Differentiating capacities as a means to sustainable climate change adaptation

There are two forms of capacity to adapt to global change: those associated with fundamental human development goals (generic capacity), and those necessary for managing and reducing specific climatic threats (specific). We argue that these two domains of capacity must be addressed explicitly, simultaneously and iteratively if climate change adaptation and sustainable development goals are to be attained. We propose a simple heuristic to understand the four main ways these two capacities interact, leading to more or less desirable outcomes. Drawing from three case studies of agricultural adaptation to climatic risk (Phoenix, AZ; Northeast Brazil; Chiapas, Mexico) we argue that the institutional context of adaptation can implicitly or explicitly undermine one form of capacity with repercussions for the development of the other. A better and more strategic balance of generic and specific capacities is needed if the promised synergies between sustainable development and adaptation are to be achieved.     

云南大关寿山水电站地质灾害危险性评估

在工程建设中,地质灾害的发生往往与工程周边复杂的地质环境条件密切相关,山地区域由于地质地形条件复杂,使得工程地质灾害发生的可能性和危险性大大增加.以云南大关寿山水电站为例,介绍了地质灾害评估工作的基本过程和特点,对一般水电站的地质灾害危险性评估工作具有一定的参考价值.     

论气候变暖背景下干旱和干旱灾害风险特征与管理策略简

The drought is a most severe natural disaster worldwide, which leads to great risk in human being. The drought disaster and risk have more prominent because of obvious climatic warming in the last hundred years. At present, the understanding of the internal laws of the occurrence of drought and drought risk is not comprehensive, and the recognition of the characteristics of the drought and drought risk under climatic warming is obscure. In this paper, we summarized systematically the domestic and overseas research progress of the drought and drought disaster risk, introduced the principle of the drought disaster transfer process and the essential features of drought disaster, analyzed synthetically the main characteristics and interactions among the key factors of the drought disaster risk, discussed the effect of climatic warming on drought and drought disaster risk, and probed into the basic requirement of drought disaster risk management. Above all, we provide the main protective measurements of the drought disaster and the main strategy of drought disaster risk management.     

Using simulated data to investigate the spatial patterns of obesity prevalence at the census tract level in metropolitan Detroit

Obesity is a serious public health problem in the United States. It is important to estimate obesity prevalence at the local level to target programmatic and policy interventions. It is challenging, however, to obtain local estimates of obesity prevalence because national health surveys such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) are not designed to produce direct estimates at the local levels (e.g. census tracts) due to small population samples and the need to preserve individual confidentiality. In this study we address the problem of estimating local obesity prevalence rates by implementing a spatial microsimulation modeling technique to proportionally replicate the demographic characteristics of BRFSS respondents to census tract populations in metropolitan Detroit. Obesity prevalence rates are examined for high and low spatial clusters and studied in relation to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) measures of low-income neighborhoods and local food deserts and CDC's measure of healthy and less healthy food environments currently used to target obesity reduction initiatives. This study found that obesity prevalence was largely clustered in the City of Detroit extending north into contiguous suburbs. The spatial patterns of highest obesity prevalence tracts were most similarly aligned with USDA-defined low-income tracts and CDC's less healthy food tracts. The locations of USDA's food desert tracts rarely overlapped with the highest obesity prevalence tracts. This study demonstrated a new methodology by which to assess local areas in need of future obesity interventions.     

Social capital and community preparation for urban flooding in China

Social capital can enhance community resilience to environmental change. Productive and trusted relations among social actors and effectual social norms can help local residents share resources, information and risks. The main objective of our study is to understand the ways in which social attributes and risk considerations influence adoption of resilient economic measures by individuals for reducing potential losses due to catastrophic rainstorm and flooding. This article provides evidence from China on how social capital contributes to anticipatory adaptation to environmental change. The inquiry is based on structured interviews with local residents of Tianjin, a flood-prone port city in China, and a standard regression analysis. Findings show that the intention to make preparation increases with the levels of social expectation, social relationship, and institutional trust. Perceived risk and damage experience, however, have no significant impacts. This suggests that building social capacity and trust will be more effective in enhancing community resilience than merely increasing awareness of hazard risks. We call for greater efforts on strengthening the capacity of formal and informal communal institutions. The structural changes required, however, are challenging.     

Data,interface, security: Assembling technologies that govern the future

Over the last decade, fire governance practices in the British Fire and Rescue Service (FRS) have undergone fundamental transformation. Rather than just being responded to as and when they occur, the FRS have adopted a range of anticipatory governing strategies to govern fires in anticipation of their occurence. This turn towards anticipatory governance has been facilitated in no small part by the digital infrastructure now embedded in the FRS. Composed of data, hardware, software, fibre-optic cables along with human analysts and organisational processes, this infrastructure operates to make risk projections on fire which shape and condition strategic decision making. This paper explores the operation of this digital infrastructure through the notion of interface. Drawing on empirical material relating to processes of data sourcing and risk calculation, interfaces account for the sites, moments and experiences in which human and non-human agents relate to one another in making fire risk projections. Showing relations to exist spatially, temporally and sensually, I argue that interfaces are crucial to the operation of an anticipatory security apparatus which relies on digital devices.     

气候变化背景下湖北省水稻高温热害变化规律研究

利用历年气象资料,运用数理统计方法,分析了湖北省1951—2010年水稻高温热害的动态变化,探讨了气候变化背景下高温热害的演变趋势与规律。结果表明,鄂东部、江汉平原部分地区水稻高温热害发生趋于频繁,且除西南部地区外的湖北省其他地区水稻高温热害最大概率出现的时间均有明显的提前,甚至每10a提前1d以上。最后,利用ArcGIS对湖北省的水稻高温热害变化趋势和风险程度进行了区划。     

The A.D. 79 eruption as a future explosive scenario in the Vesuvian area: evaluation of associated risk

 Due to the lack of an effective policy of planning and prevention, over the past decades the area around Mt. Vesuvio has undergone a steady increase in population and uncontrolled housing development. Consequently, it has become one of the most hazardous volcanic areas in the world. In order to mitigate the damage that the impact of an explosive event would cause in the area, the Department of Civil Defense has worked out an Emergency Management Plan using the A.D. 1631 subplinian eruption as the most probable short-term event. However, from 25 000 years B.P. to present, the activity of the Somma-Vesuvio volcano has shown a sequence of eight eruptive cycles, which always began with a strong plinian eruption. In this paper we utilize the A.D. 79 eruption as an example of a potential large explosive eruption that might occur again at Vesuvio. A detailed tephrostratigraphic analysis of the eruption products was processed by a multivariate statistical analysis. This analysis proved useful for identifying marker layers in the sequences, thus allowing the recognition of some major phases of synchronous deposition and hence the definition of the chronological and spatial evolution of the eruption. By combining this reconstruction with land-use maps, a scenario is proposed with time intervals in the eruptive sequence similar to those reported in Pliny's letter. Thus, it was calculated that, after 7 h from the start of the eruption, a total area of approximately 300 km² would be covered with the eruption products. In the following 11 h, a total area of approximately 500 km² would be involved. The third and last phase of deposition would not cause significant variation in the total area involved, but it would bring about an increase in the thickness of the pyroclastic deposits in the perivolcanic area. Received: 30 November 1996 / Accepted: 29 May 1997     

Volcanic risk ranking for Auckland, New Zealand. I: Methodology and hazard investigation

Volcanic eruptions typically produce a number of hazards, and many regions are at risk from more than one volcano or volcanic field. So that detailed risk assessments can be carried out, it is necessary to rank potential volcanic hazards and events in terms of risk. As it is often difficult to make accurate predictions regarding the characteristics of future eruptions, a method for ranking hazards and events has been developed that does not rely on precise values. Risk is calculated individually for each hazard from each source as the product of likelihood, extent and effect, based on the parameters order of magnitude. So that multiple events and outcomes can be considered, risk is further multiplied by the relative probability of the event occurring (probability_e) and the relative importance of the outcome (importance_o). By adding the values obtained, total risk is calculated and a ranking can be carried out.This method was used to rank volcanic hazards and events that may impact the Auckland Region, New Zealand. Auckland is at risk from the Auckland volcanic field, Okataina volcanic centre, Taupo volcano, Tuhua volcano, Tongariro volcanic centre, and Mt. Taranaki volcano. Relative probabilities were determined for each event, with the highest given to Mt. Taranaki. Hazards considered were, for local events: tephra fall, scoria fall and ballistic impacts, lava flow, base surge and associated shock waves, tsunami, volcanic gases and acid rain, earthquakes and ground deformation, mudflows and mudfills, lightning and flooding; and for distal events: tephra fall, pyroclastic flows, poisonous gases and acid rain, mudflows and mudfills, climate variations and earthquakes. Hazards from each source were assigned values for likelihood, with the largest for tephra fall from all sources, earthquakes and ground deformation, lava flows, scoria fall and base surge for an Auckland eruption on land, and earthquakes and ground deformation from an Auckland eruption in the ocean. The largest values for extent were for tephra fall and climate variation from each of the distal centres. However, these parameters do not give a true indication of risk. In a companion paper the effect of each hazard is fully investigated and the risk ranking completed.     

A case study of coping strategies and landslides in two villages of Central-Eastern Nepal

Landslides are an increasing problem in Nepal’s Middle Hills due to both natural and human phenomena: mainly increasingly intense monsoon rains and a boom in rural road construction. This problem has largely been neglected due to underreporting of losses and the dispersed nature of landslides. Understanding how populations cope with landslides is a first step toward developing more effective landslide risk management programs. The present research focuses on two villages in Central-Eastern Nepal, both affected by active landslides but with different coping strategies. Research methods are interdisciplinary, based on a geological assessment of landslide risk and a socio-economic study of the villages using household questionnaires, focus group discussions and transect walks. Community risk maps are compared with geological landslide risk maps to better understand and communicate community risk perceptions, priorities and coping strategies. A modified typology of coping strategies is presented, based on previous work by Burton, Kates, and White (1993) that is useful for decision-makers for designing more effective programs for landslide mitigation. Main findings underscore that coping strategies, mainly seeking external assistance and outmigration, are closely linked to access to resources, ethnicity/social status and levels of community organization. Conclusions include the importance of investing in organizational skills, while building on local knowledge about landslide mitigation for reducing landslide risk. There is great potential to increase coping strategies by incorporating skills training on landslide mitigation in existing agricultural outreach and community forest user group training.