Sustainability

George Mason earns solid gold in sustainability

Lauren Reuscher — Thu, 06 Jun 2024 13:56:18 +0000

George Mason earns solid gold in sustainability Lauren Reuscher Thu, 06/06/2024 - 09:56

For its commitment to campus sustainability, ��AV has earned a Gold rating in the STARS (Sustainability Tracking, Assessment and Rating System) Assessment. STARS is a self-reporting framework for colleges and universities to measure their sustainability performance and is offered by the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE). George Mason has received four consecutive STARS Gold ratings and was the first Virginia university to earn that rating in 2014.

George Mason earned a Gold rating in the STARS assessment for the fourth consecutive time, Photo by Evan Cantwell/Office of University Branding

STARS was administered by staff from University Sustainability and University Business Consulting. This year, George Mason demonstrated improvements in several performance categories, earning a total of 73.66 points. The university’s score increased 13% since the last assessment in 2021. The threshold for earning a Gold rating is 65 points, and George Mason is only 11.34 points away from earning the highest honor, STARS Platinum. Rankings are valid for three years.

Amber Saxton, program manager in University Sustainability, co-led the university-wide assessment with Minh Le, senior consultant in University Business Consulting.

“STARS recognizes what we are doing well, puts our sustainability planning and execution in context with peers nationwide, and helps us create a roadmap for continued improvement,” Saxton said. “Mason’s Gold rating reflects a comprehensive effort from stakeholders across the university, from research to operations.”

Sustainable purchasing is part of George Mason's STARS Gold rating. Locker room renovations for the men's soccer team included sustainable upgrades like lockers made from recycled content and responsibly sourced materials and energy-efficient lights. This project was supported by the Patriot Green Fund. Photo by Shelby Burgess/Office of University Branding

Consistent success in campus sustainability

George Mason has consistently earned high scores in the STARS categories for sustainable transportation programs, stormwater management, and academics and research. George Mason also scored highly in the innovation category for its on-campus gardens, food bank (the Student Support and Advocacy Center's Patriot Pantry), and sustainability project grant funds (Facilities’ Patriot Green Fund and the Institute for a Sustainable Earth’s new Mason as a Living Lab fund).

The on-campus gardens help Mason score consistently high in the innovation category on STARS. Photo by Evan Cantwell/Office of University Branding

High marks in these categories reflect the commitment of stakeholders across the university.

“Mason departments and colleges have prioritized sustainability as a strategic part of their performance criteria and benchmarks for progress,” said Greg Farley, director of University Sustainability. “Mason has set a goal to be the highest-scoring AASHE STARS school in Virginia by 2030, so University Sustainability and its partners will need to keep pushing forward.”

Measuring the culture of sustainability

This year, George Mason earned new points in the sustainability literacy and culture category for launching a survey to measure students' sustainability literacy, culture, and behavior. Recent graduate Nikita Lad, PhD Environmental Science and Policy ’24, and K.L. Akerlof, associate professor of science communication, administered the survey to a representative sample of undergraduates in fall 2022 and spring 2023.

“The survey measured what factors affect students' sustainability behaviors and whether their knowledge and behaviors changed through formal or informal programming during their college careers,” said Lad.

The theoretically informed survey model found that time spent on campus and informal program participation influenced students’ nature connectedness and norms, which in turn affected sustainability behaviors. Lad shared the research study through a webinar with other members of AASHE and hopes to collaborate with other universities on future iterations of the survey.

Through Bioblitz, the Mason Nation crowdsources the identification of species across campus. Photo by Cristian Torres/Office of University Branding

Bioblitz made an impact

George Mason earned new points in biodiversity this year thanks to Bioblitz, a crowdsourced assessment of plant and animal species on campus. Through an app, the Mason Nation helped identify and monitor endangered and vulnerable species around the university. In spring 2024, more than 500 biodiversity observations were entered into the Bioblitz app by 107 observers, documenting 273 species.

Bigbelly solar waste stations were recently installed across George Mason's campuses. Photo by Facilities

Moving toward zero waste

New efforts to improve waste diversion boosted George Mason’s score in that category. Facilities Management, University Sustainability, Auxiliary Services and Operations, and other campus partners worked to expand composting, reduce single-use plastics, and promote the use of certified compostable and aluminum products.

George Mason is expected to improve further in this category in the future, with the installation of new Bigbelly solar waste stations across its campuses, the development and implementation of new design standards for “zero waste” bins, the addition of glass recycling, and the future launch of a reusable food container pilot and paper towel composting.

Mason earned one of the highest STARS ratings among Virginia universities. As of April 2024, the University of Virginia earned 74.85 points, ��AV earned 73.66 points, and Virginia Commonwealth University earned 66.4 points. Participating institutions can earn points toward a STARS Bronze, Silver, Gold, or Platinum Rating, or earn the STARS Reporter designation.

Sustainability at George Mason

Topics

Sustainability

Campus News

Facilities

Greenhouse and Gardens Program

Patriot Green Fund

Mason as a Living Lab

Institute for a Sustainable Earth (ISE)

Strategic Direction

From an island in Korea to a leader for climate change in D.C.

Colleen Rich — Fri, 03 May 2024 17:44:55 +0000

From an island in Korea to a leader for climate change in D.C. Colleen Rich Fri, 05/03/2024 - 13:44

For Yoonseo Cho, a young STEM student from Jeju Island, the biggest island 50 miles off the coast of South Korea, going to college in the Seoul metropolitan area, was a dream come true. Being a pandemic generation student, however, her dreams of studying at a university were cut short, as she spent three semesters back home in Jeju Island persistently taking chemical engineering and landscape architecture classes.

Yoonseo Cho did one of her internships with the Green Climate Fund in Songdo. Photo provided

While volunteering at the Jeju Forum for Peace and Prosperity, she had the chance to see world leaders discussing the pressing issues of climate change and environmental policies. Her short interaction with Roland Wilson, associate professor of conflict analysis and resolution at Mason Korea, at the panels opened a new door of possibilities for her to become one of those leaders through Mason Korea.

Cho’s parents were the first to encourage her to transfer from her university to Mason Korea in Songdo, an hour away from Seoul. Their support motivated her to find a path to combine her original studies in chemical engineering and landscape architecture with global affairs. She especially saw potential career opportunities with the vaccine manufacturing facility expansion in the heart of Songdo.

Cho quickly adjusted to the American college setting. After a semester, she got involved with and became president of MK Green Patriots, a student organization that provides students with community service opportunities that promote sustainable campus life.

“In many cases, it is difficult to obtain leadership opportunities at a major Korean university since the student organizations have a longer history and rigid traditions,” she said. “While Mason Korea might be smaller in size, through my experience, I never doubted the output students created.”

Her journey in fostering climate change continued as she finished two internships before her junior year at the Fairfax Campus this year. As an assistant to the liaison officer at the Green Climate Fund, headquartered in Songdo, Yoonseo worked on various internal affairs that improved the transition for international employees to Korea. She also worked as a research intern at a green tech startup contributing to sustainable interior design solutions.

“I truly appreciated the efforts made by Mason Korea staff to produce opportunities for Mason Korea students,” she said. “As much as there is a smaller student-to-faculty ratio, there was a stronger bond, which allowed students to acquire opportunities in local firms and organizations that also represent a global audience.”

Cho is now a rising senior in ��AV’s Global Affairs Program and a greenhouse research intern for University Sustainability. She is excited to widen her scope of the world as an international student in the United States and to be at the frontline of environmental policy in Washington, D.C.

When asked what it means to be a Patriot, she said, “The intangible difference is being part of a diverse community, which not only includes students but also faculty members with different sets of values and ideas. Furthermore, the intangible is the mindset of going beyond taking classes and getting good grades; being involved in the community with a shared identity that can change the world around you.”

Mason Korea 10th Anniversary

Topics

Mason Completes Transformational Energy Action Plans for Virginia Communities

Andrew J Schappert — Tue, 30 Apr 2024 17:19:09 +0000

Mason Completes Transformational Energy Action Plans for Virginia Communities Andrew J Schappert Tue, 04/30/2024 - 13:19

In This Story

Paul Bubbosh

Request Schar School program information

Learn more about the Schar School

In a significant advancement for sustainable development, ��AV’s Local Climate Action Planning Initiative (LCAPI) announced the completion of comprehensive Energy Action Plans (EAP) for Henry County, the City of Danville, and the City of Martinsville in Virginia.

Paul Bubbosh: ‘These Energy Action Plans are a testament to what we can achieve together…‘ Photo by Buzz McClain/Schar School of Policy and Government

These plans, now accessible on the LCAPI website, “represent a pivotal step forward in the regional effort to embrace cleaner energy and ensure a resilient future for these communities,” said Paul Bubbosh, codirector of the LCAPI and an adjunct professor at the Schar School of Policy and Government.

The LCAPI, a collaboration between George Mason’ Schar School and the Center for Energy Science Policy (CESP) faculty and students, focuses on aiding Virginia municipalities in energy conservation, reducing costs, and bolstering community resilience against climate-related challenges. This initiative is particularly geared toward supporting vulnerable and marginalized communities across the state by helping them tap into state and federal funds for transitioning to reliable and affordable clean energy sources.

The development of the Energy Action Plans involved a meticulous three-phase process:

An initial research phase that involved studying the specific history and background of each municipality and identifying key stakeholders within the community.
A modeling phase where the university teams assessed the municipalities’ greenhouse gas emissions and other environmental and energy risk factors.
A community engagement phase that included public meetings with stakeholders to discuss, evaluate, and select strategic goals and actions for mitigating climate change impacts and managing rising energy costs.

These plans were crafted with close cooperation from local government officials and community members, alongside George Mason’s student teams, which brought together expertise from science, policy, and communication disciplines. The collaborative nature of this initiative has not only fostered a sense of shared responsibility but has also highlighted the practical applications of academic knowledge in real-world scenarios.

“��AV is committed to extending our educational and research resources to serve the community, especially those areas that are most in need,” Bubbosh said. “These Energy Action Plans are a testament to what we can achieve together: innovative solutions to urgent climate and energy challenges, improved air quality, and stronger, more resilient communities.”

The program is designed not to just be sustainable but replicable.

“As these newly developed plans take effect, they promise not only to reduce energy costs and lower emissions but also to serve as models for other regions aiming for sustainable development,” he said.

The ongoing efforts by Mason signify a proactive approach to environmental stewardship and community engagement, setting a benchmark for academic institutions nationwide.

Meet the Mason Nation: Kevin Brim

Lauren Reuscher — Wed, 24 Apr 2024 14:06:43 +0000

Meet the Mason Nation: Kevin Brim Lauren Reuscher Wed, 04/24/2024 - 10:06

Kevin Brim

Job: Recycle/Waste Management Supervisor, Facilities Management

Can I recycle this? At some point, anyone who has approached a recycling bin (or set of bins) with good intentions has asked this question, either aloud or in their mind.

Helping the community understand the parameters of recycling and composting is one of the biggest challenges in recycling and waste management, according to Kevin Brim, supervisor in Facilities Management at ��AV. “It can be confusing trying to decide what is recycling, trash, or compostable,” said Brim.

His team is working hard to change that.

Keeping it clean. Putting the wrong items in a recycle or compost bin can lead to contamination of waste streams. Brim and his colleagues in Facilities Management are making it easier for the George Mason community to recycle, compost, and properly dispose of items.

Waste no time. Brim knows he is part of something impactful, and interacting with the George Mason community is what he likes best about his job. “I’ve been at Mason for 18 years, and I learn something new every day,” Brim said.

Protecting the Earth isn’t a one-person job. Waste diversion efforts stretch across the university and rely on the involvement of many units—and the actions of individuals. Mason Facilities, University Sustainability, Mason Dining, and others are working to help George Mason reach its Zero Waste goal: diverting 90% or more of all waste items away from the trash through reuse, recycling, and composting.

Learning the ins and outs. Brim’s first job in George Mason Facilities was as a quality assurance inspector for the university’s housekeeping contract. Brim moved to the waste/recycle team in 2011, learning every aspect of the operation from the ground up. That knowledge and experience led him to his current role as the supervisor of that team.

Spreading the word. Brim takes pride in his team and how they help foster a culture of sustainability at Mason. “I ensure my team knows just as much as I do about waste and recycling here at Mason,” Brim said. His team’s interactions with others on campus help inform the community about the proper disposal of different items, protecting Mason’s recycling and composting streams.

It all comes back to serving George Mason students, according to Brim. “Students are the reason we are here, so they’re our target audience,” said Brim. “I’m always interested in hearing their input on what we can do better, or what they would like to see.”

Harnessing the sun. Expanded composting access is part of a long-term strategy to improve George Mason’s waste diversion rate. Brim’s team recently installed new Bigbelly zero waste stations on the Fairfax and Mason Square campuses, some of which include solar-powered, waste compacting compost bins. Brim’s team plans to install more Bigbelly stations, expanding their availability across all of Mason’s Virginia campuses.

Saving the scraps. Composting efforts will also increase in campus dining locations. “Mason Facilities is looking to expand our composting programs with all food vendors on campus, with a main focus on behind-the-scenes food waste,” Brim said. These composting streams are often easier to control, ensuring a clean composting product.

The glass is half full. This spring, George Mason launched a glass recycling program, with purple recycling trailers parked on the Fairfax Campus. Brim says the glass recycling program has expanded to collect glass bottles at catered events on campus.

“We will continue to divert as much away from landfill and incinerator as we can,” Brim said.

Reduce, reuse . . . relax. Outside work, Brim spends time with his wife of 33 years (his high school sweetheart), three adult children, five grandkids, and two dogs. “They all keep me pretty busy,” he said. Relaxing in the backyard tops the list, too. “It’s the little things in life,” Brim said.

Can I recycle this? Check out this guide to the university-wide waste streams at Mason.

Find out more ways to make a sustainable impact at Mason.

Learn more about Mason's Zero Waste goals

More about Sustainability at Mason

Podcast - Ep 58: What will become of the Amazon?

Damian Cristodero — Mon, 22 Apr 2024 14:19:56 +0000

Podcast - Ep 58: What will become of the Amazon? Damian Cristodero Mon, 04/22/2024 - 10:19

What will become of the Amazon?

Jeremy Campbell, associate director for strategic engagement in ��AV’s Institute for a Sustainable Earth, says that at its current pace the vast Amazon rainforest, in five to 10 years, could pass a tipping point in which it could transform into grasslands. That process, fueled by deforestation and climate change, is a threat to the biodiversity and socio-cultural aspects that define the region, and has global implications as well. In this fascinating conversation in recognition of Earth Month, Campbell explains to Mason President Gregory Washington the magnitude of what the loss of the Amazon rainforest would really mean, and how the Institute for a Sustainable Earth in on the front lines in the region.

Where there used to be forest, you’re not going to get any more of that transpiration cycle, and so the drying isn’t limited to the places where deforestation happens. Where things are dry, things get hotter. And then when you add like we had last year with the horrible situation throughout the Amazon of an El Nino-induced heat spike and drought, then you have villages that rely on fish, rely on the rivers to get around because the rivers are the highways of the Amazon, who are literally stranded. So the drying out of the Amazon is a tremendous biodiversity challenge, it’s also a tremendous economic challenge. But it’s also a human tragedy that is taking tremendous costs on the people of the Amazon as well."

Read the Transcript

Narrator (00:04):

Trailblazers in research, innovators in technology, and those who simply have a good story. All make up the fabric that is ��AV, where taking on the grand challenges that face our students, graduates, and higher education is our mission and our passion. Hosted by Mason President Gregory Washington, this is the Access to Excellence podcast.

Gregory Washington (00:26):

The Amazon Basin, which holds the world's biggest river rainforest and a fifth of its fresh water is running dry. That was the news in the Washington Post recently. The New York Times went even further citing a study that says the Amazon rainforest could transform into grasslands in the coming decades because of climate change, deforestation, and severe drought, such as the one the region just experienced. Jeremy Campbell is a cultural anthropologist who studies land conflicts and environmental change in the Brazilian Amazon. He is also the associate director for strategic engagement at Mason's Institute for Sustainable Earth. Since 2020, Dr. Campbell has served as the president of the Society of Anthropology of Lowland South America. That's an international scholarly organization that advocates on behalf of peoples and environments in Amazonia and beyond. In this Earth Month, I am thrilled that Dr. Campbell has given us an opportunity to engage. Welcome Dr. Campbell.

Jeremy Campbell (01:44):

Thank you so much Dr. Washington. It's a pleasure to be here.

Gregory Washington (01:47):

Well, it's great to have you. So let's get right to the bad news.

Jeremy Campbell (01:51):

Yeah, let's do it.

Gregory Washington (01:53):

According to the Times and the study that was produced by an international team of scientists and published in the Journal Nature, the collapse of all or part of the Amazon rainforest would release the equivalent of several years of global emissions, possibly 20 years’ worth, into the atmosphere. Give us a template or an understanding for how that actually happens.

Jeremy Campbell (02:19):

Sure. It's complex inherently because the Amazon is, is a very complex region. But to understand what's really going on, you have to really appreciate the size and the immensity and the complexity of the Amazon, which I think for most North Americans, certainly me growing up, I didn't really have much of an understanding other than maybe the, uh, back of the cereal box image of the canopy rainforest with monkeys and toucans and things like this. But you know, the Amazon is vast. It's the size of the lower 48 United States. Yeah, the Amazon Basin is that big.

Gregory Washington (02:51):

The Amazon Basin is the size of essentially the US minus Alaska and Hawaii.

Jeremy Campbell (02:58):

You got it. That's it. It's amazing. Yeah. Not only that, there are nine different nation states that share a portion of that basin going around from Bolivia in the southwest up to Peru, Ecuador, Columbia, Venezuela, Guiana, Surinam, French Guiana, which is an overseas part of the French Republic, so it's part of Europe, it's part of the EU. And then of course Brazil is the lion's share about 70% of the basin. You mentioned Dr. Washington, your stats are good. Your research is good that the Amazon is the world's biggest river by water discharge. Yes. But if you look at the top 20 hydrological discharges rivers in the world, six of them are tributaries of the Amazon. So you've got seven of the top 20 rivers in the world. Right. In that region. Okay. So it is a region that is so immense and so complex to say nothing of the diversity of different river types.

Jeremy Campbell (03:49):

You have black river systems, you have clear water systems, you have white water systems. The subbasins are very complex. What that all adds up to is with this immense area, with immense amounts of water, it is big enough to generate its own weather. And so when we talk about the tipping point, the looming tipping point that actually our departed colleague Tom Lovejoy coined that phrase back in 2018. It's the idea that the neotropics, the subtropical system that is the Amazon is in danger of phase shifting from a robust complex rainforest to something like a Savannah, a grassland, or even in some cases something more like the Sahel region of Northern Africa

Gregory Washington (04:35):

That's near desert.

Jeremy Campbell (04:35):

That's near desert. Exactly. And so how can that happen?

Gregory Washington (04:38):

Now, now let's, let's put it in perspective. You're talking five years, we're talking five decades, or we're talking 500 years? What are we talking about?

Jeremy Campbell (04:49):

Great question. So back in 2018, when Dr. Lovejoy and his colleague Dr. Carlos Nobre from the University of Sao Paulo, published in Nature, the first warning about the tipping point, they estimated what it would take to get to the tipping point is a gross deforestation of approximately 20 to 25% of the land in the entire basin. That was in 2018. At that time, about 18% of the basin had been deforested. Flash ahead six years we're at about 20% of the basin has been deforested. So depending on the projections, and depending on what we might be able to do to put the brakes on deforestation, we might be looking at a tipping point in the next five to 10 years. And again, to put that in perspective, you have the wettest place on earth, some parts of that place becoming a savanna due to deforestation,

Jeremy Campbell (05:40):

but the other crucial part, we can handle deforestation. It's difficult, but we can handle it. The other contributing factor to the tipping point is climate change. And that we're locked into in terms of warming that's affecting the Amazon. The Amazon is warming faster than other regions. It's already warmed 1.3 degrees Celsius since 1980. And it's on an upward trend. That means that some parts of the Amazon are getting wetter, especially the northern parts of the Amazon. But other parts of the Amazon within the global climate system are getting far, far drier. And that's irrespective of seasonal anomalies like an El Nino or a La Nina, which intensify things even further as we know. So you have deforestation cutting down trees that make their own weather through transpiration and evaporation. The Amazon is big enough to, through the transpiration process, there's literally rivers flying above your head.

Gregory Washington (06:39):

That much water.

Jeremy Campbell (06:39):

That much water. Exactly. And those rivers basically follow the trade winds that come from Senegal, from Cape Verde in Africa, and those winds pick up moisture over the South Atlantic. They pick up all the moisture at the Falls of the Amazon near the city of Belem. And then all of that goes kind of in a southwesterly direction towards the Andes. And the Andes is 20,000 feet high. So what happens when air hits that barrier?

Gregory Washington (07:04):

It turns into ice and snow.

Jeremy Campbell (07:05):

It turns to ice and snow. Some of it turns left, which is to say south and southeast and irrigates, South America's bread basket where most of South America's wheat in Argentina, soy in Paraguay and Bolivia and Brazil is grown. And then of course, cattle and pig operations. South America's economy over the past 20 years has been based on the export of commodities in the agricultural sector to East Asia. You turn off the spigot, which is the Amazon hydrogeological cycle, and you're going to see some drying out of that bread basket as well. And so the Amazon plays a crucial role in the global climate system sequestering carbon, we can get into some of the numbers for that if you like. But it also plays a key role in the hydrological and geochemical cycling beyond its borders in South America, which then has implications for global trade and for wellbeing of people who, you know, we've got 8 billion of us on this planet.

Gregory Washington (08:04):

That’s exactly right

Speaker 3 (08:04):

Hungry souls, right?

Gregory Washington (08:05):

You got more than 8 billion. So climate change is affecting that way. I was also reading in the same Nature article where they were talking about the drought significantly reducing the depth in a number of the rivers and slso causing tremendous warming of the waters in some of the lakes. I think they talk about one of the lakes, I think it's pronounced Tefe

Jeremy Campbell (08:30):

Tefe. Yah, that's in Brazil.

Speaker 2 (08:31):

Yeah, where the temperature had reached 40 degrees Centigrade. For those of us who are challenged on that system, it's 104 degrees Fahrenheit and you had large pods of dolphins over 150 of 'em, these freshwater dolphins that perished. 'cause the water got so warm. So that meant other water life didn't live either. If you major and if you major living, eating and living off and using the sea life that's right in that water for commerce, you probably saw some changes there as well.

Jeremy Campbell (09:09):

Sure. And for subsistence living, I've done a quite a bit of work over the past 20 years with indigenous and other traditional peoples in the Amazon. And you're absolutely right. The stresses caused by climate change and by deforestation, which really do interact with one another dynamically to push us ever closer to that system change, that phase change from a stable system where water gets recycled to one where, you know, when you cut down a tree and around 20% of the forest is gone now, you are drying out that soil. You are drying out that part of that region. And basically the southern strip of the Amazon has been converted to pasture and cities in the past 40, 50 years. Where there used to be forests, you're not gonna get any more of that transpiration cycle. And so the drying isn't limited to the places where deforestation happens, where things are dry, things get hotter.

Jeremy Campbell (10:01):

And then when you add, like we had last year with the horrible situation in Lago Tefe, but all throughout the Amazon of an El Nino induced heat spike and drought, then you have villages that rely on fish, rely on the rivers to get around because the rivers are the highways in the Amazon who are literally stranded without the ability to get to major cities, the without the ability to get healthcare. So the drying out of the Amazon is a tremendous biodiversity challenge. It's also a tremendous economic challenge in the ways we just talked about, but it's also a human tragedy, and it's taking tremendous costs on the people of the Amazon as well.

Gregory Washington (10:41):

Wow. This is a pretty significant outcome. I've always wanted to get a better understanding of the impact that the Amazon can have on the planet in terms of a losing of substantial portion of it. What do you think that will do to the rest of us? So let's say if we lost, let's make it a big number, 50%. What are we talking about relative to what the rest of the globe will feel?

Jeremy Campbell (11:10):

Well, the catastrophic loss of biodiversity, let's take that first, because the Amazon is estimated these are our best guesses.

Gregory Washington (11:18):

I know. I look, I understand.

Jeremy Campbell (11:19):

I mean, it's …

Gregory Washington (11:20):

But your guess is a scientific guess.

Jeremy Campbell (11:24):

Well, that's right. That's right.

Gregory Washington (11:25):

And that's better than me putting my index finger in the air and saying, you know, about, okay, so.

Jeremy Campbell (11:31):

Right, right, right. And so, yeah, for the sake of argument, if we lose half of the rainforest, then I think we're definitely, even though there was some quibbling when Dr. Lovejoy and Dr. Nobre said tipping point will be reached at 25% deforestation. There was some pushback against that. But if we get to 50%, we're definitely seeing a phase change. We're gonna be seeing savannization, we're gonna be seeing the loss of endemic species diversity in the affected valleys. Again, the Amazon is the name we give to the river that goes west to east. But there are huge river systems that go north south and south north that feed that Amazon. And each one has its distinct biodiversity profile and has also distinct sociocultural properties, different social groups who speak different languages. And so, depending on what happens valley by valley, region by region, we could be experiencing a catastrophic loss of biodiversity.

Jeremy Campbell (12:22):

What goes along with that, of course, is part of the mystery of life. Part of what makes us human is that we share this planet with other creatures. And so even before we're able to describe them scientifically, you would see thousands, if not millions of species being pushed to the brink of extinction. Of course, many minds would go towards the opportunity value or the, or the opportunity lost to develop medicines or to develop new technologies based upon things that we don't know, that we don't know in the Amazon, because it is such a biodiversity library. Library is also a good metaphor. Uh, and it's actually a metaphor that's used by my indigenous colleagues when deforestation or drought spikes and begins to challenge and affect indigenous lands. My indigenous colleagues describe that as the libraries of their people burning. Because the trees and the animals and the plant life are part of the traditional knowledge system. Part of how you make your way in the universe, know your place in the universe, find medicine, find food, find stories to pass down to the next generation. And so deforestation plays a sociocultural role in terms of challenging culture's ability to reproduce itself, right? And for people to continue to hold onto their languages and their traditional knowledges and medicines. Also, it's worth saying, because we're talking about climate change, that the system, the broader Amazonian system, sequesters roughly 200 billion tons of carbon dioxide, 200 billion tons. If we lost half of that, let's just go,

Gregory Washington (14:03):

Just cut it in half.

Jeremy Campbell (14:04):

Really gross numbers here, exactly. A hundred billion tons goes into the atmosphere, poof, just like that. We, as the United States of America, the world's second largest emitter emitted 4 billion tons of carbon last year. So that's 25 years’ worth of our emissions.

Gregory Washington (14:21):

Okay, so now we start to get an understanding of the magnitude exactly. Of what this loss can actually mean for us. And that's kind of what I wanted people to kind of grasp. Wow. It's a big number.

Jeremy Campbell (14:36):

It’s a big number. And again, the loss of biodiversity. I mean, here in the United States, we're comfortable. We plug into our cell phones, we plug into cable news, whatever it is, it can feel like the Amazon's far away. But some major drugs have been developed based on traditional ecological knowledge and biodiversity. In the Amazon, for example, the very first drug that treated malaria quinine or quinine, right? Quinine is based on, uh, derived from the bark of a tree in the Amazon. And so that's kind of a big deal, right? There are others. There are,

Gregory Washington (15:09):

And there probably, you know, as we start to, uh, for lack of a better way of putting this, use AI and other tools to look at the pharmaceutical benefits of natural extracts from plants and from plant life and all throughout the planet, but particularly that in the Amazon, we're gonna discover many more.

Jeremy Campbell (15:31):

That’s right, that’s right. So we're putting at peril future discoveries, we're putting at peril a big chunk of the mosaic of life and the big chunk of sociocultural diversity. Part of the bad news in the Amazon is in part the attitude that outsiders have taken and continue to take that understanding the region as a place where you can get rich quick, right? So I, I hear you, and it would be great if we could develop something that would be that elixir, but what the trick would be to develop that drug or develop that therapy and make sure the proceeds stay with the people of the Amazon. Because unfortunately, the more that we study the Amazon, and I've been working there for 25 years, there is chapter after chapter of economic boom that is all about getting a particular commodity out. First it was rubber.

Jeremy Campbell (16:21):

The world's rubber supply was limited to the Amazon basin because it's native to the Amazon basin. So during the industrial revolution of the late 1800s, all the world's rubber came from the Amazon. So that resulted in actually a really bad impact on the Amazon, because rubber is hard to extract. You have to physically cut the trees and collect the sap. So basically slave labor, uh, indigenous peoples were enslaved other peoples from throughout the Americas were taken in and dropped into the Amazon by their bosses and forced to work in really terrible kinds of conditions. And that all basically flamed out when the British, during the British Empire, Grand Britannia, stole some rubber trees and began a rubber plantation in Malaysia, which allowed for other markets and other sources to open up for rubber. Then you get a gold boom, similar kind of extraction, where profits are extracted, leaving behind very little in the region itself. I would argue that the cattle and soy boom that's happening right now is similar. We have 50 million people living in the Amazon, 50 million individuals, 40 million of them live in cities. A lot of people don't understand that either, right? The Amazon is a highly urbanized place.

Gregory Washington (17:34):

Interesting.

Jeremy Campbell (17:34):

There are cities of 4 and 5 million people, but they are very low on the human development index because they are the sites of factories or farms or these sorts of things where labor and environmental protections are looked askant at or really not enforced. And people are getting by as best they can. And the investment that goes to the area, because it is an incredibly rich area, tends not to stay in the area. That's a key piece of this too. The environmental and social sustainability of the area depends on economic sustainability as well. I believe that crucially, you gotta have all three pillars, uh, all three legs of that stool. And that's a key piece that we really do need to be figuring out.

Gregory Washington (18:17):

Well, that brings me to my next question, because recently it was announced that the governments of Brazil and France announced a plan to invest 1.1 billion in the Amazon over the next four years to protect the rainforest, right? Now on first blush, anytime you hear the word billion, you think, wow, it's a lot. But there was a part of me that says, given what you just told me now, it didn't seem like that much money for a region that vast. Now it's also been reported that Brazil has contemplated allowing oil exploration t certain parts of the Amazon as well. So, Can you talk a little bit about these plans and what your thoughts are relative to success?

Jeremy Campbell (18:58):

Absolutely. Yeah. So it is good news that donor countries like Germany, like Norway, like France, like the United States, actually, the United States has pledged just under, I think around seven 50 million to the Amazon Fund, which is an international, it's based in Brazil, but it's an international scoped fund to try to set up conservation areas to set up sustainable business practices, to support community led conservation and all these sorts of things, which really are project by project wonderful examples of keeping the social, the environmental, and the economic flowing in the right direction. So that's to be applauded. But I think you're right. It's a drop in the bucket when compared to the potential revenues that Petrobras, which is Brazil's largest company, and the second largest petroleum company on the planet Sees when they look at oil exploration in the Amazon, and specifically in a place that is all in the news right now. Brazil has been investing in offshore oil drilling technology in the southern part, uh, near Rio, near Sao Paulo.

Jeremy Campbell (20:06):

But a lot of oil has been found just where the Amazon River empties into the Atlantic. It's called the Falls of the Amazon. And so they are moving ahead quickly to begin to develop that area. And we're talking, if it's 1.1 billion that the French and the Germans and the Norwegians have pledged for doling out projects over the next couple years, we'll see 200, 300 multiples of that when it comes to the oil revenue based upon what's there in the offshore area. So the question then is, is that a good idea? Does that not

Gregory Washington (20:37):

Well, we, well, well, we can tell you that it's not a good idea once you have a spill. Uh, but the reality is, my fundamental philosophy on deposits of hydrocarbons in the ground is that people are going to develop 'em. To the extent that we develop technologies for mitigation, we need to, The reality of the situation is until the planet forces us to stoP, man will pull those hydrocarbons out of the ground and we'll burn them.

Jeremy Campbell (21:08):

I tend to agree with you, provided that it isn't too expensive to get them out. There has to be an economic kind of motivator. And right now, at least for the foreseeable, we see oil selling at a high enough level to justify those offshore investments, which are in the billions themselves To get started. But I absolutely agree with you. And so then I think if we're realists about it, we need to think about mitigation. We need to think about, okay, with those tax revenues going into the public coffers of Brazilian nations or multicultural corporations, what is the dividend that needs to be paid forward to the Amazon to make sure that the commitment to climate change that you're getting by pumping those hydrocarbons outta the ground can be mitigated with the peoples and places? Here's a, a moment of hope, guarded hope next year in November of 2025, so 18 months from now, Brazil will be hosting the 30th meeting of the Convention of the Parties, COP, so COP Paris,

Jeremy Campbell (22:07):

Right, The Paris Agreement, et cetera. Copenhagen, Brazil and other Amazonian nations are eager, very eager to appear to be doing right by the Amazon, which they understand to be simultaneously a globally important asset, but also their particular sovereign ground, right? So Brazil, Brazil is not interested in any, in the UN or the US coming in and taking it over, right? But they are interested in a COP or in a huge international meeting being able to tell a good story about what they're doing. And so if they're gonna move ahead to your point, right? If they're gonna get those hydrocarbons out of the continental shelf, off the Falls of the Amazon, when everyone knows that, right? What can they do when they're up there on that stage to say, this is what we're doing to make sure that the Amazon is not gonna be the victim of these or other kinds of economic development schemes?

Jeremy Campbell (23:02):

And so many of the people that I work with are pressing hard, both publicly and quietly in the back halls of power in Brasilia and other Amazonian capitals to make sure there can be some kind of, okay, if you're gonna do this, or you're gonna continue with agriculture as well, 'cause we could talk about deforestation, right? We need to have some real commitments, some measured commitments, and a plan on how to get there when it comes to putting the brakes on deforestation, protecting human rights, protecting biodiversity, and really investing in the potential there that's in the Amazon.

Gregory Washington (23:33):

That leads me to my next question, and let me make it a little more specific. So what would you like to see in a response to outcomes like this, right? Not just from the Brazilian government, but from other governments in the United Nations. From the United States for crying out loud, right?. So what would you like to see in terms of a, a response?

Jeremy Campbell (23:56):

So I think that the United States and the Brazilian government and all governments, and for that matter, NGOs and consumers, need to pay a little bit more attention to what's going on in the Amazon. And that's where I think getting some of that pretty basic, but often lacking context out there about the Amazon, that it is as big as it is, that it is really diverse. I mean, I, I don't think I mentioned this, but this is a good time to sort of say there's 300 different languages spoken in the Amazon.

Speaker 2 (24:27):

Really?

Jeremy Campbell (24:28):

Yeah, yeah, 300 different Amerindian languages to say nothing of the, the colonial languages, Spanish and Portuguese and French and and English, right? And many, many different kinds of societies. There are 2 million indigenous people. There are roughly 6 million Quilombola or Maroon communities. These are descendants of enslaved people who escaped slavery to the Amazon. A lot of people don't appreciate this, that Brazil was actually the destination of most enslaved Africans who were forced to cross in the middle passage.

Gregory Washington (25:00):

Is that for sugar primarily, or what was it?

Jeremy Campbell (25:02):

For sugar. For sugar in the Northeast and for coffee in the south of the country, right? And so enslaved people's fleeing for freedom would go to a place that was relatively uninhabited and set up their own communities called Quilombos starting in the 1600s, right? They would trade with indigenous people. Sometimes they would fight with indigenous peoples. But there were cultures set up, uh, Afro-Brazilian cultures set up that are thoroughly Amazonian and are thoroughly unique with their own cultural, religious, and subsistence practices. You have riverside communities as well, who are the descendants of, I talked about the rubber boom after the rubber bust when there was no more money in the very laborious production of rubber in the Amazon. The communities that were brought there, stayed there and basically hunted and fished and had a relationship with the environment. That was a very sustainable and interesting one. And so the Amazon, in addition to being an urbanized place, is also a place of tremendous social and cultural diversity. And it's a place of poverty, it's a place of corruption, it's a place of international crime. It's a place where all of this is happening. And so, as with any place, I mean, think again, it's, it's the size of the lower 48. Is there one policy solution to all the problems in the lower 48 United States?

Gregory Washington (26:20):

Of course not.

Jeremy Campbell (26:21):

So there are many different things that we need to think about that most of the time when we're in international audience, we just think climate or biodiversity or forest.

Gregory Washington (26:31):

Right. We just think, yeah, stop deforesting.

Jeremy Campbell (26:34):

Uh, and we need to That's absolutely crucial.

Gregory Washington (26:36):

No, I get it, I get it. But what I hear you saying is that it's more than that.

Jeremy Campbell (26:39):

Yeah. It really is. And so real partnership, real engagement, government to government or corporate or consumers needs to appreciate that diversity of the Amazon, needs to appreciate that Amazonian people have a lot to contribute to the world in terms of being stewards of the environment, in terms of the knowledge that they have and that they can share with us. But that, that has to be done in an equitable way. It's not the case that we can go save the Amazon from the United States, you know, like parachuting in. Their capacity is, is actually there in the region, but also the forces that are leading to its destruction are there in the region. Not to make this too political, but if you're in the United States and you're in higher education like you and I are, chances are you may be invested in a TIAA retirement account. Full disclosure, I've done research on this. I have the receipts, but they're not the only ones. Okay. So don't get at me, TIAA, please. They've invested, and subsequently, once this came to light, they divested, but they were investing in ranch properties on recently deforested land on the edges of the Amazon. And so, in other words, they were good investments, these ranches were accruing in value. But I didn't know, and maybe you didn't know that your own retirement is vested in, you know, deforestation.

Gregory Washington (28:01):

This is, this is the very first time I'm hearing about it. Wow.

Jeremy Campbell (28:04):

People are concerned about meat. And they should be, because it was the case in the 1980s and 1990s that Brazil was exporting meat grown on deforested land to the United States. That has stopped. So it's actually not the case that we should go after McDonald's for selling Amazonian beef in the United States, 'cause they don't. But that beef is going to China, so the rest of the world is engaged in benefiting from the Amazon's destruction. But the rest of the world can also show up in solidarity with the people who are the true stewards of the land, who are the indigenous and traditional people.

Gregory Washington (28:41):

The, the reality is, is the people who are there trying to survive as well, right?

Jeremy Campbell (28:47):

That’s right, yep.

Gregory Washington (28:47):

And it's hard to tell them, hey, make a change in your lifestyle now and suffer now, starve now so that somebody in America or some other country could have a better quality of life, 10, 20, 30 years from now, right? And that's what makes it hard and a little self-serving when we sit here.

Jeremy Campbell (29:13):

Yeah, right. I'd agree with that. And, and that actually brings to mind something that you ask how the US or how outsiders could engage. And one thing that I think we can do is support sustainable commodity chains, right? So verifiable chains of value that begin in the Amazon, and maybe the product goes to the United States, maybe just goes to urban Brazil or urban Argentina. But the majority of that profit gets reinvested in the local community. It does not get captured by a middleman or by the urban retailer, but instead it really gets returned much like shade grown coffee, you might think of that, right. It's not a good example for the Amazon, but you probably have heard, and maybe you've enjoyed acai, the wonderful super fruit from the Amazon, right? Yeah. Well, it is really wonderful and it's, it's a great way for the Amazon to be exported all throughout the world. But 90% of the economic value chain of acai rests outside the Amazon. Only 10% rests in the actual cultivation of the Amazon. So that needs to be switched, right?

Gregory Washington (30:22):

Not surprised by that, right.

Jeremy Campbell (30:24):

Yeah. Yeah.

Gregory Washington (30:25):

So talk to me a little bit about Mason's Institute for Sustainable Earth and how it's involved with what's going on in Amazonia.

Jeremy Campbell (30:32):

So we, at the ISC, the Institute for a Sustainable Earth, are involved in a lot of different projects with partners in the region, but we're also supporting a lot of really talented Mason faculty who are working on a variety of issues. And really what we try to do, our kind of theory of the case that the ISE, is to bring together teams that are interdisciplinary to do research that can be of impact, be of consequence, right? And so along those lines, I actually had the privilege of convening a high-level international symposium, I guess is the best way to to think about it, back in January of 2023, where we went to the Smithsonian Mason School of Conservation up in front Royal, spent a couple days really hashing out the priorities for international interdisciplinary research that includes communities that valorizes and really platforms scientists working in the region at Brazilian Peruvian Bolivian institutions,

Jeremy Campbell (31:38):

right so that it's a real partnership as opposed to, uh, global northern institution coming in and making the discoveries or taking the credit. And it was really eye-opening. We came out, we published a, a paper, basically a white paper, laying out what some of the big priorities are, and also where we want some of the funding mechanisms to go, whether it's agency funding for research or corporate funding or foundation funding for conservation, how that needs to be thought about and maybe redistributed in the context of the tipping point in the context of we have 10 years to make as much progress as possible with halting deforestation, with supporting the human right and dignity of Amazonian peoples with building socio, bio economy value chains that return economic investment to the region without cutting down the forest.

Gregory Washington (32:36):

So Tom Lovejoy coined that tipping point phrase in 2018. What progress have we made since then?

Jeremy Campbell (32:44):

Overall, we have done a good job since 2018, getting the word out. People are tuned into the Amazon more today than they have been, I would say since the 1988, 1989 forest fires grabbed the headlines and made the cover of Time Magazine. Remember Time Magazine?

Gregory Washington (33:01):

I do.

Jeremy Campbell (33:01):

So that was, that was a big deal, right?

Gregory Washington (33:03):

That that was. So for those of you who don't know who Tom Lovejoy is, he was a world-renowned faculty member and Mason professor. And he was studying, spent a good bit of his life studying biodiversity in the Amazon, and would often take groups of very wealthy and very famous individuals, whether were actors and actresses. And I saw what Leonardo DiCaprio and

Jeremy Campbell (33:32):

That's right. Mel Gibson.

Gregory Washington (33:34):

Mel Gibson, Cameron Diaz, and all of those people, Angelina Jolie, he would take them right into the Amazon to learn what you and I are talking about right now.

Jeremy Campbell (33:46):

That’s right. And so Tom's

Gregory Washington (33:47):

And to physically see the diversity and to see the wildlife that was there.

Jeremy Campbell (33:53):

It makes such a difference to be up close and personal. And Tom knew that Tom understood the power of the forest and the power of making that connection with the wildlife and with the people of the Amazon. And so

Gregory Washington (34:06):

Are we still doing that now, or has that subsided with Tom's passing?

Jeremy Campbell (34:10):

We are still actively engaged as a mason community with the Forest Fragments project that he was basically his brainchild and which is under the care of one of our partner organizations, the Amazonian Institute for Research. We actually have a graduate student that is funded through an ISC grant doing research right there where Tom Lovejoy took Angelina Jolie and, and Tom Cruise. We've had regular check-ins. We have one of our colleagues, Dr. David Luther, continues to do research there. And Tom's legacy really has been putting that part of the Amazon on the map. I think it's inspired a whole lot of consciousness raising in the English-speaking world about what's going on in the Amazon. And so what we're trying to do at the ISE is press that forward, really press that legacy forward.

Gregory Washington (34:58):

I got to spend a lot of time with Tom before he passed, and just one of the nicest people on Earth. I hate it we lost him so soon.

Jeremy Campbell (35:06):

He's a towering figure still, for some reason, the phrase science diplomat comes to mind, right, 'cause he was thoroughly a scientist.

Gregory Washington (35:15):

You would routinely, when I would have these meetings at his home, which was extraordinarily modest, right? It's such a Tom Lovejoy home, right? But you would routinely have the ambassador from Brazil or some dignitary from some foreign country. Some industrial leader.

Jeremy Campbell (35:34):

Or a World Bank president.

Gregory Washington (35:36):

A world bank president. Yeah. You’d routinely have those individuals at his home as well.

Jeremy Campbell (35:41):

And as you say, he was so modest, so humble, but so passionate and singularly focused that the story about the Amazon got out there. And in addition to being a, an incredible advocate and a bridger of dialogues and a diplomat, he was also a brilliant scientist. But also the whole debt for nature idea where impoverished nations would have some of their debt forgiven in exchange for conserving areas and keeping them pristine. That was his idea, right? So I mean, practical applications that have really left their mark on the world.

Gregory Washington (36:17):

And it's better and it was better than writing the debt off, right?

Jeremy Campbell (36:20):

That's right. That's right.

Gregory Washington (36:21):

No, outstanding, outstanding. So talk to me a little bit about your research. What is it you do, what are your next steps?

Jeremy Campbell (36:30):

Yeah, great. Thank you for that. I, as I said, I'm a cultural anthropologist and I've been working with native people and other traditional riverside communities who are really taking the lead in defending their own lands. The phrase for this is forest defenders, although it goes by lots of different names depending on the language you're speaking. But it entails physically defending land from loggers, from miners, from government agencies that might want to do something different with the land. And doing so not only through the physical demarcation, but through political alliances, with non-profits, with advocacy organizations, with researchers. My role specifically has been in helping the sociocultural and environmental mapping of these areas so that there can be some translation of traditional ecological knowledge that's associated with a landscape into a kind of language that maybe an ecologist or a politician might understand as well, right? And so it's really fascinating, the interplay between the kind of ethic of responsibility to lands and non-humans and waters that an indigenous person has, and how that lines up with how an ecologist sees the interaction and interdependence of species and the abiotic world and, uh, climate, et cetera.

Jeremy Campbell (37:54):

And so I sit at that node where indigenous peoples are organizing for their own defense, facing an existential threat, but helping connect them with data, with science, with storytellers, so that they can tell those stories. And I'll give you an example. The people that I've been working with for the past 10 years now, the Munduruku, have been tremendously successful in demarcating lands that were slated for, to basically to go to the bottom of a lake, a reservoir, that was going to be behind the world's second largest dam. But they stood up and organized themselves and protected their sacred land, protected the relationships that they have with non-humans. And were able to shelve that dam and have become sort of a real inspiration to other indigenous and traditional societies throughout the Amazon, standing up to not just dams; and dams, we can have a debate about whether that's green power, whether it's not.

Jeremy Campbell (38:47):

But what they were really standing up to do was to stand up and say, we're here. I’m moved by their courage and the courage of others like them who stand up. And we see it with indigenous peoples here in, in North America as well, who stand up and refuse to say we are in the past, who refuse that may be social expectation that whether it's assimilation or you've given up your culture, that the expectation that indigenous people are, are no longer among us. And the Munduruku and others in the Amazon are standing up and saying, we're here and we know how to steward these lands. We know how to make sure that the biogeochemical cycles and hydrological cycles continue. They wouldn't say it in those terms, but the terms that they would use would be about balance, reciprocity, relationship with the forces of life that course around us.

Jeremy Campbell (39:43):

So the ecology and the traditional learning really go hand in hand. And then we get them to policy through making arguments, through communication strategies, through raising awareness. There's a big push that I'm part of, and that the ISE is part of and supporting to try to preserve 80% of the Amazon by 2025. Now that's next year, we're not quite there. About 50% of the Amazon is officially protected, whether you're talking about national forests or national parks or indigenous lands, about 20% of it is deforested and urbanized, which leaves 30% up for grabs. And we're not gonna get there next year through a stroke of the pen to lock up the other 30% of it. The task here is to raise awareness and to, even in the 30% that remains, make sure that whatever happens to it, it's sustainable. That we don't see it kind of a zero-sum game. It's either a park or a paved cityscape right. There can actually be sustainable, thriving, living landscapes with people in them whose economic models are not based on extraction and destruction.

Gregory Washington (40:54):

How much time do you spend in Brazil?

Jeremy Campbell (40:55):

Well, I've got two small kids, so not as much as I used to. I'm sure you know how that goes. ... 9-year-old twins actually. Boy, girl twins. They keep me busy. But I'm down there once or twice a year usually to check up on research and to engage my research partners, but also to create new opportunities for Mason. I mentioned we've got some great faculty here that are working. We've got, uh, David Luther who works on birds. We've got Louise Shelley in the Schar School who works on transnational criminal networks, which is a big thing in the Peruvian, Colombian, Brazilian Amazon. So I've been working with her a little bit on sort of how to have conversations about rule of law and cross-border diplomacy when it comes to not just drug trafficking, but get this trafficking of species, trafficking of huge fish, the pirarucu, which is a fish that can grow up to 50, 60 kilos that is caught in Brazil, and then brought into Colombia illegally to feed an urban frontier in Colombia and, and Peru.

Jeremy Campbell (41:56):

So money laundering, drug trafficking species, et cetera, Louisehas been doing some really great work with the IUCN on traceability. You got Mike Gilmore, who's working in Peru on anti-road demonstrations and building a biocultural corridor with the Maijuna people. So I don't just go to Brazil, that's where most of my research is, but I'm also working with Mason faculty, trying to connect them better and, and really get their research out into the community and the community present in what we do here at Mason, so. I used to live in Brazil. I lived in Brazil for three years. So I have dear friends and colleagues and family, so I wish I could get there more, but we've got good stuff going on here too in Fairfax.

Gregory Washington (42:39):

So your award-winning book, “Conjuring Property: Speculation and Environmental Futures in the Brazilian Amazon,” gives a good sense of the conflict between indigenous land rights and the corporate colonization of the land for agriculture, for ranching, for mining, and for deforestation that goes along with that. So can you talk a little bit about the book? Give us a sense of how this all plays out in actuality.

Jeremy Campbell (43:10):

It's not unlike, if you think about sort of the 19th century story of the United States, this whole idea of manifest destiny, that the western part of the continent was for the taking of the proud, ambitious pioneer, usually white, the bro, the white man, right?

Gregory Washington (43:28):

The, the few, the bold.

Jeremy Campbell (43:29):

Exactly, right. So Brazil, it's a very different country than the United States. I don't want to suggest that it's the, the same, but it is continental in scale and in size. And often it has at different key moments in its history likened itself to the United States. And so there was a kind of manifest destiny moment in the 1950s and 60s where the Brazilian government, which at the time was a dictatorship, encouraged people to leave the coast of Brazil and move into the Amazon, which in the popular imagination was the next frontier. It was empty. It was a place where you could go and make something of yourself. So there was a ton of propaganda. There was a ton of kind of social engineering to try to move the vast majority of the Brazilian population, which due to it being a colonial export colony, lived along the coast, lived along the places that were close to ports.

Jeremy Campbell (44:25):

The average Brazilian thought of the Amazon as completely empty. The average Brazilian thought of it as a place where if I go and clear the forest, what I'm doing is improving the forest. What I'm doing is I'm making something where there is nothing, this terra nullius kind of idea. And so the book really traces how in the 21st century that idea continues to play out with both rich Brazilians and relatively impoverished Brazilians coming into the region and buying into and reproducing a kind of idea and ideology of the land belonging to them and their being no indigenous people there, and how they actually use land speculation and access to capital and access to political influence to undo some of the conservation and indigenous rights protections that were placed into law in the 1988 Brazilian constitution. So Brazil, as I mentioned, was in a dictatorship in the 1960s coming out of the dictatorship, had some of the most progressive environmental and human rights legislation and constitutional provisions of anywhere in the planet. But we've seen a backslide since then. And so the book really does explore that backslide and, and explore some of the social, political and environmental effects of this idea prevalent in Brazil, but again, I would say it's, it rhymes with what we have in the United States of there being no indigenous people there and it being the nation's goal to fill up this empty space with progress, and then how that motivated people's activities. It's the story that I tell in that book.

Gregory Washington (46:08):

So, uh, you have a friend in Brazil, Alessandra Korap, I, I believe the name is, who is part of one of Brazil's indigenous nations, who you have quoted saying that the resistance from the indigenous population to those who would exploit the Amazon is a fight for all of us. I think I know where this is going. But talk to me about a fight for all of us and what exactly does fight mean?

Jeremy Campbell (46:37):

Alessandra Korap is an amazing person, so I absolutely want to answer your question, but if I can paint just a quick portrait of her. She stands all of maybe four foot one, but has the fight of a thousand people in her. She is 28 years old, a law student, basically went to law school from her village, grew up in a village in the middle of the recesses of the Amazon rainforest, has gone to law school to learn how to fight with the master's tools for the rights of her people. And so when she talks about all of us, what she means, I think, is really in three different registers. First is people like her, indigenous people who have been sidelined, who have been written out of existence, who have been bulldozed. Second, the entire world's population, because she understands, as her elders do, and as her brothers and sisters do, that the work that the Munduruku are doing and, and the other indigenous people are doing, not just in the Amazon, but throughout the world.

Jeremy Campbell (47:47):

Here's another statistic. Indigenous people occupy and manage roughly 23, 24% of the world's terrestrial surface, where 80% of the world's biodiversity can be found; untold, name your metric of environmental service, whether it's clean water or wooden fiber, or carbon sequestration. So the work that indigenous people do, managing actively managing landscapes like the Amazon actually has a global benefit for all humans. So that's the other, all of us. The third all of us is non-human creatures, which for the Munduruku and many Amazonian people are literally relatives, literally brothers, sisters, uncles, cousins. And so there's that depth of compassion and empathy for the freshwater dolphins that you mentioned that literally baked or boiled alive in those warm waters. In Lago Tefe, she sees, Alessandro Korap, sees her advocacy on behalf of her people, on behalf of non-human relatives, and on behalf of all of us, even people, all of us humans, even people who might be her enemy. And so there's a kind of Gandhi-like, uh, stance or a Dr. King's stance to love even the person who would cut you down. That's what Alessandra Korap brings. It's not just me as a good friend and colleague of hers, but she received the, uh, RFK Leadership, Humanitarian Leadership Award two or three years ago. She's been to Switzerland, she's been to Germany, she's been to New York a couple times, really being an international sensation when it comes to advocating for the rights of her people and the rights of nature.

Gregory Washington (49:23):

As we close, talk to me about your level of optimism that we can avoid the worst consequences of the Amazon Basin.

Jeremy Campbell (49:31):

I am cautiously optimistic. My optimism meter goes up a point or two or several points. When I think about the indefatigable work of somebody like Alessandra Korap or other indigenous leaders who, unlike me, I, I have the luxury of being able to be in the thick of it but then come home, right? I can come home to Fairfax, I can come home to the United States. For Alessandra and for Ailton, the struggle's never ending, and they are positive. They are optimistic.

Gregory Washington (50:02):

That's amazing.

Jeremy Campbell (50:04):

They know that the world that they're giving to their children and their grandchildren is a better one, even though it is existentially threatened. So I think we all have to take our lead or, or take their lead and fall in place to do what we can to be innovative, to be a science diplomat in the model of a Tom Lovejoy, and to really try our best. I do think it's inevitable — here's just the caution part — I do think it's inevitable that 20, 30 years from now, the Amazon will be different because the world will be different, right? We've baked in a certain level of warming, we've baked in a certain level of anthropocenic and anthropogenic changes. But from the indigenous perspective, the world already ended in 1500 and has been ending in lots of different kinds of ways, and transforming in lots of different kinds of ways throughout all of that time. You know, 90% of the indigenous people who lived in the Amazon, there were 10 million there in 1500, 90% of 'em died, were gone by the time of 1600, right? So they know a lot about resilience, they know a lot about adaptation. They know a lot about bouncing back. And so I think we can take some inspiration from their lead in that respect, knowing though that the Amazon will be changing, we can nevertheless try to mitigate those changes and adapt to the new situation as it unfolds.

Gregory Washington (51:22):

Well, let's hope we can stay on the right track

Jeremy Campbell (51:25):

Here. Here.

Gregory Washington (51:25):

Jeremy Campbell, associate director for strategic engagement at ��AV's Institute for Sustainable Earth. Thank you for a great conversation.

Jeremy Campbell (51:38):

Thank you, Dr. Washington. It was a pleasure.

Gregory Washington (51:40):

I am Mason President Gregory Washington saying, until next time, stay safe, Mason Nation.

Narrator (51:49):

If you like what you heard on this podcast, go to podcast.gmu.edu for more of Gregory Washington's conversations with the thought leaders, experts, and educators who take on the grand challenges facing our students, graduates, and higher education. That's podcast.gmu.edu.

Access to Excellence Podcast Episodes

Podcast — EP 63: The economic perceptions driving U.S. politics
December 11, 2024
Podcast — EP 62: What are the chances of intelligent life beyond Earth?
November 18, 2024
Podcast - EP 61: Can dirty coffee grounds be the key to clean water?
October 21, 2024
Podcast Ep 60 - Marking a decade of success at Mason Korea
August 6, 2024
Podcast Ep 59 - Cybersecurity and the global threats of tomorrow
July 5, 2024

In This Story

Gregory Washington

Topics

Access to Excellence podcast

Podcast Episode

Featured podcast episode

podcast

Institute for a Sustainable Earth (ISE)

Earth Day

College of Science

Sustainability

Sustainability Research

Amazon Rainforest

Office Supply Swap is a staple of sustainability at Mason

Lauren Reuscher — Thu, 18 Apr 2024 13:22:38 +0000

Office Supply Swap is a staple of sustainability at Mason Lauren Reuscher Thu, 04/18/2024 - 09:22

They say one person’s trash is another person’s treasure. On a college campus, that treasure could be a stack of three-ring binders or sticky notes collecting dust in the office supply closet.

The Office Supply Swap gives new use to unneeded supplies, conserving resources and supporting Mason's zero waste goals. Photo by Getty

Someone else might need those supplies—and need them urgently. Jessica Adams, assistant director of knowledge management for fiscal learning and engagement at ��AV, remembers when a former colleague approached her with a last-minute purchasing crisis. The department was hosting a conference and organizers realized the day before that they needed additional supplies.

The commonwealth’s supply vendor policies are not always conducive to last-minute purchases, according to Adams. “I offered what advice I could from my place in Fiscal Services and asked if she checked with other offices to see what supplies they had available,” Adams said.

This last-minute request sparked an idea that had been on Adams’ mind for quite some time: Mason needed an office supply exchange, where departments could quickly and easily seek out or repurpose extra or unused supplies.

Adams shared the idea with her colleagues on the Staff Senate, and it took off from there. The Office Supply Swap launched on Microsoft Teams in Spring 2023, thanks to the efforts of the senate and University Sustainability.

April Lopez, part of the Staff Senate’s Environmental Justice and Sustainability Committee, took the lead in creating the online community. Lopez has worked as an administrative assistant at Mason since 2019 in the Division of Special Education and disAbility Research in the College of Education and Human Development.

“We realized that with new collaboration tools like Microsoft Teams and an increase in familiarity with community groups like Buy Nothing, we could get this going with very minimal input and no additional storage space requirements,” Lopez said.

The supply swap is part of the larger Greener Mason Community on Microsoft Teams, where the Mason Nation can share ideas and collaborate on topics related to sustainability. Illustration by Getty

The supply swap channel is open to all Mason faculty and staff and sits within the larger Greener Mason Community on Teams, which covers a range of sustainability topics at Mason: recycling, plastics reduction, living landscape, and even environment and climate-related reading and listening recommendations. The group offers a place for the Mason Nation to connect and learn.

The rules for the Office Supply Swap are simple: faculty and staff post unneeded items on the Teams channel. If another department needs the items, they can comment and arrange pickup. If someone needs an item, they can ask if anyone has a surplus. All items must remain university property—personal items and personal use of items are not allowed. Technology and furniture items should not be offered in the swap; they should go through existing surplus procedures.

The supply exchange echoes one of Mason’s core values: We are careful stewards.

“There are financial savings in not buying new when there are things already at the university that can be reused,” Lopez said. Repurposing and reallocating supplies also supports Mason’s zero waste goals.

Adams is thrilled that the supply swap is thriving. “The idea needed to get to the right people, at the right time,” Adams said. “April Lopez is the real hero with execution. She has been the biggest catalyst in bringing the Greener Mason Community to life and has built it into what it is today.”

Lopez hopes that the project helps people recognize that small actions support sustainability at Mason.

“I hope that the Office Supply Swap helps us recognize the abundance we already have, even if we’re just talking about paperclips, three-ring binders, and suspension files,” Lopez said. “In our cabinets and desk drawers, we already have items that the university could use for years to come.”

Earth Month at Mason

More about the Staff Senate

Topics

Staff Senate

Sustainability

University Sustainability

Fiscal Services

Faculty and Staff News

Around Mason (E-Files)

A native food forest takes root on Mason’s Fairfax Campus

Colleen Rich — Mon, 15 Apr 2024 16:16:51 +0000

A native food forest takes root on Mason’s Fairfax Campus Colleen Rich Mon, 04/15/2024 - 12:16

There is a Chinese proverb that says “The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago. The second best time is now.” But what about a forest? Last fall, volunteers planted the beginnings of a “food forest” on ��AV’s Fairfax Campus.

Mason graduate student Sarah Roth gives a tour of the Foragers' Forest. Photo by Ayman Rashid/Office of University Branding

In November 2023, Mason students, faculty, and staff gathered to help transplant 1,700 plants of more than 50 native species into two groves near the stream behind Student Union Building I between Aquia Creek Lane and Patriot Circle, on what used to be the site of the Student Apartments, which were razed in 2018.

“We are planting America’s first campus-based native food forest dedicated to feeding both human and animal foragers,” said Mason professor Dann Sklarew of what has been aptly named the Foragers’ Forest.

And like most things in the university’s Living Lab, science helped drive many of the decisions, according to Mason graduate student and lead forest maker Sarah Roth.

Roth, who will graduate in May with an MS in environmental science and policy, is leading the project with Sklarew, a professor in the Department of Environmental Science and Policy, and University Sustainability Program Manager Doni Nolan, and with administrative support from Mason’s College of Science, Mason Facilities, and University Sustainability. The forest was also made possible with a grant from Amazon Web Services, which the university matched.

An artist's rendering of the Foragers' Forest. Image provided

Roth’s designs for the Foragers’ Forest are based on the work of Japanese botanist and forest ecologist Akira Miyawaki. Designed to create forest cover quickly on degraded land that has been used for such purposes as construction, Miyawaki’s method emphasizes using native plants and trying to reconstruct natural plant communities.

Roth said the Miyawaki method also emphasizes mixing the species in the planting and planting very densely—around three trees/shrubs per square meter—to mimic natural patterns of forest regeneration. The Foragers' Forest adheres to these principles by having a high diversity of plant species and mixed dense planting.

“We were surprised to see how many edible or food-producing plants are native to Fairfax County—strawberries, blueberries, black raspberries, hazelnuts, persimmons, oaks, hickories, and even American chestnuts,” said Roth. “We surrounded our tree clusters with a native meadow that will support pollinators and other meadow-dependent wildlife.”

Sklarew said the site also will serve as a new Living Lab space where students can experiment and “act local” to promote food security, wildlife conservation, climate resilience, and other opportunities to advance sustainability.

Faculty from the College of Science and other colleges are collaborating to identify both curricular and Mason Impact projects to use the space.

Pathways, seating, and signage will lead visitors to forage, learn about the site’s principles and propagation, and enjoy the scenery.

“We're excited to highlight Virginia's natural heritage and indigenous foods in this space,” said Roth, who saw Miyawaki’s forests firsthand during a recent trip to Japan.

The Foragers’ Forest joins a prestigious group: More than 3,000 Miyawaki forests have been successfully planted globally.

“What I love about this project is that it blends everything I’m passionate about: native plants, ecological restoration, and bringing people closer to nature,” said Roth. “Our future depends on us building spaces that serve people and wildlife, and we hope this offers a blueprint others can take and improve on.”

Roth began working as a landscape architect for Fairfax County's stormwater planning division this year. “I’m working to restore healthy forests as part of stream restoration projects. The Foragers' Forest project was integral to me making those connections with county staff.”

Laura Powers and Tracy Mason contributed to this story.

Did you know?

Sarah Roth received a Dean's Award from the College of Science for her efforts in building the food forest.

Get involved with the Foragers' Forest

Bioblitz helps capture Mason’s biodiversity

Colleen Rich — Wed, 08 Nov 2023 15:32:07 +0000

Bioblitz helps capture Mason’s biodiversity Colleen Rich Wed, 11/08/2023 - 10:32

��AV students are running around the campuses taking pictures of the flora, fauna, and fungi with their smartphones—sometimes in the dark—to capture the university’s biodiversity. They are trying to record as many species as possible with a focus on endangered species.

Mason student Sarah Jadlowski (right) helps out at a Bioblitz event on Wilkins Plaza.
Photo by Cristian Torres/��AV

It is all part of Bioblitz 2023, which is an assessment project that began during Sustainability Month in October and continues through Nov. 19. For the project, Mason is using the iNaturalist app, which helps streamline the documenting process and even drops a pin of the discovery on a campus map.

So far, more than 800 observations have been made by 84 observers documenting 385 species. There are 155 “identifiers” in the app, subject matter experts and others who assist with confirming species identifications.

“What's great about the iNaturalist app is you post a photo, and it suggests identifications,” said Doni Nolan, Greenhouse and Gardens program manager in the University Sustainability office, who is leading the project. “Then [the app] also has folks confirm the identification to make it research-grade level.”

Bioblitz is another way Mason is using its campuses as a Living Lab. Working with Nolan are environmental and sustainability studies majors Eden Anderson and Sarah Jadlowski.

A student documents a persimmon tree in the Innovation Food Forest on the Fairfax Campus. Photo by Cristian Torres/��AV

Anderson has used the app before. A huge fan of fungi, she first started capturing mushroom species on campus for an Environmental Science and Policy class, EVPP 408 Mushrooms, Molds, and Society, she took a few semesters ago.

“It’s been a really good mushroom season,” said Anderson, referring to some of the rain the area received in October. In the days after a rain, Anderson takes “mushroom walks” around the Fairfax Campus to see what fungi may have popped up.

“They can pop up quick, especially if it is humid,” said Anderson, who also forages mushrooms.

Anderson says the most unusual Bioblitz observation so far are jack-o-lantern mushrooms (omphalotus olearius), which are bioluminescent—with gills that glow green in the dark—and very poisonous.

Jadlowski is doing a moth survey of the Fairfax Campus as a project for her EVPP 480 Sustainability in Action class. She has attempted to lure moths out for a photo op in a variety of ways, including soaking a sheet in a diluted wine solution and hanging it near the Mason Pond with the hopes of capturing a moth “party.”

The survey is an attempt to see which parts of campus moths prefer with a longer-term goal—building a moth garden. But Jadlowski said campus bats will be the ultimate beneficiaries of any garden as they consume moths and other insects for their diets, and they are vulnerable pollinators.

Of 17 species of bats that have been recorded in Virginia, six are endangered, according to the Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources, with two of those species predicted to live in habitats near the Fairfax Campus. Protecting endangered species and their environments is a big part of the inventory. Nolan has made a list of Northern Virginia-specific endangered species they are keeping an eye out for, including the monarch butterfly.

The biodiversity assessment also ties into Mason’s Sustainability Tracking, Assessment, and Rating System (STARS) rating. In 2011, Mason began reporting its sustainability progress to the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education and earned a Silver rating. By 2014, Mason was the first university in Virginia to achieve a Gold STARS rating. Conducting the assessment helps Mason maintain its Gold rating and helps the university track the effectiveness of its sustainability efforts.

“We found monarch butterfly caterpillars on campus in several locations. Every year we have several patches in our gardens protected for them with the milkweed they prefer to eat,” said Nolan. “It was a focus [of Bioblitz] to identify endangered and vulnerable species and how the campus promotes those. So that was a big win for us.”

Learn about Sustainability at Mason

More Sustainability News

Campus Foragers’ Forest turns 1
October 23, 2024
George Mason earns solid gold in sustainability
June 7, 2024
From an island in Korea to a leader for climate change in D.C.
May 3, 2024
Mason Completes Transformational Energy Action Plans for Virginia Communities
April 30, 2024
Mason researcher measures troubles at the tap
April 29, 2024

This content appears in the Spring 2024 print edition of the Mason Spirit Magazine.

Mason-Led System Supports Crops and Environment

Rebecca Kobayashi — Tue, 07 Nov 2023 19:14:15 +0000

Mason-Led System Supports Crops and Environment Rebecca Kobayashi Tue, 11/07/2023 - 14:14

With support from the National Science Foundation’s Convergence Accelerator, a Mason team is designing a CropSmart Digital Twin—a public-facing decision support system that provides the crop farming industry with real-time data and optimal decision advice. The team’s goal is to help increase U.S. agricultural production by 40 percent while also cutting the country’s environmental footprint in half by 2050.

The CropSmart Digital Twin will measure data from machinery like this center-pivot irrigation system. Photo courtesy of Liping Di

Liping Di, director of Mason’s Center for Spatial Information Science and Systems, leads the multidisciplinary research team building scientific data modeling tools to take the guesswork out of crop management decisions. Di will work with researchers from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, Kansas State University, Purdue University, University Corporation for Atmospheric Research, and Mississippi State University, as well as end users from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and farms in the Midwest.

Learn more about the CropSmart Digital Twin

Business student’s summer internship is an opportunity to practice sustainability
July 31, 2024
George Mason earns solid gold in sustainability
June 7, 2024
Sustainability MBA elective matches student teams with partner companies
May 20, 2024
Meet the Mason Nation: Kevin Brim
April 26, 2024
Office Supply Swap is a staple of sustainability at Mason
April 19, 2024

Topics

Mason as a Living Lab

Lynn Tierney — Mon, 23 Oct 2023 16:53:59 +0000

Mason as a Living Lab Lynn Tierney Mon, 10/23/2023 - 12:53

In many ways, ��AV is a small town with a population of about 48,000. That’s a little bit bigger than Charlottesville, Virginia, which clocks in at 45,000.

Of course, this population isn’t all in one place.

The cherry grove by Mason Pond on the Fairfax Campus is part of the Living Lab. Photo by Evan Cantwell/Office of University Branding

In Virginia, Mason has campuses in Fairfax County, Arlington County, and Prince William County, and sites in Loudoun County and on Belmont Bay in Woodbridge. There’s a contingent of students and researchers in Front Royal. On the other side of the globe, Mason Korea is about to celebrate its 10th year in Songdo, South Korea.

Our award-winning faculty is dedicated to tackling the grand challenges of our time, which include issues surrounding sustainability. That dedication can be seen anywhere you set foot on a Mason campus, with our nearly 1,000 acres of land, waterways, forests, and buildings being used as a dynamic Living Lab for hands-on applied environmental research.

From the canopies of the trees in our accredited Level II Arboretum to the stormwater running into Mason Pond, from our Green Leaf courses to serving as home to the commonwealth’s Virginia Climate Center, our experts are conducting research locally that can and will have an impact globally.

In 2011, Mason began reporting its sustainability progress to the Sustainability Tracking, Assessment, and Rating System (STARS) from the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education and earned a Silver rating. By 2014, we were the first university in Virginia to achieve a Gold STARS rating.

In 2012, Mason committed to supporting the United Nations Global Compact, the world’s largest corporate sustainability initiative. The UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals also drive much of the work coming out of the university’s Institute for a Sustainable Earth (ISE).
And still, Mason aspires to do more.

Putting Research into Practice

Part of what’s driving the Living Lab research, according to Andre Marshall, Mason’s vice president of research, innovation, and economic impact, is the desire to integrate Mason’s research and academic strengths in sustainability with campus operations to mitigate Mason’s impact on the environment and be good stewards of the resources we have.

He sees the value of the campuses serving as a test bed and “demonstration avenue” to test the effectiveness of these solutions so that “they can become realized beyond just the ideation stage.” In fact, as Virginia’s largest public research university, such experimentation is a responsibility.

For Leah Nichols, executive director of ISE, the Campus as a Living Lab concept “puts Mason research into practice here at home and helps launch solutions that can have global impact.”
As a Living Lab, Mason aims to stimulate and support the development of new research and scholarship that use the campuses and their physical and socio-ecological structures for experimentation and education to develop and advance sustainability solutions.

The success of a Living Lab is not just in the testing but also in the approach and collaboration. There are many campus partners involved in this work, from Mason Facilities, the 10 schools and colleges, and 600 faculty members, to the University Libraries and a university- wide Sustainability Council.

Frank Strike, vice president of Mason Facilities and Campus Operations, says the vision to see our campuses as a Living Lab sprouted years ago, when teams recognized Mason had the internal expertise to find solutions to the university’s challenges right here, and that could additionally have an impact on the student experience.

“This benefits students who get another opportunity for a hands-on approach to their learning experiences by approaching the work across disciplines, which is a priority for Mason, and by sharing teaching models across programs and operations,” says Strike.

The streams around the Fairfax Campus are a critical part of the university's stormwater management system. Photo by Evan Cantwell/Office of University Branding

Water, Water Everywhere

Mason Pond is a popular place to hang out and the backdrop of countless graduation photos, but not many people realize that it is a critical part of Mason’s stormwater management.

“The stormwater channels that look like streams are the actual stormwater system,” says Mason researcher Jennifer Sklarew, PhD Public Policy ’15, a professor in Mason’s Department of Environmental Science and Policy. “The pipes outflow into those streams, and then everything goes into the pond.”

Sklarew is currently working with students on a hydro-power project, supported by the Patriot Green Fund, that will attempt to use that stormwater as a source of cleaner electricity by installing microturbines with battery storage at two sites on the Fairfax Campus.

The university just completed a stream restoration project that not only improved the flow of the waterways but also added asphalt sidewalks and some lighting so the campus community can enjoy the paths.

Project manager Deniz Callahan of Facilities says Mason faculty members were involved in planning early on and provided some advice and expertise. This included a list of native plants that could improve the health of the riparian buffer without introducing invasive species. There are also plans for a “foragers’ forest” to be established along the path.

But that is just the beginning when it comes to how Mason handles water resources on our campuses by using research and technologies that can be applied to the broader community.

At Mason Square, Mason Innovation Partners encountered a serious infrastructure issue that posed a frequent stormwater challenge for the area surrounding the new Fuse building. The existing county culvert was undersized and couldn’t handle the amount of stormwater that regularly comes through Arlington.

Replacing the culvert required precise coordination with the future building’s foundation design and intricate sequencing to control the constant flow of stormwater as it was diverted from the old culvert pipes to a new 12’ by 6’ box culvert.

Facilities also has an extensive list of mitigation protocols it applies, including illicit discharge detection and elimination and runoff control for the construction site and storms.

Pondering the Pond

Earlier this year, Mason graduate student Jamie Roth worked with the Patriot Green Fund and Facilities to purchase and install a weather monitoring station and trail cameras by Mason Pond.

Working with students in two statistics classes, Roth and others have been gathering data about the Yoshino cherry trees and the environmental conditions by the pond. Mason statistics students have collected and analyzed data on the bloom date of the cherry trees as a part of their coursework in STAT 490 Capstone in Statistics and STAT 634 Case Studies in Data Analysis and have integrated it with Mason’s local meteorological data. As a result of their work, the variations can be tracked over time to build a more accurate model for the bloom date of the cherry trees at Mason.

This research builds on the international Cherry Blossom Prediction Competition, which Department of Statistics professors Jonathan Auerbach and David Kepplinger help organize annually. This competition assembles data on the peak bloom date of cherry trees all around the world from Kyoto, Japan, to Vancouver, British Columbia.

“We hope to use the long-term data on Mason’s cherry trees to raise awareness and bring the concept of climate change closer to home,” says Roth.

Smart hives are just on of the ways Mason's honey bees play a role in the Living Lab. Photo by Sierra Guard/Office of University Branding

Buzzing with Activity

Since the Honey Bee Initiative was launched in 2013, the project has led to a large number of innovative teaching and research projects and public–private partnerships.

A multidisciplinary team of Mason researchers has been working on a project at the Science and Technology Campus to see if the honey produced by bees can help locate missing persons. Perennials featuring some of the honey bees’ favorite flowers have been planted at the Forensic Science Research and Training Laboratory in support of ongoing research to determine if chemical traces of human remains can be identified in the plants or in the honey produced by the pollinators.

Engineering students are also working to make the campus apiaries into smart hives. A team of electrical and computer engineering students, mentored by Mason engineering professor Nathalia Peixoto, used the smart hive implementation as their senior cap-stone project.
Over the course of an academic year, the team designed and installed an internet-of-things-enabled sensor array, which is powered by solar panels, to monitor carbon dioxide and temperature in real time to track and predict the health of hives located by Pres-dents Park on the Fairfax Campus.

Getting Smart About It

Green Assessment and Decision Guidance Tool (GADGET) is probably the least visible Living Lab project, but it’s among the most comprehensive and complex. College of Engineering and Computing professor Alex Brodsky and his team are working to develop a tool that will help Mason reduce our carbon footprint and achieve carbon neutrality by 2040 in the most cost-effective way.

Brodsky and his team are gathering data on things like heating and cooling efficiency, energy costs and storage, and contractual agreements to create an algorithm and a computer model that university leadership will be able to use to project costs and savings and make sound decisions regarding Mason’s space and energy needs.

Having smart buildings like Mason’s Horizon Hall is also affecting the way Mason teaches data science. With funding from the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy, engineering associate professor David Lattanzi is working with a team to improve the educational experience for students by integrating data science into Mason’s engineering curriculum and providing hands-on experiences with Mason’s own smart buildings.

Supporting Researchers

Mason’s Living Labs have a dedicated webpage and other resources, thanks in part to the work done by Judit Ungvári, ISE’s research and innovation officer, and Sarah D’Alexander, MBA ’23, sustainability program manager for University Sustainability.

Ungvári and D’Alexander can help researchers obtain the necessary approvals and permissions to do their research on one of Mason’s campuses. Other resources available to the campus community to assist with research include funding, such as the Patriot Green Fund and ISE’s seed funding for Living Lab research projects, and infrastructure, like the Living Lab DataVerse, an accessible online archive of campus datasets provided by researchers that was created in partnership with University Libraries.

“Whenever I talk about sustainability work at Mason, I always emphasize that we really rely on collaborations, partnerships, and support from the entire Mason community in order to do this work,” says D’Alexander. “And I’m so excited to be able to say that Living Labs have had so much support.”

What’s Next

Coming online this fall is the Smart Grid Lab at Mason Square, which will enable students and researchers to conduct various hands-on experiments, work with hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) simulations, and analyze simulation data related to the campus’s power and energy systems.

“We can start observing the campus energy flow and collect data,” says Mason engineering professor Liling Huang, who directs the lab. “That can support our future research in data analytics, machine learning, digital twins, computing, or cybersecurity of the smart grid and smart cities.”

A student-led project to convert the Presidents Park Hydroponic Greenhouse to solar energy is also coming to fruition this fall with the installation of solar panels. Funded by the Patriot Green Fund and Facilities, the ground-mounted solar installation, a first at the Fairfax Campus, will provide a utility cost savings to power the greenhouse in the long term and decrease the university’s carbon footprint.

Shayla Brown, Sarah D’Alexander, and John Hollis contributed to this story.

This feature is from the Fall 2023 Mason Spirit magazine.

Get a closer look at Mason as a Living Lab

Topics

Sustainability

Mason as a Living Lab

Mason Living Labs Initiative

Sustainability

George Mason earns solid gold in sustainability

Consistent success in campus sustainability

Measuring the culture of sustainability

Bioblitz made an impact

Moving toward zero waste

Sustainability at George Mason

Related News

Topics

From an island in Korea to a leader for climate change in D.C.

Mason Korea 10th Anniversary

Related Stories

Topics

Mason Completes Transformational Energy Action Plans for Virginia Communities

In This Story

Request Schar School program information

Learn more about the Schar School

Meet the Mason Nation: Kevin Brim

Kevin Brim

Job: Recycle/Waste Management Supervisor, Facilities Management

Learn more about Mason's Zero Waste goals

More about Sustainability at Mason

Related News

More from Mason Spirit Magazine

Podcast - Ep 58: What will become of the Amazon?

Access to Excellence Podcast Episodes

In This Story

Topics

Office Supply Swap is a staple of sustainability at Mason

Earth Month at Mason

More about the Staff Senate

Read More Like This

Topics

A native food forest takes root on Mason’s Fairfax Campus

Did you know?

Get involved with the Foragers' Forest

Related Stories

More from Mason Spirit Magazine

Bioblitz helps capture Mason’s biodiversity

Learn about Sustainability at Mason

Read more about Mason as a Living Lab

More Sustainability News

More from Mason Spirit Magazine

Mason-Led System Supports Crops and Environment

Learn more about the CropSmart Digital Twin

Read More

Topics

Mason as a Living Lab

Putting Research into Practice

Water, Water Everywhere

Pondering the Pond

Buzzing with Activity

Getting Smart About It

Supporting Researchers

What’s Next

Get a closer look at Mason as a Living Lab

Related News

Topics