Health Analysis of California Climate-Justice Bills and Policies
Julia Walsh, Professor Emerita
Public Health
Closed. This professor is continuing with Fall 2024 apprentices on this project; no new apprentices needed for Spring 2025.
Learn how to read and assess draft laws submitted to California Legislature that are aimed at alleviating climate change, greenhouse gas emissions, air pollution and related issues for their potential Health impact on Environmental/Climate Justice (EJ/CJ) communities. This information will strengthen the ability of CJ Advocacy Groups to advocate for equitable laws and regulations. Health impact results from exposures to air pollution (PM2.5, NOx, S02, etc.), wildfires, heat, and other climate effects, from Carbon Capture and Storage, and other actions. We will compare results with the formal legislative analysis conducted by that Office. As appropriate, we will estimate social costs of health impact. We will work in parallel with a URAP group led by Prof. Claire Brown on Economic Analysis of Climate-Justice Bills and Policies, and have several sessions together for speakers and to share results.
We will also focus on assessing the Montezuma Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS) Hub proposed for the Benicia, Pittsburg, and Antioch area.
Role: Students will research the reports of this CCS project and recent CA laws and data already collected for a specific climate-related project to assess potential health impact You will explore ways that these will affect health, climate Justice communities, review related health literature, prepare a short summary for sharing with other URAP students. In the spring, when the CA Legislature is in session, we will then use this knowledge assess at least one proposed bill.
The first couple of weeks will review health impacts of climate change and social costs of health
In this URAP, students will learn how to set up research to address a specific problem and how to use the research to evaluate a potential policy solution
Qualifications: Desirable, but not essential that student come from or be familiar with EJ communities. The White House Environmental Justice Advisory Committee defines EJ communities as locations “with significant representation of persons of color, low-income persons, Indigenous persons, or members of Tribal nations, where such persons experience, or are at risk of experiencing, higher or more adverse human health or environmental outcomes. “
Taken one or more biology and political science course. Familiarity with human health, bibliographic skills to search the medical literature (or willingness to learn medical literature searching from UCB library workshops), ability to set up a database, apply statistical analysis(e.g., correlations, simple regression) and capability to present data in user friendly charts and graphs with quick turnaround.
We will have required weekly meetings to present what they have done and next steps. We will meet Monday at 12 noon in person and infrequently by zoom. You must be available to attend mandatory weekly meetings, please indicate your availability in your application statement.
Day-to-day supervisor for this project: Professor Clair Brown
Hours: 6-8 hrs
Biological & Health Sciences Social Sciences