Refugia of Futures Past

This project is driven by the looming prospect that humanity’s efforts to meet its present climate and biodiversity loss mitigation goals will fail, evidenced by unmitigated biodiversity loss rates, ocean acidification, rising atmospheric CO2 and global temperature averages resulting from the continued failure of countries to meet their Paris Agreement Nationally Determined Contributions for emissions reductions.

These shortfalls raise the prospect of human adaptation to a radically changed future global ecology. We therefore intend to create a new line of adaptation research and knowledge that recognises the deep future adaptation implications of poorly mitigated environmental change. We intend to introduce a research-based discourse on such future adaptations that is currently poorly recognised in the short-term goal focus of international research, policy, and practice toward adaptation and mitigation.

Project website

https://www.whiterose.ac.uk/collaborationfunds/refugia-of-futures-past/