The Maximising UK Adaptation to Climate Change (MACC) Hub aims to inform a national climate change adaptation plan by addressing current barriers around public awareness, policy, legislation and climate data that might prevent the UK’s ability to adapt to global warming.
Climate change increasingly impacts the UK, with more frequent and severe effects on our cities, communities, infrastructure, economy, and ecosystems. These impacts will intensify in the coming decades.
Predictions indicate that these impacts will only intensify in the coming decades, which means that we urgently need to improve the UK’s preparedness and resilience.
This is essential not only to protect our people and economy but also to manage our environment in a way that mitigates both direct and indirect costs associated with climate change.
The MACC Hub: Advancing practical and inclusive climate adaptation in the UK
The Maximising UK Adaptation to Climate Change (MACC) Hub unites a diverse group of partners and thought leaders.
The Hub focuses on practical solutions, identifying what works on the ground, and driving a step change in the UK's climate adaptation practice.
By addressing barriers such as public awareness, policy, legislation, and climate data, the MACC Hub aims to inform a comprehensive national climate change adaptation plan.
Key to the Hub is the idea of ‘transformational adaptation’ – any action taken to protect people’s way of life from climate change should drive positive change, especially for the poorest and most marginalised members of society who are usually also the most vulnerable to climate change impacts.
By bringing together expertise from Northern Ireland, Wales, Scotland and England, the MACC Hub is working together to make sure that the UK has a clear vision for the future with a strong focus on those most at risk from climate change.
The MACC Hub partners and collaborators
The MACC Hub involves eight universities and five climate partnership organisations, working side by side over the next three years.
Hub activities will be implemented through regional centres, each leading on one of the key barriers to adaptation, with a Hub Secretariat and Policy Response Unit based at King’s College London led by Dr Helen Adams and supported by King’s Policy Institute.
- Dr Shona Paterson from Brunel University London, working with the London Climate Ready Partnership and Sustainability West Midlands, will lead work on public awareness of climate adaptation and the barriers to engagement, with the aim of developing more effective ways to reach and engage members of the public.
- Professor Jaime Toney from the University of Glasgow is partnering with Sniffer to deliver place-based activities in Scotland and lead on increasing understanding of systems complexity and training needs for transformative) adaptation outcomes.
- Northern Ireland Environment Link (Climate NI Team), a cross-sectoral partnership devoted to understanding and enabling adaptation and mitigation action, is working with Professor Mark Emmerson from Queen’s University Belfast on addressing aspects of policy, legislation and regulation that hold back the adaptation vision proposed in the UK’s national adaptation plan.
- In Wales, Dr Emma McKinley from Cardiff University works with Future Generations Cymru and the Severn Estuary Partnership to explore the efficacy of Welsh and Scottish approaches to wellbeing and future generations, to help inform UK-wide justice-oriented approaches to adaptation.
- Climate Outreach will conduct research on what people think, feel and know about climate adaptation, and develop effective messaging strategies to engage the public on concepts of resilience, helping partners to integrate these into their work.
- The Data Integration Centre, led by Newcastle University will work with the University of East Anglia and the Environmental Change Institute at the University of Oxford to help make climate model results more easily understandable for policymakers.
- The Oxford Centre of the Stockholm Environment Institute will create the knowledge portal to disseminate science-based, policy-relevant information to support effective and sustainable adaptation to climate change in the UK. It will link directly to weADAPT, a global climate change adaptation platform and network, connecting UK-relevant work with research and practice frontiers and organisations worldwide.
Meet the Principal Investigator(s) for the project
Dr Shona Koren Paterson - Building on an academic transdisciplinary background in Natural Sciences (Marine Biology, Resource Management) and Social Sciences (Climate Adaptation, Social Justice, Environmental Policy), Shona’s guiding focus remains the generation and translation of defensible research informed by the needs of society and co-created with the intended beneficiaries. Her research is motivated by international frameworks such as the UN 2030 Agenda, the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, and the COP21 Paris Agreement. She has spent her working career building partnerships and knowledge exchange networks with local communities and stakeholders to achieve mutually beneficial social and ecological goals.
With a special interest in marginalised communities and social justice and equity, Shona’s recent research has focused on global flood risk and resilience, climate risk assessments, adaptation and adaptive capacity in urbanising coastal areas. Embracing a transdisciplinary approach, Shona works at the interface of science-policy as well as effective and fit-for-audience communication of data and knowledge to ensure increased impactful discourse around risk. She has research experience in the Caribbean, USA, UK and Ireland, as well as a global perspective through involvement with Future Earth and its associated global research project Future Earth Coasts.
Related Research Group(s)
Equitable Development and Resilience - Centred on development and social justice issues, our group continually reflects upon how individual and collective agency can contribute to meaningful change around climate action and sustainability across Global North and South nations.
Global Lives - Research conducted in the Centre addresses the challenges facing society, helping to change the lives of people around the world by bringing economic, social and cultural benefits.
Partnering with confidence
Organisations interested in our research can partner with us with confidence backed by an external and independent benchmark: The Knowledge Exchange Framework. Read more.
Project last modified 28/10/2024