804Z Spring 2026 Climate Change: What Now?

804Z  Climate Change: What Now?
Eight sessions
Instructor: Ron Edelstein
Thursdays, 9:40—11:05, Mar. 26—May 14
We will first examine the scientific basis for climate change to answer some basic questions: Is climate change occurring, is it real? If so, is it manmade or from natural occurrences? Can we do anything about ameliorating it or its impacts? What are the potential "tipping points" that might make climate change irreversible? Next, we will look at the state of the world's battle with climate change. Are we making progress in reducing greenhouse gas emissions? How has the change of administrations in the U.S. impacted greenhouse gas emissions and regulations? How are other nations doing? We will then examine key energy using sectors: power generation, transportation, residential/commercial buildings; all to see what is being done to impact climate change and what you and I can do. Finally we will run En-ROADS, the climate solutions model where YOU will be world energy czars who are tasked with keeping global temperature increases to less than 1.5C by 2100.
Ron Edelstein has engineering degrees in Aerospace Engineering, Solid Mechanics, and Environmental Science and Technology. He has almost 50 years of experience working on gas turbines, solar energy research, and natural gas research. He has taught climate change courses at Osher JHU, OLLI-AU, and at OLLI Mason.