Recent climatic trends and linkages to river discharge in Central Vietnam

In this study, change in rainfall, temperature and river discharge are analysed over the last three decades in Central Vietnam. Trends and rainfall indices are evaluated using non-parametric tests at different temporal levels. To overcome the sparse locally available network, the high resolution APHRODITE gridded dataset is used in addition to the existing rain gauges. Finally, existing linkages between discharge changes and trends in rainfall and temperature are explored. Results are indicative of an intensification of rainfall (+15%/decade), with more extreme and longer events. A significant increase in winter rainfall and a decrease in consecutive dry days provides strong evidence for a lengthening wet season in Central Vietnam. In addition, trends based on APHRODITE suggest a strong orographic signal in winter and annual trends. These results underline the local variability in the impacts of climatic change at the global scale. Consequently, it is important that change detection investigations are conducted at the local scale. A very weak signal is detected in the trend of minimum temperature (+0.2��C/decade). River discharge trends show an increase in mean discharge (31 to 35%/decade) over the last decades. Between 54 and 74% of this increase is explained by the increase in precipitation. The maximum discharge also responds significantly to precipitation changes leading to a lengthened wet season and an increase in extreme rainfall events. Such trends can be linked with a likely increase in floods in Central Vietnam, which is important for future adaptation planning and management and flood preparedness in the region. Copyright �� 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

The impacts of climate change on river flood risk at the global scale

This paper presents an assessment of the implications of climate change for global river flood risk. It is based on the estimation of flood frequency relationships at a grid resolution of 0.5��������0.5��, using a global hydrological model with climate scenarios derived from 21 climate models, together with projections of future population. Four indicators of the flood hazard are calculated; change in the magnitude and return period of flood peaks, flood-prone population and cropland exposed to substantial change in flood frequency, and a generalised measure of regional flood risk based on combining frequency curves with generic flood damage functions. Under one climate model, emissions and socioeconomic scenario (HadCM3 and SRES A1b), in 2050 the current 100-year flood would occur at least twice as frequently across 40 % of the globe, approximately 450 million flood-prone people and 430 thousand km2 of flood-prone cropland would be exposed to a doubling of flood frequency, and global flood risk would increase by approximately 187 % over the risk in 2050 in the absence of climate change. There is strong regional variability (most adverse impacts would be in Asia), and considerable variability between climate models. In 2050, the range in increased exposure across 21 climate models under SRES A1b is 31���450 million people and 59 to 430 thousand km2 of cropland, and the change in risk varies between ���9 and +376 %. The paper presents impacts by region, and also presents relationships between change in global mean surface temperature and impacts on the global flood hazard. There are a number of caveats with the analysis; it is based on one global hydrological model only, the climate scenarios are constructed using pattern-scaling, and the precise impacts are sensitive to some of the assumptions in the definition and application.

The impacts of climate change across the globe: a multi-sectoral assessment

The overall global-scale consequences of climate change are dependent on the distribution of impacts across regions, and there are multiple dimensions to these impacts.This paper presents a global assessment of the potential impacts of climate change across several sectors, using a harmonised set of impacts models forced by the same climate and socio-economic scenarios. Indicators of impact cover the water resources, river and coastal flooding, agriculture, natural environment and built environment sectors. Impacts are assessed under four SRES socio-economic and emissions scenarios, and the effects of uncertainty in the projected pattern of climate change are incorporated by constructing climate scenarios from 21 global climate models. There is considerable uncertainty in projected regional impacts across the climate model scenarios, and coherent assessments of impacts across sectors and regions therefore must be based on each model pattern separately; using ensemble means, for example, reduces variability between sectors and indicators. An example narrative assessment is presented in the paper. Under this narrative approximately 1 billion people would be exposed to increased water resources stress, around 450 million people exposed to increased river flooding, and 1.3 million extra people would be flooded in coastal floods each year. Crop productivity would fall in most regions, and residential energy demands would be reduced in most regions because reduced heating demands would offset higher cooling demands. Most of the global impacts on water stress and flooding would be in Asia, but the proportional impacts in the Middle East North Africa region would be larger. By 2050 there are emerging differences in impact between different emissions and socio-economic scenarios even though the changes in temperature and sea level are similar, and these differences are greater in 2080. However, for all the indicators, the range in projected impacts between different climate models is considerably greater than the range between emissions and socio-economic scenarios.

The global-scale impacts of climate change: the QUEST-GSI project

This paper introduces the special issue of Climatic Change on the QUEST-GSI project, a global-scale multi-sectoral assessment of the impacts of climate change. The project used multiple climate models to characterise plausible climate futures with consistent baseline climate and socio-economic data and consistent assumptions, together with a suite of global-scale sectoral impacts models. It estimated impacts across sectors under specific SRES emissions scenarios, and also constructed functions relating impact to change in global mean surface temperature. This paper summarises the objectives of the project and its overall methodology, outlines how the project approach has been used in subsequent policy-relevant assessments of future climate change under different emissions futures, and summarises the general lessons learnt in the project about model validation and the presentation of multi-sector, multi-region impact assessments and their associated uncertainties to different audiences.

Future landscapes in South-eastern Australia : the role of protected areas and biolinks in adaptation to climate change

The extent and rapidity of global climate change is the major novel threatening process to biodiversity in the 21 st century. Globally, numerous studies suggest movement of biota to higher latitudes and altitudes with increasing empirical -evidence emerging. As biota responds to the direct and consequent effects of climate change the potential to profoundly affect natural systems (including the reserve system) of south-eastern Australia is becoming evident. Climate change is projected to accelerate major environmental drivers such as drought, fire and flood regimes. Is the reserve system sufficient for biodiversity conservation under a changing climate? Australia is topographically flat, biologically mega-diverse with high species endemism, and has the driest and most variable climate of any inhabited continent. Whilst the north-south orientation and aftitude gradient of eastern Australia's forests and woodlands provides some resilience to projected climatic change, this has been eroded since European settlement, particularly in the cool-moist Bassian zone of the south-east. Following settlement, massive land-use change for agriculture and forestry caused widespread loss and fragmentation of habitats; becoming geriatric in agricultural landscapes and artificially young in forests. The reserve system persists as an archipelago of ecological islands surrounded by land uses of varying compatibility with conservation and vulnerable to global warming. The capacity for biota to adapt is limited by habitat availability. The extinction risk is exacerbated. Re-examination of earlier analysis of ecological connectivity through biolink zones confirms biolinks as an appropriate risk management response within a broader suite of measures. Areas not currently in the reserve system may be critical to the value and ecological function of biological assets of the reserve system as these assets change. Ecological need and the rise of ecosystem services, combined with changing socio-economic drivers of land-use and social values that supported the expansion of the reserve system, all suggest biolink zones represent a new, necessary and viable multi-functional landscape. This paper explores some of the key ecological elements for restoration within biolink zones (and landscapes at large) particularly through currently agricultural landscapes.<br />

Socio-climatic hotspots in Brazil

Coordena����o de Aperfei��oamento de Pessoal de N��vel Superior (CAPES)

Influence of habitat and climate change on European bird communities

Die Fragmentierung von Waldgebieten, der Verlust geeigneter Habitate, die Invasion exotischer Arten und globale Klimaver��nderung haben auf Artengemeinschaften erhebliche Auswirkungen. V��gel dienen in vielen F��llen als Indikatorarten f��r Umweltver��nderungen und, besonders, f��r Ver��nderungen im Zusammenhang mit globaler Erw��rmung. In meiner Arbeit habe ich zuerst einen Literatur��berblick ��ber die Auswirkungen globaler Klimaver��nderung auf die Verbreitungsgebiete, den Artenreichtum und die Zusammensetzung von Vogelgemeinschaften dargestellt. Zahlreiche Untersuchungen zeigen, da�� die Grenzen der Verbreitungsgebiete der meisten Vogelarten mit klimatischen Faktoren korrelieren. Verschiebungen der Verbreitungsgebiete in n��rdliche Richtung oder in h��here Regionen im Gebirge konnten bereits f��r viele temperate Vogelarten beobachtet werden. Weiterhin wurde ein zunehmender Artenreichtum besonders in n��rdlichen Breiten und in h��heren Lagen f��r viele temperate Vogelgemeinschaften vorhergesagt. In trockenen Gebieten ist dagegen mit einer Abnahme des Artenreichtums zu rechnen. Im zweiten Teil meiner Arbeit habe ich untersucht, ob beobachtete Ver��nderungen in der Zusammensetzung europ��ischer Vogelgemeinschaften tats��chlich durch aktuelle Klimaver��nderungen beeinflu��t werden. Das Zugverhalten der Arten war dabei ein Schwerpunkt der Untersuchung, weil zu erwarten war, da�� Vogelarten mit verschiedenem Zugverhalten unterschiedlich auf Klimaver��nderungen reagieren. Ich habe ein Regressionsmodell genutzt, welches die r��umliche Beziehung zwischen dem Anteil von Langstreckenziehern, Kurzstreckenziehern und Standv��geln in europ��ischen Vogelgemeinschaften und verschiedenen Klimavariablen beschreibt. F��r 21 Gebiete in Europa habe ich Daten ��ber beobachtete Ver��nderungen in der Struktur der Vogelgemeinschaften und isochrone Klimaver��nderungen zusammengetragen. Mit Hilfe dieser Klimaver��nderungen und dem r��umlichen Regressionsmodell konnte ich berechnen, welche Ver��nderungen in den Vogelgemeinschaften aufgrund der ver��nderten Klimabedingungen zu erwarten w��ren und sie mit beobachteten Ver��nderungen vergleichen. Beobachtete und berechnete Ver��nderungen korrelierten signifikant miteinander. Die beobachteten Ver��nderungen konnten nicht durch r��umliche Autokorrelationseffekte oder durch alternative Faktoren, wie z.B. Ver��nderungen in der Landnutzung, erkl��rt werden. Im dritten Teil der Arbeit untersuchte ich f��r eine mitteleurop��ische Vogelgemeinschaft welchen Einflu�� Habitatver��nderungen, die Invasion exotischer Arten und die Klimaver��nderung auf Ver��nderungen der H��ufigkeit und Verbreitungsgr����e der 159 Vogelarten am Bodensee zwischen 1980-1981 und 2000-2002 hatten. Dabei konnte gezeigt werden, da�� Ver��nderungen in der regionalen Abundanz sowohl durch Habitatver��nderungen als auch durch Klimav��nderungen hervorgerufen wurden. Exotische Arten schienen in dieser Zeit keinen bedeutenden Einflu�� zu haben. Besonders bei Agrarlandarten, Arten mit n��rdlicheren Verbreitungsgebieten und bei Langstreckenziehern konnten signifikante Abnahmen in der Abundanz beobachtet werden. Vor allem die anhaltenden negativen Bestandsver��nderungen bei Langstreckenziehern und die in den letzten zehn Jahren aufgetretenen Abnahmen n��rdlicher verbreiteter Vogelarten deuten darauf hin, da�� die Klimaver��nderung aktuell als der gr����te Einflu�� f��r V��gel in Europa angesehen werden mu��. Insgesamt zeigen die Ergebnisse dieser Arbeit, da�� sich der anhaltende Druck auf die Umwelt in erster Linie durch Habitat- und Klimaver��nderungen manifestiert.

Indigenous knowledge related to climate variability and change: insights from droughts in semi-arid areas of former Makueni District, Kenya

This article describes the indigenous knowledge (IK) that agro-pastoralists in larger Makueni District, Kenya hold and how they use it to monitor, mitigate and adapt to drought. It examines ways of integrating IK into formal monitoring, how to enhance its value and acceptability. Data was collected through target interviews, group discussions and questionnaires covering 127 households in eight villages. Daily rainfall data from 1961���2003 were analysed. Results show that agro-pastoralists hold IK on indicators of rainfall variability; they believe in IK efficacy and they rely on them. Because agro-pastoralists consult additional sources, the authors interpret that IK forms a basic knowledge frame within which agro-pastoralists position and interpret meteorological forecasts. Only a few agro-pastoralists adapt their practices in anticipation of IK-based forecasts partly due to the conditioning of the actors to the high rainfall variability characteristic of the area and partly due to lack of resources. Non-drought factors such as poverty, inadequate resources and lack of preparedness expose agro-pastoralists to drought impacts and limit their adaptive capacity. These factors need to be understood and effectively addressed to increase agro-pastoralists��� decision options and the influence of IK-based forecasts on their decision-making patterns. The limited intergenerational transfer of IK currently threatens its existence in the longer term. One way to ensure its continued existence and use is to integrate IK into the education curriculum and to link IK with formal climate change research through the participation of the local people. However, further studies are necessary to address the reliability and validity of the identified IK indicators of climate variability and change.

Lessons for Science from the "Year without a Summer" of 1816. What does it take for science to respond to climate change?

Science is responding in manifold ways to current climate change. What are the perquisites for response, and how can we structure the response? By studying the historical climatic event ���Year without a Summer��� of 1816 and by relating to Fleck���s theory of genesis and development of a scientific fact, we posit that responding refers to making interlinkages between different notions of climatic change.