Dear friends and colleagues, I’ve been thinking a lot about our community and — especially — our Black community members today. I also haven’t been able to stop myself from thinking about what feels like a never-ending series of injustices and crises that have...
Sowing doubt and undermining science May 28, 2020 People want to rely on scientific evidence in countless different contexts. As one professor put it, “Science has ‘epistemic authority,’ meaning it is the best method humans have available to understand what is true...
From setting to achieving sustainability goals Why do companies have an easier time setting sustainability goals than achieving them? Modern corporations create astonishing wealth and innovation, but they have so far struggled to transform themselves to operate within...
The Detroit water crisis and unexpected coalitions Mar 11, 2020 Since 2014, the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department has shut off the water to 141,000 households whose bills were past due. Last year, more than 23,000 households reportedly had their water shut off....
Agree to Disagree with Yourself Mar 10, 2020 The tougher the choices we have to make, the less sense we make making them. Understanding and educating ourselves can help us make better-informed decisions more consistent with our values. Where would you like to go for...
The term “environmental justice” still may be unfamiliar to some people, but you don’t have to be familiar with it to understand what it means when you see it. With the Flint water crisis and the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, the people who were hit hardest were...
Erb Institute Faculty Director Joe Árvai is one of the six fellows that the Society for Risk Analysis (SRA) recently named, recognizing their substantial achievements in science or public policy relating to risk analysis, as well as their service to the society. SRA...
What does sustainability look like in Detroit, a city that is going through changes that some consider a renaissance? The Erb Institute talked with five people who are working to make Detroit more sustainable—in wildly divergent ways, from bees, to dirt, to real...
Multinational corporations wield immense power. A mere 100 companies control a quarter of global trade. Walmart is the 10th-largest economic entity on the planet. Coca-Cola is the world’s largest consumer of aluminum and sugarcane. In choosing where to invest, what...
Reflecting on a year at the Erb Institute: Impact Investing and DEI Around this time last year, I was weighing my grad school options. The Erb Institute rose to the top pretty early on in the process. Once I visited campus and got a taste of the sense of community the...
