Roopali Phadke

Professor Phadke’s teaching and research focus on energy and climate policy, citizen science, community based research methodologies and sustainable development initiatives. Prior to Macalester, she served as a National Science Foundation postdoctoral fellow in the Science, Technology and Society Program at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

• PhD in Environmental Studies, Univ. of CA, Santa Cruz, 2003
• MA in South Asian Studies, Cornell University, 1998
• BA in Political Science, Wellesley College, 1994

TEACHING

Professor Phadke’s teaching centers on domestic and international environmental politics and policy. Her courses span introductory levels through the department’s senior capstone and are often crosslisted with Political Science, Geography and International Studies. She routinely teaches: ENVI 215 Environmental Politics and Policy, ENVI 337: Energy Justice, ENVI 368 Sustainable Development and the Global Future and ENVI489/490: Environmental Leadership Practicum. Her course assignments aim to build Environmental Studies core competencies, such as strong writing, problem solving, team building and presentation skills. Students in her classes write and publish op-eds, participate in community based research, and attend international conferences. The student project section below illustrates some of this work.

STUDENT PROJECTS

ENVI 194 – Welcome to the Anthropocene

• An exhibit brought to you by the first-year students in this class.

ENVI 252 – Water and Power

• A class research project Exposing Hurricane Katrina: The Scope of an Unnatural Disaster

ENVI 335 – Science and Citizenship

• Marijuana – – Podcast about the history of science policy surrounding the Schedule 1 classification of medical marijuana (by Jared Sousa ’17)Podcast by Jared Sousa ’17

ENVI 337 – Energy Justice

• A 2023 report prepared for our community partner, Citizens Utility Board, on Xcel utility rate increases.

ENVI 394 – Environment, Health and Society

• “Now Let Us Shift” – Podcast about the environmental health issues on the Mexico border and NAFTA by Miranda Harris ’18.  Works cited.

ENVI 394: Climate Negotiations at COP28: Dispatches from Dubai 

• Course website with blog posts from student participants

STUDENT HONORS THESIS

“Straws in the Wind: Race, Nature, and Technoscience in Postcolonial South Dakotan Wind Power Development” by Kai Bosworth ’10. How is wind power dynamically imbued with meanings, language, and images that seek to unevenly position the technology in relation to groups of humans, natures, and geographies? How are boundaries constructed and challenged through the production of knowledge, technology, and nature? This paper seeks to unpack the conditions of possibility that govern wind power on the Rosebud Sioux Reservation in western South Dakota. By examining the circulation of discourses and texts, I argue that narratives that position indigenous people within environmentalism are reproduced in wind power discourse, overshadowing complex networks of power, colonialism, race, nature, science and technology.

“Regional Activism in Context: Hydropower Development and Social Justice Activism in Northern Manitoba” by Kat Sachs ’06. Focusing on the intersection of globalization, aboriginal sovereignty issues, regional colonial legacies, and environmental and social injustice, this thesis examines with the lens of activism, the ways that economic and political forces have manifested themselves in the landscape of Northern Manitoba through large scale hydropower development on indigenous lands. Relying on this contextual background, this thesis evaluates the efficacy and strength with which a multifaceted social movement consisting of grassroots activism, academic and artistic advocacy, middle-reaches environmental and social justice organizations, and the newspaper media has emerged in reaction to the social and environmental effects of hydropower.

RESEARCH

Phadke’s research interests are at the interface of two academic fields: political ecology and science, technology and society (STS). On issues ranging from hydropower to wind energy, she examines how participatory planning and design techniques build social acceptance, promote justice, and produce locally relevant meanings that root material artifacts, like dams and turbines, to a sense of place.  

 Her recent research projects have focused on mining, critical minerals and circular economies. She is currently the PI on a Department of Energy-funded battery project called “CollectED”. She also recently completed a multiyear National Science Foundation study that examined the politics of siting critical minerals mines.    

Another strand of Phadke’s research focuses on the locks and dams on the Mississippi project. This NSF-funded project has included both public art and community collaboration. The Dear River archive includes over 2,000 postcards submitted by community members noting their wish for the future river.

PRESENTATIONS

“ Battling for more battery recycling” The Collected Project  (2025)

“Will the River’s Run Dry?” Macalester Big Questions Series (2020)

“Mining Futures:  Prospecting Critical Metals in the U.S. and Beyond” (video). Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, January 24, 2019.

“Looking Downstream” (audio recording). Launch: Mississippi. An Anthropocene River Symposium at Weisman Art Museum, Minneapolis, June 20, 2018.

MEDIA WORK

“A Minnesotan reports back on the climate conference in Brazil, where the U.S. government was absent” (MN Reformer, 2025)

Interview from COP28 in Dubai (Minnesota Public Radio, 2023) 

“Green tech metals for renewable energy and other smart technologies need to be sourced sustainably and responsibly” (Ensia, 2019)

“Why Red States Should oppose trump on climate” (CNN, 2017)

SELECTED PUBLICATIONS

Kinchy, A., R. Phadke and J. Smith. 2018. “Engaging the Underground: An STS Field in Formation,” Engaging Science, Technology, and Society, Volume 4 (2018): 22-42.

Phadke, R. 2018. “Green Energy Futures: Responsible Mining on Minnesota’s Iron Range,” Energy Research & Social Science, Volume 35: 163-173.

Phadke, R., C. Manning and S. Burlager. 2015. “Making it Personal: Diversity and Deliberation in Climate Adaptation Planning,” Climate Risk Management. Volume 9: 62-76.

Phadke, R. 2011. “Resisting and Reconciling Big Wind: Middle Landscape Politics in the New American West,” Antipode, Volume 43 (3): 754-776.

Phadke, R. 2010. “Defending Place in the Google Earth Age,” Ethics, Place and Environment. Volume 13 (3).

Phadke, R. 2010. “Steel Forests and Smoke Stacks: The Politics of Visualization in the Cape Wind Controversy,” Environmental Politics. Volume 19 (1): 1-20.

Phadke, R. 2005. “People’s Science in Action: The Politics of Protest and Knowledge Brokering in India,” Society and Natural Resources, Vol. 18: 363-375. (Also re-printed in D. Johnson and J. Wetmore (eds). 2008. Technology and Society: Building Our Sociotechnical Future. Cambridge: MIT Press. Pp. 499-514.

Phadke, R. 2002. “Assessing Water Scarcity and Watershed Development in Maharashtra, India: A Case Study of the Baliraja Memorial Dam,” Science, Technology & Human Values,Vol. 27 (2): 236-261.

Phadke, R., C. Manning, A. Diebolt and M. Kazinka. 2009. Wind Energy and Scenic Considerations in Wyoming. Proceedings from a June 2009 Workshop.