Our Research
Evidence for leveraging change in nature-based solution policy and investment.
Research at the PiNC Lab explores the enablers and constraints of effective and equitable nature-based solutions across all phases including design, planning, implementation, maintenance, monitoring and evaluation. All projects at the lab fall within the below research themes. Read our full list of publications here.
Social impacts & equity
Our research examines the relationship between equitable and effective nature-based solutions, and how different solutions build adaptive capacity and reduce climate risks sensitivity.
Environmental impacts
We investigate ecosystem service trade-offs and synergies between nature-based solutions used for adaptation and mitigation, particularly for water-carbon couplings and food production.
Finance & capacity
We focus on understanding what factors and evidence types incentivise investment in equitable and effective nature-based solutions, and explore approaches that enable those in practice and policy to support this.
Governance
Our research examines the governance of nature-based solutions, aiming to shed light on how they can play a role in development that is just, sustainable and climate-resilient for all.
Featured publications
The Biodiversity survey of the Cape (BioSCape), integrating remote sensing with biodiversity science
Over six weeks, an international team of ~150 scientists collected data across terrestrial, marine, and freshwater ecosystems in South Africa. These biodiversity observations were accompanied by an unprecedented combination of airborne imaging spectroscopy and lidar measurements acquired across 45,000 km2. In this paper, published in Nature, researchers review how approaches applied in BioSCape will help measure and monitor biodiversity at scale and the role of remote sensing in accomplishing this.
Understanding how gender inequality intersects with escalating climate change impacts is critical for informing climate adaptation responses that reduce vulnerability and inequality. To better understand gendered vulnerability, this study published in the journal WIREs Climate Change, develops and applies an intersectional climate risk framework, based on a systematic literature review of 52 articles. South Africa is used as a case study to apply the framework to understand how climate hazards (such as changing temperatures, droughts, and floods) exacerbate conditions of poverty and poor infrastructure and services, and the impact on women.
Addressing climate change requires knowledge of its impacts on both nature and people. This Review in the journal Nature Reviews Earth & Environment depicts current approaches to the attribution of climate change impacts and potential uses for this information. The discussion covers how impact attribution identifies the drivers of observed changes and events that form links in the causal chain from anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions and other human-induced climate forcing factors to effects on natural and human systems mediated by changes in climate and weather. It suggests Collaboration between global climate attribution experts, impact modellers, policy experts and related scholars, and interested parties beyond science will help to produce impact attribution results that address well-framed questions of societal relevance.