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The world has changed this year under the shadow of the COVID-19 pandemic. Lockdowns around the world have reduced energy demand, resulting in emissions declines, but what could the post-COVID-19 world look like — a return to normal, or will this start a transition?
An Oxford atmospheric physicist and experimenter on early NASA weather satellites who revolutionized the field through leadership of the Appleton Laboratory, the Meteorological Office and the Science Board of the IPCC.
Traditional coastal protection methods that rely on built, hard structures like seawalls may not be effective to keep pace with a changing climate. Nature-based coastal defences based on habitat restoration can be an adaptive coastal protection alternative.
Synergistically addressing local and global environmental damages rather than optimizing a specific aspect of the policy conundrum helps to effectively foster climate action in road transport while maintaining public acceptance and socially fair outcomes.
Expectations for the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosure’s framework to drive climate action in the private sector are high, and there is growing interest in its relevance for guiding public sector climate action. However, consideration of the framework’s limitations is critical prior to public sector application.
The COVID-19 pandemic will be an unprecedented test of governments’ ability to manage compound risks, as climate hazards disrupt outbreak response around the world. Immediate steps can be taken to minimize climate-attributable loss of life, but climate adaptation also needs a long-term strategy for pandemic preparedness.
Climate change is altering environmental niches, causing species to shift their habitat range as they track their ecological niche. These shifts allow species to persist but may disadvantage existing species in these areas; understanding the positives and negatives is needed to ensure effective management for biodiversity.
Applying an invasive framework to native species that are shifting their ranges in response to climate change adopts an adversarial, local and static paradigm that is often at odds with protecting global biodiversity.
The Galapagos Islands inspired the theory of evolution by means of natural selection; now in the Anthropocene, the Galapagos represent an important natural laboratory to understand ecosystem resilience in the face of climate extremes and enable effective socio-ecological co-evolution under climate change.
Climate change will increase the intensity and frequency of a range of natural hazards, from floods to wildfires, which impact the built environment. More research is needed on buildings and infrastructure performance under different climate-driven events to support recovery predictions and effective mitigation policies.
