Welcome!
I research how data technologies inform environmental governance. New kinds of data-generating sensors and data-synthesizing algorithms are becoming central to everyday life and may prove transformational in policy too. A key challenge for geographers in the coming years is assessing these technologies’ promise to help society solve sustainability issues related to food security, climate change adaptation, and ecosystem services conservation. This will be done by understanding their human dimensions - their design, use, maintenance, and effects on society - alongside other governance trends such as marketization and metrification. It will involve understanding how these data systems came to be but also experimenting with them towards more just and equitable ends.
My work contributes to the field of political ecology. I teach undergraduate courses in nature-society geography and mapping as well as graduate courses in research methods and in Guelph’s Master of Conservation Leadership program. I am a member of the Environmental Data and Governance Initiative (EDGI), where we bring people together to analyze publicly available socio-environmental data and track the portrayal of climate change issues on the web.
Projects
- Digital Conservation - Big data and related data collection tools such as acoustic
sensors; machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms; dashboards and platforms for sharing data – these all constitute “digital conservation.” Digital technologies have the potential to make conservation more holistic, responsive, and participatory. However, we hear a lot about the promises of digital conservation and less about the challenges. Is access to digital conservation democratic? Are outcomes lining up with expectations? In general, what do conservationists actually think about and do with digital tools?
- Environmental Enforcement Watch (EEW) - EEW is a collaborative project engaging with the Environmental Protection Agency’s Enforcement and Compliance History Online (ECHO) database and to: draw large-scale public attention to the lack of environmental enforcement; work with partner organizations, especially marginalized communities, to build data efficacy through mutually beneficial relationships; inform EPA visions of alternative forms of public engagement; prototype community-oriented structures for environmental data, i.e. by congressional district, watershed, and health risks for a community; call attention to the relationship between environmental enforcement, environmental racism, and other interlocking forms of oppression (particularly white supremacy, capitalism, settler-colonialism, heteropatriarchy, etc.)
Recruitment
I’m excited to hear from prospective grad students who are curious about the role data technologies play in environmental governance. Types of projects we might collaborate on include:
- Evaluating opportunities for technologies such as AI and GIS in nature conservation and agri-environmental stewardship
- Analyzing publicly-available climate, conservation, and environmental governance datasets
I am also looking for students to research the design of environmental governance datasets like Canada’s National Pollutant Release Inventory and to experiment in alternative uses of them. This research would inform ongoing policy discussions, including those around Canada’s Bill C-226 and the US’s Justice40 initiative, both of which seek to develop data infrastructures for advancing environmental justice. Students would have the opportunity to collaborate with the Environmental and Data Governance Initiative.
Prospective students should be interested in conducting interviews, document analysis, and/or surveys for their research, as well as working critically with data technologies themselves. I can offer training in communication skills - including mapping, data visualization, and public writing - and in the scholarly fields of political ecology, science and technology studies, and digital geographies. Former graduate students have gone on to work in academia and in the conservation and environmental NGO sectors.
I encourage interested candidates to email me with a brief statement of interest, an unofficial transcript, and a writing/research sample.
The Department of Geography, Environment and Geomatics at Guelph and I aim to foster welcoming and collaborative spaces that value diversity and wellness. I encourage applications from all qualified individuals, including from justice-seeking groups and those underrepresented in higher education. More about the Department:
- Guaranteed funding for all graduate students for the duration of the program
- Comprehensive support for fieldwork and research expenses
- Outstanding faculty dedicated to a collaborative model of graduate education
- Research-intensive, collegial department in one of Canada’s top comprehensive universities
- Spacious campus with modern amenities in a vibrant community
For additional details, please see our website.
Webmapping and other programming projects
Collaborative
- EDGI - Website Monitoring - Python-based analysis of changes to US federal environmental agency websites, 2016-2020
- EDGI - Environmental Enforcement Watch - Bringing people together to analyze publicly available data on how environmental protection laws are enforced and complied with (Python-based Jupyer Notebooks)
- EDGI - New Jersey Drinking Water Justice Tool - A Streamlit based-tool for exploring drinking water justice in New Jersey
- gfw - Jupyter Notebook in R for analyzing Global Fishing Watch data
- HazMatMapper - Collaborative D3.js project for telling stories about the North American hazardous waste trade
- IPCC - Jupyter Notebook in Python for bibliometric analysis of papers cited in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Sixth Asssessment Report
- LA_MasterPlan_Analysis - Jupyter Notebook in Python for analyzing the US state of Louisiana’s Coastal Master Plan
Personal
- Angular - a demonstration of using Angular.js for mapping applications
- armchairgeographer - pulls random Flickr images from a specified set of coordinates, maps the area, and displays text randomly selected from a set of social theorists.
- election 2016 - a map of the 2016 US presidential election results
- Exploring ES - an experiment in mapping difference and change in ecosystem services
- Louisiana Land Loss - D3.js visualizations of coastal erosion in the US state of Louisiana
- MyGuelph - Leaflet webmap for participatory mapping Guelph’s new city ward boundaries.
- New Orleans Census Viewer - Angular-based view of US Census information about the city
- New Orleans STR Viewer - Angular-based view of short-term rental licenses in the city
- waste processing scripts - Mostly Python scripts for integrating CSVs related to hazardous waste data
- zipcode - Using Turf.js and Leaflet to map US zipcodes
Selected Papers
Data governance and infrastructure
Environmental governance actors - states, corporations, conservation groups, farmers, and so on - struggle to get the information they want. There’s more and more data out there every day, but it’s often siloed. Even when it’s available, it’s not necessarily relevant and there typically isn’t the time or money to make sense of it. Governing nature, it turns out, means governing data. Who collects environmental data and manages environmental databases, and who pays for it all? These questions tend to crystallize in data infrastructures.
- E. Nost. 2024. Governing AI, governing climate change? Geo: Geography and Environment. Link
- J. Goldstein and E. Nost. 2022. The Nature of Data: Infrastructures, Environments, Politics. University of Nebraska Press. Link
- Nost, E. 2022. ‘The tool didn’t make decisions for us’: metrics and the performance of accountability in environmental governance Science as Culture. Link
- Drakopulos, L., Silver, J., Nost, E., Hawkins, R., and Gray, N. 2022. Making global oceans governance in/visible with Smart Earth: The case of Global Fishing Watch. Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space. Link
- Nost, E. and E. Colven. 2022. Earth for AI: A Political Ecology of Data-Driven Climate Initiatives. Geoforum. Link
- Nost, E. and J.E. Goldstein. 2021. A political ecology of data. Environment & Planning E: Nature and Space. Link
- Machen, R. and E. Nost. 2021. Thinking algorithmically: The making of hegemonic knowledge in climate governance. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers. Link
- Nost, E. 2020. Infrastructuring “data-driven” environmental governance in Louisiana’s coastal restoration plan. Environment & Planning E: Nature and Space. Link
- Nost, E. 2019. Climate services for whom? The political economics of contextualizing climate data for Louisiana’s coastal Master Plan. Climatic Change. 157(1): 27-42. Link
- Nost, E. 2015. Performing nature’s value: software and the making of Oregon’s ecosystem services markets. Environment and Planning: A 47 (12): 2573-2590. Link
Digital practice and praxis
Decision-makers increasingly aim for what they call “data-driven” governance. But data doesn’t “drive” as much as it affords. It has to be learned from, through institutions that allow decision-makers to access expertise and communicate their expectations. Who are the users of digital technologies? What can they learn and do with their tools? How can data serve public ends, in and beyond the classroom?
- Horgan, L., K. Mok., E. Boetsch, S. Kelly, K. Dickinson, E. Nost, R. Bongiavanni, an S. Wylie. 2023. What Does Chelsea Creek Do for You? A Relational Approach to Environmental Justice Communication. Environmental Justice. Link
- Molloy, M., E. Nost, and M. Bledsoe. 2023. Is adaptation planning effective and for whom? The case of Louisiana’s 2017 Comprehensive Master Plan for a Sustainable Coast. Environmental Hazards. Link
- Steger, C., Hirsh, S., Cosgrove, C., Inman, S., Nost, E., Shinbrot, X., Thorn, J.P.R., Browth, D.G., Gret-Regamey, A., Muller, B., Reid, R.S., Tucker, C., Weibel, B., Klein, J.A. 2021. Linking model design and application for transdisciplinary approaches in social-ecological systems. Global Environmental Change. Link
- Tirrell, C, L. Senier, S. Wylie, C. Alder, G. Poudrier, J. Divalli, M. Beck, E. Nost, R. Brackett, and G. Gehrke. 2020. Learning in Crisis: Training students to monitor and address irresponsible knowledge construction by U.S. federal agencies under Trump. Engaging Science, Technology, and Society 6. Link
- Walker, D., E. Nost, A. Lemelin, R. Lave, and L. Dillon. 2018. Practicing environmental data justice: From DataRescue to Data Together. Geo. Link
- Vincent, K., R. E. Roth, S. A. Moore, Q. Huang, N. Lally, C. M. Sack, E. Nost, and H. Rosenfeld. 2018. Improving spatial decision making using interactive maps: An empirical study on interface complexity and decision complexity in the North American hazardous waste trade. Environment and Planning B: Urban Analytics and City Science. Link
- Nost, E., H. Rosenfeld, K. Vincent, S. Moore, and R.E. Roth. 2017. HazMatMapper: An online and interactive geographic visualization tool for exploring transnational flows of hazardous waste and environmental justice. Journal of Maps 13(1): 14-23. Link Shortlisted for Journal of Maps’s 2017 “Best Map” award.
Methods for political ecology
How can political ecologists sharpen or build new methods for understanding environmental governance?
- Nost, E. Forthcoming. Q-method. In The Field Guide to Mixing Social and Biophysical Methods in Environmental Research R. Lave and S. Lane, eds. OpenBookPublishers.
- Nost, E., G. Gehrke, G. Poudrier, A. Lemelin, M. Beck, and S. Wylie. Visualizing Changes to US Federal Environmental Agency Websites, 2016-2020. 2021. PLoS One. Link
- Ohayon, J., E. Nost, K. Silk, M. Rakoff. 2020. Barriers and opportunities for breast cancer organizations to focus on environmental health and disease prevention: a mixed-methods approach using website analyses, interviews, and focus groups. Environmental Health. Link
- Nost, E., M. Robertson, and R. Lave. 2019. Q-method and the performance of subjectivity: Reflections from a survey of US stream restoration practitioners. Geoforum 105: 23-31. Link
- Moore, S. A., H. Rosenfeld, E. Nost, K. Vincent, and R. E. Roth. 2018. Undermining methodological nationalism: Cosmopolitan analysis and visualization of the North American hazardous waste trade. Environment and Planning A. Link
- Moore, S., R. Roth, H. Rosenfeld, E. Nost, K. Vincent, T. Buckingham, M.R. Arefin. 2017. Undisciplining Environmental Justice Research with Visual Storytelling. Geoforum. Link