The development of climate security discourse in Japan

AbstractAs the level of understanding about climate change has increased, the term “climate security” has been increasingly used in the rapidly growing literature on this subject. Although Japan has officially acknowledged the importance of tackling climate change, discussion of climate security has been almost nonexistent among Japanese governmental officials, politicians, and academics. Our aim was to trace discourses related to climate security in Japan to determine why so little exists in Japan and whether or not such discourse could suggest new areas for consideration to more comprehensively respond to the climate change problem. Because of different interpretations and uses of the term “climate security” in the existing literature, we first categorized existing approaches to climate security into four types and used this categorization to examine Japan’s discourse from these perspectives. Two of the approaches, namely “long-term irreversible planetary changes” and “short-term abrupt risks to individuals”, had been considered in Japan previously but without specific reference to the term climate security. The other two, “cause of conflict and violence” and “impacts to military and defense organizations”, however, had not been used and need to be included in discussions of climate change in Japan. Some of the topics not discussed in Japan include indirect economic losses of Japanese industries via supply chains, loss of Japan’s exclusive economic zone due to sea-level rise, and the potential inflow of refugees resulting from extreme weather patterns outside of Japan.

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Examining the Climatology of Shortwave Radiation in the Northeastern United States

Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology ◽

10.1175/jamc-d-16-0420.1 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 56 (10) ◽

pp. 2869-2881

Author(s):

Janel Hanrahan ◽

Alexandria Maynard ◽

Sarah Y. Murphy ◽

Colton Zercher ◽

Allison Fitzpatrick

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

United States ◽

Renewable Energy ◽

Renewable Energy Sources ◽

Predictor Variable ◽

Shortwave Radiation ◽

Northeastern United States ◽

Weather Patterns ◽

Long Term Trends

AbstractAs demand for renewable energy grows, so does the need for an improved understanding of renewable energy sources. Paradoxically, the climate change mitigation strategy of fossil fuel divestment is in itself subject to shifts in weather patterns resulting from climate change. This is particularly true with solar power, which depends on local cloud cover. However, because observed shortwave radiation data usually span a decade or less, persistent long-term trends may not be identified. A simple linear regression model is created here using diurnal temperature range (DTR) during 2002–15 as a predictor variable to estimate long-term shortwave radiation (SR) values in the northeastern United States. Using an extended DTR dataset, SR values are computed for 1956–2015. Statistically significant decreases in shortwave radiation are identified that are dominated by changes during the summer months. Because this coincides with the season of greatest insolation and the highest potential for energy production, financial implications may be large for the solar energy industry if such trends persist into the future.

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Satellites, Self-reports, and Submersion: Exposure to Floods in Bangladesh

The American Economic Review ◽

10.1257/aer.p20151095 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 105 (5) ◽

pp. 232-236 ◽

Cited By ~ 18

Author(s):

Raymond Guiteras ◽

Amir Jina ◽

A. Mushfiq Mobarak

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Economic Activity ◽

Climate Change Impacts ◽

Objective Data ◽

Short Term ◽

Temperature And Precipitation ◽

Flood Exposure ◽

Self Reports ◽

Term Variation

A burgeoning “Climate-Economy” literature has uncovered many effects of changes in temperature and precipitation on economic activity, but has made considerably less progress in modeling the effects of other associated phenomena, like natural disasters. We develop new, objective data on floods, focusing on Bangladesh. We show that rainfall and self-reported exposure are weak proxies for true flood exposure. These data allow us to study adaptation, giving accurate measures of both long-term averages and short term variation in exposure. This is important in studying climate change impacts, as people will not only experience new exposures, but also experience them differently.

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Climate change: long-term targets and short-term commitments

Global Environmental Change ◽

10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2003.09.001 ◽

2003 ◽

Vol 13 (4) ◽

pp. 277-293 ◽

Cited By ~ 29

Author(s):

Jan Corfee-Morlot ◽

Niklas Höhne

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Short Term

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Introduction

The Phanerozoic Carbon Cycle ◽

10.1093/oso/9780195173338.003.0003 ◽

2004 ◽

Author(s):

Robert A. Berner

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Carbon Dioxide ◽

Carbon Cycle ◽

Global Climate ◽

Geological Time ◽

Short Term ◽

Quaternary Period ◽

Geological Time Scale ◽

The Earth

The cycle of carbon is essential to the maintenance of life, to climate, and to the composition of the atmosphere and oceans. What is normally thought of as the “carbon cycle” is the transfer of carbon between the atmosphere, the oceans, and life. This is not the subject of interest of this book. To understand this apparently confusing statement, it is necessary to separate the carbon cycle into two cycles: the short-term cycle and the long-term cycle. The “carbon cycle,” as most people understand it, is represented in figure 1.1. Carbon dioxide is taken up via photosynthesis by green plants on the continents or phytoplankton in the ocean. On land carbon is transferred to soils by the dropping of leaves, root growth, and respiration, the death of plants, and the development of soil biota. Land herbivores eat the plants, and carnivores eat the herbivores. In the oceans the phytoplankton are eaten by zooplankton that are in turn eaten by larger and larger organisms. The plants, plankton, and animals respire CO2. Upon death the plants and animals are decomposed by microorganisms with the ultimate production of CO2. Carbon dioxide is exchanged between the oceans and atmosphere, and dissolved organic matter is carried in solution by rivers from soils to the sea. This all constitutes the shortterm carbon cycle. The word “short-term” is used because the characteristic times for transferring carbon between reservoirs range from days to tens of thousands of years. Because the earth is more than four billion years old, this is short on a geological time scale. As the short-term cycle proceeds, concentrations of the two principal atmospheric gases, CO2 and CH4, can change as a result of perturbations of the cycle. Because these two are both greenhouse gases—in other words, they adsorb outgoing infrared radiation from the earth surface—changes in their concentrations can involve global warming and cooling over centuries and many millennia. Such changes have accompanied global climate change over the Quaternary period (past 2 million years), although other factors, such as variations in the receipt of solar radiation due to changes in characteristics of the earth’s orbit, have also contributed to climate change.

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The Effect of Incentives: Diffusion of Responsibility

10.1093/oso/9780190076559.003.0010 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 166-182

Author(s):

Jason Brennan ◽

William English ◽

John Hasnas ◽

Peter Jaworski

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Collective Action ◽

Tragedy Of The Commons ◽

Short Term ◽

Collective Action Problem ◽

P Diffusion ◽

Perverse Incentives ◽

The Commons ◽

Diffusion Of Responsibility

Diffusion of responsibility refers to the problem that when something is everyone’s job, it in effect ends up being nobody’s job. This explains why many collective problems arise. People face perverse incentives to free ride on others’ actions and not to do their part. As a result, agents often think in short-term rather than long-term ways. Problems such as climate change can be modeled as instances of the tragedy of the commons, one form of a collective action problem that arises due to perverse incentives created by the diffusion of responsibility.

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Nemo-Nordic 1.0: A NEMO based ocean model for Baltic & North Seas, research and operational applications

10.5194/gmd-2018-2 ◽

2018 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Robinson Hordoir ◽

Lars Axell ◽

Anders Höglund ◽

Christian Dieterich ◽

Filippa Fransner ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Ocean Model ◽

Anthropogenic Pressure ◽

Short Term ◽

To Come ◽

Ocean Forecasting ◽

The Baltic ◽

Industrialised Countries ◽

High Degree

Abstract. We present Nemo-Nordic, a Baltic & North Sea model based on the NEMO ocean engine. Surrounded by highly industrialised countries, the Baltic and North seas, and their assets associated with shipping, fishing and tourism; are vulnerable to anthropogenic pressure and climate change. Ocean models providing reliable forecasts, and enabling climatic studies, are important tools for the shipping infrastructure and to get a better understanding of effects of climate change on the marine ecosystems. Nemo-Nordic is intended to come as a tool for both short term and long term simulations, and to be used for ocean forecasting as well as process and climatic studies. Here, the scientific and technical choices within Nemo-Nordic are introduced, and the reasons behind the design of the model and its domain, and the inclusions of the two seas, are explained. The model's ability to represent barotropic and baroclinic dynamics, as well as the vertical structure of the water column, is presented. Biases are shown and discussed. The short term capabilities of the model are presented, and especially its capabilities to represent sea level on an hourly timescale with a high degree of accuracy. We also show that the model can represent longer time scale, with a focus on the Major Baltic Inflows and the variability of deep water salinity in the Baltic Sea.

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Perception and risk of Covid-19 and climate change: investigating analogies in a common framework

Global Sustainability ◽

10.1017/sus.2020.30 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 3 ◽

Author(s):

Antonello Pasini ◽

Fulvio Mazzocchi

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Structural Changes ◽

Short Term ◽

Common Features ◽

Risk Equation ◽

Related Risk ◽

Policy Level ◽

Common Framework

This paper investigates analogies in the dynamics of Covid-19 pandemic and climate change. A comparison of their common features (such as nonlinearity and inertia) and differences helps us to achieve a correct scientific perception of both situations, increasing the chances of actions for their solutions. Besides, applying to both the risk equation provides different angles to analyse them, something that may result useful especially at the policy level. It shows that not only short-term interventions are needed, but also long-term strategies involving some structural changes. More specifically, it also shows that, even if climate change is probably more critical and long-lasting than the Covid-19 crisis, we still have, at least currently, more options for reducing its related risk.

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Economic losses from changing hydrology under future climate change, glacier shrinkage and growing water demand in the Tropical Andes

10.5194/egusphere-egu2020-12448 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Fabian Drenkhan ◽

Randy Muñoz ◽

Christian Huggel ◽

Holger Frey ◽

Fernando Valenzuela ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

River Basin ◽

Water Demand ◽

Future Climate Change ◽

Economic Losses ◽

Water Volume ◽

Tropical Andes ◽

Glacier Shrinkage ◽

Outburst Floods

In the Tropical Andes, glaciers play a fundamental role for sustaining human livelihoods and ecosystems in headwater areas and further downstream. However, current rates of glacier shrinkage driven by climate change as well as increasing water demand levels bear a threat to long-term water supply. While a growing number of research has covered impacts of climate change and glacier shrinkage on the terrestrial water cycle and potential disaster risks, the associated potential economic losses have barely been assessed.Here we present an integrated surface-groundwater assessment model for multiple water sectors under current conditions (1981-2016) and future scenarios (2050) of glacier shrinkage and growing water demand. As a case, the lumped model has been applied to the Santa river basin (including the Cordillera Blanca, Andes of Peru) within three subcatchments and considers effects from evapotranspiration, environmental flows and backflows of water use. Therefore, coupled greenhouse gas concentration (RCP2.6 and RCP8.5) and socioeconomic scenarios are used, which provide a broad range of the magnitude of glacier and water volume changes and associated economic impacts. Finally, net water volume released on the long term due to deglaciation effects is quantified and by multiple metrics converted into potential economic costs and losses for the agriculture, household and hydropower sectors. Additionally, the potential damages from outburst floods from current and future lakes have been included. Results for the entire Santa river basin show that water availability would diminish by about 11-16% (57-78 106 m&#179;) in the dry season (June-August) and by some 7-10% (103-155 106 m&#179;) during the wet season (December-February) under selected glacier shrinkage scenarios until 2050. This is a consequence of diminishing glacier contribution to streamflow which until 2050 would reduce from about 45% to 33% for June-August and from 6% to 4% for December-February. A first rough estimate suggests associated economic losses for main water demand sectors (agriculture, hydropower, drinking water) on the order of about 300 106 USD/year by 2050. Additionally, with ongoing glacier shrinkage and the formation of new lakes, about 45,000 inhabitants and 30,000 buildings are expected to be exposed to the risk of outburst floods in the 21st century.The pressure on water resources and interconnected socio-eonvironmental systems in the basin is already challenging and expected to further exacerbate within the next decades. Currently, water demand levels are considerably increasing driven by growing irrigated (export) agriculture, population and energy demand which is in a large part sustained by hydropower. A coupling of potential water scarcity driven by climate change with a lack of water governance and high human vulnerabilities, bears strong conflict potentials with negative feedbacks for socio-economic development in the Santa basin and beyond. In this context, our coupled hydro-glacial economic impact model provides important support for future decision-making and long-term water management planning. However, uncertainties are relatively high (uncertainty range to be estimated) due to a lack of (good) hydro-climatic and socio-economic information at appropriate spatiotemporal scales. The presented model framework is potentially transferable to other high mountain catchments in the Tropical Andean region and beyond.

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