The role of climate change education on individual lifetime carbon emissions.

ABSTRACT: Strategies to mitigate climate change often center on clean technologies, such as electric vehicles and solar panels, while the mitigation potential of a quality educational experience is rarely discussed. In this paper, we investigate the long-term impact that an intensive one-year university course had on individual carbon emissions by surveying students at least five years after having taken the course. A majority of course graduates reported pro-environmental decisions (i.e., type of car to buy, food choices) that they attributed at least in part to experiences gained in the course. Furthermore, our carbon footprint analysis suggests that for the average course graduate, these decisions reduced their individual carbon emissions by 2.86 tons of CO2 per year. Surveys and focus group inte

SUBMITTER: Cordero EC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6999882 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature