This year’s conference will have the theme of “sustainable innovation for all,” said Carole Fergusson, conference organizer and executive director of Keep Waco Beautiful.

From the week-long freeze and power outages in 2021 to the severe storms and recent drought and water restrictions, “we’ve seen for a long time that marginalized communities are the ones that are feeling this the hardest,” Fergusson said.

Next week’s conference will aim to explain the uneven impact of climate change and propose possible solutions.

The conference will be held Sept. 10 and 11, and registration is open through the end of the week, and general admission tickets are also available. Several field trips featured on the second day just got additional transportation with more seats. The original buses quickly filled up, Fergusson said.

The only way to guarantee a place is to register in advance.

In keeping with this year’s theme, several panels will be conducted solely in Spanish, Fergusson said.

She added that the panel she is most interested in will be led by Sarah Anderson, an associate in licensing and patents at Baylor who has studied the effects of global warming and land-use changes on bees.

“She’s done a lot of research on how climate affects pollination, and when there are no pollinators, we have no food sources,” Fergusson said of Anderson’s panel.

Jay Banner, director of the Environmental Science Institute at the University of Texas, shared his thoughts from his opening keynote address in an email Wednesday.

“Climate and geopolitical forces are converging in Texas and could put extreme stress on natural resources and public health,” Banner wrote. “Reconstructing past climate change in Texas provides context for the unprecedented drought and heat threats ahead.”

He added that climate science can be used to predict the effects that the increasing amount of greenhouse gases in the Earth’s atmosphere will have on our state.

“One measure of change is the projected increase in the number of 100-degree days by 2070, which will be on the order of 80 more days,” Banner wrote. “These changes will have related consequences for our economy, prosperity, and social equality.

“Planning for these changes now will avoid the greatest economic costs and provide the maximum benefits in building a resilient Texas.”

Other panels during the two-day event include “Flood Management Solutions” presented by the Texas Water Development Board and “Baylor’s Holistic Approach to Sustainability” with English Professor Joshua King, Environmental Studies Professor Andrew Stainback, Associate Vice President for External Relations Jeremy Vickers and Jenny Howell, director of Truett Seminary’s Theology, Ecology and Food Justice Program.

Panels presented exclusively in Spanish included “arboles alegres, vidas fáciles” (“Happy Trees, Easy Life”) presented by Hector Marines-Chio, urban forester with the Texas A&M Forest Service, and “energía solar” (“Solar Energy”) presented by speaker America Garcia of Solar United Neighbors.

Participants who wish to skip most of the seminars held exclusively in Spanish may choose from one of six field trips. The field trips will depart from the convention center at 8 a.m.

Tours will include a kayaking trip on the Brazos River, a walking tour of the Baylor Research and Innovation Collaborative, and trips to community gardens, recycling facilities, the Lake Waco wetlands and Cameron Park Zoo.

Registration for the conference, individual panels, and field trips is available at keepwacobeautiful.org/greencommunities.