Scientific knowledge and knowledge needs in climate adaptation policy: a case study of diverse mountain regions

Mountain ecosystems around the world are recognized to be among the most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. The need to develop sound adaptation strategies in these areas is growing. Knowledge from the natural sciences has an important role to play in the development of adaptation strategies. However, the extent of and gaps in such knowledge have not been systematically investigated for mountain areas. This paper analyzes the status of knowledge from natural science disciplines and research needs relevant to the national and subnational climate adaptation policies of 1 US state (Washington) and 7 countries (Austria, Bhutan, Colombia, Germany, Nepal, Peru, and Switzerland), in particular the elements of those policies focused on mountain areas. In addition, we asked key individuals involved in drafting those policies to answer a short questionnaire. We found that research needs mainly concern impact and vulnerability assessments at regional and local levels, integrated assessments, and improved climate and socioeconomic data. These needs are often related to the challenges to data coverage and model performance in mountainous areas. In these areas, the base data are often riddled with gaps and uncertainties, making it particularly difficult to formulate adaptation strategies. In countries where data coverage is less of an issue, there is a tendency to explore quantitative forms of impact and vulnerability assessments. We highlight how the knowledge embedded in natural science disciplines is not always useful to address complex vulnerabilities in coupled human and natural systems and briefly refer to alternative pathways to adaptation in the form of no-regret, flexible, and adaptive management solutions. Finally, in recognition of the trans- and interdisciplinary nature of climate change adaptation, we raise the question of which knowledge production paradigms are best able to deliver sustainable adaptations to growing environmental stressors in mountain regions

Climate Change Adaptation in European Mountain Systems: A Systematic Mapping of Academic Research

European mountain regions have already been impacted by climate change, and this is projected to increase in the future. These mountain regions experience rapid changes, which influence social-ecological systems in the lower-mountain and floodplain regions of Europe. There is scattered evidence across different strands of academic literature on the ways in which the impacts of changing climate in mountain regions are addressed and adaptive capacity is enhanced. Using a systematic mapping review, we mapped English-language scientific journal articles that analyzed the climate change adaptation options that are planned or implemented in European mountain regions. Our understanding of how academic literature has investigated climate change adaptation is critical to identifying key knowledge gaps and research foci. Following the Reporting Standards for Systematic Evidence Syntheses in environmental research protocol, 72 scientific articles published between January 2011 and August 2019 were identified from a total of 702 scientific articles. Our findings show that existing academic literature has a strong focus on the western and southern European mountains: the European Alps (n = 24), Pyrenees (n = 11), and Sierra Nevada (n = 4). Key climate impacts reported for the biophysical systems include reduction in forest carbon, soil erosion, changes in vegetation patterns, and changes in plant population and tree heights; in human systems, these include water availability, agricultural production, changes in viticulture, and impacts on tourism. Key adaptation options reported in this article are wetland conservation options, changing cropping and cultivation cycles, tree species management strategies, and snow-making technology. We found very few articles analyzing governance responses to planning and implementing adaptation; these had a strong bias toward techno-managerial responses. We conclude that, while climate impacts are substantial in European mountain regions, there are knowledge gaps in academic literature that need to be addressed.</p

Future trends in compound concurrent heat extremes in Swiss cities - An assessment considering deep uncertainty and climate adaptation options

The interaction of multiple hazards across various spatial and temporal scales typically causes compound climate and extreme weather events. Compound concurrent hot day and night (CCHDNs) extremes that combine daytime and nighttime heat are of greater concern for health than individual hot days (HDs) or hot nights (HNs), even though their frequency is lower. We utilize a bottom-up exploratory approach to investigate how adaptation options and various unfolding future scenarios alleviate the impacts of the heatwaves and affect the frequency and intensity of CCHDNs. We use climate observations (1981–2020) and Switzerland's future climate model scenarios (CH2018) to analyze historical and future trends of the individual hot day followed by a hot night (HDNs, first metric), and the length and frequency of CCHDNs (second and third metrics) in the near-future (2020–2050) and far-future (2070–2100). Results show more frequent and lengthier HDNs in cities under all emission scenarios, notably significant under high emissions scenarios. The highest increase of HDNs occur in i) Lugano with 65.8 days (decade−1) in the historical period and 110 (371) days (decade−1) in near-future (far-future), ii) Geneva with historical 48 days (decade−1) to 108 (362) (decade−1), iii) Basel with 48–74 (217) days in the future, followed by iv) Bern with 15–44 (213) days and v) Zürich with 14–50 (217) days (decade−1) in the near-future and far-future, respectively. We consistently project that the CCHDNs in April–October become more likely and intense in all cities under all emission scenarios, with higher increases under the RCP8.5 scenario and after the 2050s. The frequency of compound extreme heatwaves (exceeding both historical thresholds of night and day temperatures) may increase by 3.5–7.8-fold and become 3.3–5.3-fold lengthier in all cities of Switzerland in the far-future. We find that the adaptation options targeting higher tolerance to increased minimum temperatures contribute more to reducing compound extreme events' frequency and intensity than adaptation options that address the maximum daily temperature

Towards improved understanding of cascading and interconnected risks from concurrent weather extremes: Analysis of historical heat and drought extreme events

Weather extremes can affect many different assets, sectors and systems of the human environment, including human security, health and well-being. Weather extremes that compound, such as heat and drought, and their interconnected risks are complex, difficult to understand and thus a challenge for risk analysis and management, because (in intertwined systems) impacts can propagate through multiple sectors. In a warming climate, extreme concurrent heat and drought events are expected to increase in frequency, intensity and duration, posing growing risks to societies. To gain a better understanding of compound extremes and associated risks, we analyze eight historical heat and drought extreme events in Europe, Africa and Australia. We investigated and visualized the direct and indirect impact paths through different sectors and systems together with the impacts of response and adaptation measures. We found the most important cascading processes and interlinkages centered around the health, energy and agriculture and food production sectors. The key cascades result in impacts on the economy, the state and public services and ultimately also on society and culture. Our analysis shows that cascading impacts can propagate through numerous sectors with far reaching consequences, potentially being able to destabilize entire socio-economic systems. We emphasize that the future challenge in research on and adaptation to concurrent extreme events lies in the integration of assets, sectors and systems with strong interlinkages to other sectors and with a large potential for cascading impacts, but for which we cannot resort to historical experiences. Integrating approaches to deal with concurrent extreme events should furthermore consider the effects of possible response and adaptation mechanisms to increase system resilience

The existential risk space of climate change

Climate change is widely recognized as a major risk to societies and natural ecosystems but the high end of the risk, i.e., where risks become existential, is poorly framed, defined, and analyzed in the scientific literature. This gap is at odds with the fundamental relevance of existential risks for humanity, and it also limits the ability of scientific communities to engage with emerging debates and narratives about the existential dimension of climate change that have recently gained considerable traction. This paper intends to address this gap by scoping and defining existential risks related to climate change. We first review the context of existential risks and climate change, drawing on research in fields on global catastrophic risks, and on key risks and the so-called Reasons for Concern in the reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. We also consider how existential risks are framed in the civil society climate movement as well as what can be learned in this respect from the COVID-19 crisis. To better frame existential risks in the context of climate change, we propose to define them as those risks that threaten the existence of a subject, where this subject can be an individual person, a community, or nation state or humanity. The threat to their existence is defined by two levels of severity: conditions that threaten (1) survival and (2) basic human needs. A third level, well-being, is commonly not part of the space of existential risks. Our definition covers a range of different scales, which leads us into further defining six analytical dimensions: physical and social processes involved, systems affected, magnitude, spatial scale, timing, and probability of occurrence. In conclusion, we suggest that a clearer and more precise definition and framing of existential risks of climate change such as we offer here facilitates scientific analysis as well societal and political discourse and action

Chapter 8 The Status and Role of the alpine Cryosphere in Central Asia

The alpine cryosphere including snow, glaciers and permafrost are critical to water management in the Aral Sea Basin (ASB) and larger Central Asia (CA) under changing climate: as they store large amounts of water in its solid forms. Most cryospheric components in the Aral Sea Basin are close to melting point, and hence very vulnerable to a slight increase in air temperature with significant consequences to long-term water availability and to water resources variability and extremes. Current knowledge about different components of cryosphere and their connection to climate in the Basin and in the entire Central Asia, varies. While it is advanced in the topics of snow and glaciers, knowledge on permafrost it rather limited. Observed trends in runoff point in the direction of increasing water availability in July and August at least until mid-century and increasing possibility for water storage in reservoirs and aquifers. However, eventually this will change as glaciers waste away. Future runoff may change considerably after mid-century and start to decline if not compensated by increasing precipitation. Cryosphere monitoring systems are the basis for sound estimates of water availability and water-related hazards associated with snow, glaciers and permafrost. They require a well-distributed observational network for all cryospheric variables. Such systems need to be re-established in the Basin after the breakup of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s. This process is slowly emerging in the region. Collaboration between local operational hydro-meteorological services and academic sector, and with international research networks may improving the observing capabilities in high mountain regions of CA Asia in general and the ASB specifically

Human populations in the world's mountains: Spatio-temporal patterns and potential controls.

Changing climate and human demographics in the world's mountains will have increasingly profound environmental and societal consequences across all elevations. Quantifying current human populations in and near mountains is crucial to ensure that any interventions in these complex social-ecological systems are appropriately resourced, and that valuable ecosystems are effectively protected. However, comprehensive and reproducible analyses on this subject are lacking. Here, we develop and implement an open workflow to quantify the sensitivity of mountain population estimates over recent decades, both globally and for several sets of relevant reporting regions, to alternative input dataset combinations. Relationships between mean population density and several potential environmental covariates are also explored across elevational bands within individual mountain regions (i.e. "sub-mountain range scale"). Globally, mountain population estimates vary greatly-from 0.344 billion (31%) in 2015. A more detailed analysis using one of the population datasets (GHS-POP) revealed that in ∼35% of mountain sub-regions, population increased at least twofold over the 40-year period 1975-2015. The urban proportion of the total mountain population in 2015 ranged from 6% to 39%, depending on the combination of population and urban extent datasets used. At sub-mountain range scale, population density was found to be more strongly associated with climatic than with topographic and protected-area variables, and these relationships appear to have strengthened slightly over time. Such insights may contribute to improved predictions of future mountain population distributions under scenarios of future climatic and demographic change. Overall, our work emphasizes that irrespective of data choices, substantial human populations are likely to be directly affected by-and themselves affect-mountainous environmental and ecological change. It thereby further underlines the urgency with which the multitudinous challenges concerning the interactions between mountain climate and human societies under change must be tackled

Climate change research in bilateral development programmes: experiences from India and Peru

This article reflects on the merits and shortfalls of bilateral research programmes aimed at strengthening climate change research capabilities, using the experience from two programmes, the PACC and IHCAP in Peru and India, respectively. The study highlights key aspects of these types of bilateral programmes, namely: capacity; performance, salary and appreciation; funding; bureaucracy and hierarchy; publishing; and data sharing. Furthermore, it emerged that these programmes would benefit from a more extensive consolidation phase of the research activities and partnership rather than rapidly transferring into out- and up-scaling phases

ChatClimate: Grounding conversational AI in climate science

Large Language Models have made remarkable progress in question-answering tasks, but challenges like hallucination and outdated information persist. These issues are especially critical in domains like climate change, where timely access to reliable information is vital. One solution is granting these models access to external, scientifically accurate sources to enhance their knowledge and reliability. Here, we enhance GPT-4 by providing access to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC AR6), the most comprehensive, up-to-date, and reliable source in this domain (refer to the ’Data Availability’ section). We present our conversational AI prototype, available at www.chatclimate.ai, and demonstrate its ability to answer challenging questions in three different setups: (1) GPT-4, (2) ChatClimate, which relies exclusively on IPCC AR6 reports, and (3) Hybrid ChatClimate, which utilizes IPCC AR6 reports with in-house GPT-4 knowledge. The evaluation of answers by experts show that the hybrid ChatClimate AI assistant provide more accurate responses, highlighting the effectiveness of our solution

Knowledge Priorities on Climate Change and Water in the Upper Indus Basin: A Horizon Scanning Exercise to Identify the Top 100 Research Questions in Social and Natural Sciences

River systems originating from the Upper Indus Basin (UIB) are dominated by runoff from snow and glacier melt and summer monsoonal rainfall. These water resources are highly stressed as huge populations of people living in this region depend on them, including for agriculture, domestic use, and energy production. Projections suggest that the UIB region will be affected by considerable (yet poorly quantified) changes to the seasonality and composition of runoff in the future, which are likely to have considerable impacts on these supplies. Given how directly and indirectly communities and ecosystems are dependent on these resources and the growing pressure on them due to ever-increasing demands, the impacts of climate change pose considerable adaptation challenges. The strong linkages between hydroclimate, cryosphere, water resources, and human activities within the UIB suggest that a multi- and inter-disciplinary research approach integrating the social and natural/environmental sciences is critical for successful adaptation to ongoing and future hydrological and climate change. Here we use a horizon scanning technique to identify the Top 100 questions related to the most pressing knowledge gaps and research priorities in social and natural sciences on climate change and water in the UIB. These questions are on the margins of current thinking and investigation and are clustered into 14 themes, covering three overarching topics of ‘governance, policy, and sustainable solutions’, ‘socioeconomic processes and livelihoods’, and ‘integrated Earth System processes’. Raising awareness of these cutting-edge knowledge gaps and opportunities will hopefully encourage researchers, funding bodies, practitioners, and policy makers to address them