How successful disaster risk reduction looks like. Modelling economics with climate science. How do rocks end up in your food? That and more in Jesse Zondervan’s September 2019 #GfGDpicks #SciComm

Phosphate mining in Togo, on its way to sustain the global food system. Wikimedia (CC BY-SA 3.0)

Each month, Jesse Zondervan picks his favourite posts from geoscience and development blogs/news which cover the geology for global development interest. Here’s a round-up of Jesse’s selections for the last month:

Minimising disaster risk has two dimensions, understanding the hazard and targeting people’s behaviour. Therefore to prevent volcanoes killing people, researchers have studied why people return to dangerous volcanoes during evacuation periods, and have developed an approach to leverage the forecasting techniques used in weather forecasting, to predict volcanic behaviour.

Disasters are most harmful to those with fewer resources. Fortunately, great process is being made in the East Africa region, where the water resource sector, road sector, and various stakeholders communicate with meteorologists to provide impact-based forecasting. Thus, a forecast might read:

“50mm of rainfall falling in Western Kenya on Thursday will lead to some flooding of homes in Kisumu, and will disrupt transport and agriculture. Vulnerable people close to river valleys may want to consider moving to higher ground temporarily”

Read more about countries most vulnerable to hazards: Least Developed Countries (LDCs), Landlocked Developing Countries (LLDCs) and Small Island Developing States (SIDS), and which challenges they face.

Integrating climate science into finance

Climate change continues to be in the news, and the economic sector is waking up to the cost of consequences. However, economists are still downplaying major risks according to a new report by Columbia University’s Earth Institute, Germany’s Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, and the UK’s Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment.

The simplified and business-as-usual economic assessments don’t take into account the severity of impacts when thresholds in Earth systems are exceeded, resulting in a potential for mass migration and conflict.

Bad news too for pensions and government funds, many of which invest in index funds, which face unmanageable risk from climate change, according to the director of Stanford University’s Sustainable Finance Initiative. They have a need for more science-based climate policy.

That’s why companies such as Four Twenty Seven’s combined economic modelling with climate science. Their analysis shows some of Europe’s main office areas are at risk to flooding and heat extremes, leading up to a potential of over €1 trillion in damage.

More on how climate experts judge geoengineering, how the geological resource of phosphate cycles through our food system (yes we eat rocks), and how more rainwater can lead to less water available to people along the Nile.

As ever, there is more to explore, check below for more news and ideas.