Building Green Communities Conference and Trade Expo

The theme of the sixth annual conference, which coincides with the 40th anniversary of the best-seller Limits to Growth, is “Adaptation: Creating a Resilient Future.”

The HSU symposium in the Kate Buchanan Room will be anchored by top specialists in the field who will examine the effects of climate change on energy and transportation systems, food production, economics and natural resources.

The conference combines the symposium on campus Thursday and Friday, July 19-20, and an Expo/Trade Show and tours from the Arcata Community Center on Saturday, July 21. Attendance at the expo is free and open to the general public.

Nationally recognized authors and experts at the Humboldt State symposium will probe the development of strategies and technologies that can foster adaptation to a changing climate. Headline speakers are:

· Bill McKibben, famed educator, environmentalist and author of The End of Nature, The Global Warming Reader and Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future and founder of 350.org, an advocacy organization for grassroots global climate solutions

· Jorgen Randers, one of the original authors of The Limits to Growth, now a professor of climate strategy at the BI Norwegian Business School and writer of a new book, 2052: A Global Forecast for the Next 40 Years

· Richard Heinberg, Post-Carbon Institute senior fellow and author of more than 10 books on energy policy

· James Howard Kunstler, author of The Long Emergency and Too Much Magic and a specialist in suburban sprawl and diminishing global oil supplies

· Rob Hopkins, co-founder of the Transition Town movement and of the Transition Network, author of The Transition Handbook— From Oil Dependence to Local Resilience and The Transition Companion

Humboldt speakers will include Lonny Grafman, HSU environmental engineering professor and founder of Appropedia, an online source of collaborative solutions in sustainability, appropriate technology and poverty reduction; Michael Furniss of the Redwood Science Lab, who will discuss the impact of climate change on redwood forests; and Aldaron Laird of Trinity Consulting, author of the Humboldt Bay Shoreline Inventory and Inundation Assessment.