Life, Liberty and Climate Data: The Privatization of a Public Good

From America Adapts the Climate Change Podcast Doug Parsons

In episode 203 of America Adapts, Doug Parsons hosts Dr. Justin Mankin. Justin is a climate scientist and associate professor at Dartmouth College. Doug and Justin discuss his provocative column in the New York Times on climate data accessibility – should tax funded climate data remain a public good. Justin also explains the intricacies of climate modeling and the ethical considerations of private sector involvement. Justin also emphasizes the significance of aligning private and public sector efforts for effective climate adaptation. Doug and Justin discuss the importance of having a National Adaptation Plan and Justin also highlights the work of his students in climate impact attribution and loss and damage research. America Adapts is increasingly covering the issue of climate data and modeling and in this thought providing discussion, we learn about the ethical considerations of privatizing a public good.

Topics covered:

Understanding Climate Models
The Right to Climate Data
Legal Implications of Climate Data Accuracy
Interaction with Private Sector on Climate Science
Free Climate Models vs. Paid Models
Importance of National Adaptation Plan
National Resilience Framework vs. National Adaptation Plan
Dr. Mankin's Student Research Projects
Recommendation for Future Guest: Erin Mayfield and Klaus Keller

Quotes:

Dr. Justin Mankin:

"I think there's a gigantic gap between the science I do and the decision relevance of it."

"My investigations, which are fundamentally about informing adaptation and risk management of climate change that science is paid for,? And to the extent that science is linked back to people's tax dollars. I have an absolute imperative to communicate my science to whoever will listen."

"And that means that a national adaptation plan would establish minimal require informational requirements and make those data to inform adaptation decisions available to people in a legible format, right?"

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Links in this episode: https://jsmankin.github.io/

The People Have a Right to Climate Datahttps://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/20/opinion/climate-risk-disasters-data.html https://www.cnbc.com/video/2018/03/07/full-interview-the-business-of-weather-forecasting.html

Research:

Globally unequal effect of extreme heat on economic growth https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.add3726

Persistent effect of El Niño on global economic growthhttps://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adf2983

The third annual Innovations in Climate Resilience Conference (ICR24) takes place on April 22-24, 2024, in Washington, DC. This toolkit is meant to help share messaging and information with your audiences.

ICR24 WEBSITE

https://www.battelle.org/conferences/conference-on-innovations-in-climate-resilience

EMAIL CONTACTS

· General email [email protected]

· Media inquiry contact - TR Massey [email protected]

INFORMATION DOWNLOADS

· ICR22 on-demand: Access all proceedings, presentations, videos, and photos here

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IMPORTANT KEY DATES

· Abstract Submission Deadline – December 11, 2023 – Submission link

· Early Bird Registration Opens – November 1, 2023 – Registration link

o Early Bird Registration Deadline - February 16, 2024