Global Urban Climate Assessment
Measuring Climate Resiliency at the City Level Worldwide
The Global Urban Climate Assessment (GUCA) is a pilot decision-support tool aimed at tracking the progress of climate vulnerability and readiness in major cities around the world. Based on evolving climate vulnerability and adaptation research, GUCA will inform actions and investments in urban areas.
Using both remote sensing and secondary data, GUCA will provide the first assessment tool across multiple global cities on consistent resilience measures. The pilot begins with 10 densely populated cities: Amman, Jordan; Beijing, China; Berlin, Germany; Bogotá, Colombia; Jakarta, Indonesia; Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo; Mogadishu, Somalia; Mumbai, India; Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; and Shenzhen, China — with Abuja, Nigeria, and Panama City, Panama, as potential alternates.
The team will identify a suite of environmental, economic and social indicators to be delivered through an interactive geographical information system platform for a visual, comparable view of urban climate resilience.
Like ND-GAIN's Country Index, GUCA will be a free and open-source tool designed to help governments, nongovernmental organizations and investors direct funding where it’s most needed, identify opportunities for adaptation and determine where cities are most vulnerable.
Based on the pilot’s findings, ND-GAIN may expand the assessment globally to include all cities with populations higher than 1 million. GUCA is scheduled to be complete in fall 2024.