Framework For Climate Change Research Articles

Frameworkofclimate change adaptation measuresofurban planning-related sectors inUKandFrenchmunicipalities

Frameworkofclimate change adaptation measuresofurban planning-related sectors inUKandFrenchmunicipalities

How do weather and climate change impact the COVID-19 pandemic? Evidence from the Chinese mainland

The COVID-19 pandemic continues to expand, while the relationship between weather conditions and the spread of the virus remains largely debatable. In this paper, we attempt to examine this question by employing a flexible econometric model coupled with fine-scaled hourly temperature variations and a rich set of covariates for 291 cities in the Chinese mainland. More importantly, we combine the baseline estimates with climate-change projections from 21 global climate models to understand the pandemic in different scenarios. We found a significant negative relationship between temperatures and caseload. A one-hour increase in temperatures from 25 °C to 28 °C tends to reduce daily cases by 15.1%, relative to such an increase from −2 °C to 1 °C. Our results also suggest an inverted U-shaped nonlinear relationship between relative humidity and confirmed cases. Despite the negative effects of heat, we found that rising temperatures induced by climate change are unlikely to contain a hypothesized pandemic in the future. In contrast, cases would tend to increase by 10.9% from 2040 to 2059 with a representative concentration pathway (RCP) of 4.5 and by 7.5% at an RCP of 8.5, relative to 2020, though reductions of 1.8% and 18.9% were projected for 2080–2099 for the same RCPs, respectively. These findings raise concerns that the pandemic could worsen under the climate-change framework.

On the Difference between Anthropocene and Climate Change Temporalities

This article compares two dominating conceptual frameworks of the current global environmental crisis, the Anthropocene and climate change, with respect to how they can be deployed to think about the dynamics of political action. Whereas the Anthropocene has attracted the attention of audiences beyond specialists and has radically expanded the temporal horizon for politics, its temporal characteristics risk rendering it unhelpful for thinking critically about how the current environmental crisis can be addressed. Most importantly, by establishing a reference point in a distant future from which the present is evaluated, the Anthropocene framework gives the impression that the future is already determined and that the course of future environmental degradation is set. The Anthropocene thus fails to specify what is at stake for politics in the current crisis. As a contrast, the climate-change framework is structured as a range of scenarios. It establishes a temporal structure that opens the present to different potential futures and manifests the fact that the level of emissions in the coming decades is decisive for future climate change but not yet determined. Further, the presence of tipping points in the climate system can be understood in temporal terms as a risk in some scenarios of falling into a temporality of unfolding, a mode in which game-changing events that lead to even more emissions proceed beyond human influence. The risk of entering such a temporality that closes down the possibility to meaningfully deliberate on fundamental aspects of the future increases with the rate of emissions. The climate-change framework in this way helps us understand the environmental crisis in a new way, namely by conceptualizing the open future as a finite resource that has to be distributed globally and across generations. In sum, as a framework for engaging with environmental derangement, the climate-change framework offers a more specific and politically useful temporality than the Anthropocene.

Effects of climate change on soil respiration and carbon processing in Mediterranean and semi-arid regions: An experimental approach

Recent regional climate-change models indicated significant changes in the temporal and spatial distribution of rainfall in the Mediterranean-Basin region. Understanding the consequences of rainfall alterations for soil respiration and carbon processing in these regions is essential, considering their crucial functions for soil fertility and ecosystem functioning. Our aim was to evaluate the effect of rainfall manipulations and shrub cover on a soil microbial community within a climate-change framework. Three rainfall-manipulation treatments were designed to reflect potential changes in precipitation regimens: supplemented winter rainfall; winter drought; and control. Soil samples were collected seasonally under shrub (Sarcopoterium spinosum) canopies and between shrubs. Our results indicate significantly (p < 0.05) higher soil moisture in the supplemented winter-rainfall treatment in the Mediterranean and semi-arid sites in the second winter, mainly due to differences in the rainfall distribution pattern. Microbial biomass was significantly (p < 0.05) higher under dry conditions compared to more mesic conditions. Soil abiotic parameters, e.g., moisture, organic carbon, and dissolved organic carbon, were significantly higher in the shrub understory compared to open spaces at the semi-arid site. The present study elucidates that the multifaceted importance of shrub cover as an organic-matter donor, prolonging moisture availability and moderating temperature and radiation, increases under arid conditions.

Linking components of vulnerability in theoretic frameworks and case studies

Clarification on what is meant by ‘vulnerability’ continues as an unresolved problem in a world of inter-connected research fields dealing with natural hazards and of policy-makers eager for vulnerability assessments that will help in steering their decisions. This paper investigates the theoretical definitions of vulnerability components in risk-hazard and climate-change frameworks and the description of these components as operated in vulnerability assessments at the case-study level. The results point to a lower level of heterogeneity in vulnerability interpretations at the case-study level when compared to the semantically rich descriptions of vulnerability components in conceptual frameworks. Despite differences in definitions, vulnerability components such as hazard and exposure, capacities and adaptation, susceptibility and sensitivity, or susceptibility and vulnerability were made operational by the use of similar indicators and methodologies between and within the communities investigated. In order to attain a better understanding of the interdisciplinary use of the term ‘vulnerability’, the comparison of methodologies to assess vulnerability components at the case-study level seems essential.

Taking Stock of Strategies on Climate Change and the Way Forward: A Strategic Climate Change Framework for Australia

Taking Stock of Strategies on Climate Change and the Way Forward: A Strategic Climate Change Framework for Australia

Some commercial questions of the CO2emission

160 countries agreed on the reduction of greenhouse gas emission in the UN's ClimateChange Framework Convention (UNFCCC) in Kyoto n 1997. The signing countries undertook that they will reduce their emission under a defined level between 2008 es 2012. According to this Convention a 6% emission-reduction will be compulsory for Hungary. The EU approved the directive about the emission units of greenhouse gases in 2003. The direct aim of the directive is to help the EU member states so that they could fulfill their emission-reductions according to the Kyoto protocol. According to the approved directive each member state received pollution quotas that were distributed by the member states among more than 10.000 enterprises of the five industrial sectors based on certain factors. If the quota is not enough for the production of a member state (enterprise), the necessary quotas should be obtained through trade. The number of the participants in the trade may jump in the next few years, since the European Commission is planning to take other sectors and gases into the second trade period between 2008-2012. Potentially all the six greenhouse gases may go onto the list, but C02, which represents 80% of the continent's greenhouse gas emission, may hold its good position, i.e. may become an accounting instrument. The current EU member states must purchase carbon units of more than 2,5 billion tons from external sources until 2012 which means a market of 10-13 billion euros even at present carbon prices (4-5 euro/t). This value may jump remarkably in the future. At the moment carbon trade does not mean a problem yet in the agriculture. In the long run, however, the needs and the opportunities connected to CC^-trade and the experience of other sectors should be taken into account in agricultural investments.