Brittleness

Description

Alex Steffen:

"Brittleness is the quality of breaking suddenly and catastrophically. Think of a bridge collapsing. A key fact of the climate emergency that still hasn’t sunk in is that the hotter it gets, the more places and systems become brittle.

We really don’t see how climate brittle many of these places and systems already are — and how brittleness stretches out in networks, putting places at risk that are far from the direct impacts of the rising seas, monster storms and megafires causing brittle systems to collapse.

Remember those decision-makers placing their future bets? Long before a foreseeable risk hits, those bettors demand better odds. If the odds can’t be made good enough, they bet elsewhere. Brittle turns into uninsurable, unbankable, uninvestable and politically friendless.

Many of brittle places and systems are still treated as quite valuable. But as the magnitude of the risks become apparent, we’re going to see more of those rapid repricings, more bubbles popping. (more here: https://twitter.com/AlexSteffen/status/989222610075508736)"

(https://medium.com/@AlexSteffen/im-a-climate-futurist-here-s-what-s-next-4d7248c297ac)