Climate change and sea-level rise pose unprecedented threats to communities across the world, especially the heavily-populated urban coasts. There is increasing evidence that the changes anticipated for the 21st Century will push the climate outside the range known to civilization and into a phase of much greater variability. This will challenge decision-making in all societal sectors, and it will require a new level of preparedness to mitigate the impacts and adapt to the changes.

The Mitigation and Adaptation Research Institute (MARI) at Old Dominion University engages in research that produces the practice-relevant knowledge needed to address the challenge of climate change and sea level rise for the coastal zone. In doing so, MARI responds to the knowledge needs of a wide range of community stakeholders, including government, military, private sector, and private citizens. The investment that Old Dominion University has already committed in the form of the interdisciplinary CCSLR Initiative has paid dividends, with many local and non-local stakeholders already actively engaged and faculty from across ODU’s departments and colleges in an active, collaborative attempt to begin to seek solutions to the problems we face.

MARI facilitates and engages in research, education and outreach to promote and enhance the understanding of climate change and sea level rise and their multi-faceted impacts on the built environment and the social fabric of coastal cities. MARI works with societal stakeholders to develop options to mitigate and adapt to these impacts and support these stakeholders in the application of the knowledge resulting from the research.

Visit the MARI web workspace at www.odu.edu/mari.