Brown Bag Lecture feat. Professor Stephen Porder

Professor Stephen Porder, Brown University and Author of Elemental: How five elements changed Earth’s past and will shape our future

“Climate Change: Local Solutions to a Global Problem”

Human-caused climate change is the defining challenge for society in the 21st century and is the world around us. Rising to its challenge will require mitigation, to slow the pace of change, and adaptation, to build resilience to the changes that we cannot stop.

In this talk, Professor Stephen Porder will cover the basic science of climate change, its drivers, and the path towards a resilient, zero-emissions future. He will highlight things individuals can do to dramatically lower their climate footprint, and opportunities that Rhode Island has to take a leadership role in moving towards a more stable climate future. He will discuss some of the difficult tradeoffs that will need to be considered to keep warming, and thus the need for adaptation, to a minimum. This talk aims to spark exciting ideas about the ways in which we can all become a part of the solution to this unprecedented problem.

Stephen Porder is Associate Provost for Sustainability and Professor of Ecology, Evolution, and Organismal Biology at Brown University, where he is a fellow in the Institute at Brown for Environment and Society. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Natural History, Providence Journal and other leading publications.