2024 Rachel Carson Campus Fellows and Stanback Fellows Articles
A Suburban Wilderness Dams, Spillways, Gathering Places, and Decay
Ben Pluska
05-02-24
When I think of suburbia, I imagine decay. In reading much of Rachel Carson’s writing, I can feel the tension she maintains in balancing optimism and grief for the natural environment. Throughout her body of work, she grapples with her concern for pesticides, ecological degradation, and loss of natural splendor. But in her concern, she also asks us to imagine a world of optimisms among the decay. What is worth saving? What is worth remaining curious about? And how can we maintain such curiosity?
I think about Rachel Carson’s ethic of curiosity in the context of Southern suburbia and my upbringing within it. In a landscape that seeks to exile, curate, and dominate nature, how can we maintain our sense of wonder and hopefulness for an environmental future that is sustainable, just, and ecologically minded? Read more
Can We Save the Mississippi?
Emma Brentjens
03-25-24
The coastal United States has faced increasing threats due to climate change, with sea level rise, intense storms, and flooding battering the coastline. Louisiana is on the frontline of these threats. Since the 1930s, the state has lost almost 2,000 square miles of land. Some areas on the state’s coast are already grappling with the question of continuing to restore the land or retreat to avoid greater risks. Now, the impacts of sea level rise have reached freshwater systems as a mass of saltwater from the Gulf of Mexico travels up the Mississippi River.
The Mississippi River is the largest river in the country by volume and has the largest drainage basin, which covers 41% of the contiguous U.S. and extends slightly into Canada. Read more
Rachel Carson Writes, a War Against Nature is a War Against Ourselves
Molly Herring
03-22-24
In order for me to write poetry that isn’t political
I must listen to the birds
and in order to hear the birds
the warplanes must be silent.
– Marwan Makhoul, Palestinian Poet
I Heard a Caged Bird Sing
Two summers ago, I navigated a rocky street in Ramallah, a city in the West Bank of Palestine. A local led me and a dozen other UNC students through the neighborhoods in the early light, pointing out brick apartment buildings housing multiple generations of refugees. I looked up through stacks of balconies and clothes hanging to dry in the salty Mediterranean air and spotted two Palestinian children sitting with their legs threaded through the balcony railings. They watched us, kicking their bare feet in the air and singing like birds, taking turns shoving their fists into a shared bag of snacks. The little girl saw me looking and grinned, then dropped one of her treats onto my head, chortling like a warbler. Read more
Maryland or Massachusetts: Who’s Better at PFAS Regulation?
Suzanna Schofield
03-14-24
Last year while taking a class at MIT on water, health, and the environment, I produced a water vulnerability map of Massachusetts along with my group. We looked at such variables as sole source aquifers, hurricane inundation zones, superfund sites, social vulnerability, and military bases. Using these factors, we identified six municipalities that were considered the most vulnerable.
Shocking and unknown to me, PFAS were found in the water at Wellesley College. In May and July 2021, Wellesley conducted its first tests for six per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances in its campus drinking water wells. Read more
Fracking in Rural Pennsylvania
Caroline Bower
02-26-24
This winter, I travelled north, past Harrisburg and State College, up Route 13, to Lycoming County, Pennsylvania. It holds Williamsport, one of the few metropolitan areas nestled in the rural valleys of the northeastern Pennsylvania Allegheny Mountains. Once the “lumber capital of the world,” today Lycoming has fallen victim to the fracking epidemic because it positioned over a very large, very significant natural gas deposit, the Marcellus Shale.
Although not from Lycoming County, I have fond memories of spending my summers at my grandfather’s hunting cabin. But every year, I’ve seen continuous fleets of massive tanker trucks travelling up and down the interstates, vast cleared acres of forest, and eerie flares on the mountaintops in the distance. Read more
Rachel Carson and the Case for Hibernation
Molly Herring
02-26-24
In a “just not quite fatal” winter, Rachel Carson recommends we divert our efforts of mastery from nature to ourselves.
“Where does Goldilocks go when it’s cold?”
I watched my grandpa set down the white painter’s bucket full of fish food, eager to plunge my 7-ish-year-old hands inside. The pellets smelled earthy and comforting, like the tool shed where we hang snake skins. I grabbed a grubby fistful and scattered them across the pond like rain.
It was February in Appalachia, and the ground was a soggy cocktail of frosty mud and orange earthworms. I dangled my feet over the edge of the dock and peered into the pond that sits cradled in the valley of my grandparents farm. I watched for Goldilocks, the bright yellow carpenter fish that had somehow managed to outlive two golden retrievers and a couple of mountain mutts. Read more
“To Be, Rather Than to Seem:” False Promises of Sustainability
Ben Pluska
02-20-24
Driving up the last swell of mountain on Highway 421 towards Boone, North Carolina, a wind turbine pierces the horizon. The turbine is surrounded by sloping hills of trees and foliage that blanket your vision. This small corner of the Appalachian Mountains is charmed by its idyllic image comprised of a thriving forest and rural Appalachian life.
The Broyhill Wind turbine installed on ASU’s campus is 153 feet tall. Photo: Appalachian State University
The surrounding mountains also cradle Appalachian State University (ASU), a public educational institution that is part of the UNC System. ASU enrolls approximately 20,000 students in a town with a total residential population of 19,000 people. Read more
Joining the “No-Buy Challenge”
Valeria Obregon
02-18-24
From billboards to ads in our social media feeds to influencers advertising new products and more, we are constantly surrounded by advertising. Yet, there is a disconnect between the desire to buy and use these material goods and knowing what goes into the production process behind the glitter and the fate of our purchase once we discard it. This disconnect is what makes consumerism thrive. According to Parcel Path, Amazon delivers 3.5 million packages daily in the United States alone. That means more than a billion packages annually. Capitalist consumer culture flourishes on rapidly changing trends that are not intended to benefit the consumer, but instead to fill the pockets of huge companies. Read more
Are You Afraid to Ask?
Valeria Obregon
02-18-24
If you are involved in environmental activism on a college campus, you will soon realize that you can’t do it alone. Asking for help can be scary and nerve-racking, especially when you don’t know where to go, or have been faced with getting a “No!” in the past. Though people’s willingness to help is out of your control, here are a few strategies to strengthen your ask, to increase your chances of getting a “Yes!”
As the president and founder of SLU Close the Loop, a club at St. Lawrence University dedicated to fostering and promoting exchange and swap culture to reduce waste on campus, I want to share my successful experience of performing an ask to the President’s Office and other senior staff. I hope my story will inspire you and help you get the “Yes!” from your school’s administration that you are looking for. Read more
An Island Out of Time – Tom Horton’s Classic, A Climate Change Reminder
Nathan Villiger
01-16-24
When Tom Horton traded his Baltimore row home for an old fisherman’s house on Smith Island, he did so not intending to write a book but rather because Horton “… liked to muck around in the marshes of my native Chesapeake.” Despite his original plans, less than a decade later Horton would publish an account of his family’s time on Smith Island, titled An Island Out of Time: A Memoir of Smith Island in the Chesapeake. The title originally referred to Smith Island’s unique culture, reminiscent of early tidewater settlements that have all but disappeared from Maryland’s mainland; today it has a much more relevant second meaning. Read more
Climate Footprint Labels: Eco-Conscious Trend or Greenwashing Target?
Karina Marinovich
01-12-24
As 2024 begins, trend forecasters are predicting what the new kale or hoverboard will be this year. 2024’s emerging trends range from declining fertility rates to the revamping of in-person retail shopping. Perhaps the hardest trend to ignore is rising global temperatures. Environmental consciousness is increasingly present in the public discourse, and the market has to respond accordingly. Consumer preferences are evolving around buzzwords like “upcycled” and “microplastics” as being green becomes more and more virtuous. Read more
Proposed LNG Terminal Brings More Environmental Injustice to Chester, PA
Caroline Bower
01-11-24
For decades, Chester, Pennsylvania has faced environmental injustices from the laundry list of polluters that plague the town. It is located just 15 miles south of Philadelphia and is home to over 43,000 residents, 65% percent of whom are African-Americans. At 25%, the poverty rate there is three times the national average.
Chester is considered a low-income city within the more affluent, mostly white Delaware County. There is a disproportionate number of industrial polluting facilities there, including the state’s largest trash incinerator, the nation’s largest medical waste storage facility, and a large-scale sewage and sludge treatment facility, among other numerous waste processing plants, oil refineries, and industrial manufacturing centers. Read more
Greenhushing?
Salvatore Cottone
01-10-24
In this era of heightened environmental awareness, the term “greenwashing” frequently makes headlines, spotlighting companies that overstress their eco-friendly efforts. However, there’s a less discussed but equally critical counterpart: “green hushing.” This term came to my attention during a global sustainability class I took this semester, which explored the intricate challenges corporations face in attaining sustainability objectives. Read more
COP 28 and Campus Engagement
Chrishma D. Perera
01-10-24
The Conference of Parties (COP) takes place every year, with the participation of individuals and groups representing countries worldwide. The main purpose of COP is to agree on ways to address the climate crisis and associated challenges. This year COP 28 was held in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE) from November 30th to December 12th with the participation of more than 70,000 delegates. Here, I aim to outline the significant landmarks of COP 28 for the campus community and youth. Read more
The Next Frontier of Greenwashing: Petrochemical PR
Sophia Donskoi
01-09-24
With a growing industry, we can expect to see more chatter about petrochemicals, but what are they, and why does how the industry communicates?
In the evolving landscape of global energy consumption, oil companies are adapting their strategies as the world shifts towards renewable energy sources. Recently, fossil fuel companies have told their shareholders that as society moves away from oil and gas, they will keep profits up by investing in petrochemicals. Petrochemicals are expected to account for nearly 30 percent of oil demand by 2030. Petrochemicals are nearly ubiquitous in everyday life, but most consumers are unaware that their favorite products are made from or contain them. Read more
Greenwashing Garbage: Turning Trash into Profits
Ben Pluska
01-09-24
The Green for Life (GFL) Environmental Holdings Facility is located in the small predominately Black and working-class community of Snow Hill nestled in the Coastal Plains Region of North Carolina just a few miles west of the county seat of Sampson County, Clinton, NC. Snow Hill is comprised of 20 households scattered among fields of corn and soy right off NC Highway 24. The residents of Snow Hill have family roots that span generations. And as their lives became entrenched in the rural southern landscape by way of their ancestral history, so did the landfill in their back yards. Read more
