Research summary
As the climate crisis accelerates, communities need to engage in integrated sustainability planning and policy-setting in ways that align with critical climate and biodiversity imperatives. But integrating climate action and biodiversity conservation with broader local and regional development priorities and objectives comes with challenges, opportunities and intersectionality issues. As Canada Research Chair in Climate Change, Biodiversity, and Sustainability, Dr. Robert Newell is studying these.
Newell and his research team are working with regional and local governments, stakeholders and communities to co-create integrated planning tools and produce knowledge on how climate action and biodiversity conservation may align or conflict with other planning priorities and sustainability objectives. They are producing frameworks and processes that communities can use to conduct integrated planning through a climate-biodiversity lens as well as models and visualizations to support systems-based, participatory planning processes.