On Thursday, March 15, the Institute for the Environment and Sustainability (IES) will host the 2020 Drs. Gene & Carol Willeke Frontiers in Environmental Science Distinguished Lecture. This year’s Willeke Lecture will be Peggy Shepard who will be speaking on Climate Justice. 

When: Thursday, March 5, 6:00 pm

Where: 152 Shideler Hall

Peggy Shepard is the co-founder and executive director of WE ACT (https://www.weact.org/) for Environmental Justice. She has successfully combined grassroots organizing, environmental advocacy, and environmental health community-based participatory research to become a national leader in advancing environmental policy and environmental justice in urban communities.

Low-income communities and communities of color tend to produce disproportionately lower amounts of emissions contributing to climate change. Despite this, they face the greatest and earliest impacts of climate change while typically having the least political power and financial resources to address the issue.

Climate Justice refers to addressing climate change in a just and equitable manner and ensuring that low-income communities and communities do not bear a disproportionate burden of climate change.  Ms Shepard will address how we provide these communities with the resources and power to combat the detrimental effects of climate change.