Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment of Imperiled Plants in the Mojave Desert

The Mojave Desert in the southwestern United States is one of the hottest and driest areas of North America. Climate change is likely to exacerbate these conditions. The region is home to many endemic plant species, including 24 federally threatened species. The impact of climate change factors on these sensitive Mojave Desert species is relatively unknown. Here we used a climate change vulnerability assessment to determine which imperiled plants may be most affected by changing climatic conditions. We evaluated the vulnerability of each species under future climate scenarios and calculated scores using metrics such as exposure, sensitivity, niche breadth, and dispersal capability. We found that most listed plant species were vulnerable to climate change, with 21% (N = 5) classified as extremely vulnerable, 25% (N = 6) classified as highly vulnerable, and 42% (N = 10) classified as moderately vulnerable. Contributing factors most frequently associated with vulnerability included various barriers to migration, high habitat specificity, and species sensitivity to changes in hydrological patterns. Many of these species are already threatened by ongoing anthropogenic stressors such as urban growth and associated developments, and these results suggest that climate change will pose additional challenges for conservation and management. Natural resource managers can use the vulnerability ranking and contributing factors identified from these analyses to inform ecological decisions related to threatened plants throughout desert regions.

A Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment among Small Farmers: A Case Study in Western Honduras

Climate change is now affecting every known society. Small farmers in Low Income Countries (LICs) are especially vulnerable to climate change patterns because they depend heavily on rain, seasonality patterns, and known temperature ranges. To help build climate change resilient communities among rural farmers, the first step is to understand the impact of climate change on the population. This dissertation aims to use information and communication technology (ICT) to assess climate change vulnerabilities among rural farmers. To achieve this overall goal, this dissertation first proposes a comprehensive Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment Framework (CCVAF) that integrates both community level and individual household level indicators. The CCVAF was instantiated into a GIS-based web application named THRIVE for different decision makers to better assess how climate change is affecting rural farmers in Western Honduras. Qualitative evaluation of the THRIVE showed that it is an innovative and useful tool. The CCVAF and its instantiation provides an important initial step towards building climate change resilience among rural farmers. It is the first attempt to provide a comprehensive set of the indicators with related measurements and data sources for climate change vulnerability assessment. The framework thus contributes to the knowledge base of the climate change vulnerability assessment. It also contributes to the design science literature by providing guidelines to design a class of climate change vulnerability assessment solutions. To the best of our knowledge, the CCVAF is the first generalizable artifact that can be used to build a group of ICT-based climate change vulnerability assessment solutions. Another knowledge contribution of this dissertation is its reproducibility by making the input and output data available to the research and practitioner community through a GeoHub. For practical contributions, the framework can be easily used by researchers and practitioners to consistently design a vulnerability assessment tool, starting with the set of indicators organized by the three-level determinants, and following specific spatial data analysis and models. Such an ICT-based tool adds practical values to tackle climate change challenges.

Climate Change: Vulnerability Assessment of Vanishing Springs in the Mid-Hills of Nepal

Springs are the major source of water supply for domestic and agricultural uses in the mid-hills of Nepal. Therefore, these resources must be preserved and protected for the benefit of the ecology, environment, economic wellbeing and quality of life. This study aimed to assess the community perception and vulnerability assessment of spring water. Based on the participatory methods, views and experiences of communities were analyzed to understand their perception towards climate change. On the other hand, vulnerability assessment was carried out to analyze the situation of water availability in springs. The study reveals that water consumer communities have experienced changing patterns of local climate which correlates with the long-term rainfall and temperature data. Vulnerability ranged from 0.10 to 0.67. Moreover, meager water resources and low discharge during summer have resulted a lot of hardship to the people. The findings will assist policymakers and development agencies to plan and implement their projects more effectively at the local and national levels.

Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment in the High Mountain Region of Nepal: A Case Study of Lamjung District

Climate change vulnerability has need access to targeted scientific information about the impacts of climate change in order to adapt to its effects. Awareness can be measured through three different parameters-conceptualization, engagement and experimental. This research has conduct in Lamjung district where people are victimize from climate change. Primary and secondary sources of data are used. This study used household surveys and focus group discussions to assess people perceptions of these changes and identify the climate change vulnerability. Thus, the present study aimed to evaluate the Lamjung districts, vulnerable in the context of the climate change. This result is useful for policymaker, local government and different stockholder who are working on climate change sector. It is also important for long term changes in climate variables and occurrences of natural disasters is the most important component to determine the overall vulnerability. Climate change vulnerability had been decreased considerably in this study area. Meanwhile, long-term research in Nepal is required for extensive work on climate change and primary data collection for climate change vulnerability assessment.