Identifying gaps between science and practitioners perspectives on land use: the case of managed realignment in the German Baltic coast

Through state-of-the art ecosystem modelling supported by ecological experimental data, the COMTESS Project (funding: German Federal Ministry of Education and Research) investigates potential synergies and trade offs in ecosystem service provision under different land-use scenarios in two German coastal areas till 2100. Overall goal is to explore alternative sustainable land-use strategies to best adapt to climate change. Two science-based land- use scenarios were developed for two study regions on the Baltic and North Sea coasts to contrast a business-as-usual scenario. We focus here on the Baltic Se case region. The underlying premise of these alternatives is managed realignment of current dikes inland for: 1) climate mitigation through wetland re-naturation or 2) multiple land use, including biomass harvesting for energetic purposes (Baltic Sea). Managed realignment is increasingly considered as a valid coastal defence strategy to lower long-term costs of hard coastal defence and restore critical coastal and experiments have been initiated since the 1990s in a number of northwest European countries. Though politically highly controversial and facing much public antagonism, managed realignment is effectively embedded in the current coastal management policy of the state of Mecklenburg Vorpommern on the German Baltic coast. Implementation, nevertheless, faces many obstacles. Project-based scenarios for the Baltic Sea were first evaluated by key regional and local policy, management and land use practitioners, each expert in their field of activity. Their evaluation and recommendations were subsequently used to develop a fourth land-use scenario. Using qualitative empirical social research methods we analyse divergences and convergences between expert views on the projects scenarios. We argue that managed realignment is currently being mainstreamed in science, policy and resource management arenas although representatives of local land users and inhabitants do not endorse this strategy and still foster a hard defence approach to coastal zone management. This is best illustrated in recurrent social mobilisation and resistance to managed realignment proposals. This points at important perception and preference gaps between science, policy and land users / inhabitants, which need to be resolved to formulate and implement sustainable and socially acceptable land use strategies

Stakeholder dialogue as a communication and negotiation tool in scientific inquiry

A stakeholder dialogue aimed to facilitate the development and dissemination of the ATEAM European vulnerability assessment of global change impacts. This participative experiment constitutes a milestone in integrated ecological modelling. Participating ecosystem managers, sectoral representatives and policy advisers significantly influenced the research content and process. The usefulness of the projects’ outcomes for stakeholders and an evaluation of the dialogue are presented. Three challenges are highlighted. First, the increasing complexity and uncertainty of global change modelling and the multiplication of its results raise the question of how to best communicate modelling outcomes to society. Second, scientifically credible and socially relevant participative research implies the need for transparency in the research process, so that goals, underlying assumptions and methods of scientific inquiry may be adequately scrutinised and debated. Finally, stakeholder dialogues are valuable processes of negotiation, which may help to reconcile the differing needs of fundamental and applied global change sciences.Keywords: science-stakeholder dialogue, participative research, ecosystem modelling, global change, vulnerability assessmen

Introduction

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Neolithic settlement at the woodland's edge: palynological data and timber architecture in Orkney, Scotland

It has often been assumed that the islands of Orkney were essentially treeless throughout much of the Holocene, with any ‘scrub’ woodland having been destroyed by Neolithic farming communities by around 3500 cal. BC. This apparently open, hyper-oceanic environment would presumably have provided quite marginal conditions for human settlement, yet Neolithic communities flourished and the islands contain some of the most spectacular remains of this period in north-west Europe. The study of new Orcadian pollen sequences, in conjunction with the synthesis of existing data, indicates that the timing of woodland decline was not synchronous across the archipelago, beginning in the Mesolithic, and that in some areas woodland persisted into the Bronze Age. There is also evidence to suggest that woodland communities in Orkney were more diverse, and therefore that a wider range of resources was available to Neolithic people, than has previously been assumed. Recent archaeological investigations have revealed evidence for timber buildings at early Neolithic settlement sites, suggesting that the predominance of stone architecture in Neolithic Orkney may not have been due to a lack of timber as has been supposed. Rather than simply reflecting adaptation to resource constraints, the reasons behind the shift from timber to stone construction are more complex and encompass social, cultural and environmental factors

8000 years of North Atlantic storminess reconstructed from a Scottish peat record: implications for Holocene atmospheric circulation patterns in Western Europe

North Atlantic storminess can affect human settlements, infrastructure and transport links, all of which strongly impact local, national and global economies. An increase in storm frequency and intensity is predicted over the North-East Atlantic in the 21st century because of a northward shift in storm tracks and a persistently positive North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), driven by recent atmospheric warming. Although documentary records of North Atlantic storminess exist, these are generally limited to the last c. 1000 years. This paper presents a continuous high-resolution proxy record of storminess spanning the last 8000 years from a 6 m-long core taken from a peat bog in northern Scotland. Bromine concentrations in the peat, derived from sea spray, are used to reconstruct storm frequency and storm intensity, and mire surface wetness is used as an indicator of longer-term climate shifts. The results suggest a relationship between positive phases of the NAO and increased North Atlantic storminess. However, subtle differences between bromine concentrations and mire surface wetness suggest that high-intensity but perhaps less frequent periods of storminess are not necessarily associated with a wetter climate

Preventing stroke in people with atrial fibrillation: a cross-sectional study.

The annual stroke rate in atrial fibrillation is around 5 per cent with increased risk in those with hypertension, diabetes, left ventricular dysfunction and other cardiovascular risk factors. This study set out to identify the patients with atrial fibrillation and modifiable risk factors for stroke

Control of star formation by supersonic turbulence

Understanding the formation of stars in galaxies is central to much of modern astrophysics. For several decades it has been thought that stellar birth is primarily controlled by the interplay between gravity and magnetostatic support, modulated by ambipolar diffusion. Recently, however, both observational and numerical work has begun to suggest that support by supersonic turbulence rather than magnetic fields controls star formation. In this review we outline a new theory of star formation relying on the control by turbulence. We demonstrate that although supersonic turbulence can provide global support, it nevertheless produces density enhancements that allow local collapse. Inefficient, isolated star formation is a hallmark of turbulent support, while efficient, clustered star formation occurs in its absence. The consequences of this theory are then explored for both local star formation and galactic scale star formation. (ABSTRACT ABBREVIATED)Comment: Invited review for "Reviews of Modern Physics", 87 pages including 28 figures, in pres

Holocene sea level fluctuations and coastal evolution in the central Algarve (southern Portugal)

In Armação de Pêra Bay, southern Portugal, environmental changes during the Holocene can be interpreted based on the morphological and sedimentological similarities between older geomorphic features (cemented beach and dune rocks) and present coastal features. Using knowledge of the present beach and dune processes, we propose a two-step model for the evolution of Armação de Pêra Bay. First, during the rapid sea level rise between about 8800 and 6600 yr cal BP, the bay changed from a positive to a negative budget littoral cell and transgressive dunes formed, favoured by drought conditions. At about 5000 yr cal BP, during a sea level maximum, beach width was less than the critical fetch and dunes stabilized and underwent cementation during the wetter Atlantic climatic event. The second phase of dune accumulation started at about 3200 yr cal BP, due to a regression of sea level during which the bay changed back to a positive budget littoral cell in which beach width was greater than the critical fetch. Currently, the beach width is less than the critical fetch, dunes are inactive, and the sedimentary budget is negative due to sediment storage in local river systems.Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia. FEDER, and OE (Project POCTI/CTA/34162/2000

Sea-level rise impacts on transport infrastructure: the notorious case of the coastal railway line at Dawlish, England

Future climate change is likely to increase the frequency of coastal storms and floods, with major consequences for coastal transport infrastructure. This paper assesses the extent to which projected sea-level rise is likely to impact upon the functioning of the Dawlish to Teignmouth stretch of the London to Penzance railway line, in England. Using a semi-empirical modelling approach, we identify a relationship between sea-level change and rail incidents over the last 150 years and then use model-based sea-level predictions to extrapolate this relationship into the future. We find that days with line restrictions (DLRs) look set to increase by up to 1170%, to as many as 84–120 per year, by 2100 in a high sea-level rise scenario (0.55–0.81 m). Increased costs to the railway industry deriving from maintenance and line restrictions will be small (£ millions) in comparison with damage caused by individual extreme events (£10s of millions), while the costs of diversion of the railway are higher still (£100s of millions to billions). Socio-economic costs to the region are likely to be significant although they are more difficult to estimate accurately. Finally, we explain how our methodology is applicable to vulnerable coastal transport infrastructure worldwide