Abstract
The climate crisis has become one of the international community's most critically debated social issues of the modern era. Environmental impact studies have produced demographic data documenting the adverse effects of this devastating phenomenon on industrialized and third-world nations. Living in a world threatened by climate disasters has become a galvanizing force for social change. It has become a motivational force that has inspired thousands of individuals worldwide to organize into community coalitions focused on developing and implementing green energy policies supporting sustainable reforms that impact climate justice and environmental equality. President Biden's reinstatement of U.S. participation in the Paris Climate Accord in 2021 provides tangible evidence reaffirming U.S. commitment to shared responsibility for transitioning global energy production to renewable sources that protect the integrity of the natural environment and reduce the burden of social disparity that impacts the world's most vulnerable populations. This chapter analyzes how colleges and universities can play a vital role in social investment in research projects and educational programs supporting green energy solutions to climate change.
TopIntroduction: Climate Change And Social Inequality
As mounting evidence of the disparaging consequences of ecological change continues to challenge the sustainability of human populations worldwide, concerned experts from across multiple professional disciplines in the academic community have come to recognize the significance of developing a comprehensive public understanding and awareness of the impact of social problems on the environment. Growing concerns about the detrimental manifestations of the climate crisis on the fundamental survival of global societies have caused academicians at higher education institutions to direct their research efforts to find workable public policy solutions capable of resolving the social justice issues linked to environmental equality. Researchers examining the impact of ecological disruption internationally have noted that the adverse outcomes of climate change are disproportionately distributed across the world's poorest nations, leaving those most vulnerable populations with the least economic resources to shoulder the social and economic burden of the problem. They argue that the unequal sharing of responsibility for the amplification of climate change's adverse impact on impoverished countries by the global community's most economically advantaged nations raises serious ethical questions about current indicators used by climate analysts to validate legislative decisions which affect the environment (Dooley et al., 2021). The following discussion will analyze the race-based social inequalities used by the federal government and private corporations to justify national policy decisions that cause disproportionate environmental harm that worsens climate change. It will explore the feasibility of implementing green energy solutions to reduce carbon emissions through ecological research projects that advance climate justice and social equity goals administered by students and faculty at colleges and universities in the United States and abroad.
Studies show that while the detrimental effects of climate change represent a generalized sustainable threat to the physical, mental, and environmental health of international communities worldwide, groups with the most significant socioeconomic disadvantage confront the highest risk of vulnerability. Findings indicate that minority communities comprised mainly of low-income people of racial and ethnic diversity, immigrants, and people with limited English proficiency suffer the most significant consequences of the environmental forces that mitigate climate change. For example, a case study examining the impact of rising temperatures on infant mortality in California between May and October of 1999 to 2011 revealed a significant correlation between environmental risk factors that precipitate all-cause infant mortality and race. Data analysis indicated Black infants in economically disadvantaged communities exposed to extreme heat conditions are likelier to have a higher mortality risk than their White peers because they lack access to quality medical care and health insurance. In addition, the research suggests that as intense heatwaves become more frequent in low-income African American communities, children are more at risk of developing health problems related to the environment. Black children are three times more likely to experience emergency room visits, hospitalization, congenital disabilities, and death from climate-related medical conditions such as cramps, heat stroke, exhaustion, hyperthermia, and dehydration due to sustained exposure to substandard housing and other impoverished circumstances that contribute to heat retention (Basu et al., 2015).
Extreme heat is not the only environmental hazard impacting the health of communities of color. Research indicates that Black people are three times more likely to die of medical problems associated with air pollution than Whites. Evidence of this disparity is documented in a study by investigators at the Center for Environmental Medicine and Information and the Department of Environmental Science and Forestry at SUNY. The research examined the relationship between air pollution exposure and the amplification of risk factors associated with COVID-19 mortality. Findings reveal that people in Black communities with increased levels of air pollution had a higher risk of poor COVID-19 treatment outcomes than people in White communities with a lower risk of exposure to this hazard (Petroni et al., 2020).
Key Terms in this Chapter
Water Pollution: A term used to define the release of hazardous materials into groundwater sources such as rivers, lakes, streams, and estuaries which harm the functioning of ecosystems, resulting in a substantial risk to the health of global communities (Britannica.com, 2023).
Climate Litigation: A term used to define the litigation of court cases that involve potential harm to the environment mitigated by federal agencies or private energy producing-corporations (the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law, Columbia University School of Law, 2023).
Air Pollution: A term used to define the distribution of hazardous materials in gas, liquid, or solid form into the atmosphere at concentration levels beyond the environmental capacity to absorb their undesirable effects on the health and social sustainability of international populations (Britannica.com, 2023).
Greenhouse Gas: A term used to define various gaseous compounds like carbon dioxide and methane that absorb infrared radiation and trap heat in the atmosphere, which contributes to what scientists refer to as the greenhouse effect (Merriam Webster.com, 2023).
Carbon Emissions: A term used to define the process of expelling carbon dioxide from automobiles and factories into the atmosphere that has a detrimental impact on the sustainability of the environment (Cambridge Dictionary.org, 2023).
Geoengineering: A term used to define the large-scale manipulation of a specific process central to controlling the Earth's climate to obtain ecological benefits (Britannica.com, 2023).
Environmental Jurisprudence: A term used to define a collection of laws, regulations, and agreements that govern how humans interact with the natural environment (Legalknowledgebase.com, 2023).
Rapporteur: A term used to define a person chosen by an organization to prepare reports at meetings (Cambridge Dictionary, 2023).
Environmental Racism: A term used to define a type of systemic racism whereby communities of color are disproportionately affected by severe ecological hazards that compromise health (World Economic Forum, 2020).
Climate Justice: A term used to define the disproportionate impact of climate change on low-income communities of color worldwide that are least responsible for environmental harm (Center for Climate Justice University of California, 2022).