The study of atmospheric science includes the prediction of weather and climate change as well as their impact on society. Designed to provide an understanding of the fundamentals of atmospheric science at the local, regional, and global levels, this course covers the nature, composition, and structure of the atmosphere, its interactions with other parts of the Earth, and the major chemical mechanisms controlling the occurrence and mobility of air pollutants in the atmosphere. Course topics also include global atmospheric composition, ecosystems, living organisms, and environmentally important atmospheric species such as greenhouse gases, stratospheric ozone, acid precipitation, urban smog, and air toxins.

This class will explore the foundations of avifaunal biology and ecology using a combination of hands-on classroom and in-the-field experiences. Classroom content includes physiology, anatomy, and morphology of birds. The fall migration of birds in North America is an epic and often tragic event. Sampling birds in migration has resulted in foundational understandings about stopover habitats, species-specific energy budgets and has helped realize the complete life cycle of hundreds of species. We will enter the field and participate in actual ornithological research, explore avifaunal ecology through birdwatching, and meet with regional leaders in the ornithological field.

This interdisciplinary course combines bicycle design, engineering, and service learning to provide students with a comprehensive understanding of the history, evolution, and impact of bicycles on society and the environment. Through hands-on projects, community engagement, and class discussions, students will develop bicycle design and engineering skills, gain practical experience and exposure to bicycle repair and maintenance, explore the impact of bicycles and related technologies on society and the environment, and understand the role of bicycles in sustainable urban mobility and planning.

An advanced design studio for the MSD-EBD program that synthesizes the conceptsand techniques of environmental building design. Topics and materials for the studio are developed in Arch 752: EBD Research Seminar, and summarized in a research report at the end of studio.

This course examines ethical questions that arise in the context of the practice of medicine, biomedical research, the development of medical technologies, and the management of public health. These questions concern not only healthcare professionals and their patients, or researchers and their subjects, but also citizens interested in how government policy shapes health outcomes. In addition to standard bioethics topics like abortion, euthanasia, research ethics, and biotechnologies, we will also discuss health-related ethical questions around disability, race, and climate change.

Humans have an enormous impact on the global movement of chemical materials. Biogeochemistry has grown to be the principal scientific discipline to examine the flow of elements through the global earth systems and to examine human impacts on the global environment. This course will introduce and investigate processes and factor controlling the biogeochemical cycles of elements with and between the hydrosphere, lithosphere, atmosphere and biosphere. Students will apply principles learned in lectures by building simple computer-based biogeochemical models.

This course provides an introduction to community organization and community capacity building. The course encompasses strategies, models, and techniques for the creation of organizations, the formation of federations of existing organizations; and coalition-building, all designed to address problems requiring institutional or policy changes or reallocation of resources to shift power and responsibility to those most negatively affected by current socio-economic and cultural arrangements. The course emphasizes development of strategies and techniques to organize low-income minority residents of urban neighborhoods, and to organize disenfranchised groups across geographic boundaries as the first required steps in an empowerment process

The course provides students with an understanding of building design simulation methods, hands-on experience in using computer simulation models, and exploration of the technologies, underlying principles, and potential applications of simulation tools in architecture. Classroom lecturers are given each week, with a series of analysis projects to provide students with hands-on experience using computer models. This course is required and reserved for MSD-EBD students.

What makes buildings livable and buildable. After the initial concept design and massing studies are complete the next step is detailing. This seminar will examine the detail, how they can inform and enhance a building's design. The primary goals of a building is that it stands up to external forces, protects inhabitants from the elements and provides a healthy environment. This course will look at the individual components of structure, skin and systems. More importantly though, it will examine the connections between them. The class will begin with lectures examining the different systems and then progress into applying these ideas as a whole to individual studio projects. The final results of this course will be a 3D wall section with accompanying details. These details will be developed in a variety of software as chosen by the student. Recommended options are Revit, Rhino, AutoCAD.

This course focuses on the social and environmental responsibilities of business that may extend beyond profit maximization. In 2019, the Business Roundtable composed of leading chief executive officers of U.S.-based companies released a statement that resurrected and reinforced interest in this view. This view contrasts with a traditional approach famously expressed by the economist Milton Friedman that "the social responsibility of business is to increase its profits." Although Friedman acknowledged normative side constraints to the profit motive--namely, a need to conform to the "basic rules of the society, both those embodied in law and those embodied in ethical custom"--he did not see business as playing a central role in the creation and sustenance of these "basic rules." As this course will explore in depth, Friedman's view has been challenged by various competing views of business purpose, such as in normative stakeholder theory and the related idea of "shared value" The profit-maximizing view of business purpose is the one most frequently modeled in business school classes. But if business firms are conceived as social institutions that can themselves affect the "basic rules of society" rather than simply taking them as given, then the question becomes how business can or should do so. Take, for example, the global challenge of climate disruption treated in this course. Business operations are surely "part of the problem" in the sense of being the source of the production and release of large quantities of greenhouse gases every year. But can and should business also become "part of the solution"? If so, how? Do business firms have an ethical, if not a legal responsibility to minimize their own carbon footprints or other externally harmful actions? When social or environmental priorities collide directly with the profit motive, how should these competing mandates be properly reconciled? Similar questions may be asked (and touched on in this class) about other social challenges in the world today, including democratic values, poverty reduction, fresh water supplies, and global health issues affecting those less able to pay for life-saving drugs and medical services.

Carbon dioxide capture and sequestration has recently emerged as one of the key technologies needed to meeting growing worldwide energy demand while simultaneously reducing carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere. The objective of this course is to provide a quantitative introduction into the science and technology of carbon dioxide capture and sequestration. The following topics will be covered. General CO2 chemistry as it applies to capture and sequestration. Applied thermodynamics including minimal work and efficiency calculations for separation. CO2 separation from syngas and flue gas for gasification and combustion processes and the potential for direct air capture. Transportation of CO2 in pipelines and sequestration in deep underground geological formations. Pipeline specifications, monitoring, safety engineering, and costs for long distance transport of CO2. Comparison of options for geological sequestration in oil and gas reservoirs, saline aquifers, and mineral formations. Environmental risk assessment and management. Life cycle analysis

We are entering an era of growing water infrastructure failures and remaining "legacy" water pollution challenges. Fortunately, a network of global water CEOs from water utilities, industry and engineering consulting are leading the water sector towards innovative change. They are finding solutions at the intersection of science, engineering/technology and policy and paving the path forward for our water industry and our global water resources. This short course is led by the former CEO of Philadelphia Water and the Chair of the Leading Utilities of the World Network. Professor of Practice Howard Neukrug will lead a series of discussions on: (1) a brief history of water infrastructure systems in the US and the paradox of how our water resources have been used, valued, and priced over time; (2) a specific focus on the past 50 years of Philadelphia's efforts to meet the challenges of the Clean Water Act and Safe Drinking Water Act through leadership in the legislative, regulatory, management, and policy and research arenas of the water business; and (3) personal interviews with key water leaders on their greatest challenges past and future and how they are managing change and innovation towards more sustainable water systems in the 21st century.

A good idea is not enough - developing innovative and sustainable projects in cities requires understanding "how to get things done." Developing projects to promote sustainability in major US cities requires sensitivity to the political and operational context within which cities implement innovative initiatives. Cities and Sustainability uses Philadelphia as a case study to explore the issues confronting modern American metropolises as they look to manage their resources and promote environmentally friendly policies. URBS 417 will introduce students to leading Philadelphia practitioners of sustainability and municipal projects. Students will be given the tools to politically, economically and critically analyze various sustainable policy initiatives across the United States.

This course covers the levers within government (policy, regulatory agencies, legislation) and outside of government (communities, businesses, NGOs.) Any organization in pursuit of either a new energy technology or a decarbonizing one must understand and engage with these entities. To meet our net-zero goals in time, we must scale up deployment for deep decarbonization in parallel with the annual removal of gigatons of carbon dioxide from the accumulating pool in the atmosphere. There are, however, multiple barriers to deployment: high costs for first-of-a-kind technology demonstrations; lack of policy frameworks across the broad portfolio of approaches that enable nth-of-a-kind technologies to become universally affordable; and a lack of public acceptance of energy technologies in environmentally impacted communities. That said, by following the path from inception to application to deployment, we will unpack the multiple levers of governance required: the relationship between a vote, a bill, and, ultimately, a law. We’ll dig into the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and the Inflation Reduction Act, explore existing policy levers like 45Q (a tax credit and direct pay that can line up financing to capitalize 2nd- and 3rd-of-a-kind demonstrations). We’ll discuss the impact of non-governmental organizations, how think tanks can drive change, how communities can be engaged. Finally, we will examine the risks and benefits of technology demonstrations within communities: how regional resources, population density, availability of land and water impact the siting of projects; what legacy and future environmental justice impacts might result.

This course will cover some fundamental topics in Climate Sciences, while also teaching how to program & work with big data in Python.We will analyze big climate data (output from the newest generation climate models CMIP6 and NASA satellite datasets) remotely on a National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) supercomputer.

This course aims to engage undergraduate students at Wharton with fundamental questions at the intersection of climate change, environmental management, ethics, and leadership. Important questions we will address include: (1) What can we learn about leadership from being in “the environment” or “the field” that we cannot as easily learn in other settings? (2) What does it mean to be a leader in the area of climate change and environmental management at a for-profit business firm? A non-profit organization? A social enterprise/benefit corporation? Within this overarching theme of environmental and climate leadership, the course examines a concrete set of timely topics through readings, discussions, guest speakers, and written assignments, including: environmental management and a circular economy; product stewardship; extended producer responsibility; environmental personhood; greenwashing; and the different types of firms and organizations in this space, including for-profit corporations, benefit corporations/social enterprises; and non-profits. The course begins with five traditional classroom sessions on these issues with traditional assignments and readings run and graded by Professor Light. The culminating event of the course is a Leadership Venture – an expedition that combines both “being in the environment” and visiting an organization that is engaged in climate and environmental leadership.

Climate change might be the defining challenge of our times, with a wide range of effects on financial markets and the broader economy. At the same time, financial markets play an important role in financing the transition to a net-zero economy, and incentivizing firms and investors to adapt their strategies. In this course, we examine how climate risks—both physical and regulatory—affect firms, financial markets (including equity, bond, insurance, and carbon markets), and markets for energy and real estate. We also examine the role that firms’ disclosures and third-party information sources play.
We start with discussing physical and transition risks from climate change. We then study the pricing and hedging of climate impacts and risks in equity, debt and real estate markets. We apply these insights to carbon markets. Because financial markets are shaped by the information that is available to market participants, we investigate the impact of ESG reporting and rating agencies, including the costs and benefits of regulating ESG reporting and the impact of greenwashing. In the second part of the course, we study how governments and private investors finance investments in climate technologies. Here, we discuss various financial instruments that have been developed to address climate-change concerns. Given the enormous importance of electrification as a pathway towards a low-carbon future, there is special emphasis on renewable energy finance and economics. We end the semester with the latest evidence of how climate risk has affected insurance and energy markets, and how they shape decisions inside organizations, such as spin-offs, hedging, and the structure of executive-compensation contracts..

Climate change is happening right now! Climate change is a hoax this is normal variation! Climate change is something we can worry about in 50 to 100 years, no need to worry about it now. On an almost daily basis we are bombarded by mixed messages about climate in the media. Who is right? What is the truth? This course will examine the cryosphere and build on the previous Climate Certificate courses CLCH 160 Oceanography and CLCH 220 Atmospheric Science to better understand Earth's climate system. We will explore past climate, how we know what that climate was like, and how and why we believe it has changed. We will then examine current evidence for climate change (sea level rise, loss of glacier mass, changes in weather systems) and critique various climate models. Once the class has a good understanding of the science behind climate change we will examine potential impacts in various parts of the world. Finally we will examine climate policy in the US at the federal, state and local level and in various parts of the world.

This course will present the science of climate change, the impacts of climate change, and the opportunities and obstacles for avoiding climate disasters. We will identify and evaluate the application of planning tools and strategies to achieve the mitigation of climate change and adaptations to climate change. Students will understand the causes and effects of climate change and how to implement and evaluate mitigation and adaptation responses through regulations, financial incentives, infrastructure investment, design techniques, and technology. Emphasis is on climate action planning to create resilient communities.

Climate change presents an imminent threat to social and ecological systems and a fascinating set of legal and governance challenges. This course explores the institutions and policy tools available for responding to these challenges, with emphasis on the political economy and distributional consequences of action at various scales. After an introductory unit on the science and politics of climate change, the course examines potential and actual legal and policy responses at the local, state, federal, and international levels; the possibility and limits of addressing climate change via litigation and private governance; the social and racial justice implications of climate change and climate change policy; and the ways in which multi-scalar regimes fit together in a complex and contested legal tapestry. Seminar sessions will be heavily discussion oriented. Grades will be based on a combination of writing assignments and class participation, including student presentations and a simulated climate diplomacy exercise.