The NEST Climate Campus

The Nest Climate Campus:

Today, I went on a field trip with the ecology club at my highschool to the Nest Climate Campus at the Javits Center in NYC! As some of you may know, this week is climate week in New York City, and there are hundreds of cost free events to attend talking about and introducing new ideas for climate justice and a cleaner city in general.

The Nest Climate Campus started on the 19th and ended today. The experience was incredible. I got the opportunity to listen in on important conversations between governors and business owners. Throughout the whole event, there are about 3-4 conferences a day, each lasting an hour or so. We took the train from our school, and got to spend basically the whole day there.

The first event that I listened to was talking about sustainability in the travel and tourism industry. I’ve never thought about sustainable travel and hospitality before, but if implemented, it can help our planet significantly. We listened to the head of an airline supplying company, who talked about the changes in materials and fuel to make airlines more sustainable. The main issue is cost, as sustainable travel means more expensive travel, which very few people will pay for sadly. Companies are working hard to fix this, and lead to a cleaner and better world.

We then took a tour of the green roof on the javits center, where we saw hundreds of different plants, tasted some fresh raspberries, and even saw the 6 beehives on the campus. The whole center is estimated to have 6.75 acres of green roofing, how unreal is that! It makes a significant difference in air quality and storm water runoff in NYC.

Lastly, we visited a panel on the importance of environmental storytelling, which influences the younger generation to become passionate in helping the environment and saving our planet. We listened to several big nonprofits and their introduction into environmental advocacy. Talking about how they tell stories to their audiences just as stories were told to them. This was an interesting experience because I’d never thought that simple storytelling would influence environmental passion but storytelling is an important tool that truly does inspire.