Irene Lorenzoni

Adapting to Climate Change: Thresholds, Values, Governance

Adapting to climate change is one of the most challenging problems facing humanity. The time for adaptation action to ongoing and future climate change is now upon us. Living with climate change involves reconsidering our lifestyles and goals for the future, which are linked to our actions as individuals, societies and governments worldwide. This book presents the latest science and social science research on how and whether the world can adapt to climate change. Written by some of the world’s leading experts, both academics and practitioners, on governance, ecosystem services and human interactions, the book examines the nature of the risks to ecosystems and the thresholds of change. It demonstrates how values, culture and the constraining forces of governance can act as signifi cant barriers and limits to action. Adaptation will not be costless, indeed it will be painful for many. As both an extensive state-of-the-art review of science and as a holistic assessment of adaptation options, this book is essential reading for all those concerned with responses to climate change, especially researchers, policy-makers, practitioners and graduate students. The main features include:

Reframing nuclear power in the UK energy debate : nuclear power, climate change mitigation and radioactive waste

In the past decade, human influence on the climate through increased use of fossil fuels has become widely acknowledged as one of the most pressing issues for the global community. For the United Kingdom, we suggest that these concerns have increasingly become manifest in a new strand of political debate around energy policy, which reframes nuclear power as part of the solution to the need for low-carbon energy options. A mixed-methods analysis of citizen views of climate change and radioactive waste is presented, integrating focus group data and a nationally representative survey. The data allow us to explore how UK citizens might now and in the future interpret and make sense of this new framing of nuclear power—which ultimately centers on a risk—risk trade-off scenario. We use the term “reluctant acceptance” to describe how, in complex ways, many focus group participants discursively re-negotiated their position on nuclear energy when it was positioned alongside climate change. In the concluding section of the paper, we reflect on the societal implications of the emerging discourse of new nuclear build as a means of delivering climate change mitigation and set an agenda for future research regarding the (re)framing of the nuclear energy debate in the UK and beyond.

Cross-national comparisons of image associations with "global warming" and "climate change" among laypeople in the United States of America and Great Britain

Climate change poses significant risks to societies worldwide, yet governmental responses differ greatly on either side of the North Atlantic. Risk perception studies have shown that citizens in the United States and Great Britain have similar risk perceptions of climate change: it is considered a distant threat, of limited personal importance. Engaging the public on this issue is thus challenging. Affect, the positive or negative evaluation of an object, idea, or mental image, has been shown to powerfully influence individual processing of information and decision‐making. This paper explores the affective images underlying public risk perceptions of climate change through comparative findings from national surveys in the USA and in Great Britain. American and British respondents predominantly referred to generic manifestations and impacts of climate change or to a different environmental problem (ozone depletion). The terms “global warming” and “climate change”, and their associated images, evoked negative affective responses from most respondents. Personally relevant impacts, causes, and solutions to climate change, were rarely mentioned, indicating that climate change is psychologically distant for most individuals in both nations. The role of affective images in risk judgements and individual decision‐making deserves greater study. 1. The majority of the work for this paper was carried out when all the authors, except A. Leiserowitz, were affiliated to the Centre for Environmental Risk, Zuckerman Institute for Connective Environmental Research, School of Environmental Sciences, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK.

Coastal Management for Sustainable Development: Analysing Environmental and Socio-Economic Changes on the UK Coast

Littoral areas of the British Isles present an array of properties and features which have long been exploited by human populations and have contributed to the wealth and the quality of life of the nation. Past and ongoing differentiation in uses of coastal zones has led to conflicts ranging from deleterious effects on supporting ecosystems to symbiosis with human activities. This paper aims to elicit the main forces influencing the development of coastal areas and the means available to assess the present use and manage future exploitation of the coastal zone, following the P-S-I-R Framework and an ecosystem function-based valuation methodology. A variety of pressures and their trends is analysed (climate change, population and tourism changes, port development, hydrocarbon and marine aggregate extraction and pollution). All these factors are examined in the context of the sustainable use of coastal resources and on the basis of an interdisciplinary ecological economics approach.

Perceptions of heatwave risks to health: interview-based study of older people in London and Norwich, UK

BACKGROUND Most projections of climate change suggest an increased frequency of heatwaves in England over coming decades; older people are at particular risk. This could result in substantial mortality and morbidity. OBJECTIVE To determine elderly peoples knowledge and perceptions of heat-related risks to health, and of protective behaviours. METHODS Semi-structured interviews: 73 men and women, 72-94 years, living in their own homes in London and Norwich, UK. RESULTS Few respondents considered themselves either old or at risk from the effects of heat, even though many had some form of relevant chronic illness; they did recognize that some medical conditions might increase risks in others. Most reported that they had taken appropriate steps to reduce the effects of heat. Some respondents considered it appropriate for the government to take responsibility for protecting vulnerable people, but many thought state intervention was unnecessary, intrusive and unlikely to be effective. Respondents were more positive about the value of appropriately disseminated advice and solutions by communities themselves. CONCLUSION The Heatwave Plan should consider giving greater emphasis to a population-based information strategy, using innovative information dissemination methods to increase awareness of vulnerability to heat among the elderly and to ensure clarity about behaviour modification measures.

Adapting to Climate Change: Climate prediction: a limit to adaptation?

Introduction Projections of future climate and its impacts on society and the environment have been crucial for the emergence of climate change as a global problem for public policy and decision-making. Climate projections are based on a variety of scenarios, models and simulations which contain a number of embedded assumptions. Central to much of the discussion surrounding adaptation to climate change is the claim – explicit or implicit – that decision-makers need accurate, and increasingly precise, assessments of the future impacts of climate change in order to adapt successfully. According to Fussel (2007), ‘the effectiveness of pro-active adaptation to climate change often depends on the accuracy of regional climate and impact projections, which are subject to substantial uncertainty’. Similarly, Gagnon-Lebrun and Agrawala (2006) note that the level of certainty associated with climate change and impact projections is often key to determining the extent to which such information can be used to formulate appropriate adaptation responses. If true, these claims place a high premium on accurate and precise climate predictions at a range of geographical and temporal scales. But is effective adaptation tied to the ability of the scientific enterprise to predict future climate with accuracy and precision? This chapter addresses this important question by investigating whether or not the lack of accurate climate predictions represents a limit – or perceived limit – to adaptation.

Where Now for Post-Normal Science?: A Critical Review of its Development, Definitions, and Uses

‘‘Post-normal science’’ (PNS) has received much attention in recent years, but like many iconic concepts, it has attracted differing conceptualizations, applications, and implications, ranging from being a ‘‘cure-all’’ for democratic deficit to the key to achieving more sustainable futures. This editorial article introduces a Special Issue that takes stock of research on PNS and critically explores how such research may develop. Through reviewing the history and evolution of PNS, the authors seek to clarify the extant definitions, conceptualizations, and uses of PNS. The authors identify five broad areas of research on, or using, PNS which have developed over four decades. Their analysis suggests that the 1990s represent a symbolic watershed in the use of PNS terminology, when the concept was further developed and applied to highly complicated issues such as climate change. The authors particularly distinguish between uses of PNS as a normative prescription and as a practical method. Through this classification, they set out gaps and research questions arising. They then briefly summarize the Special Issue articles and consider their relationship to each other and the research questions raised by their analysis. They conclude by considering what the articles in this issue suggest for future theory building in PNS and related scholarship.

The relationship between socio-economic indicators and air pollution in England and Wales: Implications for environmental justice

Abstract This paper investigates the distribution of three common air pollutants, sulphur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide and fine particulates (PM10), in England and Wales with respect to social class, ethnicity and population density. A multilevel model is used to demonstrate regional differences in the social distribution of pollution. The results show that, allowing for ethnicity and population density, there are different relationships between socio-economic status and exposure to air pollution within different regions in England and Wales. These differences suggest that national legislation introduced to reduce air pollution levels may give rise to environmental injustice, with geographical and social differences in the costs and benefits arising to the population due to such legislation.

A co-evolutionary approach to climate change impact assessment — Part II: A scenario-based case study in East Anglia (UK)

Abstract Policy makers are beginning to intensify their search for policies that assist society to adapt to the unfolding impacts of climate change at the local level. This paper forms the second part of two part a examination of the potential for using scenarios in adaptation and vulnerability assessment. Part I explained how climate change and socio-economic scenarios can be integrated to better understand the complex inter-relationships between a changing climate and a dynamically evolving social system. This second part describes how a broadly representative sample of public, private and voluntary organisations in the East Anglian region of the UK responded to the scenarios, and identifies future research priorities. The main findings are that integrated socio-economic and climate scenarios applied `bottom up’ to locally important stakeholders: (1) provide a sophisticated and dynamic mechanism to explore the potential feedbacks between natural and human systems; (2) offer a means to understand the vulnerability and adaptive capacity of different exposure units; (3) promote social learning by encouraging participants to assess the adequacy of their existing climate strategies for longer than their normal planning periods.

Public awareness, concerns, and priorities about anthropogenic impacts on marine environments

Significance We report the results of a 10,106-person pan-European survey of public awareness, concerns, and priorities about marine anthropogenic impacts as a way to inform both science and policy initiatives in achieving marine sustainability. Results enable scientists and policymakers to understand how the public relates to the marine environment and how they frame impacts and can help make managerial, scientific, and policy priorities more responsive to public values. Numerous international bodies have advocated the development of strategies to achieve the sustainability of marine environments. Typically, such strategies are based on information from expert groups about causes of degradation and policy options to address them, but these strategies rarely take into account assessed information about public awareness, concerns, and priorities. Here we report the results of a pan-European survey of public perceptions about marine environmental impacts as a way to inform the formation of science and policy priorities. On the basis of 10,106 responses to an online survey from people in 10 European nations, spanning a diversity of socioeconomic and geographical areas, we examine the public’s informedness and concern regarding marine impacts, trust in different information sources, and priorities for policy and funding. Results show that the level of concern regarding marine impacts is closely associated with the level of informedness and that pollution and overfishing are two areas prioritized by the public for policy development. The level of trust varies greatly among different information sources and is highest for academics and scholarly publications but lower for government or industry scientists. Results suggest that the public perceives the immediacy of marine anthropogenic impacts and is highly concerned about ocean pollution, overfishing, and ocean acidification. Eliciting public awareness, concerns, and priorities can enable scientists and funders to understand how the public relates to marine environments, frame impacts, and align managerial and policy priorities with public demand.