German American Conference

The climate crisis is real and the negative impacts of changing global weather patterns are felt more every day. Despite the increasing need for immediate action, we face a political deadlock and increasing carbon emission worldwide.

Hope on the political level is only provided by the youth and the global climate strikes, that demand more rigorous climate change policies – but to what extent are they able to break the political mold?

In addition, carbon neutrality is just an intermediate step, as the atmospheric concentration of carbon must decrease. Innovative technologies such as direct air capture seem promising – but will they also be successful at large scale?

Within our societies, the most vulnerable parts and people, that often times contributed least to the climate crisis, are those who will feel the negative impact of climate change most. How can this environmental and climate injustice be addressed and what needs to change?

In this panel, we first aim to explore which political barriers need to be overcome to break this political deadlock situation. Second, we discuss which technological breakthroughs are needed in the fight against the climate crisis. Third, this panel focuses on the prevalent global and local climate injustice how our societies can be better protected.