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Folder Climate Change

Climate change is the variation in the Earth's global climate or in regional climates over time. It involves changes in the variability or average state of the atmosphere over durations ranging from decades to millions of years. These changes can be caused by dynamic process on Earth, external forces including variations in sunlight intensity, and more recently by human activities.

In recent usage, especially in the context of environmental policy, the term "climate change" often refers to changes in modern climate (global warming).

Climate change is one of the most critical global challenges of our time. Recent events have emphatically demonstrated our growing vulnerability to climate change. Climate change impacts will range from affecting agriculture- further endangering food security-, sea-level rise and the accelerated erosion of coastal zones, increasing intensity of natural disasters, species extinction and the spread of vector-borne diseases.

Document les-changements-climatiques-et-usages-en-eau-dans Item only translated in French
Document 2007/2008 Human Development Report tackles climate change
The report warns that the world should focus on the development impact of climate change, which could bring unprecedented reversals in poverty reduction, nutrition, health and education.
HTML Document A new report updates climate change science
URL Adaptation Strategies for The Mediterranean Basin

The Mediterranean region is at the crossroads of the most important environmental, economic, and political concern of the early twenty-first century. In particular, this region is ecologically fragile and its environment is already degraded to the point of penalising the population and economic development. The expected climate change during this century is therefore a particularly important challenge.

Water and Uncertainty

By the end of the century, the average annual temperature on the Mediterranean will probably rise by between 2.2 and 5.1°C, well above the global average. This warming should be definitely detectable in 15 to 25 years depending on the season. The maximum warming is expected to be in summer, with an increase between 2.7 and 6.5°C, against 1.7 and 4.6°C in winter. An increase in the number, duration, and intensity of heat waves is also expected. Rainfall totals are likely to decline between 4 and 27%, with a particularly marked decline in summer, which could reach 53%. Water availability will decrease, especially on the southern shore of the Mediterranean which is already vulnerable to water shortage. Despite this decrease, the frequency of extreme precipitation may not decline and could even increase. The risk of increased water shortages seems very likely. These changes will be accompanied by a rise in sea level which is at present very difficult to predict.

Document Arab Environment: Impact of Climate Change on the Arab Countries’ (AFED) Report 2009

‘Impact of Climate Change on the Arab Countries’ is the second of a series of annual reports produced by the Arab Forum for Environment and Development (AFED). The first, released in 2008 under the title ‘Arab Environment: Future Challenges’, covered the most pressing environmental issues facing the region. The 2009 AFED report is designed to provide information to governments, business, academia and the public about the impact of climate change on the Arab countries, and encourage concrete action to face the challenge.

 

The report analyzes the Arab response to the urgent need for adaptation measures, and uses the latest research findings to describe the vulnerabilities of natural and human systems in the Arab world to climate change and the impacts on different sectors. In an attempt to help shape adequate policies, the report discusses options for a post-Kyoto regime and outlines the state of international negotiations in this regard.

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Impact of Climate Change: Vulnerability and Adaptation
Fresh Water

Arabic version of the full report

Document Changement climatique et évènements hydrologiques extrêmes : quels liens ?

Le changement climatique a-t-il des effets sur le régime hydrologique des cours d’eau en France ? C’est une des questions que s’est posé Benjamin Renard dans le cadre de sa thèse soutenue au Cemagref, à Lyon. Il a pour cela mené une étude statistique sur l’évolution des évènements hydrologiques extrêmes en France au cours des 50 dernières années. Diffi cile de discerner le rôle du climat dans les résultats obtenus.

La lettre du CEMAGREF: N°78, Janvier 2007

URL Climate Change and Energy in the Mediterranean

Plan Bleu, Regional Activity Center, Sophia Antipolis, July 2008.

English version - French version

Document Climate change impacts in the Mediterranean resulting from a 2°C global temperature rise A report for WWF, 1 July 2005, by C. Giannakopoulos, M. Bindi, M. Moriondo, P. LeSager and T. Tin
Document Climate change, water and adaptation in agriculture Presentation given by Ana Iglesias (Universidad Politecnica de Madrid, Spain) during the international conference: "Time to Adapt - Climate Change and the European Water Dimension: Vulnerability - Impacts – Adaptation - 12 - 14 February 2007, Berlin"
URL Draft questionnaire on the impacts of climate change on water resources, and on adaptation strategies prepared by the ad hoc core group on water and climate
Document Guidance on Water and Adaptation to Climate Change released and adopted by Water Convention Parties‏

We are pleased to announce that the Guidance on Water and Adaptation to Climate Change was released and adopted by the fifth session of the Meeting of the Parties to the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe's Convention on the Protection and Use of Transboundary Watercourses and International Lakes (Water Convention) which took place on 10-12 November in Geneva. the Guidance is a unique tool which explains step-by-step how to develop and implement an adaptation strategy, with a special focus on the transboundary context.

Based on the concept of integrated water resources management, the Guidance provides advice to decision makers and water managers on how to assess impacts of climate change on water quantity and quality, how to perform risk assessment, including health risks, how to gauge vulnerability, and how to design and implement appropriate adaptation strategies. More than 80 different authors from many countries and disciplines contributed to this truly cooperative effort which contains nearly 40 case studies.

The Guidance will be launched and presented at a side event at the COP-15 in Copenhagen on 16 December at 11 a.m. in the Dutch Pavillion. This side event will focus on transboundary cooperation on adaptation to climate change and will feature several partly high-level speakers, for example from the Netherlands, Germany, UNECE and countries with economies in transition. If you are in Copenhagen we would like to invite you or your colleagues to this event.

 

More information on the meeting is available at:
http://www.unece.org/env/water/mop5.htm

 

HTML Document Rainwater Harvesting & Climate Change
Document The Copenhagen Diagnosis: Climate Science Report

It is more than three years since the drafting of text was completed for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report (AR4). In the meantime, many hundreds of papers have been published on a suite of topics related to human-induced climate change.

The purpose of this report is to synthesize the most policy-relevant climate science published since the close-off of material for the last IPCC report. The rationale is two-fold.

First, this report serves as an interim evaluation of the evolving science midway through an IPCC cycle - IPCC AR5 is not due for completion until 2013.

Second, and most important, the report serves as a handbook of science updates that supplements the IPCC AR4 in time for Copenhagen in December 2009, and any national or international climate change policy negotiations that follow.

This report covers the range of topics evaluated by Working Group I of the IPCC, namely the Physical Science Basis. This includes:

  • an analysis of greenhouse gas emissions and their atmospheric concentrations, as well as the global carbon cycle;
  • coverage of the atmosphere, the land-surface, the oceans, and all of the major components of the cryosphere (land-ice, glaciers, ice shelves, sea-ice and permafrost);
  • paleoclimate, extreme events, sea level, future projections, abrupt change and tipping points;
  • separate boxes devoted to explaining some of the common misconceptions surrounding climate change science.

The report has been purposefully written with a target readership of policy-makers, stakeholders, the media and the broader public. Each section begins with a set of key points that summarises the main findings. The science contained in the report is based on the most credible and significant peer-reviewed literature available at the time of publication. The authors primarily comprise previous IPCC lead authors familiar with the rigor and completeness required for a scientific assessment of this nature.

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Document The Spanish Adaptation Plan to Climate Change and the Water Resources Sector Presentation given during the international conference: "Time to adapt - Climate Change and the Water Resources Sector", held in Berlin on 13 February 2007; by José Ramón Picatoste Ruggeroni, Oficina Española de Cambio Climático - Ministerio de Medio Ambiente (Spain)
URL Time to Adapt - Climate Change and the European Water Dimension: Vulnerability - Impacts – Adaptation - 12 - 14 February 2007, Berlin