Healthy Indoor Air by Design (50m lecture)

This course is designed to communicate the importance of indoor air quality (IAQ) and empower architects, designers, specifiers, and construction professionals to employ strategies to improve the indoor air quality in the spaces they are creating. The course includes background on the impact of

indoor air pollution on the triple bottom line of human health, resource abuse, and economics. Participants will learn to identify sources of indoor air pollutants at the design phase of building construction. Several case studies will illustrate the major impact that ignoring indoor air quality has on a building throughout its life cycle. These case studies will highlight the effects of controlling, versus not controlling, product emissions from products has. Emphasis will also be placed on how participants can incorporate good indoor air quality principles into sustainable building projects and the importance of volatile organic compound emissions from products over content only requirements. Moreover, the participants will learn the value of selecting verified low-emitting materials as a proven method for controlling volatile organic compound emissions that can be pervasive in the indoor environment.

Providing Sustainable Utilities in Alaska's Rural and Remote Villages (50m Lecture)

In 1960, Indian Health Service (IHS) began funding sanitation facilities in Alaska. In 2001-2008, Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium conducted a pilot in the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta demonstrating how cooperative principles could be applied to drinking water and sanitation. These communities formerly had sewage lagoons and water haul systems. Alaska Rural Utility Collaborative (ARUC) has grown to 31 villages from this initial piloting.

Changes in permafrost, freeze-thaw cycles, severe storms and coastal erosion, along with high energy prices are affecting public health. Average 2012 diesel fuel prices in rural communities averaged over $6.00 with some Arctic communities well over $8 a gallon. An emerging crisis looms in sustainable operation and maintenance and developing resources that can lower the costs of energy.

Clean water and proper sanitation have significant public health benefits. So does investing in renewable energy sources that do not have high carbon emissions or pollutants that affect air quality and human health. Given high energy costs, improving affordability requires efficiency and renewable energy investments to improve rural utility economics over dependence on expensive diesel fuel.

Facilities must also be maintained in harsh environments where qualified personnel are relatively scarce. Capability and capacity building in villages is key to integrated public health infrastructure withstanding changes in environmental conditions and future energy price spikes. Applying collaborative principles can assist in achieving more sustainable communities. Our goal remains: “Alaska Natives become among the healthiest people in the world.” We need solutions that put communities at the leading edge of public health practice.

Climate Change Impacts and Options: Case Studies in the Northwest Arctic Borough, Alaska (50m Lecture)

The lifestyle, culture and subsistence activities of the Alaska Inupiat has evolved over thousands of years. Alaska has a rich history from the early contact years with the Russians, to the gold rush era to ‘black gold.’ Moving from territorial status to becoming the 49th state, a major Native land claims settlement (ANCSA of 1971) and the 1980 Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA) have set the stage for how Native cultures will adapt and fare in this Alaskan portion of the Arctic.

Climate impacts in many of the villages in the NW Arctic Borough have been documented by the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium and others. The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) will have issued its 5th Assessment by the time NEHA holds its 78th AEC. In this presentation we will explore the major impacts that are resulting from changes in the climate in the Borough, including impacts on subsistence activities, which affects diet and human health. Unpredictable and unusual weather has combined with changes in permafrost and freeze-thaw cycles, impacting not only transportation, but also construction of resilient utility systems, such as drinking water plants in Kivalina. The community water supply is vulnerable to changes in the Wuluk River and watershed, as well as to changes in shorefast sea ice where erosion washed out a major water line.

Innovation is required if the residents of villages such as Kivalina, Selawik, and Point Hope are going to thrive in this time of many changes in environmental conditions. Sustainable utilities are needed to support healthy, sustainable communities. In this portion of the Arctic, the effects of climate change can already be seen. One solution is to empower local communities through a local environmental observer program. Certainly a “fit for purpose” energy policy would support lessening the dependence on expensive diesel fuel; wind generators have reduced dependence on diesel in Kotzebue. Environmental health solutions contribute to the continuation of the lifestyle, culture and subsistence that have been practiced by Native ancestors. A new era of climate change brings challenge as well as opportunity for innovation.

Outside-the-Box Advocacy: Organizing Public Health’s Engagement in Built Environment Advocacy (50m Lecture)

Recently, the buzz phrase “Health in All Policies” has almost become ubiquitous, especially in public health’s efforts to come to the land use planning and

infrastructure design discussion. Public health has also seen dollars for marketing and education aimed at our community decision makers and their constituents become more valuable, whether by reduced funding, higher demand for health messaging, or both. Throughout 2012 and 2013, Tulsa Health Department has engaged with the Tulsa regional area Bicycle/Pedestrian Advisory Council, Tulsa’s Metropolitan Planning Organization, City of Tulsa planning and engineering staff, and various health minded coalitions to bring health and the built environment together in the minds of decision makers and the community. This presentation will tell Tulsa’s success story and provide tangible action steps to implement healthy built environment advocacy efforts. Participants will interact in small groups to discuss the process by which situational circumstance focuses advocacy messaging and share ideas among other groups. Through this interactive session, participants will walk away with innovative techniques to employ in their jurisdiction with limited resources in order to educate and advocate for health with decision makers, the public and most importantly, their own agencies.

Climate change and urban health (80m Lecture)

According to the current state of Climate Change and foreseeing a scenario of a possible worsening due to the general society business as usual, it is clear that major challenges are coming in terms of health, particularly in cities. Further measures and changes in cities are expected either in mitigation or/and adaptation.

It is foreseeable that cities will accommodate about 70% of world population by 2050. Against this backdrop and in scope of environmental, economic and social change that we are currently observing in society, it will be important to adopt a set of strategies and action programs for the protection and promotion of urban health. Particularly through urban planning and in the reconstruction of cities more sustainable and healthy.
With this paper it was done a review of the best policies in terms of sustainable development and healthy cities and we conclude that for a urban health, with the backdrop of climate change, we must achieve essential premises to minimize the consumption of space and natural resources, the rationalization and efficient management of urban streams, the health protection of urban population, equal access to resources and services and social and cultural diversity.