Innovation and the Future of Urbanization: A TSR interview with Dr. Karen Seto (Part Two)

By Branden Boyer-White and Michael Bernstein

As you may have read, we at The Sustainability Review recently had the good fortune of speaking with Dr. Karen Seto, Associate Professor of the Urban Environment at the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental studies, on her research related to urbanization in China and India. In our first piece, we discussed the implications, drivers and challenges of global scale urbanization in China and India. In this edited portion of our conversation, we look to the future and discuss the obstacles to and opportunities for urban sustainability. … Continue Reading

Challenges and Dynamics of Urbanization: A TSR interview with Dr. Karen Seto (Part One)

By Michael Bernstein and Branden Boyer-White

Dear lucky readers: we at The Sustainability Review recently had the good fortune of speaking with Dr. Karen Seto, Associate Professor of the Urban Environment at the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental studies, on her research related to urbanization in China and India. According to her official bio, Dr. Seto’s research focuses on four themes touching on human land-use transformation: its nature, impacts, implications, and potential future manifestations. In this first part of our edited transcript, we discuss aspects and drivers of urbanization in China and India. In the second part (forthcoming in Features), we look to the future and discuss challenges and opportunities for urban sustainability. … Continue Reading

New Moral Problems and New Approaches: Millennials Compared to Baby Boomers and Generation X

By Jathan Sadowski, Thomas P. Seager, and Evan Selinger

(Authorship of this article is in alphabetical order)

A recent article in the highly ranked Journal of Personality and Social Psychology reports that, contrary to commonly held beliefs, the Millennial Generation is better cast as “Generation Me” than “Generation We.” The study by psychologist Jean Twenge et. al. (1) analyzed the results of two nationally representative surveys, one administered since 1966 and the other since 1976. The surveys ask high school seniors and college freshmen a wide range of questions about life goals, concern for others, and civic orientation/social capital. The authors compared answers from across generations and determined that overall Millennials are more individualistic, materialistically motivated, and less civically engaged than the Baby Boomers and Generation X – despite the commonly held view that the current generation of college students is deeply concerned about social and environmental issues (e.g., 2). … Continue Reading

The Sustainability Review Interview with Dr. Wallace Broecker

We at The Sustainability Review had the privilege to sit down with the oracular grandfather of climate science, Dr. Wallace (Wally) Broecker, Newberry Professor of Geology in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Columbia University. We consulted him for his thoughts on his work and on the past and future paths of sustainability science. What follows is an edited transcript of our conversation. … Continue Reading

Manufacturing: The Key to Sustainable Business Innovation in the U.S.

By Daniel Riley and Jacob Park

When President Barack Obama gave his State of the Union Address (1) last month, he made the case that U.S. economic revival is tied to a healthy manufacturing sector. Of course, he is not the first to triumph the importance of manufacturing to the economy. The key question, however, is what type of manufacturing the U.S. should have in the future. … Continue Reading

Coral Reefs in Crisis: Finding Nemo May Become a lot Tougher

By Tara Haelle

If your food sources vanished tomorrow, how long would it take you to starve to death?

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Creating a Sustainable Desert Metropolis

Artists have long appreciated the desert for its otherworldly landscape. Painter Georgia O’Keefe devoted much of her late career to capturing the distinct elements of the American Southwest, and architect and designer Frank Lloyd Wright felt a strong connection to the desert – a place, he said, which inspired its own singular style of architecture.

Environmental artist Joan Baron is no different in her appreciation of the desert’s unique attributes and the creative opportunities they present. Such opportunities are the subject of Baron’s ongoing urban landscape installation, The Edible Landscape Project – a unique rental property for those who crave the hands-on approach to their food source.

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Virtual scarcity and “epic wins”: Is sustainability in need of more games?

Collaboration, urgent optimism, committed focus—these are the skills and qualities needed in humans to solve sustainability’s biggest challenges and, as it turns out, also the most minor of missions belonging to Azeroth in the online video game “World of Warcraft.”

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Feeding our cities: Why genetic engineering is our friend

By Britt Lewis

Recent concerns about phosphorous sustainability are fueled by the persistent overuse of phosphorous in fertilizers to increase crop yields. On the one hand, the United States has increased food production to both feed a growing population and produce biofuels. On the other hand, using phosphorus-laden fertilizers has imbalanced crop cycles and polluted surface water, even killing off an area the size of New Jersey in the Gulf of Mexico.

Phosphorus mine reserves are quickly diminishing, which has led to scarcity predictions worldwide. With phosphorus as vital to agriculture as water, food security hangs in the balance.

The following is a Q&A conversation with Dr. Roberto Gaxiola, an assistant professor at Arizona State University, whose research explores the role that transgenic crops might play in sustaining agriculture under limited phosphorus conditions.

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Superstition Vistas and the Battle for Smart Growth Communities

By Martin A. Gromulat

Superstition Vistas is a nearly 175,000-acre plot of land managed by the Arizona State Land Department (Department). Named for the mountain range that dominates the area, Superstition Vistas is located in the Sun Corridor, an area that stretches from Phoenix to Tucson and is predicted to grow to 15 million inhabitants by 2060. The Department’s stated goal is to develop Superstition Vistas as a sustainable community – one that can be the model for future sustainable desert development.

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