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A focus on environmental inequities
Philadelphia city street, abandoned factory in background, housing behind sidewalk fence.

A focus on environmental inequities

A Penn symposium will confront issues of inequitable access to a clean and safe environment and the unequal burden borne by vulnerable communities, particularly low-income and underrepresented minority populations, when it comes to environmental threats.

Katherine Unger Baillie

Leading the way in the field of energy policy
Mark Alan Hughes at his desk standing and talking with associates by windows in the sunlight.

Hughes (second from left) with the Kleinman Center team, including from left to right, Angela Pachon, Bill Cohen, Mollie Simon, Cornelia Colijn, and Kimberle Szczurowski.

Leading the way in the field of energy policy

During two decades at Penn, Mark Alan Hughes has made the University a leader in the field of energy policy—and he’s showing no signs of slowing down.

Michele W. Berger , Lindsey Samahon

Weighing the environmental impacts of a byproduct of biofuel combustion: plant skeletons
Pile of shredded straw from Miscanthus sinensis, Chinese silver grass

Chinese silver grass, Miscanthus sinensis, is a common source of biomass, burned to produce electricity or heat in power plants. Each piece is roughly 2-3 centimeters in length. (Image: Reto Gieré)

Weighing the environmental impacts of a byproduct of biofuel combustion: plant skeletons

The School of Arts and Sciences’ Reto Gieré and Ruggero Vigliaturo and colleagues found that phytoliths—small, silica-containing deposits present in many plant species—are emitted during biofuel combustion.

Katherine Unger Baillie

How to make progress for Pittsburgh’s Three Rivers
Evening view of Pittsburgh skyline along one of its rivers

How to make progress for Pittsburgh’s Three Rivers

The Water Center at Penn has completed the first phase of a high-level study of the challenges and opportunities for water resource management in Pittsburgh’s Three Rivers Region.

Penn Today Staff

Talking climate change with Rafe Pomerance
A person sitting in a red chair gesturing with hands.

Environmental activist, Rafe Pomerance, founder of Arctic 21 and a senior fellow at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, spoke at the Penn’s Kleinman Center for Energy Policy last week. 

  • Q&A

    • Talking climate change with Rafe Pomerance

    In a Q&A, the longtime environmental activist, who came to campus to speak at the Kleinman Center for Energy Policy, discusses where we are today and how we can avoid the worst effects of a warming planet.

    Michele W. Berger

    Dissecting the Green New Deal
    Two people sitting on a stage, one gesturing with his hands. In front of them is a brown wooden table with two water bottles.

    Billy Fleming (left), Wilks Family Director for the Ian L. McHarg Center at the Stuart Weitzman School of Design and Daniel Aldana Cohen, who runs the Socio-Spatial Climate Collaborative (SC)2 at Penn, organized the day-long event. (Photo: Lou Caltabiano)

    Dissecting the Green New Deal

    During what’s likely the largest climate event ever held at Penn, leaders in a range of fields discussed the practicalities and implications of the resolution introduced into Congress in February aimed at stemming climate change.

    Michele W. Berger

    Inferno in the rainforest
    Map of Brazil and other parts of South America showing myriad points of orange

    Sensors on NASA satellites Terra and Aqua captured a record of thousands of points of fire in Brazil in late August. The fires pose a threat to the Amazon rainforest and to people living in and around it. (Image: NASA Earth Observatory)

    Inferno in the rainforest

    Satellite images have detected more than 100,000 points of fire in the Amazon this year. Scientists Reto Gieré and Alain Plante illuminate some less obvious impacts of the fires, including health threats and climate impacts.

    Katherine Unger Baillie

    Crowdsourcing 10,000 years of land use
    A brown cow standing in a mountain landscape in the Italian Alps.

    To predict what will happen in the future, its important to understand what happened in the past. Thats the idea behind ArchaeoGLOBE, a project that looks at land use around the world—like in the Italian Alps, seen here—during the past 10,000 years. (Photo courtesy: Lucas Stephens) 

    Crowdsourcing 10,000 years of land use

    More than 250 archaeologists from around the world contributed their knowledge to ArchaeoGLOBE, an effort to better understand the prevalence of agriculture, pastoralism, and hunting and gathering at different points in human history.

    Michele W. Berger

  • Campus & Community

    • A conversation with Doug Jerolmack

    In the latest episode of Penn Today’s ‘Office Hours’ podcast series, a chat with Doug Jerolmack that ranges from geophysics to taco shops.
    Doug Jerolmack leans against railing with river in background
    Doug Jerolmack, professor of Earth and Environmental Science, with a secondary appointment in Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics.  

    Welcome to the “office hours” of Doug Jerolmack, professor of Earth and Environmental Science, with a secondary appointment in Mechanical Engineering and Applied Mechanics.

    Here, in the latest episode of Penn Today’s “Office Hours” podcast series, which explores the minds of the University’s academic talents in a more unbuttoned setting outside of the lecture hall, Jerolmack discusses the “science of scenery.” He talks rounded pebbles along riversides, studying sand movement even as it’s apparently undisturbed, and also teases out the dynamic with his twin brother, who also studies the environment, and the status of his wife’s West Philadelphia taco shop. 

    Download "Office Hours" on Apple Music

    Credits

  • Writers

    Brandon K. Baker

  • Photographers

    Eric Sucar

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