Unnatural disasters:
communication guide

The increase in extreme weather is making millions of Americans unsafe and jeopardizing the people and places that we hold dear. If we don’t dramatically reduce the carbon pollution that’s making storms more severe, heat waves more intense, droughts longer, and weather across the country more extreme, later will be too late to protect what we love.

While the solutions are clear, the communication is more complicated than we often think. “Attribution” is a complicated science, and it can be tricky to articulate the precise impact of climate change in ways that everyday Americans understand. Furthermore, while people are increasingly noticing that the weather is changing, they don’t always connect the dots to climate change (in fact, half believe the changes to be “natural”). What’s more, since so many terms and topics are politically charged, we risk unintentionally polarizing audiences.

The good news is, through conversations with thousands of Americans and months of rigorous testing, we’ve found a messaging platform that simultaneously builds awareness for the problem and generates enthusiasm for the solutions. It’s concise, plainspoken, and makes it clear that this increase in extreme weather is anything but natural: “Unnatural Disasters.”