Climate Changed: Facing Our Future - Impressions from Nobel Conference 55

The annual Nobel Conference, hosted by Gustavus Adolphus College for over 50 years, "brings students, educators, and members of the general public together with the leading thinkers of the time, to explore revolutionary, transformative and pressing scientific questions and the ethical issues that arrive with them." This year, the Novel Conference theme was climate change, asking the question, "What tools are available, what research efforts do we require, and what kind of people do we need to be to conceptualize and address global climate challenges?" The seven presenters they brought together brought different perspectives potential climate solutions, with different lenses including "paleoclimate studies, climate justice, climate modeling, and climate adaptation." Author Amitav Ghosh, author and professor of human geography Mike Hulme, and author, Nobel Peace Prize nominee, and Arctic Inuit advocate Sheila Watt-Cloutier delved into explorations of global history, the environment, and politics, and their combined effects on people.

At Macalester, the Civic Engagement Center provided livestream viewing spaces for students to engage with the Conference in the John B. Davis Lecture Hall and Davis Court. Certain courses, including Christine O'Connell's Ecology lab watched Nobel talks during class time.

From the Sustainability Office, Sustainability Manager Suzanne Savanick Hansen and Sustainability Project Coordinator Tamara Will attended the Nobel Conference.

“My biggest take-away from the conference was the need to be inclusive - that those of us who have studied an environmental issue aren’t necessarily the true experts," said Tamara of her experience, "The true experts, and those who need to be included in the conversations about remedies, are the people who live in each particular environment. Sheila Watt-Cloutier articulated that environmental rights are human rights and her story of how the health and livelihood of her people are threatened by the actions of others - the ice is melting and their waters are polluted. What we do matters whether or not we actually see it.”

Suzanne after attending said, "I was pleased to see the connections between social justice and climate.  Sheila Watt-Cloutier, who wrote the book, The Right to Be Cold, talked about the disproportionate impact of climate change, waste and pollution on her Inuit community.

Both Tamara and Suzanne, as well as students that tuned into the Conference virtually, will be able to use the new lenses and tools shared at the Conference in the Sustainability Office. 

written by Sustainability Office student worker Zella Lobo