Adaptation policies to increase terrestrial ecosystem resilience: potential utility of a multicriteria approach

Climate change is rapidly undermining terrestrial ecosystem resilience and capacity to continue providing their services to the benefit of humanity and nature. Because of the importance of terrestrial ecosystems to human well-being and supporting services, decision makers throughout the world are busy creating policy responses that secure multiple development and conservation objectives— including that of supporting terrestrial ecosystem resilience in the context of climate change. This article aims to advance analyses on climate policy evaluation and planning in the area of terrestrial ecosystem resilience by discussing adaptation policy options within the ecology-economy-social nexus. The paper evaluates these decisions in the realm of terrestrial ecosystem resilience and evaluates the utility of a set of criteria, indicators, and assessment methods, proposed by a new conceptual multi-criteria framework for pro-development climate policy and planning developed by the United Nations Environment Programme. Potential applications of a multicriteria approach to climate policy vis-à-vis terrestrial ecosystems are then explored through two hypothetical case study examples. The paper closes with a brief discussion of the utility of the multi-criteria approach in the context of other climate policy evaluation approaches, considers lessons learned as a result efforts to evaluate climate policy in the realm of terrestrial ecosystems, and reiterates the role of ecosystem resilience in creating sound policies and actions that support the integration of climate change and development goals.     

Managing climate change risks in New York City’s water system: assessment and adaptation planning

Managing risk by adapting long-lived infrastructure to the effects of climate change must become a regular part of planning for water supply, sewer, wastewater treatment, and other urban infrastructure during this century. The New York City Department of Environmental Protection (NYCDEP), the agency responsible for managing New York City’s (NYC) water supply, sewer, and wastewater treatment systems, has developed a climate risk management framework through its Climate Change Task Force, a government-university collaborative effort. Its purpose is to ensure that NYCDEP’s strategic and capital planning take into account the potential risks of climate change—sea-level rise, higher temperature, increases in extreme events, changes in drought and flood frequency and intensity, and changing precipitation patterns—on NYC’s water systems. This approach will enable NYCDEP and other agencies to incorporate adaptations to the risks of climate change into their management, investment, and policy decisions over the long term as a regular part of their planning activities. The framework includes a 9-step Adaptation Assessment procedure. Potential climate change adaptations are divided into management, infrastructure, and policy categories, and are assessed by their relevance in terms of climate change time-frame (immediate, medium, and long term), the capital cycle, costs, and other risks. The approach focuses on the water supply, sewer, and wastewater treatment systems of NYC, but has wide application for other urban areas, especially those in coastal locations.     

Urban heat indicator map for climate adaptation planning

By 2050, 75 % of the world’s population will live in cities and the occurrence of heat wave events might have doubled. Mapping the climate and land use change impact for urban heat events should set the agenda for adaptation planning at the local scale. Literature on urban heat mapping does not reveal a clear indicator to visualise the urban heat impacts that includes consequences of land use and climate changes for planning purposes. This paper introduces a stepwise approach to develop a single complex indicator to map the urban heat impact for local climate adaptation planning processes. Information on climatic drivers and land use characteristics are combined and projected for future land use and climate change impacts. Next, several visualisation techniques are developed to investigate which techniques are most effective to visualise complex information with multiple variables in one visualisation. A usability test is performed to investigate how indicator and map meet the information and communication needs of policy makers. Our findings reveal that it is important to add information on future impacts to set the agenda for adaptation planning at the local scale. Applying cartographic techniques in a map series presentation has proven to be effective to map complex information in a single image and fulfil most of the identified information needs. Based on our finding, we introduce the information enrichment chain as a promising approach to support local adaptation planning.     

Does planned retreat matter? Investigating land use change under the impacts of flooding induced by sea level rise

Coastal regions worldwide are during the process of rapid urban expansion. However, expanded urban settlements in land-sea interfaces have been faced with unprecedented threats from climate change related hazards. Adaptation to coastal hazards has received increasing attention from city managers and planners. Adaptation and land management practices are largely informed by remote sensing and land change modeling. This paper establishes a framework that integrates land change analysis, coastal flooding, and sea level rise adaptation. Multilayer perceptron neural network, similarity learning, and binary logistic regression were applied to analyze spatiotemporal changes of residential, commercial, and other built-up areas in Bay County, Florida, USA. The prediction maps of 2030 were produced by three models under four policy scenarios that included the population relocation strategy. Validation results reveal that three models return overall acceptable accuracies but generate distinct landscape patterns. Predictions indicate that planned retreat of residents can greatly reduce urban vulnerability to sea level rise induced flooding. While managed realignment of the coast brings large benefits, the paper recommends different mixes of adaptation strategies for different parts of the globe, and advocates the application of reflective land use planning to foster a more disaster resilient coastal community.     

Advancing urban ecosystem governance in Rotterdam: From experimenting and evidence gathering to new ways for integrated planning

To improve quality of life as well as the adaptive capacity in the city of Rotterdam over the past 15 years there has been a lot of focus on improving green infrastructure and finding new ways for integrated planning. As many cities face similar challenges they are looking for novel approaches in urban ecosystem governance. The Rotterdam case can be an interesting example but can also reveal new questions to be researched.Before local policies and projects where developed a regional and urban green blue vision of how to improve overall quality of life using green infrastructure were developed. This provided policy frameworks for politicians, policymakers and other actors. Later on the same was done with Urban Waterplan 2, using the Rotterdam Watercity 2030 vision document as a basis. This vision was the result of a stakeholder based planning process which was made for the International Architecture Biennale 2005. Within these frameworks many interesting projects have been built and tested in the city and city region; ranging from a) a roof park over a railway yard to connect neighbourhoods to the waterfront, to b) water squares and c) digging new waterways with connected walking and biking routes. To go from projects to an overall implementation at city level required tools and approaches for better decision making. For the ‘Dakpark’ project as well as for the Zomerhofkwartier, the first climate proof neighbourhood in the city, stakeholder sessions were held and plans were drawn together with urban planners and landscape architects. To feed these processes even better and to know what would be an optimal solution for certain challenges, city data were studied and linked to scalable GIS mapping in the ‘smart city planner’. This tool gives the decision maker the possibility to quickly have an overview of an area and can be used in a stakeholder process to provide relevant additional information and to define joint projects. The tool makes it possible to do this for all 90 neighbourhoods in the city.Overall the urban ecosystem governance in the city of Rotterdam has – with trial and error- lead to a series of innovative projects. The next steps are acceleration and scaling up to city and regional level. Valuing the crucial role of green blue infrastructure for several aspects of the quality of life in cities are paramount.     

SD-MOP整合模型在秦皇岛市生态环境规划中的应用研究

针对秦皇岛市区的系统特征，应用SD－MOP整合模型对其进行了生态环境系统规划研究，从该市生态系统的结构和功能模拟入手，建立城市生态环境系统动力学模型，通过模型的原始运行和灵敏度分析，寻找出对城市发展影响较大的敏感点及与之相应的参变量，以之核心建立多目标规划模型，求解MOP模型，获取敏感点最优解集，根据模型的解，针对具体情况设计模拟运行方案，与决策者进行交互，取得系统发展的优化规则方案，并对方案实施后的社会，经济，环境等结果进行了预测。     

Adaptation Options Strategies for Hazards and Vulnerability Mitigation: An International Perspective

The broad objective of this special issue of Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change is to address some of the gaps in our knowledge and understanding of the policies, programs, and measures that might be applied to natural hazards and their impacts in an era of climate change. Given the global impacts of climate change and world-wide pattern of increasing losses from natural hazards we necessarily adopt an international perspective. The specific goals of the special issue are to: (a) encompass experiential aspects, emphasizing current practice of mitigation and its associated measures, and their results; and (b) explore primary or root causes of alarming shifts in human and economic costs of environmental extremes. Special emphasis is placed on how human activities are playing a key role in enhancing vulnerability to NTEE (nature-triggered environmental extremes), quite independently from the anthropogenic causes of climate change. The goals are also (c) to examine costs, risks, and benefits (of all kinds including social, political, ecological) of mitigation, and adjustment and adaptation measures; and (d) analyze policy implications of alternative measures. These components are expected to make significant contributions to policy considerations – formulation, implementation and evaluation. There is much uncertainty about the rate of climate change; however, the fact of increase of the atmospheric temperature in the last century is no longer a subject of scientific or policy debate. Due to such changes in the geophysical parameters, certain types of nature-triggered environmental extreme events are likely to continue to increase. How global warming will affect regional climates and pertinent variables is not well known, limiting our ability to predict consequential effects. This factor poses serious constraints against any straightforward policy decisions. Research findings of the work of this volume reaffirm that human dimensions, specifically our awareness and decision-making behavior, are powerful explanatory factors of increasing disaster losses. Disaster mitigation through addressing human, social, and physical vulnerability is one of the best means for contributing to ‘climate change adaptation plans’, and sustainable development goals. Recent lessons from various countries have depicted that the formulation of mitigation strategies cannot be exclusively top-down as it requires social, political, and cultural acceptance and sense of ownership. An interactive, participatory process, involving local communities, produces best expected outcomes concerning mitigation, preparedness, and recovery. An emerging consensus is that there is a need to move towards the ‘mission’ of the International Strategy for Disaster Reduction which aims at building disaster resilient communities by promoting increased awareness of the importance of disaster reduction as an integral component of sustainable development, with the goal of reducing human, social, economic and environmental losses due to natural hazards and related technological and environmental disasters. Sharing of best practices and lessons globally is certain to produce more efficiency and understanding in policy and decision making.     

CLIMATE CHANGE AND NATURAL HAZARDS IN NORTHERN CANADA: INTEGRATING INDIGENOUS PERSPECTIVES WITH GOVERNMENT POLICY

A study of the relationship between natural hazards and climate change in the international context provides the background for a discussion of the expected changes. In the context of this global discussion, this paper reviews the current perspectives of those natural hazards that are likely to be influenced by climate change, using northern Canada as a regional case study. The northern implications of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change are examined, including the status of climate change action by the northern territorial governments, the evolving role of indigenous people, and the responsibility for climate change impacts. The difficulties surrounding natural hazards research in remote locations, and the approaches of indigenous people to natural hazards are then presented. The paper concludes with a suggested policy approach for climate change and natural hazards in northern Canada, underscoring the need for more comprehensive adaptive strategies to complement the current tendency to focus on the mitigation of greenhouse gases produced in this region.     

Coastal flooding,climate change and environmental justice: identifying obstacles and incentives for adaptation in two metropolitan Boston Massachusetts communities

We explored the possible future impacts of increased coastal flooding due to sea level rise and the potential adaptation responses of two urban, environmental justice communities in the metropolitan Boston area of Massachusetts. East Boston is predominantly a residential area with some industrial and commercial activities, particularly along the coastal fringe. Everett, a city to the north of Boston, has a diversified industrial and commercial base. While these two communities have similar socioeconomic characteristics, they differ substantially in the extent to which residents would be impacted by increased coastal flooding. In East Boston, a large portion of residents would be flooded, while in Everett, it is the commercial/industrial districts that are primarily vulnerable. Through a series of workshops with residents in each community, we found that the target populations do not have an adaptation perspective or knowledge of any resources that could assist them in this challenge. Furthermore, they do not feel included in the planning processes within their communities. However, a common incentive for both communities was an intense commitment to their communities and an eagerness to learn more and become actively engaged in decisions regarding climate change adaptation. The lessons that can be applied to other studies include 1) images are powerful tools in communicating concepts, 2) understanding existing cultural knowledge and values in adaptation planning is essential to the planning process and 3) engaging local residents at the beginning of the process can create important educational opportunities and develop trust and consensus that is necessary for moving from concept to implementation.     

Climate change adaptation planning in agriculture: processes,experiences and lessons learned from early adapters

This paper explores the lessons learned by leaders in agricultural adaptation planning in order to assist other jurisdictions to develop adaptation strategies. It seeks to identify effective institutional, participatory and collaborative processes involved in designing agricultural adaptation strategies at the national and sub-national levels in Germany, Finland, the United Kingdom, the United States and Canada. Its methodology is based on review of agricultural adaptation policy documents, research initiatives, stakeholder engagement processes, and cross-sectoral collaborations as well as interviews with key informants such as leaders and actors in adaptation planning. The gathered data show that early adapters have an improved regional and national understanding of climatic impacts, and of the risks to agriculture before the initiation of the planning process. The results indicate that the interplay between bottom-up and top-down initiatives has been crucial in the development of adaptation strategies. The former has provided rich and robust participation in designing, implementing and monitoring adaptations, while the latter was important for prioritizing and legitimizing the development of strategy. It also provided access to high-level decision makers and funding. The results of the study suggest that fostering cross-sectoral collaborations—especially by focusing on broader questions such as the role of agriculture in society—has become an important part of adaptation planning. Finally, our results also stress that adaptation planning in agriculture could be enhanced by skills development and mutual learning across stakeholder groups, research and policy-makers, and through the ongoing interactive development of institutional capabilities.     

Participatory adaptation planning and costing. Applications in agricultural adaptation in western Kenya

Adaptation to climate change is an important theme in the strategy and policy of institutions around the world. Billions of dollars are allocated every year, based on cost estimates of actions to cope with, or benefit from the impacts of climate change. Costing adaptation, however, is complex, involving multiple actors with differing values and a spectrum of possible adaptation strategies and pathways. Currently, expert driven, top-down approaches dominate adaptation costing in practice. These approaches are subject to misallocation, with global funds not always reaching vulnerable communities in most need. This paper introduces an analytical framework called Participatory Social Return on Investment (PSROI), which provides a structured framework for multi-stakeholder planning, selection and valuation of appropriate methods of adaptation. The broader economic, social and environmental impacts of these adaptation actions are explored and valued through a participatory process. PSROI is strength-based, building local capacity and generating stakeholder buy-in. The financial valuation generated provides an additional tool for examining and prioritizing adaptation actions based on their impact. Results from a pilot of the PSROI framework in a smallholder farming community in Western Kenya provide empirical evidence for the difference between expert driven desk-based and ground-based cost estimates that involve local communities. There was an approximate 70 % reduction in the valuation of an agroforestry intervention, selected by the local community, when compared between the desk-based valuation and that of the local community, using primary field data. This reduced expectation of the desk-based PSROI is justified by coherent explanations such as lack of knowledge about the intervention, misconception about the potential costs and benefits, and the risk-averse nature of the farmers. These and other important insights are fundamental for planning and decision-making, as well as appropriate targeting and delivery of funding for adaptation.     

Advancing values-based approaches to climate change adaptation: A case study from Australia

Coastal flooding affects physical and social place attachments. Values-based approaches to climate change adaptation examine how risks to place attachments are distributed within and among communities, with a view to informing equitable adaptation policies. In this nascent body of research, divergent theoretical frameworks and empirical approaches to measuring social values are evolving. While some studies explore the things people value about their everyday lives generally—the lived values approach, others locate specific social and cultural values in geographic space—the landscape values mapping approach. This study aims to compare the explanatory value of these two approaches for understanding the social risks of sea-level rise, and appraise whether either or both approaches are likely to meet local adaptation planning needs. It does this by examining the potential social impacts of sea-level rise in Kingston Beach, Australia, informed by a mail-out survey of the community. The lived values approach identified that the natural environment, scenery, relaxed lifestyle and safety are highly important to local residents, while the landscape values mapping approach revealed that Kingston Main Beach is the most highly valued of eight coastal landscape units. Incorporating the landscape values mapping into the lived values cluster analysis revealed that while Kingston Main Beach is highly important for its recreational value to some members of the community, for others manmade features such as community halls or sports ovals may be of higher importance because they facilitate social interactions. There is potential to further integrate these two approaches to better inform adaptation policy about how lived and landscape values are distributed among communities, where they are located in space and whether they change over time. A deeper understanding of such assigned values can lead to improved engagement with coastal residents to inform adaptation policy now and into the future.     

生态文明时代国土空间规划理论与技术方法创新

国土空间规划是现代国家实施国土空间治理的重要手段,是为实现特定战略意图而进行的理性设计,规划的编制实施理念会随时代的发展而变化。为了解生态文明时代国土空间规划理论与技术方法创新,特邀请本领域的五位知名专家就国土空间规划和治理的价值导向、目标追求、重点任务、实施路径和主要领域等开展访谈。专家认为：（1）国土空间规划需要用更高的整体利益原则去处理个体利益之间的失衡,在整体利益的指引下提升特定利益的最大化和保证其他利益的最起码满足。（2）国土空间规划和治理的目标不是单纯追求“地理的普遍繁荣”,而是需要重视追求“人民的普遍幸福”,营造宜居宜业的高品质国土空间。（3）国土空间规划需要统筹安全与发展,合理适度开发利用自然资源,推动实现人与自然和谐共生。（4）需要以核心都市圈为支点,主要城市群为平台,打造宜居城市、韧性城市、智慧城市,建立高质量的城市生态系统和安全系统,重塑中国经济地理格局。（5）城市,特别是大城市是国土空间规划和治理的重点地区,需要通过拓展对城市多元属性的认知、系统研判大城市空间治理的问题与成因,完善大城市治理的逻辑。通过专家访谈,可以看出国土空间规划本质上是对空间关系的重建与重构,需要协调人地关系,推动实现人与自然和谐共生;需要处理好多元主体的利益关系,实现社会和谐;还需要尊重山水林田湖草沙生命共同体、城市有机体等不同层级国土空间单元的运行规律,维护和修复各要素之间的联系和作用机制。     

Climate change adaptation planning in large cities: A systematic global assessment

Cities globally face significant risks from climate change, and are taking an increasingly active role in formulating and implementing climate change adaptation policy. However, there are few, if any, global assessments of adaptation taking place across cities. This study develops and applies a framework to track urban climate change adaptation policy using municipal adaptation reporting. From 401 local governments globally in urban areas with >1 m people, we find that only 61 cities (15%) report any adaptation initiatives, and 73 cities (18%) report on planning towards adaptation policy. We classified cities based on their adaptation reporting as extensive adaptors, moderate adaptors, early stage adaptors, and non-reporting. With few exceptions, extensive adaptors are large cities located in high-income countries in North America, Europe, and Oceania, and are adapting to a variety of expected impacts. Moderate adaptors usually address general disaster risk reduction rather than specific impacts, and are located in a mix of developed and developing countries. Early stage adaptors exhibit evidence of planning for adaptation, but do not report any initiatives. Our findings suggest that urban adaptation is in the early stages, but there are still substantive examples of governments taking leadership regardless of wealth levels and institutional barriers.     

Air quality and climate change: Designing new win-win policies for Europe

Anthropogenic activities are responsible for the emission of gaseous and particulate pollutants that modify atmospheric composition. Such changes are, in turn, responsible for the degradation of air quality at the regional/local scale as well as for changes of climate. Air pollution and climate change are two intimately connected environmental issues. However, these two environmental challenges are still viewed as separate issues, which are dealt with by different science communities and within different policy frameworks. Indeed, many mitigation options offer the possibility to both improve air quality and mitigate climate change but, at the same time, mitigation options that may provide benefits to one aspect, are worsening the situation in the other. Therefore, coordinated actions taking into account the air quality-climate linkages are required. These actions need to be based on strong scientific grounds, as recognised by the European Commission that in the past few years has promoted consultation processes among the science community, the policy makers and the relevant stakeholders. Here, the main fields in which such coordinated actions are needed are examined from a policy perspective.     

Adaptive governance to typhoon disasters for coastal sustainability: A case study in Guangdong,China

Globally, more people and assets are concentrated on the limited coastal plains where they are exposed to frequent disasters, such as typhoons, rainstorms and floods that often result in tremendous casualties and economic losses. Based on the causal analysis of the historical typhoon cases in the Guangdong Province of China, this study indicates that structural measures alone are not sufficient to resist and offset the impacts caused by typhoon disasters. Additionally, structural measures are unsustainable due to their high investment and low security. Adaptive governance, which uses non-structural measures and resilience building, is a feasible and cost-effective strategy for responding to the cascading effects of typhoon disasters. Multi-stakeholder participation and vertical–horizontal coordination are essential for providing adaptive governance to typhoon disasters. A risk-sharing model was put forward by bringing together the government, insurance companies and victims. Furthermore, a favorable atmosphere for public participation in disaster risk reduction can be fostered and should be a long-term adaptation strategy. The views and frameworks of adaptive governance provide policy makers with insights on coastal disaster risk management within the broader context of climate change.     

Wave overtopping at coastal structures: prediction tools and related hazard analysis

Safe use of low lying and densely populated coastal regions depends critically on the performance of coastal structures in defending these areas against storm surges, wave attack, flooding and erosion. Continuing sea level rise and climate change (storms are becoming rougher) emphasise the need for reliable and robust predictions as higher storm surges and bigger storms may lead to flooding. Population pressures on land use in coastal regions have sometimes ignored age-old appreciation of coastal hazards. The CLASH research project EVK3-CT-2001-00058 was funded by the EU to provide “Crest Level Assessment of coastal Structures by full scale monitoring, neural network prediction and Hazard analysis on permissible wave overtopping”. One of its main objectives was to produce a generally applicable prediction method based on permissible wave overtopping and hazard analysis. This paper describes the problems related to wave overtopping and crest level design of coastal structures. Within the CLASH background, the development of a generic prediction method and its use taking into account hazards is presented.     

Fostering coastal resilience to climate change vulnerability in Bangladesh,Brazil, Cameroon and Uruguay: a cross-country comparison

This paper describes a comparative study of four different cases on vulnerability, hazards and adaptive capacity to climate threats in coastal areas and communities in four developing countries: Bangladesh, Brazil, Cameroon and Uruguay. Coastal areas are vulnerable to sea-level rise (SLR), storm surges and flooding due to their (i) exposure, (ii) concentration of settlements, many of which occupied by less advantaged groups and (iii) the concentration of assets and services seen in these areas. The objective of the paper is twofold: (i) to evaluate current evidence of coastal vulnerability and adaptive capacity and (ii) to compare adaptation strategies being implemented in a sample of developing countries, focusing on successful ones. The followed approach for the case evaluation is based on (i) documenting observed threats and damages, (ii) using indicators of physical and socioeconomic vulnerability and adaptive capacity status and (iii) selecting examples of successful responses. Major conclusions based on cross-case comparison are (a) the studied countries show different vulnerability, adaptive capacity and implementation of responses, (b) innovative community-based (CBA) and ecosystem-based adaptation (EbA) and (c) early warning systems are key approaches and tools to foster climate resilience. A recommendation to foster the resilience of coastal communities and services is that efforts in innovative adaptation strategies to sea-level rise should be intensified and integrated with climate risk management within the national adaption plans (NAPAs) in order to reduce the impacts of hazards.     

Climate change and local level disaster risk reduction planning: need, opportunities and challenges

The field of climate change is full of uncertainties that are limiting strategic disaster risk reduction planning. In this paper, however, we argued that there is lot to do before we get our hands on reliable estimates of future climate change impacts. It includes bringing together different stakeholders in a framework suggested in this paper, developing case studies that reflect long-term local impacts of climate change, capacity building of local stakeholders that enables them to take decisions under uncertainty etc. We proposed a simple scheme that brings together climate, disaster and policy community together to start a dialogue in a run-up to understanding wider aspects of long-term risk reduction at local level. Strategic thinking, which has only been restricted to national and regional planning to date, needs to be inculcated in local level disaster risk reduction and policy personnel as well. There is a need to move from the attitude of considering local level players as ‘implementers’ to ‘innovators’ for which developing a network of self learning and evolving organizations are required at the local level.