Comment in 2026

Integrating knowledge across climate risks, societal responses and their interactions is a critical yet persistently challenging goal. We argue that advanced artificial intelligence frameworks, specifically foundation models, offer a new opportunity to unify these domains and support climate decision-making.

As cities heat up, climate shelters are increasingly vital for protecting people from extreme heat. Beyond temporary emergency stopgaps, Spain’s pioneering experience shows how climate, health and governance align to turn these spaces into enduring infrastructures of care and resilience.

Despite strong evidence that Indigenous stewardship sustains biodiversity and carbon stocks, carbon markets typically reward recovery from degradation rather than protection, often excluding Indigenous-managed lands. Rethinking additionality could align climate mitigation with care, equity and long-term ecosystem stewardship.

Regulation of property insurance pricing involves trade-offs that will determine how disaster risks impact households’ budgets. Allowing prices to reflect property-specific risks offers several benefits, but may cause a range of negative unintended consequences associated with declines in coverage.

Adaptation is often viewed as a local, highly contextual challenge; however, given the regional nature of many climate risks, adaptation could benefit from municipal collaboration. Here, I present four avenues of collaboration that support learning, discuss their advantages, and reflect on their effectiveness and challenges for urban adaptation.

Mountains, with their sharp climatic contrasts, are emblematic of climate-driven species movement and, ultimately, loss. Here, we argue that these same contrasts make mountains powerful natural laboratories for discovering the mechanisms that underlie biological change.

Visitors are increasingly drawn to disappearing glacier landscapes for their beauty and scientific value. This Comment examines the paradoxes reshaping relationships among glaciers, people and communities, and highlights research needed to avoid maladaptation harming local communities.

Climate change is tightening its grip on the world’s drinking water, threatening both safety and supply. Without urgent and coordinated adaptation of treatment systems, this overlooked vulnerability could compromise global water security.

Economists have spent a decade designing the perfect climate club, yet political reality has hitherto rendered these designs practically infeasible. The Open Coalition on Compliance Carbon Markets offers a path forward, but only if its architects recognize that understanding political feasibility is crucial to turning a declaration into a functioning carbon pricing club that could close the emissions gap.

Although climate action is undermined by political interests and institutional inertia, multiple safeguards are in place to prevent backsliding on progress so far, and positive feedbacks reinforce progress despite opposing forces. Key elements of climate action are irreversible and can be further strengthened by commitments, investments and positive narratives.