NY Climate Tech: Oct 31 - Nov 7
Microplastic madness, biodiversity experts from Berlin, three incredible climate tech summits, and so much more
Start off this week at Columbia with a screening and discussion of Microplastic Madness or go for more networking and learn about Opportunities & Challenges in Real Estate. If Morningside is a bit too far, tune into the ClimateTech Founders Summit online on Tuesday and Wednesday. Get started in activism in Park Slope on Wednesday with an Info Session on how NYC can catalyze a just transition, or swing by NYU for a talk on urban biodiversity with a panel of experts from New York City and Berlin. On Thursday, head back to Columbia for a (heady) talk on AI for Climate Modeling.
Finish up the week on Friday with Converge on Climate hosted by Sanjiv Sanghavi for 2 days of field-leading speakers, roundtable discussions, workshops and invaluable networking, or head to the Women in Communications & Energy Conference at ConEd HQ at Union Square. Follow up with the First Friday Climate Meetup at Blue and Gold (an institution). Then on Saturday, check out the Sustainable Fashion: Clothing Swap & Panel Discussion in Chelsea or join the Civic Art Lab online and around the city for sessions on design and sustainability.
Finally, check out the Women and Climate Wall of Hope for COP 27!
Hot Take: The Election That Matters for Planet Earth
Late last night, many in the global climate community took a huge sigh of relief as Brazilians elected Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva as their next President. Brazil is the largest nation in South America, the ninth largest economy in the world, and most importantly, home to the iconic Amazon rainforest. Few political issues have higher global stakes than the conservation of the Amazon, and Lula’s victory is a huge win for Planet Earth.
NYTimes Opinion piece on the Brazilian Presidential Election and its implications across the globe. Source: NYTimes
But first, a history lesson.
Brazil was once a poster child for conservation. Starting in the early 2000s, the government protected Indigenous communities, monitored forest loss, and imposed huge fines for illegal logging and deforestation. The Forest Code worked. When Lula first took office in 2003, the Amazon was losing 7 million acres per year - by the time he left office in 2011, that number was down to 1.1 million acres per year according to Brazil’s National Institute of Space Research. This number remained relatively consistent until far-right President Jair Bolsonaro came into power in 2019.
Bolsonaro fired environmental experts, gutted Lula’s enforcement mechanisms, and significantly cut spending for science and environmental agencies that were tasked with monitoring and protecting the Amazon. This was all in support of the agribusiness industry that brought him to power. Much of the rainforest that has been cut down has been used as land for cattle grazing, increasing Brazil’s beef exports and agricultural production. At the same time, Indigenous defenders of these prized lands have been vilified and killed. During Bolsonaro’s first three years in office, the Amazon lost 8.4 million acres of natural forests.
Lula brought deforestation of the Amazon down to its lowest levels, and those gains were reversed under Bolsonaro. Source: Brazil’s National Institute for Space Research / Vox.
The Amazon is about 10 times the size of France. In sum, about 17% of the Amazon rainforest has been gutted – if this number reaches 20-25%, the tropical ecosystem will be decimated, threatening millions of people and animals who depend on it. The Amazon is the world’s most biodiverse habitat and includes 14% of the world’s birds and 18% of its vascular plants. The tree count is 390 billion - twice as many as that of the United States. Approximately 20% of all of the world’s freshwater is in the Amazon - our farms in California’s central valley or New York’s upstate regions are irrigated by - you guessed it - The Amazon. This piece of land produces the world’s oxygen, stores its carbon, and holds untold public health benefits.
Now that Lula has defeated Bolsonaro to take over once again, the Amazon will also receive a second chance at life. “Instead of being world leaders in deforestation, we want to be world champions in facing up to the climate crisis and in socio-environmental development,” Lula said. “That way we will have healthy food on our plates, clean air to breathe and water to drink and lots of quality jobs with green investment.”
Bringing all this back home - elections - whether local or global - matter. This is your weekly PSA to get up, get involved, and get to the polls. Election Day here in the US is on November 8, and early voting across New York has already begun. Whether it’s the local ballot measure for the $4.2 billion Clean Air, Clean Water and Green Jobs Bond Act or the race for our state’s governor and legislature, your voice matters. Exercise it!
Events This Week:
♴ Microplastic Madness: Film Screening and Panel Discussion: Tue, Nov 1
🏙 Building a Sustainable Future: Opps & Challenges in Real Estate: Tue, Nov 1
📈 ClimateTech Founders Summit: Tue & Wed, Nov 1 & 2
⚖️ Info Session: How NYC can Catalyze a Just Transition: Wed, Nov 2
🦆 Urban Biodiversity: A Transatlantic Dialogue: Wed, Nov 2
🤖 Hybrid Physics-Machine Learning + AI for Climate Modeling: Thu, Nov 3
💡 Converge on Climate: Fri, Nov 4
🍻 First Friday Climate Meetup: Fri, Nov 4
👩🔧 Women in Communications & Energy Conference: Fri, Nov 4
🧥 Sustainable Fashion: Clothing Swap & Panel Discussion: Sat, Nov 5
🎨 Civic Art Lab 2022: Sustainability and Design Lab: Sat & Sun, Nov 5 & 6
For The Early Birds:
🌊 Urban Ocean Stewardship: Wed, Nov 9
🌎 DERTfest: Thu, Nov 10
🏞 Governors Island Climate Solutions Center Community Brief: Mon, Nov 14
👩💼 NYC Meetup for Advertising and PR Pros, with Clean Creatives: Tue, Nov 15
🍺 Green Drinks Brooklyn: Wed, Nov 16
⚡️ Cornell Energy Connection: Fri, Nov 18
✍️ Pratt Design Symposium: Designing for Sustainable Innovation: Wed, Nov 30
♴ Microplastic Madness: Film Screening and Panel Discussion
When: Tue, November 1, 5:00 PM – 7:00 PM EDT
Where: The Forum at Columbia University, 601 W. 125th Street, New York, NY 10027
Microplastics Madness is an optimistic take on the local and global plastic pollution crisis as told through an urban youth point of view, with an inspiring message to take action. The production follows a group of 5th graders who spent 2 years investigating plastic pollution by taking on the roles of community scientists, leaders, and advocates. This special event between the Columbia Climate School, Barnard Sustainability, and Cafeteria Culture, the creators behind the film, will start with a screening, followed by a dynamic discussion with a diverse panel of scientists, educators, and students.
🏙 Building a Sustainable Future: Opportunities and Challenges in Real Estate
When: Tue, November 1, 6:30 PM – 8:30 PM EDT
Where: Columbia Alumni Center, 622 W 113th Street, New York, NY 10025
Join the Columbia Alumni Global Sustainability Network and the Real Estate Network of the Columbia Alumni Association for Building a Sustainable Future: Opportunities and Challenges in Real Estate. Enjoy a lively discussion, followed by Q&A and a networking hour.
📈 ClimateTech Founders Summit
When: Tue, November 1 & Wed, November 2, 10:00 AM – 4:00 PM EDT
Where: Online
2030 seemed so far when the Sustainable goals were set up, but fast forward to today, and we’re only 93 months away from the climate goals once set out to achieve a more sustainable, healthy world for everyone. With a steady increase of the industry, from innovation to funding, now more than ever, it’s time to take our community along for the ride with us!
⚖️ Citizens' Assembly Info Session: How NYC can Catalyze a Just Transition
When: Wed, November 2, 6:30 PM – 8:00 PM EDT
Where: Interference Archive, 314 7th Street, Brooklyn, NY 11215
The current economic and political systems are laying waste to our planet, and fracturing our social relationships at the same time. We need a plan to restart our economy in a way that is not only sustainable, but just. Our allies are fighting hard for a Green New Deal, and we applaud their dedication. But what would Extinction Rebellion’s “Green New Deal” look like? It would include the demand for a Citizens’ Assembly! Politics as usual is not working - we need something different. Learn how a Citizens’ Assembly is a mechanism for change - and how bottom-up participatory democracy can reclaim local politics. It’s more important than ever that everyday people across the city join together in fighting for the future we want. Showing up for each other today, builds a stronger tomorrow.
🦆 Urban Biodiversity: A Transatlantic Dialogue
When: Wed, November 2, 6:00 PM – 8:00 PM EDT
Where: NYU School of Law, Snow Dining Room, 40 Washington Square S, New York, NY 10012
Though seemingly at odds with one another, a wide variety of living organisms and habitats exist in and around dense urban areas. With more than half of the world’s population now living in cities and the urban footprint steadily growing, policymakers must think about how to protect the biodiversity that remains within urban areas and how to make our cities more hospitable to wildlife in the future.
🤖 Adventures in Hybrid Physics-Machine Learning + AI for Climate Modeling
When: Thu, Nov 3, 3:00 PM EDT
Where: Columbia Innovation Hub Room 202, 2276 12th Avenue, New York, NY 10027
Low cloud forming turbulence is a key source of climate model prediction uncertainty that, despite seeming unapproachable to simulate on planetary scales, could soon come into computational range with hybrid machine learning methods. We will discuss a chain of recent work that has tried to outsource explicit computations within “multi-scale” climate models to simple neural networks. The focus will be on the unsolved challenge of controlling stubborn prognostic error growth in such hybrid AI climate models and especially the emerging potential of physical renormalizations to achieve “climate invariance.”
🍻 First Friday Climate Meetup
When: Fri, Nov 4, 7:00 PM - 8:30 PM
Where: Blue & Gold Tavern, 79 E 7th St, New York, NY 10003, USA
This Friday in the East Village, is the monthly First Friday Meetup for people working on climate!
👩🔧 Women in Comms & Energy Conference
When: Fri, November 4, 6:00 PM – 10:00 PM EDT
Where: 258 East 3rd Street New York, NY 10009
We are thrilled to announce that the Fall 2022 Women in Communications and Energy Conference will take place at Con Edison's headquarters in Union Square in Manhattan. Registration, breakfast, and networking will begin at 8:30 a.m., and programming will begin at 9:15 a.m. Please reach out to info@wiceny.com with any questions you may have prior to the event.
💡 CONVERGE on Climate 2022
When: Fri, November 5 and Sat, November 6 from 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM
Where: Location with RSVP
Meeting of the Minds
CONVERGE on Climate gathers those of us who don't always spend time together, but should. Engage with founders, product leaders, scientists and academics who are looking to explore, build or deploy technology to help our planet flourish.
Join us for 2 days of field-leading speakers, roundtable discussions, workshops and invaluable networking. Enjoy food, drinks, and as much genius you can handle (or bring).
🧥 Sustainable Fashion: Clothing Swap & Panel Discussion
When: Sat, November 5, 2:00 PM – 7:00 PM EDT
Where: 220 East 23rd Street, Suite 400, New York, NY 10010
Join us on Saturday, November 5th for a fall/winter clothing swap at Starta! Freshen up your wardrobe for Fall and meet the trendsetters of sustainable fashion! Gift your clothes a second chance at life by swapping them with someone else. We will be hosting a panel discussion on sustainable fashion followed by a clothing swap. Where do the leftover items go? We will work with our partners to either donate the items or make sure they are properly recycled.
🎨 Civic Art Lab 2022: Spaces | Sustainability and Design Lab
When: Sat, Nov 5, 11:00 AM – Sun, Nov 6, 7:30 PM EDT
Where: Saturday's talks are virtual. Sunday events are held in-person throughout NYC
This year’s Civic Art Lab explores the notion of contested spaces through the lens of sustainability, creative placemaking and placekeeping. As it pertains to this year’s theme, a contested space can be a site of resistance, social activism, art, urban design, remembrance, and more. Many ephemeral sites of environmental and social movements have grown into brick-and-mortar community gathering places, public green spaces, safe spaces, and sustained places of protest. In a global political climate that increasingly disregards the urgency of sustainability and humanitarian challenges, Civic Art Lab 2022’s two-day lab incorporates virtual presentations and in-person NYC-based tours of locations at the center and margins of community-driven sustainability and action. Civic Art Lab is a pop-up gallery and workshop space hosted by GreenspaceNYC.
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Volunteer
We're excited to grow the Climate Tech community in cities across the globe - starting right here in our hometown of New York! 🗽 What started as an 8-person mid-pandemic outdoor dinner has since morphed into a 2,500+ strong and ever-growing group of rockstars trying to change the world. We're looking for volunteers to help us expand our programming into a full roster of community-wide meetups, subject-specific events, mentorship programs, site visits, and more. We aim to be a community resource - built for and by our community. Share your thoughts and we look forward to working with you!