Counter Climate Change Research Articles

Contesting Political Decisions Involving Environmental Issues: A Case Study in Portugal Based on the Press About Offshore Oil and Gas Drilling

This paper presents a case study about the drilling of offshore oil and gas in mainland Portugal, a process that ended with the cancelation of all contracts. It aimed to better understand the argumentative and value dynamics involved in how municipalities, populations, civic organizations, and others successfully contested the central government decision of prospection. Since the press was one of the main stages for this conflict, it was important to analyze how it presented the respective arguments to society. Articles on this topic were collected from the two widely read national newspapers “Correio da Manhã” and “Público” in the culmination period of this confrontation, which occurred between June 2016 and December 2018. In total, 155 articles were found, 61.3% (n= 95) from “Público” and 38.7% (n= 60) from “Correio da Manhã.” The quantitative analysis focused on the number of news per month and the frequency of themes, as well as the frequency of actors and arguments used against and in favor of exploitation on the news. Thematic analysis was used to qualitatively assess the articulation of arguments in the two opposing views. Results show that, in both newspapers, the majority of articles focused on the positions and actions of those opposing prospection, as the Government and other actors in favor of drilling were much less active in presenting its arguments. Overall, the analysis suggests two different strategies: (a) a strong argumentative synergy between a wide range of actors against offshore prospection. Their concerted arguments defended multiple values, including public participation in political decisions, protecting local communities and places from environmental risks, countering climate change, and protecting local economic activities. (b) The Government was usually isolated in its arguments with the occasional exception of oil companies or representatives of the national industry. The scarce arguments used by these actors evoked mostly national economic values, with little engagement with other societal goals. This study suggests that the large mobilization of different sectors of society, their use of a convergent and wide range of arguments, and the lack of engagement of the Government in a dialogical argumentation were crucial to delegitimize the latter’s political decision.

Predicted Distributional Impacts of Climate Change Policy on Employment

Efforts to reduce emissions to counter climate change are expected to have both costs and benefits, and these effects are likely to be unevenly distributed across the population. We examined the potential distributional impacts on employment in New Zealand from using different mitigation options (“pathways”) designed to achieve net zero emissions of long-lived gases and to reduce biogenic methane emissions by 24-47% by 2050. For the analysis, we developed the Distributional Impacts Microsimulation for Employment (DIM-E). DIM-E uses results from a computable general equilibrium (CGE) model, C-PLAN, to estimate which industries, workers and jobs are expected to be most affected by different options to achieve these reductions. Overall, our results are similar to those from previous research in that the net employment effects are predicted to be relatively small, though some industries will be more affected than others. Moreover, the top net negative and top net positive industries ranked fairly consistently across the four time periods and across the different pathways that were analysed. On the net positive side, transport industries tended to dominate the industry rankings, and in later periods, some agriculture industries also tended to rank highly (e.g., Dairy Cattle Farming and Sheep/Beef Farming). On the net negative side, various manufacturing industries tended to dominate the top ranks, though oil and gas extraction was also consistently ranked. We also found that very few groups of workers were negatively affected (in terms of the number of worker-jobs) by any of the proposed pathways especially over the long term.

Exploring the potential for plant translocations to adapt to a warming world

Abstract Anthropogenic climate warming is undisputed and yet, there is much that is unknown regarding biological impacts of changing temperature and precipitation, and the management options presented as solutions to biodiversity losses—such as translocations of plants and seeds—are often controversial. This Special Focus presents five new studies and two recently published articles in Journal of Ecology and Ecological Solutions and Evidence that analyse the use of existing plant translocations, assess the potential to use translocations to offset past declines and future population losses, and articulate the need to involve a broader range of stakeholders in the use of translocations. Our recommendations include improving the monitoring of plant translocations; harnessing existing translocations to form a global monitoring array for climate change impacts on biological diversity and strengthening research–practice linkages improving data sharing and broadening the stakeholders involved in translocations. Synthesis. Further study of translocations and integration of information from translocation projects holds the opportunity to provide a wealth of new knowledge and improved ways to counter climate change impacts on biological diversity and ecosystems.

Sustain(able) urban (eco)systems: Stakeholder-related success factors in urban innovation projects

Urban areas are centers of financial and industrial activities and social life. Therefore, they are high consumers of resources and energy. Consequently, the relevance of sustainable urban transformation as a mean to counter climate change is increasing. However, because cities are complex and adaptive (eco)systems characterized by constant change, established innovation management approaches are not necessarily compatible with them. Therefore, this study aims to shed light on the underlying mechanisms, innovation barriers, and drivers of urban innovation development in urban ecosystems. It adopts the complex adaptive system perspective that allows an exploratory analysis of intricate stakeholder interactions, being a means to achieve urban transformation. Based on a qualitative content analysis of data obtained through 20 semi-structured interviews, the author shows that urban innovation implementation relies on the interaction between stakeholders in the urban district and from the near and distant urban environment. However, individual, organizational, and ecosystem innovation resistance in the urban district hinder innovation implementation, innovation drivers instead focus on the core of the urban ecosystem. In addition, based on a crisp-set qualitative comparative analysis using data from 33 German urban innovation projects, the author identifies and proffers combinations of specific innovation drivers that result in urban innovation implementation.

Diverging pathways to port sustainability: How social processes shape and direct transition work

To counter climate change, societies are under pressure to transform energy and transport sectors. Considering the crucial node position of ports in the intersection between energy and transport systems and their connecting of numerous sectors, markets, and values chains, they have hitherto received surprisingly little attention as potential sites for whole system thinking and deep transition. Their heterogeneity suggests that ports are likely to follow different transition pathways. This study explores two Norwegian frontrunner ports to demonstrate how social processes are part of the fabric that constitutes transition pathways in ports. The transition pathways in the two ports diverge according to how they are shaped by deep learning, resource capacity and the collective action of their wider networks, as well as the specificity of expectations. The study complements existing research on transition pathways by focusing on social processes beyond the niche level and by suggesting inter-process and inter-level dynamics to be decisive for the direction of transition work. Contrary to earlier findings, the paper demonstrates how broad and diversified networks may also represent a challenge to the directionality of transitions work. Ports can, however, promote transition work by aligning expectations to port sustainability with expectations in specific value chains.

Methodology for Modelling Distributional Impacts of Emissions Budgets on Employment in New Zealand

Efforts to reduce emissions to counter climate change are expected to have both costs and benefits, and these effects are likely to be unevenly distributed across the population. Hence, we developed the Distributional Impacts Microsimulation for Employment (DIM-E) to examine the potential distributional employment impacts for different mitigation options to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. DIM-E is comprised of two main components: the first component estimates industry-level employment effects, and the second simulates the characteristics of impacted workers and jobs. We based DIM-E on results from a computable general equilibrium (CGE) model, C-PLAN, and applied them to more detailed employment information in order to better understand the extent to which industries, jobs and workers are likely to be impacted by the different pathways. It is possible, however, for DIM-E to be used to analyse any policy scenario and its baseline using employment indices and similar employment information. In this paper, we describe DIM-E in the context of the initial case for which it was developed – to analyse emissions budgets for greenhouse gasses to be set by the New Zealand government for three time periods (2022-2025, 2026-2030, and 2031-2035). We also provide a sampling of results from this initial case in order to put the methodology into context. Hence, we show that DIM-E can be used to examine changes in employment trends due to policy changes as well as the different types of workers that are most likely to be affected by the reallocation of employment across industries. We found that the DIM-E results produced for the initial case were in line with previous research in this area – the overall net industry employment effects were predicted to be relatively small, though some industries will be more affected than others especially in the short- and medium-term. Moreover, very few worker groups would be negatively affected (in terms of the number of jobs) by any of the proposed mitigation options especially over the long term.

Fiscal Policies to Counter Climate Change and Economic Depression in the Post Covid-19 European Union

The Covid-19 health crisis will eventually fade out, but the consequential economic crisis is right ahead of us, along with the ongoing climate crisis. The European Union’s policies and institutions seem to hinder the green transition, in favor of fiscal balance and debt repayment among its member states. This paper proposes some fiscal policies, such as an EU “Employer of Last Resort” (ELR) program, which could successfully counter the upcoming depression and climate change, to finally bring economic and social prosperity to the EU’s citizens.

Econometrics Analysis of the Relationship between Climate Change and Economic Growth in Selected West African Countries

Linkages between Climate Change, Economic Growth and Poverty Reduction have become increasingly popular in local and international communities. This is due to the fact that we are currently facing pressing issues about climate change and poverty reduction effects in our planet. In this paper an empirical testing of the effects of Climate Change, Economic Growth and Poverty Reduction was carried out. Panel estimation methods of fixed effect, random effect, and panel unit root test-fisher type with trend and constant were applied. From the results, shows that economic growth has a negative and highly significant effect on the growth of poverty in the selected West African countries. Using growth rate of economics as dependent variable, the result shows that growth of poverty is highly significant. The population living in rural areas is significant with growth of poverty and highly significant with growth of food security. The policy recommendation is that the government of the west African countries should put in place strategies to reduce poverty, climate change effects on economics growth by following measures; to have strong institution and avoidance of corruption.Such strategies contain to counter climate change effects and increase the resilience of the economy, society and country in general.

Women in innovation processes as a solution to climate change: A systematic literature review and an agenda for future research

This paper focuses on identifying the means to tackle climate change as it explores the key role women could play in developing and enhancing innovation. Based on a systematic literature review (SLR) of 1,275 journal articles, we explore the impact of a stronger presence of women within institutions, including companies, to take on climate change. We also look at the need to properly align public policies and combat climate change while engaging global companies in the process. The SLR shows that more women within the technological innovation process promise greater productivity and better results. It also reveals that women tend to adopt innovations that have proven to be efficient. We argue that more women in science would contribute to accelerating the development of the necessary technological innovation to counter climate change and promote continued awareness about it. We also argue that more female board members in large companies and public institutions would contribute to not only appropriate climate change policies, but also to a move away from “gadget” technologies that fail to effectively fight rising global temperatures. The article concludes with a discussion of whether we need more women or feminine qualities within innovation processes.

A Quantitative Estimation of the Effects of Measures to Counter Climate Change on Well-Being: Focus on Non-Use of Air Conditioners as a Mitigation Measure in Japan

Measures to mitigate climate change are being considered all over the world. Reducing the use of air conditioners is one such measure. While it seems to be effective in mitigating climate change, it may also reduce individuals’ well-being and increase the risk of heatstroke. To compare the impact of reducing air conditioner use and the mortality risks, the indicator Loss of Happy Life Expectancy (LHpLE), which measures the reduction in the length of life that individuals can spend happily, was used. The reduction in well-being due to non-use of air conditioners was obtained by applying the propensity score matching method to the results of a questionnaire. We evaluated the impact of reducing air conditioner use in both the current and future situation in comparison to the mortality risk from flood and heatstroke, respectively. The increase in mortality risk due to flooding was estimated based on numerical simulation, and the increase in the risk of mortality due to heatstroke was estimated based on existing reports in Japan. Using these results, the magnitude of the impacts on LHpLE caused by the reduction in well-being due to the non-use of an air conditioner and the increase in the mortality risks were compared, both for the current situation and the future. The results show that LHpLE due to non-use of air conditioners was much greater than that due to the risk of mortality due to flood and heatstroke, and implied that reducing air conditioner use is not necessarily a good way as a mitigation measure. This result would be useful for creating and implementing measures to counter climate change and could also be applied in many other fields.

Public perceptions of forests across Italy: an exploratory national survey

In a context of progressive expansion of the Italian forest area, we present the results of a national survey exploring public perception of forests across different geographical scales in Italy. Perceptions of forests are assessed in relation to popular beliefs on relevant environmental issues such as countering climate change, protecting biodiversity, and promoting social cohesion and environmental education. Participants (N = 1059) living in five different regions of Northern (Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol, Piemonte), Central (Lazio, Molise) and Southern Italy (Puglia), were recruited in the survey and completed a paper-and-pencil questionnaire. Survey questions regarded the estimated percentage of forest cover, the perceived importance of different environmental issues and of different material and non-material forest products, as well as participants’ perceptions regarding connectedness to nature. Results revealed a generalized tendency to overestimate the extension of forest surface area in the participants’ region, in Italy, and in the European Union. Results also showed high scores for participants’ perceived importance of environmental issues, such as climate change and biodiversity protection, and in their belief that forests could play a positive role in addressing these issues and providing important outcomes and benefits for the quality of human life, such as health and well-being or social cohesion.

Increasing the broad-leaved tree fraction in European forests mitigates hot temperature extremes

Forests influence climate through a myriad of chemical, physical and biological processes and are an essential lever in the efforts to counter climate change. The majority of studies investigating potential climate benefits from forests have focused on forest area changes, while changes to forest management, in particular those affecting species composition, have received much less attention. Using a statistical model based on remote sensing observations over Europe, we show that broad-leaved tree species locally reduce land surface temperatures in summer compared to needle-leaved species. The summer mean cooling effect related to an increase in broad-leaved tree fraction of 80% is relatively modest (~ 0.3–0.75 K), but is amplified during exceptionally warm periods. The reduction of daily maximum temperatures during the hottest days reaches up to 1.8 K in the Atlantic region and up to 1.5 K in Continental and Mediterranean regions. Hot temperature extremes adversely affect humans and ecosystems and are expected to become more frequent in a future climate. Thus, forest management strategies aiming to increase the fraction of broad-leaved species could help to reduce some of the adverse local impacts caused by hot temperature extremes. However, the overall benefits and trade-offs related to an increase in the broad-leaved tree fraction in European forests needs to be further investigated and assessed carefully when adapting forest management strategies.

Is Substitutability the New Efficiency? Endogenous Investment in the Elasticity of Substitution between Clean and Dirty Energy

When analyzing potential ways to counter climate change, standard models of green growth abstract from investment in substitutability between “clean” and “dirty” energy inputs. Instead, they rely on the assumption that efficiency with respect to fossil fuels can be increased perpetually. However, this is not in line with observed firm investment behavior and the limits to efficiency imposed by thermodynamic laws. In this paper, I develop a growth model that explicitly accounts for endogenous investment to increase input substitutability, in addition to investment in efficiency. The model predicts that, for a growing economy, there is always investment in both substitutability and efficiency, even without a carbon cap and with non-infinite fossil fuel prices. Most importantly, in the long-run, with sufficient investment in substitutability, fossil fuels become inessential for production. Moreover, the model predicts a declining income share of fossil fuels, an outcome not featured by standard models based on purely efficiency-enhancing technological progress. Overall, the model generates an endogenous path of transition from an economy characterized by a low elasticity of substitution to one characterized by a high elasticity. In doing so, it still nests the results derived from a purely efficiency-based directed technical change framework as a special case. In addition, this paper analyzes the scope for policy intervention, showing that even a temporary subsidy/tax can trigger a full transformation toward green growth.

Climate Change Accounting and Reporting: A Systematic Literature Review

During the last few years, sustainability has become an increasingly important dimension for corporations. Many stakeholders expect companies to implement sustainability-oriented practices and report on these actions and their results. As a consequence, corporate accountability and, more specifically, corporate accounting and reporting, should focus not only on financial, social, and environmental performance, but also on sustainability-related aspects. Among these aspects, climate change is becoming increasingly important for companies, which must take action to counter the effects of their activities on climate change and inform their stakeholders about these actions and their effects. Given the initial state of research about climate change accounting and reporting, the authors focused on the sustainable development goal (SDG) no. 13, “climate action”, in order to highlight the current state and the future directions of this area of inquiry. They used a mixed approach to perform a systematic literature review about sustainability accounting/reporting and climate change: (1) a qualitative analysis according to a qualitative analytical framework, and (2) a bibliometric (descriptive statistical) approach. The authors found that: (1) the main perspectives addressed in the selected articles relate to sustainability accounting and reporting in a broad sense; (2) there was a lack of contributions about management of climate change-related aspects, with specific reference to strategic and operational planning, accounting, and control of the actions implemented by the management of firms to counter climate change problems. The authors suggested the topics accounting scholars should focus their future research upon and underscored the social responsibilities of accounting scholars to increasingly integrate climate change mitigation into their accounting foci. They reviewed the main areas of climate change accounting/reporting literature and identified the gaps to be filled.

Sustainable Forest Management and Avoiding Pandemic Crisis

Forests are a unique gift from nature to man. They are the most biologically-diverse ecosystem on land and home of more than 75% of terrestrial species of animals, birds, plants and insects. They store about 296 Giga ton of carbon and counter climate change. They conserve soil, fix nitrogen and add organic matter to improve soil fertility. Forested watersheds and wetlands supply 75% of fresh water. They clean air and water, provide critical wildlife habitat, and make the planet a healthier place to live. Deforestation, climate change, poaching of wildlife, capturing them and their illegal world trade are worrisome. Due to the consumption and exposure of meat from the "wet market" or unnatural reproduction of animals, their deadly viruses are spreading in humans by spreading global epidemics. In the years 2003 to 2019, three global epidemics were encountered. The Covid-19 epidemic has disturbed the entire world. To avoid global epidemics in the future, sustainable forest management and allowing wildlife to live in the forests is absolutely necessary for public welfare.

Managing the Complexity of Climate Change

The purpose of this paper is to indicate how the knowledge of complex systems can be put into practice to counter climate change. A contribution of the paper is to show how individual behaviour, institutional analysis, political science and management can be grounded and integrated into the complexity of natural systems to introduce mutual sustainability. This is achieved by using bytes as the unit of analysis to explain how nature governs complexity on a more reliable and comprehensive basis than can be achieved by humans using markets and hierarchies. Tax incentives are described to increase revenue while encouraging organisations to adopt elements of ecological governance found in nature and in some types of social organisations identified by Ostrom and the author. Described is the ability of ecological governance to provide benefits for all stakeholders as desired by CEO’s of the US Business Round table. Ecological corporations become a common good to promote global common goods like enriching democracy from the bottom up while countering: climate change, pollution, in-equalities in power, wealth and income.

Effects of disturbance patterns and deadwood on the microclimate in European beech forests

More frequent and severe disturbances increasingly open the forest canopy and initiate tree regeneration. Simultaneously, increasing weather extremes, such as drought and heat, are threatening species adapted to cool and moist climate. The magnitude of the microclimatic buffering capacity of forest canopies to mitigate hot and dry weather conditions and its disturbance-induced reduction remains poorly quantified. Also, the influence of disturbance legacies (e.g., deadwood) on forest microclimate is unresolved. In a unique manipulation experiment we investigated (i) the microclimatic buffering capacity of forest canopies in years with different climatic conditions; (ii) the impacts of spatial disturbance patterns on surface light and microclimate; and (iii) the effect of deadwood presence and type on microclimate.Treatments included two disturbance patterns (i.e., aggregated and distributed), four deadwood types (i.e., standing, downed, standing and downed, removed), and one untreated control (i.e., nine treatments in total), replicated at five sites dominated by European beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) in southeastern Germany. We measured forest floor light conditions and derived diurnal extremes and variation in temperature (T) and vapor pressure deficit (VPD) during four consecutive summer seasons (2016 – 2019).The buffering capacity of intact forest canopies was higher in warm and dry years. Surface light was significantly higher in spatially aggregated disturbance gaps compared to distributed disturbances of similar severity. An increase in surface light by 10 % relative to closed canopies elevated Tmax and VPDmax by 0.42°C and 0.04 kPa, respectively. Deadwood presence and type did not affect the forest microclimate significantly.Microclimatic buffering under forest canopies can dampen the effects of climate change. However, increasing canopy disturbances result in more light penetrating the canopy, reducing the microclimatic buffering capacity of forests. We conclude that forest management should foster microclimatic buffering in forests as one element of a multi-pronged strategy to counter climate change.

Influence of Women Empowerment on Adoption of Agroforestry Technologies to Counter Climate Change and Variability in Semi-Arid Makueni County, Kenya

Climate change has become a major concern in Africa, where many climate models predict that it will cause among other things; decreasing rainfall especially in arid areas, warmer temperatures and increasing severity and frequency of extreme weather events. Subsistence farmers in developing world are unable to cope with such climate variability since they do not have the capital to invest in new adaptive practices. They are also especially sensitive to climate change since they rely almost entirely on rain- fed agriculture. This study was carried out at Nguumo and Makindu locations in Makindu sub-county, Makueni County. The main objective of the study was to examine the role of women in agroforestry technologies as an adaptation strategy to climate change and variability in Makindu and Nguumo locations, Makindu sub county, Makueni County, Kenya.

Valuation and investment strategies of carbon capture and storage technology under uncertainties in technology, policy and market

Although developing renewable energy sources is the best way to reduce carbon dioxide emissions and deal with climate change, fossil fuels are currently the most important energy sources. To counter climate change and reduce carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels, scientists are developing new carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies. In this paper, we discuss existing and future CCS technologies, compare the values of three CCS investment strategies in the real options framework under uncertainties in technology, policy and market, and consider the effect of learning curves on investment values. Generally, uncertainty can increase investment valuation, but we find that uncertainty in CCS technology reduces its investment valuation. Finally, we calculate the probability that the optimal investment strategy will be implemented.

To veg or not to veg? The impact of framing on vegetarian food choice

Research suggests that consuming vegetarian foods is one of the key lifestyle changes that could reduce greenhouse gas emissions. However, transforming dietary habits to counter climate change has received little attention to date compared to other green behaviors. In three large pre-registered online studies conducted on 11,066 US participants, the present research tested whether reframing the name of the vegetarian food category impacts the choice of dishes from this category in the context of restaurant menus. We showed that a pro-environmental frame (i.e. “Environmentally Friendly Main Courses for a Happy Planet”), a social frame (i.e. “Refreshing Main Courses for Relaxing Conversations”), and a neutral frame (i.e. vegetarian and non-vegetarian dishes mixed in the same section “Main Courses”) all increased the likelihood of vegetarian choice compared to a vegetarian frame (i.e. “Vegetarian Main Courses”). Given that either of the three framing conditions (vs. the vegetarian frame) increased vegetarian food choice but no consistent differences emerged among them, the main message of the present research is that the absence of vegetarian framing, regardless of the alternative intervention, may make vegetarian choices more likely. In addition to testing the main effects of menus on vegetarian choice, we comprehensively examined the mechanism behind these effects by probing multiple mediators. Overall, our research offers new insights into how techniques stemming from psychology can enhance vegetarian food choice.