Measurements from the University of Colorado RAAVEN Uncrewed Aircraft System during ATOMIC

Between 24 January and 15 February 2020, small uncrewed aircraft systems (sUASs) were deployed to Morgan Lewis (Barbados) as part of the Atlantic Tradewind Ocean–Atmosphere Mesoscale Interaction Campaign (ATOMIC), a sister project to the ElUcidating the RolE of Cloud-Circulation Coupling in ClimAte (EUREC4A) project. The observations from ATOMIC and EUREC4A were aimed at improving our understanding of trade-wind cumulus clouds and the environmental regimes supporting them and involved the deployment of a wide variety of observational assets, including aircraft, ships, surface-based systems, and profilers. The current paper describes ATOMIC observations obtained using the University of Colorado Boulder RAAVEN (Robust Autonomous Aerial Vehicle – Endurant Nimble) sUAS. This platform collected nearly 80 h of data throughout the lowest kilometer of the atmosphere, sampling the near-shore environment upwind from Barbados. Data from these platforms are publicly available through the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Center for Environmental Intelligence (NCEI) archive. The primary DOI for the quality-controlled dataset described in this paper is https://doi.org/10.25921/jhnd-8e58 (de Boer et al., 2021).

First insights into coral recruit and juvenile abundances at remote Aldabra Atoll, Seychelles

Coral recruitment and successive growth are essential for post-disturbance reef recovery. As coral recruit and juvenile abundances vary across locations and under different environmental regimes, their assessment at remote, undisturbed reefs improves our understanding of early life stage dynamics of corals. Here, we first explored changes in coral juvenile abundance across three locations (lagoon, seaward west and east) at remote Aldabra Atoll (Seychelles) between 2015 and 2019, which spanned the 2015/16 global coral bleaching event. Secondly, we measured variation in coral recruit abundance on settlement tiles from two sites (lagoon, seaward reef) during August 2018–August 2019. Juvenile abundance decreased from 14.1 ± 1.2 to 7.4 ± 0.5 colonies m-2 (mean ± SE) during 2015–2016 and increased to 22.4 ± 1.2 colonies m-2 during 2016–2019. Whilst juvenile abundance increased two- to three-fold at the lagoonal and seaward western sites during 2016–2018 (from 7.7–8.3 to 17.3–24.7 colonies m-2), increases at the seaward eastern sites occurred later (2018–2019; from 5.8–6.9 to 16.6–24.1 colonies m-2). The composition of coral recruits on settlement tiles was dominated by Pocilloporidae (64–92% of all recruits), and recruit abundance was 7- to 47-fold higher inside than outside the lagoon. Recruit abundance was highest in October–December 2018 (2164 ± 453 recruits m-2) and lowest in June–August 2019 (240 ± 98 recruits m-2). As Acroporid recruit abundance corresponded to this trend, the results suggest that broadcast spawning occurred during October–December, when water temperature increased from 26 to 29°C. This study provides the first published record on coral recruit abundance in the Seychelles Outer Islands, indicates a rapid (2–3 years) increase of juvenile corals following a bleaching event, and provides crucial baseline data for future research on reef resilience and connectivity within the region.

Oikography: Ethnographies of House-ing in Critical Times

Houses are at once built shelters; collections of relations, affects, and moralities; and nodes within neighborhoods, communities, and larger political-economic and environmental regimes. This Colloquy proposes oikography as an ethnographic approach that deconstructs technocratic assumptions about the house and traces the plasticity of dwelling across multiple space-times, with a focus on the action of house-ing. Inspired by critical perspectives emanating from the diasporic, post-plantation house, we explore the reciprocal process of people making houses and houses making people amid ongoing calamity. The processes of house-ing reveal houses as unpredictable human-nonhuman entities, modulated by tensions between stability and instability, borders and fluxes, stillness and movement. Oikography is thus attuned to multirelational efforts at creating provisional dwellings, grounds from which the past is gauged and future horizons crafted. Resumo As casas são ao mesmo tempo abrigos construídos, coleções de relações, afetos e moralidades, e nodos dentro de bairros, comunidades e regimes político-econômicos e ambientais. Esta coletânea propõe a oikografia como uma abordagem etnográfica que desmonta pressupostos tecnocráticos sobre a casa e traça a plasticidade da moradia através de múltiplos espaços e temporalidades, com foco nas ações de house-ing. Inspirados por perspectivas críticas que emanam do viver diaspórico e pós-plantação, exploramos o processo recíproco de pessoas fazendo casas e casas fazendo pessoas em meio a calamidades recorrentes. Os processos de house-ing mostram as casas como entidades humano-não humanas imprevisíveis, moduladas por tensões entre estabilidade e instabilidade, limites e fluxos, repouso e movimento. A oikografia está assim em sintonia com os esforços multi-relacionais de criação de vivendas provisórias, bases a partir das quais o passado é aferido e horizontes futuros são traçados. Resumen Las casas son a la vez refugios construidos, complejos de relaciones, afectos y moralidades, nodos dentro de barrios, comunidades, regímenes político-económicos y medioambientales. Este dossier propone a la oikografía como un enfoque etnográfico que deconstruye los supuestos tecnocráticos sobre la casa y rastrea su plasticidad a través de tiempos y espacios, focalizando las acciones de house-ing. Inspirados en las perspectivas críticas que emanan del vivir diaspórico y de la post-plantación, exploramos el proceso recíproco de personas que hacen casas y de casas que hacen personas en medio a las calamidades del mundo contemporáneo. Los procesos de house-ing muestran a las casas como entidades humanas-no humanas impredecibles, moduladas por tensiones entre estabilidad e inestabilidad, fronteras y flujos, quietud y movimiento. La oikografía está, por lo tanto, en sintonía con los esfuerzos multirrelacionales para crear hogares provisorios, terrenos desde los que se observa el pasado y se elaboran horizontes de futuro.

Part VIII Compliance, Implementation, and Effectiveness, Ch.57 Effectiveness

This chapter introduces some key concepts: what international regimes are; how to measure their effectiveness (the dependent variable); how this can be explained (independent variable); and the severe methodological challenges associated with answering these questions. Two main explanatory perspectives are introduced: the nature of the problem dealt with by the regime and its problem-solving ability. The chapter then surveys some key general findings that have emerged from the study of the effectiveness of international environmental regimes. Perhaps the most important finding is that although most international regimes that have been studied have had some effect on the problems they address, they have very rarely been able—if at all—to solve them fully. Another important observation is the sizeable variation among regimes in their problem-solving ability. The chapter presents empirical examples to illustrate how effectiveness can be measured and explained in practice. Most attention is given to the global climate regime, given its prominence on the international agenda. Viewed from a problem-solving perspective, however, the climate regime emerges as a low-effectiveness regime. This is briefly contrasted with the highly successful international ozone regime, as well as a regime that is very hard to measure in terms of effectiveness due to the deep and divisive conflicts over values, namely, the international whaling regime.

Part IV Normative Development, Ch.24 Multilateral Environmental Treaty Making

This chapter reflects on multilateral environmental treaty making. From its inception, international environmental law has consisted primarily of treaties and other forms of negotiated instruments, which offer several advantages over more informal mechanisms of international cooperation. Traditionally, treaties were comparatively static arrangements, memorializing the rights and duties of the parties as agreed at a particular point in time. Today, environmental agreements are usually dynamic arrangements, establishing ongoing regulatory processes. The result is that, in most environmental regimes, the treaty text itself represents just the tip of the normative iceberg. Most norms are adopted through more flexible techniques, which allow international environmental law to respond quickly to the emergence of new problems and new knowledge. The chapter then introduces the basic types of international instruments, analysing why states negotiate and accept them. It describes the process by which agreements are created, from the inception of negotiations to the adoption and entry into force of the resulting instrument. The chapter also explores various design issues in developing international environmental agreements.

A branching process model for dormancy and seed banks in randomly fluctuating environments

The goal of this article is to contribute towards the conceptual and quantitative understanding of the evolutionary benefits for (microbial) populations to maintain a seed bank consisting of dormant individuals when facing fluctuating environmental conditions. To this end, we discuss a class of ‘2-type’ branching processes describing populations of individuals that may switch between ‘active’ and ‘dormant’ states in a random environment oscillating between a ‘healthy’ and a ‘harsh’ state. We incorporate different switching strategies and suggest a method of ‘fair comparison’ to incorporate potentially varying reproductive costs. We then use this concept to compare the fitness of the different strategies in terms of maximal Lyapunov exponents. This gives rise to a ‘fitness map’ depicting the environmental regimes where certain switching strategies are uniquely supercritical.

Evolution of the International Forest Regulation

In 2019, the World came face to face with the unprecedented challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic. While the immediate global priority has become to tackle the global public health emergency, the long-term response must also address the underlying causes of such a pandemic. Degradation and loss of forests is one of such contributing factors disrupting nature’s balance and increasing the risk and exposure of people to zoonotic diseases. Worldwide deforestation and forest degradation are continuing at alarming rates. The underlying causes of deforestation and forest degradation include the lack of good governance at both international and national levels, the undervaluation of forest products and ecosystem services and the inadequate crosssectoral policies (e.g. policies that encourage the conversion of forestland to other uses). In order to overcome these major obstacles in combating deforestation and forest degradation it is important to provide for forestrelated policy consistency and for effective policy coordination. Up until now, although in general the need for consistency and coordination has been recognized, the extent to which various environmental regimes interact concerning forest regulation and/or may be in conflict with one another remains underexploited. In order in a later step of the research to investigate the interactions and identify conflicts, gaps and synergies with regards to forest regulation, this current article sets the background and investigates the forest regulation under the international environmental law. The challenge for such investigation lies in the fragmentation of the international forest regulation: instead of a basis in a single convention or a protocol, provisions related to forests are scattered through the pieces of hard, soft and private international law. The objective of the current article is to grasp the overall scope of the international forestrelated instruments and their evolution under various environmental regimes. The main methodology employed throughout the research is desktop research and legal analysis. In a chronological order the article investigates the evolution of the international forest regulation and reveals its current highly fragmented state.Following the introduction is the essential scientific background for the purpose of the legal research: a brief explanation of what constitutes “forests”, an overview of forests resources worldwide and of the current alarming rates of forests decline. In the following, the article looks at the evolution of the topic of forests in the international agenda from their first appearance up until today. For the purpose of the research three developmental stages in the evolution of the forest regulation at the international level are distinguished: the Foundational Period (i.e. before 1990) — when the scientific consensus about global deforestation and forest degradation developed and transformed from a scientific into a policy issue; the Fragmentation Period (from 1990 until 2011) — when forests entered the UN environmental agenda and gained attention as a stand-alone topic and the United Nations Forum on Forests (UNFF) was established; and the Pre-Constitutional Period (from 2011 — onwards) — when negotiations on the Legally Binding Agreement (LBA) on forests in Europe are taking place. Finally, the conclusions bring the findings of the article together and provide the ground for subsequent legal research.

Measurements from the University of Colorado RAAVEN Uncrewed Aircraft System during ATOMIC

Between 24 January and 15 February 2020, small uncrewed aircraft systems (sUAS) were deployed to Morgan Lewis (Barbados) as part of the Atlantic Tradewind Ocean-Atmosphere Mesoscale Interaction Campaign (ATOMIC), a sister project to the ElUcidating the RolE of Cloud-Circulation Coupling in ClimAte (EUREC4A) project. The observations from ATOMIC and EUREC4A were aimed at improving our understanding of trade-wind cumulus clouds and the environmental regimes supporting them, and involved the deployment of a wide variety of observational assets, including aircraft, ships, surface-based systems and profilers. The current manuscript describes ATOMIC observations obtained using the University of Colorado Boulder RAAVEN sUAS. This platform collected nearly 80 hours of data throughout the lowest kilometer of the atmosphere, sampling the near-shore environment upwind from Barbados. Data from these platforms are publicly available through the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Center for Environmental Intelligence (NCEI) archive. The primary DOI for the quality-controlled dataset described in this manuscript is 10.25921/jhnd-8e58 (de Boer et al., 2021).