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Climate change impacts are already happening through the world, and it is now clear that there is the need for an adaptive response from global institutions down to the local level. Reducing vulnerability to cope with climate variability might be more challenging in tropical countries than in North America or Europe. The ten papers of this special issue were presented during the Adaptclim conference that was held by the Sinergia Project, the CLARIS LPB project, and the GeoData Institute in Asunción, Paraguay, in 2010. All papers, except one regarding the Brahmaputra Basin in South Asia, present studies from South America. These studies are first contextualized geographically and then are related one to another by a simplified vulnerability concept linking climate stress to sensitivity and adaptive capacity of natural and human systems. One half of the papers focus on actual or future climate change and the present-day causes of the vulnerability of natural and agrosystems. Droughts are and will be the main source of stress for agriculture in South America. Increasing fragmentation of forest of the center of this continent is aggravating their vulnerability to dry spells. Another half of the studies of this special issue deal with the adaptive capacity human populations to system perturbations produced or enhanced by climate change. The studies point out inclusion of traditional knowledge and involvement of local actors in their own vulnerability assessment to increase adaptive capacity. These elements of climate justice, giving voice to those less responsible for carbon emissions but bearing their most severe consequences, allow the particular needs of a community to be considered and can direct adaptation policy toward preserving or rebuilding their specific capabilities under threat from climate change. The special issue also made clear that a basin analysis of the climate change problem could provide information, results, and methods more readily of use for the local population and decision makers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Policy makers are still struggling to find a rational and effective way to handle adaptation to climate change. This paper discusses a more strategic, economic approach to public adaptation and compares it with adaptation practice in Europe. An economic approach to adaptation involves setting priorities, both spatially ( where to adapt) and inter-temporally ( when to adapt). The paper reviews what we know about Europe's geographic adaptation priorities. On inter-temporal priorities, it recommends fast-tracking two types of action: Win-win measures that yield an immediate return, such as water efficiency, and strategic decisions on infrastructure and spatial planning that have long-term consequences for Europe's vulnerability profile. An economic approach to adaptation involves careful project design to ensure adaptation measures are cost-effective and flexible in the light of climate uncertainty ( how to adapt). The final element of an economic approach to adaptation is the division of labour between the state and private actors ( who should adapt). The paper argues that the traditional functions of the state-the provision of public goods, creation of an enabling environment and protection of the vulnerable-also apply to adaptation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies of climate change impacts on agricultural land use generally consider sets of climates combined with fixed socio-economic scenarios, making it impossible to compare the impact of specific factors within these scenario sets. Analysis of the impact of specific scenario factors is extremely difficult due to prohibitively long run-times of the complex models. This study produces and combines metamodels of crop and forest yields and farm profit, derived from previously developed very complex models, to enable prediction of European land use under any set of climate and socio-economic data. Land use is predicted based on the profitability of the alternatives on every soil within every 10' grid across the EU. A clustering procedure reduces 23,871 grids with 20+ soils per grid to 6,714 clusters of common soil and climate. Combined these reduce runtime 100 thousand-fold. Profit thresholds define land as intensive agriculture (arable or grassland), extensive agriculture or managed forest, or finally unmanaged forest or abandoned land. The demand for food as a function of population, imports, food preferences and bioenergy, is a production constraint, as is irrigation water available. An iteration adjusts prices to meet these constraints. A range of measures are derived at 10' grid-level such as diversity as well as overall EU production. There are many ways to utilise this ability to do rapid What-If analysis of both impact and adaptations. The paper illustrates using two of the 5 different GCMs (CSMK3, HADGEM with contrasting precipitation and temperature) and two of the 4 different socio-economic scenarios ('We are the world', 'Should I stay or should I go' which have contrasting demands for land), exploring these using two of the 13 scenario parameters (crop breeding for yield and population) . In the first scenario, population can be increased by a large amount showing that food security is far from vulnerable. In the second scenario increasing crop yield shows that it improves the food security problem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adaptation and mitigation are complementary strategies for addressing the impacts of climate change, yet are often considered separately. This paper examines the literature for evidence of the interactions of adaptation and mitigation measures across the agriculture, biodiversity, coasts, forests, urban and water sectors, focusing on Europe. It found that often adaptation and mitigation synergies and conflicts were not explicitly mentioned within a sector, let alone between sectors. Most measures, however, were found to have an effect on another sector, resulting in neutral, positive (synergies) or negative (conflicts) interactions within and between sectors. Many positive cross-sectoral interactions involved biodiversity or water and thus these could represent good starting places for the implementation of integrated, cross-sectoral strategies. Previous studies suggest that adaptation and mitigation are undertaken on different time and geographical scales; this study found many local scale measures which could facilitate integration between both adaptation and mitigation. It is important that cross-sectoral interaction of adaptation and mitigation measures are explicitly recognised if they are to be mainstreamed into policy, so that positive outcomes are enhanced and unintended consequences avoided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scenario development methods get to grips with taking a long-term view on complex issues such as climate change through involvement of stakeholders. Many of the recent (global) scenario exercises have been structured according to a Story-and-Simulation approach. Although elaborately studied, conceptual and practical issues remain in linking qualitative stories and quantitative models. In this paper, we show how stakeholders can directly estimate model parameter values using a three-step approach called Fuzzy Set Theory. We focus on the effect of multiple iterations between stories and models. Results show that we were successful in quickly delivering stakeholder-based quantification of key model parameters, with full consistency between linguistic terms used in stories and numeric values. Yet, values changed strongly from one iteration to the next. A minimum of two and preferably at least three iterations is needed to harmonise stories and models. We conclude that the application of Fuzzy Set Theory enabled a highly valuable, structured and reproducible process to increase consistency between stories and models, but that future work is needed to show its true potential, particularly related to the effect of iterations. Additionally, the number of tools that need to be applied in a short period of time to execute a Story-And-Simulation approach introduces drawbacks that need to be studied. However, an approach such as Story-And-Simulation is indispensable and effective in marrying the perspectives of scientists and other stakeholders when studying complex systems and complex problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Integrated cross-sectoral impact assessments facilitate a comprehensive understanding of interdependencies and potential synergies, conflicts, and trade-offs between sectors under changing conditions. This paper presents a sensitivity analysis of a European integrated assessment model, the CLIMSAVE integrated assessment platform (IAP). The IAP incorporates important cross-sectoral linkages between six key European land- and water-based sectors: agriculture, biodiversity, flooding, forests, urban, and water. Using the IAP, we investigate the direct and indirect implications of a wide range of climatic and socio-economic drivers to identify: (1) those sectors and regions most sensitive to future changes, (2) the mechanisms and directions of sensitivity (direct/indirect and positive/negative), (3) the form and magnitudes of sensitivity (linear/non-linear and strong/weak/insignificant), and (4) the relative importance of the key drivers across sectors and regions. The results are complex. Most sectors are either directly or indirectly sensitive to a large number of drivers (more than 18 out of 24 drivers considered). Over twelve of these drivers have indirect impacts on biodiversity, forests, land use diversity, and water, while only four drivers have indirect effects on flooding. In contrast, for the urban sector all the drivers are direct. Moreover, most of the driver-indicator relationships are non-linear, and hence there is the potential for 'surprises'. This highlights the importance of considering cross-sectoral interactions in future impact assessments. Such systematic analysis provides improved information for decision-makers to formulate appropriate adaptation policies to maximise benefits and minimise unintended consequences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses two models to examine the direct and indirect costs of sea-level rise for Europe for a range of sea-level rise scenarios for the 2020s and 2080s: (1) the DIVA model to estimate the physical impacts of sea-level rise and the direct economic cost, including adaptation, and (2) the GTAP-EF model to assess the indirect economic implications. Without adaptation, impacts are quite significant with a large land loss and increase in the incidence of coastal flooding. By the end of the century Malta has the largest relative land loss at 12% of its total surface area, followed by Greece at 3.5% land loss. Economic losses are however larger in Poland and Germany ($483 and $391 million, respectively). Coastal protection is very effective in reducing these impacts and optimally undertaken leads to protection levels that are higher than 85% in the majority of European states. While the direct economic impact of sea-level rise is always negative, the final impact on countries' economic performances estimated with the GTAP-EF model may be positive or negative. This is because factor substitution, international trade, and changes in investment patterns interact with possible positive implications. The policy insights are (1) while sea-level rise has negative and huge direct economic effects, overall effects on GDP are quite small (max −0.046% in Poland); (2) the impact of sea-level rise is not confined to the coastal zone and sea-level rise indirectly affects landlocked countries as well (Austria for instance loses −0.003% of its GDP); and (3) adaptation is crucial to keep the negative impacts of sea-level rise at an acceptable level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The gradual increase in temperature is one of the most pronounced trends of climatic changes in the atmosphere. The pollution levels depend essentially on the emissions (both on the human-made emissions and on the biogenic emissions) as well as on the chemical reactions which take place during the transport of pollutants in the atmosphere. Since both the chemical reactions and the biogenic emissions depend on the temperature, it is obvious that the gradual increase of the temperature will have some effect on pollution levels. The impact of climatic changes on high ozone levels, which may have damaging effects on human health, is studied in this paper. Eight European suburban areas were selected. These areas are densely populated and, therefore, increased ozone pollution levels may cause harm to a great number of human beings living there. All experiments indicate that, although the changes of the ozone concentrations are relatively small, some critical levels, which are related to ozone concentrations and which may have damaging effects, will be significantly exceeded as a result of the warming trend in the future climate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to improve understanding of the adaptive capacity of European agriculture to climate change. Extensive data on farm characteristics of individual farms from the Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN) have been combined with climatic and socio-economic data to analyze the influence of climate and management on crop yields and income and to identify factors that determine adaptive capacity. A multilevel analysis was performed to account for regional differences in the studied relationships. Our results suggest that socio-economic conditions and farmcharacteristics should be considered when analyzing effects of climate conditions on farm yields and income. Next to climate, input intensity, economic size and the type of land use were identified as important factors influencing spatial variability in crop yields and income. Generally, crop yields and income are increasing with farm size and farm intensity. However, effects differed among crops and high crop yields were not always related to high incomes, suggesting that impacts of climate and management differ by impact variable. As farm characteristics influence climate impacts on crop yields and income, they are good indicators of adaptive capacity at farm level and should be considered in impact assessment models. Different farm types with different management strategies will adapt differently. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

If uncontrolled, human influences on the climate system may generate changes that will endanger various aspects of life on Earth. The precise implications of the scientific claims about climate change, and the extent to which they pose dangers to various populations, are becoming intensely debated at many levels in relation to policy. How 'danger' is interpreted will ultimately affect which actions are taken. In this paper, we examine how climate change is conceptualised by publics in Europe and in the USA. Although there is widespread concern about climate change, it is of secondary importance in comparison to other issues in people's daily lives. Most individuals relate to climate change through personal experience, knowledge, the balance of benefits and costs, and trust in other societal actors. We analyse these factors through findings from various surveys and studies, which highlight both the distinctiveness and some shared perspectives at a generalised level. We reflect upon these in relation to trust and responsibility for climate change action, and risk communication, supporting the call for discourses about climate change to also be situated in people's locality, as a means of increasing its saliency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most studies on the impact of climate change on regional water resources focus on long-term average flows or mean water availability, and they rarely take the effects of altered human water use into account. When analyzing extreme events such as floods and droughts, the assessments are typically confined to smaller areas and case studies. At the same time it is acknowledged that climate change may severely alter the risk of hydrological extremes over large regional scales, and that human water use will put additional pressure on future water resources. In an attempt to bridge these various aspects, this paper presents a first-time continental, integrated analysis of possible impacts of global change (here defined as climate and water use change) on future flood and drought frequencies for the selected study area of Europe. The global integrated water model WaterGAP is evaluated regarding its capability to simulate high and low-flow regimes and is then applied to calculate relative changes in flood and drought frequencies. The results indicate large `critical regions' for which significant changes in flood or drought risks are expected under the proposed global change scenarios. The regions most prone to a rise in flood frequencies are northern to northeastern Europe, while southern and southeastern Europe show significant increases in drought frequencies. In the critical regions, events with an intensity of today's 100-year floods and droughts may recur every 10-50 years by the 2070s. Though interim and preliminary, and despite the inherent uncertainties in the presented approach, the results underpin the importance of developing mitigation and adaptation strategies for global change impacts on a continental scale. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]