Diffusing Knowledge to the General Public About Waste’s Impact on Climate Change

A campaign proposal to integrate a more sustainable suburban lifestyle that may decelerate global warming using the Diffusion of Innovations Theory.

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December 2022

By: Natasha Avalos

About half of Americans believe that climate change is not human made, with nearly half of the non-believers thinking that there is no evidence that the planet is warming (Funk, 2016). How do an overwhelming number of Americans disagree with the scientific consensus that climate change is real? Perhaps it is to shift the blame away from ourselves as experts determine that humans are amongst the greatest contributors to the problem (Herring & Lindsey, 2022).

What Science Knows According to the Environmental Protection Agency (Environmental Protection Agency [EPA], 2022a), the warming of the planet’s overall temperature is due to excessive greenhouse gases stored in Earth’s atmosphere creating a Greenhouse Effect (EPA, 2022a). Scientists discovered that this changing climate has affected precipitation patterns, sea level and acidity, melting glaciers, more extreme weather events, and shifts of various ecosystem components such as agriculture and animal migration (EPA, 2022a). The greenhouse gases emitted into the atmosphere are primarily human made, with an excessive amount of the molecules being Carbon Dioxide. These gases are absorbed into the atmosphere and make it more difficult for heat already on Earth to leave it as the greenhouse gases form a type of “blanket” trapping heat closer to Earth (EPA, 2022a). This is where the Greenhouse Effect comes into play as the “heat-trapping gases in the atmosphere, [causes] the earth to warm up” more quickly than it would without human contribution (EPA, 2022a).

Scientists discovered that “Carbon dioxide is the primary greenhouse gas contribution to recent climate change” (EPA, 2022a). In 2020, the EPA found that 13% of greenhouse gas emissions were sourced from commercial and residential habits including mishandling of waste (EPA, 2022b). This mishandling includes excessive waste sitting in landfills, incineration to burn what no longer fits, as well as improper recycling and composting.

If the general public plays a larger role in the increase of climate change than they believe, how do we get them to learn about it? Unfortunately, politics and money have affected the way people behave and think; however, we can try to use this to our advantage as we try to effectively communicate scientific evidence of climate change to the general public and possibly even get them to change their habits to help stop the rapid growth of climate change.

Diffusion of Innovation The Diffusion of Innovation theory (Rogers, 2005) is a process in which a new idea, practice, or object is communicated through certain communication channels over a period of time among members of a social system (p. 11). The theory considers four elements that demonstrate how and why people come to adopt the innovation: innovation, channels, time, and social system/structure (p.15). First, recognize the innovation’s relative advantages, compatibility, complexity, trialability, and observability (p. 15-16).

Second, it’s important to diffuse the innovation through a credible and efficient communication channel (p. 18-20). Know who your audience is and their preferred communication channel; whether it’s through mass media or interpersonal connections, the public should be able to confide and relate to the innovator before even contemplating adoption.

Time and attitude are also key elements in the innovation-decision process when considering: knowledge (gaining an understanding), persuasion (forming an un/favorable opinion), decision to adopt, reject, or discontinue the innovation, implementation (voluntarily use), and ends with confirmation (seeks reinforcement to keep or reverse use) (p. 20-23).

Finally, recognize the structure of the social system where the innovation is being trialed by observing behavior patterns, norms, change agents and opinion leaders, as well as the consequences of adoption (p. 23-31).

Communicating Science to the General Public Using the Diffusion of Innovation theory, we can implement a local regulation that requires residents of a town to acknowledge their waste habits through an incentivized program that teaches them the impact of their waste on climate change and how to make a difference as a means of effectively communicating the issue of climate change.

Innovation The new incentivized program is an innovation that will teach the general public about a specific aspect of climate change: waste management. Through this program, a local regulation in collaboration with the city’s local landfills will give presentations, exams, and evaluations of the town’s residents’ waste habits. The EPA has created a Waste Reduction Model (WARM) that allows waste management companies to determine greenhouse gas emissions from waste, ways to reduce them, and economic and energy saving strategies while also suggesting alternative practices that locate the source of these emissions and the landfilling consequences of them (EPA, 2022c). This model will be used by local landfill companies to evaluate the residents’ impact on climate change.

Communication Channels Residents will receive an annual invitation to attend two presentations on residential waste contribution and its impact on climate change. The presentations will be hosted by opinion leaders of the town (such as the local government), people who work at the landfill, and scientific experts. By doing two presentations, the audience will be better able to recall and have a deeper understanding of the information they are being given. The two presentations will occur within about a month of one another with multiple opportunities for residents to attend with whatever works best for their schedule.

Using in-person presentations allows interaction between the audience and speakers to get instant feedback from one another about any questions or concerns they have surrounding what they are learning and how the program will affect them.

About a month after the second presentation, residents sixteen-years and older will go to a testing site to take an exam regarding their climate change and waste knowledge. The exams will be taken alone, however the average score per household will determine a fixed garbage bill for each home that will be re-evaluated annually after repeating the presentations and exam.

What about residents under the age of sixteen? At some point, everyone will turn sixteen, meet this requirement, and participate in the program. So until then, it is up to the adults of the household, and hopefully the child’s source of education, to prepare them for it.

Although exams and school are not always the absolute best way to effectively teach people about a complex topic, this exam is currently the best way to measure and understand the public’s understanding and consideration of residential impact on climate change and possibly even motivate them to be more mindful of their habits.

Time To start, landfill management can conduct this program for five years before determining if it is successful and worth continuing forward with. Every six months, the landfill will re-evaluate overall waste habits and emission from the town through the WARM process. The data collected from this should be shared through the radio, news, letters, or even emails to reach residents and update them on the town’s progress. The announcement will also include ways to further reduce emissions as a way to receive a better garbage bill rate next year.

This incentive for a lower bill may be more motivating for individuals who are more mindful of their finances than those who are more secure, yet it is still a persuasive way for residents to understand the impact waste leaves on climate change.

Bill consideration is incentivizing residents, nonetheless: actions speak louder than words. At this phase, residents are reflecting on the knowledge they have been shared about waste and climate change and we can tell if the communication of this information is working by measuring their emission and waste habits.

Increasing the garbage bill is a positive punishment as the program adds a higher bill as a punishment to high emissions. Lowering the garbage bill would be a negative reinforcement as the program would further encourage the low emissions by rewarding people with a lower payment each month.

Realistically, this system can work and truly teach people how they are directly impacting climate change, but it would take a while to be fully developed and implemented with proper training and passing of the regulation through election before the program can really get moving. Therefore, the effectiveness of this program relies on the structure and determination of the town to want to learn more and make change. Social Structure and System The three categories of people who would regulate and promote this program to be as effective as possible depends on opinion leaders, change agents, and experts. Opinion leaders are those who the public confide in and trust most, which would likely be local government officials. Change agents are those who are advocating for a change in current society standards and norms, and in this case that would include landfill managements and scientists who want lower greenhouse gas emission rates. Finally, experts are those who are most knowledgeable and skilled in their field, which would be climate scientists.

Local government officials may be a bad example of opinion leaders as politics are so polarized and half of the population may have strong trust in their government whereas the other half strongly disagrees with them. In this situation, we can assume that the majority of each town’s population agrees with their local officials as we are focusing on a smaller voter population compared to a more divided national opinion. Typically, as long as the opinion leaders strongly believe in something or someone, their followers will as well. In this situation, the program can be effective as long as their government demonstrates agreement and trust in the change agents and experts.

Accounting for everyone’s waste consumption and effectively reaching and teaching all people is nearly impossible, so the best way to reach the majority would be by focusing on people who live in some sort of home; whether it’s a house, apartment, townhome, etc.. In regards to those who live in an apartment or some sort of complex where there is a large communal garbage bin, the landfill management can calculate waste and emissions based on the overall complex where everyone’s bill will be the same.

Focusing just on towns in the United States, this program would unfortunately not be able to reach and inform the homeless population due to having no way to properly measure their waste and emissions as well as having no way to contact them for the presentation and exam.

Additionally, children under the age of sixteen are difficult to reach due to having little independence to make informed decisions as they can not even drive yet. While we can not reach the homeless population, children under the age of sixteen will eventually reach that age in which they will also begin to learn about waste habits’ contribution to climate change.

Adoption and Rejection After reaching the above elements, it is at the end of the program where we can determine if science’s communication to the public was successful. If this program and regulation were implemented and trialed for five years, the results after would be either a continuation of trying to educate the public or stopping the program and the public would then decide, on their own, if they want to continue seeking information about climate change as well as practicing the new waste habits.

If the residents decide to reject practicing on their own, we can consider the messaging of the program to have failed. The residents could have been doing well during the duration of the program due to the incentive of a lower trash bill, but once the incentive is removed it is up to them to decide if the issue is important.

Should the residents decide to continue to adopt the practices on their own, we can consider the messaging of the program to be successful. At this point, the resident is personally motivated to continue and understands the urgency of the issue that science was communicating.

Accessibility Using this model, we are targeting people who have a place to call home and focusing on small, local areas at a time. Because our target audience requires people to have a place of residency, we are not able to reach the two-percent of Americans who are homeless (National Alliance to End Homelessness, 2022). However, focusing on small areas first when developing this program will allow other towns to see the success of the program in one place and learn how to utilize it in their town later. By clustering this innovation, there will be a greater spread of accessibility to climate change awareness to different communities.

Regarding the presentations and exams, they will be offered at multiple points in time within a month to allow people with limited schedules to participate. As for those who are disabled or non-English speakers, online streaming and translation is available. We’ve seen success with broad options of community participation and advocacy through elections by offering multiple locations and times to vote as well as sending voter information packets and opportunities to learn about candidates and propositions. Due to these accessible measures, voting results in larger and more educated turnouts each year. If we translate these measures to our program, we can expect to also see a more educated general public.

What’s Next? The concept of Science in and of itself has a bad reputation amongst individuals as they often give up on learning it once it gets slightly difficult to understand. With that, people often ignore or have little trust in what scientists try to explain and warn the public about. Climate change is a very real, and oftentimes overwhelming, topic to discuss and effectively communicate as emotions, beliefs, and politics all play a role in how much attention is paid to the issue. As the scientific community has tried to warn and advocate for change before we reach the point of no return, there is little chance that one-hundred percent of the population will understand or take action.

This program includes an incentive to understand and make change, which could potentially be the downfall of it due to people only “learning” and acting in order to better their own financial situation. But if money can’t even get people to accept and understand climate change, what will?

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References Environmental Protection Agency. (2022a, August 19). Basics of climate change. EPA. Retrieved November 20, 2022, from https://www.epa.gov/climatechange-science/basics-climate- change

Environmental Protection Agency. (2022b, August 5). Sources of greenhouse gas emissions. EPA. Retrieved November 20, 2022, from https://www.epa.gov/ghgemissions/sources- greenhouse-gas-emissions

Environmental Protection Agency. (2022c, October 7). Waste reduction model (WARM). EPA. Retrieved November 20, 2022, from https://www.epa.gov/warm

Funk, C. (2016, October 4). The Politics of Climate: Americans' view on climate change and climate scientists. Pew Research Center Science & Society. Retrieved November 20, 2022, from https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2016/10/04/public-views-on-climate- change-and-climate-scientists/

Herring, D., & Lindsey, R. (2022, October 12). What evidence exists that Earth is warming and that humans are the main cause? NOAA Climate.gov. Retrieved November 20, 2022, from https://www.climate.gov/news-features/climate-qa/what-evidence-exists-earth- warming-and-humans-are-main-cause

Rogers, E. M. (2003). Elements of diffusion. In Diffusion of Innovation (5th ed., pp. 1–38). Chapter, Free Press.

National Alliance to End Homelessness. (2022, September 27). State of Homelessness: 2022 edition. Retrieved November 20, 2022, from https://endhomelessness.org/homelessness- in-america/homelessness-statistics/state-of-homelessness/