Lichtash ’13, Weber ’13 Offer “The Plan” to Combat Global Warming

Matt  Lichtash ’13 was co-author of an op-ed published in U.S. News and World Report titled “Five Steps America Must Take Now to Combat Climate Change.”

Lichtash is working with Evan Weber ’13 and Michael Dorsey, who served as visiting scholar for Wesleyan’s College of the Environment for the 2012–13 academic year. The three, concerned that the United States adopt an effective national energy strategy, have developed “The Plan,” which they propose can “set our nation on a promising path towards ensuring a safer, more prosperous, and more just future for ourselves and our posterity.” The Plan is available for download at http://www.usclimateplan.org/

In the op-ed, Lichtash insists that the U.S. “must propose a bolder plan to position the world to hold a temperature increase below 2 degrees Celsius, the widely agreed ‘safe-zone’ that prevents climate catastrophe.”

Lichtash and co-author Michael Shank offer “five market-based solutions,” starting with a greenhouse gas fee and finally urging the country to “scrap fossil fuel subsidies.”

Weber majored in economics and environmental studies; his thesis focused on the social justice implications of U.S. climate policy. Lichtash, who also majored in economics and environmental studies, uses data analysis to explore the quantitative side of sustainability and energy policy,. Dorsey, now an assistant professor in Dartmouth College’s Faculty of Science in the Environmental Studies Program, as well as director of Dartmouth’s Climate Justice Research Project. The three hope to foster national dialog on both challenges of and solutions for national climate change. They further explain their vision in this video.

Learn more about them in this WesConnect feature.