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Globally, cities have become hubs for economic activity, productivity, and important platforms for achieving sustainable development goals. The potential of urban agriculture (UA) in improving urban local economies and urban micro-climate has been acknowledged in the literature. The study looked at how the concepts of UA, local economic development (LED), and climate change can be treated in unison. Based on the review of credible published papers on the various concepts of UA, LED, climate change and nature-based solutions (NBS), a proposed conceptual framework was developed in this paper showing the linkages. The paper established that UA could boost LED, build resilient urban settlements, and promote social inclusiveness, but with social challenges. It is therefore recommended that policymakers make UA a crucial aspect of their agenda in the coming years to address the local economic and climate challenges now and in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change is becoming a defining factor for communities in South Asia. Forming one-fifth of the world population, the region increasingly faces climate-induced disasters such as floods, droughts, heatwaves, cyclones etc. This region also has one of the world's poorest people who struggle to cope with the rapidly changing climatic conditions. Agriculture still employs many people in the region, one of the worst-hit sectors. Agriculture will become untenable in some parts of the region due to climate change. Monsoon patterns have changed, and agriculture does not guarantee sustainable income for the vast majority. Many climate change adaptations have been initiated in the region in response to the threat of climate change. Scholars and practitioners feel that these adaptations must be transformative to be effective. In this paper, we examine eight such adaptations from three South Asian Countries – Bangladesh, India, and Nepal, from the lens of transformative adaptation. We found that no single adaptation initiative meets all the criteria for sustainable socio-ecological transformations. However, there is a significant overlap between different typologies of transformation as envisaged in the paper and literature. We conclude that the concept of socio-ecological transformation is new for South Asia, so integrating it into the programmes and policies is the need of the hour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Iberian Peninsula is a climate change hotspot, where the temperature is increasing faster than the global annual mean surface temperature, with the largest reduction of precipitation. Consequently, freshwater availability is expected to decrease substantially. In this context, freshwater systems are especially vulnerable in terms of meeting the water demands and ecosystem requirements we know today. In this paper, we present an extension of the eco-engineering decision scaling (EEDS) method to explore trade-offs in agricultural and ecologic metrics at the catchment scale across a range of unknown future hydrological and climate states. The extended EEDS method evaluates current water resource management rules focusing on agricultural and ecologic objectives, identifies climate hazards that make the system fail and assesses climate risk in three time horizons for the design of adaptation measures. The case study is the Serpis River basin, Spain, where 72% of available water is used for agricultural purposes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article seeks to discuss the associations elaborated by riverine interlocutors between infrastructures and the landscape in which they occur, within the context of climate change in the Brazilian state of Amazonas. Here, we debate the relational character of infrastructures, and how they act as important markers of river seasonality, landscape, people's existence, and practices from the perspective of the accessed riverine people. This paper's discussion is supported by qualitative data from semi-structured interviews and field notes from two riverine communities in the Amazonas state: Tumbira and Lago do Catalão. Inspired by authors who dialogue with Social Studies of Science and Technology and discuss infrastructures, their effects, their relational and ontological character, we seek to identify entanglements of landscape and infrastructure, and their implications in the practices and ways of living of riverine Amazonian people. Elements such as gas pipelines, power transmission lines, hydroelectric plants, cargo ships, and highways emerge, affect, and are affected in these entangled landscapes in the eyes of the riverine people. They merge with other entanglements such as the rivers and creeks that perform the riverine landscape and life. Thus, they induce reflections on such relationships and the affectations permeated by fears, wishes, and (dis)trust of their operation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article aims to situate climate change by examining three scalar dissonances between "global" and "local" knowledge-making and policy action. The three dissonances – the knowledge production and policy meaning-making nexus, the politics of urgency, and the politics of building socio-climatic future pathways – engage deeply with the emergent literature that deals with climate change from the perspective of Human Geography Studies and the Social Studies of Science and Technology (STS). By posing guiding questions and through examples primarily from Latin American countries, this paper lays out a research agenda that advances geographical sensitivity, allowing us to better understand the "other" geographies of climate science production, circulation, and information use. Furthermore, it highlights the unresolved political and interdisciplinary tensions in accommodating global narratives in regions of the Global South. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Estimating the economic risks of climate shocks and climate stressors on spatially heterogeneous cities over time remains highly challenging. The purpose of this paper is to present a practical methodology to assess the economic risks of climate change in middle-income cities to inform municipal climate response strategies. Building on a capital-based framework (CBF), spatially disaggregated baseline and future scenario scores for economic wealth and its exposure to climate change are developed for six different classes of capital across 77 major suburbs in Cape Town, South Africa. Capital-at-risk was calculated by combining relative exposure and capital scores across different scenarios, with population impacted for major suburbs and the city's eight main planning districts. The economic risk assessment presented here provides a generic approach to assist city managers through an enhanced understanding of the relative levels of capital endowment across the city vis-à-vis relative levels of exposure to climate-related hazards over time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Disabled populations are disproportionally affected by the current climate and environmental crises. However, they are hardly included and their knowledge is neglected in processes addressing these challenges. To achieve the UN Agenda 2030, societies should actively engage with the values, experiences and knowledge held by people with disabilities in science and policy contexts. In this paper, we suggest that addressing 'deep' leverage points by 1) recognising diverse valuations of and connections to nature by different social groups (i.e. re-connecting to nature), 2) including disabled populations in decision-making and knowledge creation (i.e. re-structuring institutions), and 3) promoting inclusive education and knowledge generation (i.e. re-thinking knowledge production) can facilitate the development of inclusive transformation pathways and foster sustainable human-nature relationships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With increased urbanization and the impacts of climate change, cities around the world are making resilience-building a priority. Simultaneously, advances in technology have enabled the creation of City Digital Twins (CDTs). Informed by a literature review and interviews with resilience and Digital Twin experts, this paper explores how CDTs might support the development of more resilient urban communities. First, the various definitions of urban resilience, smart cities and CDTs are described. Second, the paper explores how characteristics of CDTs make them uniquely equipped to facilitate (1) a better understanding of complex phenomena, (2) the imagination of possible futures and (3) collaboration between stakeholders. Finally, the technical requirements and challenges of CDT implementation are discussed, including (1) identifying priority hazards and users, (2) collecting and managing data, (3) integrating different models and (4) ensuring usability. The paper concludes by emphasizing the important role of stakeholders in shaping CDTs that can be successfully integrated by the communities they serve. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides an assessment of hydrological research activity conducted in the Oceania Region. Literature from three databases (Web of Science (WOS), Scopus, and Google Scholar) was collected and analysed. Results show large gaps in the variety of themes and poor collaborative efforts between regional water specialists. Results also suggest that local specialists potentially lack the ability to conduct quality hydrological research or that, due to the region's developing status, more focus has been placed on project-based objectives rather than building a body of research. A solution could be the development of a self-reliant base for conducting hydrological research by empowering and improving capabilities of local citizens. Firstly, an overhaul of organization policies regarding the introduction of research and performance monitoring is needed. Secondly, education in hydrology must be improved to suit local capabilities while addressing the complex socio-cultural environment with transdisciplinary measures. This assessment could benefit the future management of hydrological services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rainfall is considered a major input in designing stormwater management measures, especially for any low-impact development (LID) control design. With the impact of climate change, rainfall frequency and its patterns are changing continuously. Quantification of these changes and their impact on the performance of LID design becomes crucial. This paper presents a methodology to quantify the change in rainfall patterns using the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project 5 (CMIP5) climate model and to select the most feasible LID for a catchment with haphazard development. Interconnected decentralization-based LID controls are evaluated with the objective of emulating a pre-urbanized scenario. The overall analyses indicated that green roof (GR) followed by infiltration trenches (IT), rooftop disconnection (RTD), and permeable pavement (PP) showed better performance. Furthermore, a combination of IT, PP, and RTD accomplishes better efficiency for extreme rainfall events. Implementation of the most feasible combination will provide the additional benefit of water recycle and reuse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates how hydrological drought affected suspended sediment yield (SSY) in the Mediterranean Ofanto River basin, southern Italy, and in its five sub-basins from 1951 to 1989. The Standardized Precipitation Evaporation Index over a scale of 12 months (SPEI12) has been used to compute the hydrological drought in the investigated span of time. SPEI12, mean and maximum monthly discharge (Qmean and Qmax), monthly rainfall erosivity, monthly simple daily intensity index and monthly SSY were used to assess the relationships between dry/wet cycles, streamflow and SSY through the Pearson correlation matrix. Qmean and Qmax are significantly correlated with SSY, while SPEI12 and rainfall intensity do not show good correlation with SSY. Furthermore, from the overall analyses it emerges that sediment yield estimations were higher mainly during the wet period following a period of drought or during a drought period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The climate change – inequality nexus has become an increasingly important concept advanced by inequality and sustainability experts as well as international organisations like the United Nations. In this perspective paper, two arguments are made to further our understanding of the nexus and to promote action on SDG 10 ("Reducing inequalities within and among countries") and SDG 13 ("Climate action"). First, climate change's status as a "core" planetary boundary as well as its embeddedness in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, calls for a wider discussion on environmental and ecological degradation in the context of inequality. Second, the concept of inequalities of opportunity freedoms, under the guise of the influential human capabilities framework, is well suited to make sense of the complexity and multidimensionality of the climate change – inequality nexus. To this end, some (and by no means all) causal links between climate change, wider environmental and ecological degradations, and inequality are analysed. The paper concludes by arguing in favour of a framework that can aptly capture the full complexity and multidimensionality of the climate change – inequality nexus. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Secondary cities are home to most of the world's urban populations vulnerable to climate change, yet researchers and policymakers have devoted less attention to them than large and megacities. To help address this gap, this paper explores the relationship between incomplete decentralized governance, climate change, and urban resilience. It does through the case studies of secondary cities of Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam. Secondary cities are of importance because they are the fastest growing cities in the Global South but also because they have weaker capacity to address climate risks. Through these case studies, the paper draws comparisons between the different cases to look at the linkages between decentralization and urban resilience in secondary cities. Overall, it argues that climate governance, due to the retention of power and resources by central bureaucrats along with fragmented governance structures, and misaligned incentive structures which prioritize economic growth over climate protection have undermined resilience building and contributed to the uneven distribution of climate risks in these cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Potential changes in hydro-meteorological events have been causing mass damage to the economy and lives. Among several other factors, the progression of climate change over a long time is expected to cause non-stationarity in annual maximum rainfall. Understanding the characteristics of annual maximum rainfall series is crucial for coastal cities as they are highly vulnerable due to the greatly varying weather patterns. In this paper, we propose stationary and non-stationary methods to model the effect of non-stationarity on the differing duration of annual maximum rainfall and demonstrate the impacts on nine coastal cities spread across the Arabian Sea and Bay of Bengal stretch of India. The Bayesian inference parameter estimation technique was used. It was found that while stationary models often fit well for longer-duration rainfall, non-stationary models often best fit the short duration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the EIA process and its effectiveness in addressing the impacts of a 190 km long national highway project along the Karnataka coast. We analyse the quality and relevance of the environmental clearance conditions established by the Ministry of Environment, Forest, and Climate Change (MoEF&CC) and discusses their potential implications. The findings underline that most of the conditions that pertained to the prevention of pollution, restoration of mangroves, and protection of biodiversity lacked a scientific basis and specific information required for effective implementation. The MoEF&CC also overlooked the social impact of the project and underplayed its own role in ensuring fair compensation to project affected communities for the loss of their land and other livelihoods. The paper concludes by promulgating a long list of irrelevant and ineffective environmental conditions that represent greenwashing because it could misguide affected communities and other stakeholders by creating the impression the state is exercising due diligence in protecting the environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This review paper focuses on the question of what will happen to the future water resource system of Grand Renaissance Dam of Ethiopia based on the projected hydrology of the Upper Blue Nile River basin. For this, the hydrological extremes, the baseline hydrological trends, and projected hydrological extremes of the Upper Blue Nile River basin were reviewed from various published and unpublished sources. Changes in the future hydrology of the Upper Blue Nile River basin due to climate change or any other natural or manmade modification of the river basin deserve concerted attention in the future water resources system of the Grand Renaissance Dam of Ethiopia, because the water resources of the dam mainly depend on the water potential nature of the Upper Blue Nile River basin. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rapid climate change is impacting water resources in Afghanistan. The consequences are poorly known. Suitable mitigation and adaptation strategies have not been developed. Thus, this paper summarizes current status of knowledge in relation to Afghan water resources. More than 130 scientific articles, reports and data sources are synthesized to review the potential impacts of climate change on the cryosphere, streamflow, groundwater and hydrological extremes. The available information suggests that Afghanistan is currently witnessing significant increases in temperature, less so precipitation. There is evidence of shifts in the intra-annual distribution of streamflow, with reduced summer flows in non-glaciated basins and increased winter and spring streamflow. However, in the short-term there will be an increase in summer ice melt in glaciated basins, a "glacial subsidy", which sustains summer streamflow, despite reduced snow accumulation. The future prognosis for water resources is likely to be more serious when this glacier subsidy ends. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A recent scandal in the Netherlands painfully underscored that sexual harassment and abuse are unfortunately still happening around the world, even after decades of advocacy on this issue and five years of #MeToo. To make progress in prevention and treatment we argue that we should address sexual violence from a public health perspective. Furthermore, looking back on the past year, the COVID-19 pandemic was the dominant and potentially traumatic stressor affecting large populations around the world. Another big topic was that of the impact of climate change, we are only beginning to realize its impact on stress across the globe. The European Journal of Psychotraumatology (EJPT), with its increasing global readership and scientific and social impact, is focusing on the traumatic stress aspects of these and many other events. Relatedly, neurobiological aspects are an important and growing focus of the journal in that they help us better understand the mechanisms behind the development of trauma-related disorders and their treatment. In this editorial, we present recent trends, new Open Science developments, journal metrics, the plans and themes for next year and the ESTSS EJPT award winners for best paper of 2021. • Next years' research focus should be on sexual violence from a public health lens, climate change, and neurobiologal aspects of trauma-related disorders. The European Journal of Psychotraumatology (EJPT) calls or papers on these issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, our world has experienced significant disruptions due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine, impacting human activities and the global environment. This paper explored air quality changes in Ukraine due to COVID-19, and Russia's invasion of Ukraine using on-demand with a what-you-see-is-what-you-get approach. During the COVID-19 pandemic, strict quarantine policies in Ukraine led to a 2% reduction in tropospheric NO2 concentration before the lockdown and 4% during the lockdown period. Cities like Kyiv, Donetsk, and Dnipro exhibited reductions of 5%, 11%, and 16%, respectively. Total SO2 column concentration decreased by 6% before the lockdown and 2.5% during the lockdown period, except in high population density areas. Kyiv showed the highest reduction of 17% in SO2 concentration, while Donetsk and Dnipro exhibited an 11% reduction. However, during the Russian invasion, there was a significant increase in tropospheric NO2 concentration in heavily destroyed Kharkiv while most eastern regions experienced a reduction. The total SO2 column was 48% higher before the war but reduced throughout the country after the war, except for in Kyiv and a few central regions. These findings can contribute to analyzing air pollution and building digital twin simulations for future reconstruction scenarios. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change is an important driver of migration, but little research exists on whether migrant communities in the U.S. identify climate change-related factors as reasons for migrating. In 2021, we conducted a multidisciplinary, collaborative project to better understand the nexus of climate change and immigrant health in the Atlanta area. This paper presents one arm of this collaboration that explored both the role of climate change in decisions to immigrate to Georgia and the ways that climate change intersects with other possible drivers of migration. First generation migrants from Latin America were recruited primarily through CPACS Cosmo Health Center and were invited to participate in an intake survey and an in-depth interview. Results were analyzed using descriptive statistics and thematic analysis. Findings suggest that while participants may not have explicitly identified climate change as a primary reason for migration, in both surveys and in-depth interviews, participants reported multiple and intersecting social, economic, political, and environmental factors that are directly or indirectly influenced by climate change and that are involved in their decisions to migrate. The narratives that emerged from in-depth interviews further contextualised survey data and elucidated the complex nexus of climate change, migration, and health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

2022 was a year of crises, not just one but multiple intersecting crises that caused traumatic stress in billions of people worldwide. COVID-19 is still not over. New wars have started, and the climate change impact is bigger than ever. Will the Anthropocene be an era of continued crises? This past year the European Journal of Psychotraumatology (EJPT) has again tried to contribute to how to prevent or treat the consequences of these major crises as well as other events and we will continue to do so the year to come. For instance, we will have special issues or collections addressing these big issues, such as climate change and traumatic stress, or early intervention after trauma or in times of conflict. In this editorial, we also present the past year's excellent journal metrics regarding reach, impact, and quality and the ESTSS EJPT award finalists for best paper of 2022 and look forward to 2023. 2022 was a year of multiple intersecting crises causing traumatic stress to billions of people around the world. European Journal of Psychotraumatology (EJPT) aims to contribute to how to understand, prevent or treat the consequences of these major crises. EJPT's editorial team again achieved excellent journal metrics regarding reach, impact, and quality in 2022. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The reliance on petroleum derivatives and the increasing trend of fuel consumption in the transport sector have brought attention to biofuels as a measure to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, enhance energy security and boost economic development. The incentive for utilizing biofuels is their potential to reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions compared to fossil fuels. Biofuels are considered to be carbon-neutral, regarding the direct CO2 emissions associated with their combustion, on the grounds that the carbon dioxide absorbed by the plants through photosynthesis is equivalent to the CO2 released during their combustion. However, a part of the carbon of biofuels may have a fossil origin and therefore, it is responsible for "non-neutral" CO2 emissions. This was recognized by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in its guidelines for greenhouse gas inventories. Nevertheless, specific guidance of how to estimate fossil CO2 emissions per each type of biofuel, in order to facilitate the work of emission inventory compilers and practitioners, is neither available in the IPCC guidelines nor in the scientific literature. The purpose of this paper is to define a higher tier method to estimate the associated CO2 emissions with the fossil carbon content of biofuels, aiming to cover all possible biofuel types that are mainly used nowadays to replace diesel and gasoline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper briefly reviews recent and current approaches to the formulation and implementation of urban housing policies in towns and cities in the global South, with emphasis on local government-community participation and partnerships. It looks ahead into the implications of the lasting impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic and tenets of climate change that will constitute the 'New Normal'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In striving to achieve the Paris Agreement and the 2030 Agenda, governments have the opportunity to implement their climate and sustainability goals more coherently. Such coherence requires the coordination of interdependent policies across different policy fields, sectors and actors. This paper explores how governments design and implement synergic solutions to concomitantly achieve both international agendas. With the empirical cases of Germany and South Africa, we investigate two independent approaches to the synergic solution of a just energy transition, whereby countries aim to phase out coal as a means to tackle climate change while also ensuring that the achievement of other Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is not hindered. Methodologically, we apply a deductive qualitative approach consisting of literature review, semi-structured interviews, and content analysis. To that end, we examine relevant policies and institutional arrangements by applying a combined conceptual framework of energy justice and just transition in both countries. We find major challenges in overcoming environmental, economic and social burdens of the coal phase-out, especially related to jobs and inequality (SDGs 8, 10) and the Water-Energy-Food-Land nexus (SDGs 2, 6, 7, 15). Through the selection of Germany and South Africa, we illustrate how countries with different political, social and economic backgrounds strive to manage such a transition. Our developed framework and case-studies' findings point towards important considerations when designing just energy transition pathways, such as ensuring inclusiveness in decision-making, thoroughly assessing social, economic and environmental impacts, and adequately coordinating across different actors and the local, provincial and national levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Horn of Africa is at stake concerning climate change. The considerable population size of the Horn of Africa is a pastoral community living out of livestock and small farmers living in subsistence agricultural production. The loss of livestock and harvests resulting from a drought causes the deprivation of millions of citizens. The effect has triggered mass migration within and several offshore destinations. The question is, while Africa produces a low carbon emission, remains the primary victims of climate change. Africa lacks resources and technical expertise to respond to the devastating effects of climate change. This study aims to analyse the agency of climate change as a social and political process. Therefore, this paper seeks remedies on how to avert climate change threats by examining the collective responsibilities and different stakeholders. The article would conduct an inquiry on the responsibility of industrial nations vis-à-vis climate change. The paper employs a qualitative research method to explores how to mitigate climate change threats. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses opinion paper titled "Hydrology and change" by professor of hydrology Demetris Koutsoyiannis. It mentions Hurst-Kolmogorov (HK) statistical effect which is the focus of the paper and suggests invention of tools with HK effect for future day predictions. It also presents discussion on the physical changes along with time such as change in climatic conditions due to human activities including innovation in agriculture, industrial advancement and electronic revolution.

Rockfalls influence the safety of the surrounding infrastructure and the normal operation of transportation lines. The application of synthetic aperture radar (SAR) technology is a new method of rock-fall monitoring and disaster prediction. This paper introduces a novel method to velocity estimation of rock-fall target utilizing SAR with low pulse repetition frequency (PRF) sampling. As is known to us, when PRF is less than the Doppler spectrum bandwidth, rock-fall target suffer both Doppler centroid frequency ambiguity and Doppler spectrum ambiguity. Under this condition, the traditional velocity estimation method in the Doppler domain is out of action. To solve above problem, this paper designs an improved reconstruction filter bank to reconstruct the Doppler spectrum of rock-fall target, and then Doppler in-band energy and Doppler out-of-band energy ratio of rock-fall target is utilized to estimate the velocity of rock-fall target. Simulation experiment results show the effectiveness of proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the consideration of climate change in environmental assessment (EA) in the liquefied natural gas (LNG) sector, British Columbia, Canada. Based on an analysis of recent EA applications, results show that climate change is considered, to some extent, in all phases of EA for most LNG projects. However, stakeholders indicate a dissatisfaction with practice – often based on expectations about EA that exceed what it can deliver as a project-based tool, and sometimes based on an incomplete understanding of existing climate change legislation and targets. Results also indicate inconsistent application of existing climate change requirements across project EAs. Notwithstanding proponents often addressing climate change in their EA applications, climate change tends to receive little attention in project decision and approval conditions. The paper concludes with recommendations for better practice climate change consideration in EA that is commensurate with the scope and scale of project-level issues, complemented by more strategic EA and economic instruments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The numerous consequences of climate change worldwide have precipi- tated research efforts to realise sustainable development goal 13 (SDG 13). SDG 13 has recommended mitigation and adaptation strategies to combat climate change, and many of these can be achieved using emerging technologies. Research has shown the efficacies of information communication technologies (ICTs) in mitigat- ing and adapting to climate change. However, the selection and ranking of ICT tools for mitigating and adapting to climate change is a multicriteria problem. This paper presents a multicriteria framework that identifies and ranks the various ICT tools that can ensure climate change mitigation and adaptation. A fuzzy-technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal solution method is used as the basis of this model and tested using information obtained from an expert. The results show that the most ideal ICT alternative is social media with a closeness coefficient of 0.62, while the least preferred alternative is the intelligent system with a closeness coefficient of 0.17. The proposed model can be used in the planning of climate change adaptation strategies in developing countries where finances are usually a major constraint in implementing climate change action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) onboard National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) satellites can provide over 40 years of global remote sensing observations, which can be used to retrieve long-term aerosol optical depth (AOD). This is of great significance to the study of global climate change. In this paper, we proposed an algorithm to jointly calculate AOD and land surface properties from AVHRR observations. With assumptions that AOD doesn't vary in adjacent space and earth surface property doesn't vary in two days, the algorithm considered non-Lambertian surface reflection based on the shape of bidirectional reflectance distribution function (BRDF shape) and obtained AOD and surface property by optimal estimation (OE) method. The algorithm has been applied to NOAA-7, 9, 11, 14, 16, 18, and 19 satellites and AVHRR-retrieved AOD with 5 × 10 km over China (15°–60° N, 70°–140°E) has been obtained from 1982 to 2016. Comparisons of AVHRR-retrieved AOD against AErosol RObotic NETwork (AERONET) (in and around China) and China Aerosol Remote Sensing Network (CARSNET) AOD show good consistency with 62.62% points within the uncertainty of Δτ = ± (0.05 + 0.25τ) and root-mean-square error (RMSE) of 0.26. Further comparison of the monthly mean AOD of multiple AOD datasets in the 'Beijing', 'Dalanzadgad', 'NCU_Taiwan' and 'Kanpur' stations shows that the results of the algorithm are stable. The yearly averaged AOD data also has similar agreements with MERRA-2 (The Modern-Era Retrospective analysis for Research and Applications, Version 2) and AVHRRDB data (AVHRR 'Deep Blue' aerosol data set). The multi-year mean correlation coefficient is 0.70 and 0.61 and the percentages within the uncertainty are 80.01% and 67.29% compared with MERRA-2 AOD and AVHRRDB AOD respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change is having significant impacts on health and mental health across Europe and globally. Such effects are likely to be more severe in climate change hotspots such as the Mediterranean region, including Italy. To review existing literature on the relationship between climate change and mental health in Italy, with a particular focus on trauma and PTSD. A scoping review methodology was used. We followed guidance for scoping reviews and the PRISMA Extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR) checklist. We searched for literature in MEDLINE, Global Health, Embase and PsycINFO. Following screening, data was extracted from individual papers and a quality assessment was conducted. Given the heterogeneity of studies, findings were summarized narratively. We identified 21 original research articles investigating the relationship between climate change and mental health in Italy. Climate change stressors (heat and heatwaves in particular) were found to have several negative effects on various mental health outcomes, such as a higher risk of mortality among people with mental health conditions, suicide and suicidal behaviour and psychiatric morbidity (e.g. psychiatric hospitalization and symptoms of mental health conditions). However, there is little research on the relationship between climate change and trauma or PTSD in the Italian context. More attention and resources should be directed towards understanding the mental health implications of climate change to prevent, promote, and respond to the mental health needs of Italy and the wider Mediterranean region. • Climate change stressors in Italy were found to have detrimental impacts on various mental health outcomes, such as psychiatric mortality and morbidity. • Little research on the relationship between climate change stressors and PTSD exists in Italy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since first proposed, the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines have been extensively covered by the media, shaping readers' perceptions of the pipelines, as well as perceptions of the places and peoples impacted by them. Using critical discourse analysis, this paper examines the media coverage, their Plains descriptions, and expressions of place attachment. Through the media's use of "place talk," it presents a hybrid Plains: placeless, yet with a strongly place-attached population who are "tied to the land." As conflicts over environmental and energy projects become increasingly contentious, place and place attachment are important for understanding the conflicts and potentially mobilizing resistance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nigeria is experiencing, together with the rest of the world, consequences of relentlessly accelerating technological developments, in the contexts of relative lagging of developments in the Humanities, new discoveries in sciences and technological innovations, advances in medicine, changes in government policies and norms, rapid changes in the society, unhealthy practices in the area of food and agriculture, degradation of the environment as well as climate change. Furthermore, Nigeria as a Member State of UNESCO Bioethics is expected to have a National Bioethics Committee to enhance her participation in global concerns, as well as increase her opportunities to tap into global Bioethics resources. For this Committee to be established, the National Bioethics Framework and Policy Documents must be put in place. This paper discusses the rigorous process of developing the National Bioethics Framework and the National Bioethics Policy Documents as well as the need for a National Bioethics Committee in Nigeria. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change, urbanisation and demographic change affect urban areas and pose a range of health-related challenges to urban residents, including heat waves, drought periods, air pollution and densification processes. Urban green spaces provide ecosystem services that can help to mitigate the effects of these challenges. Urban green spaces such as parks, urban gardens and street trees regulate the microclimate and buffer noise as well as a variety of air pollutants. Parks promote physical activity, relaxation and social interaction. The potential to provide these services might be limited during extreme weather events such as heat waves and drought periods. With this experience-based perspective paper, we introduce an interdisciplinary project that consists of multi-method field campaigns to assess the potential of urban parks to provide regulating and recreational ecosystem services in the context of the 2018 and 2019 heat and drought periods in Germany. We highlight that multi-method field campaigns that combine sensor-based environmental measurements with social science approaches, including visitor observations, counts, and questionnaire surveys, are highly useful when urbanisation and climate change-related challenges must be effectively addressed in the context of the complex socio-ecological systems of a city. Based on our hands-on experiences, we provide recommendations for local urban green space planning and outline prospects for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drought is one of the important and costliest disaster all over the world. With the accelerated progress of climate change, its frequency of occurrence and negative impacts are rapidly increasing. It is crucial to initiate and sustain an early warning system to monitor and predict the possible impacts of future droughts. Recently, with the rise of data driven models, various case studies are conducted by using Machine Learning algorithms instead of using pure statistical approaches. The main goal of this paper is to conduct a drought forecasting study for a weather station located in Marmara Region. For that purpose, firstly, widely used univariate drought index, Standardized Precipitation Index is calculated for Bursa station. Thereafter, both the historical information retrieved from time series data and its wavelet transformation are considered to investigate Nonlinear Auto-Regressive and Nonlinear Auto-Regressive with External Input (NARX) type Neural Network (NN) models. According to a pool of Goodness-of-Fit (GOF) tests, the forecasting performance of the models with various number of hidden neurons are compared. The recent findings of the study showed that considering the data with its wavelet transformation under (NARX-NN) has benefits to increase the capacity of forecasting the drought index. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change is a current concern in our society, with consequences increasingly felt worldwide. Alongside territories and communities, large infrastructures such as dams may be vulnerable to climate change and need to be resilient to related impacts. Consequently, their approval should require a comprehensive assessment of associated climate change risks. This concern is addressed by several international guidelines that suggest incorporating the evaluation of climate change risks in the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) process to overcome it. It is also evidenced in several national EIA regulations updated accordingly. Based on a systematic review of scientific literature published in the last twenty years, this paper explores how has the scientific community addressed the integration of climate change risks in the EIA of dams. The findings show that the potential of EIA to address climate change risks is widely acknowledged. However, published systematic studies assessing how the analysis of these risks is being included in dams' EIA current practice, are rare. This gap suggests a research potential around the topic and a new niche for research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates climate change impacts on the hydrology and water quality of Brazilian semi-arid reservoirs. An integrated approach coupling climate, hydrological and water quality models was proposed. Five general circulation models (GCMs) and two future scenarios (SSP2-4.5 and SSP5-8.5) were used for the projections. The simulations showed that uncertainty in climate forecast significantly impacted hydrological and water quality outputs. Some scenarios revealed a strong decrease in streamflow and storage volume. On the other hand, 40% of multi-GCM projections indicated reservoir eutrophication. The impacts on hydrology and water quality under SSP5-8.5 were more significant than those under SSP2-4.5. The results also indicated that drought events may be prolonged under climate change, principally at the end of the 21st century for SSP5-8.5, and may significantly increase the total phosphorus concentration. This suggests that tropical semi-arid reservoirs could be more vulnerable to eutrophication in scenarios of climate change than those in other regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the gradual eclipse of a water management paradigm governed by the dominance of hydropower and irrigation-driven development. With the advent of new values, the former approach has given way to an acknowledgement of the value of water for its intangible contribution to the landscape, among other things. The European Water Framework Directive has lent further impetus to changes in water management and governance. Future water authorities and stakeholders will face additional management challenges such as growing water scarcity, climate change and the predominant role of regional governments in water use negotiation and decision-making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Malthouse Theatre's The Suitcase Series celebrated ten years in 2020. As a participatory theatre making program for young people in Years 9 and 10 of secondary education, it holds a unique position in the Victorian and, arguably, the Australian theatre education landscape. Since 2010 Malthouse Theatre has commissioned an original script by a new playwright every two years, then challenging young people to give voice to their thoughts and feelings to the issue through the interrelated roles of creator-performer-audience-critical peer. This paper offers critical insight into the origin, intentions, process, and social and artistic impacts of the program across ten years. It positions the Malthouse as a key contributor to the field of participatory theatre programs in Australia, and considers how theatre can create 'something very forceful, something that we believe, then offer to students in a way that doesn't crush them' (Lynch, 2010). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The climate change adaptation field has evolved considerably in recent years. Important contributions have been made, with scholars developing methods for assessing vulnerability in different countries and communities, documenting broad strategies for adaptation and identifying opportunities for and barriers to adaptation as well as ways to enhance adaptive capacity. Issues of sustainability are, however, not readily argued and embraced. Predominantly, our analysis exposes that current adaptation discourse, particularly in Africa, offers a narrow conceptualisation of sustainability. The paper argues for a clear framework of sustainability in adaptation discourse which encompasses awareness to contextual aspects in responding to climate variability and change as well as resilience aspects. The paper also calls for an expansion of the knowledge base around the concept of 'climate-smart agriculture' towards effectively incorporating sustainability aspects in climate change adaptation discourse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A letter to the editor is presented in response to the article "Discussion on the Opinion Paper Hydrology and change" by Arie Ben-Zvi published in the 2014 issue of the journal.

In municipal energy planning, climate change is a key concern. Additionally, a multitude of environmental impacts and associated objectives also need to be addressed. Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) should increase environmental consideration in planning, including that of national environmental objectives. This paper investigates the SEA screening practice and its effect on the execution of SEA as well as the inclusion of national environmental objectives in Swedish energy and climate planning. The results show that due to low execution and quality of screening, SEA is seldom conducted. However, environmental objectives in which synergies and conflicts can occur in relation to the climate objective were more often included in policy documents when environmental assessment had been conducted, thus indicating that they are incorporated into the basis for planning and decision-making in those processes. If SEA can highlight local co-benefits through this approach, it can facilitate building local support for climate action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change impact search methodologies, for a single hydro-meteorological record, are based mostly on probabilistic, statistical and stochastic processes. The application of these methodologies requires some restrictive assumptions for their validation, which may not be embedded in the structure of the record. Either transformations or approximations are taken into consideration, with idealization and simplification assumptions. In this paper, a series of conceptual trend polygon methodologies are presented without mathematical expression or restrictive assumptions. These are serial, cross- and double polygonal trend methods, in addition to trend star graphs. They help in identifying, interpreting and calculating monthly shifts, producing useful scientific information that cannot be obtained by the classical monotonic trend identification approaches. The methodology is applied to hydro-meteorological series from different regions of the world including precipitation and discharge records. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is increasing global attention to the importance of menstrual health and hygiene (MHH) for the lives of those who menstruate and gender equality. Yet, the global development community, which focuses on issues ranging from gender to climate change to health, is overdue to draw attention to how addressing MHH may enable progress in attaining the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). To address this gap, we undertook a collective exercise to hypothesize the linkages between MHH and the 17 SDGs, and to identify how MHH contributes to priority outcome measures within key sectoral areas of relevance to menstruating girls in low- and middle-income countries. These areas included Education, Gender, Health (Sexual and Reproductive Health; Psychosocial Wellbeing), and Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH). These efforts were undertaken from February – March 2019 by global monitoring experts, together with select representatives from research institutions, non-governmental organizations, and governments (n = 26 measures task force members). Through this paper we highlight the findings of our activities. First, we outline the existing or potential linkages between MHH and all of the SDGs. Second, we report the identified priority outcomes related to MHH for key sectors to monitor. By identifying the potential contribution of MHH towards achieving the SDGs and highlighting the ways in which MHH can be monitored within these goals, we aim to advance recognition of the fundamental role of MHH in the development efforts of countries around the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following the 2014 report of the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Earth surface has been warming up since the mid-18th century. From the late 1970s, Earth warmed up intensively, leading to unusual environmental, economic and social events. An intensive 19th century's, Earth warming has speeded up ice melting and sea level rise, increased water shortage and drought intensity. Expected drought intensification and expansion would reduce crop production, deteriorating food security and intensifying poor population's hunger. Since climate warming is continuing, we estimate long-term interaction between global warming and high-resolution drought tendencies and its consequences for global and regional food security. This paper develops and investigates satellite-derived 38-year high-resolution drought data sets and evaluate their trends, during 1981-2018. Drought was estimated using satellite-based Vegetation Health (VH) method. The results indicated that for the entire globe, hemispheres and the main grain-producing countries (China, USA and India) drought has not intensified and expanded during 38-year, while the global temperature anomaly has strongly increased. Since drought has not intensified and expanded during strong global warming, food security in the next few years is likely to remain at the level of the most recent decade. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A relevant number of reports have examined the role of airborne signals in plant-plant communication, indicating that volatile organic compounds (VOCs) can prime neighboring plants against pathogen and/or herbivore attacks. Conversely, there is very limited information available on the possibility of the emission of VOCs by emitter plants under abiotic stress conditions, which may alert neighboring unstressed plants and prime these individuals (receivers) against the same stressors. The present opinion paper briefly reviews a few reports examining the effect of infochemicals produced by emitters on receiver plants subjected to abiotic stresses typical of global climate change. The ecological implications of these dynamics, as well as some concerns related to the potential roles of inter-plant communication in environmentally controlled experiments, have arisen. Some possible inter-plant communications applications (biomonitoring and biostimulation), mediated by airborne signals, and some directions for future studies on this topic, are also provided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sustainable agricultural production has encountered difficulties such as water scarcity, improper use of available water resources and climate change in arid countries like Iran. Simulation-optimization approaches are helpful tools for crop pattern planning and irrigation water allocation to ensure maximum net benefit is gained from the system. In this paper, optimum cultivation area and allocation of irrigation water in conditions compatible with climate change are obtained for the Borkhar plain in Iran. To achieve this, the network flow programming-based MODSIM, as a water allocation simulation model, is coupled with the grey wolf optimization (GWO) algorithm to obtain the optimum irrigation amounts and cultivation areas in the plain under two conditions: status quo, and with climate change-affected streamflows. The Hadley Centre coupled Model version 3 (HadCM3) and the second-generation Canadian Earth System Model (CanESM2) are used to generate the climatic parameters in the study area. The Identification of unit Hydrographs and Component flows from Rainfall, Evapotranspiration and Streamflow (IHACRES) rainfall–runoff model is applied to calculate the coefficients of variation for the Zayandehroud River streamflows, as the surface water resource for irrigation of the plain. Results indicate that the agricultural net benefit gained from the plain will decrease by 1.5% in the A2 emissions scenario, and by 3.5%, 8% and 17.5% in the three representative concentration pathway (RCP) scenarios in the optimum states obtained by the GWO-MODSIM model. Moreover, the cultivation areas are decreased in the climate change scenarios. Therefore, appropriate management policies should be adopted for adaptation to the likely future situation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study investigated the vulnerability of Swaziland’s sugarcane small scale farmer associations (SSFAs) to climate change through the Sustainable Livelihoods Framework. From a survey of 45 SSFAs, representing +2700 farmers, drought emerged as the most significant stress. Droughts result in failed cane germination, increased pests and increased diseases. Farmers indicated that there had no land title deeds and were concerned about the poor state of infield and feeder roads damaged during heavy rainfall and floods. It emerged that the bulk of the SSFAs irrigate during the day, a scenario that leaves them vulnerable to high temperatures leading to high evapotranspiration. In addition, 97% of the SSFAs sampled did not have drought preparedness plans and likewise, all did not have a flood management plan. About 76% of SSFAs operation costs goes to crop upkeep and harvesting, with labour cost increases attributed to extreme weather events. All sampled SSFAs had no insurance against loss from extreme weather events. Given the foregone, the paper recommends that the government fast tracks the 1999 Draft Land Policy intended to address the issue of title deeds. The paper further suggest that extension officers and farmers be trained to sharpen skills on understanding climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study deals with certain variations of the diversity level of clavarioid funga in the 33 localities (100 km² each) inside seven longitudinal sectors (100,000 km²) situated along the gradient of the climatic continentality of the Eurasian tundra zone. As continentality increases, from the maritime climate of Fennoscandia to the continental climate of Yakutia, α-diversity and γ-diversity decrease considerably. On the other side, spatial turnover of species, or β-diversity, grows in the direction of continental areas. This paper uses the following methods to assess the spatial turnover: Whittaker's index and mean Jaccard similarity index, as well as by several other parameters. In addition, our data show that the genus Typhula is richest in the tundra, and its share in the structure of the clavarioid funga grows as the studied area decreases, as well as when the environmental conditions become more severe (continentality of the climate). Also, the paper discusses the issue of newly emerging taiga fungi species in the European Arctic, which is connected with climatic warming followed by "greening" of the tundra. Note that in the cryosemiarid continental climate of Yakutia, where climatic changes are just as pronounced, no new taxons have been discovered so far. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]