Disaster risk prevention under climate change: current status, challenges, and scientific issues

doi:10.12006/j.issn.1673-1719.2025.015

Abstract

Abstract:

The impacts of climate change on natural disasters are intensifying, giving rise to new characteristics and trends in disaster activities, and a significant increase in disaster risks. Disaster prevention and mitigation efforts now face unprecedented challenges. This paper examines the mechanisms and activity patterns of natural disasters under climate-driven factors, focusing on cross-sphere disaster characteristics and the spatiotemporal ocean-land linkages of disaster activities. It highlights the “new normal” and challenges of disaster risks in the context of climate change and evaluates the effectiveness and limitations of current disaster risk management strategies. To enhance the scientific and technological capabilities for disaster risk prevention, this paper proposes five key scientific questions: (1) The impacts of climate change on sphere processes and their disaster-inducing mechanisms; (2) Prediction and risk evolution of catastrophic events driven by extreme weather; (3) Mechanisms and risk assessments of major disasters on socio-economic systems; (4) AI-driven adaptive framework for dynamic disaster risk management; (5) Theoretical frameworks for building resilient societies to adapt to climate change.

Key words: Climate change, Natural disasters, Risk prevention, Disaster evolution, Climate adaptation

CUI Peng, WANG Yan, ZHANG Guo-Tao, ZHANG Zheng-Tao, LEI Yu, WANG Hao, WANG Jiao, HAO Jian-Sheng, ZHU Hong. Disaster risk prevention under climate change: current status, challenges, and scientific issues[J]. Climate Change Research, 2025, 21(4): 449-460.

Figures/Tables 1

References 80

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