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“I think, in a country where innovation is super important—we’re able to send people up to the moon now whenever we want—but you tell me we can’t get diesel out of trucks? Sometimes I’m thinking the priorities are all wrong.”
“Everyday people should be involved in policy work…It’s people who have lived it that should be in the rooms and should be taken as equal as any economist, as any scientist.”
Andrea Vidaurre, co-founder of the People’s Collective for Environmental Justice and Goldman Environmental Prize recipient
Last week, we discussed the emerging digital economy and artificial intelligence sector. Fulfilling the long-term potential of such technological advancements will also require innovation in the ways we anticipate, understand and control their potential consequences.
Take, for example, the revolutionary success of Amazon and other online and same-day delivery retailers. During the COVID-19 pandemic, demand for these services boomed. Even as brick-and-mortar stores reopened, consumers continued to rely on the ease of almost anything in the world shipping right to their doorstep at the click of a button.
Unanticipated changes in land use patterns and demands on aging energy, water and transportation infrastructure, however, belie that incredible convenience. How should we reconcile such popular improvements to daily life with the side effects experienced by the communities that find themselves directly in the path of a roaring supply chain?
Our guest this week, Andrea Vidaurre, grew up in California’s Inland Empire. This semi-rural metropolitan area located just an hour inland from the critical Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach has been fighting a growing wave of pollution and industrial intrusion. Within a fraction of Andrea’s lifetime, the Inland Empire’s warehouse footprint has grown 90%, starting with a few hundred facilities and today reaching 4,000 (and counting). More than half a million trucks move goods to and from these centers every day, generating 25,000 tons of daily CO₂ emissions and myriad public health risks for the surrounding neighborhoods.
In this discussion, Andrea describes her transformation from concerned community member to award-winning policy analyst and environmental justice advocate who helped pass two landmark air quality regulations in California. Her work near the far western end of the I-10 is challenging conventional priorities for U.S. innovation and influencing more effective energy transition policy structures.
Listen until the end for a postscript detailing the latest efforts in the Senate to limit California’s regulatory powers around air quality.
Relevant articles and resources:
Follow the People’s Collective for Environmental Justice on X, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Facebook
Read Andrea’s Goldman Environmental Prize and Time Magazine recognitions
CARB pulls Advanced Clean Fleets Rule EPA waiver a week after Trump’s election
“Senate Fight Over Gas-Powered Vehicles Is Also A Filibuster Showdown” (The New York Times, May 21, 2025)
“Shopping online surged during Covid. Now the environmental costs are becoming clearer” (Politico, 2021)
“E-Commerce Mega-Warehouses, a Smog Source, Face New Pollution Rule” (The New York Times, 2021)
More 10X Conversations on U.S. environmental justice:
“Catherine Coleman Flowers: A National Voice for Rural and Unincorporated America”
“Envisioning a Just Future for All with Dr. Robert Bullard”
“Financing Our Future: Justice 40’s Legacy Beyond November”
Credits:
Host: Duke Reiter
Producer and editor: Taylor Griffith
Music by: Helmut Schenker and Hushed
Research and support provided by: Kate Carefoot, Rae Ulrich, and Sabine Butler
Guest Speaker
Andrea Vidaurre is a policy analyst and co-founder of the People’s Collective for Environmental Justice. Born and raised in California’s Inland Empire, Andrea organized and her organization were instrumental to the California Air Resources Board’s passage of two landmark policies directing a comprehensive and timely phase out of diesel infrastructure in the state’s trucking and freight industries. For her work, Andrea received the 2024 Goldman Environmental Prize, often referred to as the “Green Nobel,” and in 2025 was named one of TIME Magazine’s 100 most influential people.
