Climate, Volume 7, Issue 8 (August 2019) – 7 articles

Mitigating climate change to limit the global temperature increase (relative to pre-industrial temperatures) to 2 °C is receiving considerable attention around the world. Here, historical and future carbon dioxide equivalent (CO₂e) emissions from municipal solid waste (MSW) in Bahrain were calculated using the revised Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 1996 and IPCC 2006 methods. The extent to which waste-to-energy (WtE) technologies can contribute to climate change mitigation was assessed by performing a multicriteria analysis. The results indicated that CO₂e emissions from MSW in Bahrain have been increasing since the Askar landfill was constructed in 1986. Emission recalculations indicated that CO₂e emissions from MSW contribute 6.2% of total emissions in Bahrain rather than the 11.6% reported in the second national communication. Methane emissions from MSW in 2030 are predicted to be 22–63 Gg. The WtE technologies anaerobic digestion and landfill gas recovery gave the best and gasification the worst multicriteria analysis model results. A database of WtE plants around the world should be compiled to allow decisions around the world to be based on best practices. The potential for maximizing energy recovery and decreasing costs needs to be investigated to allow WtE plants to compete better with renewable and nonrenewable energy sources. Full article

An urban heat island (UHI) is a phenomenon that shows a higher temperature in urban areas compared to surrounding rural areas due to the impact of impervious surface (IS) density, and other anthropogenic activities including changes of land use/land cover (LULC). The purpose of this research is to examine the spatiotemporal land-use/land-cover changes and their impact on the surface UHI (SUHI) in Kandy City, Sri Lanka, using Landsat data and geospatial techniques. LULC classification was made by using a pixel-oriented supervised classification method, and LULC changes were computed by using a cross-cover comparison. The SUHI effect was discussed mainly through the variation of land-surface temperature (LST) over persistent IS and newly added IS. The study showed the dynamics of each LULC and its role in the SUHI. The results showed that IS areas expanded from 529 to 1514 ha (2.3% to 6.7% of the total land area) between 1996 and 2006, and to 5833 ha (23.9% of the total land area) in 2017, with an annual growth rate of 11.1% per year from 1996 to 2006 and 12.2% per year from 2006 to 2017. A gradually declining trend was observed in forest areas. Persistent IS reported the highest mean LST areas compared to newly added IS. The mean LST difference between persistent IS and newly added IS was 1.43 °C over the study period. This is because areas of persistent IS are typically surrounded by IS even in their neighborhoods, whereas areas of newly added IS occur at the edges of the city and are, therefore, cooled by the surrounding nonurban surfaces. This calls for appropriate green-oriented landscape-management methods to mitigate the impact of the SUHI in Kandy City. The findings of the study showed that LULC changes and their effect on the SUHI from 1996 to 2017 made a significant contribution to long records of change dynamics. Full article

Passive microclimate frames are exhibition enclosures able to modify their internal climate in order to comply with paintings’ conservation needs. Due to a growing concern about the effects of climate change, future policies in conservation must move towards affordable and sustainable preservation strategies. This study investigated the hygrothermal conditions monitored within a microclimate frame hosting a portrait on cardboard with the aim of discussing its use in view of the climate expected indoors in the period 2041–2070. Its effectiveness in terms of the ASHRAE classification and of the Lifetime Multiplier for chemical deterioration of paper was assessed comparing temperature and relative humidity values simultaneously measured inside the microclimate frame and in its surrounding environment, first in the Pio V Museum and later in a residential building, both located in the area of Valencia (Spain). Moreover, heat and moisture transfer functions were used to derive projections over the future indoor hygrothermal conditions in response to the ENSEMBLES-A1B outdoor scenario. The adoption of microclimate frames proved to be an effective preventive conservation action in current and future conditions but it may not be sufficient to fully avoid the chemical degradation risk without an additional control over temperature. Full article

European climate change objectives aim to reduce CO₂ emissions, promote the spread of renewable energy sources (RES), and stimulate energy efficiency (EE). The situation of local and regional governance is crucial in the implementation of community objectives. A multi-year research project was implemented in East Hungary by the University of Debrecen and Eszterházy University. It focuses on the relevance of local communities in the formation of adequate responses to the fore-mentioned challenges. A broad range of primary data collections (questionnaires and interviews) were implemented in two rural counties of the country. The first objective was to elicit existing plans concerning RES and EE at the municipality level and to measure the rate of public participation in the elaboration of them. Secondly, the scopes of the implemented projects were examined in the target area. According to the results, local leaders seem to be committed to environmental issues, but communities rarely possess energy/climate-change plans and projects. The main motivators of project implementation are financial. Because of poor financial conditions, only EU co-financed projects are realized. As subsidies come through the national government, political factors are crucial. From a governance point of view, national and county levels are decisive, and local specialties are not taken into consideration. Full article

Urban territorial expansion generated in the last decades has brought a series of consequences, such as the variation between urban and suburban weather conditions affecting indoor temperature and increasing electricity consumption derived from the use of cooling systems. Current approaches of simulation models in residential buildings use indoor environmental data for carrying out validations to propose hygrothermal comfort alternatives for the mitigation of the effects of the external environmental conditions on the interior spaces of dwellings. In this work, an hourly evaluation of both indoor and outdoor environmental parameters of two case studies in a tropical climate was carried out, by means of a whole-building simulation approach tool during a week representative of the warmest period of the year. The integration of the collected environmental data in the theoretical model allowed us to reduce the error range of the estimated indoor temperature with results in normalized mean bias error between 7.10% and −0.74% and in coefficient of variation of the root mean square error between 16.72% and 2.62%, in the different indoor zones of the case studies. At the same time, the energy assessment showed a difference of 33% in Case 1 and −217% in Case 2 for final electricity consumption. Full article

Institutions matter because they are instrumental in systematically adapting to global climate change, reducing disaster risks, and building resilience. Without institutionalised action, adapting to climatic change remains ad-hoc. Using exploratory research design and longitudinal observations, this research investigates how urban stakeholders and policy entrepreneurs negotiate institutional architecture and pathways for sustaining climate change adaptation and resilience implementation. This paper introduces hybrid institutionalism as a framework to understand how city administrators, local policy makers, and policy advocates navigate complex institutional landscapes that are characterised by volatility and uncertainties. Grounded in the experience from a recent experiment in Indonesia, this research suggests that institutionalisation of adaptation and resilience agenda involves different forms of institutionalisation and institutionalism through time. Future continuity of adaptation to climate change action depends on the dynamic nature of the institutionalism that leads to uncertainty in mainstreaming risk reduction. However, this research found that pathway-dependency theory emerges as a better predictor for institutionalising climate change adaptation and resilience in Indonesia. Full article

Insufficient winter chill accumulation can detrimentally impact agriculture. Understanding the changing risk of insufficient chill accumulation can guide orchard management and cultivar selection for long-lived perennial crops including peaches. This study quantifies the influence of modeled anthropogenic climate change on observed chill accumulation since 1981 and projected chill accumulation through the mid-21st century, with a focus on principal peach-growing regions in the southeastern United States, and commonly grown peach cultivars with low, moderate, and high chill accumulation requirements. Anthropogenic climate change has reduced winter chill accumulation, increased the probability of winters with low chill accumulation, and increased the likelihood of winters with insufficient chill for commonly grown peach cultivars in the southeastern United States. Climate projections show a continuation of reduced chill accumulation and increased probability of winters with insufficient chill accumulation for cultivars with high chill requirements, with approximately 40% of years by mid-century having insufficient chill in Georgia. The results highlight the importance of inter-annual variability in agro-climate risk assessments and suggest that adaptive measures may be necessary in order to maintain current peach production practices in the region in the coming decades. Full article