In this era of climate change, society is desperately looking for answers to some tough questions. How do we cope with the many impacts arising from our shifting climate? What can we do to stem, and hopefully halt, this complex problem?

Brock University is providing international leadership in selecting a location on Earth that shows the clearest evidence in the geologic record for a proposed new epoch in geologic time: the Anthropocene. Brock-led research has led to Crawford Lake in Milton, Ontario as the site that demonstrates how human activity has changed the Earth to a great extent.

Based at Brock is a UNESCO Chair “Community Sustainability: From Local to Global.” The Chair aims to strengthen initiatives in sustainable agriculture and community-based natural resource management in Canada, China and other countries, to develop concrete actions and best practices that countries around the world can use. We are well placed for this research, as Brock University is located in a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, an area seeking to reconcile social, economic and biophysical challenges confronting societies around the globe.

The Environmental Sustainability Research Centre (ESRC) investigates how we can live more ‘sustainably,’ or “meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” (World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987). ESCR’s Niagara Adapts partnership leveraged resources and expertise from seven municipalities in the Niagara Region to collaborative on climate change adaptation assessment, planning and implementation.

The Brock-Niagara Validation, Prototyping and Manufacturing Institute has specialized equipment and expertise to design and test chemical products and processes that contain little or no substances toxic to the environment and human health. Researchers identify, quantify, and understand what’s in the air, ground, and water, which is particularly useful in monitoring and tracking pollutants.

Brock is noted for research on rocks, volcanoes, fossils and glaciers. We have one of the few micromorphology labs in the world, allowing researchers to examine thin section samples of glacial and non-glacial sediments under the microscope. A Brock researcher Is a Participating Scientist with the Mars 2020 mission with NASA.