Environmental Justice Organizations, Liabilities, and Trade: Mapping Environmental Justice Project (2014)

Contact full name: 
Alejandro Colsa
Additional Faculty Advisor(s) and Department(s): 
Paul Mohai
Project Status: 
Project in Progress
Year project was Completed: 
2014
Client Organization: 
European Commission: Community Research and Development Information Service
Client Website: 
European Commission: Community Research and Development Information Service
Client is confirmed: 
yes
SNRE Faculty Advisor: 
Rebecca Hardin
Advisor Confirmed: 
yes
Additional Faculty Advisor(s) Confirmed: 
yes
Master Students Involved in Project: 
  • Alejandro Colsa, MS Environmental Justice
  • Bernadette Grafton, MS Behavior, Education and Communication
  • Katy Hintzen, MS Environmental Policy and Planning
  • Sara Orvis, MS Environmental Justice
City: 
Ann Arbor
Contact Phone: 
(734) 747-0880
State or Country: 
MI
Contact e-mail: 
acolsa@umich.edu
Contact information: 
I am an SNRE student
Other
If Other: 
Secondary SNRE Contact: Katy Hintzen, Phone: (773) 931-0285, Email: khintzen@umich.edu
Project Location : 
Ann Arbor, with potential for travel if funding is available.
Summary of Project Idea: 

The Environmental Justice Organizations, Liabilities, and Trade (EJOLT) mapping project is directed by Professor Joan Martinez-Alier of the ICTA Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona and part of the European Commission's FP7 "Science-in-Society" program.

The project brings together twenty-three different partners from academic and activist organizations across Europe, Africa, Latin America and Asia (India). EJOLT is producing a series of reports, openly available to the public (seven are currently available online) looking at risk assessment, legal tools for environmental justice organizations, and economic valuation aspects of environmental conflicts. Conflicts studied include nuclear energy, biomass extraction, mining, fossil fuels and climate injustice conflicts, and some waste disposal disputes. Presently, EJOLT is collecting and mapping more than 2,000 cases of environmental conflict. The end result will be a global atlas of environmental conflicts that will help academics and policy makers better understand the causes and consequences of environmental justice conflicts.

As of yet the EJOLT mapping project has no formal partners in the United States. The proposed master's project would be a collaboration between University of Michigan students and EJOLT in mapping and evaluating environmental justice conflicts in the U.S. and Canada. EJOLT's project director will help supervise SNRE student efforts to integrate their findings into the larger EJOLT project.

The project would be based around the EJOLT Database Forms. Students would research and complete the forms for environmental justice conflicts and then analyze the results. As an end goal the group will produce a final report focusing on a particular field within environmental justice, such as fracking, urban waste disposal, or mining initiatives. The specific topic of this report will be determined by the students and the report could be presented at a conference.

Skills/Expertise Needed: 
  • Group collaboration
  • Data collection and research methods
  • Synthesis and critical analysis of case data
  • Statistic and GIS skills
  • Policy analysis
SNRE Program Areas: 
Conservation Ecology (Aquatic Sciences, Terrestrial Ecosystems, and Conservation Biology)
Environmental Policy and Planning
Environmental Informatics
Environmental Justice
Sustainable Systems
Professional Career Development Benefits: 

Key professional and career benefits include networking opportunities with domestic and international environmental professionals and participation in a groundbreaking global environmental justice and policy project. Students will also have the chance to work with the European Union, a leading actor in global environmental politics. They will apply learned analytics skills in GIS and statistical analysis to a modern real world example. Finally, they will gain experience taking on a large scale project requiring coordination with a wide range of stake holders.

Funding Sources: 

Potential to apply for travel funding for conference presentation if needed.

Identify expected products/deliverables: 
  • 30 to 50 EJOLT database forms completed for environmental conflicts in the U.S. and Canada.
  • Final report synthesizing study results, including critical and comparative analysis of U.S. and Canadian environmental justice conflicts in the global context.