Weston Roundtable – Air Pollution and Environmental Data Justice

Speaker: Amanda Giang, Assistant Professor, University of British Columbia

Air pollution is one of the leading contributors to the global burden of disease, and decades of research have shown that vulnerable communities are often disproportionately exposed to these risks. Addressing these environmental injustices requires attention to the systems that create and perpetuate these harms, including knowledge systems. What infrastructures exist for data about air pollution and its inequitable production and distribution? Who gets to participate in generating and interpreting this data, and whose knowledge counts?

In this talk, Giang will explore these questions through examples from recent projects in the Lab for Environmental Assessment and Policy. She will discuss how improved data transparency and community right-to-know about industrial emitters can inform targeted interventions to reduce exposure disparities; and how community knowledge is a crucial complement to traditional air quality monitoring and modeling through community-based air quality monitoring and citizen science projects.

The Weston Roundtable is made possible by a generous donation from Roy F. Weston, a highly accomplished UW-Madison alumnus. Designed to promote a robust understanding of sustainability science, engineering, and policy, these interactive lectures are co-sponsored by the Center for Sustainability and the Global Environment (SAGE), the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, and the Office of Sustainability.

Photo by Bruce Marchfelder