Cross-border partnership to tackle 'wickedly complex' climate change challenge

A climate activist holds up a placard at the Cop26 summit in Glasgow. 

An all-island partnership between leading researchers on climate change and biodiversity will attempt to tackle what has become a "wickedly complex" challenge, a leading academic has said.

Professor Peter Thorne is the Irish lead scientist on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, the precursor to the UN climate change summit Cop26 in Glasgow.

The director of the ICARUS Climate Research Centre at Maynooth University will be speaking as the All-Island Climate and Biodiversity Research Network is launched today in a bid to tackle the crisis.

Professor Peter Thorne, Maynooth University

Founding members include Prof Yvonne Buckley, vice president for biodiversity and climate action at Trinity College Dublin; and Prof Brian Ó Gallachóir, director of the Science Foundation Ireland MaREI Centre in Cork.

Over the last two years leading academics from across the Island of Ireland have collectively established an All-Ireland Climate and Biodiversity Research Network #AICBRN hear about our ambitions and impending launch https://t.co/JkwSS08Gup @y_buckley @climpeter @BOGallachoir pic.twitter.com/oWdYFsooFp

— Mark Emmerson (@MEecoprof) October 31, 2021

Prof Thorne said there is a "real need for diverse expertise and perspectives to be bought together if we are to solve the wickedly complex challenges before us" when it comes to climate change and biodiversity. 

Failure is not an option, and I am excited to see colleagues from across the island stepping up to ensure Irish research plays its part and helps Ireland to respond," he said.

The All-Island Climate and Biodiversity Research Network aims to bring together researchers from a wide range of disciplines across the island of Ireland who are undertaking research in climate and biodiversity topics.

Ireland is facing an unprecedented crisis in biodiversity, with the alarming losses in recent decades leading to the country becoming only the second in the world to declare the situation a national emergency.

Despite that emergency declaration in 2019, there has been criticism from environmental and nature organisations since. A Citizens Assembly on how best to deal with the crisis has still not been established. 

The All-Island Climate and Biodiversity Research Network "has never been more critical", according to Taoiseach Micheál Martin, who will join the North's deputy first minister, Michelle O'Neill, for its launch today.

"Climate change and the loss of biodiversity is one of the biggest threats facing humanity," said Mr Martin.

It is a crisis and challenge shared by all on this island; it will require collaboration, research and innovation across all sectors of public, private and civil society."

Prof Buckley said the climate and biodiversity crises "transcend national, disciplinary, and sectoral boundaries".

She added: "We all live on the same planet, and urgently need to fulfil our international commitments to reducing greenhouse gases, while protecting and restoring the ecosystems that sustain our lives, livelihoods and wellbeing. 

"Researchers from different disciplines across both jurisdictions on the island have grasped this challenge and are working together through the All-Island Climate and Biodiversity Research Network to find those solutions.”

CLIMATE & SUSTAINABILITY HUB