In The News

The Change Luck City: Dhaka’s Climate Refugees

Nellie Le Beau and Hugh Tuckfield August 12, 2016
As many as a half million people flee their homes in Bangladesh each year because of the “devastating effects of climate change – floods, salinization of land, destructive super cyclones, and reduced agricultural yields,” explain Nellie Le Beau and Hugh Tuckfield in an essay with photographs for the Diplomat. “Displaced primarily from Bangladesh’s southern and eastern regions, these are climate...

How Climate Disasters Can Drive Violent Conflict Around the World

Chelsea Harvey August 3, 2016
Higher temperatures and rising sea levels associated with climate change are expected to contribute to food and water shortages, in turn displacing communities. “Overall, multiple studies have indicated a connection between climate and conflict, although several have suggested that the link may be weak,” notes Chelsea Harvey for the Washington Post. A research study published in the Proceedings...

Why Brexit Freaks Out So Many Scientists

Michael Greshko June 28, 2016
The UK is belatedly tallying up benefits of EU membership including research support. “The decision has dismayed scientists in the United Kingdom and across Europe, as it stands to disrupt scientific funding and the United Kingdom’s stature in the European and international research communities,” writes Michael Greshko for National Geographic. The country will have a transition of two years, and...

Guess What Else Climate Change Hurts? Globalization

Eric Roston June 15, 2016
Multinational corporations rely on supply chains, and climate change could disrupt the efficiency. Weather-related disasters from flooding, droughts and wildfires cost billions of dollars in damage. “Manufacturing these days involves facilities in multiple countries, each of which has a sequential role in taking raw materials a step closer to being finished products,” reports Eric Roston for...

Nature’s Answer to Climate Risk

Maria Damanaki May 31, 2016
About half the world’s people live near coasts, and climate change is putting their livelihoods at risk. A risk assessment report from the World Economic Forum points to “failure to adapt to the effects of climate change as the single greatest risk, in terms of impact, to societies and economies around the world,” explains Maria Damanaki, global managing director for oceans at the Nature...

The Ghost of Kyoto Still Lurks

Nayan Chanda May 19, 2016
Representatives of more than 170 countries have signed the Paris agreement, pledging to reduce reliance on fossil fuels and stem climate change – conceding “that climate change is a global problem and needs a global solution,” writes Nayan Chanda, founding editor of YaleGlobal Online in his column for Businessworld. But Chanda also expresses concern that the agreement may be a symbolic act and...

Africa Faces Worst Drought in Half a Century

Bartholomäus Grill May 13, 2016
Drought is devastating some of Africa’s poorest countries, threatening water supplies, power generation and agriculture. Malawi, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Lesotho and Swaziland have declared states of emergency. But some nations, like Ethiopia, are in denial about the impact of the abnormal sea and air patterns known as El Niño and the continent’s inability to handle population growth. Ethiopia’s...