Environmental Activism
The first broadly known American Environmental Activist
Who is John Muir?
This fossil fuel is the most commonly used for electricity generation in the U.S., but is a major source of carbon emissions.
What is coal?
This federal agency, established in 1970, is responsible for protecting human health and the environment.
What is the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)?
This concept refers to reducing or eliminating greenhouse gas emissions to balance out emissions that cannot be fully avoided, often achieved through activities like afforestation or carbon capture.
What is carbon neutrality?
This U.S. President, often called the "Conservation President," helped establish the National Parks system and the U.S. Forest Service in the early 1900s.
Who is Theodore Roosevelt?
This type of technology is increasingly used to store renewable energy for use during non-peak production hours.
What is lithium-ion battery storage?
Passed in 1972, this law regulates pollutant discharges into U.S. waters and sets quality standards for surface waters.
What is the Clean Water Act?
This decarbonization method involves capturing CO2 emissions from industrial sources and either reusing or storing them underground to prevent their release into the atmosphere.
What is Carbon Capture and Storage? (CCS)?
The concept for environmental justice that has been developed by Dr. Robert Bullard
What is procedural, geographic and social equity?
In nuclear fission, atoms of this element are split to release energy in most current reactors.
What is uranium?
This 1990 amendment to a major environmental law introduced a cap-and-trade system for sulfur dioxide to address acid rain.
What is the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990?
This U.S. state was the first to pass a law requiring all new residential buildings to be carbon-neutral by 2030, focusing on energy efficiency and the use of renewable energy sources.
What is California?
This legal doctrine, used by environmental groups, allows individuals or organizations to challenge government actions or omissions that harm the environment, even if they have no direct stake in the outcome.
What is standing (or citizen standing)?
This term refers to the point at which the cost of electricity from solar or wind becomes equal to or less than the cost from traditional grid power sources, without subsidies.
What is grid parity?
This 1976 law gives the EPA authority to require reporting, record-keeping, and testing of chemical substances and mixtures.
What is the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA)?
In 2023, this percentage of all new car sales in the U.S. was accounted for by electric vehicles, showing strong growth in EV adoption.
What is 10%?
In 2017, this New Zealand river was granted legal personhood under a historic agreement, allowing it to be represented in court and granting it rights similar to human entities.
What is the Whanganui River?
Although rudimentary forms date back to the 1940s, modern hydraulic fracturing was pioneered in the late 1990s by this Texan engineer, who combined horizontal drilling with slickwater fracking in the Barnett Shale
Who is George P. Mitchell?
This law created the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) and formalized environmental review procedures for federal projects.
What is the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA)?
In 2023, this U.S. city introduced a comprehensive plan to decarbonize its entire public transportation system by 2035, including transitioning its bus fleet to 100% electric and increasing access to shared mobility options.
What is New York City?