My 2001 ‘Climate Book of the Year’

A 2001 Climate Book cover featuring the title "Population and Climate Change" displayed above a panoramic view of a coastal city beneath a partly cloudy sky—an insightful contender for Book of the Year.

O’Neill,B.C., MacKellar,F.L. and Lutz,W. (2001) Population and Climate Change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 266pp. This essay continues my series of monthly posts in which I select one ‘climate’ book to highlight and review from one of the 44 years of my professional career in climate research (starting with 1984, my first year of academic employment).  […]

Review of David Livingstone’s ‘The Empire of Climate: A History of an Idea’ (Princeton, 2024)

Book cover featuring the title "The Empire of Climate" by David N. Livingstone in bold white text on a muted background, reflecting themes of climate history and environmental change.

The Journal of Historical Geography have newly published (June 2025) a ‘review forum’ based on David Livingstone’s recent book, ‘The Empire of Climate’. As well as myself, five other historical geographers — Awadhendra Sharan, Li Zhang, Louis S. Warren, Margarita Gascón, and Simon Naylor — also reviewed the book, and the journal has gathered these […]

‘The Unbearable Weight of Displaced Weather’

A train covered in snow moves along tracks at a station during heavy snowfall, with snow piling on the ground and overhead wires.

Read my new essay in The Rachel Carson Centre’s quarterly magazine, SPRINGS, Issue #7, May 27th 2025 Summary: Decades of scientific research have made clear that human presence on the planet is changing the world’s climates. Making them warmer on average, yes. But climate and weather are not the same thing, so as climates warm, […]