Environmental Studies

This course examines the nearshore coastal zone. It focuses on the development of hands-on practical skills and field experiences that will include student-driven exercises and projects. This will include a multi-day field trip to Moreton Bay Research Station, where students will engage in field data collection training from experts in water quality assessment, coastal processes, seagrass monitoring and coral reef surveys. 

This course examines the study of the ‘blue’ spaces of our planet—oceans, rivers, reefs, and inland bodies of water—through case studies in the arts and literature. Using the vantage point in Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa, “The Great Connector”, it considers environments and peoples whose lives are explicitly connected with and determined by the ocean. It considers kinship, sovereignty, and belonging through aesthetic, historical, religious, political, social, and material manifestations. Situated around issues of ocean acidification, pollution, and sea-level rise, it critically reflects on ways the humanities can improve our knowledge of cultures, histories, publics and practices of the blue planet.

The transition toward a carbon-neutral and circular economy demands concerted efforts across all levels and sectors of the economy. At micro and meso levels, companies, organizations, and sectors are therefore increasingly asked to make choices related to sustainable development. Yet, changing business operations is not always straightforward. It may necessitate significant transformations and innovations in existing processes. Multiple tools have been developed to identifying opportunities for energy conservation, improving resource utilization, and implementing sustainable practices. In the "Energy and Material Analysis" course, students are introduced to the most relevant tools for energy and material analysis. The primary focus of this course lies in investigating the impacts of innovations implemented at the micro and meso levels, such as hospitals, factory complexes, and neighborhoods, specifically in terms of energy and material effects. This course focuses on developing basic energy and material analysis that can then be applied to interdisciplinary innovation issues, e.g. in IP1 and IP2 courses.

Food choices have a large impact on peoples’ health, the welfare of animals, stakeholders in the food system, and ultimately the planet. This course focuses on food environments and the consumer, to understand the factors that lead to unhealthy and unsustainable choices and how these can be shifted.
The course explores a wide range of disciplines and topics, from brain processes and gut bacteria (biology and nutrition science) to decision making processes (psychology), to cultural processes (sociology), to the food environment (marketing and human geography) and finally behavior change interventions (Communication and psychology). The course includes an excursion to get some hands-on experience and guest lecturers who contribute to resolving the issues in the food system. The course discusses societal issues such as obesity, malnutrition, food waste, microplastics, the protein transition and diet hypes. The research methods with which food science is conducted in order to take part in meaningful discussions about sustainable and healthy food consumption are introduced.

This course uses London's central place in the world's carbon economy to understand global environmental challenges. Through field trips, firsthand encounters, and engaging class sessions students learn about London's role in the global geographies of carbon extraction. The course starts with early connections of empire, colonialism, and coal. It then moves through efforts to transition from carbon intensive energy sources to consider contemporary contests over climate change and the different ways financial activism seeks sustainable futures.

This course explores how environmental factors such as pollution, waste management, climate change, and urban planning affect and shape the health of individuals in our societies. It touches on the environment-health nexus within the sustainable development goals and global agendas, and it explores the theoretical approaches to understanding the environmental determinants of health. It also explores case studies and empirical research conducted in both developed and developing countries and dives into the social inequalities in environmental exposures and health. Methodologically, this course provides analytical skills such as collection, analysis, and interpretation of quantitative (statistical literacy) and qualitative (e.g., Photovoice) data and generic research skills including reading and critically summarizing and presenting research papers.

How should we balance the need to produce cheap food with environmental damage? Should we be using low-cost airlines? Is it now immoral to have children? Should animals be granted the same rights as human beings? The climate crisis gives rise to many daily and long-term moral questions concerning how we should live and behave. This course introduces students to environmental ethics, the branch of philosophy concerned with how our moral values and decisions impact the natural world. Through a series of talks and discussions, this course grapples with the difficult environmental moral dilemmas we face as humans and encourage students to reflect and consider how we face these challenges.

This course will go through the different parts of the climate system, atmosphere, hydrosphere, cryosphere, biosphere and lithosphere and cover the evidence for human influenced climate change globally and in Australia. It will discuss the consequences and risks that climate change presents to the society, environment, ecosystems and biodiversity, and the potential strategies to mitigate and adapt for a future warmer world.

This course examines basic scientific knowledge about indoor and outdoor air pollution, as well as global and regional climate change, in relation to human health. The following questions will be talked and discussed: What types of air pollution are there in
indoor and outdoor environment? What types of compounds form the pollution? Can they be measured? Do we know the levels of different pollutants? How about the relationship between outdoor and indoor environment? Is it safer to stay in indoor environment if there is a high outdoor air pollution? Do we have any measures to prevent or reduce the pollution level? What are the health effects of these pollutants? Do they affect our respiratory health, cardiovascular system or even our endocrine systems? How much does the climate change interact with air pollution and affect our health? How are international or national fighting strategies on it?

This course teaches the complexities of socio-technical transitions, including the systemic nature of these long-term change processes, and their unfolding across geographical scales (local/regional, national, supra-national/global). Students develop a conceptual understanding of transitions in a multi-scalar context, as well as apply transitions frameworks to the empirical context of their domain of interest (i.e. energy, transport, food, or life sciences). Via guest lectures, students learn about the transition challenges different organizations (including government, industry, consultancy, NGOs and industry associations) are facing and how they make sense of their transitioning systems environment. The course is split into two parts: In the first part, students learn the basics theory and core concepts related socio-technical transitions. Several transition frameworks and concepts, like the Multi-Level Perspective (MLP), Strategic Niche Management (SNM), and transition pathways are taught and are applied to their own societal transitions study. Furthermore, students learn about public policy instruments and the underlying policy rationale for intervening in societal transitions. In the second part of the course, based on the general conceptualizations, students learn how to embed transition dynamics in a specific geographical context. Develop an understanding about the diversity of actor-specific resources, networks, and institutional conditions across space, and explore the regional aspects of a transition in relation to national and global system structures. Throughout the course, students apply the theoretical knowledge to their own empirical case study and develop transition- and region-specific policy interventions to help support their focal societal transition.