President Schlissel:

We Demand A Just Transition to True Carbon Neutrality by 2030

        Today, students from on and off campus have come in person to demand a just transition to true carbon neutrality. Throughout the preceding months, representatives of student groups have met with President Schlissel and with the regents to share our concern and dismay at the state of climate action on campus. We have spoken out at regents’ meetings, published articles in the local press, attended office hours, circulated petitions, and submitted letters of commentary on current processes such as the President’s Commission on Carbon Neutrality (hereafter, “Commission”). Not only has the University administration ignored our own concerns and recommendations, but it has continuously failed to take meaningful actions despite decades of awareness of the threat of climate change. In recent years, public gestures such as the formation of the President’s Greenhouse Gas Reduction Committee and the signing of the We Are Still In pledge have not been followed by meaningful implementation. This demonstrates to us that, without further imposition of structures that ensure accountability, we can have little faith in the President’s Commission to address our climate emergency.

The heel-dragging, greenwashing, and excuse-making that has taken the place of meaningful action is especially unacceptable coming from a center of power and privilege that both bears a great climate debt and possesses a disproportionate capacity for the swift transition that we, and they, know is necessary. Student strikers are making our voices heard today because we recognize that climate change is an ecological and humanitarian crisis on a massive scale that disproportionately causes the most harm to those who have done the least to cause it. Global scientific consensus tells us we have only 11 years remaining to curb the worst impacts of climate change and combat the causal systems of oppression that channel its effects to our most at-risk communities. We recognize the call to climate justice, coming from grassroots leaders and frontline communities around the world, which calls for a just transition, energy democracy, and food sovereignty to solve our global crises and restore communities. Climate justice rejects false solutions designed to preserve the power structures and profiteering that caused the climate crisis. Therefore, we have come to demand the following actions from the University of Michigan administration, which are necessary in the pursuit of Climate Justice.

The University of Michigan must:

• Honor the public commitment already made by President Schlissel when he signed  the “We are still in” pledge, which committed U-M to pursue actions to limit warming to 1.5 degrees C. 

• Commit publicly to the necessary and scientifically-informed goal of achieving carbon neutrality by 2030, with intermediate goals and regular assessments of progress.

• Use accurate carbon accounting in all climate targets, accounting for the full carbon footprint of purchased energy and fuels (including methane leaks), emissions from commuter and University travel, and U of M’s share of emissions from companies of which it has partial ownership.

• Publicize the current state of progress for each recommendation made in the 2015 Report of the President’s Greenhouse Gas Reduction Committee, including timelines and resource allocations for implementation.

• Account for failures to implement the 2015 Recommendations, and provide detailed plans for the process of implementation of current and future recommendations for carbon reductions.

• Establish regular, public assessments of progress toward each recommendation produced by the new Commission.

• Cancel the planned expansion of natural gas use at the Central Power Plant and include the future of the central power plant in the Commission’s scope.

• Empower the Commission to meaningfully direct the University’s infrastructure, budgeting, operational, and investment changes to initiate real and rapid transition.

• Disempower DTE, Consumers, and other fossil fuel and corporate interests in decision-making processes regarding U-M’s future.

• Immediately direct Facilities and Operations to develop proposals for carbon-neutral heating and cooling of U-M campuses as rapidly as possible. Provide resources for them to adequately perform this task.

• Establish a science-based University carbon budget that cannot be overdrawn.

• Establish a well-endowed Green Revolving Fund to provide and preserve funding for large investments in carbon neutrality.

• Divest completely from fossil fuels; no endowment funds should be invested in entities that do business in fossil fuel extraction, transport, or burning.

• Refuse to approach climate goals with interim or false solutions, such as carbon offsets, which justify prolonged consumption in the global north and neocolonial relationships with the global south.  

• Draft U-M climate policy in consultation with experts in Environmental Justice and Life Cycle Analysis.

• Give equal participatory rights to historically displaced communities at every stage of decision-making.

• Recognize and respect Indigenous sovereignty rights and consult local Indigenous groups in needs assessment and decision-making.

• Restructure the Office for Campus Sustainability so that it is adequately staffed, funded, and integrated into University operations to ensure that U-M leads in the implementation of just climate solutions.

• Sign the President’s Climate Commitment to provide a durable framework for achieving carbon neutrality and a standardized way of sharing information with other universities.

• Join the University Climate Change Coalition, to exchange best practices and lessons learned with other universities in pursuit of accelerating local climate solutions that reduce greenhouse emissions and build community resilience.

[Accomplished September 17, 2019]