HSU’s new ‘Sustainable Futures’ speaker series starts on Thursday

Humboldt State University’s Sustainable Futures speaker series opens on Thursday at 5:30 p.m. with Jill Lindsey Harrison, author of “From the Inside Out: The Fight for Environmental Justice within Government Agencies.”

Harrison will present key findings from her book, which lifts the veil on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and other environmental regulatory agencies to offer new insights into why they fail to reduce harmful toxins and other hazards in the nation’s most environmentally overburdened and vulnerable communities. Harrison is a professor at the University of Colorado Boulder, whose research focuses on environmental justice, environmental politics and immigration politics.

On March 3 at 5:30 p.m., Alison Bates will share research she has conducted over the last decade on the social acceptance of offshore wind energy, and how conceptualizations of “community” and a “just” energy transition have evolved over that time.

Bates is a professor of environmental studies at Colby College in Maine, where she researches the social acceptance of renewable energy systems, including offshore wind, utilizing an equity and justice framework. This year, the federal government expects to award the first offshore wind leases on the Pacific coast, which will be located in the Humboldt Bay region. Bates’ expertise with offshore wind decision-making processes and their impacts on marginalized communities is very timely for the North Coast.

The Sustainable Futures speaker series will close out on April 28 at 5:30 p.m. with a presentation by Andrea Rodgers on children’s fundamental rights, the climate crisis and the call for judicial branch engagement.

Rodgers is a senior litigation attorney at Our Children’s Trust, where she serves as counsel on several climate-related lawsuits filed by youth plaintiffs, including Juliana v. United States, Aji P. v. State of Washington and Reynolds v. State of Florida. Rodgers will explore how children and youth have turned to the courts to seek protection of their fundamental rights, and where that stands now.

The spring 2022 Sustainable Futures speaker series is being held online. All events are free and open to the public, and live captioning is provided for all talks. To request additional support, contact schatzenergy@humboldt. edu or call 707-826-4345. Find more info and register for all events at schatzcenter.org/speakers.

The speaker series was created to stimulate interdisciplinary collaboration around issues related to energy, the environment and society. Lectures are sponsored by the Schatz Energy Research Center and HSU’s Environment & Community program and the College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences.