Weather events exacerbated by climate change will threaten many places in the coming years, and many of these locations are also projected to gain a lot of new inhabitants.
In the world’s largest cities, governments will have to do more to protect the millions of people in danger from a hot planet.
Growing Exposure
Countries with surging urban populations are also the most vulnerable to climate change.
Sources: Notre Dame Global Adaptation Initiative, UN-Habitat
Note: Color indicates climate vulnerability (red = highest). Countries without ND-GAIN index scores or negative projected urban population growth not shown
Drought has edged Mexico City close to “Day Zero,” when it would run out of water.
Phoenix has a director of heat response and mitigation whose department runs, among other things, a tree-planting program to provide shade.
Cairo’s $390 million Abu Rawash wastewater treatment plant is one of the world’s largest. Almost 60% of city adaptation funding goes to water and waste.
Jakarta is the fastest-sinking megacity in the world. If managers don’t stop groundwater withdrawals, the subsidence, coupled with sea level rise, will spell doom.
About 90% of domestic migrants to Niamey, the capital of Niger, cited climate change as their reason for moving in a 2021 United Nations survey.
India and Bangladesh are home to three of the world’s 10 most populous cities. Yet they receive only 6% of all urban financing.
Ten Philippine cities have a disaster insurance pool to help them cope with increasingly severe typhoons.
Source: Bloomberg
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