Climate change is an urgent and multifaceted challenge facing all of society.
Harvard faculty teach an expanding array of courses examining the many dimensions of this shared challenge. Explore courses in climate and sustainability ranging from economics and English to public health and climate science.
HARVARD UNIVERSITY
THE SALATA INSTITUTE FOR CLIMATE AND SUSTAINABILITY
The Interdisciplinary Art and Design Practices Seminar investigates art and design work in the interdisciplinary modalities of contemporary culture, the city, and the world. This semester, we will explore the theme of survival in times of an endangered and uncertain future.
This course will consider the challenge of climate change and what to do about it. Students will be introduced to the basic science of climate change, including the radiation budget of the Earth, the carbon cycle, and the physics and chemistry of the oceans and atmosphere.
At a time of increasing global turbulence with debates on the end of the liberal international order and rising turmoil in the wider European neighborhood, this course offers a comprehensive dive into EU external relations.
This course examines the relationship between urbanization and development through a historical and contemporary lens, paying close attention to the ways that the growth and structure of cities have influenced the economic, social, and political prospects of residents and their host nations, as well as vice-versa.
A project-based course, where groups of 2–4 students engage in synthetic organic or bioanalytical chemistry research. Students are introduced to experimental problems encountered in the synthesis, isolation, purification, characterization, and identification of potentially therapeutic organic compounds.
Data and artificial intelligence (AI) are changing our world.. Intended for leaders, this course introduces statistics and machine learning and what they can tell us about global challenges. Using case studies on justice and policing, elections and polling, behavioral economics, development, climate change, education, and health, we analyze research design, regression, and project evaluation, and compare the perspective of ethics.
This course prepares students to invest in, advise, or lead organizations in the context of increasing pressures of global urbanization, resource scarcity, and perils relating to climate change. The course takes a finance and real assets point of view focusing on houses, buildings, infrastructure, and cities as individuals, businesses, and global society make choices about who and what to protect. There are perils and also extensive opportunities in the analysis of situations and the deployment of tools, data science, and capital leading to success even in the face of these tensions.
This course is about one of the largest industries in the world: energy. Not only will we cover energy sectors that have traditionally supplied economies across the globe, but we will also cover the energy transition needed to reduce climate change and its impacts. It will examine the economic, regulatory, and social contexts that provide the dynamic backdrop for how both new entrants and incumbent firms can navigate and drive the energy transition. How does the energy economy work, and how fast can it change? How are entrepreneurial start-ups disrupting the energy economy? How are corporations across sectors navigating and potentially driving the energy transition—or not? How are new policies being enacted worldwide impacting billion-dollar decisions? And how are different local communities responding, given the benefits and costs of enormous changes in the energy mix?
This is an investing/finance course, designed to build on skills introduced in the RC finance course, but with an emphasis on how investors should incorporate what have traditionally been considered “non-financial” criteria in their decisions: for example, climate risk, environmental sustainability, minority representation on boards, and even the potential to create social good. Covering both public and private markets, the course will present the unprecedented opportunities that have arisen due to energy transition and other trends through rigorous approaches to business model assessment, valuation, transaction structuring and exits, as well as equity selection and portfolio construction. The course also explores incentives, decision-making, and the crucial problems and opportunities within the industry itself.
How we teach about climate change is critical to our response as a global population. Educators adopt a longitudinal view on the outcomes of their daily efforts—guiding each generation with hope and possibility. How do we communicate the loss of what might be called a pact between the generations to the next generation? This course offers an intensive opportunity to explore issues related to teaching climate change in K-12.
This course covers the international law governing the environment and natural resources. The course begins by covering the sources and institutional structure of international environmental law, as well as the fundamental principles governing international environmental law. The course continues by delving into the core treaty regimes in the field, including ozone protection, climate change, and biodiversity and species protection. The course will also address the relationship of international environmental law with other fields of international law.
