What's this all about?

Welcome to my first ever blog. Here I will be discussing the many collaborations and conflicts arising from climate change.  Our changing climate has a multitude of direct consequences on the habitability of our planet, and it is therefore easy to imagine how it may generate conflict , however it is also clear that the only route to  fix our “climate problem”  as it has sometimes be named, is through collaboration.

A disturbing new study by Solomon Hsiang of the University of California, Berkeley and his colleagues, suggests that alterations in climate are strongly linked to human violence around the World; even comparatively minor strays from normal temperatures or rainfall can considerably increase the risk of conflict. These conflicts may be as minor as an aggressive horn honk from a frustrated driver (guilty),  extending to the possibility of complete societal collapse and war.  The authors found that over the past 60 years, at least 40% of internal conflicts have had a link to natural resources and since 1990 there have been at least 18 violent conflicts fuelled by the exploitation of natural resources.

However, this blog isn’t exclusively about the conflict fueled by climate change; a great deal of collaboration has also come about; on scales that range from international cooperation and agreements (such as the ipcc) to community projects aimed at reducing the notorious carbon footprint.

Every fortnight I will explore a new topic within climate change that has the potential to, and in some cases has already created conflict and/or collaboration.