Drought and water policy in Australia: Challenges for the future illustrated by the issues associated with water trading and climate change adaptation in the Murray–Darling Basin

This paper reviews historical and existing drought and water policy in Australia in order to gain a sense of the strengths and weaknesses in enabling effective adaptation to climate change. In particular, (a) the social, economic, and environmental costs and benefits of water trading and (b) the limitations of using ‘market-based’ instruments (MBIs), like water trading, for adapting to drought and water security related climate change impacts are investigated. It was found that water trading has potential as a climate change adaptation strategy with many benefits experienced in previous and current versions of water trading. However, there are also limitations and those negatively impacted by water trading are hit hard. These social impacts of water trading have not been thoroughly investigated and are not well understood. Significant uncertainty also exists around the impacts of water trading on the environment (e.g. changed hydrological regimes, underestimation of sustainable environmental flows etc.). Proper quantification of these impacts is needed, however, it is a complex task given Australia's large hydroclimatic variability and the current lack of understanding as to how to optimise water needs of the environment, humans, agriculture and other industries. It appears that ‘cap and trade’ quantity-based MBIs such as water trading will eventually do what they are designed to do (i.e. reallocate a resource to ‘high value’ users). However, given that the ‘low value’ users in this case are agriculture and town/urban water supply (not including drinking water) and the ‘high value’ users are mining, manufacturing, and electricity production (i.e. high greenhouse gas emissions), do we really want the water trading MBI to achieve its objective? And, what would the social and environmental ramifications of such a shift in water use within Australia be? These questions, along with the limitations and potential implications of using water trading (and MBIs in general) as a climate change adaptation tool, must be carefully considered if past Australian drought and water policy failures are not to be repeated.     

Contestations around water allocation during a climate crisis in India: The case of ‘IPL vs. drought’

In this paper, we analyze a major controversy regarding the allocation of water for Indian Premier League (IPL) cricket matches during a period of extreme drought in the state of Maharashtra in India. We use a discursive approach to public policy to understand water policy production and to analyze the competing narratives on water advanced by opposing discourse coalitions during the ‘IPL vs. drought’ controversy. We find that the neoliberal view of ‘water as an economic good’ is dominant and institutionalized in the water allocation priorities determined by the Maharashtra State government. This is resisted by civil society actors like Loksatta and by the Indian judiciary, who view ‘water as a Human Right.’ Our reading of the ‘IPL vs. drought’ public interest litigation (PIL) shows that Loksatta’s decision to target water allocation for the IPL through the Courts leverages the popularity of the IPL in the Indian media, as well as the uneven unfolding of neoliberalism across institutions of the state in India. At the same time, Loksatta’s PIL focuses solely on the IPL and does not pay attention to the water allocation to larger users like industry and sugarcane cultivation that best represent the institutionalization of the neoliberal view of water in Maharashtra. We argue that the focus on the IPL makes it the site of contesting water policy on ideological grounds. We conclude by examining the challenge provided by Loksatta’s PIL to the dominant neoliberal view of water in Maharashtra.     

To be ethical or to be good? The impact of ‘Good Provider’ and moral norms on food waste decisions in two countries

One-third of all food produced in the world is lost or wasted, which has negative consequences for societies and the environment. Thus, curbing food waste is critical to securing human well-being and protecting the environment. This study examines the drivers of household food waste decisions by investigating the activation and deactivation of moral norms and introducing the concept of the ‘good provider’ in an augmented norm-activation model (NAM). A survey of 643 consumers in Australia and Singapore explores the ‘good provider’ norm as a driver of food waste behaviours in both cultures. For Australians, ‘good provider’ norms suppress intentions to avoid food waste, most likely to provide for the immediate family, which can be a motive that overrides moral concern about food waste in an individualistic culture. For Singaporeans, ‘good provider’ norms do not suppress food waste intentions, possibly due to the value placed on thrift by a long-term-oriented culture. The paper significantly extends the previous research on norms, culture and sustainable consumption and provides policy and practical implications for curbing food waste in different cultural contexts.     

Mexican megadrought

Around 1550 AD a megadrought occurred in Mexico, possibly resulting in the death of over 80% of the Indian population at that time from disease. By any measure this was a major disaster that warrants serious examination. A 10,000-year simulation with the CSIRO Mark2 coupled global climatic model has been used to investigate the existence and genesis of major droughts in the Mexican region. One megadrought event was identified and a number of droughts lasting a decade or longer were also found. Average reductions in rainfall of 20 to 40% over the duration of these droughts were found to occur. While there is a mechanistic link between El Niño events and drought over Mexico, this link is tenuous, as shown by observations and this simulation. Stochastic processes appear to have a considerable influence on Mexican rainfall, and contribute to the weakness of the El Niño influence on such rainfall. It is shown that for both El Niño events and stochastic processes drought is created over Mexico by the reduction of the intensity of the climatological high pressure system in this region. This reduces the influx of moisture associated with the monsoonal system and thus rainfall. While only one 'megadrought' was found in the 10,000-year simulation thirteen droughts lasting over a decade occurred, suggesting that a devastating drought in the Mexican region has a return period of less than 1000 years and represents a non-trivial potential problem for this region.     

Investigating the correlation between monthly average temperatures and tithe proxy data from the Low Countries

The likely intensification of extreme droughts from climate change in many regions across the United States has increased interest amongst researchers and water managers to understand not only the magnitude of drought impacts and their consequences on water resources, but also what they can do to prevent, respond to, and adapt to these impacts. Building and mobilizing ‘adaptive capacity’ can help in this pursuit. Researchers anticipate that drought preparedness measures will increase adaptive capacity, but there has been minimal testing of this and other assumptions about the governance and institutional determinants of adaptive capacity. This paper draws from recent extreme droughts in Arizona and Georgia to empirically assess adaptive capacity across spatial and temporal scales. It combines quantitative and qualitative methodologies to identify a handful of heuristics for increasing adaptive capacity of water management to extreme droughts and climate change, and also highlights potential tradeoffs in building and mobilizing adaptive capacity across space and time.     

Drought and the future of rural communities: Opportunities and challenges for climate change adaptation in regional Victoria,Australia

Australia's vulnerability to climate variability and change has been highlighted by the recent drought (i.e. the Big Dry or Millennium Drought), and also recent flooding across much of eastern Australia during 2011 and 2012. There is also the possibility that the frequency, intensity and duration of droughts may increase due to anthropogenic climate change, stressing the need for robust drought adaptation strategies. This study investigates the socio-economic impacts of drought, past and present drought adaptation measures, and the future adaptation strategies required to deal with projected impacts of climate change. The qualitative analysis presented records the actual experiences of drought and other climatic extremes and helps advance knowledge of how best to respond and adapt to such conditions, and how this might vary between different locations, sectors and communities. It was found that more effort is needed to address the changing environment and climate, by shifting from notions of ‘drought-as-crisis’ towards acknowledging the variable availability of water and that multi-year droughts should not be unexpected, and may even become more frequent. Action should also be taken to revalue the farming enterprise as critical to our environmental, economic and cultural well-being and there was also strong consensus that the value of water should be recognised in a more meaningful way (i.e. not just in economic terms). Finally, across the diverse stakeholders involved in the research, one point was consistently reiterated: that ‘it's not just drought’. Exacerbating the issues of climate impacts on water security and supply is the complexity of the agriculture industry, global economics (in particular global markets and the recent/ongoing global financial crisis), and demographic changes (decreasing and ageing populations) which are currently occurring across most rural communities. The social and economic issues facing rural communities are not just a product of drought or climate change – to understand them as such would underestimate the extent of the problems and inhibit the ability to coordinate the holistic, cross-agency approach needed for successful climate change adaptation in rural communities.     

Copula-based risk evaluation of droughts across the Pearl River basin, China

Daily precipitation data for the period of 1960–2005 from 42 precipitation gauging stations in the Pearl River basin were analyzed using the Mann–Kendall trend test and copula functions. The standardized precipitation index method was used to define drought episodes. Primary and secondary return periods were also analyzed to evaluate drought risks in the Pearl River basin as a whole. Results indicated that: (1) in general, the drought tendency was not significant at a 95 % confidence level. However, significant drought trends could be found in November, December, and January and significant wetting trends in June and July. The drought severity and drought durations were not significant at most of the precipitation stations across the Pearl River basin; (2) in terms of drought risk, higher drought risk could be observed in the lower Pearl River basin and lower drought risk in the upper Pearl River basin. Higher risk of droughts of longer durations was always corresponding to the higher risk of droughts with higher drought severity, which poses an increasing challenge for drought management and water resources management. When drought episodes with higher drought severity occurred in the Pearl River basin, the regions covered by higher risk of drought events were larger, which may challenge the water supply in the lower Pearl River basin. As for secondary return periods, results of this study indicated that secondary return periods might provide a more robust evaluation of drought risk. This study should be of merit for water resources management in the Pearl River basin, particularly the lower Pearl River basin, and can also act as a case study for determining regional response to drought changes as a result of global climate changes.     

IPCC AR6报告关于不同类型干旱变化研究的新进展与启示

基于IPCC第一工作组(WGI)第六次评估报告(AR6),从干旱的定义和类型、干旱的驱动因素、监测到的干旱变化、干旱的归因以及预估5个方面进行了分析和总结.IPCC评估指出:(1)在全球变暖的背景下,监测到的气象和农业干旱的变化在全球尺度上并不显著,但干旱频发区域呈现不同程度的增加趋势.这种增加的趋势表明,人为气候变化...     

北大西洋-东亚和北亚型遥相关的机制及其对新疆夏季旱涝的影响

北大西洋-东亚和北亚（简称NAENA）型遥相关是夏季欧亚大陆对流层上层经向风异常的第二主导模态,对欧亚大陆多尺度气候变率有显著影响。本文在分析NAENA型维持的动力学机制的基础上,研究了该遥相关型对新疆夏季旱涝异常的影响及其可能机制。大气波列的涡度收支分析表明,气候态的旋转纬向风引起的扰动涡度平流可以被扰动旋转经向风引起的平均涡度平流所补偿。能量转换过程分析表明,该大气波列有效地从平均流中提取有效位能,通过斜压能量转换过程得以维持。大西洋海温异常三极子模态则是NAENA型维持的重要外强迫因子。回归分析表明NAENA型遥相关能通过促进南疆夏季降水,显著影响新疆的旱涝异常。NAENA型位于中亚的气旋性低压一方面增强了南疆地区的垂直上升运动,同时气旋性环流将更多的水汽输送到该地区,有利于水汽在对流层中低层的异常辐合,进而对南疆的降水有促进作用。     

Reflexive adaptation for resilient water services: Lessons for theory and practice

‘Adaptive management’ concern attempts to manage complex social-ecological and socio-technical systems in nimble ways to enhance their resilience. In this paper, three forms of adaptive management are identified, ‘scientific’ forms focused on collation of scientific data in response to management experiments, but more recent developments adding processes of collaboration as well as emphasising the need for reflexivity, that is, conscious processes of opening up debates to different perspectives and values. While reflexive adaptive management has been increasingly discussed in theory, there is a lack of examples of what its application means in practice.As a response, this paper examines an ‘Adaptive Planning Process’ (APP), seeking to apply reflexive adaptive management as a means to improve climate resilience in the UK water sector. The APP’s three inter linked workshops – Aspiration, Scenario and Roadmapping – were co-developed and trialled in a water utility. By describing and justifying the choices made in the development of the APP, the paper aims to reveal some of the challenges that arise when trying to design processes that achieve reflexive adaptation.The paper concludes that, if applied to planning for climate change, reflexive adaptation has the potential to explore multiple value positions, highlight different potential futures and acknowledge (and hence, partly address) power differentials, and therefore to offer the possibility of real change. On the basis of the trial, we argue that through tapping the depth and breadth of internal knowledge the APP process created the potential for decision making to be joined up across different parts of the utility, and hence offering new strategies and routes for addressing uncertainties and delivering more resilient water services.     

Voluntary citizen participation in carbon allowance markets: the role of norm-based motivation

The results from a semi-experimental study of Swedish students’ stated willingness to purchase emission allowances for carbon dioxide are presented. Drawing heavily on recent developments in the literature on integrating norm-motivated behaviour into neoclassical consumer theory, it is assumed that individuals have a preference for maintaining a self-image as a responsible (and thus norm-compliant) person. The results indicate that students’ willingness to purchase carbon allowances is determined by both price and the presence of norms: those who feel personally responsible for contributing to reducing climate damages also appear more inclined to buy allowances. The empirical findings are consistent with the notion that a person's beliefs about others’ stated willingness to purchase carbon allowances imply improvements in their own self-image and ultimately behavioural change. This suggests that information campaigns that attempt to influence beliefs about others’ intentions could promote ‘green’ consumer behaviour in the carbon allowance market. Such (stated) behaviour also appears to be influenced by a person's awareness of the problem of climate change and their beliefs about their own ability to contribute to solving it.

Policy relevance

Although there is a concern that public goods such as reduced climate change may be under-provided in the free market, individual concern for the environment occasionally has profound impacts on consumer choice and voluntary action. This research suggests that information campaigns that attempt to influence beliefs about others’ intentions could promote ‘green’ consumer behaviour in carbon allowance markets. Publicly-provided information about the impacts of climate change and the ways in which these damages stem from individual choices could also induce this type of behaviour.     

The influence of inter-annually varying albedo on regional climate and drought

Albedo plays an important role in land–atmosphere interactions and local climate. This study presents the impact on simulating regional climate, and the evolution of a drought, when using the default climatological albedo as is usually done in regional climate modelling, or using the actual observed albedo which is rarely done. Here, time-varying satellite derived albedo data is used to update the lower boundary condition of the Weather Research and Forecasting regional climate model in order to investigate the influence of observed albedo on regional climate simulations and also potential changes to land–atmosphere feedback over south-east Australia. During the study period from 2000 to 2008, observations show that albedo increased with an increasingly negative precipitation anomaly, though it lagged precipitation by several months. Compared to in-situ observations, using satellite observed albedo instead of the default climatological albedo provided an improvement in the simulated seasonal mean air temperature. In terms of precipitation, both simulations reproduced the drought that occurred from 2002 through 2006. Using the observed albedo produced a drier simulation overall. During the onset of the 2002 drought, albedo changes enhanced the precipitation reduction by 20 % on average, over locations where it was active. The area experiencing drought increased 6.3 % due to the albedo changes. Two mechanisms for albedo changes to impact land–atmosphere drought feedback are investigated. One accounts for the increased albedo, leading to reduced turbulent heat flux and an associated decrease of moist static energy density in the planetary boundary layer; the other considers that enhanced local radiative heating, due to the drought, favours a deeper planetary boundary layer, subsequently decreasing the moist static energy density through entrainment of the free atmosphere. Analysis shows that drought related large-scale changes in the regional climate favour a strengthening of the second mechanism. That is, the second mechanism is stronger in a drought year compared to a normal year and this difference is larger than for the first mechanism. When both mechanisms are active, the second mechanism tends to dominate across the model domain, particularly during the 2002 drought period. The introduction of observed inter-annual variations in albedo produces an enhancement of the first mechanism and a weakening of the second mechanism during the onset of the drought.     

Health and climatic hazards: Framing social research on vulnerability,response and adaptation

Floods, windstorms, drought and wildfires have major implications for human health. To date, conceptual advances in analysis of vulnerability and adaptation to climatic hazards from the environmental and social sciences have not been widely applied in terms of health, though key progress is being made particularly in relation to climate change. This paper seeks to take this conceptual grounding further, examining how key themes relate to health concerns, exploring connections with existing health literatures, and developing an organising framework to aid analysis of how vulnerability to health impacts varies within society and how actors make decisions and take action in relation to climatic hazards and health. Social science research on this theme is challenging in part because of the complex mechanisms that link hazard events to health outcomes, and the many-layered factors that shape differential vulnerability and response within changing societal and environmental contexts (including the dual effect of hazards on human health and health systems, and the combination of ‘external’, ‘personal’ and ‘internal’ elements of vulnerability). Tracing a ‘health impact pathway’ from hazard event through health risk effects to health outcomes can provide a research tool with which to map out where the different factors that contribute to vulnerability/coping capacity come into effect.     

全球变化背景下多尺度干旱过程及预测研究进展

干旱是一种周期性的气候异常,主要受气候自然变率驱动,具有发展缓慢、持续时间长、影响范围广等特征。然而,气候变化使得干旱不仅有增加趋势,其特征也在发生变化。例如,发展迅速的干旱,也称骤旱,近年来频繁发生。此外,人类活动通过改变陆地水循环,直接或间接地影响干旱过程。在全球变化背景下,干旱机制研究由海-陆-气相互作用影响气象干旱的气候动力学研究扩展到包含干旱传递过程机理认识、考虑区域尺度人类活动影响,面向农业、水利、生态等行业的农业干旱和水文干旱研究,为认识干旱可预报性、发展预测方法带来了新的挑战。本文将针对多尺度干旱过程及预测,讨论相关的研究进展及未来发展方向。     

Civil society lobbying and countries’ climate change policies: a matching approach

Does civil society lobbying affect states’ policies on climate change? Does it facilitate or hamper cooperation towards ‘greener’ policies? Environmental non-governmental organizations (ENGOs) and business lobbying groups alike are increasingly seeking to access states’ negotiation delegations at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in order to affect or even change official delegates’ policies. Previous studies have failed to control for the fact that the set of states that have granted civil society access to their delegations is unlikely to be a random sample. Moreover, the fact that a delegation's policy outputs may converge with the preferences of a civil society group cannot be taken as evidence that it was caused by civil society lobbying. A matching approach that addresses both problems is proposed, which corrects for the non-random assignment of civil society organizations to state delegations and forms quasi-experimental contrasts by sampling a set of ‘most similar’ cases that only differ in their treatment; i.e. civil society lobbying. This approach facilitates a causal interpretation of lobbying efforts. The results indicate that only business groups are likely to exert a causal influence on states’ climate delegations. However, contrary to expectations, these groups appear to have enhanced states’ efforts towards environmentally friendly policies.

Policy relevance

What impact can non-governmental actors have in influencing states’ policies at the climate change negotiations? This question is addressed empirically using a matching approach, which corrects potential challenges in the research on interest group influence. It is shown that business groups are likely to influence states’ policies at the UNFCCC – unlike green interest groups or civil society in general. In light of these findings, three policy implications are derived that might be of importance for states and non-governmental decision makers alike. Most importantly, ENGOs should refocus their efforts for exerting their influence. ENGOs could make their lobbying more effective by first identifying the states that may be more receptive to their preferences and positions.     

Assessing the robustness of adaptation decisions to climate change uncertainties: A case study on water resources management in the East of England

Projections of future climate change are plagued with uncertainties, causing difficulties for planners taking decisions on adaptation measures. This paper presents an assessment framework that allows the identification of adaptation strategies that are robust (i.e. insensitive) to climate change uncertainties. The framework is applied to a case study of water resources management in the East of England, more specifically to the Anglian Water Services’ 25 year Water Resource Plan (WRP). The paper presents a local sensitivity analysis (a ‘one-at-a-time’ experiment) of the various elements of the modelling framework (e.g., emissions of greenhouse gases, climate sensitivity and global climate models) in order to determine whether or not a decision to adapt to climate change is sensitive to uncertainty in those elements.Water resources are found to be sensitive to uncertainties in regional climate response (from general circulation models and dynamical downscaling), in climate sensitivity and in climate impacts. Aerosol forcing and greenhouse gas emissions uncertainties are also important, whereas uncertainties from ocean mixing and the carbon cycle are not. Despite these large uncertainties, Anglian Water Services’ WRP remains robust to the climate change uncertainties sampled because of the adaptation options being considered (e.g. extension of water treatment works), because the climate model used for their planning (HadCM3) predicts drier conditions than other models, and because ‘one-at-a-time’ experiments do not sample the combination of different extremes in the uncertainty range of parameters. This research raises the question of how much certainty is required in climate change projections to justify investment in adaptation measures, and whether such certainty can be delivered.     

RESEARCH ON THE INTERANNUAL AND INTERDECADAL VARIABILITIES OF THE MONSOON TROUGH AND THEIR IMPACTS ON TROPICAL CYCLONE GENESIS OVER THE WESTERN NORTH PACIFIC OCEAN

In this paper, we mainly summarize and review the progresses in recent climatological studies (by CMSR, IAP/CAS and some associated domestic and international institutions) on the interannual and interdecadal variabilities of monsoon troughs and their impacts on tropical cyclones and typhoons (TCs) geneses over the western North Pacific Ocean. The climatological characteristics of monsoon troughs and four types of circulation patterns favorable to TCs genesis over the western North Pacific Ocean in summer and autumn are given in this paper. It is also shown in this paper that the monsoon trough over the western North Pacific Ocean has obvious interannual and interdecadal variabilities. Especially, it is revealed in this paper that the interannual and interdecadal variabilities of the monsoon trough over the western North Pacific Ocean influence the TCs genesis not only through the impact on distributions of the vorticity in the lower troposphere and the divergence in the upper troposphere, the water vapor in the mid- and lower troposphere and the vertical shear of wind fields between the upper and lower troposphere over the western North Pacific Ocean, but also through the dynamical effects of the transition between convectively coupled tropical waves and providing disturbance energy. Besides, some climatological problems associated with TCs activity over the western North Pacific Ocean that need to be studied further are also pointed out in this paper.     

Climate warming, water storage, and Chinook salmon in California’s Sacramento Valley

The Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) spawns and rears in the cold, freshwater rivers and tributaries of California’s Central Valley, with four separate seasonal runs including fall and late-fall runs, a winter run, and a spring run. Dams and reservoirs have blocked access to most of the Chinook’s ancestral spawning areas in the upper reaches and tributaries. Consequently, the fish rely on the mainstem of the Sacramento River for spawning habitat. Future climatic warming could lead to alterations of the river’s temperature regime, which could further reduce the already fragmented Chinook habitat. Specifically, increased water temperatures could result in spawning and rearing temperature exceedences, thereby jeopardizing productivity, particularly in drought years. Paradoxically, water management plays a key role in potential adaptation options by maintaining spawning and rearing habitat now and in the future, as reservoirs such as Shasta provide a cold water supply that will be increasingly needed to counter the effects of climate change. Results suggest that the available cold pool behind Shasta could be maintained throughout the summer assuming median projections of mid-21st century warming of 2°C, but the maintenance of the cold pool with warming on the order of 4°C could be very challenging. The winter and spring runs are shown to be most at risk because of the timing of their reproduction.