Brown’s Equitable Climate Futures initiative, led by IBES and launched in 2024 to strengthen community-driven climate research, has determined its first round of working group awards. The funded projects range from policy development to resident-led data collection efforts. The four awarded working groups reflect the main goals of ECF: to bring a new, interdisciplinary, and engaged approach to climate solutions. 

Working Group #1: Engineering a Just Transition for Rhode Island Buildings 

One awarded working group focuses on Rhode Island’s transition to greener heating systems, researching potential community impacts. Co-led by University Research Associate Tom Sgouros and Stephen Porder, Brown’s provost for sustainability and a professor in IBES and the Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Organismal Biology, the project hopes to engage local stakeholders to develop model policies that ensure an equitable transition away from fossil fuels. 

The working group looks to identify how many workers might be impacted by replacing natural gas heating systems with electrical ones. It also hopes to understand how many property owners and tenants might need extra resources to afford the transition.

Working Group #2: The Rhode Island Environmental Justice Committee/Breathe Providence Resident Task Force 2.0 

Breathe Providence, a hallmark IBES project that has launched innovative sensors to monitor air quality across the city, also received funding from ECF. Led by IBES and DEEPS Professor Meredith Hastings, the working group aims to bolster Breathe Providence’s resident task force, in partnership with the Racial & Environmental Justice Committee, to collect data on community experiences related to air quality, decarbonization efforts, housing, and energy. 

“A key tenet of the Resident Task Force model is that community members direct the research questions and subsequent investigations, in addition to acting as data sources themselves,” Hastings said. The project’s first resident task force, established in 2023, addressed questions related to indoor air quality in schools, among others, which will be expanded in this second iteration. 

“This new funding will … ultimately contribute to more equitable approaches to Providence's challenges at the intersection of health, air quality, and climate change,” Hastings said.

Working Group #3: Equitable Climate Information 

IBES Affiliate Mara Freilich, an assistant professor in DEEPS and the Department of Applied Mathematics, also received funding for her proposed working group, which focuses on creating avenues for community engagement around the topic of climate change. 

Beyond a strong cohort of IBES faculty, including professors Daniel Ibarra and Seda Salap-Ayca, the working group is also led by scholars across University departments, such as English and Sociology. Through its interdisciplinary approach, the project hopes to work with community leaders to identify climate information gaps and establish a fellowship for early-career researchers.

The group also seeks to develop a structure for scholars to participate in community-engaged, climate-relevant research while at Brown. They have partnered with Rhode Island’s Racial and Environmental Justice Committee, nonprofit Alianza Coachella Valley, and the Woonasquatucket River Watershed Council to accomplish those goals.

Working Group #4: Historicizing Climate Innovations Research Group 

To rethink climate-resilient histories, IBES and History Assistant Professor Aparajita Majumdar’s working group seeks to mobilize a collective of academics, activists, and local community members to resurface forgotten and marginalized stories about how individuals relate to the natural world and climate change. The project will also involve organizing a two-day event, including an academic symposium and an educational exhibition, to share findings. 

“We hope that ECF is an effective onramp for our research community to be a part of the climate solution here in Providence, across Rhode Island, and far beyond,” said IBES Director Kim Cobb.