Why Norwich continues to be at the heart of climate change research

As we come towards the end of the hottest UK summer where our region was the warmest, the sunniest and one of the driest, with rainfall 62% lower than average, the question of the impact of climate change now and in the future is once again a major talking point.

After all, the food we eat and grow for the rest of the country, our health and adverse weather conditions all contribute to the environments we live and work in.

So, it’s important that we can monitor and then take appropriate action to mitigate climate change impacts.

Celebrating 25 years of important climate monitoring work, the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, whose HQ is at the University of East Anglia (UEA) at Norwich Research Park, is one of the UK’s centres of excellence for the study of climate change and its impacts.

Established in 2000, it is the UK’s first interdisciplinary and policy-relevant climate change research centre and is a partnership of universities, led by UEA, bringing together researchers from the social and natural sciences, with engineering, to develop sustainable responses to climate change.

It works with leaders from the public and private sectors to promote informed decision-making on mitigating and adapting to climate change.

To celebrate its 25th anniversary, the Tyndall Centre has just hosted its largest ever climate conference – ‘The Critical Decade for Climate Action’ – which built on its legacy bringing together cutting-edge interdisciplinary sciences, with the arts and humanities, to generate new knowledge and strengthen the foundations for a healthy planet and fair society.

Many of the brightest minds in climate change, both young and old, attended to discuss what research needs to happen in the next five years that will be truly useful for climate change action.

Experts at the Tyndall Centre believe that this decade is critical in our attempt to achieve the progress necessary to address the climate challenge.

Adverse impacts of climate change are now considered to be widespread in all world regions, leading to loss and damage of both nature and people.

Tackling climate change transcends academic disciplines because it involves fundamental changes to how society functions in political, technological, ecological and economic systems.

It touches on our core activities, as humans, and the way we operate as a society, locally, nationally and internationally, including how we approach the distribution of resources and issues surrounding inequality, poverty and social justice.

To help create greater public engagement, the conference included exhibitions at The Sainsbury Centre from artists who illustrated how humanity is responding to flooding and other climate impacts.

Asher Minns, Executive Director at the Tyndall Centre, explained, “Climate change is an all-encompassing issue that we cannot ignore, waste time being inactive or argue about.

“Not only is this conference our largest one in Norwich, it’s also our most important to date.

“For those of us who’ve been around since the start of the Tyndall Centre, this is our critical decade for climate action, it’s what we’ve been working for.

“For the younger researchers, their critical decades for climate action are yet to come.

“This is already a decade of profound changes.

“Climate change trends are increasingly distinguishable across an extensive range of environmental variables, with growing threats for vulnerable people, societies and ecosystems, increasing global and regional tensions.

“We cannot wait or deliberate because we are already missing our chance to protect this region and our planet’s future.

“In the UK, decarbonisation is working and is benefiting the economy, in this region we also need to become much smarter and more resilient to the impacts of climate change.

“That’s not really begun yet.”

As well as the work of the Tyndall Centre, many researchers across the Norwich Research Park campus at, for instance, the John Innes Centre, The Sainsbury Laboratory, Earlham Institute and Quadram Institute are working on specific solutions, to mitigate the impacts of climate change, in sectors such as agrifood and human health.

In addition, we are seeing new companies spinning-out research and creating businesses, to bring solutions to market, whether that’s exciting concepts such as growing rice on the surfaces of the world’s oceans, developing longer shelf-life and disease-resistant bananas and potatoes, or creating dye for the fashion industry that is sourced from plants and insects.

A huge amount has been accomplished in the 25 years since the Tyndall Centre was established and it has had a profound influence on how we address the challenges of climate change.

‘The Critical Decade for Climate Action’ conference marks another important stage its work to help address the global challenge of climate change, and we should be rightly proud that Norwich Research Park continues to be at the heart of the advancement of research into this undoubtedly serious issue.

Rob Davies is from OneOnOne Communications and works with Norwich Research Park.