Upmanu Lall is the director of the Columbia Water Center, a senior research scientist at IRI and the Alan & Carol Silberstein Professor of Engineering in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. In addition to other presentations at the 2016 American Geophysical Union Annual Meeting, Lall will be presenting, “Quantifying conditional risks for water and […]
By Sofía Martínez, Radost Stanimirova and Daniel Osgood Since January, the northwestern Dominican Republic has experienced one of the worst droughts in 15 years. Early work by the International Research Institute for Climate and Society and its partners on a project funded by the United States Agency for International Development has shown the potential for using […]
By Alexa Jay and Jim Hansen El Niño’s impacts are far-reaching, influencing rainfall and temperature patterns across the globe. In agriculture, these impacts are felt primarily through the cycle’s effect on precipitation, particularly in the developing world where 80% of farmland is rainfed. But not all impacts are bad — while some areas may suffer […]
With a moderate El Niño expected to develop later this year, the global health community is closely monitoring seasonal climate forecasts. A new bulletin released by the IRI addresses ways in which health decision-makers can use climate information to reduce the potential for negative health impacts. IRI is a WHO/PAHO Collaborating Centre for Early Warning Systems for Malaria […]
The Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that nearly 900 million people in the world were chronically hungry between 2010 and 2012. The organization is also warning we could face a global food crisis in 2013 because of historically low grain reserves and rising food prices. Add to this the ever-present challenge of trying to increase both production of and […]
“We have to stop thinking in terms of ‘100-year events.’ It’s not going to be another 100 years before we see another extreme storm such as Sandy.” – Art Lerner-Lam, deputy director, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory For years before Hurricane Sandy charged ashore on Monday, researchers from the Earth Institute knew what was coming. In a rapidly […]
This is the tenth and final interview in our series on the International Conference on Climate Services, held at Columbia University in October 2011. In this interview, the IRI’s Stephen Zebiak describes the fledgling Climate Services Partnership, which was a key outcome of the International Conference on Climate Services. Developing useful climate services requires overcoming both […]
by Stephen Zebiak We live in a time of rapidly escalating concern about climate change. Although scientific evidence on climate change has been steadily building over many years, only recently has the consensus concerning observed impacts and future scenarios reached a level to capture the world’s attention. Increasingly, the question of whether or not climate […]
The International Research Institute for Climate and Society, part of the Earth Institute at Columbia University, and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies have forged a partnership to help save lives from the humanitarian impacts of climate change. The IRI is developing tailored forecasting and monitoring products to help the International […]