Cooling off
Done with bootcamp, security and heat, and an adaptation / resilience roundup. Also cool events!
Welcome back!
12 weeks of learning about climate science, policy and action - done!
I’ve mentioned Terra.do a few times on this newsletter but with now the 12 weeks just in the rear-view mirror, I simply can’t praise the course enough (I swear I’m not paid to say the following!): for a virtual bootcamp, it had many of the key elements I was looking for out of active learning: the course content was fresh, easily accessible and relevant for people who wanted to learn and apply that knowledge in action. The weekly lab sessions were interactive and assignments driven towards collaboration and community building. The Slack channels are a great asset to be and stay connected to the cohort - be it webinars, job openings, articles or events.
Finally, the people: our instructor Carley was passionate about her work and guided us well through new and sometimes challenging content. The other people in my cohort were amazing: passionate, high-energy and motivated for action - I was blown away by the diversity of background and experience they brought to the group which really enriched my experience. In places where there are a a critical mass of fellows and alums - like London - the in-person meetups were a great way to network and learn what everyone else is doing / thinking / pitching. With this foundation I’m definitely feeling more confident about the next steps in my climate journey - of which growing this newsletter is a big part of!
If you’re looking to do more than passive learning about climate, or you’re already keen to work on climate but don’t quite know how to get started, I would really recommend your checking this out. Their next Learning for Action course begins on 12 June - the deadline is today! - and they form a new cohort every 6 weeks or so. Say my name (as an alum of the programme) and get 20% off the course fee. #notanad
Extreme weather and security revisited
It seems like every week we get yet another extreme / record-breaking / historic / catastrophic weather event, which the media links to climate change. It’s unlikely every event is “because of climate,” but many recent events are low probability, or almost impossible, without attribution to climate change impacts.
The recent heatwaves in April and May across much of South and Southeast Asia triggered power outages, work stoppages and hard-to-bear heat indexes hitting +45C in many places. In Hanoi, for instance, two-thirds of street lights were largely turned off by 11pm to prioritise air conditioning and cooling systems while preserving grid’s stability. While such energy conservation measures happen annually, they were impacting a broader area in the Vietnamese capital. These measures followed planned national rolling blackouts the week before, due to the high temperatures and low rainfall impacting hydroelectric production - reminiscent of the a similar heatwave in southwest China last year which heavily disrupted that region’s manufacturing base. Utility officials acknowledged the grid was strained and they were bracing for another wave in June.
Disruptions like this can have some interesting implications for operational security and incident management:
Life safety for those who cannot access cooling - whether they are outdoors, or living in conditions where this is unavailable or unaffordable
More frequent strains on “backup” and emergency resources like local generators, UPS batteries. Generators often work on diesel, which is not great for carbon emissions. Solar-backed generators are a possibility but may not be practical by location, duration or unit economics. Over time, these can accelerate the costs of upkeep from refueling and wear-and-tear.
Not everything is hooked up to a local generator and more can go offline with so many critical systems mostly or wholly electronic: access control, CCTV, building communications etc. Power loss can create vulnerabilities - not only when there is no power but also device or system failure when they try to reboot.
Public lighting going off creates traffic and people safety issues. The correlation in seasonal variation, temperature and humidity with violent crime rates is well studied but conclusions can be complex to draw because of the complex interplay of socioeconomics, demography, psychology, geography, environment and technology. A couple of studies in China and Vietnam suggests a generally positive correlation between temperature, humidity with violent crime, with caveats. The Vietnam study cautiously suggests that at above 30C, crime rates plateau and begin to fall, likely as extreme heat begins to be a deterrent. Energy conservation and cooling measures may thus in some instances create unanticipated tradeoffs with public safety and security for both public officials and business owners. So rather than drawing conclusions - more studies are needed - perhaps it is more valuable to pose questions: How effective would be police, firefighting and ambulance services? Would those who are more vulnerable to extreme heat become also more vulnerable to criminality? Would criminality be drawn to places most equipped to cool, such as wealthy expat private residences, because of the presence of essential resources like cold water, generators, etc. How would different stakeholders manage these operational risks?
And we should expect and plan for much more of this, for scenarios that may have seem far-fetched or impractical to plan for only a couple of years ago. Last year, Carbon Brief published an update to its multi-year study of 504 weather events over the past 20 years, over 70% were made more likely because of climate change. A further breakdown (below chart) suggests that the vast majority - 93% - of recorded extreme heat events were made more likely or more severe because of climate change. Similar analysis comparing the April heatwave by the World Weather Attribution group with existing climate models came to similar conclusions - the wave over India and Bangladesh with such intensity is now 30x more likely, and a heatwave with a 1-in-5 year chance of occurring would now be 2C hotter than without human impact on climate. While adaptation solutions are already present across the region - India has plenty of experience with heatwave planning - implementation is patchy across cities and regions; places like Thailand which may have less frequent experience with spikes in heat may be more vulnerable when those events occur.
Effective cooling systems and structures, early warning systems, storage of perishable goods and self-protective action - all of which require a blend of public policy / funding / education alongside private investment in the built environment, are necessary to manage life safety and resilience risks in future, more frequent extreme weather events. Informed by weather analysis and other climate intelligence, simulations, staff drills, resiliency testing and awareness campaigns should become norm for any organisation operating in these areas. As cities account for over 70% of global CO2 emissions, implementing good urban resilience is wise for hitting Paris targets, improving adaptation capacity for as many people as possible, while improving the overall security of our urban environments via that gained resilience.
Investing in adaptation - back in the news
An industry colleague shared with me a recent piece in the World Economic Forum by the World Resources Institute about mobilising private investment for climate adaptation - one of the topics close to my heart. A couple of interesting points to turn over, as my perspective continues to evolve:
The space is still so new but very exciting. It’s in desperate need for financial innovation and capital (the Adaptation Gap report last year has already called the 5-10x gap between current and required annual funding). And the article rightly calls out a data gap as a hindrance to informing deployment of capital. I suspect, though that the data gaps may be slightly exaggerated; in many localities or sites, the data needed to make adaptation decisions is already there. They may just not openly available; they’re inside corporate databases, sensors not linked up to broader data networks with the right underlying data architecture to “share” it more widely, or may be on paper, or as oral history. Adaptation projects to-date are hyper-local, which is why new hardware / software solutions in the disaster management and operational security management space are the immediate low-hanging fruit. Those make it also adaptation work tricky to scale because of the unique nature of each locality.
Blended finance has been instrumental in many adaptation projects. A funding crisis hitting, though, is hitting many traditional donor nations - the US is escaping default by the skin of its teeth this week, the UK and Europe facing high levels of inflation crowding out further non-essential fiscal spending, and most wealthy nations suffering from donor fatigue against the increasing multitude of crises needing aid. I wonder, then, if we are in fact in for “years” of high inflation that a) there would be even less risk appetite to shift losses to the public side to entice private capital and b) aside from a few VCs and PEs, private capital largely continues to focus on the mitigation side (e.g. wind, solar, CDR solutions) where business models and underlying “standards” of measuring impact are comparatively more robust.
Finally, I don’t think anyone has “cracked the code” on how to set adaptation impact standards and frameworks that can be robust enough to draw in bigger chunks of cash. As we’ve seen, organisations looking to report under TCFD and TNFD frameworks continue to face major data challenges - access, resources, comparability. We may yet see water-related disclosure requirements go down the path but it’s not there yet. Social resilience and impact, conflict reduction, community security and cohesion etc - despite their being linked to SDG goals - are even thornier with fewer areas of alignment on what to measure, let alone how.
What caught my eye
Lloyds’s and several other insurance heavy hitters quit the insurance industry’s net zero initiative, which may well be a death knell to their collective efforts for now. The story from organisation to organisation may differ, but the changes occur amidst the backdrop of heavy “anti-ESG” political pressure in the US. Insurance has been at the forefront of climate finance and risk products; this has to feel like a major setback. Relatedly, insurance firms are calling out for better data from the scientific community.
The Amazon is “at risk of being taken over by the mafia” as organised crime becomes increasingly powerful in gold and timber extraction. NBS and regenerative agriculture projects in Brazil, then have one more serious security risk to manage and mitigate.
A new study on climate change’s impact on the vulnerability of the US military’s force readiness and calls out the need for the US Department of Defense to integrate climate risk into their readiness assessment framework.
A failed adaptation project? LA’s bus stops have new shades but they don’t look really effective and aesthetically kinda awful. Not to mention being inadequate in lower income areas where tree cover may be less available. La sombrita no funciona a nadie.
Interesting events
The Adaptation Professionals Association is hosting an event on best practices in US state and local levels for good governance around turning climate adaptation and resilience plans into action. While through the lens of local officials and policymakers, adaptation is ultimately hyper-local (that’s quite similar to the nature of operational security mitigation, disaster management and business continuity work). The ability for public and private funders to be able to work fluently at this level is essential to successful implementation. 2 June
The Lightsmith Group, which was profiled in the World Economic Forum above, is hosting a webinar on investing in tech for adaptation and resilience in Asia. 7 June.
Columbia University in New York is hosting a conference on the impact of climate change on migration and mobility. The title, “Managed Retreat” hints at the threats faced by those compelled to move as their local communities become increasingly hostile to habitation. Research in 2020 estimated over 3 billion people may be displaced by 2070 because they will be living outside of the “human climate niche” - the range of average temperatures which people can survive. 20-23 June.
London Climate Action Week - a big climate world event in the UK runs from 24 June - 2 July.
Working the space
Got a cool opening? Let me know and I’ll post it on Substack Notes or in the next newsletter.
Intern on climate security at Swedish thinktank SIPRI, a thought leader in the climate x security space: SIPRI internship.
DC thinktank CSIS is looking a Fellow in food security
Climate data / intelligence / consulting startup Watershed is hiring for a bunch of roles including strategic solutions consultants.
Another climate risk startup, Mitiga Solutions, is hiring for technical roles
I saw this way too late but the UN hosts an annual Climate Academy in September, in partnership with the philanthropic arm of insurer Munich Re. Keep an eye out for it when the apps come around again early 2024: ,
I’ll continue to post on Substack Notes and LinkedIn throughout the month, and going forward may break up these longer posts into shorter, punchier ones twice a month. More to come.
See you next month!