A grim outlook

IN 2012, WHEN post-tropical storm Sandy devastated New York, the city was left in darkness. Among the few buildings still lit up was the headquarters of Goldman Sachs, which had a 25,000-sandbag wall and a backup generator. Gary Cohn, then the bank’s president, said one problem was how to get staff into the office in a shut-down city. In 2018, after a storm battered Vancouver Island, falling trees toppled electricity poles. The resulting power cut led to the closure of a water-treatment plant. And last January, when wildfires ravaged Australia’s outback, the toxic air hampered production at a coalmine owned by BHP, a commodity giant.