Below are news items from the UBC IRES community.
PICS highlights Charlotte Milne for her work advocating for Semá:th First Nation flood rights through mapping
Further, Charlotte is reviewing First Nation flood mapping engagement efforts from across Canada to create a framework that outlines the variety of ways that Nations can engage in (or lead) different stages of flood mapping, across different types of maps.
From the Strait of Hormuz to African Markets: How the Persian Gulf Region Conflict Could Deepen Food Insecurity
IRES student Momodou Barry explores how conflict in the Persian Gulf region could deepen food insecurity across Africa by disrupting energy markets, fertilizer supply chains, and global shipping routes. Global food systems are interconnected, and shocks in one region can quickly influence food prices elsewhere.
Leaving the Playbook on the Sidelines: Sveinar Soldal on Sustainable Sports and the 2026 FIFA World Cup
Despite lofty promises, the upcoming World Cup is set to become the most emission-intensive sporting event in history.
Creating Communities to Help Interdisciplinary Scientists Thrive
Dr. Navin Ramankutty explains that as more researchers connect across disciplinaries, science will be better able to pursue solutions that address complex, urgent problems to secure livelihoods, food security and to safeguard our planet’s environmental health. Picture credits: Attendees socialize during an event at the 5th Open Science Meeting for the Global Land Programme (GLP) in Oaxaca, Mexico, in 2024. Credit: Ximena Fargas
A Reminder About The Food We Eat: “Every Seed We Place In The Earth Is An Act Of Trust”
🍎🍗How can we reconcile our love of food with the reality that many are sourced in ways that are warming our planet? Research by Juan Diego Martinez and Navin Ramankutty explains how agricultural policies can make peace with the climate through different declarations. Photo via Bakd&Raw by Karolin Baitinger
Encouragement boosts people’s likelihood to take climate action
☺️🌍 The fight against climate change is often framed as a sacrifice, Jade Radke's study finds presenting environmental action in a proactive light makes people more likely to act. "Clear, actionable alternatives make it easier for people to engage," Radke explains. Bicycle rush hour in Copenhagen, Denmark. Image by Mikael Colville-Andersen via Flickr (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 ).
Dropping EV mandate for emissions standard ‘a mistake’ in Carney’s auto strategy: Climate scientist
🚗⚡Simon Donner shares his viewpoint about Mark Carney's new automotive plan, which he believes is 'hamstrung by the fact that we work with the North American automakers who are influenced by the U.S. government - and who are frankly behind on electric vehicles.' Photo by Michael Fousert via Unsplash
Silvopasture Gains Momentum in the Amazon, but Can It Shrink Beef’s Footprint?
“Farmers may seem like the main decisionmakers, but actually macro-scale factors like policies and market conditions are what drive adoption" explains Tatiana Chamorro-Vargas who is featured in the Good Men Project for her research on silvopastoral systems, which combine trees and pasture.
Your dinner may be heating up the planet: study shows that almost half the world’s population needs to change their diet.
🌍🍔 IRES student Dr. Juan Diego Martinez's study shows that food systems account for more than a third of global greenhouse gas emissions caused by human activity and encourages people to "vote with their forks."
Why most Americans misjudge which personal decisions contribute most to climate change
🌍 While most Americans misjudge which personal decisions contribute to climate change, Dr. Jiaying Zhao explains how more readily available information can help people more accurately estimate which actions are most effective. Photo credit: David Preston via unsplash
New book from Stephanie Chang: Legacy in the Landscape
Discover how urban growth drives disaster risk. This accessible book links tech, economy, and landscape with hazards, using a new Urban Risk Dynamics framework and six global cities to guide better planning.
Q&A with Vicky Lucas on the private sector at COP30
With COP30 in full swing, IRES Master’s student Vicky Lucas wants us to watch the attendee list as closely as the agenda.
TA Opportunity for UBC Course: ASIC 220
This is an introductory course to provide a comprehensive introduction to sustainability from a science, economics, and societal perspective.
IRES’s Kate Reynolds situates Palestinian identity within relationships to plants, place and food
Reynolds's work on Palestinian displacement and ecological identity takes memory from the abstract into the sensory, exploring how taste and smell bring land and people closer together.
Postdoctoral Research Fellow – Transforming Chemical Risk Management with Indigenous Expertise
The candidate will work under the supervision of Dr. Amanda Giang, with supervisory support from Dr. Susan Chiblow, and Dr. Élyse Caron-Beaudoin, on a subproject linking Indigenous experiences on chemicals policy development across scales.
Meet the Canadian Aiding Trump’s ‘Insane’ War on Climate Science
Curious in how climate scientists are responding to Ross McKitrick contributing to Trump administration studies? Dr. Simon Donner's response is featured in DeSmog saying, “I cannot state enough how insane it is that the same old debunked arguments from the same old debunked individuals are actually emerging in the year 2025."
Water companies under fire after shocking surge in dangerous incidents: ‘Continued systemic failure’
Dr. David Boyd is featured in The Cool Down for his insights on a new report from the U.K. Environment Agency has found that water company pollution incidents rose across England in 2024.
How ‘eco improv’ can help manage climate anxiety
Anaïs Pronovost-Morgan and Samantha Blackwell are featured in CBC for their workshop on 'eco improv'. While it won't fix the climate crisis, it can create community and spaces to empower people
Is your dog keeping Swiss Re’s underwriters up at night?
When asked to rank a range of lifestyle choices - from flying to recycling - by their climate impact. The results were sobering: most people failed to identify the most carbon-intensive actions, while overestimating the significance of lower-impact habits. Dr. Jiaying Zhao is featured in Insurance Business, explaining why and how this can happen.
Emily Shilton, IRES alumna, sounds alarm on vaping as Canada’s “addictive e-waste problem”
Shilton's research reveals how nicotine vaping devices—small, battery-powered electronics—are slipping through regulatory cracks, causing serious environmental concerns.
As the World Confronts Climate Change, the US Leaves Our Future Behind
Former and current UN special rapporteurs David Boyd and Elisa Morgera are featured in The Nation, noting that a recent opinion from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights fails to call directly for broad fossil fuel phaseout.
3 PhD & 2 Postdoc positions at UCLouvain with former IRES visiting prof Patrick Meyfroidt
Announcing positions at UCLouvain in collab with IRES's Navin Ramankutty! Examining land use and democratic backsliding via cross-country studies + cases in Europe, Canada (northern BC & AB, YT & NT), Mozambique.
World’s top court paves way for climate reparations
"The court's clear and detailed articulation of state obligations will be a catalyst for accelerated climate action and unprecedented accountability," Dr. David Boyd responds to the International Court of Justice's historic statement that climate change is an urgent and existential threat and countries have a legal duty to prevent harm from their planet-warming pollution in France 24.
Want a Carbon Fix? It’s Closer than You Think
Carbon sequestration solutions like kelp and forests do more than just capture carbon. Dr. Kai Chan is featured in the Tyee for his advice on the benefits carbon sequestration can have on both animals and overall ecosystems
Jiaying Zhao helps people enjoy protecting the planet
Can we make meaningful climate action feel happy instead of miserable? Dr. Jiaying Zhao answers this and more in the American Psychological Association.
How a lottery-style refund system could boost recycling
Dr. Jiaying Zhao and Jade Radke are featured in the Conversation for their innovative study to increase recycling rates through a green lottery. If done right, offering a chance to win a higher amount of money for recycling can meaningfully increase recycling rates, contribute to a circular economy and allow people to choose the refund option that works best for them.
Two global Frontiers Planet Prize winners call for a future of diversified farming
For James and Klassen, who were PhD students at IRES while contributing to the award-winning study, what matters most is what comes next. Will the world be willing to do the hard work of supporting farmers diversify their practices?
Rethinking agricultural data through a justice lens
Governments are increasingly asking farmers to share more data, especially around environmental concerns like nutrient management. And the private sector is racing ahead with new digital tools. But the question remains: who benefits?
This is a climate election
Dr. Simon Donner is featured in the analysis of the main party platforms on climate change seems to suggest that emissions would continue a gradual decline under a Mark Carney government, but not under one run by Pierre Poilievre.
Farm-diversification research wins high kudos
An international group of researchers, including IRES alum and current faculty, are named U.S. national champions of the Frontiers Planet Prize for research that finds environmental and social benefits of agricultural diversification.
Q&A: How maritime experts are charting a course to cut emissions by 40% per shipment by 2030
While international shipping accounts for over 3% of global greenhouse gas emissions, there’s optimistic news emerging from the experts working to decarbonize this critical sector. According to a new study by IRES’s Imranul Laskar, Dr. Hadi Dowlatabadi and Dr. Amanda Giang, many experts in the shipping sector are confident in the possibility of meeting short-term […]
Solid Carbon receiving $24 million to advance ocean-based carbon dioxide removal
Dr. Terre Satterfield is co-leading a $24-million initiative over six years through the Government of Canada’s NFRF to advance the Solid Carbon research project—one of the most promising ocean-based carbon dioxide removal (CDR) initiatives of the modern era to combat the climate crisis.
$22 million awarded to Indigenous-led and multi-institutional research project for Indigenous and community-based approaches to chemical risk management
IRES has partnered with 20 researchers and collaborators from Canada and Aotearoa (New Zealand) on a large international research initiative that puts Indigenous experts as leaders in designing how chemical risk is evaluated and managed.