Reimagining Risk
Turning Risk Around: Material Flows, Ecosystem Growth, and Urban Landscape Renewal
Paul Mankiewicz
May 1, 2008What if the threat of a large rise in sea levels inspired us to use living communities of marshes, mussels, seaweeds, and oysters to restore and expand the intertidal edge to catch sediments and resist storm surges? What if the need to counter urban heat islands led us to create a whole new approach to urban parks and water use, with green spaces, green streets, green roofs, and waste water recycling all forming a new cooling infrastructure? What if we thought about New York City’s waste stream as a kind of essential municipal resource, available in the quantities needed to protect coastal infrastructure with reefs and wave-dissipators?

Biologist and plant scientist Paul Mankiewicz discusses how some of the enormous challenges posed by climate change could be addressed by radically different ways of thinking about material flows and ecosystem function in the urban environment. Mankiewicz is founder and executive director of the Gaia Institute, which explores, through research and development, design and construction, how human activities and waste products can be treated to increase ecological productivity, biodiversity, environmental quality, and economic well being.

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