Environmental citizens: climate pledger attitudes and micro-generation installation

To date, the phenomenon of climate pledging has been little investigated. This paper describes the results of a questionnaire survey of 201 climate pledgers in Greater Manchester (UK), focusing on attitudes and behaviour relevant to environmental citizenship. In particular, attention is given to attitudes and behaviour related to renewable energy and micro-generation, selectively comparing with national UK data. The survey shows that installation cost and lengthy pay-back times have been major constraints on microgen installation not just for the general population, but also for those with a high degree of environmental commitment. Nonetheless, the microgen installation rate among the climate pledgers as of early 2011, before the introduction of feed-in tariffs, was at least 11 times higher than the national average. Using regression analyses, the best model that could be found for explaining installation of the most popular microgen technology, solar thermal, accounted for 27% of variance. Within this model, environmental commitment was of less importance than having given serious consideration to other microgen options. While this was possibly due to group homogeneity, in general, the results do emphasise the limits to environmental citizenship.     

A protracted age of oil: pipelines,refineries and quiet conflict

This article examines the relevance of environmental justice (EJ) and climate change debates as points of articulation and mobilisation among community groups responding to a proposed refinery. It then compares media coverage of the refinery project, a bi-national pipeline and other energy and climate-related news events. The analytical frame joins the EJ paradigm with citizen mobilisation on issues of climate change and energy projects that emit greenhouse gases and that discourage development of renewable sources. Data were collected and analysed from websites, public message boards and media documents. Findings indicate that a community-based anti-refinery campaign combined local EJ struggles with climate activism, while challenging fossil fuel dependencies and calling for renewable regional energy. A climate justice community formed – yet their voices were in their blogs and websites, not in local or national media.     

邛海水质变化趋势及保护对策研究

本文通过对邛海流域现状污染源进行调查,邛海流域COD、氨氮、总氮和总磷产生量分别为5892.1t/a、995.6t/a、2888.2t/a和1105.1t/a,污染负荷主要来自面源污染.通过2002 ～ 2011年邛海水质监测数据分析,邛海水质近10年总体保持Ⅱ～Ⅲ类,处于中营养状态,2004～ 2006年水质相对较差,2006年以后水质逐渐好转.总磷、总氮是邛海主要污染因子,海河口是邛海污染最严重的区域.为实现邛海水质和流域生态环境持续改善,从产业结构优化、流域污染源治理、生态保育和流域生态环境综合监管等方面提出对策建议.     

What are the barriers to successful community-based climate change adaptation? A review of grey literature

ABSTRACT

Across the Global South, community-based adaptation (CBA) projects are increasingly being implemented in an effort to respond effectively and sustainably to the impacts of climate change, with a particular focus on people’s livelihoods. Despite an increase in the number of CBA projects being implemented, detailed analysis and evaluation of their efficacy and the barriers faced in achieving successful outcomes is lacking. This study draws on an analysis of grey literature (i.e. project and donor reports) to explore the barriers faced in achieving effective CBA. An extensive global search of online project evaluations yielded 25 documents comprising 69 projects from which this analysis is based. This paper first presents an overview of the 69 projects and highlights any trends. Second, this paper describes the barriers to CBA according to three broad themes: socio-political, resource, and physical systems and processes. Following this is a discussion of the most prevalent barriers: cognitive and behavioural, financial, and human resources. Third, this paper discusses the key findings elucidated from this review. This includes the need for greater sharing of project reports and findings so lessons can be learned across spatial and temporal scales, and the disparity between critical academic literature on CBA and what is implemented in practice.     

Governing climate change for a just city: challenges and lessons from Maputo,Mozambique

As new forms of governance for climate change emerge in African cities, will they enable emancipatory and socially progressive transformations or will they exacerbate existing inequality, poverty and vulnerability patterns? This paper presents one of the case studies developed by UN-Habitat Cities and Climate Change Initiative in Maputo, Mozambique. The case analyses first, the production of urban vulnerabilities under climate change, and second, the existing governance arrangements for climate change in the city. Building on the lessons of the case study, the paper argues that to ensure that new forms of climate change governance lead to socially and environmentally just outcomes climate change interventions should, at least, meet two conditions: first, they should consider the close interactions between social and ecological elements and, specially, how patterns of urban inequality interact with environmental factors; second, they should recognise the opportunities in African cities through a broad notion of governance that looks beyond the government as the sole agent of urban change.     

Transformative climate change adaptation: bridging existing approaches with post-foundational insights on justice

ABSTRACT

Climate adaptation is a complex policy domain, spanning multiple sectors, scales and actors, and wherein those most at risk have the least power. The influence of linear positivist models of science uptake are proving ineffective in a world with increasingly concentrated wealth and power, institutional barriers, and rapidly growing risks facing the many. A plurality of approaches is needed to better examine those dynamics of climate adaptation which are often invisible in models of science uptake – equity, the value of contestation, path dependency – and to consider how to empower communities to find solutions. In this conceptual paper, we argue that bridging existing positivist and interpretivist methods with insights from post-foundational theory so as to underpin pluralism and re-orient ethical principles of justice, strengthens the capacity of social research to support transformative climate adaptation. Principles are proposed to facilitate such bridging.     

“At the water's edge”: community voices on climate change

The photovoice research project, “At the water's edge”, which gives voice to communities exploring the threats and impact of climate change and rising sea levels on coastal communities, was conducted during an environmental art symposium in the Noosa Biosphere Reserve, Australia in June 2009. Photos by participants illustrated both local and global threats and reflected psychological tension between global and local action. This research partnership with the local people demonstrated an innovative visualisation technique which can be used to collaboratively build capacity and consensus about adaptation to climate change. It also contributed to the Biosphere Reserve's educational and cultural aims in relation to climate change.     

Adaptation in situ or retreat? A multivariate approach to explore the factors that guide the peoples' preference against the impacts of sea level rise in coastal Bangladesh

This paper is aimed to identify the factors that influence peoples' preference for adaptation against the impacts of sea level rise (SLR). A total of 285 respondents from three coastal villages in Bangladesh are randomly interviewed using a semi-structured questionnaire. First, employing the principal component analysis various factors that influence adaptation preferences of people are identified. These factors are related to “demographic and social aspects”, “wealth and economic standing”, “past coping and adaptive behaviour”, “climate knowledge and information” and “spatial aspect” of life. What is common in these factors is their ability to influence peoples' vulnerability. Finally, the binomial logistic regression model is employed to compute the explanatory power of these factors to predict the respondents' preference for adaptation in situ over retreat or vice versa. Model findings are robust for two scenarios of SLR, i.e. 2050–2075 (LR χ ²?=?133.65, pseudo-R ²?=?0.53, p?<?0.001) and 2080–2100 (LR χ ²?=?282.61, pseudo-R ²?=?0.85, p?<?0.001). Therefore, it is concluded that to avoid relocation of substantial number of people initiative for encouraging adaptation in situ must be taken along side establishment of safe shelter, community radio service and campaign for raising climate awareness.     

A Regional Cadmium Inventory: Interpretation and management

Local authorities in Sweden are responsible for the management of sewage treatment and municipal solid waste. Due to this, they handle large flows and stocks of materials and substances that may be harmful for the environment. However, knowledge about these flows is sometimes deficient. In addition, the capacity to influence the composition of these flows is mainly beyond the jurisdiction of the local authorities. Flow-oriented studies, such as substance flow analysis (SFA), have proven to be a useful tool in order to understand and quantify these flows. Furthermore, SFA is sometimes claimed to be beneficial to the process of decision making, since it generates comprehensive overviews of the substance in focus. However, quantification of stocks and flows of a certain substance does not necessarily provide sufficient information for environmental management on the local level. Hence, for SFA to further contribute to the environmental management process, there is also a need for development in the interpretation of the results. The main objective of this paper is to contribute to the discussion about (1) how to interpret the results from SFA and (2) how the results from an SFA can be used in environmental management by local authorities. A tentative framework for interpretation is discussed in the paper, focusing on five aspects: total material quantities, exposure to humans and the environment, resource economy, function and capacity to influence the substance flows. Furthermore, the paper discusses the suggested framework applied to results of a regional cadmium inventory.     

Flooding in Texas: Examination of Temporal Changes and Impacts of Tropical Cyclones

Annual maximum peak discharge measurements from 62 stations with a record of at least 70 years are used to assess extreme flooding in Texas at the regional scale. This work focuses on examination of the validity of the stationarity assumption and on the impact of tropical cyclones (TCs) on the upper tail of the flood peak distribution. We assess the validity of the stationarity assumption by testing the records for abrupt and gradual changes. The presence of abrupt changes in the first two moments of the flood peak distribution is assessed using the Lombard test. We use the Mann‐Kendall test to examine the presence of monotonic trends. Results indicate that violations of the stationarity assumption are most commonly caused by abrupt changes, which are often associated with river regulation. We fit the time series of stationary flood records with the generalized extreme value distribution to investigate whether TCs control the upper tail of the flood peak distribution. Our results indicate that TCs play a diminished role in shaping the upper tail of the flood peak distribution compared with areas of the eastern United States subject to frequent TCs.