Cool It On City Playgrounds: Swings and Slides Get Hot Enough to Burn
August 14th, 2023
Courtesy of The Washington Post, a report on the impact of urban heat on playgrounds and some green solutions to help cool things down: In a child’s imagination, a climbing frame can become a pirate ship or a princess’s castle. But during this summer’s heat waves, the Sahara desert and the surface of Venus might […]
Read more »America’s Hottest City Is Nearly Unlivable in Summer. Can Cooling Technologies Save It?
August 13th, 2023
Via The Guardian, a look at how Phoenix’s new ‘heat tsar’ is betting on less asphalt, more green canopy and reflective surfaces to cool the sprawling heat island: A surge in heat-related deaths amid record-breaking summer temperatures offers a “glimpse into the future” and a stark warning that one of America’s largest cities is already […]
Read more »RainReady: Helping Communities Find Solutions to The Problem of Urban Flooding
August 12th, 2023
The RainReady program in Chicago aims to enlist residents in creating green infrastructure like permeable pavement and rain gardens that can reduce flooding in hard-hit neighborhoods, including by revamping vacant lots. The RainReady program has two facets that are inadequate in many other local-level flood mitigation efforts: community leadership and serious funding.
Read more »A Tree Grows in Birmingham
August 12th, 2023
Via Inside Climate News, a report on how one Southern community aims to plant its way into the Alabama shade: Sometimes Thomasine Jackson can’t get to work. Jackson, 65, said if there’s been a hard rain, water covers her entire street, leaving her no choice but to call her supervisor at Drummond Coal and tell […]
Read more »How Philanthropy Is Helping Cities Adapt to Extreme Heat
August 11th, 2023
Via Philanthropy.com, a look at how philanthropy is helping cities adapt to extreme heat: In 2019, a group of climate experts gathered at the Bellagio Center, a sprawling 50-acre property owned by the the Rockefeller Foundation on Lake Como in Northern Italy. The year was shaping up to be one of the hottest in recorded […]
Read more »This Butterfly-Inspired Paint Could Keep Cars and Houses Cool
August 10th, 2023
Via Fast Company, a look at a nature-inspired cooling technology: Scientists have designed a thin film that mimics a butterfly’s wings to help keep surfaces cool. The vivid blue color of morpho butterflies doesn’t come from pigment but from tiny nanostructures on their wings that bend and reflect light. In a recent study, scientists designed […]
Read more »'Black Swans' are highly improbable events that come as a surprise, have major disruptive effects, and that are often rationalized after the fact as if they had been predictable to begin with. In our rapidly warming world, such events are occurring ever more frequently and include wildfires, floods, extreme heat, and drought.
'Green Shoots' is a term used to describe signs of economic recovery or positive data during a downturn. It references a period of growth and recovery, when plants start to show signs of health and life, and, therefore, has been employed as a metaphor for a recovering economy.
It is my hope that Black Swans / Green Shoots will help readers understand both climate-activated risk and opportunity so that you may invest in, advise, or lead organizations in the context of increasing pressures of global urbanization, resource scarcity, and perils relating to climate change. I believe that the tools of business and finance can help individuals, businesses, and global society make informed choices about who and what to protect, and I hope that this blog provides some insight into the policy and private sector tools used to assess investments in resilient reinforcement, response, or recovery.