I. Introduction
A. Research problem
Flooding is one of the leading public policy concerns in many cities. Major floods in Ho Chi Minh City, Bangkok, New Orleans, Talcoban, and Rome have resulted in loss of lives, damage to infrastructure, economic losses, and threaten health with water borne diseases. With the onset of climate change, sea level is expected rise and the frequency of intense storms are likely to increase, makeing cities more vulnerable to the resulting hazards (IPCC, 2007). The vulnerability of cities is chronic as 50% of the world population is expected to live in them by 2030 (Brown et al., 2012; Huong and Pathirana, 2012). Accordingly, there are two known approaches that address flooding: (1) mitigation is a global level response that reduces the long-term hazards of flooding by targeting the causes through policies that reduce green-house gas emissions; and (2) adaptation is a place-based policy response that reduces the felt and forecasted impact of flooding because the effects, response, and benefits area specific (IPCC, 2002; Webster and McElwee, 2009). Both of these interventions are complementary and should be undertaken jointly to reap their full intended benefits (Rose and Krausmann, 2013). At the city level, adaptation fits nicely into the paradigms of planning and can be undertaken by local planners and other decision makers to reduce flooding vulnerability (Blanco et al., 2008).
B. Research purpose
A survey of existing climate change adaptation scholarship revealed that research on this subject is not as comprehensive as mitigation, as earlier response strategies were concerned with reducing anthropogenic activities to mitigate long-term hazardous consequences (Carmin et al., 2012). Schola...
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...de Can Tho, Taipei, Bangkok, New York City, and Rotterdam.
B. Philosophical orientation
The philosophical orientation underpinning this proposal study is pragmatic paradigms. Given the apparent impacts of climate change, a cost benefit analysis monetizes input variables so that planners can systematically rank available alternative interventions. This model is scalable and can contextualize the unique needs and available resources of each city to generate relevant results. A cost benefit analysis can be adapted to deal with uncertainty, which is crucial as the causes and impacts of climate change are still being studied. For over one hundred years, this assessment model has been used by all levels of governments around the world to allocate public resources, demonstrating the usefulness of this pragmatic tool in action-based decision making.
Global Warming, much of what does or does not happen forty years from now, rests on our actions or inactions taken between now and then. The crucial question is whether we should pour all our resources into mitigation – reducing our carbon emissions. According to scientists who study the climate, there are other environmental problems; “we now face a global crisis in land use and agriculture that could undermine the health, security, and sustainability of our civilization”. Rather than worry too much about emissions, we should accept the world is going to get warmer anyway and adapt to global warming by building better flood defenses and developing drought-resistant crops. We cannot dispute that automobiles, factories, and power plants, displace an unprecedented twenty tons of carbon monoxide per person per year.
manmade levees, dikes, and other flood control measures, is a case in point. In a
The general idea of the order listed in NDAA is the adaptation, defined as the adjusting to the effects of climate change in our environment, instead of addressing the very important topic of mitigation, which is the reduction of harmful greenhouse gases and other pollutants to slow the effects of climate change (Source 6).There are several problems that arise with this exclusion because this is a major threat to the survival
Cities in Texas are especially vulnerable to the effects of climate change. Depending on where they are located, cities vary in their vulnerability and most major cities face a decline in water resources. Coastal cities, such as from Houston to the Rio Grande, are exposed to a rise in sea level. The decline of fresh water reservoirs and the rising sea level ...
Climate change is on the international policy agenda primarily because of warnings from scientists. Their forecasts of a potentially dangerous increase in the average global temperature, fortuitously assisted by unusual weather events, have prompted governments to enter into perhaps the most complicated and most significant set of negotiations ever attempted. Key questions - the rapidity of global climate change, its effects on the natural systems on which humans depend, and the options available to lessen or adapt to such change - have energized the scientific and related communities in analyses that are deeply dependent on scientific evidence and research.
New Orleans flooding risks originated from its location characteristics in proximity of Mississippi River. Since its foundation up to 1927, New Orleans water and flooding threats originated from Mississippi River but human activities had contained this by 1930s. Regrettably, this led to additional water problems. Accordingly, the critical changes to the New Orleans environment originating from the human development worsened the water problems in area caused by the floods. In particular, the growth in ...
Houston, home to two major water reservoirs, now grapples with the task of safely releasing water from these dams. Because of Harvey, they are at a dangerously high level that poses many safety concerns. If the water continues to rise, the reservoirs could break, and release a tidal wave of water into the already flooded city. However, some residents don’t agree with the releasing of water, even in controlled portions, because it adds to the flooding. “The Addicks and Barker dams hold back the reservoirs’ collective 410,000 acre-feet of water and if the dams fail, half the city could be underwater” (Planas, Satlin, et al, 2). The release of water could be a major threat to nearby homes as well while causing more flooding on the major roads, perpetuating the issue of transportation. The Army Corps of Engineers ultimately decided that waiting and praying that the reservoirs didn’t fail would be a poor decision, and came out with a statement saying they would be releasing rationed portions of water. The overflowing of the reservoirs and the possible increase of flooding is a direct impact of Harvey on Houston, and this continues to perpetuate issues they will face in the months to
Flooding is an extreme climatic event that generates devastation and economic losses all around the world. The extreme climatic events are increasing more severe and frequent due to the climate change. The climate change is a global scale, the mean annual surface temperature has increased over the past century by 0.6°C (IPCC, 2007).Climate models and theoretical arguments further indicate that extreme precipitation events will continue to increase with rises in greenhouse gas (GHG) concentrations (Min et al., 2011). Climate change will have significant impacts on precipitation patterns, overall increase in annual average temperature, increase precipitation of frequency, magnitude, precipitation amounts, severe events and flooding risk. The frequency, magnitude and severity of flooding are also increasing in many parts of the world associated with climate change, population pressure and urbanization (Hirabayashi et al., 2013., Jongman et al., 2014). These increases in the frequency and severity of extreme precipitation, impact of climate change associated damages and losses from flooding, is also likely to increase in the 21st century and beyond (Allamano et al., 2009; Pallet al., 2011).
Although it is often a topic for contention in politics, global warming over the span of several decades, has led to climate change, which has had an alarming impact globally. Climate change needs to ...
“An introduction to climate change.” Natural Resource Defense Council. Natural Resources Defense Council 8 November 2015 n. pag. Web. 28 November 2015.
The first part of this essay discusses what the human species has done to deal with the problem of climate change. While some improvements have been made, the problem has not been addressed aggressively enough to stop the damage. What is amazing about this is the denial of so many people that problems exist. If they do realize the risks, they are simply not taking actions to contain the damage.
It is becoming increasingly certain that climate change will have severe adverse effects on the environment in years to come. Addressing this issue poses a serious challenge for policy makers. How we choose to respond to the threat of global warming is not simply a political issue. It is also an economic issue and an ethical one. Responsible, effective climate change policy requires consideration of a number of complex factors, including weighing the costs of implementing climate change policies against the benefits of more environmentally sustainable practices.
Due to climate changes, we are a “gradual and uncertain rather than immediate and obvious” process, we as humans cannot understand it (Jamieson, 102). In addition, climate change effects have no geographical bounds and because very few people pay attention to events that occur beyond national boundaries, most people are oblivious to its existence. Jamieson makes the point that climate change must be thought rather than sensed, and we as humans are not very good at thinking (Jamieson, 103). On top of that, even if we succeed in thinking that something is a threat, we are less reactive than if we sense that it is a threat. Since we cannot even comprehend climate change's presence in our world right now, it also makes it extremely difficult for us to comprehend how our anthropogenic actions of today will affect future generations all over the world.
The ecological consequences of global climate change are expected to be drastic although not much is known as to how individual species will react to these changes. Irrespective of the causes of climate change, whether anthropogenic or natural, it is imperative that we address these concerns, as they will have widespread impacts on the human species, both directly and indirectly through forcings on other species. The climate is not expected to shift evenly and the ways in which certain species adapt or migrate due to these changes could be erratic and unpredictable. The rate at which the earth’s climate is currently changing is unprecedented and has not been seen in the past 450,000 years. Although many species have simply migrated northward or vertically up mountainsides to escape warming habitats, others do not have this luxury or cannot migrate fast enough to survive. The earth’s temperature has risen by over one degree Fahrenheit over the past century, based on land and sea level measurements. The temperature is expected to continue rising at a faster pace over the next century, possibly increasing by as much as seven degrees Celsius. In comparison, the earth’s average global temperature was only twelve degrees cooler than it is now during the last great ice age. A vast majority of species now living do so within a narrow spectrum of temperature ranges and will not be able to adapt to a warming climate on such a large scale. If humans are the cause of a warming climate we will ultimately be responsible for the destruction of millions of species.
Hardy, J. T. Climate Change: Causes, Effects, and Solutions. New York: J. Wiley, 2003. Print.