Anders Wijkman

Resilient Cities with Michael Berkowitz

Welcome to this series of podcasts. This series discusses the risks facing humanity over the next 100 years. We have leading researchers, policymakers and entrepreneurs. Together we seek to analyze the risks from a 4Ways perspective. You can find out more about us on 4ways.org. Today, we are delighted to have as our guest Michael Berkowitz. Michael is the founding principal of Resilient Cities Catalyst, a new global nonprofit helping cities and their partners tackle their toughest challenges. He’s a world-leading expert on making cities resilient to everything from natural disasters to terrorism. Previous roles include Founding President of the 100 Resilient Cities, which as Rockefeller Foundation project which he led from August 2013 until 2019. Other various roles include Deutsche Bank, their Global Head of Operations Risk Management. He also led the efforts addressing the 2009 flu pandemic at Deutsche Bank, and he was the Deputy Commissioner at the Office of Emergency Management in New York City. Unsurprisingly, NYC has called him back for support following Hurricane Ida.

Anders Wijkman

This is a series of podcasts, which discusses the risks facing humanity over the coming years, all the way up to 100 years, with leading researchers, policymakers and others who are active in this space. And we try and analyze these risks from a 4Waves perspective. You can find out more about us on https://www.4waves.org/ [https://www.4waves.org/] in this episode, we have as our guest Anders Wijkman. Anders is a Swedish politician who has actively worked on environmental and social issues since at least 1970s. He has held many different posts, including Member of the Swedish parliament, Member of the European Parliament, Assistant Secretary-General of the United Nations and Policy Director of the UNDP, Secretary-General of the Swedish Red Cross and Director General of the Swedish Agency for Research Cooperation with Developing Countries, the full list is much, much longer. These are just some examples. Anders continues to be a member of The Club of Rome. Until recently, he was one of the co-presidents, and also the Swedish Royal Academy of Sciences, the World Future Council, and the International Resource Panel. Recent books includes the Club of Rome Report—Come On and A Finer Future: Creating An Economy In Service To Life. And also, if you would like to follow him in more life away, he's active on Twitter (@anderswijkman [https://twitter.com/AndersWijkman]).

Harald Sverdrup

Welcome to this series of podcasts. This series discusses the risks facing humanity over the next 100 years with leading researchers and we analyze these risks from the perspective of the 4Waves. In this episode, we have with us, Harald Sverdrup. Harald is a professor at Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences. He’s the World’s Bookkeeper, no one knows better what resources remain inside our planet. He’s been working and developed the World6 [https://www.researchgate.net/publication/333239417_Conceptualization_and_parameterization_of_the_market_price_mechanism_in_the_WORLD6_model_for_metals_materials_and_fossil_fuels?_sg=nNtVbYrGQhYdKLJvtAacXWr_WbPLWHvXBmESgoSxMFBTFJfJtaY-nZj_02aI31NJzFUnVWWtRNg79D4]model. But Harald also, beyond the university, also runs a family recycling business. This has been a business that’s been around for 150 years and profitable every single one of those years.  And far more importantly, he’s proud to say that it’s the cleanest recycling plant in the world. And more broadly, he takes a strong interest in bringing environmental technologies from research to market, and he’s had a success on that school today. And he’s a member of the Balaton group. And also importantly, if you do search for him online, you’ll find many results regarding the late oceanographer and Harald’s grandfather, Harald Sverdrup not the Harald we have with us today is the one who has developed the World6 model.

Ugo Bardi

Today, we have our first podcast as part of the 4 Waves series of podcasts, a series that discusses the risks facing humanity over the next 100 years with leading researchers and analyzing them through a 4Waves perspective. Today as our first guest, we have Ugo Bardi. Ugo Bardi teaches physical chemistry at the University of Florence in Italy. He spent his career working on resource depletion, system dynamics modelling, climate science, and renewable energy. He is a member of the scientific community of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil. And he’s a regular contributor to The Oil Drum and Resilience.org. Even more importantly, at least for us, he’s a member of the Club of Rome and he authored the 33rd report extracted how the quest for global mining wealth is plundering the planet, and also The Limits to Growth Revisited, an update to the Club of Rome most seminal texts, which had a profound influence on many, including the author of The 4 Waves Method. Alexander Chikunov is also on the call. And he has authored many other books too. Most recently The Empty Sea: The Future of the Blue Economy. And we also, of course, recommend reading his blog, The Seneca Effect.