Kategoria BISAC: Science >> Global Warming & Climate Change

The impacts of climate change are already being felt. Learning how to live with these impacts is a priority for human development. In this context, it is too easy to see adaptation as a narrowly defensive task - protecting core assets or functions from the risks of climate change. A more profound engagement, which sees climate change risks as a product and driver of social as well as natural systems, and their interaction, is called for.

Adaptation to Climate Change argues that, without care, adaptive actions can deny the deeper political and cultural roots that...

Bjorn Lomborg argues that many of the elaborate and staggeringly expensive actions now being considered to meet the challenges of global warming ultimately will have little impact on the world s temperature. He suggests that rather than focusing on ineffective solutions that will cost us trillions of dollars over the coming decades, we should be looking for smarter, more cost-effective approaches (such as massively increasing our commitment to green energy R&D) that will allow us to deal not only with climate change but also with other pressing global concerns, such as malaria and...

Even with significant reductions of greenhouse gas emissions, a certain degree of climate change will inevitably occur. Adapting to climate change, then, will become a necessary step in reducing the vulnerability of many regions across the globe. This is especially true for urban areas where climate change has been shown to have particularly destabilizing effects. Through the identification and analysis of the most relevant impacts facing urban areas, this book makes clear the need to incorporate climate change concerns into the mainstream of local planning, governance and policy making...

The debate on how mankind should respond to climate change is diverse, as the appropriate strategy depends on global as well as local circumstances.

As scientists are denied the possibility of conducting experiments with the real climate, only climate models can give insights into man-induced climate change, by experimenting with digital climates under varying conditions and by extrapolating past and future states into the future.

But the 'nature' of models is a purely representational one. A model is good if it is believed to represent the relevant processes of a natural...

Humans have always used denial. When we are afraid, guilty, confused, or when something interferes with our self-image, we tend to deny it. Yet denial is a delusion. When it impacts on the health of oneself, or society, or the world it becomes a pathology. Climate change denial is such a case. Paradoxically, as the climate science has become more certain, denial about the issue has increased. The paradox lies in the denial. There is a denial industry funded by the fossil fuel companies that literally denies the science, and seeks to confuse the public. There is denial within governments,...

It is now widely accepted that adaptation will be necessary if we are to manage the risks posed by climate change. What we know about adaptation, however, is limited. While there is a well established body of scholarship proposing assessment approaches and explaining concepts, few studies have examined if and how adaptation is taking place at a national or regional level.

As demographics and rising demand threaten the sustainability of water supplies, pro-active decisions on resource management are desperately needed. This volume collates expert contributions on a range of relevant issues such as data collection.