Mapping Future Climate Change Hotspots

Climate change has emerged as one of the most serious threats facing humanity. This project aims to forecast the emergence of coastal ocean and hydrological hotspots over the 21st century. Climate hotspots are useful to social scientists and policy makers in guiding adaptation efforts and investment areas for climate emergency response purposes. Using the latest generation of global climate models with the most sophisticated representation of the Earth system components to date, Marinov and Weller will prepare for the next Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change Report (due in 2022) evaluating the global spatial distribution in hotspots, and aim to understand the mechanisms behind their distribution as well as their forecast skill. The project will directly contribute to the COP26 UN effort on climate change and the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (2021-2030.)