Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
8.6.2
Detailed Climatic Analyses for Optimal Territorial
Governance and Sustainable Development
Carlo Bisci
Environmental parameters and quality of life are strictly interrelated and
both strongly depend, directly and indirectly, on local meteorological and
climatic features. The latter, in turn, have been significantly altered by
recent complex
global climatic changes
, making it even more difficult to
create a detailed model of their spatial and seasonal variation, and therefore
to properly delineate a local development plan and to follow best practice
for optimal territorial governance.
Therefore, the primary aim of research in applied climatology general-
ly is to identify a circumstantial pattern of spatial and seasonal distribution
of the main
climatic parameters
and
bioclimatic indices
in the study area,
while also evaluating from a probabilistic point of view their evolutionary
trends in the short and medium term (i.e., for the next few decades). Only
by working from these data, in fact, it is possible to give sound information
regarding the potential impacts (positive and negative) of the local micro-
and topoclimates (and of their variability and variation) on land use suit-
ability and on natural hazard and risk, which are instrumental to adequate-
ly interpret natural environments as well as social and economic problems
for proper land planning and territorial management.
Present knowledge of global climatic features is good, particularly in
European countries where a fairly dense network of recording stations
exists, such as in Italy (where, except for some mountain ranges, their dis-
tribution is generally good for precipitation data and adequate for thermo-
metric ones). On the other hand,
detailed analyses of topo- and microcli-
mates
that are instrumental for land use planning and territorial governance
are sporadic and extremely inhomogeneous.
It is therefore fundamental to carry out research to define models to
quantitatively describe the spatial and seasonal distribution of the various
parameters. These studies should be based on the integration of historical
climatic records with environmental data, such as morphometry, elevation,
slope angle and aspect, albedo, land use, vegetation, valley and ridge
trends, and so on. In fact, only by analyzing synergistically all the above
information, it is possible to produce reliable and detailed maps of the cli-
matic features and indices that are needed for optimal territorial planning
and governance.
For present climatic change, the reports and technical papers of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climatic Change
are generally considered
as the most reliable reference on a global scale. Starting from them, it is
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