Climate Change

Adaptation (Climate Change, Water, and Wastewater in Cities) Part 1

Water supply and wastewater treatment infrastructures are typically long-lived, are ubiquitous elements in developed urban centers, and are subject to critical stresses from climate change, including sea level rise, higher temperatures, changes in precipitation patterns, and potentially more intense storms. In less-developed urban centers, water supply is more informal, and wastewater treatment may not be […]

Adaptation (Climate Change, Water, and Wastewater in Cities) Part 2

Step 3: Characterize adaptation options Adaptation options may be usefully categorized as operations/management, investments in infrastructure, and policy. Many adaptations fall into more than one of these categories. A wide range of potential adaptations should be examined at the initial stage and evaluated and prioritized in later stages of the decision-making process. Operations/management adaptations These […]

Mitigation (Climate Change, Water, and Wastewater in Cities)

Under the IPCC definition (e.g., IPCC, 2007a), mitigation is action to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases in order to reduce overall climate change. Notably the IPCC Fourth Assessment Working Groups II and III conclude that "mitigation primarily involves the energy, transportation, forestry, and agricultural sectors, whereas actors involved in adaptation primarily represent a large variety […]

Policy considerations and knowledge gaps (Climate Change, Water, and Wastewater in Cities)

Policy considerations Some cities have implemented policies to encourage adaptation and mitigation in the face of the effects of increased urbanization combined with climate change and variability. These include, among others, Chicago, London, New York, Seattle, and Toronto (Parzen, 2008). A broad range of policies is available for implementation, including operational/management changes, infrastructure investments, and […]

Introduction (Climate Change and Urban Transportation Systems)

Cities are key hubs of the transportation sector. According to the C40 Cities Climate Leadership group (www.C40Cities. org), cities contribute 75 percent of greenhouse gas emissions. Based on the IPCC assessments, "petroleum… supplies 95% of the total energy used by world transport. In 2004, transport was responsible for 23% of world energy-related GHG emissions with […]

Risk management as a framework for adaptation and mitigation (Climate Change and Urban Transportation Systems)

Adaptation and mitigation of urban transportation systems to climate change can be defined as a form of risk management. Mitigation is a global mandate, while adaptation is a local necessity. The goal of risk management is to minimize future damages at affordable costs. The social context is: What risks are managed at whose cost and […]

Assessing climate risks to urban transportation (Climate Change and Urban Transportation Systems)

This section describes methods for assessing climate risks to urban transportation systems and then highlights specific hazards to the systems posed by climate change. Defining climate risks and methods of risk assessment Risk in general is defined as "the product of the likelihood of an event occurring and the magnitude of consequence should that event […]

Adaptation of urban transportation systems (Climate Change and Urban Transportation Systems)

Adaptation of urban transportation systems to the challenges of climate change implies making these systems optimally suited to operate safely; to experience minimal interruptions and losses from the immediate effects of extreme climate events; and to be designed and modified in order to make these adaptations possible over the long term. Urban transport managers need […]

Mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions due to urban transportation (Climate Change and Urban Transportation Systems) Part 1

This section identifies and categorizes mitigation strategies, discusses potential constraints on their effective implementation, and describes relevant policies and financial mechanisms. Mitigation strategies The transport sector represents around 30 percent of global CO2 emissions, with urban transportation comprising more than half of this amount. This is the type of greenhouse gas emissions "that is expected […]

Mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions due to urban transportation (Climate Change and Urban Transportation Systems) Part 2

A sustainability framework tailored for transportation and applied to Sydney, Australia CUSCCRR (Coalition of Urban Sustainability & Climate Change Response Research) Urban transport system characteristics and system vulnerability provide the basis for a climate change scenario in the context of a sustainability framework as shown in Box Figure 6.8. Climate change impacts are drawn in […]

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