On the southern bank of a turbulent, muddy-brown bend in the Congo River, sits the Congolese capital of Kinshasa. Here, Woodwell Climate Associate Scientist, Dr. Glenn Bush and Forests and Climate Change Coordinator, Joseph Zambo, have joined other researchers and government officials in the conference rooms of a downtown hotel for a three-day workshop about peat.

Bush is an economist and social scientist who has worked in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) for 16 years, studying the social and economic structures that shape land use. Zambo leads Woodwell Climate’s work from the DRC side, liaising between local residents, the national government, and international researchers. The pair of them are hard at work advising on the creation of the DRC’s Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC), which outlines the country’s commitment to emissions reductions within the UN climate change framework.

Peatlands, a type of wetland, could be a critical element in the DRC’s contributions. Underlying large swaths of the Congo Rainforest, these carbon-packed soils are critical to protect. But disturbances like agriculture, deforestation, and climate change have already begun nibbling at the valuable stock of carbon. And once it is released, it takes millennia to replace.

What is a peatland?

Congo peatlands are found primarily in the wet, marshy forests of the country’s “Cuvette Central” or Central Basin. They form on the water-soaked banks of stream channels—an oxygen-poor environment that slows the decomposition process, allowing organic matter to build up over time into a spongy soil that locks away carbon, preventing it from re-joining the atmosphere.

A stable peatland relies on wetness. Draining a peat swamp immediately exposes that carbon to decomposition and erosion when it touches air.

“As soon as aerobic bacteria start getting in there,” says Bush. “Then all that carbon starts to become unstable. So the idea is, we just need to not disturb that peat as much as possible.”

But avoiding disturbance is a difficult thing to do these days. As populations grow, people are pushing further into forested marshland margins, often modifying them for agricultural uses like wetland rice production or fish farming to support their families and communities.

Peatlands are also extremely sensitive to degradation and deforestation across the rainforest biome. In the Congo Basin, the rainforest is actually responsible for creating most of its own rain—the spring rainy season is triggered by moisture breathed into the atmosphere by plants, rather than blown inland from the sea. This makes the Congo even more sensitive than the Amazon when it comes to the drying effects of deforestation.

“For every hectare of forest you lose in Africa, you lose proportionately more rainfall than you do for a similar amount of forest loss in Latin America or in South and Southeast Asia,” says Woodwell Climate Tropics Program Director, Dr. Mike Coe.

What we don’t know about the Congo’s peatlands

So exactly how much peatland does the Congo Basin hold? And how bad would it be in terms of emissions to lose them? The answer to both is “we don’t know for certain.”

Research has only just begun to give size and shape to this critical ecosystem. Recently, a collaborative Congolese and British team led by Dr. Simon Lewis of the University of Leeds walked two 20-30 kilometer transects of marshy forest, taking core samples to assess the existence of peatland. They found it everywhere beneath the forest. All told, an estimated 145,000 square kilometers across the entire region.

That translates to an estimated 30 billion metric tons of carbon—more than 20 times the United States’ annual fossil fuel emissions.

“It’s only two transects in the whole of the Congo Basin, but using that, we’ve been able to recalibrate existing models of peatland extent and quality, and it basically shows we’re sitting on a tropical carbon treasure trove,” says Bush.

Peatland protection is poverty alleviation

So protecting peatlands is important, but in practice, it’s a hard thing to accomplish. Why?

Right now, peatlands are more valuable to the people of DRC as a land resource to produce food, hunt, fish and harvest plants and materials for building, than as untouched forest. Some estimates indicate more than 90% of deforestation in the country occurs to support subsistence agriculture. It’s a necessity for the nearly three quarters of the country’s population that lives on less than $2.15 a day.

In 2020, Zambo and Bush, alongside Woodwell Senior Research Scientist Kathleen Savage, conducted research into methods of agricultural intensification in rice paddy wetlands which are often created on deforested peatland. Applying different farming methods, involving weeding and tending to rice plants throughout the full season rather than traveling and returning for the harvest, significantly boosted yields over the same area, meaning less pressure to expand into the forest to increase productivity.

“Just by tending the rice, you could perhaps save about 30% of the forest,” says Savage.

Farmers recognized the benefit of this method, but were hesitant to adopt it. That time spent not tending to rice is often spent working to earn extra cash to pay immediate expenses. Waiting for a larger payout at the end of the season is not always a risk they are able to take. A good crop is not guaranteed; pests, drought, or floods could all wipe out a year’s worth of work, leaving farmers with no income. That uncertainty pushes people to make tough decisions about how to use forests.

“There’s no social safety net,” says Savage. “Well actually, the social safety net is the forest—hunting, chopping a tree down and selling the lumber because it’s worth a lot of money.”

Carbon markets could direct money to forest communities

To prevent deforestation and degradation of peatland, rural communities will need an alternative source of income. Bush and Zambo have been discussing the potential for carbon markets to supply that income.

Carbon markets are a finance mechanism that places a monetary value on preventing carbon from entering the atmosphere—or actively removing it. They function on the sale of “carbon credits” which theoretically represent one metric ton of carbon kept stored or sequestered through land management practices. Ideally, money from their purchase goes directly to the people managing the land—whether that’s a farmer protecting forests or a community group restoring degraded areas.

In reality, however, carbon credits have been challenging to verify because of weak regulations and lack of data.

“The problem with the carbon credit is nobody’s really sure about quality and standards for delivery or how to measure and monitor them because, obviously, somebody doesn’t turn up on your doorstep with a bag full of carbon,” says Bush.

So far, market implementation has been plagued by accusations of greenwashing for polluting corporations who buy offsets and government regulatory programs unable to prove positive climate and biodiversity impacts. But Bush and Zambo see potential for a version of this solution to bring more wealth directly into farmers’ hands if done right.

Bush is working with the Carbon team at Woodwell Climate on the development of a Landscape Capital Index (LCI) that uses scientific standards to assess the potential of any tract of land to deliver climate mitigation and other benefits like biodiversity and water cycling. Once refined, the Index will provide data against which carbon credits can be checked.

Zambo has been deeply involved in conversations with the Ministry of Environment around the country’s National Net Zero Plan. Both he and Bush hope that a science-backed carbon market could make many of the sustainable development projects outlined in the plan economically feasible.

“The validation of carbon stored in this ecosystem could generate a lot of money in the country for development,” says Zambo.

Building Congolese Capacity

Another obstacle to implementing an effective carbon market is finding available data to feed the LCI. As Bush mentioned, current information on peatland carbon is based on only a thin slice of the entire watershed. In order to provide payments for local-level conservation projects, we need a much more granular understanding of the extent and quality of carbon across the entire ecosystem. Collecting that kind of data will require more scientists—Congolese scientists—and more technical capacity among officials who could be responsible for managing conservation programs in the future.

“DRC needs capacity building in the mapping of peatland areas to develop a national strategy specific to peatlands,” says Zambo.

Capacity building was a large part of the workshop in Bush and Zambo attended in Kinshasa.

“This workshop was very important in the context of sharing knowledge and advances in data collection about peatlands, in order to enable the Congolese government to identify missing data, raise awareness among stakeholders, and create synergies between peatlands and other climate initiatives,” says Zambo.

Additional technological resources could also help bolster scientific capacity. Savage has been working with Research Assistant Zoë Dietrich to develop inexpensive, portable, methane monitoring chambers for use at field research sites in Brazil and Alaska. Savage sees the potential to adapt the chamber design for use in the DRC monitoring carbon fluxes in wetland forests.

“Right now, in terms of carbon accounting, [the DRC] is using measurements estimated from another similar country and the assumption is that’s what their forests are doing, too. But in order to get accurate numbers, they really need to move to direct measurements,” says Savage.

DRC’s sustainable future

There is much work to be done to build carbon markets into a viable funding mechanism for large conservation efforts in the DRC. Sustainability and economic growth will ultimately come down to providing rural households with pragmatic livelihood alternatives, and developing a sense of financial security. But Bush hopes the excitement around their potential could help push forward difficult conversations, not just around conservation and climate, but about economic governance within the country on a larger scale.

The carbon market, after all, is a market just like the ones selling sacks of rice or valuable timber.

“Once the buyers and sellers understand the basic value of what is being bought and sold, then it requires the same framework conditions to operate as any market needs,” says Bush. “Good governance, transparency and adherence to the rule of law.”

Zambo sees a path forward as well. One where valuing peatlands for their ecosystem benefits can help lift up all of DRC.

“I hope that the conservation, protection, management, and development of peatlands and forests in the DRC can be a key driver for the country’s sustainable development,” says Zambo.

Negotiations at COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan ran well past the scheduled end of the conference Friday evening. While the final outcomes fell short of hopes, they exceeded many expectations.

And while a full analysis of the final decisions will take time, a few key takeaways are already clear. The new goal for climate finance is an important step in the right direction, but responsibilities for it are ambiguous. The same can be said for the global goal on adaptation, conclusions about the need for enhanced research and observation systems, and a work plan for greater involvement of Indigenous peoples in the UN climate negotiation process. There was some enhanced clarity around mechanisms for implementing carbon markets under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement; however, the failure to reach consensus on the Just Transition Work Programme and improvements to the Global Stocktake process used to gauge progress toward climate goals were distinct disappointments.

Every COP presents unique challenges and opportunities, the pace of diplomacy rarely matches the acceleration of climate change, and under the Paris Agreement, the responsibility for ambition lies at the national level. But the main negotiations—as important as they are—are not the only venue where progress is made. Over the course of the two week convening, Woodwell Climate’s delegation hosted and participated in dozens of meetings and events, scoring significant wins at COP29:

As is always the case, this COP was the first step on the road to the next one. COP30 will bring the UN climate change negotiation process back to Brazil, where the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change was adopted in 1992, and where sustainable food production and tropical forest conservation—core areas of research and expertise for Woodwell Climate—are expected to be at the top of the agenda.

This year, Las Vegas, Nevada broke its all-time heat record, reaching 120° F. 

The temperature was recorded at Harry Reid International Airport on July 7, 2024. That week, between July 6 and July 12, was the new hottest 7-day period on record, with an average high temperature of 117.5° F. 

This is the daily reality for Vegas residents in the summer. Record-breaking temperatures are hard to bear, but so were all the hot days and nights that came before. Commuters frequently see temperatures above 120 flash on their vehicle dashboards, and outdoor workers struggle to do their daily tasks under the hot sun.

“There’s a disconnect between climate science and the people who live here,” says Woodwell Climate Research Associate, Monica Caparas. “Vegas residents know our summers are hot and unbearable. Understanding climate change is driving the extreme weather we’re experiencing is where the disconnect lies. ”

Caparas moved to Las Vegas as a child. She grew up there, left for college, and returned to settle into her adult life. Today, she works for Woodwell Climate’s Risk team remotely from her home in the city. Caparas knows the ins and outs of local life. These include Vegas’s rapid population expansion, the groups of people experiencing homelessness sheltering in underground stormwater infrastructure, and the heat that was unbearable before it started making headlines. 

Experiencing climate change without shelter

Caparas’s work with the Risk team aims to provide communities like Las Vegas with an accurate picture of the climate-driven changes in their future. These “risk assessments” are provided through Woodwell Climate’s Just Access program, which uses the most accurate climate models, in collaboration with local knowledge, to anticipate future community safety threats. The analyses have brought to light growing threats from flooding, heat, storms, and more. The team provides assessments, free of charge, to states, cities, and countries across the world.

Just Access serves what Risk Program Director Christopher Schwalm calls “frontline communities.” The term describes groups of people who are over-exposed, under-resourced, underserved, historically marginalized, and therefore the most at-risk to the repercussions of climate change. In the risk assessment for Las Vegas, people experiencing homelessness are front and center. 

“Between May 20th and the first week in July, about 20 people who were experiencing homelessness died of heat,” says Dr. Catrina Grigsby-Thedford, Executive Director of the Nevada Homeless Alliance (NHA) and community partner in Las Vegas. 

The NHA estimates that almost 8,000 people are experiencing homelessness on any given night in southern Nevada. The number is only growing. Grigsby-Thedford says that this year’s unhoused population is up 1,300 people compared to 2023. 

“Often our shelters are full,” Grigsby-Thedford says, “We’re limited by shelter beds and space.”

The NHA’s shelters do open all day in extreme heat, but so many people packed tightly together is still unsafe. 

With nowhere to go, some seek shelter underground in Las Vegas’s stormwater infrastructure. While the tunnels are cooler out of the sun’s reach, they are at risk from flooding. Across the region, extreme precipitation is expected to increase by 12-14% by 2050, raising flood risk in the city and especially within the tunnels.

To combat lack of space and shelter, the NHA hosts 4-8 one-stop resource fairs per month. The events, called Project Homeless Connect, serve both people experiencing homelessness and low-income residents in Las Vegas. Grigsby-Thedford says these events “fill in gaps”—offering housing assistance, medical care, hygiene care, and other resources. 

Despite all of this work, many unhoused people are hesitant to engage with organizations like the NHA. Grigsby-Thedford says “choice is often a challenge,” and that when people grow accustomed to the way things are, they often accept it and choose to stay. 

Picturing risk

Building trust with communities, especially those predisposed to mistrust outside actors, is essential in this work. Which is why, Schwalm says, Woodwell Climate approaches risk work with the goal of “meet[ing] people where they are.” 

That means “scoping,” the team’s word for listening to what community and government leaders want out of the risk analysis—what concerns they have, weak points they’ve identified, and what help might be needed post-analysis.

“Two-thirds of the time we spend from start to finish falls into this scoping idea, rather than doing analysis itself,” Schwalm says. 

Scoping frames the data the risk team collects, as well as who their partners will be during the risk analysis process. 

“We find people who are practical and recognize that there’s a problem,” Schwalm says, “We only work with communities who want to work with us.”

Following the scoping process, the Risk team compiles an analysis of extreme weather events and subsequent risks each community will face as climate change progresses. 

“We perform a stress test of that particular geography to identify weak points,” Schwalm explains.

Then, the Risk team uses the most up-to-date climate models possible to predict changes in extreme weather and regional climate. By using predictive models, the team focuses efforts on what the future will hold, as opposed to using past strategies.

“We need to use the future to predict the future,” Schwalm says simply. 

Making climate risk data accessible to all

Over the past three years, Just Access has provided 50 communities—that’s about a quarter billion people—with risk analyses. These communities span the U.S., Central and South America, Africa, Asia, and Oceania. They’ve worked with countries, like the Democratic Republic of Congo, where they helped update the country’s National Adaptive Plan, states like Chiapas in Mexico, groups like Cree Nation in Canada, and other communities, now including Las Vegas.  

Despite all of this work, though, Schwalm says there is still room to grow. 

“Fifty communities is kind of only a drop in the bucket,” he says, “We’re not going to make a huge dent in this unless we move beyond working community-by-community.” 

Two major roadblocks for Just Access are finite resources: time and money. Individual risk analyses require a lot of time and communication to address risks in relatively small areas. 

The other obstacle, money, is something climate research could always use more of. Grants and donations are crucial in order for analyses to remain free, and those sometimes come with limitations. 

“There’s a tension from the funder to work in a specific geography sometimes,” Schwalm says, “It’s a juggling act.”

Climate change can also be a politicized topic. In order to meet people where they are, sometimes the Risk team implements changes in language used to communicate with community leaders. This can be a change as simple as using “extreme weather” instead of “climate change.” As long as everyone in the room is ready to confront what the future holds, they’re all working on the same page towards the same goal. 

“We’ve done red states, blue states, rural, urban,” Schwalm continues. “We’ve learned how to read the room.” 

Creating the foundations for change

Woodwell Climate’s involvement in Las Vegas brings to light the way justice issues, like homelessness, interact with growing threats from climate change.

“In the Las Vegas risk assessment, we are focusing on the disproportionate impacts of the climate crisis on communities already facing systemic socio-economic inequity,” says Caparas. “We must think about intersectionality in order to address climate justice.”

Not only does climate change represent a current crisis for those experiencing homelessness, communities with fewer resources are now at greater risk of being made homeless by future climate-related disasters. Accurate climate risk information can support organizations like NHA as they develop strategies to serve people experiencing homelessness in a more extreme future. 

Grigsby-Thedford says that NHA members, especially those with lived experience of homelessness who work as Lived X Consultants, are always looking to be involved in projects like the one Caparas leads. 

“We always talk about weather in our meetings,” she says, “So this is perfect, someone’s actually doing research about this. Anything that impacts [Las Vegas’s homeless population], we want to make sure we’re involved in that.”

For the Las Vegas risk assessment, Caparas is working with the NHA and Southern Nevada Lived X Consultants to understand climate risks around cooling stations in public buildings, which are a vital, air-conditioned shelter when the heat index is too high. Grigsby-Thedford says there were many more cooling stations in 2023 and 2024 compared to previous years.

Caparas also forged a connection with Miguel Dávila Uzcátegui, Southern Nevada’s Regional Transportation Commission (RTC) Senior Planner and board member of Help Hope Home. Together, they are developing a database of flooding infrastructure and updating the city’s flooding model with future climate projections. The RTC will integrate the Risk team’s model into regional planning work, updating Las Vegas’s flooding and transportation infrastructure for community safety. 

None of this work would have been possible without Caparas’s diligent bridge building between the scientific resources of Woodwell Climate and the needs of people in her own community. Those connections allow science to be informed first and foremost by those most affected by climate change. 

“The people closest to the problem are the people closest to the solution,” says Grigsby-Thedford. 

Woodwell Climate Research Center and UN Climate Change are collaborating to develop a new training course—announced November 14 at COP29 in Azerbaijan—to prepare experts for a voluntary review of adaptation reporting by Parties under the Paris Agreement.

Countries submit Biennial Transparency Reports (BTRs) every two years to inform the world about their national climate efforts. These reports are vital enabling tools for governments, helping to build a robust evidence base critical to strengthening climate policies and climate action over time. The first BTRs are due at the end of 2024.

“Transparency is a priority for the COP29 presidency, because transparency is a cornerstone of climate action,” said a representative for the COP29 presidency at the Together for Transparency event on Thursday. 

Each BTR will be reviewed by teams of technical experts coordinated by UN Climate Change, which provides a set of training courses for experts to prepare for that task. A country can request a voluntary review of the information it has reported on adaptation efforts, which requires special expertise on climate risk and adaptation to execute. 

This collaboration draws on Woodwell expertise on climate change impacts and adaptation reporting, as well as climate risk and vulnerability assessments. Woodwell Climate’s Director of International Government Relations, Dr. Matti Goldberg, was responsible for spearheading this collaborative effort.  

The training will encompass a set of five lessons and accompanying exams that help future expert reviewers learn key aspects of vulnerability assessments, adaptation planning, monitoring and evaluation, and loss and damage, among other issues. These lessons will be launched in a PDF downloadable format by the end of 2024.

Squabbling, compromise, disappointment, hope, and incremental change— these are features of any decision making process, but especially one requiring the cooperation and agreement of nearly 200 countries with varied interests, resources, and desire for change. 

At the annual Conference of Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), member countries gather to hash out the gritty details of international agreements concerning climate change. These COPs have become the world’s most prominent stage for climate action, drawing not only heads of state and diplomats, but also scientists, activists, businesses, journalists, financial organizations, Indigenous knowledge holders, artists, and spiritual leaders, just to name a few. All are in attendance to influence the future of planet Earth. 

Here’s how climate’s biggest event of the year steers the international framework for combating climate change.

What is COP?

Formally, the COP is the decision-making platform for signatories of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). The UNFCCC is a legally binding agreement between UN member countries, created specifically to tackle the crisis of climate change. Each year since its creation, delegations from participating countries (called Parties) have met at the COP to discuss the agreements and mechanisms by which to address climate change. 

After two weeks of negotiation, conference delegates produce text that becomes binding for UNFCCC Parties. These texts have legislated things from the commitment of industrialized nations to reduce emissions, to the direction of funding for climate action, to the upper limit of acceptable warming. 

The prominence and importance of these conference proceedings have grown with each year and each increment of warming. The conference itself has expanded to encompass climate action across multiple channels at once.

“There are actually three COPs happening in parallel,” says Woodwell Climate’s Director of International Government Relations, Dr. Matti Goldberg, who has learned the ins and outs of the conference over 15 years spent working for the UN’s Climate Change Secretariat.

The first layer is the core of the conference— the negotiations. This is the space where each participating country sends delegates to argue on their behalf. The agenda for each year’s negotiations is developed during preparatory meetings of the delegates, with planning sometimes starting two years in advance, and resulting in agendas of 50-60 interlinked issues. COPs are typically judged as successes or failures based on the strength of the resulting text from the formal negotiations. The complexity of the issues, and the negotiating tactics of different countries, tend to push final agreements well beyond the scheduled closing of the COP.  

Then there’s what Goldberg calls the “high-level COP.” This is the platform for heads of state to showcase their country’s progress on various issues. Think, speeches from the president, announcements of new coalitions, hand-shaking between ministers, or denunciations of other countries’ lack of action. Although the high-level COP can feel like superficial performance, deals between countries can help move the negotiations forward— or delay them, depending on a country’s interests.

Surrounding both the formal negotiations and closed door deals is the “third COP” — also referred to as the “Blue Zone”: a space open to scientists, NGOs, activists, and companies for hosting side events, pavilions with panel talks and presentations, forge new partnerships, hold protests, and apply pressure on negotiators. The third COP also spills out into a “Green Zone”, a space where those not badged for the official conference can organize events and contribute to the momentum of the moment.

What does an NGO do at COP?

For an organization like Woodwell Climate, the third COP is the main stage on which to contribute to the conference. 

“Our first priority is to showcase our research and its relevance to the key questions of each year’s COP,” says Goldberg.

At COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan, Woodwell Climate will host a pavilion to showcase the organization’s work in several key areas, including climate risks and national security, accounting for growing natural emissions sources like permafrost thaw and wildfires, as well as emerging collaborations with new partner countries such as Ethiopia. The pavilion also serves as a convening place to discuss work with partners.

“The sheer scale of participation at COPs makes them critical annual opportunities to solidify existing partnerships and build new ones,” says Goldberg.

While participants of this third COP aren’t officially part of negotiations, Woodwell Climate scientists still have opportunities to participate in the more formal COP processes. Each COP hosts an “Earth Information Day” where scientists exchange data and research with country delegations to better inform decision making. At COP29, Woodwell has proposed to highlight the latest research on wildfire emissions.

Scientists also have a role to play in ensuring national emissions reductions plans are based on accurate numbers—a point that Woodwell Climate will be emphasizing both at this COP and beyond. In 2025, countries must submit their updated 5-year climate targets (called Nationally Determined Contributions or NDCs) to the UNFCCC. The adequacy of those targets depends on how much carbon can still be emitted without surpassing the agreed-upon maximum limit of warming.

“Our research on permafrost and wildfires indicates that the global carbon budget available for staying below the 1.5 degrees Celcius temperature limit might be much smaller than countries are thinking right now,” says Goldberg. “From the Woodwell perspective, it would be great to remind the international community that the numbers need to add up. We need to take into account these emissions that are not being discussed.”

Successes and failures in three decades of COP

Over his tenure with the UN Secretariat, Goldberg has witnessed both promising action and frustrating setbacks, sometimes at the same conference. 

COP15, held in Copenhagen in 2009 was one of those moments for him. Here negotiations decayed, and the weak resulting agreement failed to legally bind countries to emissions reductions.

“Turkeys don’t vote for Thanksgiving,” Goldberg jokes. “Countries will generally not agree to a regime that will force them to take on targets determined at the UN or by others.”

But Goldberg says that Copenhagen did, at least, define a new paradigm where every country would commit to doing something. Voluntarily, and perhaps not ambitiously enough, but in a year widely considered a failure, steps towards universal climate cooperation were still made.

Each successive COP built upon this new paradigm and in 2015 the conference arrived at another milestone— the Paris Agreement. This is the framework under which the world operates today, with every country creating NDCs appropriate to their size and resources, with the goal of limiting warming to 1.5 degrees C above pre-industrial levels. 

The agreement spurred more conversation around how that goal would be achieved, and in 2018 the parties adopted a rulebook for its implementation. Since then, however, Goldberg says many of the conferences have been “searching for real purpose” — some kind of action to match the ambition of the Paris Agreement. But, in Goldberg’s mind, that doesn’t necessarily indicate a failure of the process.

“You can’t have a spectacle forever,” says Goldberg. “At some point the pressure should be less on the COP itself and more on countries actually working under the Paris Agreement to get more ambitious about what they’re doing, and probably making some very painful decisions at the national level.”

Climate has the world’s attention

But of course, policy making moves slowly, both for the UN and national governments. And with each year that passes, cooperation and increased ambition becomes more urgent. In 2023, record high temperatures spurred conversations about whether the 1.5 degree limit has already been surpassed. In five years, Goldberg states, “it might be way too late even to pretend that we are under that limit.”

But Goldberg remains hopeful. Before the COPs, before 30 years of tough conversations attempting to find a way through the climate crisis, Goldberg says, the prevailing thought among political scientists was that international cooperation on this scale was a fantasy. But despite its failures, the process has persisted, inching the world towards climate action. Other international treaties have taken their lead from this process as well, hosting COPs to address issues like plastic pollution and biodiversity.

“The fact that there are so many people dedicated to solving this and to working through mutual disagreements, that people haven’t walked away, makes me hopeful,” says Goldberg. “This is possibly the hardest global policy problem there is, and it has the world’s attention. I think that’s very positive.”

In the US, state and federal governments regularly fight wildfires that threaten people and property, but Alaska’s Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge recently began piloting a novel strategy: putting out fires to prevent climate-warming carbon emissions from being released from trees and soils.

Read more on caryinstitute.org

 A new study, published in Nature Communications Earth and Environment and co-authored by researchers at Atmospheric and Environmental Research, Inc. (AER) and Woodwell Climate Research Center, finds that abnormally warm temperatures in the Arctic are associated with a higher likelihood of severe winter weather including cold-air outbreaks and heavy snowfall in Northern Hemisphere continents.

“When the Arctic atmosphere is warmer than normal, we see a much higher likelihood of extreme winter weather across much of Canada, the northern U.S. and northern Eurasia,” remarked lead author, Dr. Judah Cohen at AER. “The relationship is especially strong in the northeastern sections of the continents.” 

“Even though we’re seeing cold records being broken less often as the globe warms, we’ll still see debilitating spells of severe winter weather,” added co-author Dr. Jennifer Francis at Woodwell Climate. “There will be plenty of ice, snow, and frigid air in the Arctic winter for decades to come, and that cold can be displaced southward into heavily populated regions during Arctic heat waves.”  

Recent disruptive extreme winter weather events—such as the deadly Texas cold spell of February 2021—have occurred and will continue to occur in the future, wreaking havoc on infrastructure, human wellbeing, and ecosystems, especially in areas unaccustomed to and ill-equipped for dealing with winter extremes.

“The Arctic may seem irrelevant and far away to most folks, but our findings say the profound changes there are affecting billions of people around the Northern Hemisphere,” added Dr. Francis. To reverse these trends, “it will take bold and rapid actions to reduce our burning of fossil fuels and the build-up of heat-trapping gasses in the atmosphere, but the tools exist if we can muster the will.”

According to Francis, recent studies have theorized that rapid Arctic warming, a pace three-to-four times faster than the globe as a whole, may increase the likelihood of extreme weather events owing to a reduced north/south temperature difference. In addition, slower westerly winds of the jet stream lead to more frequent convoluted jet-stream configurations, which lead to unusual weather.

“Disruptions in the typically stable stratospheric polar vortex may also occur more often in a warming climate,” noted Cohen, “and we know hazardous winter weather is more likely during these disruptions.”

In February, Woodwell Climate Research Center’s new Climate Justice committee gathered for the very first time. Even through the screen, you could feel it—a buzz of anticipation, the spark of hope, as folks from across the organization came together to dream about the vision and goals ahead. 

This was no ordinary meeting—it was the first step in what many hope will be a transformative journey for Woodwell Climate, guiding us toward a more just and equitable climate future. Like a handful of seeds taking root, this meeting was full of potential. Participants shared ideas and intentions that, with care and nurture, could grow into something powerful that reshapes the landscape of Woodwell Climate’s global impact. 

Climate justice is indispensable to Woodwell’s work

Climate change is being felt around the world, but as its effects become more frequent and intense,  the unequal impacts on different communities become more obvious. Some communities are disproportionately affected, while others benefit more from societal responses to climate change. 

A salient example of this can be found in the aftermath of climate-related disasters like hurricanes or wildfires. Affluence of a community or country plays a role in shielding citizens from the worst effects of the disaster, and efforts to rebuild are often much swifter. Meanwhile,  low income communities must often face forced displacement, material destruction, and cultural degradation. 

This growing disparity underscores the need for research and solutions that acknowledge and work to rectify these inequities. Because climate change creates and exacerbates inequitable situations, addressing disparity must be a central consideration in both current climate research and long-term climate adaptation strategies. 

Climate justice is an approach to addressing climate change that not only considers, but centers, disproportionate impacts. It integrates principles of social justice, human rights, and equity, emphasizing the interconnectedness of environmental issues with systems of oppression. By centering those most affected by climate injustice—who are also the least responsible for causing it—climate justice reframes the issue as not only scientific, technical, or financial but as a moral and justice concern. It requires us to consider not just where and how climate change is happening but also who is excluded or marginalized by the physical and social mechanisms of climate change and by any adaptation or mitigation efforts we pursue.

As an institution dedicated to using science to inform climate change policy, integrating climate justice enriches our work in five significant ways. 

  1. First, by identifying who is disproportionately affected, our research and policy recommendations can be more targeted and effective in addressing vulnerabilities that might otherwise be overlooked. 
  2. Second, demonstrating a commitment to equity in our work increases our credibility and broadens our support among diverse stakeholders, including members of historically marginalized communities. 
  3. Third, understanding the social, cultural, and economic contexts in which climate impacts occur allows us to develop strategies that are not only scientifically sound but also socially relevant and adaptable. 
  4. Fourth, policies shaped with an awareness of who is excluded or marginalized are more likely to succeed because they are grounded in the realities of those most affected.
  5. Lastly, by considering who is excluded or marginalized, we can address not only the symptoms but also the root causes of climate injustice, leading to more comprehensive and lasting solutions.    

Nurturing a growing climate justice ecosystem

It’s essential to remember that this kind of transformative work is often slow, challenging, and asks for a commitment that stretches beyond the urgency of the moment. There’s no magic wand, no quick-fix—something we know deeply, sometimes frustratingly, from our scientific work. Real climate justice isn’t something you can cook up in isolation or rush through with a checklist. It’s born from the steady, patient work of weaving relationships, dismantling entrenched inequalities, and watering the seeds of small, consistent actions—nurtured across many hands and hearts over time, even when the growth feels almost imperceptible. 

Think of it like the slow growth of trees that eventually give rise to forests—subtle, persistent, inevitable. The key is to stay rooted in purpose, grounded in the values that guide us, trusting that even the smallest efforts will accumulate into something deep, something strong, something lasting—like a mature old-growth forest, resilient through the cycles of time.

The work we’re doing as a committee is very much in its early, tender stages. It is dynamic and evolving, like the ‘pioneer stage’ of a forest’s life. Here, the groundwork is being lovingly (and with considerable effort) laid for what’s to come, like the lichens and mosses breaking down rock, slowly transforming barren ground into rich, life-giving soil. In these first steps, we are creating the conditions for future growth, for future flourishing. 

As we move forward, the process becomes more complex—a kind of intermediate stage. Dandelions, grasses, the boldest and most audacious plants take root first, thanks to the quiet, persistent work of the mosses and lichens. The rest need a little more nurturing, a bit more care. Diversity begins to blossom—shrubs, small trees, and layers of life start to interweave, creating habitats for fungi, microbes, and animals. The community is expanding, deepening, finding its rhythm. Together as a committee we will expand our capacity to interweave more complex ideas and projects, allowing our work to deepen and evolve like a thriving ecosystem.  

And then, like the forest maturing into its climax stage, we envision a time when the ecosystem is stable, resilient, and thriving—a rich blend of old, wise trees and vibrant new growth. A place where deep-rooted interconnectedness allows life to sustain itself, weathering disturbances with grace. As a Climate Justice Committee, we aim to create a space where renewal is constant, change is embraced, and growth is continuous—ever adaptive, ever committed to justice, and ever alive to the needs of all, as Woodwell Climate continues to work towards an equitable, healthy and sustainable world. 

Pioneering climate justice work at Woodwell

Our first offering as a committee of mosses and lichens is to craft a set of actionable recommendations to help guide Woodwell Climate toward a future where our work is deeply rooted in the principles of climate justice, rich in diverse perspectives, and resilient in the face of challenges. This is our way of fostering the right environment for the seeds of future work to grow into a thriving, enduring ecosystem of ideas and actions. Our pioneer stage isn’t growing from a completely “barren substrate” however. We’re rich in resources – our science, staff, and you, our supporters reading this! 

While developing these recommendations will be inherently challenging, it’s critical that we get it right together. How we reach our goals is just as important as the goals themselves, and our collaborative process should reflect principles of justice, equity and mutual support. In other words, the process itself should be a model of the world we are trying to create. 

Drawing inspiration from Team Science—a collaborative approach to scientific challenges—Adrienne Maree Brown’s Emergent Strategy, which highlights the importance of cultivating relationships, trust, and community-building in collaborative work, and Dean Spade’s Mutual Aid, which emphasizes equitable distribution of roles, responsibilities, and credit in a supportive environment, we have created a team charter, establishing the principles guiding how we will work together. 

The team charter aligns members on the goals we are working toward and how members will approach the work together, providing clarity and focus. It creates a shared understanding of the team’s purpose and mission and fosters a sense of ownership and commitment that makes it easier to stay focused on long-term goals. By clearly defining roles and responsibilities, the charter reduces confusion and prevents overlap, ensuring that everyone’s contributions are recognized and understood. The guidelines for equitable participation, decision-making, and conflict resolution, set forth in the charter, help build a culture where all voices are heard and respected. Principles of flexibility and continued improvement are embedded into the charter as well, allowing the team to adapt as needed. 

Our hope is that this foundational work, like the pioneer stages of a forest, sets the stage for a process of ongoing growth, adaptation, and transformation that will carry Woodwell’s climate justice work into the future. As our work progresses (starting now with developing those recommendations), we’ll move through the intermediate stages of ecological succession—where new members are integrated and experimentation thrives. We’ll learn from both successes and setbacks, like our scientists testing their ideas in the field. Ultimately, we’ll cultivate a mature, stable ecosystem, where deep-rooted relationships hold the committee together. 

Yet even in this stage, just as in a primary forest, dynamic change continues. A gap in the canopy lets in light, sparking fresh growth and kickstarting another round of succession. We find ourselves asking: How might we spark deep and lasting change for a just climate future? The forest teaches us that the answers lie in cycles of renewal, in allowing space for the new while honoring the stability of what’s been built.