Melbourne 2100: Dystopian Virtual Reality to provoke civic engagement with climate change

We designed and trialled a virtual reality application, Melbourne 2100, that simulates a flooded CBD in a future Melbourne impacted by climate change. We hypothesised that experiencing dystopian futures in VR can make abstract and distal climate change more concrete for people, provoking public engagement and discussion. This paper presents the first stage of a project to design and trial our system with members of the public. We describe our design process, the application we built, and the results of a user study. Observations and interviews yielded feedback that will inform the ongoing development both the application and our methods for gauging its impact. The study indicates that VR is a viable medium for engaging the public with the critical issue of climate change.