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9. Climate changes assessment and management

 Lead Papers


MALIK AMIN ASLAM, S. Augustin and J. Katima and E. Klawe and B. Lyimo, Germain Dufour, Dr. Brad Bass and Roger Hansell and Glenda Poole, Joy Hyvarinen, Isabelle Lambiel, Mr. Aubrey Meyer, Akim Rahman, Dr. C. Ramachandraiah, Professor Madireddi Venkata Subba Rao, E. Mohan Reddy, Hasida Yasmin and MD. Hasibur Rahman and Shahidul Haque, Dr. David E. Wojick, Dr. Katalin K. Zaim, Dr. ZhongXiang Zhang

 

 Dr. Brad Bass, Roger Hansell and Glenda Poole have shown that by increasing vegetation in urban areas will reduce the urban heat island, and the impacts of other urban environmental problems, which will be exacerbated under climate change. Reducing the urban heat island will also reduce the energy demand for space conditioning, and hence greenhouse gas emissions. Plants directly reduce the urban heat island through evaporative cooling but further reduce energy consumption through shading. The most common strategy to increase urban vegetation is to plant trees at ground level. However, where space is not available for trees, vegetation can be grown on building roofs, but walls offer far more space, hence vertical gardening is a viable alternative. Data were collected on the evaporative cooling capacity of different vertical garden designs at three different sites at the University of Toronto. An infrared pyrometer was used to measure the surface temperature of a vertical garden, a light-coloured wall and a black surface. The data were compared using an analysis of variance, and in all cases, the vertical garden was significantly cooler than the other two surfaces. This reduction in surface temperature could reduce the urban heat island, providing a strategy for mitigation and adaptation, and achieve other environmental and social benefits.Vertical gardens are an important part of any urban vegetation strategy in that they reduce the heat gain due to windows. However, they also impart other benefits to the city. For example, they would protect building facades from persistent climatic threats such as freeze-thaw events, acid rain and ultra-violet radiation. Installing vertical gardens also opens up the possibility of transforming our urban canyons into farms, thus reducing the amount of energy required for growing and transporting food from outside of the city. Despite the successes that we have seen with urban forestry and rooftop gardens, the low roof-to-wall area ratio suggests that it is in the vertical dimension in which vegetation may have the largest impact in adapting urban areas to climate change.

Joy Hyvarinen contributes to the debate about the EU's role, in particular the EU's aspirations for a leadership role, in the international climate negotiations. This has been the subject of interesting projects, including the recent 'EU leadership initiative' launched by IEEP's partner office ECOLOGIC in cooperation with the Wuppertal Institute. This paper aims to help catalyse further debate that could lead to new approaches to an 'old problem'. The key question is how the EU's negotiating approach can be strengthened. Why is the EU not more successful in pursuing its objectives in the climate negotiations? How can the EU overcome internal disagreements in order to operate more effectively? Climate change is a top priority for the EU. The Sixth Conference of the Parties to the Climate Convention (COP 6) in November 2000 will be a decisive meeting for implementation of the Kyoto Protocol. Important issues, such as rules for emissions trading, are at stake for the global community and for the EU. EU Member States are clearly seeking to play a leading, positive role in the development of a fair and effective global climate change regime. They have environmentally progressive positions on many issues. However, somewhere in the process of developing EU strategy and taking it forward in the negotiations, the good intentions and initiatives seem to become lost. Unless the EU finds new ways of approaching the climate negotiations in the coming months, an all too likely scenario is a road to defeat at COP 6, paved with unclear objectives, lack of strategy, disagreements and dithering. This paper first outlines some background issues. It then considers the 'concrete ceiling' on the flexibility mechanisms, meeting the Kyoto Protocol commitments, the EU, the US and developing countries, concluding with a section on ways forward.

 Isabelle Lambiel has shown that all people have noticed that the climate has changed over the last few years. In some countries the temperature has increased by one or two degrees and natural catastrophies are becoming more and more frequent. Flooding or freshwater scarcity as well as water pollution are harming the environment of the Thirld World and developing countries and air pollution characterizes the industrialized regions. Therefore, poor and rich regions are facing a common problem which is linked to climate change, that's why they should negotiate and find a compromise as quickly as possible. If no sollution is suggested, developing countries like China will repeat the same mistakes as the developed world. In fact, the latter can expect a higher salary, which will close the gap between rich and poor regions. Accordingly, they will be able to consume more luxury products like cars and pollute more. Our governments have to intervene by developing and measuring consumption pattern. Why not launch on the market vehicles which do not emit dangerous gas ? Moreover, the firms should be interested in investing for the environment. Thus, ecological norms have to be intoduced and gain as much credibility as the norms for quality (Iso 9000). An increase in taxes could also give the companies an incentive to produce ecologically. There is a real need of consumption and production patterns for sustainable development.

World industrial activity is now profoundly affecting the atmospheric environment(Dufour). It is now the number of humans and industrialization that makes the major impacts on the atmosphere. The most important changes affecting the atmosphere are due to the growth in the burning of fossil fuels. The burning of fossil fuels increases carbon dioxide concentrations and air pollutants. The clearing of forested lands for agriculture and other purposes has reduced the amount of carbon absorbed by the forests and contributed to the increase of atmospheric carbon dioxide. We have disturbed a fragile balance by causing chemical changes in the global atmosphere.

The most devastating effects of contamination of the atmosphere on a global scale include:

  • An increase in greenhouse gas concentrations brought the warming of the climate;

  • Depletion of the stratospheric ozone layer;

  • Acidification of lakes and forests; and

  • Toxic chemicals have contaminated our food chain on the land and in the waters.

The most sophisticated climate models take into account factors such as:

  • The changes in the radiation balance of the Earth;

  • Contamination of the atmosphere;

  • Greenhouse gas concentrations;

  • Absorption of heat by the oceans;

  • The ice and snow fields;

  • The hydrological cycle of precipitation; and

  • The melting of glaciers and the Greenland ice cap.

A consequence of a warmer climate is a rise in global mean sea-level. Several countries will be more susceptible to inundations. We will see hundreds of millions of environmental refugees searching for land.

The mid-latitude wheat belts of the planet will dry; forest fires will wipe out most of the forests; world food markets will have to adjust to help a starving population. 

Tourism and wildlife in the tropics will be seriously affected by a temperature that is just too hot.

Tropical diseases will cause epidemics.

Major changes in evaporation and precipitation patterns will not adjust quickly enough to supply the population with water it needs to survive; agriculture will become a dying industry either because of too much water or not enough of it.

Sub-Arctic communities will disappear because of the melting of the permafrost.

It is well known that biological communities of the waters and of the land absorb and bio-accumulate toxic contaminants through the food webs. Trace concentrations deposited by the atmosphere have become harmful. They are chemicals carried through the atmosphere to seas, rivers, lakes and other streams, and subsequently into sediments and soils. Metals and chemical contaminants can be absorbed for a long time, and are in fact chemical 'time bombs'. 


Comments and Recommendations from Participants


THE EU IN THE INTERNATIONAL CLIMATE NEGOTIATIONS- Lost and Defeated?
Paper by Joy Hyvarinen

Our names: JHY Katima, S. Augustin, B. Lyimo and E. Kilawe

Comments to the paper:

In general this paper is brief and well presented and is giving insight on the current situation of European Union before November 2000 UNFCCC meeting in Hague. The author first presented the good background of issues pertaining on going negotiations on climate change and EU position on different meetings. She gave a good conclusion on the way forward if and only if EU need to strength their approach to the international climate negotiations what has to be done.

The following points need some clarification from the author!!!

1. Looking at the UN level. If we now start looking this problem of climate change in regional wise: are we real going to reach consensus and ratify the Kyoto Protocol?
2. "who has responsibility to climate change negotiations?", "who has the right to lead negotiations) and who has the right to listen/leaded?
3. How possible to reach the strength between member states by having a global leadership on climate change? The fear behind is: climate change negotiations might be dominated by few powerful member states 'umbrella group' by ensuring their interests are presented.
4. The negotiations are led by lack of political and conscious will on how to solve global environmental problem.
5. Who is going to play a neutral role to ensure that the togetherness in solving the environmental dilemma. Maintenance of status quo will not assist in problem solving.







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