Modern buildings risk not being ready for climate change warns academic

A leading climate‑resilience architecture academic has warned that new thinking is needed in how modern buildings are designed to cope with a warming climate.

Heriot-Watt University

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Professor Susan Roaf

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Credit: Sue Roaf

A leading climate‑resilience architecture academic has warned that new thinking is needed in how modern buildings are designed to cope with a warming climate.

Professor Emeritus at Heriot-Watt University Susan Roaf says most modern public and private buildings are simply not designed for the impending realities of the 2030’s and 2040’s climates.

With over 50 years’ experience in extreme‑climate design, from the deserts of Iraq to Antarctica, Professor Roaf warns that as weather events intensify, less climate‑adapted buildings may increase health risks and place additional pressure on services.

Professor Roaf said: “We are moving into a world that is getting significantly warmer, with extreme weather records being broken year after year.

“Our workplaces, public sector care facilities and our own homes must be designed to cope with future conditions and currently ‘modern’ designs simply are not compatible with this reality. The Government’s focus now is on warm homes but the need for cool homes is growing.

“More intense storms, heatwaves and cold snaps place additional pressure on energy systems. We need to be designing buildings and homes that will remain habitable should these systems fail.”

Roaf’s warnings are clearly set out her new book ‘Adaptive Thermal Comfort: At the Extremes’, co‑authored with leading comfort experts Fergus Nicol and Michael Humphreys.

Professor Roaf added: “For instance, with more people now working from home or in hybrid patterns, the cost and usefulness of large glass office building types must be looked at more closely.

“The higher the structures the higher energy demands and vulnerable to over-heating and cooling during power outages when mechanical systems fail.

 “We’ve already seen what happens when buildings cannot function without electricity. Recent winters showed that some rural Scottish communities experienced extended power interruptions, during which lightweight homes cooled more quickly than traditional constructions.”

The same design logic is now embedded in hospitals, schools and care settings, Roaf warns, buildings that often have sealed facades, restricted or non‑existent opening windows, and ventilation that can spread pathogens between rooms with recirculating air.

 “During COVID, studies in Scottish hospitals found that naturally ventilated spaces were associated with lower transmission risk compared with some mechanically ventilated settings.

 

“In 2020, Lanarkshire acute hospitals introduced an enhanced infection‑prevention package that included greater use of natural ventilation, which was associated with reduced COVID‑19 clusters.

 

“Yet many new hospitals have limited natural ventilation. In a heatwave or power interruption, this can make it harder to manage indoor temperatures and air quality for vulnerable patients.”

Roaf argues that there is an urgent need to globally move to the next generation of climate-safe, low impact buildings that are ‘mixed‑mode’ buildings that can run on local energy with sun and natural ventilation, shading and energy storage for as much of the year as possible and only report to heating and cooling when and where needed. All this for the health and wellbeing of populations and the planet.

Professor Roaf added: “Our research makes one thing clear, we need to prepare ourselves and our societies to live decently in the very different climates of the future. To do so we need common sense and good science to lead us.

“That cannot be done in silos. It requires genuine collaboration between government, regulators, health and care leaders, architects, engineers and communities to deliver buildings that are safe, healthy and resilient by design.”

Sudden Glacier Collapse, Fastest Ever

Robert Hunziker

March 6, 2026

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Image by Robert Wong.

Hektoria Glacier (Antarctica) retreated 8 kilometers (5 miles) in only two months; one-half of the structure collapsing in record time. This is the fastest glacier collapse ever, and the message to the world is very clear: Global Warming looks like it’s ahead of schedule. (Antarctica Just Saw the Fastest Glacier Collapse Ever Recorded, ScienceDaily d/d February 26, 2026)

The world climate system is starting to unravel faster than expected. Sea level rise estimates by major institutions such as the IPCC should probably be tossed out the window. Global warming is not waiting around for guesstimates. Hektoria Glacier is real time evidence that the consequences of global warming are ahead of expectations.

A few more warnings like this and the mayors of mega-coastal cities New York, London, Manila, Tokyo, Shanghai, Mumbai, Lagos, Jakarta, Karachi, Buenos Aires, Rio de Janeiro, Guangzhou, Osaka, Istanbul will demand answers, red-faced, pounding the table with clenched fists, as to why countries like the United States ignorantly promote fossil fuels, kill climate science, and destroy clean renewable policies when nearly 100% of the world’s scientists agree fossil fuels are the primary cause of destructive global warming. “More than 99.9% of peer-reviewed scientific papers agree that climate change is mainly caused by humans, according to a new survey of 88,125 climate-related studies.” (Cornell Chronicle)

According to ScienceDaily: “Antarctica’s Hektoria Glacier stunned scientists by retreating eight kilometers in just two months, with nearly half of it collapsing in record time… Satellite and seismic data captured the dramatic chain reaction in near real time. The findings raise concerns that much larger glaciers could one day collapse just as quickly.”

Indeed, scientists were taken aback: “When we flew over Hektoria… I couldn’t believe the vastness of the area that had collapsed,’ said Naomi Ochwat, lead author and CIRES postdoctoral researcher. ‘I had seen the fjord and notable mountain features in the satellite images, but being there in person filled me with astonishment at what had happened,” Ibid.

According to senior research scientist Ted Scambos, University of Colorado/Boulder: “Hektoria’s retreat is a bit of a shock — this kind of lightning-fast retreat really changes what’s possible for other, larger glaciers on the continent… If the same conditions set up in some of the other areas, it could greatly speed up sea level rise from the continent,” Ibid.

In a very real sense, the Hektoria incident is fortuitous because the glacier is only 115 square miles, or roughly the extent of a large city, not one of the large glaciers. It therefore gives scientists a solid glimpse of a new danger, meaning, this is real time evidence, if large glaciers collapse as quickly as Hektoria did, then global sea level rise could be severe, catching the world unaware, unprepared. As such, according to polar scientists, Hektoria is a commanding siren signal to get off fossil fuels as soon as possible.

According to a recent Antarctic study by the prestigious Potsdam Institute For Climate Impact Research d/d Feb. 16, 2026:”Ricarda Winkelmann, just returning from several weeks of fieldwork in Antarctica, adds that seeing how rapidly some regions in Antarctica are already responding to anthropogenic climate change, how extreme weather events are not only becoming more frequent but lead to subsequent changes in the ice dynamics, really puts into perspective the vulnerability of this vast ice sheet. Our mapping of potential regional tipping points shows where the greatest risks lie on the long term, and which regions of the Antarctic Ice Sheet need closest monitoring. Cutting greenhouse gas emissions rapidly is imperative to prevent further destabilization of ice basins.”

Polar scientists have gone public about acceleration of Antarctica’s glaciers for a couple of years now and have issued warnings to the public about the tenuousness of the situation, to wit: In August 2024 at the 11^th Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research held in Pucón, Chile attended by 1,500 scientists: “Antarctica’s glacial melt is advancing faster than ever before in recorded history.”

Gino Casassa, PhD, an attendee glaciologist Head of the Chilean Antarctic Institute stated: “Based upon current trends, sea levels will be up 13 feet by 2100,” which begs the obvious question of the level by 2035-40, assuming Dr. Casassa is correct, after all, 13 feet won’t all happen in 2099 (there’s no public record of any other scientists with such an aggressive forecast).

Additionally. in November 2024, 450 polar scientists held an emergency meeting at the Australian Antarctic Research Conference to announce, via a press release: “If we don’t act, and quickly, the melting of Antarctica ice could cause catastrophic sea level rise around the globe within our lifetimes.” Moreover, “we’ve found immense global warming induced shifts in the region.” This was an appeal to the general public to take preventative measures: “Drastic action is necessary… CO2 emissions must stop.”

“Antarctica is melting ice more than six times faster than it was 20 years ago, according to satellite imagery… Runaway ice loss causing rapid and catastrophic sea-level rise is possible within our lifetimes. Our societies must set and meet targets to ‘bend the carbon curve’ as quickly as possible.” (Australian Antarctic Research Conference, 2024)

Large Methane Leaks Discovered in Antarctica, Polar Journal d/d March 2025

In March 2025, a Spanish scientific expedition announced discovery of “large scale” methane CH4 plumes erupting from the ocean floor off the coast of the Antarctic Peninsula.  “Methane has a high climate impact, which is 20 to 40 times higher than that of carbon dioxide. If large quantities of the gas were released, this could contribute significantly to global warming – to an extent not yet taken into account by climate models,” Ibid. One member of the expedition said: “It could be an environmental bomb for the climate.”

As for the above-mentioned scientists, the Hektoria Incident is most likely not a complete surprise other than the surprising rapidity of collapse, which concerns polar scientists a lot. In fact, it follows in the footsteps of the warnings they’ve issued over past years.

Significant Terrestrial Glacier Meltdown Underway

But the dangers of unanticipated sea level rise may be even worse yet. Far beyond Antarctica, a massive worldwide terrestrial glacial meltdown is underway that also directly impacts sea level rise, a threat not included in most analyses of potential sea level rise.

A 20-year study by 35 international teams of worldwide terrestrial glacier meltdown published in Nature (February 2025 issue) claims terrestrial glacier loss is “greater than Greenland and Antarctica.” The study discovered “staggering volumes of ice loss,” e.g., 273B tons ice loss per year over a 20-year study. Of concern, momentum is accelerating. For example, the first half of the study, or 10-years, registered 231B tons per year. The second half registered 314B tons/year or an increase of nearly 40% acceleration. The study identifies future risks as “entire countries erased” via sea levels rising much higher/faster and GLOFs (glacial lake outbursts floods). (World’s Glaciers Melting Faster Than Ever Recorded, BBC d/d Feb. 19, 2025)

There are already examples of erasure of communities, for example, on May 28, 2025 the Swiss village of Blatten was buried by ice and mud following collapse of the Birch Glacier. This is the impact of GLOF. And a GLOF June 3, 2025, in Gilgit-Baltistan, Pakistan completely destroyed homes in six villages.

The Third Pole Hotspot

Of special concern, according to a UN study, Glacial Lake Outburst Floods: A Growing Climate Threat: The Third Pole is the world hotspot for GLOF risks. “The Hindu Kush Himalaya (HKH) region, comprising the mountains of Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, China, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh and Myanmar, contains the largest concentration of snow and glaciers outside the Polar regions and is therefore called the ‘Third Pole’. This region is a global hotspot for GLOF risks. Between the mountains themselves and the valleys downstream, around two billion people are exposed to these risks.”

Therefore, it is not at all surprising that both China and India are taking a diametrically opposite approach to the United States on global warming, fighting it, embracing renewables. When GLOFs intensify, one has to wonder whether China and India will demand a scientific-based explanation from the United States regarding its careless overarching promotion of fossil fuels and destruction of climate science/renewables. Oops! That may not be possible as the U.S.is ditching environmental science, so it may not have the data base still available to provide a science-based answer.

Ever since the first major scientific study (early 1990s) officially connecting the dots of fossil fuel emissions to global warming, it seems as if scientific warnings have been echoing in an enormous vast empty chamber, silently haunting the future. (Of historical note: Eunice Newton Foote first discovered the CO2 connection to global warming in 1856) Now, it has been three decades that nations of the world have mostly ignored scientists’ warnings. As of today, those echoes 0f the past are becoming real by coming home to roost, and it’s not a pretty picture; it’s much worse than the all of warnings of the past 30 years.

Robert Hunziker lives in Los Angeles and can be reached at rlhunziker@gmail.com.

 

Will melting glaciers slow climate change? A prevailing theory is on shaky ground

In Antarctica, Rutgers marine scientists find evidence to challenge a key assumption about iron availability, an essential micronutrient in the process of carbon dioxide removal

Rutgers University

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Sampling rosette with gray sampling bottles at left, the ship’s rail at lower right, and the face of the ice shelf in the background.

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Credit: Robert Sherrell

For scientists who study the Southern Ocean, a long-standing silver lining in the gloomy forecast of climate change has been the theory of iron fertilization. As temperatures rise and glaciers in Antarctica melt, ice-trapped iron would feed blooms of microscopic algae, pulling heat-trapping carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as they grow.

There’s just one problem: The theory doesn’t hold water.

In what researchers describe as the most accurate measurement of iron inputs from a glacier in Antarctica, marine scientists from Rutgers University-New Brunswick have discovered that meltwater from an Antarctic ice shelf supplies far less iron to surrounding waters than once thought.

The findings, published in the journal Communications Earth and Environment, raise questions about the sources of iron in the Southern Ocean near Antarctica, and could significantly alter how climate change predictions are forecasted and modeled, the researchers said.

“It has been widely assumed that glacial melting underneath ice shelves contributes considerable bioavailable iron to these shelf waters, in a process of natural glacier-driven iron fertilization,” said Rob Sherrell, a professor in the Department of Marine and Coastal Sciences at the Rutgers School of Environmental and Biological Sciences and the study’s principal investigator. 

Sherrell said the study modifies those assumptions by determining that the amount of iron in meltwater is several times lower than previously thought and that most of that iron comes from a different type of meltwater than is produced by ice shelves melting.

Despite being shrouded in darkness for several months a year, the Antarctic waters of the Southern Ocean are a highly productive region for growth of phytoplankton – the vital food source for krill, which feed penguins, seals and whales. As phytoplankton grow, they absorb vast amounts of carbon dioxide through photosynthesis, making the region the world's largest oceanic sink for the climate-warming gas.

Previous research into iron sources in the Southern Ocean has primarily been through simulations and computer modeling. Together with researchers from Rutgers and several universities in the United States and the United Kingdom, Sherrell, who also is a professor at the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at the Rutgers School of Arts and Sciences, took a different approach. In 2022, they traveled aboard a now-decommissioned U.S. icebreaker, the Nathaniel B. Palmer, to the Dotson Ice Shelf, located in the Amundsen Sea in West Antarctica, to collect melting glacial water at the source.  The Amundsen Sea accounts for most of the sea level rise driven by Antarctic melting.

In the Amundsen Sea, glacial meltwater comes from beneath floating ice shelves – the seaward extensions of glaciers from the continent – and the melting is caused primarily by warm water that flows from the deep ocean into the cavities under the ice.

At the Dotson Ice Shelf, Sherrell and his team identified where seawater enters one such cavity and where it exits after meltwater is added. They collected water samples from entry and exit points.

Back in New Jersey, Sherrell’s colleague Venkatesh Chinni, a postdoctoral scholar and lead author of the study, analyzed the samples for iron content in both its dissolved state and in suspended particles.  Collaborators Jessica Fitzsimmons, a professor and chemical oceanographer, and Janelle Steffen, an assistant research scientist, both at Texas A&M University, measured the isotopic ratios to “fingerprint” and distinguish the sources. Steffen carried out initial isotopic measurements in the laboratory of Tim Conway, an associate professor at the University of South Florida.

Chinni and the team then calculated how much more iron was coming out of the cavity than went in and deduced from the isotopic data the type of melting that was responsible.

The results were surprising, Sherrell said. Total meltwater contributed about 10% of the outflowing dissolved iron, with the majority contributed by inflowing deep water (62%) and another 28% as inputs from shelf sediments.

“Roughly 90% of the dissolved iron coming out of the ice shelf cavity comes from deep waters and sediments outside the cavity, not from meltwater,” Chinni said.

Additionally, iron isotope ratios from the samples suggest that somewhere beneath the glacier is a liquid meltwater layer that lacks dissolved oxygen, a condition that promotes the dissolution of solid iron oxides in the bedrock, seemingly a larger source of iron than ice shelf melting, Chinni said.

Taken together, the findings challenge prevailing assumptions about iron sources in the Southern Ocean in a warming world, though additional research is needed to better understand how the subglacial processes are involved, the team said.

“Our claim in this paper is that the meltwater itself carries very little iron, and that most of the iron that it does carry comes from the grinding up and dissolving of bedrock into the liquid layer between the bedrock and the ice sheet, not from the ice that is driving sea level rise,” Sherrell said.

For some colleagues, this will be a very surprising realization, he added.

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Journal

Communications Earth & Environment

DOI

10.1038/s43247-026-03264-x