199 research outputs found
Projects economic efficiency for reconstruction of heat pipelines flooded areas using modern thermal insulation construction
В работе, на основе экспериментальных, научных и эксплуатационных данных приводится оценка инвестиционной привлекательности программы по замене подтопляемых участков трубопроводов с минераловатной изоляцией на предизолированные на пенополиуретановой основе.In this paper, based on experimental, scientific and operational data is an investment attractiveness program assessment to replace flooded pipeline sections with mineral wool insulation on the polyurethane foam basis and pre-insulated
Changing social contracts in climate-change adaptation
Risks from extreme weather events are mediated through
state, civil society and individual action
1
,
2
. We propose evolving
social contracts as a primary mechanism by which adaptation
to climate change proceeds. We use a natural experiment
of policy and social contexts of the UK and Ireland affected
by the same meteorological event and resultant flooding in
November 2009. We analyse data from policy documents and
from household surveys of 356 residents in western Ireland and
northwest England. We find significant differences between
perceptions of individual responsibility for protection across
the jurisdictions and between perceptions of future risk from
populations directly affected by flooding events. These explain
differences in stated willingness to take individual adaptive
actions when state support retrenches. We therefore show
that expectations for state protection are critical in mediating
impacts and promoting longer-term adaptation. We argue
that making social contracts explicit may smooth pathways to
effective and legitimate adaptation
Trapped in the prison of the mind: notions of climate-induced (im)mobility decision-making and wellbeing from an urban informal settlement in Bangladesh
The concept of Trapped Populations has until date mainly referred to people ‘trapped’ in environmentally high-risk rural areas due to economic constraints. This article attempts to widen our understanding of the concept by investigating climate-induced socio-psychological immobility and its link to Internally Displaced People’s (IDPs) wellbeing in a slum of Dhaka. People migrated here due to environmental changes back on Bhola Island and named the settlement Bhola Slum after their home. In this way, many found themselves ‘immobile’ after having been mobile—unable to move back home, and unable to move to other parts of Dhaka, Bangladesh, or beyond. The analysis incorporates the emotional and psychosocial aspects of the diverse immobility states. Mind and emotion are vital to better understand people’s (im)mobility decision-making and wellbeing status. The study applies an innovative and interdisciplinary methodological approach combining Q-methodology and discourse analysis (DA). This mixed-method illustrates a replicable approach to capture the complex state of climate-induced (im)mobility and its interlinkages to people’s wellbeing. People reported facing non-economic losses due to the move, such as identity, honour, sense of belonging and mental health. These psychosocial processes helped explain why some people ended up ‘trapped’ or immobile. The psychosocial constraints paralysed them mentally, as well as geographically. More empirical evidence on how climate change influences people’s wellbeing and mental health will be important to provide us with insights in how to best support vulnerable people having faced climatic impacts, and build more sustainable climate policy frameworks
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Landsat-Derived Estimates of Mangrove Extents in the Sierra Leone Coastal Landscape Complex during 1990–2016
This study provides the first assessment of decadal changes in mangrove extents in Sierra Leone. While significant advances have been made in mangrove mapping using remote sensing, no study has documented long-term changes in mangrove extents in Sierra Leone—one of the most vulnerable countries in West Africa. Such understanding is critical for devising regional management strategies that can support local livelihoods. We utilize multi-date Landsat data and cloud computational techniques to quantify spatiotemporal changes in land cover, with focus on mangrove ecosystems, for 1990–2016 along the coast of Sierra Leone. We specifically focus on four estuaries—Scarcies, Sierra Leone, Yawri Bay, and Sherbro. We relied on the k-means approach for an unsupervised classification, and validated the classified map from 2016 using ground truth data collected from Sentinel-2 and high-resolution images and during field research (accuracy: 95%). Our findings indicate that the Scarcies river estuary witnessed the greatest mangrove loss since 1990 (45%), while the Sierra Leone river estuary experienced mangrove gain over the last 26 years (22%). Overall, the Sierra Leone coast lost 25% of its mangroves between 1990 and 2016, with the lowest coverage in 2000, during the period of civil war (1991–2002). However, natural mangrove dynamics, as supported by field observations, indicate the potential for regeneration and sustainability under carefully constructed management strategies
A discursive review of the textual use of ‘trapped’ in environmental migration studies: The conceptual birth and troubled teenage years of trapped populations
First mooted in 2011, the concept of Trapped Populations referring to people unable to move from environmentally high-risk areas broadened the study of human responses to environmental change. While a seemingly straightforward concept, the underlying discourses around the reasons for being ‘trapped’, and the language describing the concept have profound influences on the way in which policy and practice approaches the needs of populations at risk from environmental stresses and shocks. In this article, we apply a Critical Discourse Analysis to the academic literature on the subject to reveal some of the assumptions implicit within discussing ‘trapped’ populations. The analysis reveals a dominant school of thought that assisted migration, relocation, and resettlement in the face of climate change are potentially effective adaptation strategies along a gradient of migrant agency and governance
Still in Need of Norms: The State of the Data in Citizen Science
This article offers an assessment of current data practices in the citizen science, community science, and crowdsourcing communities. We begin by reviewing current trends in scientific data relevant to citizen science before presenting the results of our qualitative research. Following a purposive sampling scheme designed to capture data management practices from a wide range of initiatives through a landscape sampling methodology (Bos et al. 2007), we sampled 36 projects from English-speaking countries. The authors used a semi-structured protocol to interview project proponents (either scientific leads or data managers) to better understand how projects are addressing key aspects of the data lifecycle, reporting results through descriptive statistics and other analyses. Findings suggest that citizen science projects are doing well in terms of data quality assessment and governance, but are sometimes lacking in providing open access to data outputs, documenting data, ensuring interoperability through data standards, or building robust and sustainable infrastructure. Based on this assessment, the paper presents a number of recommendations for the citizen science community related to data quality, data infrastructure, data governance, data documentation, and data access
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Focus on environmental risks and migration: causes and consequences
Environmental change poses risks to societies, including disrupting social and economic systems such as migration. At the same time, migration is an effective adaptation to environmental and other risks. We review novel science on interactions between migration, environmental risks and climate change. We highlight emergent findings, including how dominant flows of rural to urban migration mean that populations are exposed to new risks within destination areas and the requirement for urban sustainability. We highlight the issue of lack of mobility as a major issue limiting the effectiveness of migration as an adaptation strategy and leading to potentially trapped populations. The paper presents scenarios of future migration that show both displacement and trapped populations over the incoming decades. Papers in the special issue bring new insights from demography, human geography, political science and environmental science to this emerging field
Climate change and increased risk for the insurance sector: A global perspective and an assessment for the Netherlands.
Climate change is projected to increase the frequency and severity of extreme weather events. As a consequence, economic losses caused by natural catastrophes could increase significantly. This will have considerable consequences for the insurance sector. On the one hand, increased risk from weather extremes requires assessing expected changes in damage and including adequate climate change projections in risk management. On the other hand, climate change can also bring new business opportunities for insurers. This paper gives an overview of the consequences of climate change for the insurance sector and discusses several strategies to cope with and adapt to increased risks. The particular focus is on the Dutch insurance sector, as the Netherlands is extremely vulnerable to climate change, especially with regard to extreme precipitation and flooding. Current risk sharing arrangements for weather risks are examined while potential new business opportunities, adaptation strategies, and public-private partnerships are identified. © The Author(s) 2009
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Science for loss and damage. Findings and propositions
The debate on “Loss and Damage” (L&D) has gained traction over the last few years. Supported by growing scientific evidence of anthropogenic climate change amplifying frequency, intensity and duration of climate-related hazards as well as observed increases in climate-related impacts and risks in many regions, the “Warsaw International Mechanism for Loss and Damage” was established in 2013 and further supported through the Paris Agreement in 2015. Despite advances, the debate currently is broad, diffuse and somewhat confusing, while concepts, methods and tools, as well as directions for policy remain vague and often contested. This book, a joint effort of the Loss and Damage Network—a partnership effort by scientists and practitioners from around the globe—provides evidence-based insight into the L&D discourse by highlighting state-of-the-art research conducted across multiple disciplines, by showcasing applications in practice and by providing insight into policy contexts and salient policy options. This introductory chapter summarises key findings of the twenty-two book chapters in terms of five propositions. These propositions, each building on relevant findings linked to forward-looking suggestions for research, policy and practice, reflect the architecture of the book, whose sections proceed from setting the stage to critical issues, followed by a section on methods and tools, to chapters that provide geographic perspectives, and finally to a section that identifies potential policy options. The propositions comprise (1) Risk management can be an effective entry point for aligning perspectives and debates, if framed comprehensively, coupled with climate justice considerations and linked to established risk management and adaptation practice; (2) Attribution science is advancing rapidly and fundamental to informing actions to minimise, avert, and address losses and damages; (3) Climate change research, in addition to identifying physical/hard limits to adaptation, needs to more systematically examine soft limits to adaptation, for which we find some evidence across several geographies globally; (4) Climate risk insurance mechanisms can serve the prevention and cure aspects emphasised in the L&D debate but solidarity and accountability aspects need further attention, for which we find tentative indication in applications around the world; (5) Policy deliberations may need to overcome the perception that L&D constitutes a win-lose negotiation “game” by developing a more inclusive narrative that highlights collective ambition for tackling risks, mutual benefits and the role of transformation
Food security among dryland pastoralists and agropastoralists: The climate, land-use change, and population dynamics nexus
During the last decades, pastoralist, and agropastoralist populations of the world’s drylands have become exceedingly vulnerable to regional and global changes. Specifically, exacerbated stressors imposed on these populations have adversely affected their food security status, causing humanitarian emergencies and catastrophes. Of these stressors, climate variability and change, land-use and management practices, and dynamics of human demography are of a special importance. These factors affect all four pillars of food security, namely, food availability, access to food, food utilization, and food stability. The objective of this study was to critically review relevant literature to assess the complex web of interrelations and feedbacks that affect these factors. The increasing pressures on the world’s drylands necessitate a comprehensive analysis to advise policy makers regarding the complexity and linkages among factors, and to improve global action. The acquired insights may be the basis for alleviating food insecurity of vulnerable dryland populations.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio
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