Preparing for a warming world will take a new information revolution

By Annalee Newitz

AS I write this, it’s 13°C and foggy in San Francisco. But 1000 kilometres north, in Portland, Oregon, it hit 47°C just days ago. Across the border in Canada, it reached 49°C. Coroners are blaming the heat for hundreds of deaths in the US and Canada. Climate experts are warning that it’s only a matter of time before my region of the west is broiling under a “heat dome” (see page 10) – catalysing wildfires bigger than those that burned 1.7 million hectares in California last year.

Heat domes are statistically likely to become more intense and common …