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Category: Student blogs
A New York take on Sustainable Development: Is it feasible?
By Clea Kolster, PhD student, Science and Solutions for a Changing Planet
The term ‘sustainable development’ was first coined in 1987 in the UN’s World Commission on Environment and Development report, Our Common Future. Almost 30 years later, the concept of sustainable development is more relevant than ever.
The definition given in the report is, to this date, the most widely accepted modern definition of the term: ‘Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.’ Climate and society, energy, water, ecosystem health and monitoring, global health, poverty, urbanization, natural disasters, food, ecology and nutrition – these are some of the main problems that need to be tackled when discussing the possibility of sustainable development. They are all complex problems that require an interdisciplinary and analytical approach. Earlier this year, I joined a group of people doing just that.
On Friday April 3rd 2015, I entered the land of Ivy League elites of Columbia University to take part in the 5th Annual Interdisciplinary PhD Workshop on Sustainable Development. Having been on a year abroad at Columbia University during my undergraduate degree, I knew the spot pretty well and was thrilled about getting the chance to come back as a matured and informed PhD student ready and eager to present my work.
Arriving at the workshop, I struck up a conversation with some of the students around me. I quickly understood that a number of us had made the cross-Atlantic trip, with participants from Denmark, Italy, Sweden, France and even Australia. Students also came from Canada and Mexico, with a large majority attending world-renowned US universities, including Harvard, MIT, Yale, Princeton, UC Berkeley and of course Columbia.
Tackling sustainable development
The highlight of the first day was a keynote speech by American economist Jeffrey Sachs, head of the Earth Institute at Columbia University., Sachs has an incredible track record: he is a Quetelet professor (honorary distinction given to Columbia University professors, awarded to only four professors since 1963) of Sustainable Development, special advisor to Ban Ki-Moon, youngest economics professor at Harvard University (age 28), author of three New York Times bestsellers – and the list goes on.
One of the things that engrossed me most was his emphasis on planetary boundaries and the current ideological conflict between growth (mostly economic) and environmental sustainability. Sachs definitely got the whole room thinking about whether or not sustainable development is actually feasible and, for those like myself who desperately want that answer to be positive, what one can do to bring us closer to that goal: a world with sustainable economic, social and environmental objectives.
The rest of the afternoon featured sessions on a variety of topics from natural disasters – including the Venetian example of floods – to urban planning in China and development in India. After a long afternoon of presentations, I got the chance to network and socialize with the students. I met some very interesting individuals, most of whom, contrary to myself, feel as though they are economists before anything else, in spite of an earlier education in engineering.
On the second day, I was due to give my presentation as part of the Energy. In a small room filled with 10-15 other PhD students, all of whom were senior to me, and a few professors, I sat nervously waiting for my turn, beginning to realize that my presentation was clearly going to be one of the most “engineeringy” and technical of all.
I finally gave my 20 minute talk on the “Techno-Economic Analysis of the Link between Above Ground CO2 Capture, Transport, Usage for Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) and Storage”. I was happy to take some interesting questions at the end of it (which I hoped meant that the audience was actually interested by my topic) and later on at the coffee reception engaged in some stimulating discussions with some of my peers. It was clear that in spite of our dissimilar approaches, we had all contributed to responding to the question of sustainable development and its feasibility.
A look forward
Did you know that 1.4 billion people currently live in a state of extreme poverty at below $1.25/day? In fact, it will take a 4 to 5 time increase in total global output by 2050 to get poor countries to meet the $40,000 per capita income of rich countries today. With figures like these, it isn’t surprising that large groups of individuals around the world dedicate their time to assessing and analyzing the best ways of achieving sustainable development encompassing economic, social and environmental goals.
In my view, sustainable development is feasible, we can tackle climate change, we can reduce our exploitation of natural capital while promoting economic growth, we can bridge the gap between poor and rich countries; the problem is – as Jeff Sachs pointed out – a lack of trust. A lack of trust leads to social and political instability and these will always impede sustainable development around the world.
References
World Commission on Environment and Development – Bruntland Commission. 1987. Our Common Future. s.l. : Oxford University Press, 1987.
Find out more about Clea’s research
How do marine renewable devices affect marine life?
by Roan du Feu, PhD student, Science and Solutions for a Changing Planet
The marine renewable energy sector is poised and ready, waiting to harness the power of tides and waves with underwater tidal turbines and floating wave energy converters. A shift to renewable energy sources is essential to reducing global carbon emissions, but what are the consequences of these new technologies? Are we prepared for the effects of filling our already fragile oceans with rows of large, moving structures? Will we cause irreparable damage? Or might there even be some positive effects?
These are all questions relevant to my thesis and so, for two weeks, I attended a course on Marine Renewables and the Environment held at SAMS (the Scottish Association of Marine Science). The aim of this course was to explain the interactions between the abundant and varied ecology of the seas and the devices that will inevitably be placed in the midst of them.
What is SAMS?
SAMS is one of the oldest oceanographic organisations in the world and one of Europe’s leading research centres for marine science. It takes a great interest in marine prosperity and sustainability, climate change and, crucially, renewable energy. SAMS is located next to Dunstaffnage castle on a wild and exposed spit of land just north of Oban, Scotland, where the sinuous Loch Etive breaches into the grand, island-studded Firth of Lorn.
Marine Life
Over the course of two weeks we studied all forms of marine life. The flora ranged from the tiny, sometimes unicellular, phytoplankton and drifting algae, to the larger seaweeds. The fauna, a rather more extensive group, covered zooplankton, sponges, hydrozoa (including jellyfish and coral), segmented worms, molluscs, crustaceans, echinoderms (starfish and urchins, for example), bryzoans (moss animals), ascidians (sea squirts), fish, and of course the many marine mammals and seabirds that live and feed in the marine environment.
Something that struck me was the vast disparity, between the variety of marine flora and fauna. The dependence of plants on light to photosynthesise is at least partially responsible. The turbidity of British seas means that larger plants can only survive to a depth of about 25m, and even phytoplankton only descend to about 50m. Marine fauna on the other hand have no such limit, and can thrive many kilometres below the surface.
Effects of Marine Renewables
Marine renewable devices can have both negative and positive impacts on these many types of life. But what was made very clear was the great uncertainty in the extent and degree of almost all of these effects.
The most commonly discussed consequence of tidal turbines is blade strike. This represents a potential issue for marine mammals, large fish / sharks, and various types of diving bird, many of which dive well below the depth at which you might expect to find a turbine (guillemots, for example, have demonstrated the almost unbelievable ability to dive up to 180m below the surface in their search for fish). The extent of this problem is completely unknown, it is possible that such animals will be adept at avoiding turbine blades, but it is possible they will not.
T
hen there is the noise produced during both the construction and the operation of such devices. This could potentially scare off or disorientate some marine mammals (or during pile driving even deafen them) while possibly attracting other more curious species. In this case mitigation techniques such as using bubble shields to damped sound during construction could the limit negative effects.
Another interaction that was heavily discussed was that of the artificial reef effect. Whatever the marine renewable device in question, one immediate change to the local environment will be the addition of large, sometimes complex, structures which provide a new, different habitat type upon which life can and will grow, often significantly increasing the biomass of the area.
This is not necessarily a good thing as structures in the water have been known to provide stepping stones for invasive species that are otherwise unable to cross wide channels. This influx of both floral and faunal growth will attract fish which in turn will attract marine mammals and seabirds into a, potentially, dangerous area. In fact, considering that fish also like to hide in the shelter given by these structures, and that such areas will likely become no fishing zones it seems probable that a marine renewable development could become a veritable haven for fish. Whether the knock-on effects of this, on other marine life or indeed on fishermen, are positive or negative is unknown.
What have I learned?
The main thing I am now aware of is the high levels of uncertainty in expert opinion. I had assumed that putting devices in the sea would be an inherently bad thing for the local environment (although good for the world at large), but is it? Possibly, sometimes, but we don’t yet know. Then I was told of all the life that would actually be drawn to such devices, surely that’s good? Possibly, sometimes, but we don’t yet know.
The introduction of marine renewables to the seas is inevitable. It is one of many things that has to happen if we hope to combat the inescapable advance of man-made climate change. But I have learned that it has to be done with care, it has to be monitored well, and the information gathered has to be put to use. It seems possible that such technology could be implemented without contributing to the decline of the oceans, but only as long as it is done in an appropriate and measured manner. For what is the point in trying to save the planet if we end up destroying it in the process?
Read more about Roan’s PhD project
NERC Innovation business school: The first week
On 9 March a group of students, accompanied by innovation and system thinking coaches, embarked on a Business Innovation Journey organised by NERC and the Grantham Institute. Aiming to tackle NERC’s key challenges through the means of innovation and entrepreneurship, the first week involved visits to the UK’s Catapult centres which take inventions from academia and to turn them into innovations – the perfect space to get inspired.
On Monday, the students were introduced to the challenges lying ahead of them: the creation of business ideas which would then be presented to an expert panel at the end of the second week. They also visited the Future Cities Catapult where they were given an introduction to the challenges and opportunities that arise in current and future cities. The whole concept of the Catapult System, which is motivated by Germany’s Fraunhofers institutions, was explained, showing how the UK wants to create wealth and prosperity through innovation.
The second day was based in Harwell, at the Satellite Catapult, with a focus on the possibilities of satellite technologies as well as the on-going developments in this domain. In discussions with experts from ESA, Airbus and the Catapult the students discovered the vast opportunities that access to small and very cheap satellites has sparked. This was followed by a visit to the ESA Business Incubation Centre and a discussion with funding bodies where the students were made aware of the ways by which their potential ideas could be funded.
The students then spent the evening exploring common areas of interest and sharing skills and expertise. The lively discussions went on until deep into the night.
The next day was based at the Transport Catapult in Milton Keynes. There the participants considered the challenges and opportunities in the future of transport. Aspects such as minimizing traffic, changing to cleaner means of transport or technologies for electric cars were presented and discussed. Additionally, different ways to model and visualise flows of people and goods, and how they can be used to inform decision makers, were illustrated.
Finally, the participants brainstormed and presented different ways to innovate in the rail sector.
Chris is a Grantham PhD student who helped to develop this program and who is also one of the business innovation coaches. In this blog he provides insights into the program and the experiences the students have gained.
The NERC School for Environmental Innovation and Entrepreneurship would like to invite PhD students and early career researchers with an interest in Environment and Climate Change to register their interest in attending the London Environmental Challenge, a full-time residential course that will run from 13 April to 24 April 2015.
Responding to environmental change
This blog post is part of a series on Responding to Environmental Change event, organised by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) funded Doctoral Training Partnerships at Imperial (SSCP), and the University of Reading and the University of Surrey (SCENARIO).
A recent event in London brought together emerging environmental scientists (PhD students and early career researchers) with leaders from business, policy and academia to explore the challenges posed by environmental change and opportunities to work in collaboration to respond to these.
Communities today find themselves and the environments they live in under increasing pressure. This is driven by growing populations, urban expansion and improving living standards that place increasing stress on natural resources. Added to this is the rising threat from environmental hazards and environmental change.
Research, development and innovation within the environmental sciences and beyond offers the opportunity to manage these pressures and risks, exploring how we can live sustainably with environmental change, whatever its drivers.
Discussion at the event covered three key societal challenges and their implications for business and policy. A summary of these talks has been captured by students attending the event and can be found below.
The event was organised by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) funded Doctoral Training Partnerships at Imperial (SSCP), and the University of Reading and the University of Surrey (SCENARIO).
Benefiting from natural resources
Natural resources are fundamental for wellbeing, economic growth and sustaining life. Greater demand for food, water and energy requires better management and use to reduce stress on natural systems and ensure a sustainable future.
Read more in a report by Jonathan Bosch, a first year SSCP PhD student researching transitions to low-carbon energy systems.
Resilience to environmental hazards
Environmental hazards are becoming more frequent and severe, with potentially serious impacts on people, supply chains and infrastructure globally. Advancing our knowledge and understanding of these hazards, and the processes involved, will allow us to better predict, plan for and manage the risks in order to increase resilience to these changes.
Read more in the report by Malcom Graham, a first year SSCP PhD student researching saline intrusion in coastal aquifers.
Managing environmental change
In addition to natural variability, human activities are causing rapid, large-scale climate and environmental change. Understanding how these processes work as a whole Earth system can improve our understanding of the impacts of these changes and inform responsible management of the environment.
Read more in a report by Rebecca Emerton, a first year SCENARIO PhD student researching approaches to global forecasting of flood risk.
The Road to Paris 2015 – COP 21
Matthew Bell, Chief Executive at the Committee on Climate Change, concluded the event with a talk on the road to Paris and the issues that could be faced in the climate negotiations.
Read more in a report by Samantha Buzzard, a third year NERC PhD student at Reading investigating the role of surface melt in the retreat and disintegration of Antarctic ice shelves.
Watch videos of all the talks on our YouTube channel.
Find out more about the Science and Solutions for a Changing Planet DTP at Imperial College London.
Find out more about the SCENARIO DTP at the University of Reading and University of Surrey.
Benefiting from natural resources
This blog post by Jonathan Bosch, an SSCP DTP student, is part of a series on Responding to Environmental Change, an event organised by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) funded Doctoral Training Partnerships at Imperial (SSCP), and the University of Reading and the University of Surrey (SCENARIO).
See the full list of blogs in this series here.
Natural resources are fundamental to human well-being, economic growth, and other areas of human development. Greater demand for food, water and energy resources against the current backdrop of climate change and population growth requires better management and more efficient use of natural resources to reduce the resulting stress on the earth’s natural systems.
In this “benefiting from natural resources” section of the programme there were three talks from representatives of three distinct sectors, presenting how the respective areas of industry, regulatory bodies, and academia are currently dealing with the management of natural resources.
Sustainable business
Andy Wales, Director of Sustainable Development at SABMiller plc, made an arresting case for why sustainability is not only important for their business model, but also why it’s vital for its continued success. SABMiller is a multinational beer and soft drinks producing company.
SABMiller presents itself as a local beer brand, although it operates in 40 countries. As such, the business is exposed to the perturbations and vulnerabilities of, principally, local water supplies, but also grain and packaging supply chains. And with 80% of its income coming from developing markets, it cannot secure its future profitability without smart resource management. Procuring primary products from local markets is important to achieving this and therefore water management is critical.
The ‘Prosper’ programme, sits on five sustainable development pillars, and has as its catchphrase, “When business does well, so do local communities, economies and the environment around us. When they prosper, we do.” The five pillars are associated with a “thriving, sociable, resilient, clean and productive world.” Encompassed in these areas is an acknowledgement that not only do water supplies matter, but, for example, ‘clean’ – reducing its carbon footprint, and ‘productive’ – food and land security, are central to ensuring a profitable future.
A number of case studies went some way in demonstrating the achievements of Prosper to date. Already, $40m in efficiency savings have been achieved by programmes implemented in Colombia and India, using a systems approach which helped farmers choose better crop types – reducing water consumption by 30% and raising crop yield by 20%.
In Bogota, India, Prosper highlighted issues of poor land management which caused regular and intolerable spikes in water prices. Water run off was high and productive yield of food crops and milk production was low. A sophisticated approach tackled the problem by simply changing the breed of local milk cows to better benefit from the local ecological conditions. The result was an increase in the milk yield of the region and a sharp reduction in water run-off, securing milk and water availability for all users.
Prosper continues to forge collaborations worldwide in the nexus of water, food and energy security. A partnership with the WWF will continue development in that direction.
Environmental regulation
Miranda Kavanagh, Executive Director, Evidence Directorate of the Environment Agency, focused her talk on ‘Fracking’, or hydraulic fracturing, which is one of the unconventional techniques of oil and gas extraction currently attracting world-wide media attention for its, as yet, undetermined environmental risks.
The Environment Agency’s role is in delivering on a policy framework set by the relevant government agencies, principally DEFRA. It has three specific roles in achieving this objective: Regulating industries and activities that can potentially harm the environment; advising government, industry and the public about more sustainable approaches to the environment; and specific operational work to protect and improve the environment.
The Environment Agency (EA) is guided by its Evidence Directive, which aims to use evidence to “guide and inspire” their actions and those they advise. It states that they must use the best available evidence, use environmental data to support the decisions of others, and develop a joined up approach to evidence, among other equally impressive visions.
On Fracking, the EA must balance, pragmatically, the needs and interests of different groups concerned with environment, resource exploitation and people, as Kavanagh clarified in the Q&A session. As well as the pure environmental impacts, the EA must consider the effects on people and communities, but also the need for fuel exploitation and energy security; areas of interest of both government and the energy sector.
These needs were highlighted in the Potential Contribution report produced by the UK Institute of Directors, which highlighted the social benefits of one scenario to include a likely decrease in the use of imported gas, 70,000 energy jobs and a net benefit to the Treasury.
These benefits are offset by the environmental risks, which are complex, and in some cases, undetermined. The known risks involve a range of air, land and water pollution, the release of chemical and radioactive substances, and a range of spatial and time dependent risks, which will affect exploited regions differently, and on differing timescales. For example, ground water contamination may take decades to become detectable.
The EA works in many areas to produce evidence for the advice and regulation of future potential fracking operations. The EA was, for example, instrumental in producing a UK geological map of the subsurface extent of shales and their vertical separation to aquifers. These were important as a preliminary risk assessment for a broad geological understanding of the importance and distribution of our groundwater resource. This type of evidence gathering must be done for the range of environmental concerns listed above.
Also highlighted were collaborations and opportunities which the EA are eager to develop. NERC Fellowships and various PhD Studentships are ongoing and include projects as broad as evaluating methodologies for environmental risks, but also the invention and patenting of new instruments for air-quality impacts and other applications.
The EA welcomes partnerships, particularly those involved with their Collaborative Research Priorities. Their expertise and extensive datasets are important resources which other organisations with similar resources and objectives may make use of to aid progress on some key questions within applied environmental science.
Ecosystem services
Elizabeth Robinson, Professor of Environmental Economics at the University of Reading presented two projects demonstrating her work on how scientists and social scientists can and have been working together to improve our ability to benefit from natural resources.
There has been, in the past, little need to actively manage our natural resource base, but the pressures of climate variability and population growth have made optimising the use of these resources effectively much more important. The relationship between ecosystem services – measurable by ecological scientists – and agricultural intensity – understood by management and social structures – becomes a crucial collaboration.
But what is the relationship between these inextricably connected issues? Robinson was concerned, as a trained economist, with ‘drawing a curve’ between these two dimensions, which would describe how and why a change in the intensity of agriculture would affect the ecosystem services which are critical to the sustainability and well-being of communities.
In Ghana, cocoa production was investigated in order to understand how some farmers may choose to intensify their agriculture and why some do not, and furthermore some intensifications were damaging the ecosystem more than others. Ecologists were employed to determine the relationship between intensity and ecosystem services, while social scientists interviewed farming communities to discover how the forest land was managed and what were the limiting factors to best managing the land in benefiting farmer yield and ecosystems.
It was found that there are often complicated social factors affecting how the farms and forest land was managed, and these included the ability of farmers to use or afford fertiliser, shift cultivation to newly converted forest when soils are exhausted, and even whether farmers benefit from pollination by nearby forests. It was seen that many local perceptions of resource space and property rights restricted the farmers’ ability to optimise their practices even if they desired to do so. Among many other constraints, poverty, labour availability and wages, and institutional contexts affect the outcomes when farmers attempted to intensify their practices.
Ultimately, a simple behavioural model can attempt to capture the ecological boundaries, and social constraints, and can be used to propose routes toward an optimum solution for ecosystem services and farmer preferences and resources.
The second case study was related to managing fisheries in Tanzania, where such efforts are typically addressed only when falling stocks become an issue. This project also highlighted the need to observe the socio-economic situation and implement credible solutions which may indeed lead to a slower recovery of the ecology, but which resolve societal tensions and allow the fishing communities a reliable income without implementing a total fishing ban. A ‘Bio-economic’ model was indispensable in this project too.
Watch a video of the talk on our YouTube channel.
Resilience to environmental hazards
This blog post by Malcom Graham, an SSCP DTP student, is part of a series on Responding to Environmental Change, an event organised by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) funded Doctoral Training Partnerships at Imperial (SSCP), and the University of Reading and the University of Surrey (SCENARIO).
See the full list of blogs in this series here.
Environmental hazards are becoming more frequent and severe, with potentially serious impacts on people, supply chains and infrastructure globally. Advancing our knowledge and understanding of these hazards, and the processes involved, will allow us to better predict, plan for and manage the risks in order to increase resilience to these changes.
This session focussed offered perspectives from academia (Imperial College London), the world of (re)insurance (Willis Re) and the charity sector (Oxfam).
Evaluating risks
David Simmons, the Head of Strategic Capital and Result Management at Willis Re, began proceedings and impressed us by speaking with no slides or notes, describing it as a ‘liberating’ experience. Despite (or perhaps helped by) the absence of visual aids, his delivery was nevertheless engaging and humorous.
His talk focussed on the world of reinsurance, which he assured us was the ‘sexy’ part of the insurance sector, specialising as it does in catastrophe risk. He contrasted this with the banal nature of regular insurance work and the social death that ensues for most practitioners.
We were told that reinsurance, which covers the insurance companies themselves against major disasters, is suffering from too much capital. Stoically, David explained the reasons behind this: essentially, due to financial uncertainty in other sectors, no one else could offer the low risk and high returns on investment now commonplace in the reinsurance industry. This he attributed to a much greater understanding of catastrophe risk over the last few years than had previously existed.
Following on from Don Friedman’s modelling of hurricanes in the 1980s, which provided a basis for hazard and probability analysis, David explained how there has since been massive investment in producing ever more reliable models to understand these elements. Indeed, the process of developing models in itself seems to have driven the understanding of various components and allowed constraints to be placed on the ‘unknown unknowns’, a Rumsfeldism which seems to make its way into most talks on modelling these days.
The price of reinsurance has apparently dropped substantially in recent times, driven by the unprecedented levels of investment. In particular, we were told that reinsurance for many parts of the developing world comes at negligible cost, due in part to a reduction in the number of deaths from droughts as a result of more reliable aid. Although this is clearly a positive development, David was keen to point out that the arrival of aid was often too slow to prevent significant human suffering and damage to assets and infrastructure. The focus has therefore turned to more timely interventions and having better systems in place for disaster response.
We learnt that insurers are now playing an important role in driving best practice from governments, with many African countries having to present draft disaster response plans, audited reports on actual responses implemented by the government and the results of anti-corruption tests before they can join insurance programs.
David’s talk closed with commentary on the growth of various large-scale insurance schemes, many of them covering multiple countries. He cited the example of the African Risk Capacity, which is expanding from 5 to 10 members, and a scheme in the Caribbean which is now expanding into Latin America. He did highlight some pitfalls with the more inclusive approach to insurance, contrasting the approach to flood insurance in the UK, where higher risk properties pay an additional premium, with the French system where all households pay the same, thereby removing some of the incentive for individuals to reduce their risk.
Improving resilience
Our second talk of the session came from Martin Rokitzki, former resilience advisor for climate change adaption at Oxfam. Humbly professing to be ‘the least scientific person in the room’, he could nevertheless point to 15 years of practical experience working on climate change and environmental issues.
His talk began by looking at what is actually meant by the term ‘resilience’, which appears to have numerous definitions relating to one’s ability to cope, adapt, prepare or thrive when faced with shocks, stresses or uncertainties.
When presented with such an uncertain framework, we were unsurprised to learn that there is no ‘cookie-cutter or cook-book’ for resilience and that the term may be applied to a huge range of social and economic groups. By talking about his experiences with Oxfam, Martin was at least able to narrow his focus to addressing the resilience of the world’s poor.
Even within this constraint, understanding hazards and impacts was presented as a multi-faceted exercise. Variations in the spatial extent of damage, its intensity, duration, rate of onset and level of predictability could all have profound effects on the planning process. Counterintuitively, Martin felt that slow-onset hazards were often the hardest to address and his talk focussed on how to deal with challenges of that nature, such as the East African food crisis, glacier melt in Nepal and salt intrusion in Tuvalu.
We were told that Oxfam’s approach to resilience involves 5 key areas: livelihood viability (i.e. the economic buffer to disaster); innovation potential; contingency resources and support access (i.e. provision of aid); integrity of the natural and built environment (in the case of the extreme poor, they are directly dependent on the surrounding natural environment); and social and institutional capacity (i.e. governance).
In contrast to the preceding speaker, Martin’s presentation abounded with eye-catching schematics, highlighting various approaches to disaster management. Key to these were the integration of policy and projects to get a successful outcome. To illustrate this, he presented us with the ‘Cycle of Drought Management’ which moves through stages of preparedness, disaster response and relief, reconstruction and mitigation. Alas, the paucity of data in 80-90% of affected areas means that the preparedness stage is often a huge challenge. Our presenter highlighted this as a key reason for Oxfam to collaborate more closely with scientists.
Towards the end of his talk, Martin touched on Oxfam’s R4 approach to risk, encompassing risk reduction (managing resources well), risk transfer (insurance), risk taking (credit for investment) and risk reserves (savings). Without this sort of strategy, seasonal food shortages could easily become year round famines. As part of this Oxfam has been helping to administer financial services in remote rural areas and developing a focus on flexible and forward-looking decision making.
Martin’s final message was that we need more collaboration between the ‘thinkers’ and the ‘doers’ – a clear call for the science community to engage more directly and more frequently with aid agencies and other environmental organisations.
Assessing impacts
Our final speaker of the session was Imperial’s very own Professor Ralf Toumi, who described his ongoing work on the OASIS project, an open access model for looking at the impacts of extreme weather events on the built environment.
His main driver for the project was the limited number of companies providing assessments of risk in this area, thereby giving a fairly narrow field of views on risk to the insurance sector. He reflected that this has not been helped by a continuing barrier of information between researchers and insurers and the ‘black box’ approach to disaster modelling which exists within the commercial world.
Following the previous speaker’s flurry of eye-catching diagrams, Ralf was not shy to present a few schematics of his own, illustrating the concepts behind OASIS. These highlighted the user’s ability to select combinations of models to give a tailor-made view of risk, including a broader spread of results and a greater understanding of model bias and uncertainty. To highlight the point, Ralf asserted that vulnerability modelling (i.e. the damage caused by an event) has a much greater level of uncertainty than hazard modelling. Indeed, one of the key challenges of the OASIS project has apparently been to get hold of datasets on damage, information which some players in the industry have been reluctant to provide.
A further challenge, we were told, is the effect of giving insurers greater experience in using this modelling framework: the desire for greater complexity. Whilst models appear to be ever more powerful (a 30 year dataset can apparently now be used to predict a 1 in 1000 year event!) there is a serious challenge to translate this complexity from the academic / journal environment to insurance professionals. There has also been a need to standardise the wide array of different data formats associated with OASIS’ component models.
Despite these challenges, it appears that OASIS is flourishing. Our presenter proudly displayed a series of media articles after their press release went viral, along with a list of 44 members of the OASIS Loss Modelling Framework, a list that includes numerous insurance and reinsurance companies. Their many associate members include a variety of government bodies, academic institutions and IT companies.
Long-term planning
A combined question and answer session followed on the three presentations. It began with the question of how all these ‘big complex’ models have been validated with data. Professor Toumi agreed that validation is a huge issue, although hazard validation is much easier to do, using historical datasets, than validating predictions of damage, which sometimes diverge wildly. David Simmons was able to point to a recent paper he had written on model validation and highlighted that the non-stationary world we live in means that there are never sufficient data. Nevertheless, he believed that even non-validated models are better than nothing and that the modelling process aids understanding as much as the end result. He also highlighted that satellite datasets can act as a useful first-pass method for validating models.
The second question focussed on how we transition from looking at short-term resilience to combatting longer-term changes. Martin Rokitzki responded that although we live in a short-term world, transformative scenario planning is more commonly done nowadays, which is often based on narratives rather than data alone. Adaptive management is also more common.
Another audience member (currently working for one of the London mayoral candidates) wondered what question we should pose to mayoral candidates of large cities in relation to risk management and resilience. The panel were somewhat stumped by this, but (ironically) opted to answer the question about a question with another question: Martin Rokitzki wondered who has responsibility for risk management. Should adaptation be a government service, should it be borne by individuals or even by the private sector? David Simmons cited an example of the World Bank trying to cover industrial areas against earthquakes and reward good design through financial incentives. Unfortunately, the scheme struggled through a lack of political will to take decisions which might be unpopular with their electorates, despite having clear long-term benefits.
The final question related to the possible impacts of a catastrophic asteroid impact and the huge disparity between the insurance fund set aside to cover Florida’s coastline from storm damage and flooding ($2 trillion) compared to a much smaller sum assigned globally for larger-scale catastrophes like asteroid impacts ($0.5 trillion). David Simmons responded that the insurance industry focuses on the short-term, partly due to the 5 year tenure of most CEOs. This makes asteroid impacts beyond the timescale of concern. Another contributor to the disparity is that flood insurance is governed by a regulator in Florida. Despite this, David felt that Florida now has enough reinsurance capacity and that there is now a need to better understand hazards like asteroids.
And as we all dwelt on what sort of cosmic destruction may be in store, the session was brought to a close, leaving us with the much simpler conundrum of what to have for our lunch.
Watch a video of the talk on our YouTube channel.
Managing environmental change
This blog post by Rebecca Emerton, a Scenario DTP student at University of Reading, is part of a series on Responding to Environmental Change, an event organised by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) funded Doctoral Training Partnerships at Imperial (SSCP), and the University of Reading and the University of Surrey (SCENARIO).
See the full list of blogs in this series here.
In addition to natural variability, human activities are causing rapid, large-scale climate and environmental change. Understanding how these processes work as a whole Earth system can improve our understanding of the impacts of these changes and inform responsible management. One key challenge is how we monitor and record environmental data, and the role this data can play in managing the environment.
The third challenge area of the Responding to Environmental Change event explored the management of environmental change, including how environmental data is monitored and recorded, and challenges faced in utilising this data.
Monitoring the environment from Space
Jacquie Conway, Head of Institutional Relations UK within Airbus Defence and Space – Geo-Intelligence, opened the afternoon with a discussion of the practical applications of Earth Observation (EO) data. A key question was presented: “Why Space?”, highlighting the benefits of EO for providing evidence used to assess how much land change is occurring, where this land change is taking place and the causes and impacts of the change, alongside uses in model validation and determining possible future changes. Examples were given such as forest mapping and monitoring, in order to identify degradation and illegal logging, and the changes in these over time. Further examples include food security and crop sustainability – analysis of drought areas and possibilities for improved farming management practices, and urban planning through monitoring land use change and developing cities. Disaster management is also key, with EO data and mapping used in emergency response, recovery and preparation.
The challenges associated with EO and Big Data are continuously evolving, with increased volume, diversity and value of EO data, in conjunction with non-space data. Aspects such as quality, continuity, timeliness and uniqueness of data are significant in approaching the Big Data challenge. Emerging solutions include the Airbus Processing Cloud, which provides a platform for hosted processing, with examples given of completed successful processing and reprocessing campaigns. Where the previous data processing time for one mission was greater than 700 days, it is now possible to process this data in just 2 weeks through use of the Airbus Processing Cloud. Alongside data processing, the platform will enable development of new products and services through a partnership approach, with the intent to support SMEs, research organisations and Universities, among others.
Copernicus was introduced as the European Flagship Earth Observation Programme to monitor environmental change, by Jacquie Conway, and discussed further by Dr Farhana Amin (Defra). Copernicus is led by the EU and co-ordinated by the ESA, and is the European response to a global need to manage the environment, providing necessary data for operational monitoring of the environment, and for civil security. With a €3.8bn investment in Copernicus, 6 missions (each with 2 satellites) will be launched, resulting in up to 8TB of new, open access data on the environment, per day. These missions will provide valuable information for land, marine and atmosphere monitoring, alongside emergency management, security and climate change services.
Environmental policy and regulation
Dr Amin gave a policy perspective on managing environmental change, highlighting the responsibilities of Defra for policy and regulation on environment, food and rural affairs, including the protection from floods and plant/animal diseases, alongside improving the environment and rural services. The statutory obligations of Defra range from monitoring pesticide residues on food, to managing natural resources through monitoring of air quality and biodiversity. Emphasis was placed on Evidence-Based Policy, using observations, knowledge and scientific research to provide the basis for all policies. Examples were given of current programmes such as Cefas – the Clean Seas Environment Monitoring Programme, which aims to detect long-term trends in the quality of the marine environment through collection of high quality, standardized data. Other examples include the monitoring of bathing water quality, and UK Surveillance Schemes involving partnerships between the Joint Nature Conservation Committee (JNCC), NGOs, research bodies and volunteers to monitor wintering and breeding birds, butterflies, bats, plants and other mammals.
Satellite applications also have a long history of use within Defra, for research and monitoring of land use, roads and marine environments, and GPS data for forestry monitoring, flood monitoring and field sample collections. Again, challenges with EO were discussed, such as the highly complex processes involved, the need for high quality data and regular analysis, working around multiple partners and methodologies, and the resource intensive nature of environmental monitoring.
Understanding the ‘Critical Zone’ for life
Professor Anne Verhoef (University of Reading) provided a research perspective on managing environmental change, discussing steps towards an improved understanding and sustainable management of the ‘Critical Zone’ (CZ), which extends from groundwater reservoirs to soil, to the surface and lower atmosphere – in other words, the zone in which we live. The CZ affects food, water and energy resources, and plays a major role in our weather and (micro)climate, also allowing us to mitigate the effects of extreme events and environmental change. Advances in monitoring of the CZ at many time and space scales (for improved understanding and management), include novel monitoring of field-scale soil moisture and a wireless underground sensor network. Also on the theme of Earth Observation, imaging such as X-Ray CT imaging and remote sensing play a role in understanding and managing the CZ.
Another key aspect is modelling of the CZ, using various models to study part of, or the entire, CZ, such as land surface models (within global circulation models, e.g. JULES), groundwater models, and Soil-Vegetation-Atmosphere-Transfer (SVAT) models. SVAT models can further be coupled with remote sensing (EO) data of multiple types and at a range of spatio-temporal scales, leading to more generic tools for environmental research and management. Versatile tools exist allowing the calculation of crop yield, photosynthesis etc., such as the SCOPE model, which is an SVAT model supporting the direct interpretation of EO data. It was concluded that improving models to include more realism, and combining them with EO and remote sensing products, alongside the use of novel in-situ monitoring techniques (for improved ground data), will improve our understanding of the CZ and help move towards sustainable management of environmental change.
Benefits of collaboration for sustainable management
Both the similarities and differences between the perspectives from business, policy and research, and the challenges faced in using EO data for the management of environmental change, show the benefits of collaboration and partnerships, alongside the advances and extensive work towards sustainable management of the changing environment.
Watch a video of the talk on our YouTube channel.
The Road to Paris 2015 – the UK’s postition
The Climate and Environment at Imperial blog has moved. View this post on our new blog
This blog post by Samantha Buzzard, a NERC student at the University of Reading, is part of a series on Responding to Environmental Change, an event organised by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) funded Doctoral Training Partnerships at Imperial (SSCP), and the University of Reading and the University of Surrey (SCENARIO).
See the full list of blogs in this series here.
To conclude the Responding to Environmental Change meeting Matthew Bell, Chief Executive of the Committee on Climate Change, outlined the position of the UK in relation to climate change and the issues that could be faced at the Paris Climate Conference (COP 21) at the end of this year. At the beginning of his talk he emphasised that the credibility of the Committee on Climate Change depends on properly interpreting the science of climate change and also that the committee should feedback into the scientific community through signalling the gaps in the evidence and determining what research would be most valuable in the long term.
The UK at present
Matthew made it clear that most of the debate in the UK was not whether climate change is happening, but around the uncertainty of the levels of change and its impacts. This was highlighted only a few days ago when David Cameron, Nick Clegg and Ed Milliband made a pre-election pledge to uphold the climate change act, which holds the UK to a statutory 2050 target for emissions reductions. In fact when the act was first introduced in 2008 it received massive cross-party support with only three MPs voting against it.
It is because of this act that Matthew was able to speak to us – it established the Committee on Climate Change as an independent advisor to report back to the government annually on the UK’s progress towards meeting the five year legally binding carbon budgets that the country has been set in order to meet the 2050 emissions target (the Committee also suggest the levels that these five year targets should be set at when they are planned). The Committee also gives an assessment of the country’s adaptation to climate change, ensuring that actions taken are in line with the level of risk expected.
The UK’s 5 year carbon budgets. The UK met the first budget but mostly due to the economic slowdown. (Source Matthew Bell, Committee on Climate Change).
Issues in Paris
There will be many areas under discussion at COP 21, ranging from pledges and the monitoring of them once they are made, support from high to low income countries (both financial and non) and the actions required from ‘international’ sectors such as aviation and shipping.
However, the focus here was on the wider co-benefits of tackling climate change. Matthew stressed that when looking at these issues the Committee have to take into account a range of factors. Although scientific knowledge is key, areas such as technology, the impact of actions upon the competitiveness of UK industry, social circumstances (particularly fuel poverty) and fiscal circumstances all have to be considered. There is a trade-off to be made between the cost of mitigation and how much we are willing to accept risk to ecosystems and certain parts of the planet. Furthermore, there are both benefits and costs of tackling climate change, some of which are outlined below:
Benefits:
- Improved air quality
- More active lifestyles
- Fewer (net) road traffic accidents
- Time savings from reduced congestion
- Less water abstraction
- Improved health from better diet
Costs:
- Landscape impact of renewables
- Hazardous waste (and risk of major incidents) from nuclear
- Road accidents from walking and cycling
- Air quality impacts of biomass for heat
- Airstream quality and upstream fuel impacts of coal carbon capture and storage
Some work has been done to calculate the net impact of tackling climate change but the error bars are large and more work is needed. The current recommendation that the Committee on Climate Change are suggesting would costs less than 1% of the UK’s GDP.
The UK leading into Paris
The UK is currently in a good position leading up to COP21 having met the first of our five yearly carbon budgets – although it must be stressed that this is largely due to the financial crisis and economic slowdown rather than specific policies. There is still a lot to do to meet the 2nd and 3rd targets and the 4th is going to be a very big step down.
A key stage in reaching these targets will be to have a largely decarbonised power sector by 2030. Matthew suggests a highlight for future research could be the wider use of low-carbon heat, for example having this in 15% of homes by 2030. To ensure the success of policies relating to these changes more research also needs to be done into behaviours – what prevents people taking up green actions and determines their reactions to environmental policies?
It was emphasised that we also have a poor evidence base and lack of data for working with the industry and agriculture sectors, so these areas need greater attention in future. Furthermore, despite success in reducing vehicle emissions by a greater amount than expected (due to EU regulation) it will now be even more challenging to reduce them further.
The Committee are due to release a progress report on both adaptation and mitigation in June outlining the key risks to achieving the 2050 carbon target and will also advise on the level of the 5th carbon budget (the 2028-32 budget as these are set 12 years in advance) at the same time COP 21 is taking place in December.
Help in different areas will be important to the Committee this year and well beyond. From scientists better near-term climate models, better monitoring and understanding of the full life-cycle of greenhouse gas emissions and their wider environmental impacts and linking the science of diversity, ecology and evolution to policy debates about climate will all be helpful for the committee’s work. However, this will need to be combined with better understanding of people’s behaviours and gaining the optimal balance between adaptation and mitigation, as well as understanding the best timing and level (local, regional or national) at which to apply measures.
Watch a video of the talk on our YouTube channel.
The Post-2015 Goals: Environmental Sustainability, Science and Development
By Bora Ristic, Science and Solutions for a Changing Planet DTP student
This week, the next round of UN negotiations on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are under way in New York. The SDGs aim to coordinate and promote development across the world in critical areas, including health, education, governance, and environment amongst others. Imperial College PhDs (myself included) recently exchanged ideas with David Hallam from the Department for International Development about his current work on the SDGs to be agreed later this year. The talk centred on how this ambitious global development effort could be successful and, very broadly, what role science and the environmental research being conducted at Imperial can play.
Too many targets?
The UK holds the position that there are too many goals and too many targets currently under discussion. The 17 goals and 169 associated targets are not easily memorable to put it mildly. David argued that development agencies cannot do all at once, and will inevitably prioritise some goals and targets over others. Such prioritizing can reduce the impact of the SDGs as the easier options may be chosen over the harder ones.
On the other hand, a set of easily communicable goals and targets could mean oversimplification – once again lowering their effectiveness. These goals, after all, reflect what every UN member sees as the ends any society should pursue. Clearly a delicate balance must be struck between a manageable list and the inclusion of many different concerns.
Science and the SDGs
Science plays an integral role in these policies. Science can determine baseline values, measure current performance, and determine policy effectiveness against these. It can help in identifying the particular barriers to achieving goals and also elucidate means for removing them, such as the knowledge and the innovations that can feed the world sustainably and provide it with low-carbon energy.
For science to do any of this however, there must be communication between development needs and the research conducted. DfID uses a tendering method for its outsourced research needs and this could be applied more broadly. It is still important to have fundamental research, but the relevance of research to needs could be improved if funding criteria target the SDGs.
Limits of Science
Limitations to the application of science to the development agenda also exist. Scientists are trained in assessing uncertainty in their measurements and predictions. However, uncertainties are often misunderstood by the general public and are unpalatable to decision makers who push for clear answers.
Uncertainty is not the only limit to what science can deliver for development. Science often is simply trumped by political considerations in policy making. For example, the UNFCCC target of keeping global warming under 2°C was not determined by science, but by negotiations taking science into account. This is related to the question of weighting the interests of the disadvantaged duly and brings us to the main challenge posed for the application of science to development.
Science and Values
The SDGs, and development in general, deal with fundamental questions of value. What is development about? Do we want wealthy people? Healthy people? Educated in which way? Development is always driven by a sense of fairness or dignity or other values. We need environmentally friendly economies because people are suffering and we should help those in need (or at least not harm them). More ambitiously, we may consider the interests of future generations or the environment itself as imposing duties on us. So, how can science, with its objectivity, help us in this normative terrain?
While the interplay between science and values is hotly contested, one philosopher of science, Otto Neurath, saw science as a “a social practice – a discursive formation with emancipatory potential.” Science is influenced by social interests and projects but its choice of subject for investigation can deliver beneficial outcomes to human or non-human well-being. Such a conception of science as a sort of discourse ‘format’ could be applied to the development of the SDGs. With it, we would limit ourselves to the consideration of measurable well-being as targets for goals. This may enable easier communication between diverse perspectives, and may lead policy to deliver tangible results more readily.
Achieving the SDGs
There was also substantial discussion on practical steps for achieving the goals and targets. As with research funding, the work of development agencies and their staff could be assessed on the basis of the SDGs.
In terms of the negotiating process, a promising approach that is being adopted in the climate negotiations is one which calls for countries to report their nation’s intended contributions in advance of substantive negotiations. Coordinating bodies can then calculate the total individual measures in advance and determine if together they would meet the targets. Gaps can then be identified and parties called upon to address them. Secondly, instead of countries arguing they will not take ambitious measures until other parties do so, such an advance announcement creates competition between parties for the best measures.
As with any international effort, the SDG process suffers from the lack of a higher authority to ensure ambition and compliance. The anarchic setting of international agreements means parties can only deal in the currencies of goodwill and reputation. Preview and review processes, coupled with a scientific mind-set such as we have discussed above, could help to develop and achieve ambitious but feasible goals in such a setting.
We are extremely grateful to David for his visit and the fruitful conversation he made possible.
Time to Act climate march – what was missing?
On Saturday, 7th March 2015, I attended the Time to Act climate march. After a winding route through the historic streets of central London, an impromptu sit-down on the Strand, and a spirit-raising day under an early spring sun, we converged on Parliament Square where a number of speakers from charities, trade unions, political parties and other activist groups launched their rallying cries for climate justice, aiming their anger squarely upon the walls of the houses of parliament: the centre of British democracy – those with the power to make change, but who perhaps far too often stand in its way.
For me, it was a particularly sobering experience. Not since my first protest attendance at the million-strong “No War on Iraq” protest of February 2003 had I attended a public protest – it’s still feted as probably the largest protest movement in human history – and I was enthusiastic this time, to show up, hold up my placard, and join thousands of concerned citizens to convey our collective anger at what I see to be the complicit and complacent inaction of our government on the urgent challenges of climate and environmental change, in opposition to the rational, fair minded and compassionate citizenry of the United Kingdom.
However, after the excitement of the day had worn off, I couldn’t help but feel somewhat deflated by the realities of the movement as it exists today, nearly four decades after global warming was raised as an international concern at the World Climate Conference in Geneva in 1979. A decade too, before I was even born.
My main concern was that the attendees, despite coming seemingly from all walks of life, were not justly represented by the big-name speakers in attendance. For sure, there was representation by Greenpeace and Avaaz and many of the usual charitable organisations. There was also representation by a number of trade unions and the equally impassioned orators of environmental-cause NGOs and celebrity activists.
But none of the mainstream political parties were present, bar one left-wing Labour MP, John McDonnell. Is climate change an issue undeserving of the legitimacy of our democratic process?
There were however a few refreshingly erudite voices in the form of Bangladeshi campaigner Rumana Hashem, comedian, Francesca Martinez, and the blazing writer and activist – via recorded video message – Naomi Klein, author of This Changes Everything.
Then there was 12 year-old Laurel, who spoke simply on behalf of her generation.
Our climate legacy is to 12 year old Laurel and her generation.
A science-shaped gap
The most invisible group, but those very often with the most to say, were the climate scientists themselves.
There were no scientists in the list of speakers; no scientific media organisations handing out materials; and no science representative block, as there were for many environmental interest groups.
Scientists are absent from the fight. They reliably churn out results, smoothing the climate curves, adding degrees to our predicted future surface temperatures, and adding calamity to the already calamitous ice sheet collapses, and yet we/they stay as staunchly apolitical as ever, perhaps for fear of being discredited as impartial scientists.
But to me, it’s the voice that is most obviously missing from the activist debate. Yes, there are scientists on government panels, and in IPCC working groups, but these are only the places that scientists have a duty to be. It is clear however that any paradigm shifting fight, as demonstrated in the previous century, requires grassroots activism. Not accepting the status quo. It was how civil rights were won in the US, how the suffragettes won women’s rights, and how wars became politically toxic worldwide.
The point often repeated by the many trade union and intellectual activists is that climate change is not only a non-partisan issue, but an issue which many interest groups would gain leverage if they acted together. For example, the occupy movement, anti-capitalist, and others all have a strong mandate to rid the system of austerity politics, rampant capitalism, and the huge projected industrial emissions that go along with it. Likewise scientists are fighting a lonely battle if they insist on fighting from high up in their ivory towers.
For the reasons above, and for the very longevity of our own species, I believe that it has become the job of scientists, not only to carry on doing the science that is imperative to human progress, but also to become activists, reporters and educators on this, the main issue of the 21st century.
Guardian coverage of the march
Internship Experiences: Skidmore, Owings & Merrill
The Climate and Environment at Imperial blog has moved. View this post on our new blog
by Peter Blair, Science and Solutions for a Changing Planet DTP student
The Thames Basin is set to face many challenges in the future: climate change, a growing population and economic requirements all present developmental challenges, as well as major sources of uncertainty. Having previously worked on a voluntary project producing a vision for planning in the Great Lakes Basin over the next hundred years, Skidmore Owings and Merrill (SOM) were interested in applying the same methodology to the Thames Basin to determine how we may best plan for the future in this area.
During the summer of 2014, prior to starting the NERC Science and Solutions for a Changing Planet Doctoral Training Partnership at Imperial College, I undertook the exciting opportunity of an internship with Skidmore, Owings and Merrill, looking at the future of planning of development in the Thames Basin.
Who are SOM?
SOM, short for Skidmore, Owings and Merrill, are a world-leading firm of architects, structural engineers and urban planners. They have designed buildings such as the Burj Khalifa and the Broadgate Tower (where their London office is now based), and have worked on the Imperial College Campus master plan, amongst many other projects.
What did I do?
I used SOM’s Great Lakes investigation as an inspiration for looking at planning in the Thames Basin, identifying the assets that the basin has, for example extensive infrastructure, a thriving economy, a history of innovation and a rare depth of culture, the issues that it faces, including overcoming archaic governance boundaries, managing water in the face of both drought and flood, and coping with the change and uncertainty that climate change brings. I produced a booklet identifying first ideas for a vision of what planning in the Thames Basin could be built around in the future. Elements of this vision include integrating the various planning documents that exist into a more cohesive, basin-level plan, recognition of the positive feedback cycles that exist between ‘green’ and ‘blue’ policies and using infrastructure to develop a holistically connected basin.
What did I gain?
I had a fantastic time at SOM: I met a lot of great people with amazing ideas and skills, and was also able to develop myself while there. The internship gave me the freedom and time to develop new skills that are hugely useful, but which I would probably not have had the opportunity to investigate otherwise. One example would be ArcGIS, which allows for the creative display of map-based data, and which I will be able to utilise as part of my PhD, but which I may never otherwise have had to opportunity to learn. I was also able to ‘dip my toe’ into the corporate environment, without having to jump straight in. This showed me the different emphasis which is placed on various aspects of work in business compared to academia: the importance of delivering a positivist message and looking at the big picture, distilling a great amount of information into a short message and using images to convey meaning.
What did SOM gain?
Hopefully SOM feel as though they have gained from my undertaking of this internship as well. As I was a short-term member of the team, SOM were able to work on a different kind of project that was perhaps less corporate and which required different skills. While many other members of the team were working on multiple projects at any one time, I was also able to give my focussed attention to the Thames Basin project. This internship has also strengthened the link between SOM and Imperial College, and building links with academia is something that SOM have been very keen to do.
Find out more about Peter’s PhD project
7 Frightening Findings from the IPCC Report
By Helena Wright, Research Postgraduate, Centre for Environmental Policy
Helena Wright, an Imperial PhD student, looks at worst possible scenarios from the IPCC Working Group II report.
The United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) recently released its latest report, featuring the most up-to-date science on global climate change.
As a researcher, I had an opportunity to contribute to a table in one of the chapters and have read through each of the 30 chapters of the Working Group II report (on Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability). Here is my personal take on seven of the most frightening findings from the WG2 report:
- CO2 levels of 1000ppm could impact on mental performance
The health chapter explains how climate change will affect global health, including direct impacts of heat stress, drought and extreme events, as well as indirect impacts on nutrition and mental health.
One extremely frightening direct effect could actually be from CO2 itself. A recent study found indoor CO2 levels of 1000ppm (parts per million) can impair human decision-making performance and cognition. Current atmospheric levels are 400ppm and rising fast. Some scenarios have us reaching these levels by 2100. If these effects are confirmed, how will we be able to adapt?
- Climate stress affects children
One particularly frightening aspect of climate change is its impact on children. This is a long term problem with implications for future generations.
Also, children, young people and the elderly are at increased risk of climate-related injury and illness. One study in Nepal found flood-related mortality was twice as high for girls as for women, and was higher for boys than men. Children are more vulnerable to impacts like malaria and diarrhoea for physiological reasons, and also more vulnerable to heat stress.
- Coral reefs would degrade under 2 degrees of warming
The coastal chapter explains carbonate reef structures would degrade under a scenario of 2°C by 2050-2100. Increasing levels of atmospheric CO2 also cause the ocean to acidify, causing coral reefs to lose their structural integrity. The North Atlantic and North Pacific are already becoming more acidic.
Coral reefs are important for biodiversity and account for 20-25% of fish caught in developing countries, as well as housing many other marine creatures. Skeletal “dissolution” is expected to be widespread by 2100. The most frightening thing of all is that these are the impacts under business-as-usual scenarios. Average global temperature has already risen by 0.8°C since 1880. Global leaders have only agreed to limit warming to 2°C of warming, a target they are currently missing.
- Climate extremes threaten our food security
Over 70% of agriculture is rain-fed, so agriculture and food security are highly sensitive to changes in rainfall. Higher temperatures have an impact on crop yields. Climate change will affect rivers and oceans as well. Some scenarios forecast widespread fish extinctions in rivers. In one study where data was available, as much as 75% of local fish biodiversity would be ‘headed toward extinction’ by 2070 due to climate change, particularly in tropical areas.
Food price rises triggered by climate shocks disproportionately affect the poor who tend to spend a higher proportion of their income on food.
- Global trade will be affected
Climate change will impact on international trade in both physical and value terms. For example, coffee is a major traded beverage which is sensitive to climate variability. Coffee crops will be forced to move to higher altitudes where they are available. Millions of rural people rely on coffee, tea and cocoa production.
The economic costs are expected to be huge. For example, in Ethiopia, agricultural decline is projected to cause a 10% decline in GDP against benchmark levels. While trade can help countries to adapt, for example by importing food, deficits may have to be met by food aid.
- Climate change will impact on migration, and could lead to conflict and even wars
High food prices can impact on socio-political stability. For example, 14 countries in Africa experienced food riots in 2008 during the 2008-9 price spike.
People can also be displaced by extreme weather events. But migrants do not necessarily reach safety; with new migrants more at risk at destinations in cities. Sea level rise is projected to lead to permanent displacement as coastal areas become uninhabitable. Under 2 metres of sea level rise, 187 million people are expected to be displaced.
Chapter 12 also examines research on links between climate change and armed conflict. Many of the factors that increase the risk of civil war are sensitive to climate change. US Military experts recently called climate change “a catalyst for conflict”.
- There are limits to adaptation
Finally, there are limits to adaptation. This means we cannot adapt to many of these impacts. For example, 31 Native Alaskan villages are facing “imminent threats” due to coastal erosion and several decided to relocate – but their ability to relocate also depends on financial support. Examples of ‘hard’ limits to adaptation include water supply in fossil aquifers, limits to retreat on islands, and loss of genetic diversity. In such cases climate change will lead to irreversible losses.
There are various ‘tipping points’ in the earth system which, if crossed, could trigger rapid and catastrophic climate change. Only mitigation can avoid such risks. Unfortunately little is known about where exactly these ‘thresholds’ lie, making the risks even more difficult to manage.
The limits to adaptation explain why global emission reduction is so vital for humanity. 3-4 degrees of warming would be much more difficult to adapt to than 2 degrees to and could result in the collapse of systems. Yet current climate pledges leave us heading to a world 3.7 degrees warmer. The IPCC shows global emissions are still rising rapidly and show no signs of stabilising. We are entering a radically different world.
However, there are reasons for hope. The UNFCCC negotiations took place again last month in Bonn, with the aim of reaching a global climate deal. There are signs of leadership from the US and China, the worlds’ two biggest emitters, offering renewed hope that collectively we can tackle this problem.
Collaboration with Stanford University and Biofuels Research at the Joint BioEnergy Institute
By C. Chambon, Research Postgraduate, Department of Chemistry
As part of a group of six Imperial students who visited California, I travelled to San Francisco to work on two projects: the New Climate Economy project, and a research collaboration with the Joint BioEnergy Institute.
The New Climate Economy project is a government-commissioned project looking at how economic goals can be achieved in a way that also addresses climate change. The Innovation stream, led by Stanford University and the Grantham Institute at Imperial, is focused on the potential economic and environmental impact of disruptive technologies. Beginning in January, a group of six Imperial students each focused on a different technology for the project, researching and preparing case studies for our weekly teleconferences. The topics researched were as varied as solar PV, nanomaterials, customer segmentation and the smart grid. My focus was on carbon capture and storage or utilisation (CCUS) technologies, and the policies needed to support them.
In Palo Alto, we worked together with Stanford students to construct a business model for each of our technology clusters. Our research findings were presented to NRG Energy’s newly formed Station A, a kind of skunkworks for energy resilience within NRG, a wholesale power company. The collaboration was a successful and a productive one, and several of us will continue to work with the New Climate Economy project to publish our research. The work will contribute to the UNFCCC COP negotiations in Paris in 2015.
During the latter half of the trip, I combined visits to Stanford with research for my PhD at Lawrence Berkeley National Lab across the bay. The San Francisco Bay Area is well-renowned as a bioscience and biotech hub, and is home to over 200 bioscience companies, start-ups and research institutes. One of these is the Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI), a branch of Lawrence Berkeley National Lab in the Berkeley hills. JBEI is a U.S. Department of Energy bioenergy research center dedicated to developing second-generation biofuels. These are advanced liquid fuels derived from the solar energy stored in plant biomass. The cellulosic biomass of non-food plants and agricultural waste can be converted to petrol, diesel and jet fuel, whilst the non-cellulosic part is a promising candidate to replace aromatic chemicals.
My project at JBEI looked at the upgrading of lignin, extracted from the non-cellulosic part of woody biomass, into aromatic building-blocks. This experience was a valuable addition to my PhD project, which looks at the valorisation of lignin from pine wood to improve the economics of the biorefinery. A highlight of my stay was a visit to the scaled-up biorefining facilities at LBNL, where a one-of-a-kind reactor is used to convert biofeedstocks into fuels. It was a very inspiring glance into the future of biorefining and I look forward to working closely with LBNL researchers and others working in the field of bioenergy.
New Climate Economy Collaboration with Stanford University
By Phil Sandwell, Research postgraduate, Department of Physics and Grantham Institute for Climate Change
This March, six Imperial students travelled to Palo Alto, California, to work with Stanford University students on the innovation stream of the New Climate Economy.
The Global Commission on the Economy and Climate was established to investigate the economic benefits and costs associated with climate change mitigation and adaptation. The flagship project of this is the New Climate Economy, a worldwide collaboration of internationally renowned research institutions. One such stream, focusing on innovation, was spearheaded by Stanford University and the Grantham Institute at Imperial College London.
The aim of this part of the project was to analyse how disruptive technologies, techniques or methods could develop, overtake their incumbent (and generally environmentally damaging) predecessors and mitigate greenhouse gas emissions. These ranged from carbon capture and storage to 3D printing, with my focus being concentrated photovoltaics (CPV).
Beginning in January, we held weekly video conferences with the two Stanford professors facilitating the course. Using their guidance and experience, we established the current limitations of our chosen technologies, how they are likely to advance and the conditions under which their development can be accelerated.
After travelling to Palo Alto, we were divided into groups with the Stanford students based on the themes of our research, for example electric vehicles and car sharing. We then integrated our findings, investigating the synergies and similar themes, and together built models to quantify the potential for greenhouse gas emissions reduction and how it could become achievable.
My research led to the conclusion that CPV can become economically competitive with the most common solar technology, flat-‐plate crystalline silicon cells, in the near future. Given the correct conditions being met (for example the cost per Watt continuing to decline as currently projected) CPV would compare favourably in regions with high direct normal irradiance, such as the Atacama Desert in Chile, the Australian outback and South Africa. One possible application of CPV would be supplying these countries’ mining industries, displacing their current fossil fuel-‐intensive electricity generation and providing an environmentally responsible alternative – with even less embedded carbon and energy than silicon cells.
This project was a valuable addition to my PhD project, the focus of which is to investigate how several different photovoltaic technologies can mitigate greenhouse gas emissions. Collaborating on this project introduced me to interesting new ways of approaching my work, as well as identifying parallels between my research and that of others in the field of renewable energy technology.