Institutions for Climate Adaptation: An Inventory of Institutions in the Netherlands that are Relevant for Climate Change

One of the goals of project IC12, a research project of the Climate changes Spatial Planning programme, is to assess if the formal institutions operating in the Netherlands are improving or hampering adaptive capacity. In order to answer the research question, the most important documents referring to those institutions need to be evaluated. This document presents an initial inventory of these adaptation institutions – i.e. policy plans, laws and directives, reports and other documents that seemed relevant to the question at hand

Institutions for adaptation: the capacity and ability of the Dutch institutional framework to adapt to climate change

The climate is not the only aspect in this world that is changing. We notice a number of societal trends – a shift towards individual responsibility to receive rain water on private property and to encourage individuals to seek insurance rather than depend on a safety net to be provided by the government; increasing pressure on rural land use because of urbanisation processes, together with development to combine land use functions; decisions to develop large scale housing projects that do not take into account the potential impact of climate change; and, inter alia, the development of innovative solutions such as floating houses and brackish agriculture. We also notice the development of new organizational arrangements, such as multilevel agreements between policy actors, a more horizontal approach to land use planning, and a shift form national to European nature policies. Obviously, the system we will try to study is a moving target, and the theoretical framework we use will have to be able to deal with thi

Potentials of Telemedicine for Green Health Care

Neurological facilities are traditionally centered in academic hospitals and often far away from the patients’ living area. Both, the transfer of patients to remote hospitals and inpatient treatment are associated with high energy consumption. Numbers of patients with neurological diseases are expected to increase along with the demographical changes and the environmental impact of neurological treatment should become a target for health policy, therefore. Positive effects have been demonstrated for the use of telemedicine by improving inpatient treatment in local community hospitals or avoiding hospital admissions via monitoring of complex diseases in outpatient settings. We discuss the potentials of telemedicine in the field of in- and outpatient neurological care as well as the need for more scientific evaluation on environmental impacts

Starting jet flows in a three-dimensional channel with larynx-shaped constriction

A numerical model for the three-dimensional starting jet flow in a channel with a static larynx-shaped constriction is presented. Detailed resolution of this kind of jet flow is necessary in order to understand the complex coupling between flow and acoustics in the process of human phonation. The numerical model is based on the equation of continuity and the Navier-Stokes equations. The investigations are done with the open source CFD package OpenFOAM. Numerical simulations are performed for a square-sectioned channel geometry, which is constricted with a fixed shape conforming to the fully opened human glottis. Time-dependent inflow boundary conditions are applied in order to model transient glottal flow rates. The setup of the numerical simulations corresponds to the configuration of a model experiment in order to allow detailed validation. The numerical results are in good agreement with the experimental data, when the near-wall region in the glottal gap is adequately resolved by the numerical grid. The results illustrate the complex interactions between the jet flow and the surrounding vortices. © 2011 Elsevier Ltd

Het 'adaptieve vermogen' van het ontwerp Nationaal Waterplan : in hoeverre bevordert het ontwerp Nationaal Waterplan het vermogen van de Nederlandse samenleving om zich aan te passen aan klimaatverandering?

Het adaptatiewiel is door Kennis voor Klimaat toegepast op het te voeren waterbeleid (Nationaal Waterplan, 2008) in Nederland. In de inspraakreactie levert KvK commentaar op het NWP, maar wijst ook de sterke kanten van het ontwerp Nationaal Waterplan aan

How Dutch Institutions Enhance the Adaptive Capacity of Society

This report examines the adaptive capacity of the institutional framework of the Netherlands to cope with the impacts of climate change. Historically, institutions have evolved incrementally to deal with existing social problems. They provide norms and rules for collective action and create continuity rather than change. However, the nature of societal problems is changing as a result of the processes of globalization and development. With the progress made in the natural sciences, we are able to predict in advance, to a certain extent, the potential environmental impacts of various human actions on society, for example, climate change. This raises some key questions: Are our institutions capable of dealing with this new knowledge about future impacts and, more importantly, with the impacts themselves? Are our institutions capable of dealing with the inherent uncertainty of the predictions

'Daar botst het weten' : interdisciplinair en transdisciplinair onderzoek binnen Wageningen UR

Welke verschillende vormen van interdisciplinair en transdisciplimnair onderzoek zijn er te onderscheiden inde Wageningse onderzoekspraktijk voor een duurzaam gebruik van de "groen-blauwe ruimte". Wat is de positie van Wageningen UR ten opzichte van een aantal andere Nederlandse wetenschappelijke instituten op het gebied van interdisciplinair onderzoek? Op basis van interviews met betrokken Wageningse onderzoekers van elf internationale projecten en drie onderzoekers van andere Nederlandse instituten zijn antwoorden ontwikkeld. Dit type onderzoek blijkt een specifiek Wageningense benadering te zijn vanwege de probleemoplossende insteek die veel onderzoekers kiezen

Institutions for Climate Change : A Method to assess the Inherent Characteristics of Institutions to enable the Adaptive Capacity of Society

This paper addresses the question: How can the inherent characteristics of institutions to stimulate the adaptive capacity of society to climate change from local through to national level be assessed? On the basis of a literature review and several brainstorm sessions, this paper presents six criteria: Variety, learning capacity, space for planned and innovative autonomous action, leadership, availability of resources and fair governance

The Early Childhood Educator Preparation Innovation Grant: Lessons from Initial Implementation

The main goals of this implementation study were to: a) examine how the grant recipients were implementing the changes set forth in their grant proposals; b) identify initial barriers to implementation of grant activities; c) identify catalysts that aided in goal attainment and/or partnership development; and d) consider the sustainability of the impact of the grant-related activities. Through structured telephone interviews, we solicited a brief description of major activities associated with the grant; catalysts and/or levers enhancing grant activities; barriers inhibiting implementation of grant activities; and successful strategies utilized to overcome barriers. There was also a specific emphasis on articulation activities within the partnerships, as articulation was considered a foundational component of the EPPI grants.https://spark.siue.edu/ierc_pub/1004/thumbnail.jp