Current Projects
In collaboration with the Chinese think tank China Center for International Economic Exchanges (CCIEE), we developed a rating system by which the sustainability performance of Chinese cities and provinces can be compared.
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The world's first interactive data visualization of product carbon footprints.
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An ongoing study and evaluation of the current measures of sustainability performance and impact measurement at the organizational, local, national and global level, with the ultimate goal of developing generally accepted measures of the physical dimensions of sustainability.
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Completed Projects
Under the Earth Institute's Cross-Cutting Initiative, we developed an urban sustainability indicator set for Chinese cities using three cities in China's Henan Province as a pilot case. We integrated scientific and participatory approaches in designing the indicator set, in one of the first studies of its kind to propose integrating both top-down and bottom-up methods.
Surveys conducted also yielded a large amount of data on public attitudes towards sustainability issues, environmental behavior, and local environmental governance in China. One paper on these topics was published in the journal Sustainable Development, and two more are forthcoming.
Conference presentations have included "Determinants of urban pro-environmental behaviors: a study based on survey at three cities in Henan Province, China"; "Willingness to Pay for Environmental Quality Improvements: Evidence from a Contingent Valuation Survey in China"; and "Environmental Pollution as Public Priority in Urban China."
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The potential tradeoff between the twin goals of reducing environmental impact while maintaining growth will require China’s cities to evaluate the economic impact of urban pollution at the local level. Using economic input-output analysis, city-level indicators of economic activity and environmental impact, and available estimates of the benchmark relationships between output and pollution by sector, we outline a method to quantify–in monetary terms–the marginal damages of air pollution by sector at the city level. By applying the framework of environmental accounting to the pilot case of Jiyuan, a small city in Henan province, we demonstrate a method for local public agencies to facilitate administrative tracking of monetized air pollution based on underlying economic activity, and outline a minimum set of metrics which a small city in China must track in order to estimate the monetized damage of air pollution by sector.
Read the report and learn more here.
Dr. Satyajit Bose worked with the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) Group to support the enhancement of their index that assesses companies acting in Latin America and the Caribbean based on their performance in environmental, social and governance dimensions, as well as on a development commitment in the region. The index, IndexAmericas, is the first index developed by a multilateral development bank to assess companies acting in Latin America in this way, and was launched at the 2017 World Economic Forum in Buenos Aires.
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The City of Huizhou was one of 16 cities selected to receive a Smarter Cities Challenge grant from IBM in 2015, receiving recommendations from IBM experts on how Huizhou can measure and grow its tourism industry. The Earth Institute’s Research Program on Sustainability Policy and Management at Columbia University was tasked by IBM to execute a study on the relationship between the tourism industry, sustainability, and economic development in Huizhou.
By using sustainability as a lens with which to analyze tourism growth, we have developed a management system and set of recommendations for developing Huizhou’s tourism industry—one which encourages environmental sustainability, reduces seasonality, and expands the marketing of Huizhou as a “green” city. This report begins with a background of the tourism industry and its expansion both within China and internationally, followed by a discussion of the case studies we analyzed to form the basis of our recommendations. We then provide a sustainable tourism management system for Huizhou, an indicator system which we developed for the city to assess its progress and evaluate long-term success, both environmentally and economically. Finally, the majority of the report is devoted to our six recommendations for Huizhou’s tourism development, which collectively touch upon topics of policy, environment, marketing, and off-season tourism.
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China has the world's largest high-speed railway (HSR) network, but while HSR is meeting high transportation demand, the Decide-Announce-Defend approach to infrastructure policy and projects still prevails in China and is often criticized for not addressing public concerns of environmental and social risks. In recent years, researchers have investigated the economic and environmental impacts of HSR, yet few studies have evaluated the public's views on HSR risks or their views on the trustworthiness of key information sources, which are believed to be critical in predicting public behavior and reaction to infrastructure projects. Using random survey data from communities along the Beijing-Shenyang and Beijing-Shanghai high-speed railway lines, our study shows that perceived risks of HSR are higher in the operating stage rather than during construction. We also find that in the construction stage, risk-related information is often obtained through informal channels, while the government becomes a more trusted information provider only after HSR goes into operation. Furthermore, we confirm that the public's perception of the level of knowledge, transparency, and attention to risk of the information sources1 are key determinants of their perceived trustworthiness. Lastly, this study reveals that socioeconomic characteristics are more important than project phase in explaining the regional differences in risk perception and trustworthiness of key information sources. This key finding calls for a strategy of stakeholder engagement that is carefully tailored to the demographics of the affected population in the decision-making and implementation process of HSR, as well as other infrastructure projects.
Learn more here.
The Earth Institute Research Program on Sustainability Policy and Management created a benchmarking methodology for a scoring model for users of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) data available on Bloomberg terminals. The model facilitates analysis, comparison, and scoring of publicly listed companies on relative ESG performance. We have collaborated with ESG Analytics to develop a statistical methodology for the assessment framework.
Our research team collaborated with the Columbia Global Centers in Beijing to assess the deployment of The Sustainability Consortium’s “Sustainability Measurement and Reporting System” in China and its success as a tool for improved decision-making on sustainability initiatives. Research took place both in the US and China to analyze the effectiveness, appropriateness, and practicality of the reporting system.
Learn more about The Sustainability Consortium here.