Breakthroughs in computing have enabled a new generation of Earth System Models, providing increasingly detailed insights into how the climate and individual regions may evolve. These advances make it possible to translate climate information into parameters and constraints relevant to engineering design and decision-making. This challenge lies at the heart of Climate-Informed Engineering (CIE), an emerging research initiative at Hamburg University of Technology (TUHH), supported by the German Research Foundation (DFG), that investigates how climate data and projections can be systematically incorporated into engineering research and practice.
CIE brings together climate science and engineering to develop the concepts, methods, and tools needed to account for changing environmental conditions in the design of infrastructure and materials, sustainable resource management, and industrial processes. A particular challenge is determining how information from climate models—including the uncertainties associated with future projections—can be translated into quantities that are meaningful and actionable for engineering applications. CIE therefore seeks to establish a rigorous interface between climate science and engineering, requiring close collaboration across disciplines.
In this Science Talk, Prof. Nima Shokri will introduce the principles of Climate-Informed Engineering and explore their relevance to a range of real-world challenges, including soil health, land subsidence, water management, and microplastics in soils, highlighting how climate information can inform engineering analysis, design, and decision-making.
You may watch the talk on the UNU-INWEH YouTube channel (no registration required).
Speaker
Professor Nima Shokri
Executive Co-Director, UNU Hub on Engineering to Face Climate Change
