April 12, 2024 – Exploring the Clean Energy Transition Through the Lens of Energy Justice

Please join us for this webinar to learn about a lesson co-created by STEM educators in NC that invites students to examine how current and future energy sources and systems impact people and communities. This collaborative lesson introduces students to the concept of energy justice by fostering learning about how energy sources, their production, distribution, and associated waste (e.g., coal ash), along with the generation and distribution of electricity, affect communities. The lesson features real-life energy stories and relevant online mapping tools, such as the EPA’s Environmental Justice Screening and Mapping Tool, support inquiry by enabling students to ask about and examine relationships between energy infrastructure and community demographics. Students use an adaptation of the Energy Justice Scorecard (Baker, et al. 2019) published by Initiative for Energy Justice as a tool to evaluate the extent to which a relevant energy story promotes energy justice. Ultimately, this lesson prepares students to be able to describe the features of a “just transition” to a clean energy future.

Presenter: Dana Haine, MS, K-12 Science Education Manager for the UNC Institute for the Environment’s Center for Public Engagement with Science