Climate Change and Cities

Urban Climate Change Research Network (UCCRN) and Assessment Report on Climate Change and Cities (ARC3) are projects of Columbia University, Hunter College of the City University of New York, and NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies

Contact

Somayya Ali

Center for Climate Systems Research/NASA GISS

Earth Institute at Columbia University

2880 Broadway
New York, NY 10025
+01 212-678-5626

UCCRN contact form

 Rationale

• Cities neglect climate change risks due to a lack of scientific assessments
• There is an urgent need to integrate climate risk into city development strategies and plans
• The Climate and Cities Program fills this gap

Objectives

• To reduce climate risk in developing-country cities through city-specific climate risk assessments, and by crafting flexible adaptation and mitigation strategies to leverage existing and planned investments
• To develop a global, institutional structure for integrating climate risk assessments into city development

Our Approach

Track 1

Global Progress Assessment: To develop state-of-the-knowledge assessments on climate change and cities.

Track 2

National – Across-city rapid climate risk assessments: To provide national city-specific rapid climate risk assessment of city development strategies and urban poverty programs.

Track 3

City Level – City-specific, in-depth impacts assessments:To craft city-specific risk assessments, for adaptation and mitigation mechanisms in each sector as well as to identify co-benefits and integrated impacts.

Track 4

Knowledge Sharing – Learning from doers: To derive adaptation and mitigation lessons from early adopters—such as London, Mexico, and New York—for knowledge sharing and capacity building.