C
limate
activists
can
usually
remember the moment they real-
ized the magnitude of the ecologi-
cal problem humanity faces.
Ten years ago, Noah Weaverdyck, cur-
rently a doctoral student in physics at the
University of Michigan and a member of
Climate Action Movement, an environmen-
tal policy organization on campus, attended
an environmental advocacy event at Goshen
College. He had heard about climate change
and its supposed dangers, but didn’t know
much else. He decided to attend the event
and listen to the featured speaker’s presen-
tation with an open mind.
The speaker was Bill McKibben, a
renowned author and perhaps the most
influential environmentalist in the coun-
try. McKibben recounted his experiences
suffering through dengue fever, a painful
and potentially fatal disease spread by mos-
quitoes whose habitats have expanded due
to global warming. McKibben used this to
underscore the global nature of the threat
posed by climate change. Weaverdyck was
struck by the certainty of this threat and the
supreme importance of fighting it.
“That was what queued me into the real-
ity that this is the biggest thing that’s hap-
pening and has ever happened in terms of
challenges facing humanity,” Weaverdyck
said.
This is a perspective shared by scientists
and activists around the world. There is a
strong consensus in the scientific communi-
ty that the significant global warming of the
last 150 years is both caused by human activ-
ity and preventable through the efforts of
governments and individuals. This warming
is caused by an overage of greenhouse gases
in Earth’s atmosphere. These gases trap the
sun’s energy in the atmosphere and warm
the earth, an effect which normally keeps
the planet habitable for life, but now threat-
ens to overheat it and irreparably harm the
ecosystems on its surface.
A major goal in combating climate change
is thus the reduction of greenhouse gas
emissions into the atmosphere. American
universities have made pledges in the last
two decades to reduce their emissions and
build permanent sustainable systems that
will both reduce their impact on the envi-
ronment and provide resources to other
communities and organizations to follow
their lead.
The University of Michigan, however,
has faced some criticism from students
and faculty for lagging behind institutions
with similar resources and academic stand-
ing. While the University has improved its
environmental stature and made laudable
efforts to build a more sustainable school,
other Big Ten universities and elite research
institutions have set more ambitious goals
and made further progress in fighting cli-
mate change than the University.
Stanford University, for example, has
been remarkably proactive when it comes to
climate policy. The institution has commit-
ted to using 100 percent renewable energy
by 2021 and is currently building its second
solar power plant in order to meet that goal.
Additionally, Ohio State University, histori-
cally Michigan’s biggest rival, has some of
the most ambitious environmental policies
of any school in the Big Ten. Its administra-
tion has pledged to cut its emissions by 50
percent by 2030 and 100 percent by 2050 as
well as achieve a zero waste system by 2025.
When asked how the University compares
to such other schools, Andrew Berki, the
director of the Office of Campus Sustain-
ability, said environmental policy should be
evaluated on a case-by-case basis.
“Each school has a different approach
to reducing its impact on the environment
because each has different circumstances,”
Berki wrote in an email interview with The
Daily. “U-M involves a broad range of stake-
holders in the goal-setting and decision-
making process, which is important at our
institution.”
It should be noted that the University
does face several unavoidable challenges
that make climate progress more difficult
than at other schools. For example, the Uni-
versity administration has noted that Ann
Arbor exists in a more extreme climate than
both Stanford and Ohio State — its facilities
require significantly more heating and cool-
ing energy to keep people safe and comfort-
able. The University, along with individual
state residents, is also required by state law
to use electricity from the local utility grid,
which is more carbon-intensive than most
others in the nation. The University invol-
untarily inherits the environmental impact
of this electricity.
However, seeing the progress of these
other institutions and spurred by the
increasingly apparent dangers of climate
change, concerned students and faculty have
been pushing the University to make greater
strides in its environmental policy. The most
prominent campus advocacy group in recent
months has been the Climate Action Move-
ment, a group of undergraduate and gradu-
ate students that was founded last year by
LSA junior Julian Hansen.
CAM is now composed of several dozen
students with considerable involvement
in the campus environmental commu-
nity. These students are at the center of an
increasingly urgent debate among activ-
ists, faculty and administrators over how
to effectively combat climate change in
higher education. Most members are part of
other climate organizations, including Cli-
mate Blue, the Climate Reality Project, the
Citizens’ Climate Lobby, Students for Clean
Energy, the Sunrise Movement and under-
graduate environmental fraternities and
sororities.
According to Sasha Bishop, a doctoral
student in ecology and evolutionary biol-
ogy and a member of CAM, this wealth of
experience informs much of CAM’s work;
members make recommendations for policy
and advocate for specific causes based on
the expertise its members have gathered in
their years of involvement in environmental
activism. Bishop believes this is one of the
core strengths of CAM and a reason for its
considerable presence despite its relative
youth.
Weaverdyck said a significant portion
of CAM’s work has simply been spreading
awareness about the University’s climate
policies and their potential shortcom-
ings. Weaverdyck believes that most stu-
dents overestimate the University’s level of
involvement because of its self-identification
as a leader in higher education and scientific
achievement.
“We need to raise a lot of awareness,”
Weaverdyck said. “A lot of people assume
that U-M, as this progressive campus, one of
the world’s leading research institutions —
people just assume that U of M is at the top
when it comes to emissions reductions and
being proactive. But that’s not the case.”
According to Weaverdyck, one of the
biggest challenges for climate policy is the
reluctance of the University leadership to
set concrete goals as the administrators of
other prominent universities have.
“When the leadership comes forward and
sets a public goal — that’s what’s needed
to get the huge machinery of a university
to start moving and working together to
achieve those goals,” Weaverdyck said.
For this reason, CAM has campaigned
heavily for a firm commitment to carbon
neutrality by 2035. Members have created
a petition, published criticisms of the Uni-
versity’s policies and made appearances at
the University’s Board of Regents meetings.
After several months of lobbying and activ-
ism, the administration made a commitment
to take action, and on Feb. 4, University
President Mark Schlissel launched a com-
mission tasked with developing timelines
and strategies for the University to achieve
carbon neutrality.
However, members of the campus envi-
ronmental
community
have
expressed
concerns that the commission will not be
effective in solving the problem. To explain
their worries, Weaverdyck and Bishop cited
the example of the President’ Greenhouse
Gas Reduction Committee.
This committee was similarly formed to
reduce the University’s carbon footprint
in 2011, and it delivered a non-binding
reportwith several recommendations in the
summer of 2015. The University has made
progress on several of the goals, including
an upgrade to the Central Power Plant and
plans to purchase renewable energy credits,
which would allow the University to pay for
the creation of renewable energy elsewhere.
However, these plans still include extensive
use of fossil fuels and no plans for future
renewable energy sources on campus.
“We are currently implementing many
of the GHG committee’s recommendations,
including the Central Power Plant natu-
ral gas turbine; continued investment in
the Energy Management Program, which
focuses on energy conservation within some
U-M buildings; on-campus demonstration
projects; and renewable energy purchases,”
Berki said.
Bishop and Weaverdyck also expressed
worried about a perceived lack of account-
ability for the commission, again drawing
parallels to the Greenhouse Gas Reduc-
tion Committee. They believe a firm com-
mitment from University leadership at the
outset is the only way
to ensure that prog-
ress will be made in the
near future.
“It’s death by com-
mittee,”
Weaverdyck
said. “That’s something
that we really can’t
afford given the time-
line that the science
makes clear. We can’t
afford to lose another
few
years
debating
what the target is.”
Adam Simon, a pro-
fessor in the Earth and
Environmental Scienc-
es Department, shares
this
concern.
Simon
has been a member of
the Greenhouse Gas
Reduction Committee
since the summer of
2017. He believes the
committee has been
able to do some produc-
tive work despite a few
shortcomings.
“It was overall a posi-
tive experience,” Simon
said.
“There
were
certainly some times
when I felt frustrated
by what, to me, seemed
like a slowness to react
among the committee
members.”
For instance, Simon
was glad the committee
met last year with the
director of Renewable
Energy at DTE Energy, which is a Detroit-
based energy company that runs the grid
on which the city of Ann Arbor is situated.
But he was sur-
prised
to
find
out the commit-
tee
had
never
done so before,
describing
the
collaboration as
a
“no-brainer”
that should have
been
started
years previously.
Despite
such
delays,
Simon
praised members
of the commit-
tee for initiating
the relationship
with DTE and
cited it as an
example of the
kind of environmental work the University
needs to be doing moving forward. In his
view, it will be absolutely necessary to bring
in outside expertise to accelerate the work
of the Commission on Carbon Neutrality.
“I hope that (the Commission on Carbon
Neutrality) does exactly what we need it to
do, which is to reach out to people in the real
world who do this for a living and figure out
how we can partner with private industry
to make carbon neutrality a reality,” Simon
said.
Simon has also expressed particular
concern about the University’s 2011 goal of
reducing its greenhouse gas emissions by 25
percent by 2025 — which, remeber, is a goal
among the least ambitious in the Big Ten. As
of 2018, the University has achieved only a
7 percent reduction from the 2006 baseline
measurement.
The impending upgrade to the Central
Power Plant is expected to reduce emis-
sions further, to around 12 or 13 percent.
Right now, the University buys roughly
two thirds of its energy from DTE Energy.
The other third is produced by the Central
Power Plant. Once the plant is upgraded, the
University will produce about half of its own
energy.
The Greenhouse Gas Committee’s report
stated this upgrade is the single largest
contributor toward meeting the emissions
reduction goal. But the report also noted
the upgrade ties the University to fossil
fuels for at least another two decades, and
likely more. Natural gas still has a notable
environmental impact due to the emissions
involved in its use.
Emissions are often organized into three
categories, called scope 1, scope 2 and scope
3. Scope 1 emissions are direct emissions
from owned sources. Scope 2 emissions are
indirect emissions from the generation of
energy that an institution purchases. Scope
3 emissions are all indirect emissions, not
included in scope 2, that occur from sources
not owned or controlled by the institution.
Last in line:
U-M climate
policy faces
re-evaluation
Wednesday, February 13. 2019 // The Statement
4B
Wednesday,February 13, 2019 // The Statement
5B
“It’s death by committee,”
Weaverdyck said. “That’s
something that we really can’t
afford given the timeline that the
science makes clear. We can’t
afford to lose another few years
debating what the target is.”
BY RILEY LANGEFELD, STATEMENT CORRESPONDENT
ILLUSTRATION BY MICHELLE FAN
”
NIGHT SHIFT
See LAST IN LINE, Page 6B
INFOGRAPHIC BY NOLAN FELICIDARIO