Sustainability Highlights

Julie Ann Wrigley Global Institute of Sustainability

Sustainability Highlights

International members of GIOS®-led consortium unite around global sustainability outcomes

At the first-ever meeting of the Global Consortium for Sustainability Outcomes, hosted by Arizona State University, representatives of eleven universities from around the world worked to design an innovative path toward timely sustainable outcomes on a global scale.

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Leon Billings and Thomas Jorling: Thought Leader Series

Widely regarded as pioneers of the "Golden Age" in environmental policy seen in the 1970s, Leon Billings and Thomas Jorling penned this Thought Leader Series contribution to call attention to the enormous pink elephant in the current U.S. presidential election – climate change.

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Collaborating at the nexus of society's challenges

Recognizing that agriculture, energy and water systems are all interconnected, a transdisciplinary team of five ASU researchers – including sustainability scientists Dave White and Rimjhim Aggarwal – has set out to build decision support tools that inform the development of sustainable policies.

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Prospective sustainability leaders offered a financial boost

Through funding provided by the Rob and Melani Walton Fund of the Walton Family Foundation, ASU will award a limited number of scholarships of up to $15,000 to professionals seeking to accelerate their careers through the Executive Master of Sustainability Leadership program.

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Closing the loop on an essential but finite element

By collecting phosphorus – the element at the foundation of our food system – before it reaches waterways, ASU's Sustainable Phosphorus Alliance hopes to extract it from waste and sell it back to fertilizer companies, eliminating the reliance on a dwindling supply from other countries.

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Going to court for the human right to water

By documenting how court systems have been used to advance water rights in emerging economies with fairly well-developed legal systems – specifically, Brazil, South Africa and India – two sustainability scientists are highlighting the role courts can play in ensuring global thirst is quenched.

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Sustainable energy versus natural landscape

Addressing concerns about the transformation of open spaces to solar fields and wind farms, a new book co-authored by sustainability scientist Mike Pasqualetti suggests that though sustainable energy is a must, the infrastructure can be built with a less disruptive effect on the landscape.

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Peer pressure's potential to solve climate change

A study published in Science and co-authored by School of Sustainability Professor Marty Anderies indicates that social norms may have a greater effect on individual behaviorial changes than policy alone – a finding reinforced by other sustainability scientists at ASU.

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Joan McGregor: Thought Leader Series

Food provides much more to humanity than sustenance, says Professor of Philosophy and Senior Sustainability Scientist Joan McGregor, who articulates the need for a values-based food system and describes an event aimed at modeling one in this Thought Leader Series piece.

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Series serves as showcase of ASU's work on water

Tackling a myriad of subjects, from the dropping levels of water in Lake Mead to the merits and pitfalls of measures like desalination, a three-part series published in ASU Now captures the breadth of work ASU sustainability scientists are undertaking to protect water in the arid West.

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US-Pakistan energy partnership welcomes second cohort

Part of a larger effort to meet Pakistan’s growing energy needs, a second group of Pakistani graduate students recently arrived at ASU to study energy engineering through the U.S.-Pakistan Centers for Advanced Studies in Energy, directed by sustainability scientist Sayfe Kiaei.

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Partnership to increase pool of plant biology experts

To address the shortage of plant experts that can inform important biodiversity conservation efforts, ASU partnered with the Desert Botanical Garden to launch a new master’s degree program in plant biology and conservation that sustainability scientist Julie Stromberg will direct.

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