Environmental Studies Commons^™

Roadblocks Ahead: High-Speed Rail Setbacks In The United States—Reflections And Ramifications, Sophie Dorn

Pitzer Senior Theses

This thesis analyzes the current state of High-Speed Rail (HSR) development within the United States and the reasoning behind its historical failure. Through frameworks such as funding and organizational structure of public or private entities (or both), this paper focuses on three case studies: The Northeast Corridor Improvement Project, Florida’s Brightline, and the California High-Speed Rail Project. With an additional scope of organizational studies, this thesis assesses the current state of HSR within the U.S. and considers approaches that could work best, given well-documented hindrances. Although originally hypothesized that a public-private partnership would be the most successful strategy for U.S. …

Fashioning Sustainability At Scripps: An Analysis Of Scripps College Students' Clothing Acquisition And Disposal Habits In The Era Of The Free Closet, Serena David

Scripps Senior Theses

The fast fashion industry presents an array of environmental and humanitarian concerns,

and, while this is not the fault of individual consumers, collective action can help to mitigate the negative impacts of the industry. At Scripps College, the Scripps Free Closet seeks to aid in this action by accepting clothing donations from students and providing clothing to students free of charge. A survey among Scripps students sought to answer the question “Is the Scripps Free Closet an effective sustainability initiative on campus by a) decreasing the amount of clothing students buy and/or b) decreasing the amount of clothing students dispose …

The Ecological Underpinnings Of Famine: Irish Agriculture And Land Use Under British Colonialism, 1534-1852, Wyatt Bandy-Page

Pitzer Senior Theses

Ireland’s Great Hunger (1845-52) cannot be reduced to merely potatoes and blight. This thesis approaches the Great Hunger in the context of agricultural and land use changes under British colonialism (1534-1852). Across seven centuries, successive waves of settlers seized the most productive lands, eventually giving rise to a series of plantation schemes designed to maximize the extraction of Irish human and natural capital. Land use transformations under colonial rule severely restricted Gaelic foodways and kept the Irish laboring classes at bare subsistence levels, while the produce of Irish plantations fueled English economic development. Following the onset of blight in 1845, …

Costuming The Californian Apocalypse: Sartorial Speculations Of Los Angeles's Future, Isabel Kramer

Scripps Senior Theses

With this project, I use fashion design as a medium to visually speculate a range of futures that exist in relation to different temporal apocalypses and dystopian world endings under the current capitalist structure. Three questions guided my thinking and creation of this project: What will people be wearing in 100 years in Los Angeles if we continue down our current path of late capitalism-induced climate change? How will this look differently for people who exist alongside different axes of oppression and who are affected by environmental racisms that manifest in the built environment of Los Angeles? How do dystopian …

Greening The Grounds: Mitigating Compost Contamination And Expanding Onsite Composting Practices In A Small Liberal Arts College Setting, Loren Mello

Scripps Senior Theses

In response to the growing need for sustainable waste management practices, the Farm Manager at Pomona College proposed redirecting food waste from offsite industrial composting to onsite composting at the Pomona Farm, expanding beyond kitchen waste to include student plate scrapings. This research aimed to address the anticipated challenges associated with this transition, including increased compost contamination, Farm staff labor, and operational work hours. To gain insights, a pilot program was conducted at Frank Dining Hall for one week, focusing on compost contaminants, food waste weight, collection and composting time, and additional qualitative measures. Findings from the pilot indicated that …

Can Intentional Community-Engagement Bridge The Town And Gown Divide? Creating Collaborative Partnerships Between Colleges And Local Organizations Engaged In Social Activism, Anna Wilk

Scripps Senior Theses

In higher education spaces, there tends to be a divide between on-campus and off-campus communities creating dissonance between the activism conducted by the students and faculty and that taken on by the surrounding communities; this is known as the “town and gown divide”. For the sake of each of these individual groups it is pivotal to attempt to rectify this division so that the institutions and the communities that they find themselves within can work together to strive for justice and innovation. A crucial aspect of diminishing the town and gown divide involves addressing students' preconceived notions of the community …

Assessing The Opportunities And Risks Of Extraction In The Lithium Triangle, Jennifer Cuahutencos

CMC Senior Theses

Climate change mitigation efforts have grown in recent years, giving rise to energy transition technologies, including electric vehicles and grid storage, which rely heavily on lithium. The resulting acceleration of lithium demand poses an opportunity for Argentina, Bolivia, and Chile – collectively referred to as the Lithium Triangle, where more than half of the world’s lithium resources are found – to produce lithium as a way of generating revenue that can be redistributed to increase social well-being. Despite the enticing opportunity, lithium extraction has several socioecological and economic risks that may make lithium extraction a futile endeavor. This thesis aims …

Revolutionizing Lithium Extraction: Analysis Of Factors Affecting Commercialization Timelines With Insights From The Shale Gas Boom, Bilge Tayyar

CMC Senior Theses

This study draws parallels between Direct Lithium Extraction (DLE) and hydraulic fracturing to highlight the transformative potential of DLE technology in the lithium industry. The comparative analysis supports the hypothesis that DLE might expedite commercialization timelines, similar to the effect hydraulic fracturing has had on traditional shale gas extraction. The study includes a regression analysis to determine the factors affecting the commercialization of conventional lithium brine extraction methods, thereby better understanding the potential changes DLE will create. The regression model, based on data from 11 projects, examines the impact of variables such as temperature range, tax rates, royalty rates, regulatory …

Is Green The New Gold? Esg’S Influence On The Financial Performance Of The Energy And Mining Industries, Alexa De Vegvar

CMC Senior Theses

The demand for Environment, Social, and Governance (ESG) reporting has increased in recent years. As the concern for climate change has moved to the forefront of the investment process, companies have needed to prioritize ESG in their operations. Previous literature addresses how ESG has benefited companies’ financial performance and increased shareholder value. The pandemic has proven to have positively impacted ESG reporting as social priorities shifted. However, studies have also shown that ESG reporting is too ambiguous to concretely display any relationship with financial performance. This thesis will analyze the impact of ESG and environmental data reporting on the Return …

Determinants And Effects Of Offset Usage Within The California Cap-And-Trade System – A Firm-Level Analysis, Adarsh Srinivasan

CMC Senior Theses

This thesis examines the determinants of the usage of carbon offsets within the California cap-and-trade program for greenhouse gas emissions. It also investigates the relationship between a firm’s investment in offsets and its financials for publicly traded companies. Entity-level data from 2013 to 2020 was used, which was sourced from the California Air Resources Board. Multiple regression analysis was used to investigate factors that correlated with offset usage and whether offset usage correlated with EBITDA. Dummy variables indicating geographic location and economic sector of each entity were used as controls. The analysis found that total covered emissions and privately owned …

The Korean Hanok As A Model For Sustainable Architecture In South Korea, Jordan Oh

CMC Senior Theses

This thesis analyzes the traditional Korean hanok within the Western framework for sustainability across environmental, social, and economic dimensions. It then cross-references the findings of this analysis with existing theory on the cultural role of architecture to elucidate how the traditional Korean hanok can serve as a model for sustainable architecture in South Korea. Through a comprehensive analysis this thesis highlights the importance of architectural vernacular to define a sustainable building, and critiques contemporary Western ideas of sustainable architecture. Furthermore, this thesis synthesizes two current approaches to sustainable development in South Korea, the u-eco-city and the Green Standard for Energy …

Getting Youth On The Streets: Accounting For Levels Of Youth Mobilization Among International Climate Organizations, Sara E. Anderson

Claremont-UC Undergraduate Research Conference on the European Union

Youth, many of whom are not given the voice or the opportunity to collaborate with political institutions, often turn towards climate movements to make an impact on the climate. Through a series of interviews in the United Kingdom and supporting secondary research, this paper offers a formal overview of factors that contribute to youth mobilization. These factors include type of protest, community, and leadership, in addition to narrative building and media engagement with the movement. By assessing the mechanisms behind youth mobilization, movements can establish how to better attract youth.

Collaboration Between Science And Art Through A Special International Symposium For Ecosystem Health And Sustainability, Changwoo Ahn Dr.

The Transdisciplinary STEAM+ Journal

The collaborations between ecosystem restoration and art practices was epitomized by the eco-artist Jackie Brookner who said: “it is not a matter of the scientists providing the hard-core research and artists the soft outreach; rather, the dynamics engendered in the space between disciplines is full of information necessary to solve complex problems at the systemic level”. This paper reviews and summaries the goals, activities, and lessons learned from a special symposium, which was held at the 12^th INTECOL (International Congress of Ecology) conference in Beijing, China, August 21 through 25, 2017, where about 3000 people attended from 70 countries. …

Entangled Mangrove Roots: The Shrimp Industry, Ancestral Afro-Descendant People, And Community Resistance In Esmeraldas, Ecuador, O'Philia Le

Pitzer Senior Theses

Mangroves are one of the most important ecosystems because of the many services they provide on a local and global scale, but in contrast, are one of the most threatened by anthropogenic activities at a global level. Being sources of food for various kinds of fish, crustaceans, and mollusks, they are essential for the economy, culture, and livelihood of locals in Esmeraldas, Ecuador. This thesis takes an environmental justice approach in the discussion of the loss of mangroves in Esmeraldas, Ecuador. While toxic industries may not be apparent at first, environmental injustice prevails in adverse human health effects, environmental degradation, …

An Ancient Thread Of “Inseparable Oneness”: A Theoretical Exploration Of Community And Kinship In Grassroots Environmental Justice Movements, Izzy Dean

Pitzer Senior Theses

This thesis arose from a particular fascination and frustration with the prescribed nuclear family unit and the competitive isolation that capitalism breeds within normative communities, particularly in the United States. In this paper, I use the approach of theoretical exploration combined with case study research to explore the role of community and kinship within grassroots environmental justice organizations. I initially wanted to explore examples of people and groups who found strength and resistance by engaging in “non-normative” or “queer” community-building practices. I have since redefined my topic as a broad theoretical exploration in which I cite theories of non-normativity, among …

Growing Culturally Relevant Food At The Urban Farm: An Examination Of Sovereign Foodways, Place-Making Practices, And Autonomous Identity-Shaping, Dahlia Bess Zail

Pitzer Senior Theses

This paper examines channels of culturally relevant food production on the urban farm. It further investigates the connection between this production and the shaping of sovereign foodways, as well as how urban farm models provide space and resources for place-making practices and autonomous identity-shaping. This thesis shifts away from the notion of access to culturally relevant food and instead focuses on the multi-fold context that any food item takes on through its production, distribution, and consumption. This allows for a nuanced understanding of the role that culturally relevant food can play in immigrant foodways. Through case-studies at three urban farms …

Breakwater: Anti-Blackness In Geoscience Lessons From Long Beach, Ca, Christina Marsh

Pomona Senior Theses

Breakwaters are more than just physical structures that protect against storm surges and in the context of Long Beach, CA, my hometown, they are actualizations of economic, social, environmental, geologic, and policy challenges. Inspired by Trace: Memory, History, Race, and the American Landscape by Lauret Savoy, and Teaching to Transgress by bell hooks, I use an extended metaphor and autoethnographic approach to connect a chronology of my educational life to the physical structure of a breakwater. Where the breakwater also acts as a signifier of my personal experiences of seeing it, questioning its purpose, and not always finding an answer. …

Decolonial Foodurisms: From Plantations To Agricultural Spaces Of Intersectional Healing, Dominic Arzadon

Pitzer Senior Theses

Considering the complex colonial histories and relationalities associated with agricultural food production, a reimagined future beyond the violent legacy of plantations is presented. Exploring land as the site for intersectional healing to take place, the symbiotic relationship between humans and food production is increasingly becoming a reality—a theoretical framework I propose called decolonial foodurisms (pronounced food-yoor-isms). Combining “food” and “futurism” to emphasize that our collective futures are predicated on food security and food justice for all and especially for marginalized and racialized communities with ancestral ties to agricultural violence, decolonial foodurisms aims to capture how intersectional healing can come into …

How To Build A World: Stereoscopes, Tourism, And Land In Zion National Park, Emma Duggleby

Scripps Senior Theses

This thesis fundamentally questions how representations of the environment and land impact how we relate to and live in it. By examining a set of 1925 stereoscope images of Zion National Park, it considers how use-based perceptions of place – structured by the entertainment of tourism and mass media – become part of the mundane practices of consumption. By revealing how these capitalist-colonial relationships to the land have been built through time, an analysis of these stereoscope slides reveals that these stories are anything but natural in hopes of making room for other stories to be built instead. The second …

Grain-Washing: The Issue With Corn Ethanol As A Sustainable Aviation Fuel, Emily J. Rinn

Scripps Senior Theses

Decarbonizing the aviation sector remains one of the most prevalent obstacles in reducing the United States’ significant contribution to global greenhouse gas emissions. Launched in 2021, the Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) Grand Challenge aims to supply enough fuel to meet 100% of demand by 2050 through reducing its production costs and enhancing its sustainable practices. Corn ethanol feedstock has been proposed to make up as much as half of all SAF production in the 2030 benchmark. This thesis explores the assemblage of corn ethanol – from its true environmental impacts, role in the future SAF market, to research claiming corn …

Radioactive, Internal Colonialism: The Uranium Industry’S Historic And Current Impact On The Navajo Nation, Sophie Arens

Pitzer Senior Theses

The United States withheld information pertaining to the health problems associated with nuclear power, allowing uranium to be extracted, processed, and stored in the Southwest of the United States and more specifically the Navajo Nation. With this, many Diné people who had previously worked in the mines or lived within close vicinity to facilities developed various types of illnesses. This thesis argues that the development of nuclear energy in the United States is a form of radioactive, internal colonialism and that the current waste facility located in Carlsbad, New Mexico is furthering this history into the present day. This thesis …

Let Us Be The Fish Who Grow Legs: A Curriculum Guide For Linking Prison Industrial Complex Abolition, Environmental Justice, And State Power, Tess Gibbs

Scripps Senior Theses

This curriculum guide is designed to connect students’ understandings of environmental problems and injustices to their understandings of prison industrial complex (PIC) abolition, with the ultimate intention of cultivating the knowledge and imaginative practices to develop abolitionist-aligned solutions to environmental justice (EJ) problems outside of frameworks that rely upon state sanction. Students will connect the mutual causal forces of environmental injustices and the carceral state; explore intersections of environmental and carceral politics; and finish the course with broadened understandings of humans’ real and unrealized relationships with each other and the more-than-human world. The guide is intended to be worked through …

Concrete Everywhere: A Project-Based Analysis Of The Unequal Distribution Of Warehouses In Fontana, Chanah Haigh

Scripps Senior Theses

Unjust legislation and zoning practices drive the excess of warehouses in Fontana, California whose impacts fall disproportionately on low income communities of color. This paper addresses the environmental and health impacts of warehouses, as well as the legislation and the use of zoning which bring them to Fontana. Original maps show the spread of warehouses over census tract level data depicting race, income, and environmental factors such as diesel particulate matter. State and local legislation is analyzed to determine its intended effect and how well it has been enforced. Research was conducted through a project based thesis done in conjunction …

Grieving Climate Change: A Psychological And Personal Exploration Of Emotionally Processing The Climate Crisis, Hava Chishti

Pitzer Senior Theses

The psychological concept of grief, although not typically associated with climate change, has strong applications to the emotional processing of climate change for human beings. Grief can be related to climate change in many ways, including the grief that individuals may feel over the anticipated loss of their future, losses that may be experienced due to climate-related disasters, and grief for the overall implications of anthropogenic climate change. A mixture of traditional literature analysis and creative nonfiction essays, which focus on personal narratives from interviews and the author’s experience, are used to outline the ways in which the psychology of …

An Analysis Of Water Quality At Orange County, California Beaches, Naomi Meurice

Pomona Senior Theses

Beaches in Southern California are highly recreated by residents and visitors, making beaches socially and economically important. Public health departments in coastal communities are in charge of measuring water quality and ensuring it is safe for users. Research in the past has indicated that beach water quality gets worse after storms, with bacteria levels jumping on the day of a storm and staying high for up to five days. Studies have shown these spikes in bacteria to be associated with storm runoff, with beaches closer to runoff discharge locations experiencing more impact. However, prior research has not considered the period …

Warehouses In The Inland Empire: Displacing Land And Life, Katherine Gelsey

Pomona Senior Theses

The Inland Empire in Southern California embodies unique spatial and social configurations as a consequence of how settler colonialism has manifested locally in the region since the Spanish Mission Period. This work uses GIS software to estimate patterns of land conversion for residential, agricultural, and warehouse land from 2012 to 2022. Preliminary analysis suggests that thousands of people have been displaced by warehouse expansion over the ten-year period. In the twenty-first century, the Southern California logistics industry continues processes of land dispossession and racialized labor exploitation through displacing agricultural and residential land, exposing disproportionately low-income Black and Latine communities living …

The Wh-Eye Of The Storm: How Zora Neale Hurston, Virginia Woolf, And Arif Anwar Fictionalize Extreme Weather In Their Works, Elena Vedovello

Pomona Senior Theses

In this thesis, I used Robin Wall Kimmerer’s and James D. Rice’s ideas of “ecological imagination” to analyze three twentieth and twenty-first century works that feature historical extreme weather events. American Harlem Renaissance writer Zora Neale Hurston introduces her fictional characters to the historical force of the 1928 Okeechobee Hurricane in her 1937 novel Their Eyes Were Watching God; British Modernist writer Virginia Woolf writes about the 1609 Great Frost in Orlando; and Bangladeshi author Arif Anwar sets his novel The Storm during and around the infamous Bhola Cyclone of 1970.

Although these authors and their novels stem …

Ecodrama And Sustainable Theatre: A Handbook For Creating Remarkable Change, Gigi Buddie

Pomona Senior Theses

The climate crisis is not new to us, nor are the art forms that have taken shape as vital components of the many activist movements that seek to save the planet. Yet, for the first time at Pomona College, a play about environmental devastation and our hand in it finally graced the stage of this progressive institution this past year. This mini handbook is a call-to-action (of sorts), one that stems from the idea that this should not be the last ecodrama performed at Pomona College. These chapters are structured and supported by both experience and research – formulated from …

¡Hay Comida En La Casa! - There Is Food At Home!, Gabriela Camacho

Pomona Senior Theses

Implemented in 2019, AB 626 created a new category in the California Retail Food Code known as a Microenterprise Home Kitchen Operation (MEHKO). MEHKOs are restaurants operated from private homes that allow the preparation and sale of meals that were previously illegal under state law. Californians were previously limited to cottage food laws which restrict home-cooked food production to non-perishable foods like baked goods. My thesis analyzes the progression of homemade food laws and how they impact home cooks. Additionally, many MEHKO owners and home cooks are immigrants, low-income individuals, or belong to BIPOC communities, groups that have traditionally faced …

Weaving Testimonio And Territory In La Comuna Ancestral Las Tunas, María J Durán González

Pomona Senior Theses

“Nosotras las mujeres ibamos al río a lavar la ropa pero sin con tanto químico y nada de esas cosas. Ahora, pues, cómo ve…” (Tomala, 2023).

The woman’s vignette of La Comuna Ancestral Las Tunas, or the Ancestral Commune of Las Tunas is a testimonio of the territory, yet women’s testimonios are registered separately from the dominant tales of territorial resistance of la Comuna. The analysis of testimonios arises from Chicanx/Latinx feminist studies that center the voices of Chicana/Latina women to form a collective narrative emerging from silences. I aim to interlace Latinx and Latin American geography principles with …