Credit: Egan Jimenez
Lisa is a climate change impact researcher with a focus on extreme weather events and human mobility in drylands areas. Her research seeks to disentangle the underlying drivers of human (im)mobility, e.g., conflict and food insecurity, and attribute extreme weather-driven human mobility to climate change. Related research interests include anticipatory action, compound events, and systemic risk. Lisa is an associate researcher at Climate Econometrics and the World Weather Attribution initiative.
She received her DPhil (PhD) from the Environmental Change Institute at the University of Oxford, and a MS in Sustainability Management from Columbia University. Her doctoral research developed a method to quantitatively assess the contribution of climate change to human mobility, combining methods from climate science and econometrics. Prior to joining Princeton, she worked in a variety of roles at international organisations and NGOs such as the World Bank and The Earth Institute, providing her with a multifaceted, international background in environmental economics and climate policy.
For more information on Lisa’s work, visit her website.
- Thalheimer, L., Simperingham, E., Jjemba, E. (2021): The role of anticipatory humanitarian action to reduce disaster displacement in Environmental Research Letters (https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ac4292)
We performed an multi-disciplinary expert assessment and show how forecast-based financing as one mode of anticipatory action can be used to minimize the displacement risks and impacts from extreme weather events on displaced populations.
- Harrington, L., … Thalheimer, L., … (2021): Attribution of severe low rainfall in southern Madagascar, 2019-21 (World Weather Attribution study)
We find that factors other than climate change drive situations of food insecurity among an already vulnerable population.
- Stavi, I., … Thalheimer, L., … (2021): Multidimensional Food Security Nexus in Drylands under the Slow Onset Effects of Climate Change in Land (https://doi.org/10.3390/land10121350)
Comment on interconnected drivers of food insecurity in dryland areas
- Advancing the evidence base of future warming impacts on human mobility in African drylands in Earth’s Future (Sep 2021)
- Thalheimer, L., Williams, D. S., van der Geest, K., & Otto, F. E. (2021). Advancing the evidence base of future warming impacts on human mobility in African drylands. Earth's Future, 9(10), e2020EF001958.
- Deciphering impacts and human responses to a changing climate in East Africa in Frontiers in Climate (Aug 2021)
- Thalheimer, L., Otto, F., & Abele, S. (2021). Deciphering impacts and human responses to a changing climate in East Africa. Frontiers in Climate, 84.
- Rapid attribution of heavy rainfall events leading to the severe flooding in Western Europe during July 2021 (23 Aug 2021)
- Working paper: Towards attributing climate-related displacement in Somalia to anthropogenic climate change in IIASA working paper
- Thalheimer, L. (2020). Towards attributing climate-related displacement in Somalia to anthropogenic climate change.
- Book chapter: Climate Change, Conflicts and Migration (Feb 2020)
- Thalheimer, L., & Webersik, C. (2020). Climate Change, Conflicts and Migration. Environmental Conflicts, Migration and Governance, 59.
News:
BBC interview on the July 2021 floods in Germany (link)
