Consultant Dan
15 June 2010
Request for help - how to visualise complex climate policy information?
I have been working with an intern who is doing a great research project on the future of carbon markets and now we have some complex information that needs visualization. The essay draws on a deep literature survey and interviews with some very big players, both supporters and critics of carbon markets.
Sally Etherington is finishing up her studies at Monash University. She is determined to save the concept of ecologically sustainable development, which has become emptied of meaning and energy over the past twenty years. Sally is completing a Bachelor of Commerce/Bachelor of Science double degree, majoring in Economics and Geography & Environmental Science and also finishing up a Diploma of Modern Languages, in Indonesian.
The research essay Sally has been doing with me is about the key international climate policy instrument, the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). It is central to the Kyoto Protocol and the longer term framework treaty that enables the Protocol, the UNFCCC.
Sally’s essay has identified 12 problems with the CDM, which need to be solved if we are to continue to put carbon markets in the centre of international climate law. She has also identified 8 solutions.
The question is how to map 8 solutions against 12 problems?
It is not a simple set of relationships because some problems can only be partially solved, some solutions only relate to one problem and so on. There is no consistent or simple relation between solution and problem.
I’ve been thinking that a Sankey diagram could do the job for us, but I do not know how to make one.
Do you have any ideas to share? Do you know a designer who will work with Sally to explain this very important set of issues?
I am keen to find a solution for Sally because I believe that good Internships are vital for the next generation of sustainability leaders.
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