Baltic Sea ecosystem-based management under climate change: Synthesis and future challenges

Ecosystem-based management (EBM) has emerged as the generally agreed strategy for managing ecosystems, with humans as integral parts of the managed system. Human activities have substantial effects on marine ecosystems, through overfishing, eutrophication, toxic pollution, habitat destruction, and climate change. It is important to advance the scientific knowledge of the cumulative, integrative, and interacting effects of these diverse activities, to support effective implementation of EBM. Based on contributions to this special issue of AMBIO, we synthesize the scientific findings into four components: pollution and legal frameworks, ecosystem processes, scale-dependent effects, and innovative tools and methods. We conclude with challenges for the future, and identify the next steps needed for successful implementation of EBM in general and specifically for the Baltic Sea.     

Nexus on climate change: agriculture and possible solution to cope future climate change stresses

The changing climate scenarios harshen the biotic stresses including boosting up the population of insect/pest and disease, uplifting weed growth, declining soil beneficial microbes, threaten pollinator, and boosting up abiotic stresses including harsh drought/waterlogging, extremisms in temperature, salinity/alkalinity, abrupt rainfall pattern)) and ulitamtely  affect the plant in multiple ways. This nexus review paper will cover four significant points viz (1) the possible impacts of climate change; as the world already facing the problem of food security, in such crucial period, climatic change severely affects all four dimensions of food security (from production to consumption) and will lead to malnutrition/malnourishment faced by low-income peoples. (2) How some major crops (wheat, cotton, rice, maize, and sugarcane) are affected by stress and their consequent loss. (3) How to develop a strategic work to limit crucial factors, like their significant role in climate-smart breeding, developing resilience to stresses, and idiotypic breeding. Additionally, there is an essence of improving food security, as much of our food is wasted before consumption for instance post-harvest losses. (4) Role of biotechnology and genetic engineering in adaptive introgression of the gene or developing plant transgenic against pests. As millions of dollars are invested in innovation and research to cope with future climate change stresses on a plant, hence community base adaptation of innovation is also considered an important factor in crop improvements. Because of such crucial predictions about the future impacts of climate change on agriculture, we must adopt measures to evolve crop.

     

Managing flood risks in the Mekong Delta: How to address emerging challenges under climate change and socioeconomic developments

Climate change and accelerating socioeconomic developments increasingly challenge flood-risk management in the Vietnamese Mekong River Delta—a typical large, economically dynamic and highly vulnerable delta. This study identifies and addresses the emerging challenges for flood-risk management. Furthermore, we identify and analyse response solutions, focusing on meaningful configurations of the individual solutions and how they can be tailored to specific challenges using expert surveys, content analysis techniques and statistical inferences. Our findings show that the challenges for flood-risk management are diverse, but critical challenges predominantly arise from the current governance and institutional settings. The top-three challenges include weak collaboration, conflicting management objectives and low responsiveness to new issues. We identified 114 reported solutions and developed six flood management strategies that are tailored to specific challenges. We conclude that the current technology-centric flood management approach is insufficient given the rapid socioecological changes. This approach therefore should be adapted towards a more balanced management configuration where technical and infrastructural measures are combined with institutional and governance resolutions. Insights from this study contribute to the emerging repertoire of contemporary flood management solutions, especially through their configurations and tailoring to specific challenges.     

Predicting climate change effects on wetland ecosystem services using species distribution modeling and plant functional traits

Wetlands provide multiple ecosystem services, the sustainable use of which requires knowledge of the underlying ecological mechanisms. Functional traits, particularly the community-weighted mean trait (CWMT), provide a strong link between species communities and ecosystem functioning. We here combine species distribution modeling and plant functional traits to estimate the direction of change of ecosystem processes under climate change. We model changes in CWMT values for traits relevant to three key services, focusing on the regional species pool in the Norrström area (central Sweden) and three main wetland types. Our method predicts proportional shifts toward faster growing, more productive and taller species, which tend to increase CWMT values of specific leaf area and canopy height, whereas changes in root depth vary. The predicted changes in CWMT values suggest a potential increase in flood attenuation services, a potential increase in short (but not long)-term nutrient retention, and ambiguous outcomes for carbon sequestration.     

RETRACTED ARTICLE: The global inequalities and climate change

Environmental Science and Pollution Research -     

Global climate change: The quantifiable sustainability challenge

Population growth and the pressures spawned by increasing demands for energy and resource-intensive goods, foods, and services are driving unsustainable growth in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Recent GHG emission trends are consistent with worst-case scenarios of the previous decade. Dramatic and near-term emission reductions likely will be needed to ameliorate the potential deleterious impacts of climate change. To achieve such reductions, fundamental changes are required in the way that energy is generated and used. New technologies must be developed and deployed at a rapid rate. Advances in carbon capture and storage, renewable, nuclear, and transportation technologies are particularly important; however, global research and development efforts related to these technologies currently appear to fall short relative to needs. Even with a proactive and international mitigation effort, humanity will need to adapt to climate change, but the adaptation needs and damages will be far greater if mitigation activities are not pursued in earnest. In this review, research is highlighted that indicates increasing global and regional temperatures and ties climate changes to increasing GHG emissions. GHG mitigation targets necessary for limiting future global temperature increases are discussed, including how factors such as population growth and the growing energy intensity of the developing world will make these reduction targets more challenging. Potential technological pathways for meeting emission reduction targets are examined, barriers are discussed, and global and U.S. modeling results are presented that suggest that the necessary pathways will require radically transformed electric and mobile sectors. While geoengineering options have been proposed to allow more time for serious emission reductions, these measures are at the conceptual stage with many unanswered cost, environmental, and political issues.

Implications:?This paper lays out the case that mitigating the potential for catastrophic climate change will be a monumental challenge, requiring the global community to transform its energy system in an aggressive, coordinated, and timely manner. If this challenge is to be met, new technologies will have to be developed and deployed at a rapid rate. Advances in carbon capture and storage, renewable, nuclear, and transportation technologies are particularly important. Even with an aggressive international mitigation effort, humanity will still need to adapt to significant climate change.     

Quantifying flexibility in combating climate change: modelling the implications of flexibility mechanisms in the climate change negotiations

With the 'International Trading of Emission Allowances' (ITEA) model, we have analysed the flexibility mechanisms provided for in the Kyoto Protocol. Three main mechanisms of flexibility are analysed differentiation of initial commitments, multiple sources, and locational flexibility (trading). A differentiation of commitments could help the evolution of commitments, especially with a trading regime, which could create some income. Multiple sources give a large pool of cheaper abatement options from the non-CO₂ gases, and costs are reduced substantially. Finally, a trading regime would make available even more cheap abatement options, mainly in the economies in transition (EITs). This regime would provide income support for the EITs, helping them to speed up their transition. The combined mechanisms reduce dramatically the costs for the compliance with the protocol for the whole of Annex I; they fall to zero in some cases. Two other main findings deal with the EU and the EITs. Internal trading would ease the debate on the internal distribution of commitments within the EU under the bubble provision, reducing costs significantly. The allocations in the protocol for the EITs probably create a huge excess - 'hot air' - which could seriously harm the agreement if it is not dealt with. Excluding the hot air will increase costs for the quota importers, and it will also slightly reduce income for the relevant EITs, but this is offset by a rising price, which also benefits other EITs.     

Challenges of climate change: an Arctic perspective

Climate change is being experienced particularly intensely in the Arctic. Arctic average temperature has risen at almost twice the rate as that of the rest of the world in the past few decades. Widespread melting of glaciers and sea ice and rising permafrost temperatures present additional evidence of strong Arctic warming. These changes in the Arctic provide an early indication of the environmental and societal significance of global consequences. The Arctic also provides important natural resources to the rest of the world (such as oil, gas, and fish) that will be affected by climate change, and the melting of Arctic glaciers is one of the factors contributing to sea level rise around the globe. An acceleration of these climatic trends is projected to occur during this century, due to ongoing increases in concentrations of greenhouse gases in the Earth's atmosphere. These Arctic changes will, in turn, impact the planet as a whole.     

Greenhouse gas induced climate change

Simulations using global coupled climate models predict a climate change due to the increasing concentration of greenhouse gases and aerosols in the atmosphere. Both are associated with the burning of fossil fuels. There has been considerable debate if this postulated human influence is already evident. This paper gives an overview on some recent material on this question. One particular study using optimal fingerprints (Hegerl et al., 1996) is explained in more detail. In this study, an optimal fingerprint analysis is applied to temperature trend patterns over several decades. The results show the probability being less than 5% that the most recently observed 30 year trend is due to naturally occurring climate fluctuations. This result suggests that the present warming is caused by some external influence on climate, e.g. by the increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases and aerosols. More work is needed to address the uncertainties in the magnitude of naturally occurring climate fluctuations. Also, other external influences on climate need to be investigated to uniquely attribute the present climate change to the human influence.     

Improving dialogue among researchers,local and indigenous peoples and decision-makers to address issues of climate change in the North

Ambio - The Circumpolar North has been changing rapidly within the last decades, and the socioeconomic systems of the Eurasian Arctic and Siberia in particular have displayed the most dramatic...     

Beyond dichotomies: Gender and intersecting inequalities in climate change studies

Climate change and related adaptation strategies have gender-differentiated impacts. This paper reviews how gender is framed in 41 papers on climate change adaptation through an intersectionality lens. The main findings show that while intersectional analysis has demonstrated many advantages for a comprehensive study of gender, it has not yet entered the field of climate change and gender. In climate change studies, gender is mostly handled in a men-versus-women dichotomy and little or no attention has been paid to power and social and political relations. These gaps which are echoed in other domains of development and gender research depict a ‘feminization of vulnerability’ and reinforce a ‘victimization’ discourse within climate change studies. We argue that a critical intersectional assessment would contribute to unveil agency and emancipatory pathways in the adaptation process by providing a better understanding of how the differential impacts of climate change shape, and are shaped by, the complex power dynamics of existing social and political relations.     

A joint climate and nature cure: A transformative change perspective

Climate change has considerably dominated science-policy dialogue, public debate, and subsequently environmental policies since the three “Rio Conventions” were born. This has led to practically independent courses of action of climate change mitigation and biodiversity conservation actions, neglecting potential conflicts among outcomes and with missed opportunities for synergistic measures. Transformative governance principles have been proposed to overcome these limitations. Using a transformative governance lens, we use the case of the Norwegian "Climate Cure 2030" for the Land Use, Land-Use Change and Forestry (LULUCF) sector to, first, illustrate the mechanisms that have led to the choice of climate mitigation measures; second, to analyze the potential consequences of these measures on biodiversity and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions; and, third, to evaluate alternative measures with potential positive outcomes for biodiversity and GHG emissions/removals. We point to some mechanisms that could support the implementation of these positive actions.Supplementary InformationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s13280-021-01679-8.     

Halogenated compounds and climate change: future emission levels and reduction costs

OBJECTIVES: This work assesses the contribution to climate change resulting from emissions of the group of halogenated greenhouse gases. METHODS: A bottom-up emission model covering 22 technological sectors in four major regions is described. Emission estimates for 1996 and projection for 2010 and 2020 are presented. The costs for deep cuts into projected emission levels are calculated. RESULTS: The substances covered by this study have contributed emissions of 1100 +/- 800 MT CO2 equivalents per year in 1996. In terms of their relative contribution to emissions of CO2 equivalents, this corresponds to 3 +/- 2% of global emissions of all anthropogenic greenhouse gases. The wide range of uncertainty is due to the poorly quantified net global warming potential of the ozone depleting substances, which have an indirect cooling effect on climate through the destruction of stratospheric ozone. For annual emissions of HFCs, PFCs and SF6 (which are regulated under the Kyoto Protocol and for which global warming potentials are well defined), the relative contribution is projected to increase to 2% (600 MT CO2 eq.) of global greenhouse gas emissions by 2010. This trend is expected to continue, emissions are projected to grow to a contribution of roughly 3% (870 MT CO2 eq.) in 2020 compared to 0.9% (300 MT CO2 eq.) in 1996. For HFCs, PFCs and SF6, this study identifies global emission reduction potentials of 260 MT CO2 eq. per year in 2010 and 640 MT CO2 eq. per year in 2020 at below US$ 50 per ton. These values correspond to roughly 40% and 75% of projected emissions in 2010 and 2020, respectively.     

The domino effect in climate change

This paper provides a concise summary of the natural and the anthropogenic greenhouse effect and the major causes for climate change. This summary may be particularly accessible for readers who are not familiar with natural sciences. Building on these explanations, we develop a simplifying atmospheric model that demonstrates a widely unknown aspect of global warming: the greenhouse effect enhances its own causes and, as a repercussion, induces a further global warming. This effect, referred to as domino effect, is based on the additional production of heat in the atmosphere, happening substantively while heat passes our atmosphere on its way to outer space. On the basis of our considerations, in principle, technological efficiency improvements appear to be an attractive measure for mitigating global warming.     

Effects of climate change on surface-water photochemistry: a review

Information concerning the link between surface-water photochemistry and climate is presently very scarce as only a few studies have been dedicated to the subject. On the basis of the limited knowledge that is currently available, the present inferences can be made as follows: (1) Warming can cause enhanced leaching of ionic solutes from the catchments to surface waters, including cations and more biologically labile anions such as sulphate. Preferential sulphate biodegradation followed by removal as organic sulphides in sediment could increase alkalinity, favouring the generation of the carbonate radical, CO₃ ^·?. However, this phenomenon would be easily offset by fluctuations of the dissolved organic carbon (DOC), which is strongly anticorrelated with CO₃ ^·?. Therefore, obtaining insight into DOC evolution is a key issue in understanding the link between photochemistry and climate. (2) Climate change could exacerbate water scarcity in the dry season in some regions. Fluctuations in the water column could deeply alter photochemistry that is usually favoured in shallower waters. However, the way water is lost would strongly affect the prevailing photoinduced processes. Water outflow without important changes in solute concentration would mostly favour reactions induced by the hydroxyl and carbonate radicals (·OH and CO₃ ^·?). In contrast, evaporative concentration would enhance reactions mediated by singlet oxygen (¹O₂) and by the triplet states of chromophoric dissolved organic matter (³CDOM*). (3) In a warmer climate, the summer stratification period of lakes would last longer, thereby enhancing photochemical reactions in the epilimnion but at the same time keeping the hypolimnion water in the dark for longer periods.