Culture under climatic threat.

It remains surprising, to this day, that human civilisation is so dependent on climate. Often these links are not obvious, this being particularly the case in industrialised nations. However, these links are real, and more and more areas are being investigated for climate vulnerability.

A project--Noah's Ark--by the European Commission to investigate the impacts of climate change on Europe's cultural heritage has just been launched.

This EC project takes a detailed look at climate impacts, using the latest knowledge of material science. A brochure with programme outline and an simple explanation of the work can be downloaded from here (PDF)


The project is however, limited in scope to Europe, another organisation very much involved with architectural preservation is UNESCO. A report earlier in the year by UNESCO on the threat posed by climate change to world heritage sites received a great deal of attention. More on UNESCO and climate change here.

The threats posed by climate change to natural and cultural sites on UNESCO's World Heritage List are outlined in a new UNESCO publication, "Case Studies on Climate Change and World Heritage"^*. The report features 26 examples - including the Tower of London, Kilimanjaro National Park and the Great Barrier Reef - case studies that are representative of the dangers faced by the 830 sites inscribed on the World Heritage

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