From the cultural hub of Lahore down to the bustling ports of Karachi, smog is king in Pakistan, with citizens enduring unhealthy air quality for much of the year. The smog, generated mostly by crop and garbage burning and diesel emissions from furnaces and cars, could get worse by the end of this year when Pakistan opens five new Chinese-built coal power plants, funded by a $6.8 billion venture under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) initiative. These five plants are just the beginning of the Pakistan government’s planned 7,560 MW expansion in coal power, which are CPEC-energy priority projects. “It’s a perfect storm for a pollution crisis,” said Michael Kugelman of the Wilson Center’s Asia Program. “The poor will continue to burn a variety of polluting materials to produce fuel, and now you’re also going to be introducing dirty coal into the mix. Combine that with crop burning in the countrywide and car exhaust fumes in rapidly growing cities, and you’ve got a really smoggy mess on your hands—and in your lungs.”

“Right now, it’s the Wild West in regard to governance with geoengineering,” said Paul Wapner, a professor at the School of International Service at American University at a recent panel about solar radiation management (SRM) at the Arizona State University’s Washington Center. According to the Governing Solar Radiation Management report which was the focus of the event, SRM, which theoretically would cool the planet by reflecting sunlight back into space, may be a viable last-resort option if climate change mitigation and adaptation efforts fail. Wapner said that “there’s a danger in SRM, there’s a danger in climate change. And, balancing those risks is part of the exercise and will continue to be part of the exercise.”

“China can simultaneously be the world’s biggest polluter and the leading developer and employer of clean energy technologies,” said Joanna Lewis, an associate professor of science, technology, and international affairs at Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at a recent event at The Brookings Institute on China’s local and global environmental agenda. “It’s not just megawatts being added, it’s actual investment in the innovation of these [renewable energy] technologies.”

It is imperative that countries adopt a human security approach to achieve “freedom from hazard impacts”—nationally through a scientific disaster risk reduction strategy and internationally through climate diplomacy.

For this World Cities Day, the UN’s theme calls for “building sustainable and resilient cities.” Cities across the Global South are assessing their physical preparedness against future shocks. Can cities that leave out—or often push out—poor workers claim resiliency? These moves are, in fact, weakening any preparedness. The foundations of truly sustainable and resilient cities lie in their residents’ abilities and agency.

“What we do during this decade can be critical for the future of Amazonia,” said São Paulo Research Foundation member, Paulo Artaxo, at a recent Wilson Center event on efforts to support sustainability and development in the Amazon region. The recently accelerating environmental change in the Amazon region warrants greater collaboration between the civil and scientific communities on community and international scales, according to a panel of experts.

The challenge of peacebuilding missions is not only to stop violence and prevent a rekindling of conflict, but also to help societies and governments reset their internal relations on a peaceful path towards sustaining peace.

The security implications of climate change emerged as an important area of concern in the mid 2000s in both policy circles and academia. Since then, there has been much research exploring causal pathways between climate phenomena and violent conflict, often with inconclusive or mixed results.