ONA Issues

Reporting on Climate Adaptation | A guide and resources for reporters covering the climate adaptation story.

The Reynolds Journalism Institute has created a new guide to help journalists find and source stories on climate change. 

A. Adam Glen writes: 

RJI created the guide to foster improved coverage of this developing story. The free, mobile-friendly resource provides an animated explainer and backgrounders on adaptation, plus suggested story angles and reporting case studies.

But the heart of the guide is an extensive database of resources for journalists to research and report the story. More than 200 sources — from government reports and datasets to industry and nonprofit sources — are carefully annotated, with overview information and ideas on how journalists might use it.

Each source is then sorted into one or more of 30 categories covering six specific types of climate risks, 18 areas of policy responses and 11 global regions.

For example, journalists can click a link to find more than 20 sources that address public sector investment, as well as organizations providing database maps that profile on-the-ground adaptation investments across the globe.

Another set of resource links yields dozens of sources on floods, storms and sea-level rise. Resources include a set of NOAA climate maps that can be re-used by news organizations for their audiences, climate tools from FEMA, and an EPA stormwater calculator.

More than 100 sources deal with adaptation in the United States, including regional breakdowns for the Northeast, South, West and Midwest. Global sources number more than 60, with breakdowns for Asia and Oceania, Africa, Europe, and Latin America and the Caribbean.

(Source: reportingonclimateadaptation.org)