature. We grow aware of something outside ourselves and become rapt with admiration and joy. It can be a religious experience. To quote one of Sarton’s favorite authors, the French philosopher and Classicist Simone Weil: “Absolute attention is prayer.” 47
A common buckeye moth nectaring on Lantana flower. Photo courtesy of Dr. Martha Weiss.
A Flutter of Memory
Georgetown professor explores how insects learn—and why it matters By Maya Snyder, SFS ’24 & Common Home Editor Even the tiniest creatures play an important role in our ecosystem. As an expert in ecology, Georgetown professor Martha Weiss has long been fascinated by the relationship between insects and the environment. One area of study that particularly interested Dr. Weiss was the learning ability of butterflies and moths. “For a long time, entomologists have assumed that social insects like bees are the only insects that can learn, and that everybody else is sort of a flying automaton,” Dr. Weiss said. To understand whether this was really the case, she conducted a series of experiments to determine the extent of butterflies’ learning and memory retention abilities. 48
She was able to train a variety of butterfly species to learn to associate a sugar reward with a range of different cues. “We were able to demonstrate that butterflies are excellent learners, and that they can learn really quickly to associate a reward with a color, shape, or pattern,” Dr. Weiss said. What does this mean from an ecological standpoint? For the butterfly, their learning ability helps them locate nectar from flowers. For the flower, this ability allows them to enjoy a more efficient pollination service. In another experiment, designed to determine whether a learned memory could persist across the dramatic changes of complete metamorphosis, Dr. Weiss began by training
caterpillars to avoid a particular odor. After they underwent metamorphosis, Dr. Weiss would expose them to the same odors they were taught to avoid. Interestingly, her experiment showed that moths do retain memories learned as a caterpillar. The moths that she and her team had trained six weeks before still knew to avoid that odor. More recently, Dr. Weiss also conducted research on an insect well-known to DC residents: cicadas. Dr. Weiss was curious how the Brood X cicada emergence was going to affect the diverse set of organisms that make up the oak forest community. She and her fellow research team began the experiment by setting up a field site in a Maryland oak forest, a year prior to the cicada emergence. They studied what kinds of caterpillars were on the oak tree, how much damage the caterpillars were exacting on the oak leaves, and importantly, how frequently or intensely the birds eat the caterpillars on the tree. To measure the predation of the caterpillars, Dr. Weiss and her team made clay caterpillars out of plasticine. “It’s a simple but very effective technique,” Dr. Weiss said. “They’re soft enough that when a bird sees the caterpillar and bites it, you see the beak mark left in the clay.” Every week, Dr. Weiss and the rest of the research team would put clay caterpillars on the oak trees and return to assess the level of caterpillar damage. Using this technique, they were able to determine a baseline level of bird predation pressure on the caterpillars. This same procedure was repeated before, during, and after the cicada emergence. The results corroborated the team’s hypothesis. “We predicted that a lot of the birds that ordinarily eat caterpillars when faced with an abundance of undefended, fat, heavy, protein-rich cicadas, would switch over from the caterpillars to cicadas. And that’s exactly what happened.” Before the cicadas emerged, the data showed about the same level of predation as the year before. When the cicadas surfaced, the bird predation on caterpillars sharply fell and
stayed low during the time period cicadas were out. After the adult cicada population began to dwindle, the bird predation level rose again. “The birds clearly switched over from the caterpillars to the cicadas,” noted Dr. Weiss. This conclusion was supported by the team’s other observations, as well. For instance, the amount of leaf damage that the caterpillars caused also seemed to be higher than the year before, suggesting that the caterpillar population experienced an unusually low level of predation. The team also made several qualitative observations to back up their data. Researchers observed a wide range of bird species in the act of catching cicadas and feeding them to their young. The impact of cicadas doesn’t end there, however. There are a range of insects, mostly flies and wasps, that lay their eggs inside the bodies of caterpillars. The eggs hatch, and the larvae eat the caterpillars from the inside out— but they do not disturb the essential tissues, so the caterpillars remain alive for a while. Once the parasitoids reach a certain stage of growth, they emerge and turn into flies and wasps. Ordinarily, birds would have eaten a higher proportion of the parasite-infected caterpillars. However, because the emergence of cicadas resulted in an unusually low level of caterpillar predation, it is likely that there will be a lot more parasitoid flies and wasps surviving next year. “With this system, we are able to look at how the effects of this gigantic resource pulse of cicadas trickle through the whole ecosystem,” Dr. Weiss said. The full ecological ramifications of cicadas likely will not be seen for years to come, but Dr. Weiss’s research provides a vital glimpse into the dynamics underpinning the oak tree and broader ecological community. Dr. Weiss is a professor in the Biology department at Georgetown and is also the co-director of the Environmental Studies program. Interested in learning more about her research? Check out her website: https://www.weisslab.org/ 49
Spirit of Georgetown Care for Our Common Home
In his landmark 2015 encyclical, Laudato Si, Pope Francis urgently calls for “a new dialogue about how we are shaping the future of our planet.” As we strive to protect our common home and promote the common good, we show respect for the Creator and act on the moral imperative to care for the earth and for those most impacted by environmental degradation. Georgetown seeks to strengthen our efforts to bring the intellectual, institutional, and spiritual resources of our community to advance environmental sustainability and environmental justice.
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