The 3rd World War: Climate Change?
Climate change, Earth’s most pressing issue, now in the limelight for us all. Rising sea levels, severe natural disasters, more extreme weather; impacts of climate change are creeping up on everyone’s back. So, what now, what can we do about it? That’s where the Climate Impact Lab comes in.
At a recent briefing on September 15, hosted by Ethnic Media Services, a group of experts discussed the importance of storytelling in raising awareness about climate change.
Speakers
- Hannah Hess, Associate Director, Climate Impact Lab
- Megan Mullin, Faculty Director, UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation
- Jon Christensen, Adjunct Assistant Professor, Institute of the Environment and Sustainability, Laboratory for Environmental Narrative Strategies, UCLA
- Anais Reyes, Senior Exhibitions Associate, Climate Museum
Climate Impact Lab use cutting-edge data and modeling techniques to showcase the socioeconomic impacts of climate change. Their focus is designing policies in efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, with curbing climate change as their endgame.
Former California governor Jerry Brown, now a member of the Climate Impact Lab’s advisory board, “used the pulpit of the governor’s office to warn loudly and constantly about the existential threat that climate change poses to our civilization. He pointed to raging wildfires and a persistent drought. Things that people could see and feel in their communities and lives … To have agency. That too is a key to storytelling, the agency of characters.”
Brown’s words were crystal clear: climate change was a global issue, everyone has to chip in. But how do we motivate people? According to one member of the Climate Impact Lab, the answer lies in storytelling, by “mobilizing the people feels most important to me. Writing stories that can motivate people to act. And motivations can come from positive and negative. It can come from inspiration, it can come from anger.”
Storytelling in Climate Change
Storytelling is a powerful tool for inspiring action, and the Climate Impact Lab is using it to great effect. Sharing stories of climate change’s impacts help convey the urgency and act as a call to action.
But storytelling is just a part of the Climate Impact Lab’s work. They call upon the tech army to shed light on the socioeconomic impacts of climate change. Data from crop yields to mortality rates provide information needed to design greenhouse gas emission reduction policies.
What the Data Tells Us
Climate Impact Lab’s worked on analyzing the economic impacts of climate change in the country. Research suggests that climate change can leave a really large mark on our checkbooks. Regions may experience up to a 20% loss of their GDP by the end of the century. Action needs to be taken to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and this projected economic fall makes it much more than just imperative.
But the Climate Impact Lab isn’t just focused on the United States. Partners around the world have also extended hands to work together, to understand climate change on vulnerable populations. Climate Impact Lab are “working with partners in India, in Africa, in Latin America, to understand the impacts of climate change on vulnerable populations … a global problem, and it requires a global solution.”
Let’s Fix It!
The Climate Impact Lab’s work is more important now than ever before. We are being hit with a double whammy with natural disaster becoming more severe and more frequent. Why, you ponder? Well, it’s simple, climate change. It’s high time we take action, we can’t take this global issue lightly anymore. And we need to do it in a way that is equitable and just, ensuring that vulnerable populations are not left behind.
As one member of the Climate Impact Lab commands that we must “act now, and we need to act together. Climate change is not a problem that any one person or country can solve on their own. It requires collective action, and it requires leadership. That’s what the Climate Impact Lab is all about.”
Climate Impact Lab is putting the work in, raising awareness about global warming and inspiring action. Armed with cutting edge tech and the power of storytelling, they can design policies to curb climate change. The responsibility is ours, using what the Climate Impact Lab is lending, we all must do our part when it comes to bringing the planet back to a happy state.
