State of the Planet

News from the Columbia Climate School

Water33

  • Putting the Focus on ‘A Thirsty World’

    Putting the Focus on ‘A Thirsty World’

    The water documentary “A Thirsty World” combines French photographer Yann Arthus-Bertrand’s aerial photography with down-to-earth messages, a mélange that calls attention to problems of water security on a global scale.

  • Preparing for Chimborazo

    Preparing for Chimborazo

    I am staying with a friend’s family in Quito, Ecuador’s capital city, and tomorrow will meet up with my climbing partner, Pablo Puruncajas, to prepare for our expedition. I am here to collect tree ring samples and put up a weather station on Chimborazo, Ecuador’s tallest peak, to provide climate data about this region, which…

  • Bharungamari – End of the Road

    Bharungamari – End of the Road

    For our final installation, we had to go from the edge of the Bay of Bengal almost to Bangladesh’s northern border with India, a trip of over 350 miles. Along the way we stopped at Humayun’s childhood home, had several flats and picked up a student of Humayun’s from the town where we installed it.…

  • Hiron Point in Sundarban

    Hiron Point in Sundarban

    We traveled by boat to the south part of the Sundarbans near the Indian Ocean to install a GPS at Hiron Point, this isolated facility also hosts a tide gauge recording long-term water level changes due to rising sea level and land subsidence. Our GPS will help distinguish how much of each there is in…

  • Polder 32

    Polder 32

    Polder 32 is one of the many inland islands in Bangladesh that was enclosed by an embankment to protect it from flooding. When that embankment failed during Cyclone Aila in 2009, the island was flooded for almost 2 years. Subsidence of the ground inside the embankment with no sedimentation to compensate made it worse. We…

  • Khepupara to Kokilmoni

    Khepupara to Kokilmoni

    Leaving Dhaka, we spend an entire day getting to Khepupara in southern Bangladesh. Then we spent a long morning installing a GPS to monitor subsidence of the delta before heading back on the road again.

  • Watering the World’s Crops, Drop by Drop

    Watering the World’s Crops, Drop by Drop

    Dr. Daniel Hillel was recently honored with the World Food Prize for his pioneering work in sustainable agriculture.

  • To Comilla and Back

    To Comilla and Back

    I’ve just arrived back in Bangladesh with an engineer to install 6 new GPS stations to add to our studies of earthquake hazards and land subsidence. Our first stop was Comilla University, the westernmost exposed fold of the collision between the Ganges-Bramaputra Delta and the Sumatra-Andaman-Burma plat boundary.

  • Biotherapy: Technology Assisted Wetland Revival

    Biotherapy: Technology Assisted Wetland Revival

    Coastal Wetlands provide homes for migrating and native birds, protected areas for hatcheries, flood mitigation and an unrivaled biodiversity of microorganisims that serves as the basis of the marine food chain. Nature here works hard to compensate for an increasingly heavy human footprint.

Colorful icons representing nature, sustainable living, and renewable energy with text "Earth Day 2026"

The first Earth Day in 1970 ignited a movement to stop polluting our planet. Today, our scientists and experts are tackling the most pressing challenges to achieve real-world impact. This Earth Day, join us in our commitment to realizing a just and sustainable future for our planet. Visit our Earth Day website for ideas, resources, and inspiration.

  • Putting the Focus on ‘A Thirsty World’

    Putting the Focus on ‘A Thirsty World’

    The water documentary “A Thirsty World” combines French photographer Yann Arthus-Bertrand’s aerial photography with down-to-earth messages, a mélange that calls attention to problems of water security on a global scale.

  • Preparing for Chimborazo

    Preparing for Chimborazo

    I am staying with a friend’s family in Quito, Ecuador’s capital city, and tomorrow will meet up with my climbing partner, Pablo Puruncajas, to prepare for our expedition. I am here to collect tree ring samples and put up a weather station on Chimborazo, Ecuador’s tallest peak, to provide climate data about this region, which…

  • Bharungamari – End of the Road

    Bharungamari – End of the Road

    For our final installation, we had to go from the edge of the Bay of Bengal almost to Bangladesh’s northern border with India, a trip of over 350 miles. Along the way we stopped at Humayun’s childhood home, had several flats and picked up a student of Humayun’s from the town where we installed it.…

  • Hiron Point in Sundarban

    Hiron Point in Sundarban

    We traveled by boat to the south part of the Sundarbans near the Indian Ocean to install a GPS at Hiron Point, this isolated facility also hosts a tide gauge recording long-term water level changes due to rising sea level and land subsidence. Our GPS will help distinguish how much of each there is in…

  • Polder 32

    Polder 32

    Polder 32 is one of the many inland islands in Bangladesh that was enclosed by an embankment to protect it from flooding. When that embankment failed during Cyclone Aila in 2009, the island was flooded for almost 2 years. Subsidence of the ground inside the embankment with no sedimentation to compensate made it worse. We…

  • Khepupara to Kokilmoni

    Khepupara to Kokilmoni

    Leaving Dhaka, we spend an entire day getting to Khepupara in southern Bangladesh. Then we spent a long morning installing a GPS to monitor subsidence of the delta before heading back on the road again.

  • Watering the World’s Crops, Drop by Drop

    Watering the World’s Crops, Drop by Drop

    Dr. Daniel Hillel was recently honored with the World Food Prize for his pioneering work in sustainable agriculture.

  • To Comilla and Back

    To Comilla and Back

    I’ve just arrived back in Bangladesh with an engineer to install 6 new GPS stations to add to our studies of earthquake hazards and land subsidence. Our first stop was Comilla University, the westernmost exposed fold of the collision between the Ganges-Bramaputra Delta and the Sumatra-Andaman-Burma plat boundary.

  • Biotherapy: Technology Assisted Wetland Revival

    Biotherapy: Technology Assisted Wetland Revival

    Coastal Wetlands provide homes for migrating and native birds, protected areas for hatcheries, flood mitigation and an unrivaled biodiversity of microorganisims that serves as the basis of the marine food chain. Nature here works hard to compensate for an increasingly heavy human footprint.