Putting Yourself in the Community’s Shoes: Thoughts from Dr. Christian Braneon

Christian Braneon, PhD, is co-director of the Environmental Justice and Climate Just Cities Network at Columbia University’s Earth Institute. He co-leads the Urban Climate Change Research Network’s Urban Design Climate Workshop series and serves as co-chair of the New York City Panel on Climate Change. His career spans water resources engineering, remote sensing, climate resilience, and data science. Christian previously served as co-director of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s inaugural Environmental Justice Academy for community leaders, and he has led community engagement programs toward environmental justice and clean power around the country for the EPA and the White House. At the 2022 Waterfront Conference, he will be speaking about resilience for the most vulnerable communities, which tend to bear the brunt of heat waves, poor air quality, flooding, and other impacts of the climate crisis. We caught up with Dr. Braneon earlier this week to talk about climate adaptation, environmental justice, and community engagement.

You have led community engagement programs promoting environmental justice and/or clean power around the country for the EPA and the White House. What’s the key to successful community engagement? 

In my opinion, often the key to community engagement is simply putting yourself in the community’s shoes. That is to say, one needs to take the necessary steps to see things from the community’s perspective. Sometimes that requires personal growth and self-work. For example, many folks in the United States have been socialized not to talk about race and consequently it may be more difficult for them to recognize racism (even manifestations of racism that may be considered obvious to most people of color in the U.S. as well as people outside of the U.S.).

You’ve worked at universities in Georgia (Georgia Institute of Technology), Texas (Huston-Tillotson University), and now here you are in New York City at the Columbia University Climate School. In your experience, does science prevail over politics? 

Yes, I think science does ultimately prevail. About 20 years ago when I was an undergraduate student at Georgia Tech, faculty were putting out collective statements affirming anthropogenic climate change in an effort to combat misinformation and public confusion about climate change. Now most conversations at Georgia Tech are about what we should be doing about climate change (as opposed to whether humans are causing it). In 2004 I decided to pursue graduate studies focused on water resources and climate change (despite the ongoing debates about it) in part because I anticipated that public sentiment in the U.S. would dramatically shift by the 2020s as a variety of extreme weather events became more frequent.

You’re known for integrating satellite data and climate science into urban planning and civil engineering. How has your work been used in New York City? 

I am really proud to have helped the New York City Council’s Data Operations Unit map how temperature varies across the city. Using satellite data from the Landsat 8 satellite, the team ultimately developed an interactive heat map that also displays comorbidities, parks/greenspace, and air conditioning access. When NASA asked me to brief Vice President Harris last year, I made sure that this interactive map was part of my presentation.

I understand that one of your current research projects is about the role of coastal marshes in the global carbon and nutrient cycles. What can you tell us about this? 

I have not been out to Jamaica Bay yet, but I plan to do some field work there soon. Coastal marshes are highly valued for the ecosystem services they provide, yet they are disappearing at an alarming rate worldwide due to seawater intrusions. Marshes also store a significant amount of carbon and nutrients that are released to the open ocean when wetland areas become completely submerged by rising sea water. This carbon and nutrient flux affect ocean biology and biogeochemistry cycles and can impair coastal water quality. The submergence of coastal marshes also transforms them from sinks to sources of greenhouse gasses, further accelerating climate change and rates of sea-level rise. My collaborators and I are conducting research to assess the relative significance of carbon fluxes into the ocean from coastal marsh losses using a combination of diverse datasets, including: a large database of historical satellite imagery and ocean color data, in-situ and remotely sensed tidal and land elevation data, marsh depth estimates from in-situ sediment cores, reanalysis data and physically based simulations of past and future sea-levels.

Do you think current plans and policies are on the right track for true environmental justice, or does the system need an overhaul?

Sometimes I feel like the system needs an overhaul as we are really just scratching the surface right now. We are a long way from true environmental justice and even further from actually addressing the root causes of inequity. Nevertheless, we need to have tremendous gratitude for Dr. Peggy Shepard and other trailblazers who have paved a path for us.