I have recently been awarded a UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship. My research programme, “Climate futures science for adaptation”, seeks to transform our ability to develop climate information for climate change adaptation planning. In recent decades, there has been significant progress in the ability to model future climate change, and “climate services” research and practice has emerged to support decision-makers in adaptation to climate change. Yet it remains very challenging to communicate climate risk to decision-makers. My research programme seeks to change this, through two complementary elements. The first element involves novel climate science research,  which is designed with adaptation at the forefront. The second element is to bring in insights and methods from behavioural science to design and test communications with stakeholders, to better understand the most effective approaches to communicating risk.

The first four years of the programme will focus primarily on southern Africa. If successful, I will use the following three years to apply lessons and frameworks developed in southern Africa to other regions and across scales.

This work is inherently collaborative! I am currently building a team to work with me on this at University of Bristol, and we will be collaborating with colleagues in southern Africa, as well as working with an Advisory Board of professionals involved in national or regional planning. I am also seeking to link the work with related research programmes and networks. I am keen to be in touch with those interested in African climate, mechanisms of future climate change, quantifying uncertainty, climate science for climate policy, loss and damage, novel approaches to developing climate information, and application of behavioural science approaches to climate change adaptation.