Environmental Studies

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.

This course examines the principles of ecology and environmental science, including a required week long field trip in the mid-trimester break. It focuses on physical and biological processes in terrestrial environments and ecosystem functioning. The field trip will introduce techniques relevant to field-based enquiry in ecological and environmental science.

This course focuses on contemporary global health issues, with emphasis placed on contextualizing global, national, and subnational health disparities. Students study how health, the environment, and sustainable development are interrelated and work to improve our understanding of both policy and practice. Therefore, students are introduced to important actors and their stated goals. Students examine cases from low- and middle-income countries, as well as from high-income countries. The course takes an interdisciplinary approach, using various perspectives including sociology, bioethics, epidemiology, anthropology, clinical medicine, and political science. 

The course is developed to advance the knowledge of and ability to apply theories, policies, frameworks, and concepts related to promoting green transition and dealing with the twin crises of climate change and biodiversity loss through a deeper understanding of sustainability reporting regulations, transition finance and business transformation. The course promotes green transition by better integration of sustainability consideration into financial decision making through enhanced sustainability reporting regulations. The course is structured into modules integrating the following themes: the twin crises of climate change and biodiversity loss. The objective, structure, and content of the EU Green Deal, transition finance, and the myriads of public policies and private initiatives related to green transition and business transformation; transition versus incremental change enabling and constraining factors for transition the role of industry, the financial system, and policy makers in promoting societal and business transition; the objective, structure, and content of upcoming and launched sustainability reporting regulations and auditing standards including the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) and its European Sustainability. Reporting Standards (ESRS), the Omnibus proposal, Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD), Green Claim Directive; and the tension between regulative compliance and business transformation.