scholarly journals Strategic retreat for resilient and equitable climate adaptation: the roles for conservation organizations

Author(s):  
Mali‘o Kodis ◽  
Marci Bortman ◽  
Sarah Newkirk

AbstractAs climate change accelerates the frequency and intensity of natural disasters, damage to public and private property is also increasing, putting exorbitant strain on governments and communities. Societies across the world are working to adapt to climate change, but climate adaptation is currently inadequate to meet the needs of the people left increasingly vulnerable and the places that risk being irreversibly changed or destroyed. One tactic of climate adaptation is strategic retreat, sometimes referred to as managed retreat. Strategic retreat is the process by which the government or another entity purchases (buys out) developed properties that are at risk of destruction or have been destroyed by natural disasters. The structure is most often demolished, and the land is placed under a permanent easement to prevent future development. What happens next is dependent on the entities involved in the buyouts, and can range from derelict, vacant lots to full restoration of ecosystems and their abilities to mitigate flood damage. Sometimes recreational amenities, such as trails or park infrastructure, are prioritized and funded as well. Conservation organizations can leverage their expertise in conservation planning, land acquisition and restoration, policy advocacy, and partnership development to improve the implementation of strategic retreat so that nature and people can thrive in the long term. In this policy paper, we review ways that conservation organizations have and can continue to engage in buyout processes to ensure positive outcomes for communities and nature. Conservation organizations must also evolve their approaches to climate adaptation to integrate equity and redress historical injustices in land use, and contribute towards improving strategic retreat for a more just and resilient future across disaster-prone communities. This work focuses on the context of disasters and climate adaptation in the USA, though many of the principles presented are applicable around the world.

Mathematics ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (12) ◽  
pp. 1385
Author(s):  
Irais Mora-Ochomogo ◽  
Marco Serrato ◽  
Jaime Mora-Vargas ◽  
Raha Akhavan-Tabatabaei

Natural disasters represent a latent threat for every country in the world. Due to climate change and other factors, statistics show that they continue to be on the rise. This situation presents a challenge for the communities and the humanitarian organizations to be better prepared and react faster to natural disasters. In some countries, in-kind donations represent a high percentage of the supply for the operations, which presents additional challenges. This research proposes a Markov Decision Process (MDP) model to resemble operations in collection centers, where in-kind donations are received, sorted, packed, and sent to the affected areas. The decision addressed is when to send a shipment considering the uncertainty of the donations’ supply and the demand, as well as the logistics costs and the penalty of unsatisfied demand. As a result of the MDP a Monotone Optimal Non-Decreasing Policy (MONDP) is proposed, which provides valuable insights for decision-makers within this field. Moreover, the necessary conditions to prove the existence of such MONDP are presented.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dimitar Ouzounov ◽  
Menas Kafatos ◽  
Patrick Taylor

<p>The forefront of science now is in bridging fields and making connections across different disciplines, challenging our current understanding of the Earth's changes and overall state. Some of the most challenging science questions now have to do with warnings for significant geohazards and Earth-Space systems' response to climate variability affecting adaptation processes, such as geosphere changes due to climate change and resultant strategies. In recent years, the study of pre-earthquake processes has led for example to developing the lithosphere-atmosphere-ionosphere-coupling concept. This in turn provides new information about the Earth's energy balance (Pulinets and Ouzounov, 2011). From space-born NASA and NOAA Earth observation of atmospheric conditions, we have shown the consistent occurrence of radiative emission anomalies in the atmosphere near or over regions of earthquakes, volcanoes, and geothermal fluxes. Our assessment shows that the latent heat released before major earthquakes is larger than the seismic energy released during the quake (Ouzounov et al., 2018). We find that the associated pre-earthquake phenomena for large events may create an additional thermodynamic contribution in the atmosphere and impact on climate, caused by sources of Earth de-gassing in the lithosphere and followed by ionization processes. Because of these findings, we start exploring major global geodynamics activities and their impact on atmospheric processes and climate through the geosphere coupling channels as a potential forward process of interaction between geohazards and climate adaptation. The reverse mechanism of climate adaptation's impact on geohazards is based on the initial idea that climate adaptation could force additional geohazards activities (McGuire, 2010). The removal of ice sheets may somehow or likely have permitted the release of stresses that had accumulated on previously confined faults, triggering earthquakes in the US, Canada, and Europe. How realistically is it to expect a change in the existing earthquake patterns in Europe, the USA, and Canada during climate change processes? It is plausible, but we do not yet know the answer. Our goal is to explore the coupling between geohazards processes and climate change processes through the lithosphere-atmosphere framework, focusing on dynamic environments, exhibiting a change in physical and thermodynamics processes over relatively small-time scales.</p>


Author(s):  
Tünde Anna Kovács ◽  
Zoltán Nyikes

In today's world, critical infrastructure encompasses facilities vital to the economy, politics, and population. Their maintenance and safe operation can ensure the supply for the population. These facilities are at risk due to climate change, natural disasters, terror attacks, or wars which are increasingly affecting countries around the world. In addition, the human factor can also cause uncertainty and damages. The function of the world depends on human activities. In this chapter the uncertainties in safety and security are introduced. Security is the most important part as it is the critical infrastructure protection and human safety . The important pillars of safety and security and these uncertainties are introduced in this chapter.


2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 72-76
Author(s):  
Antti Mäkelä ◽  
Irma Ylikangas ◽  
Ramchandra Karki ◽  
Kamal Prakash Budhathoki ◽  
Adriaan Perrels ◽  
...  

The Finnish Nepalese Project (FNEP) is a project aimed for the development of infrastructure, education and preparedness to better respond to the increased risks related to the weather-related natural disasters by climate change in Nepal. The project duration was 2010-2012, and the partners were the Finnish Meteorological Institute and the Government of Nepal, Ministry of Environment and Science, Department of Hydrology and Meteorology. The project is financed by the Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. This paper introduces the concept and main results of the project.Journal of Hydrology and Meteorology, Vol. 8(1) 2012, p.72-76


Author(s):  
Gerhard Berz

Windstorm disasters (including storm surges) account for about one-third of all natural disasters throughout the world (by number, fatalities and economic losses), but for more than two-thirds of the corresponding insured losses. Trend analyses reveal that major windstorm disasters and the losses generated by them have increased drastically in recent decades. Risk partnership between the state, the affected population and the insurance industry assumes a key role with regard to the windstorm hazard. Scientists, engineers and insurers must work together in formulating their requirements and shaping them in such a way that politicians can derive clearly recognizable policy options (e.g. land-use, restrictions, design-code adjustments) from them. Another important aspect is stepping up the efforts being made towards curbing climate change, which will, otherwise, exacerbate the risk in the future.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabriela Gesualdo ◽  
Felipe Souza ◽  
Eduardo Mendiondo

<p>Extreme weather events are increasingly evident and widespread around the world due to climate change. These events are driven by rising temperatures and changes in precipitation patterns, which lead to changes in flood frequency, drought and water availability. To reduce the future impacts of natural disasters, it is crucial to understand the spatiotemporal variability of social, economic and environmental vulnerabilities related to natural disasters. Particularly, developing countries are more vulnerable to climate risks due to their greater economic dependence on climate-sensitive primary activities, infrastructure, finance and other factors that undermine successful adaptation. In this concept, adaptation plays the role of anticipating the adverse effects of climate change and taking appropriate measures to prevent or minimize the damage they may cause. Thus, the insurance fund is a valuable adaptation tool for unexpected losses reimbursement, long-term impacts prevention and encouraging risk mitigation. Although this approach is successful throughout the world and major organizations support insurance as an adaptation measure, the Brazilian insurance fund only provides support for rural landowners. Thus, we will evaluate the implementation of an indexed multi-risk insurance fund integrated with water security parameters, as an instrument for adaptation to climate change. We will use the SWAT+, a hydrosedimentological model, to assess the current conditions and future scenarios (up to 2100) of water security indices considering two International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Representative Concentration Pathways (RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5). Then, we will incorporate those parameters to the Hydrological Risk Transfer Model (MTRH). Our results will provide optimized premium in current and future scenarios for supporting adaptation plans to climate change. Furthermore, to contribute to technical-scientific information addressing possible effects of climate change on the hydrometeorological variables and their spatiotemporal variability.</p>


2012 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 197-213 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anika Nasra Haque ◽  
Stelios Grafakos ◽  
Marijk Huijsman

Dhaka is one of the largest megacities in the world and its population is growing rapidly. Due to its location on a deltaic plain, the city is extremely prone to detrimental flooding, and risks associated with this are expected to increase further in the coming years due to global climate change impacts as well as the high rate of urbanization the city is facing. The lowest-lying part of Dhaka, namely Dhaka East, is facing the most severe risk of flooding. Traditionally, excess water in this part of the city was efficiently stored in water ponds and gradually drained into rivers through connected canals. However, the alarming increase in Dhaka’s population is causing encroachment of these water retention areas because of land scarcity. The city’s natural drainage is not functioning well and the area is still not protected from flooding, which causes major threats to its inhabitants. This situation increases the urgency to adapt effectively to current flooding caused by climate variability and also to the impacts of future climate change. Although the government is planning several adaptive measures to protect the area from floods, a systematic framework to analyze and assess them is lacking. The objective of this paper is to develop an integrated framework for the assessment and prioritization of various (current and potential) adaptation measures aimed at protecting vulnerable areas from flooding. The study identifies, analyzes, assesses and prioritizes adaptive initiatives and measures to address flood risks in the eastern fringe area, and the adaptation assessment is conducted within the framework of multi-criteria analysis (MCA) methodology. MCA facilitates the participation of stakeholders and hence allows normative judgements, while incorporating technical expertise in the adaptation assessment. Based on the assessment, adaptive measures are prioritized to indicate which actions should be implemented first. Such a participatory integrated assessment of adaptation options is currently lacking in the decision-making process in the city of Dhaka and could greatly help reach informed and structured decisions in the development of adaptation strategies for flood protection.


2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 067
Author(s):  
Achmad Romsan ◽  
Farida Ali ◽  
Akhmad Idris ◽  
Adrian Nugraha ◽  
Nurhidayatuloh Nurhidayatuloh ◽  
...  

Climate change and global warming affect major change in freshwater availability and season uncertainty which hamper all part of the globe. Although the phenomenon is not new but it needs concerns from all the government of States around the world to  address the problem. If notthe drought and water shortages will directly and indirectly be the world problem and finally will ignite conflict over resources.Pollution and environmental degradation will also affect the sustainability of community’s economic activities. In Indonesia, since the enforcement of the first Environmental Management Act of 1982 up to the third Environmental Management Act of 2019, there have been forty one conflicts involving community and industries and palm plantation companies. All the conflicts are brought before the courts. Herein, industries and plantations are blamed for responsible for river water pollution and environmental degradation. Unfortunately, there is very little information in Indonesia obtained from the research reports, journals, news papers, magazines whether climate change and global warming also responsible for the occurrence of community environmental conflict. From the second data sources obtained from outsite Indonesia it is found that there is a link between climate change and community environmental disputes. The objectives of this paper tryto examine whether the cases submitted and solved by the District Courtsalso have some connection with the climate change phenomenon. Other objectives are to recommend to the Government of Indonesia to strengthen the existing regulations dealing with the climate change


2015 ◽  
Vol 37 (3) ◽  
pp. 36-37
Author(s):  
Colin Garner ◽  
David Brown

Medicine as currently practised throughout the world is threatened by the rise of antibiotic resistant infections. In 2014 it was reported that 50,000 people a year die from antibiotic resistant infections in the USA and Europe. Worldwide there may be as many as 700,000 deaths a year. Jim O'Neill, the eminent economist appointed by the Prime Minister as chair of the Government Review of Antimicrobial resistance recently stated “For doctors and for those who have experienced first-hand the anxiety of an infection that is drugresistant, as a patient or when caring for a loved one, there is little need to prove the importance of tackling antimicrobial resistance.”1,2 The Prime Minister stated in 2014 that the world could soon be “cast back into the dark ages of medicine” unless action is taken to tackle the growing threat of resistance to antibiotics”,3.


2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 129
Author(s):  
Indra Jaya Wiranata ◽  
Khairunnisa Simbolon

<p>Global policies on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) address several aspects of environmental life and climate change. There are still challenges that many regions do not pursue the achievement of sustainable development goals which means that SDGs cannot simply and automatically be achieved in several regions due to different contexts and different geographic backgrounds. Extreme climate change can cause natural disasters that have the potential to cause losses and even claim victims. Thus, Lampung, which is a disaster-prone area, is interesting to be studied whether the government and the community's efforts to realize potential disasters have been accomplished properly. This research explains the efforts that have been and need to be done by Lampung Province in responding to potential disasters through a policy brief in order to motivate the government to pay more attention to climate change and natural disasters. This research is a type of qualitative research with primary data that will be taken by using interview techniques and literature review. The survey was conducted by random sampling the people of Lampung regarding the level of awareness of potential disasters. The data will also be obtained by using Google Trend. The results of this research indicate that the efforts of the Lampung Provincial Government such as mitigation, emergency response, reconstruction, rehabilitation, disaster risk assessments, and support from the epistemic community.</p>


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