Paper 3: Climate Change Adaptation for Neophytes - UPEI Projects

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LINKING CLIMATE MODELS TO POLICY AND DECISION-MAKINGIn terms of climatic changes warming will be greatest over land and most highnorthern latitudes. It will be least over the Southern Ocean and parts of theNorth Atlantic Ocean. The contraction in snow cover area will continue,including increases in thaw depth over most permafrost regions, and decrease insea ice extent. Arctic late-summer sea ice may disappear almost entirely by thelatter part of the 21st century. In other regions, there is a very likely increase infrequency of hot extremes, heat waves, and heavy precipitation. A likely increasein tropical cyclone intensity and a poleward shift of extra-tropical storm tracks.Precipitation is very likely to increase in high latitudes and likely decrease in mostsubtropical land regions, continuing observed recent trends. As such, annualriver runoff and water availability are projected to increase at high latitudes (andin some tropical wet areas) and decrease in some dry regions in the mid-latitudesand tropics. Many semi-arid areas (e.g. Mediterranean basin, western UnitedStates, southern Africa and northeast Brazil) will suffer a decrease in waterresources due to climate change.Critical impacts are listed in tabular form for regions (Table SPM.2) and sectors(SPM.3). Table SPM.7 illustrates impacts to systems and sectors over anincreasing global temperature, superimposed over the likelihood of thosetemperature increases under the different SRES scenarios. More specificallyterrestrial ecosystems such as the tundra, boreal forest and mountain regions arelikely to be affected by climate change, as are Mediterranean-type ecosystemsand tropical rainforests. Coastal systems including mangroves and salt marshes,and marine systems including coral reefs, and sea ice are to be affected as well.In terms of human systems, agriculturalists in low-latitudes areas, and those whoinhabit low-lying coastal systems (i.e. threat of sea level rise and increased riskfrom extreme weather events) are to be severely affected. Regions such as theArctic, Africa, small oceanic islands and Asian and African mega-deltas are to beseverely affected.Finally, Figure SPM.8 describes estimated long term (multi-century) warmingcorresponding to the six AR4 WGIII stabilisation categories (Table SPM.3).Stabilisation targets are compared in terms of CO 2 concentrations and rangefrom 445-490 ppm, all the way up to 855-1130 ppm. The graph shows thecorresponding global temperature increases of 2-2.4°C up to 4.9-6.1°C. TableTS.2 shows as well the change in 2050 CO 2 concentrations in relation to year2000 emissions. The timing of emission reductions depends on the stringency ofthe stabilization target. Stringent targets require an earlier peak in CO 2emissions. In the majority of the scenarios in the most stringent stabilizationcategory (I), emissions are required to decline before 2015 and be further44
PAPER 3 CLIMATE CHANGE ADAPTATION FOR NEOPHYTESreduced to less than 50% of today’s emissions by 2050 (IPCC, 2007). In otherwords, this informs policy makers of the levels of emission reductions required tostabilise temperatures at the given levels.TOPIC 4 – Adaptation, mitigation options and responses: This section dealswith human responses in the form of mitigation and/or adaptation to climatechange. It can read like a cookbook of ad hoc heuristics and lists describingeither adaptation or mitigation actions. In terms of ‘adaptation’ this is partiallydue to the inherent difficulties in defining it, measuring it and/or projecting it.Comprehensive estimates of global costs and benefits of adaptation are verylimited. Equally difficult is determining the ability or capacity to adapt. Adaptivecapacity is intimately connected to social and economic development, unevenlydistributed across and within societies, is dynamic and is influenced by a society’sproductive base including: natural and man-made capital assets, social networksand entitlements, human capital and institutions, governance, national income,health and technology.The requirement of adaptation can be exacerbated by additional factorsincluding current climate hazards, poverty and unequal access to resources, foodinsecurity, trends in economic globalisation, conflict and incidence of diseasessuch as HIV/AIDS. Though a wide array of adaptation options exists, moreextensive adaptation will be required than is currently occurring to reducevulnerability to climate change. Adaptation is not being implemented due tobarriers, limits and costs that are not well understood. When implemented, itoften occurs as a result of multiple drivers, such as economic development andpoverty alleviation, which are embedded within broader development, sectoral,regional and local planning initiatives such as water resources planning, coastaldefence and disaster risk reduction strategies. Thus a guiding principle ofadaptation (i.e. a heuristic rule of thumb) is that it is more likely to be successfulwhen it is embedded in broader sectoral initiatives.Table SPM-4, describes some selected examples of planned sectoral adaptation(i.e. Water, Agriculture, Infrastructure/settlement (including coastal zones),Human health, Tourism, Transport, and Energy) in terms of: 1) adaptation optionsand strategies; 2) the relevant underlying policy framework; and 3) keyconstraints or opportunities to its implementation. If we examine Infrastructureas an example, adaptation options include: seawalls and storm surge barriers;dune reinforcement; land acquisition and creation of marshlands/wetlands asbuffer against sea level rise and flooding; protection of existing natural; andrelocation. The underlying policy framework it affects includes: standards and45
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