Barcamp Open Science Geneme

Open Science and Climate Change

Notes for Barcamp Open Science@Geneme

Three examples can be mentioned to give different vectors for Open Science practice and Climate Change.

First, is the Open Climate Knowledge FORCE11 Working Group (OCKProject). This is a project working for 100% open research for climate change related research. In research literature we see less than 30% of papers being Open Access. Research being accessible and usable is important for public trust in science and to work on solving the many problems climate change presents. Greta Thunberg says, 'wants you to listen to the scientists' - but how can the public do this when its paywalled. OCKProject used data mining to explores next levels systems public access to research.

Second, is the Open Energy Modelling (openmod) Initiative which is a research community, mainly coming out of Germany, working on new energy systems for a low carbon future. Openmod is in its sixth year and has run ten workshops, the latest in Berlin in early 2020 attracting nearly two hundred participants. The community has enthusiastically embraced Open Science practice as a tool to drive their work on policy and planning for low carbon energy - but also because overall models for a green future need overhauling and making open and transparent. No future low carbon economic plans have been reliably tested with energy models using the transparency and so reliability that Open Science practices would build - essentially we are currently trapped in a state of being planlos (without a plan).

Third, is on the question of Open Science and science communications related to climate change. Incentives that are intentionally programmes into social networks monitise anti-science content which results in generating anti-climate change media. An example is YouTube as identified by the researcher Joachim Allgaier and outlines in the GenR interview 'Fix Your AI for Climate Change! An Invitation to an Open Dialogue'. The result is that a search for Climate Change on YouTube will return 50% as anti-climate change content, which can be attributed to YouTube financially rewarding users for content views. What needs to happen with social media networks like YouTube is a good dose of Open Science transparency and accompanying regulation of their content algorithms.