The University of California (UC) announced ambitious goals to achieve carbon neutrality benchmarks by 2030 with startling positivity and optimism. With air quality in California at a dangerous low and the state struggling to comply with new Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) soot standards, efforts by the UC to minimize carbon emissions are essential. However, the promises associated with this plan are inherently flawed and there is little hope that the UC will be able to meet their own objectives.
While the UC’s carbon neutrality plan may face challenges, it’s important to acknowledge the progress made on various campuses. In October 2023, UC Santa Cruz took the first step by publishing its plan to replace natural gas with renewable energy. This aligns with the UC’s subsequent July 2023 directive, which calls for all 10 campuses to create a plan to transition away from fossil fuels with renewable energy at the forefront.
UC Davis has already replaced the campus’ natural gas-fired steam system with an electric-based water heating system in what was called the Big Shift. UC Berkeley has begun designing a reconstruction of the campus’ energy system to cut building-related carbon emissions by 85%. Unfortunately, all of this work only accounts for a small fraction of emissions and is only a minuscule step towards carbon neutrality.
The UC has been plainly optimistic about meeting these goals, but the truth is that these aspirations are lofty, costly and complicated. Achieving these standards is made less realistic with increasing admission numbers. The UC already admitted a record-breaking number of students in Fall 2023, making carbon neutrality that much more difficult.
These projects present short-term inconveniences and growing pains for the campus community, whether in the form of construction projects or blocked-off roads. Campuses’ existing accessibility will need to be preserved, and the cost should not be passed onto the students in any way, shape or form.
Additionally, there are questions about how much the UC can be trusted in the fight against climate change when its original plan relied on the purchase of carbon offsets instead of actual infrastructure change. Carbon offsets or carbon credits are bought by a person or organization to fund projects fighting climate change at the pace of actually taking the initiative of lowering that person or group’s actual carbon emissions. These purchases “offset” the carbon emissions of the buyer by funding efforts to lower emissions such as renewable energy expansion or reforestation. Different UC campuses have taken this route to create the appearance that they have lowered their own emissions because it is less expensive than the restructuring necessary to divest from fossil fuels. As recently as 2020, UC Merced paid for offsets that halted the emission of methane gasses in Oklahoma, North Carolina, South Dakota and Nebraska. Before the 2024 plan was released by the UC, the previous goal was to offset approximately 650,000 metric tons of emissions, equating to over 80% of the UC’s current carbon emission levels.
A UC-commissioned research project in 2018 found that purchasing offsets was also incredibly misleading. In reality, the overwhelming majority of those offsets gave the impression that more emissions were being cut than were. This information indicated that purchasing offsets to equate to UC’s emissions would actually be more costly and that money was redirected to decarbonization projects on campuses in the 2024 plan. Therefore, while it is the express goal of the UC to limit the use of carbon offsets to reach carbon neutrality, they have particularly craven motives for doing so.
Furthermore, it’s unclear if the money allocated per campus will be enough to achieve what is necessary. There’s also a question of if the $6 to $10 billion should be distributed based on need. For example, the level of air quality in Santa Barbara versus Riverside and Los Angeles is comparable. There’s no question that all campuses will need to get to work and receive funding for decarbonization, but the needs of different campus communities should be considered and factored in.
Unfortunately, the unbalanced funding per UC campus will likely not change with this issue. Currently, UC Riverside (UCR) gets the least amount of money despite admitting and enrolling the most low-income students. Undergraduates at UCR receive less funding from the state than students at all other UCs. UCR has been forced to make do with less funding per student despite meeting calls from state lawmakers and officials to admit more in-state students that bring in less tuition revenue than out of state students do. Without increased state support, UCR undergraduates will continue to be educated at $8,600 per student as compared to a UC-wide average of $10,000. This is not a pattern that can be allowed to continue, especially when it comes to addressing emissions and their negative impacts.
Adding insult to injury, the Inland Empire (IE) has been a tragedy for years for air and water quality standards. The American Lung Association’s 2023 report ranked Riverside and San Bernadino as the two most ozone-polluted counties. There have been cries to state and local governments to halt the expansion of warehouses in the IE, as they have significantly contributed to pollution and land shortages. This has always qualified as a dire situation in the IE.
Sustainability in higher education is essential, and the UC is already behind. Decarbonization is going to be a multi-billion dollar endeavor, and each campus needs the state’s backing and internal accountability. Allocating resources and creating realistic plans has to be central as each UC puts its plans forward because, without efficiency, support and fairness, this will just be another dead initiative.
