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Research ArticlePeer-Reviewed Articles

Policy Brief: Alternatives to In-Person American Society of Landscape Architects Conferences on Landscape Architecture

Rob Kuper
Landscape Journal, January 2022, 41 (1) 77-93; DOI: https://doi.org/10.3368/lj.41.1.77
Rob Kuper
Rob Kuper is a licensed landscape architect in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and an associate professor of landscape architecture at Temple University. He Received a BS in Environmental Design and an MLA from Auburn University. Past research interests generally involved the perception of landscapes, specifically with regard to time. His current and future research focuses on greenhouse gas emissions related to landscape architectural teaching and practice.
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Abstract

Annual, in-person professional meetings at a single location yield several personal and organizational benefits. Yet greenhouse gas emissions from organizing, executing, and attending conferences contribute significantly to the climate crisis. Within at least the last decade, the American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA) has claimed to continually reduce the carbon footprint of the annual meeting and EXPO by performing a variety of actions. ASLA supports global and national greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets to limit global warming to 1.5°C and has committed to measuring, understanding, making public, and reducing the organization’s emissions. To date, ASLA has not released information on its progress toward these goals. This study extends my previous work by estimating carbon dioxide emissions from the venues of the 2018 and 2019 ASLA Annual Meeting and EXPO and from travel and hotel accommodations for the attendees and 711 EXPO exhibitors. This study used online carbon calculators, refereed literature, and building energy benchmarking data. The results indicate that featured speakers and EXPO representatives originated from a small number of metropolitan areas, thereby supporting potential future decentralized meetings. Additionally, attendees’ and exhibitors’ total four-day conference emissions estimations were equivalent to the entire annual per capita emissions of someone residing in Ethiopia. In light of these results, I present ideas for several alternative means of convening. My emissions estimations of alternative conference modes indicate that emissions reduction targets could bemet in the short term by immediatelymoving to hybridizedmeetings requiring virtual attendance fromat least half of the participants from the most distant locations. In the long term, and by 2030 at the latest, ASLA’s annual meetings should be held entirely online.

KEYWORDS
  • Climate change
  • equity
  • green meetings
  • sustainability
  • Paris Agreement
  • © 2022 by the Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System

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Landscape Journal: 41 (1)
Landscape Journal
Vol. 41, Issue 1
1 Jan 2022
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Policy Brief: Alternatives to In-Person American Society of Landscape Architects Conferences on Landscape Architecture
Rob Kuper
Landscape Journal Jan 2022, 41 (1) 77-93; DOI: 10.3368/lj.41.1.77

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Policy Brief: Alternatives to In-Person American Society of Landscape Architects Conferences on Landscape Architecture
Rob Kuper
Landscape Journal Jan 2022, 41 (1) 77-93; DOI: 10.3368/lj.41.1.77
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Keywords

  • Climate change
  • equity
  • green meetings
  • sustainability
  • Paris Agreement
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