Isra-Tech | april 2023

Julia Shteingart Prof. Colin Price Prof. Dan Rabinowitz Prof. Vered Blass T el Aviv University (TAU) has set its sights on becoming the heart of environmental and climate change research in Israel and on the global stage. Having set up an interdisciplinary Center for Global Climate Change in 2021 , the university is now launching a newmultidisciplinary master’s (MA) program in climate change and has created a startup accelerator, both of which will help fast forward TAU’s ambitions. “The solution must be interdisciplinary,” said Prof. Vered Blass, who oversees the university’s one-year international MA in Environmental Studies. “We know we cannot solve the climate crisis with just one discipline. That is the strength of our programs. They draw on students and researchers from all the faculties and put everyone on the same page”. A Global Center for Climate Solutions The aim of the Center for Global Climate Change, housed in TAU’s Porter School of Environment and Earth Studies, is to find practical solutions to the global crisis by tackling climate change from all angles. This is done by utilizing the knowledge and resources within TAU’s campus, from engineering and life sciences to law and social sciences, and by collaborating with industry and governments to find technologies, raise public awareness and promote legislation and regulatory frameworks. Moreover, as the Middle East and North Africa are seen as among the most vulnerable places in the world for climate change, the center is also ideally positioned geographically to foster collaborations and advance global solutions. “The idea is to bring everyone together and think out of the box about how we can help solve the huge climate change problemhumanity is facing,” said Prof. Colin Price, who heads the Center and who has been researching the crisis for the past 30 years. “We know there's a problem, we know the cause of the problem. We know also what has to be done to solve the problem,” he said. “At the Climate Change center we bring people together fromdifferent disciplines, in Israel, from the region and also globally, to find practical solutions by looking not only at technologies but also legal aspects, public health, policy and economic models”. The Center is currently looking for a donor to help solidify and expand its activities, Price added. A New MA Program in Climate Change In October, TAU will start its newly create d Social and Policy Aspects of Climate Change one-year international MA, the first program to focus on climate, offered by any university in theMiddle East and just one of a handful of social science graduate programs anywhere in the world that address social, cultural, political and policy dimensions of the climate crisis. “The MA program is a real game changer,” said Prof. Dan Rabinowitz, of the department of Sociology and Anthropology, who heads the program that is offered in English. The multidisciplinary aspect of the program is what makes it pioneering, he said. “Because TAU has such a long tradition of cross fertilization of ideas between people from different disciplines, it is only natural that such a program is set up here”. With a new global center, multidisciplinary master's program and tech accelerator, TAU charts the course for climate disruption All Hands on Deck: How Tel Aviv University is Leading on Climate Change Action 24 Climate Tech Isra-Tech Israeli Technologies Magazine April 2023 Utilizing Knowledge