Informal Lunch Discussion Series Encourages Interdepartmental Collaboration

We’re all familiar with three R’s of sustainably: Reuse, Reduce, Recycle. But despite the catchy motto, two of the R’s are mostly an afterthought; when it comes to consumption, recycling gets most of the attention, even though, in reality, it doesn’t have much of an impact. Professor of Marketing Gergana Y. Nenkov, an affiliate faculty member at Schiller, hopes to influence the way that both consumers and scholars think about responsible consumption—by helping to shift the focus. “Reducing consumption waste by extending product lifespans delivers far greater environmental benefits than recycling and should therefore be prioritized,” she tells SchillerNow.

Though in her career she has developed strategies for increasing recycling rates and recycling accuracy, she believes it’s time for a change of emphasis. “My current research agenda shifts the spotlight from recycling to reduction, and developing innovative communication strategies that encourage consumers to reuse and repair,” she says.

On October 29, Professor Nenkov spoke on October 29 about her research into responsible consumption and strategies to minimize waste as part of the Schiller Informal Lunch Seminar (SILS). SILS launched this fall, under the leadership of Economics Professor Edson Severnini, one of Schiller’s core faculty members. The series of discussions will range more broadly and be more informal than past Schiller discussion series, which were overseen by Political Science Professor David Deese during the 2021-2023 academic years, and subsequently by Professor Yi Ming, a Schiller core faculty member, for 2023-2024. “My goal is to create a relaxed, inclusive space for faculty to share their research on energy, health, and the environment, learn from one another’s methods, and spark interdisciplinary conversations,” says Professor Severnini.

For the SILS talks — which begin with fifteen minutes of mingling while boxed lunches are distributed— presenters will talk about their work for thirty minutes, starting at noon. In keeping with the more laidback approach, presenters will not hand out working papers for review, as they did in the past. Speakers will not only describe their area of study, but the methodological tools they use. Professor Nenkov explained that she examines how re-using, reducing, and recycling plays out in the real world by using field experiments, online surveys, and behavioral data analysis (which leverages Google Search insights). Professor Severnini hopes that communicating about methods will give audience members a chance to spot opportunities to collaborate — on seed grand proposals or larger initiatives.

For Professor Severnini’s talk, which inaugurated the series, he described his research on how Brazil’s tax policies have had the unintentional effect of increasing air pollution — damaging infants’ health in the process. More specifically, he explained that an anti-scrappage policy that was implemented in Brazil to help low-income households afford to keep cars unintentionally led to older, dirtier cars on the roadways. 

Professor Severnini provided details on how he and his team figured this out: “We used a border-pair quasi-experimental approach that compares municipalities located on either side of state borders — where one side is subject to specific vehicle tax exemption ages and the other is not — to estimate the policy’s causal effects on vehicle age, emissions, and health,” he tells SchillerNow. “I chose this topic because it illustrates how empirical, quasi-experimental methods can be applied to evaluate real-world environmental and public policy tradeoffs. It also demonstrates how policies intended to promote equity can, paradoxically, undermine environmental and health objectives — an issue at the core of sustainability debates.” 

He was pleased by the response he got to the talk. “Several colleagues were particularly interested in the methodological approach and the policy relevance of the findings,” he says. “The discussion afterward focused on how similar approaches could be applied to evaluate other environmental and health interventions, both in the U.S. and abroad. A few colleagues from political science and environmental health expressed interest in exploring potential collaborations, particularly around the political economy of environmental policy reform.”

Associate Professor of Physics Fazel Tafti has spoken at SILS, discussing the cutting edge work he is doing with quantum materials, used to make quantum computers—which could soon be vastly more powerful than today’s computers, so good at problem-solving that they could help scientists design ground-breaking new drugs and innovative new building materials. (As The New York Times recently reported, “Google announced last year that it had built a quantum computer that needed less than five minutes to perform a particularly complex mathematical calculation in a test designed to gauge the progress of the technology … [which] the world’s most powerful non-quantum supercomputers would not have been able to complete it in 10 septillion years, a length of time that exceeds the age of the known universe by billions of trillions of years.” While the calculation has no practical use, it suggests quantum computing's outsized promise.)

Professor Tafti’s specific focus is on new quantum materials that could serve as better building blocks of quantum computers. As mind-bending as it may be to even contemplate this, he studies how to make materials that are solid—whose electrons nonetheless behave like fluids. “I focused on an enigmatic phase of matter known as the Quantum Spin Liquid, where the magnetic moments of atoms remain fluid-like instead of freezing into a magnetic order,” he explains to SchillerNow. “A true quantum spin liquid has not been discovered yet, and my group is a front-runner in search of this enigmatic phase.” 

He was impressed by the questions that colleagues outside of the physics department asked him, perhaps especially those posed by a professor in the Carroll School of Management. “She asked me about the real-world applications of my research,” he says. “I explained that a quantum spin liquid can be used in quantum computation devices.” The experience “made me rethink the way I present my research to a broader audience,” he added. 

Professor Severnini invites anyone who wants to be added to the SILS email list to drop him a line: severnin@bc.edu. He believes the talks could make a real difference in multiplying Schiller’s impact. “I hope SILS becomes a catalyst for new research partnerships that address complex sustainability challenges through diverse perspectives and methods,” he says. “I also hope it helps build a sense of community around sustainability topics and challenges, while fostering both research and teaching collaborations on these topics across campus.”