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Young people have an unprecedented opportunity to effect meaningful change around the world, according to Sophia Kianni, founder of Climate Cardinals鈥攖he world鈥檚 largest youth-led climate nonprofit.聽

鈥淚 have never been more confident that it is the best time to be a young person who is passionate about social impact and wants to make a difference,鈥� Kianni said. 鈥淭here truly has never been a better time to innovate and to capitalize on these opportunities.鈥�

Kianni is the co-founder of Phia, an AI-powered e-commerce platform that facilitates sustainable shopping. Kianni is also the youngest adviser to the United Nations Association of the United States of America鈥攁n official ancillary U.N. organization established to promote the U.N.鈥檚 political and public support within the United States.

Kianni鈥檚 talk emphasized the importance of an international response to climate change, highlighting her experiences as an Iranian-American and her inspiration for Climate Cardinals.聽

鈥淚 used to spend every single summer visiting my relatives in Iran,鈥� she said. 鈥淚 learned that every single day, thousands of people were being hospitalized because of the air pollution in Iran. I also learned that temperatures in the Middle East were rising more than twice the global average. My relatives were living on the frontlines of the climate crisis.鈥�

Despite the prevalence of the issue, Kianni noticed that climate literacy in Iran was shockingly low.聽

鈥淲hen I started to talk to my relatives about these issues, I realized they鈥檇 never really heard about climate change,鈥� Kianni said. 鈥淚 looked more into the literature, and learned that less than 5 percent of Iranian university students could properly explain the greenhouse gas effect.鈥�

The greenhouse gas effect is a process through which atmospheric gases trap heat near Earth鈥檚 surface before the heat can escape into space. Fossil fuel emissions have intensified the process, causing global temperatures to rise.聽

In high school, Kianni was deeply involved with climate activism, working closely with various organizations to promote change. She observed, however, that resources to fight climate change had not been made accessible outside the United States.

鈥淲hen I was working with these different climate organizations in high school, I noticed that almost all the resources, the organizing handbooks, every piece of literature that we鈥檙e getting was pretty much exclusively in English,鈥� she said. 鈥淎nd the vast majority of people who were on the frontlines of the climate crisis are not in the United States. But they weren鈥檛 at these discussions we were having. We鈥檙e basically talking about people, but we were not talking to them.鈥�

So Kianni decided to take action. With the help of 19,000 volunteers across 145 countries, Climate Cardinals translates critical information into languages besides English. Building this organization, she explained, was a lesson in getting people involved.聽

鈥淭he biggest thing that I took away from this, in terms of inspiring the people around me into taking action, was that most people are aware that problems exist in society,鈥� Kianni said. 鈥淭he issue is that they feel pathetic towards them, or they feel like there鈥檚 not anything that they themselves can do. The way that you get people to take action is by living them tools.鈥�

While she was an undergraduate at Stanford University, Kianni realized how inefficient and unsustainable the fashion industry was. This further cultivated her passion for fighting climate change.聽

鈥淭here鈥檚 enough clothes in existence to dress the next six generations of humans,鈥� Kianni said. 鈥淚 thought it was fascinating that we had created this cycle where companies were arbitrarily pumping out garments. And then people would either return items at astronomically high rates or those items would end up in landfills. It was clear that something was very, very fundamentally broken.鈥�

To address this issue, she co-founded Phia with entrepreneur Phoebe Gates鈥攄aughter of Microsoft founder Bill Gates. The platform makes sustainable, second-hand shopping more accessible.聽

鈥淚t wasn鈥檛 an issue of 鈥業鈥檓 not interested in that [second-hand shopping],鈥� it was an issue of, 鈥業 didn鈥檛 know that I could buy the item I was looking at for a fraction of the price, in a far more sustainable way, from a different website,鈥� Kianni said. 鈥淭he first solution we built was a Chrome extension, where, as you鈥檙e shopping, you can click a button, and it would find all of the options from across the internet at a cheaper price.鈥�

Whether it is through her work at the U.N., Climate Cardinals, or her latest work with Phia, Kianni鈥檚 passion for youth-led action and fighting climate change has been the throughline of her career.

鈥淟ooking at my work, from Climate Cardinals to Phia, the thing that really has remained true is that young people have, right now, the biggest opportunity to make a difference and an impact with very little resources,鈥� Kianni said. 鈥淎ll of this was possible with pure agency, a lot of hard work, and bringing incredible groups of young people together to work on a specific problem.鈥�

Adapted from article by Emily Russo '28

Presented with the Environmental Studies Program, EcoPledge, and Climate Justice