Environmental Policy & Law

Thirty-five thousand Americans marched around the White House in biting winds and cold sunlight on Sunday in the largest demonstration for climate action in history.

Environmental scientist Amy Luers found the nonprofit setting more fitting than academia for her career goals. "I wanted to be at the intersection of science, policy and action," she said. That would have been hard to do as an academic scientist, she said. "It's rare that a scientist at an academic research institution gets to really see the fruits of their labor put into practice in a significant way in their lifetime," said Luers, climate change director for the Skoll Global Threats Fund, a San Francisco-based non-profit. ...

In this interview, Robert Kates discusses the challenges of sustainability science in moving from what scientists know to actions that can provide solutions to pressing environmental and development problems. Kates notes that sustainability science has the dual mission of addressing core scientific and intellectual questions, while at the same time addressing development in particular places. He suggests that one of the key questions is how to address long-term trends and transition to a “better synthesis between environment and society.”

In his experience as a firefighter, paramedic, union officer, green chemistry leader, and now Director of the UC Berkeley Labor Occupational Health Program, Switzer Fellow Mike Wilson (2002) has learned that when someone is injured, sickened, or killed on the job, the immediate cause is usually obvious: an unguarded machine, a blocked exit door, a toxic chemical, exposure to silica, and so forth.

Democrats and Republicans alike hope for an energy independent future—an America freed from the whims of a temperamental global energy market. The differences arise when determining what to do today to make that future a reality.

To help utilities address the privacy issue, two research associates at the Vermont Law School’s Institute for Energy and the Environment have developed a model privacy policy. “We identified concerns about privacy as a barrier to smart grid progress,” said Colin Hagan, one of the researchers. “We’ve seen how consumer concern can delay projects or focus attention on them.”

2011 Switzer Fellow Sarah Uhl works to protect people and the environment from the harmful effects of toxic chemicals.

CALL FOR PAPERS2013 Food Law ColloquiumMaine Law Review The Maine Law Review invites you to participate in its 2013 Food Law Colloquium. The Colloquium presents an opportunity for discussion and debate about the legal architecture of food systems in Maine, the United States, and beyond. To complement the Colloquium, the spring volume of the Review will be devoted to high-quality legal scholarship focusing on a wide range of food law topics.

“Illinois is the largest source of both of the nitrogen and the phosphorus that causes the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico,” said Glynnis Collins with the Prairie Rives Network, “The industrial scale of corn and soybean production on our farmland is a major source of nutrient pollution, and secondly, Illinois is home to Chicago’s Water Reclamation District with seven large sewage treatment plants.” Read the full story