<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rss xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" version="2.0"><channel><title><![CDATA[UBC Environmental Policy Association]]></title><description><![CDATA[A student-led organization that aims to promote awareness, education, and advocacy for environmental policy and current global events.]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/blog</link><generator>RSS for Node</generator><lastBuildDate>Mon, 06 Apr 2026 14:21:02 GMT</lastBuildDate><atom:link href="https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/blog-feed.xml" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml"/><item><title><![CDATA[I’m Allergic to Sakuras]]></title><description><![CDATA[I’m allergic to sakuras. A quick Google search should yield a plethora of information about how the trees are not, in fact, the source of most allergies but an innocent bystander that takes the blame. But I only get swollen eyes and a stuffy nose when I stand close to them, and only when they are in bloom. I’m pretty certain that they are the source of my mildly allergic plight. You might read the above and assume I have a dislike toward the trees. After all, they make me, if not downright...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/i-m-allergic-to-sakuras</link><guid isPermaLink="false">69b13003a547e1dd3d7f3d16</guid><pubDate>Wed, 11 Mar 2026 09:09:09 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/11062b_2277fceea18e4ffc82ec7defe747083c~mv2.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_1000,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Andreas Kondos Sheppard</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[Hot Springs and Hard Questions: Canada’s National Park Story]]></title><description><![CDATA[The year is 1885. After years of scandal, hard labor, and on the brink of fiscal ruin, the Canadian Pacific Railway had finally breached the great rock wall of the continent: the Rocky Mountains. In specifics, the Canadian Rockies — those jagged peaks that rise from the Earth in the manner of a sawblade, frozen in time, slicing across the great plains (The Canadian Encyclopedia, n.d.-b). Ascending up the Bow Valley, railway crews, during breaks from the grueling manual labor of the job...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/hot-springs-and-hard-questions-canada-s-national-park-story</link><guid isPermaLink="false">69b12e39a547e1dd3d7f3926</guid><pubDate>Wed, 11 Mar 2026 09:02:13 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/437c3dc2bb1155a5220bc5d2342d4994.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_667,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Andreas Kondos Sheppard</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[Slacktivism: Theory and Practice]]></title><description><![CDATA[I spend far, far too much time doomscrolling on social media. That cycle of constant novel stimulus that consumes an alarming percentage of my day really gets my dopamine flowing. I also like to think of myself as reasonably politically correct — enough so that my feed reflects my worldviews. I’m especially passionate about environmental issues: climate change, biodiversity preservation, and related topics. And it is right at the intersection of these three things — doomscrolling, political...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/slacktivism-theory-and-practice</link><guid isPermaLink="false">69b12ac9a547e1dd3d7f31bd</guid><pubDate>Wed, 11 Mar 2026 08:52:24 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/372add_2bd579b715874fcb9da94d0f4bbdf84a~mv2.jpg/v1/fit/w_550,h_353,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Andreas Kondos Sheppard</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[The Myth of the Great Outdoors]]></title><description><![CDATA[Andreas Kondos Sheppard As a boy, I used to frequently take road trips across the continental divide – that vast mountain gap marking the division of North America’s Pacific and Atlantic watersheds (1). Not only was this a place of remarkable ecological change, but so too was it of natural beauty. The checker-board clear cuts of my home in the Columbia Valley gave way to protected park land; first in glimpses, then stands, and finally, whole valleys of untouched, un-felled timber, climbing...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/the-myth-of-the-great-outdoors</link><guid isPermaLink="false">69818527aa13a366d93bf97c</guid><pubDate>Tue, 03 Feb 2026 05:33:17 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/11062b_30fb221e645d4de2baeed84690bdb38e~mv2.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_1000,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Andreas Kondos Sheppard</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[Corals have hit their tipping point: What now?]]></title><description><![CDATA[You are a coral, a colourful marine invertebrate that is the backbone of many ocean ecosystems, hosting organisms in coral reefs. You absorb energy from waves, calming the wrath of the ocean before it hits shore. You provide food and medicine for the humans nearby. And now, you may be dying off forever.  Recent analysis from the Global Tipping Points Report indicates that human-caused global warming is pushing coral reefs past their survival limit (also known as their ‘tipping point’). Earth...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/corals-have-hit-their-tipping-point-what-now</link><guid isPermaLink="false">69803176396306036ecbef34</guid><pubDate>Mon, 02 Feb 2026 05:12:59 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/nsplsh_ea051e2eabc74d958568d1d1720d88a1~mv2.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_1000,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>EPA President</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[‘Tis the Season to be Sustainable]]></title><description><![CDATA[As December approaches, many of us prepare for the holidays and celebrations such as Christmas, New Year’s and more. These holidays are deeply meaningful to many, and offer a great time for folks to rest, reflect and reconnect with loved ones! For others, December also represents a time filled with get-togethers, gifts, parties and a bit of retail therapy. It’s easy to get swayed into the holiday spirit as one walks along streets decorated by twinkling lights, excited to bring home some new...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/tis-the-season-to-be-sustainable</link><guid isPermaLink="false">69685755bbaf501a67da0af6</guid><pubDate>Thu, 15 Jan 2026 03:05:39 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/372add_f703b523a22f4e11adac5bd5d4ecdab2~mv2.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_768,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Sanjana Karthik</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[Floods are Natural. Our Disasters are not.]]></title><description><![CDATA[Andreas Kondos Sheppard Imagine a river mid-flood. Not the catastrophic images of our modern era; just imagine what a natural river honestly looks like mid-flood. The vast, churning water, rich in brown, silty sediment. The embankments as they erode. The sound of the flow and its power, pouring over to the shallow marshes flanking its banks. Trees, knee-deep in water. Temporary ponds forming as water fills depressions in the earth. Somewhere upriver, weeks, months, or even years’ worth of...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/floods-are-natural-our-disasters-are-not</link><guid isPermaLink="false">693d364f42832d49aebbd4ed</guid><pubDate>Sat, 13 Dec 2025 10:01:25 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/11062b_f3aa8c82478f447ab16e8712ec01b568~mv2.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_1000,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Andreas Kondos Sheppard</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[Melting Boundaries: Understanding Black Carbon in the Himalayas]]></title><description><![CDATA[By Sukanya Aggarwal When people think of climate change in South Asia, they think of high temperatures and rising sea levels. But far above the cities and coastlines, another crisis is lingering, affecting over two billion people. The Himalayan region, often called the “Water Towers of Asia”, supplies freshwater to nearly two billion people. Its glaciers feed important rivers like the Indus, Ganges, Brahmaputra, and Mekong. In recent decades, some glaciers have melted quicker than...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/melting-boundaries-understanding-black-carbon-in-the-himalayas</link><guid isPermaLink="false">693be36cc07e7900a33b910e</guid><pubDate>Sat, 13 Dec 2025 09:37:04 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/0bb83114d47e4ca0a9fa5a9ea6a16530.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_1000,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Sukanya Aggarwal</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[British Columbia Has an Old-GrowthProblem]]></title><description><![CDATA[Opinion Piece by Andreas Kondos Sheppard For how visible clear -cut logging is — the checkerboard scars across hillsides, the bald mountaintops, the flood-prone valleys once shaded by giants — the BC government seems deter- mined to obscure it. And not with cloud cover, fog, or clever strategic logging. No. The BC government obscures the truth  — about the scale, the impact, and the contra- diction at the heart of its own forestry policy. In one hand, the province promises to protect 30% of...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/british-columbia-has-an-old-growthproblem</link><guid isPermaLink="false">693bdef942832d49aeb8f87b</guid><pubDate>Fri, 12 Dec 2025 09:32:30 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/c02765efdf4d4e4189453697caac2600.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_1000,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Andreas Kondos Sheppard</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[Disappearing Cows: Artificial Intelligence and Socio-environmental Harm]]></title><description><![CDATA[I haven’t seen a cow in years. You see cows everywhere in the Texas suburbs and plains (where I’m from), and you see a lot of steakhouses and barbecue spots in general, too. But you see just the meat in cities like Vancouver, where the product is more detached from its source, only sometimes labelled “from BC”. Seeing cuts of beef in Save-On without acknowledging the farms, cows, and farmers is like seeing AI without the data centers, pollution, and labor. AI, though it has the ring of...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/disappearing-cows-artificial-intelligence-and-socio-environmental-harm</link><guid isPermaLink="false">69335eff6f872a8bb4d833c0</guid><pubDate>Fri, 05 Dec 2025 23:07:18 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/11062b_fa0f3be07ddd49e1b825c84dc82c7560~mv2.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_1000,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Ashley Smyth</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[Ksi Lisims LNG Gets the Green Light: Approval Amidst Divided First Nations Response]]></title><description><![CDATA[Following a joint decision by provincial ministers, the Ksi Lisims LNG project has been granted a B.C. environmental assessment...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/ksi-lisims-lng-gets-the-green-light-approval-amidst-divided-first-nations-response</link><guid isPermaLink="false">68de1372938dc83f5390e0ec</guid><pubDate>Thu, 02 Oct 2025 06:27:35 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/372add_271de6625b0b4ca8b6be7a5048b36ba2~mv2.png/v1/fit/w_1000,h_1000,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Sanjana Karthik</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[The Whanganui River: Nature’s Rights in New Zealand]]></title><description><![CDATA[The Whanganui River: Nature’s Rights in New Zealand 	 	In 2017, New Zealand made global headlines when Parliament passed the Te Awa Tupua...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/the-whanganui-river-nature-s-rights-in-new-zealand</link><guid isPermaLink="false">68de059d938dc83f5390c454</guid><pubDate>Thu, 02 Oct 2025 05:47:18 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/372add_07acdb1313cb4c7c8ff2dbdafc3e3481~mv2.jpg/v1/fit/w_993,h_660,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Sukanya Aggarwal</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[The Rainbow–Jordan Watershed: Last Cathedral of the Big River]]></title><description><![CDATA[The Columbia River — The Big River — is the namesake of British Columbia. 	With a drainage basin approximately the size of France,1 the...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/the-rainbow-jordan-watershed-last-cathedral-of-the-big-river</link><guid isPermaLink="false">68ddf8a4938dc83f5390a59e</guid><pubDate>Thu, 02 Oct 2025 04:32:56 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/372add_342027a74c79476fa163a5c711163b04~mv2.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_660,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Andreas Kondos Sheppard</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[Where the Wild Bees Are (and aren't) Impacts Food Supply]]></title><description><![CDATA[The traditional focus on honey bees in the realm of pollination is being challenged by recent discussions highlighting the indispensable...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/where-the-wild-bees-are-and-aren-t-impacts-food-supply</link><guid isPermaLink="false">6611f49e28b1117109095dd7</guid><pubDate>Fri, 05 Apr 2024 07:00:00 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/372add_34dbe20b771448d39bf73929279dd5cf~mv2.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_674,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Kasish Mahajan</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[Antarctic Sea Ice at Near-Historic Lows]]></title><description><![CDATA[There is a concerning trend of decreasing ice coverage in the waters surrounding Antarctica, highlighting the third consecutive year of...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/antarctic-sea-ice-at-near-historic-lows</link><guid isPermaLink="false">65fa097a4af27b29ee9842d2</guid><pubDate>Tue, 19 Mar 2024 07:00:00 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/372add_829eadb473a94dc5bcc957644f77bf4d~mv2.jpg/v1/fit/w_720,h_477,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Kasish Mahajan</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[What to Know about BC's 5 Biggest Oil and LNG Projects]]></title><description><![CDATA[LNG Canada, the company owned by a multitude of foreign fossil fuel organisations, is building Canada's first large-scale liquified...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/what-to-know-about-bc-s-5-biggest-oil-and-lng-projects</link><guid isPermaLink="false">65fa04a8d6c5f59be9f61706</guid><pubDate>Tue, 19 Mar 2024 07:00:00 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/372add_184d8cecafe74d82a08288d9029a0478~mv2.jpeg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_533,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Dylan Evans</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[Zombie Deer: Is it Canada's Problem Now?]]></title><description><![CDATA[Chronic wasting disease, or CWD, is a horrible neurological disease that affects cervids such as deer and moose. The disease which is...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/zombie-deer-is-it-canada-s-problem-now</link><guid isPermaLink="false">65e62766617985dc230e51b1</guid><pubDate>Mon, 04 Mar 2024 08:00:00 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/372add_f8ccae99f52b4b0b9933c6b5f23af06f~mv2.jpg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_630,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Dylan Evans</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[The World's First Airport-Based Green Hydrogen Plant]]></title><description><![CDATA[The recent collaboration between Cochin International Airport Limited (CIAL) and Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) to build a...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/the-world-s-first-airport-based-green-hydrogen-plant</link><guid isPermaLink="false">65e627febfa16e70a6b20c5c</guid><pubDate>Mon, 04 Mar 2024 08:00:00 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/372add_fc226afd34c7407ab25c27d3f6ee5930~mv2.png/v1/fit/w_1000,h_1000,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Kasish Mahajan</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[How to Love the Environment this Valentine's Day]]></title><description><![CDATA[Everyone loves to love on Valentine's, but does the environment get stood up? Flowers being imported burn up to 114 million litres of...]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/how-to-love-the-environment-this-valentine-s-day</link><guid isPermaLink="false">65da3876d5521c283a0e817d</guid><pubDate>Fri, 16 Feb 2024 08:00:00 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/372add_dac9c79ed95348aab21fdf6fe4b0ad49~mv2.jpeg/v1/fit/w_1000,h_676,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Dylan Evans</dc:creator></item><item><title><![CDATA[This Week's Environmental Wrap Up]]></title><description><![CDATA[Monday: According to Sponges We’re Warming A new study suggests that the Earth has warmed almost half a degree more than suspected....]]></description><link>https://ubcepa.wixsite.com/ubc-epa/post/this-week-s-environmental-wrap-up</link><guid isPermaLink="false">65da38f198a0e857906a41c2</guid><pubDate>Fri, 16 Feb 2024 08:00:00 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://static.wixstatic.com/media/372add_aa0bcf9b5fd649dbbec03ef8733dd805~mv2.jpeg/v1/fit/w_760,h_507,al_c,q_80/file.png" length="0" type="image/png"/><dc:creator>Dylan Evans</dc:creator></item></channel></rss>