| 1. |
- Andersson-Sköld, Yvonne, et al.
(författare)
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An integrated method for assessing climate-related risks and adaptation alternatives in urban areas
- 2015
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Ingår i: Climate Risk Management. - : Elsevier BV. - 2212-0963. ; 7, s. 31-50
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- © 2015 The Authors. The urban environment is a complex structure with interlinked social, ecological and technical structures. Global warming is expected to have a broad variety of impacts, which will add to the complexity. Climate changes will force adaptation, to reduce climate-related risks. Adaptation measures can address one aspect at the time, or aim for a holistic approach to avoid maladaptation. This paper presents a systematic, integrated approach for assessing alternatives for reducing the risks of heat waves, flooding and air pollution in urban settings, with the aim of reducing the risk of maladaptation. The study includes strategies covering different spatial scales, and both the current climate situation and the climate predicted under climate change scenarios. The adaptation strategies investigated included increasing vegetation; selecting density, height and colour of buildings; and retreat or resist (defend) against sea-level rise. Their effectiveness was assessed with regard to not only flooding, heat stress and air quality but also with regard to resource use, emissions to air (incl. GHG), soil and water, and people's perceptions and vulnerability. The effectiveness of the strategies were ranked on a common scale (from -3 to 3) in an integrated assessment. Integrated assessments are recommended, as they help identify the most sustainable solutions, but to reduce the risk of maladaptation they require experts from a variety of disciplines. The most generally applicable recommendation, derived from the integrated assessment here, taking into account both expertise from different municipal departments, literature surveys, life cycle assessments and publics perceptions, is to increase the urban greenery, as it contributes to several positive aspects such as heat stress mitigation, air quality improvement, effective storm-water and flood-risk management, and it has several positive social impacts. The most favourable alternative was compact, mid-rise, light coloured building design with large parks/green areas and trees near buildings.
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| 2. |
- Antonson, Hans, 1963-, et al.
(författare)
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Road Salt Damage to Historical Milestones Indicates Adaptation of Winter Roads to Future Climate Change May Damage Arctic Cultural Heritage
- 2021
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Ingår i: Climate. - Basel : MDPI. - 2225-1154. ; 9:10
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- There is no doubt that anthropogenic global warming is accelerating damage to cultural heritage. Adaptation measures are required to reduce the loss of sites, monuments and remains. However, little research has been directed towards understanding potential impacts of climate adaptation measures in other governmental sectors on cultural heritage. We provide a case study demonstrating that winter road salt, used to reduce ice related accidents, damages historical iron milestones. As the climate warms, road salt use will move north into areas where sites have been protected by contiguous winter snow cover. This will expose Artic/sub-Arctic cultural heritage, including Viking graves and Sami sites, to a new anthropogenic source of damage. Research and planning should therefore include the evaluation of secondary impacts when choosing climate adaptation strategies.
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| 3. |
- Ali, A., et al.
(författare)
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Diversity-productivity dependent resistance of an alpine plant community to different climate change scenarios
- 2016
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Ingår i: Ecological Research. - : Wiley. - 0912-3814 .- 1440-1703. ; 31:6, s. 935-945
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Here we report from a experiment imposing different warming scenarios [control with ambient temperature, constant level of moderate warming for 3 years, stepwise increase in warming for 3 years, and one season of high level warming (pulse) simulating an extreme summer event] on an alpine ecosystem to study the impact on species diversity-biomass relationship, and community resistance in terms of biomass production. Multiple linear mixed models indicate that experimental years had stronger influence on biomass than warming scenarios and species diversity. Species diversity and biomass had almost humpback relationships under different warming scenarios over different experimental years. There was generally a negative diversity-biomass relationship, implying that a positive diversity-biomass relationship was not the case. The application of different warming scenarios did not change this tendency. The change in community resistance to all warming scenarios was generally negatively correlated with increasing species diversity, the strength of the correlation varying both between treatments and between years within treatments. The strong effect of experimental years was consistent with the notion that niche complementarity effects increase over time, and hence, higher biomass productivity over experimental years. The strongest negative relationship was found in the first year of the pulse treatment, indicating that the community had weak resistance to an extreme event of one season of abnormally warm climate. Biomass production started recovering during the two subsequent years. Contrasting biomass-related resistance emerged in the different treatments, indicating that micro sites within the same plant community may differ in their resistance to different warming scenarios.
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| 4. |
- Alatalo, J. M., et al.
(författare)
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Impacts of different climate change regimes and extreme climatic events on an alpine meadow community
- 2016
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Ingår i: Scientific Reports. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2045-2322. ; 6
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Climate variability is expected to increase in future but there exist very few experimental studies that apply different warming regimes on plant communities over several years. We studied an alpine meadow community under three warming regimes over three years. Treatments consisted of (a) a constant level of warming with open-top chambers (ca. 1.9 degrees C above ambient), (b) yearly stepwise increases in warming (increases of ca. 1.0, 1.9 and 3.5 degrees C), and (c) pulse warming, a single first-year pulse event of warming (increase of ca. 3.5 degrees C). Pulse warming and stepwise warming was hypothesised to cause distinct first-year and third-year effects, respectively. We found support for both hypotheses; however, the responses varied among measurement levels (whole community, canopy, bottom layer, and plant functional groups), treatments, and time. Our study revealed complex responses of the alpine plant community to the different experimentally imposed climate warming regimes. Plant cover, height and biomass frequently responded distinctly to the constant level of warming, the stepwise increase in warming and the extreme pulse-warming event. Notably, we found that stepwise warming had an accumulating effect on biomass, the responses to the different warming regimes varied among functional groups, and the short-term perturbations had negative effect on species richness and diversity
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| 5. |
- Johansson, Magnus, 1970-, et al.
(författare)
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How to measure efficiency in risk prevention?
- 2012
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Risk assessment methods form corner stones in the striving to reduce risks and threats to human life and society. Proposed actions can be physical or non-physical and adopted or declined after political evaluation, with consideration taken to available resources and estimated effect on risk. To optimize and avoid regrettable actions, decision-makers are in need of well-founded analyses of how efficient different options might be. Analytically, there are several possible steps that can contribute.Firstly, the correlation between a measure and its effect should be based on causality, which often is difficult to establish quantitatively. High frequent accidents (e.g. traffic) can normally be treated statistically , while low frequent accidents with severe consequences (e.g. natural hazards) are more restricted to qualitative descriptions of correlation. Systematic monitoring of injury and damage data and gathering into databases, are a crucial activity for causality valuation. Secondly, economic valuation of effect is an important contribution in a cost-benefit perspective. Thirdly, a measure often brings several different effects and some may fall outside the actual purpose. An additional problem is how to handle effects that exert varied influence on different stakeholders or social groups in society. Fourthly, certain criteria are required for final prioritization. For instance, in analysis of goal fulfillment, effects are compared with politically decided quantified goals.In cases where basic data from steps 1-3 are incomplete, alternative criteria like “acceptable risk” might be necessary to agree about politically. To use similar approaches on how to describe and quantify effect correlations, promote gathered efforts at local level where risk reducing measures are decided upon by different actors and with regard to diverse local conditions. Tests of suitable methods and approaches to measure efficiency of planned or accomplished actions in gain for risk prevention, are described and discussed.
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| 6. |
- Arvidsson, Anna K, et al.
(författare)
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Klimatanpassning av vägkonstruktion, drift och underhåll
- 2012
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Rapport (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Klimatförändringarna är en realitet och påverkar vårt samhälle och därigenom även våra transporter. Genom att klimatanpassa transportsystemen blir systemen mer robusta och risken för transportstörningar blir mindre. För vägars konstruktion, drift och underhåll innebär klimatanpassningen i de flesta fall relativt stora förändringar men det saknas idag en övergripande bild av det totala klimatanpassningsbehovet nationellt sett samt vilka åtgärder som behöver tas och som är rimliga att tas. Eftersom klimatförändringarna generellt varierar mellan Sveriges klimatzoner är det förenat med stora svårigheter att förutsäga vilken påverkan klimatförändringarna får på vägarnas beteende och livslängd. Inom vinterväghållningen i Sverige kommer saltanvändandet totalt sett att minska på grund av det varmare klimatet. Plogningstillfällena kommer antagligen minska, men beredskapen bör inte minskas för mycket eftersom de mer extrema tillfällena kommer att öka. För att lyckas klimatanpassa vägtransportsystemen så att de blir robusta konstaterar vi att det finns ett stort behov för att ta fram mer kunskap om vägkonstruktionens påverkan av ett förändrat klimat, samt inom drift och underhåll hur man skall anpassa sig genom olika typer av varierande och flexibla klimatanpassningsåtgärder och till effekterna av extrema väderhändelser.
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| 7. |
- Jonsson, Anna, et al.
(författare)
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Cities’ capacity to manage climate vulnerability : experiences from participatory vulnerability assessments in the lower Göta Älv Catchment, Sweden
- 2012
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Ingår i: Local Environment. - : Routledge. - 1354-9839 .- 1469-6711. ; 17:6-7, s. 735-750
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Within the scope of this project, tools for conducting systematic and integrated climate vulnerability and sustainability assessments have been developed. Two municipalities in the lower Göta Älv catchment were selected as study cases. Together with representatives from key municipal departments and national government agencies, the interdisciplinary research team designed and conducted a co-production process. Results obtained using the developed tools demonstrate that conducting such a systematic assessment of the current situation and potential impacts of climate change adaptation measures would contribute to synergies between adaptation strategies and other policy arenas. Our recommendation for enhancing the capacity of local vulnerability management in Sweden is to shift foci in four fields: from static analysis of climate vulnerability to a dynamic approach to social vulnerability, from a sectorwise fragmented approach to integrated management, from a focus on technical fixes and physical measures to institutional adaptation measures, and, finally, from sustainability-blind adaptation investments to long-term sustainable climate adaptation measures. The processes and mechanisms for succeeding in this requires that knowledge be produced, shared, and managed in partly new ways, allowing stakeholders both inside and outside local government administration to voice and synergise their concerns and solutions.
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| 8. |
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| 9. |
- Andersson-Sköld, Yvonne, et al.
(författare)
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Landslide risk and climate change : economic assessment of consequenses in the Göta river valley
- 2011
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Konferensbidrag (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- According to climate change scenarios, Swedish summers will be drier, but in large parts of Sweden there will also be increased annual precipitation, more intensive precipitation and periods with increased water flows. In many areas the risk for landslides is expected to increase. In response to this the SGI, on commission of the Environmental ministry, has started a risk analysis for the Göta river valley. The results of the analysis will be used in the surveillance of the safety along the Göta river valley. The valley is one of the most frequent landslide valleys in Sweden.The area has a long history of anthropogenic activities such as settlements, shipping, industry, contaminated soil and infrastructure including large roads and railroads. A number of landslides occur every year. The landslide risk analysis of Göta river valley is performed by traditional technical risk analysis, i.e. a function of hazard probability and consequences of the hazard. Elements at risk in the valley include for example, human life, transport and other infrastructure, properties and industrial activities, contaminated land, agriculture and forestry, and intangibles such as biodiversity. Exposure, vulnerability and the monetary value related to the landslide are used to describe the consequence of the landslide.This paper shows the process and structure of this consequence analysis for natural hazards. The consequence analysis methodology can be applied generic both nationally and internationally and for several types of natural hazards such as landslides and flooding.
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| 10. |
- Nordin, Lina, 1981-, et al.
(författare)
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Are winter road maintenance practices energy efficient? : A geographical analysis in terms of traffic energy use
- 2014
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Ingår i: Journal of Transport Geography. - : Elsevier. - 0966-6923 .- 1873-1236. ; 41, s. 163-174
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Snow removal and anti-slip measures on roads are necessary to maintain road safety and a free-flowing transportation system. This is also interesting from an energy perspective as a free-flowing transportation system will use less energy than a congested one. These road maintenance measures focus, however, only on safety and not on energy use at all. This study will try to quantify the need for winter road maintenance in terms of energy in order to determine when, from an energy perspective, it would be best to remove snow or apply anti-icing agents. To explore this, parts of the VTI (Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute) winter model were used. Several scenarios were set in different areas in Sweden in order to investigate a geographical divergence. It is possible to reduce 10.7% of traffic energy use if the starting criterion for snow removal is changed from 1 cm to 2 cm before action needs to be taken. If the speed limit is also reduced from 90 km/h to 70 km/h, the saving could be up to 17.2%. This paper aims to focus on the energy perspective of the winter maintenance operations in Sweden as well as on proposing other aspects of use for the model.
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