scholarly journals Environmental Efficacy, Climate Change Beliefs, Ideology, and Public Water Policy Preferences

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (13) ◽  
pp. 7000
Author(s):  
Erika Allen Wolters ◽  
Brent S. Steel
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Water Management ◽  
Political Ideology ◽  
Water Policy ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Agricultural Development ◽  
Policy Option ◽  
Policy Preferences ◽  
The West ◽  
Water Policies

Water is an unpredictable and often overallocated resource in the American West, one that strains policy makers to come up with viable, and politically acceptable policies to mitigate water management concerns. While large federal reclamation projects once dominated western water management and provided ample water for large scale agricultural development as well as the urbanization of the West, water engineering alone is no longer sufficient or, in some cases, a politically acceptable policy option. As demand for water in the West increases with an ever-growing population, climate change is presenting a more challenging and potentially untenable, reality of even longer periods of drought and insufficient water quantity. The complexity of managing water resources under climate change conditions will require multifaceted and publicly acceptable strategies. This paper therefore examines water policy preferences of residents in four western states: Washington, Oregon, California, and Idaho. Using a public survey conducted in these states in 2019, we examine preferences pertaining to infrastructural, education, incentives and regulation specifically examining levels of support for varying policies based on climate change and environmental efficacy beliefs as well as geography, demographic variables, and political ideology. Results show support for all water policies surveyed, with the exception of charging higher rates for water during the hottest part of summer. The most preferred water policies pertained to tax incentives. Some variation of support exists based on gender, education, environmental values, efficacy, state residency and belief in anthropogenic climate change.

scholarly journals WETCHIMP-WSL: intercomparison of wetland methane emissions models over West Siberia

2015 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 1907-1973 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. J. Bohn ◽  
J. R. Melton ◽  
A. Ito ◽  
T. Kleinen ◽  
R. Spahni ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Methane Emissions ◽  
High Latitudes ◽  
The West ◽  
Wetland Area ◽  
Forward Models ◽  
Ch4 Emissions ◽  
In Situ Observations

Abstract. Wetlands are the world's largest natural source of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas. The strong sensitivity of methane emissions to environmental factors such as soil temperature and moisture has led to concerns about potential positive feedbacks to climate change. This risk is particularly relevant at high latitudes, which have experienced pronounced warming and where thawing permafrost could potentially liberate large amounts of labile carbon over the next 100 years. However, global models disagree as to the magnitude and spatial distribution of emissions, due to uncertainties in wetland area and emissions per unit area and a scarcity of in situ observations. Recent intensive field campaigns across the West Siberian Lowland (WSL) make this an ideal region over which to assess the performance of large-scale process-based wetland models in a high-latitude environment. Here we present the results of a follow-up to the Wetland and Wetland CH4 Intercomparison of Models Project (WETCHIMP), focused on the West Siberian Lowland (WETCHIMP-WSL). We assessed 21 models and 5 inversions over this domain in terms of total CH4 emissions, simulated wetland areas, and CH4 fluxes per unit wetland area and compared these results to an intensive in situ CH4 flux dataset, several wetland maps, and two satellite inundation products. We found that: (a) despite the large scatter of individual estimates, 12 year mean estimates of annual total emissions over the WSL from forward models (5.34 ± 0.54 Tg CH4 y-1), inversions (6.06 ± 1.22 Tg CH4 y-1), and in situ observations (3.91 ± 1.29 Tg CH4 y-1) largely agreed, (b) forward models using inundation products alone to estimate wetland areas suffered from severe biases in CH4 emissions, (c) the interannual timeseries of models that lacked either soil thermal physics appropriate to the high latitudes or realistic emissions from unsaturated peatlands tended to be dominated by a single environmental driver (inundation or air temperature), unlike those of inversions and more sophisticated forward models, (d) differences in biogeochemical schemes across models had relatively smaller influence over performance; and (e) multi-year or multi-decade observational records are crucial for evaluating models' responses to long-term climate change.

scholarly journals Integration of gender considerations into Tanzania's climate and water policies

Water Policy ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Margaret Sima Kironde ◽  
Oludare Sunday Durodola ◽  
Claydon Mumba Kanyunge
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Water Management ◽  
Climate Change Impacts ◽  
Gender Issues ◽  
Vital Role ◽  
Water Access ◽  
Policy Documents ◽  
Gender Integration ◽  
Water Policies ◽  
Climate Policies

Abstract Integrating gender considerations into national policies such as climate and water policies is a critical step toward achieving gender equality, resilient systems, sustainable water access and management of climate change. In Tanzania, just like in many developing countries, women play a vital role in water management and could be more vulnerable to climate change impacts than their male counterparts. While there are few attempts in existing literature toward examining the integration of gender considerations into water and climate policies, analyzing policies' formulation process has not been given attention. Thus, this study analyzed the extent and effectiveness of gender integration in climate change and water sector policies in Tanzania. The study shows that there is a substantial acknowledgment of gender issues in the reviewed policy documents but there exist considerable gaps in terms of integrating gender issues in the documents and during formulation processes.

scholarly journals Management of Water Resources in Agriculture in Chile and its Challenges

2021 ◽  
Vol 48 (3) ◽  
pp. 171-185
Author(s):  
Guillermo Donoso ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Water Management ◽  
Water Resource Management ◽  
Agricultural Development ◽  
Agricultural Sector ◽  
Agricultural Water ◽  
Agricultural Water Management ◽  
Northern Regions ◽  
Management Policies ◽  
Key Aspects

Water is a strategic resource for agricultural development, particularly in the arid and semiarid regions of central and northern Chile. Currently, irrigated surfaces contribute between 60 and 65% of the country’s agricultural GDP. Associated with Chile’s economic growth, total consumptive water use has increased, which, together with population growth, urbanization, water contamination and pollution, has led to important water stress situations that are triggering a greater number of conflicts and social, economic, and environmental vulnerability. The above phenomena will be exacerbated by climate change. At present, surface water deficit covering irrigation demands exists in the central and northern regions. This deficit is projected to increase as a result of climate change, which would increase the challenges for satisfying agricultural water requirements. The objective of this article is to integrally review the key aspects of Chilean water and agricultural water management policies, considering their interphases, providing the reader with a general overview of the main features of this model, an evaluation of its effectiveness and the main challenges agricultural water management faces. Resolving the challenges of the future requires a thorough reconsideration of water management policies and institutions and how water is managed in the agricultural sector in the broader context of overall water resource management in Chile.

scholarly journals Not All Skepticism Is Equal: Exploring the Ideological Antecedents of Science Acceptance and Rejection

2017 ◽  
Vol 44 (3) ◽  
pp. 384-405 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bastiaan T. Rutjens ◽  
Robbie M. Sutton ◽  
Romy van der Lee
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Political Ideology ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Political Orientation ◽  
Food Acceptance ◽  
Change Acceptance ◽  
Gm Food ◽  
Science Understanding ◽  
Political Conservatism ◽  
Large Scale Survey

Many topics that scientists investigate speak to people’s ideological worldviews. We report three studies—including an analysis of large-scale survey data—in which we systematically investigate the ideological antecedents of general faith in science and willingness to support science, as well as of science skepticism of climate change, vaccination, and genetic modification (GM). The main predictors are religiosity and political orientation, morality, and science understanding. Overall, science understanding is associated with vaccine and GM food acceptance, but not climate change acceptance. Importantly, different ideological predictors are related to the acceptance of different scientific findings. Political conservatism best predicts climate change skepticism. Religiosity, alongside moral purity concerns, best predicts vaccination skepticism. GM food skepticism is not fueled by religious or political ideology. Finally, religious conservatives consistently display a low faith in science and an unwillingness to support science. Thus, science acceptance and rejection have different ideological roots, depending on the topic of investigation.

scholarly journals Good Status in the Changing Climate?—Climate Proofing Law on Water Management in the EU

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 517
Author(s):  
Suvi-Tuuli Puharinen
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Water Management ◽  
Water Framework Directive ◽  
Surface Waters ◽  
Water Policy ◽  
Climate Change Impacts ◽  
Eu Water Framework Directive ◽  
Management Objectives ◽  
Policy Objectives ◽  
The Eu

Climate change impacts constitute a major risk to the attainment of water policy objectives. This article analyses the resilience of the EU Water Framework Directive (WFD) in the light of the challenges that climate change brings to achieving the Directive’s objectives, no-deterioration and good status of surface waters and groundwater. The WFD includes mechanisms to adapt the water management objectives to climate change impacts, including redefining good status and application of exemptions. However, more harmonised efforts at the EU level would be needed to ensure an equal level of ambition and continuity in the water management objectives capacity to steer towards sustainable regime shifts.

scholarly journals The effects of a temporal framing manipulation on environmentalism: A replication and extension

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. e0246058
Author(s):  
Samantha K. Stanley ◽  
Anna Klas ◽  
Edward J. R. Clarke ◽  
Iain Walker
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Political Ideology ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Environmental Changes ◽  
Open Science ◽  
Political Orientation ◽  
Temporal Framing ◽  
Replication Studies ◽  
The Past ◽  
State Of The Environment

Recent research promotes comparing the current state of the environment with the past (and not the future) to increase the pro-environmental attitudes of those on the political right. We aimed to replicate this temporal framing effect and extend on research in this area by testing the potential drivers of the effect. Across two large-scale replication studies, we found limited evidence that past comparisons (relative to future comparisons) increase pro-environmentalism among those with a more conservative political ideology, thus precluding a full investigation into the mediators of the effect. Where the effect was present, it was not consistent across studies. In Study One, conservatives reported greater certainty that climate change was real after viewing past comparisons, as the environmental changes were perceived as more certain. However, in Study Two, the temporal framing condition interacted with political orientation to instead undermine the certainty about climate change among political liberals in the past-focused condition. Together, these studies present the first evidence of backfire from temporal frames, and do not support the efficacy of past comparisons for increasing conservatives’ environmentalism. We echo recent calls for open science principles, including preregistration and efforts to replicate existing work, and suggest the replication of other methods of inducing temporal comparisons.

scholarly journals Current state and perspective of water management policy in terms of climate change

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (5) ◽  
pp. 796-811 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sanja Stojkovic Zlatanovic ◽  
Milan Stojkovic ◽  
Mihailo Mitkovic
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Water Management ◽  
European Union ◽  
River Basin ◽  
Water Policy ◽  
Management Policy ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Morava River ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Morava River Basin

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to set out the policy guidelines and recommendations to harmonise the Serbian water legislation with European Union standards in the area of water system management as impacted by climate change. Design/methodology/approach The EU Water Framework Directive is analysed in the context of implementation of the integrated water management policy presented in the Serbian Water Law (2010), as well as the National Water Management Strategy (2016). It has been found that the water management legislation that deals with the impact of climate change on water resources is incomplete. Although there are numerous challenges related to research of climate change and water systems, water policy and legal aspects cannot be neglected. The so-called soft law instruments represented in a form of strategy documents could be a valuable response in terms of an adaptive and integrated water policy approach. Findings The research is applied to a case study of the Velika Morava River Basin, at Ljubicevski Most hydrological station. Long-term projections suggest a decrease in annual precipitation levels and annual flows up to the year 2100 for climatic scenarios A1B and A2, accompanied by a rapid increase in air temperatures. Originality/value This study proposes a water management policy and provides recommendations for the Velika Morava River Basin as impacted by climate change, according to the European Union legislation.

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