Using Risk Assessment to Inform Adaptation

1. Using Risk Assessment to Inform Adaptation Roger N. Jones In-session Workshop on Impacts Of, and Vulnerability and Adaptation To, Climate Change Hotel Maritim, Bonn, Germany 18 June 2004

2. Risk Can be broadly defined as the likelihood of an adverse event or outcome How does this relate to Article 2 of the UNFCCC?

3. Consequence Hazard Management options Through adaptation and mitigation Management criteria Article 2 UNFCCC Aims to prevent dangerous anthropogenic climate change by stabilising greenhouse gas emissions, thus allowing Ecosystems to adapt naturally Food security to be maintained Sustainable development to proceed

4. Scales of “dangerous” climate change Global thresholds of criticality • Grounded ice sheet melts, • N. Hemisphere flips to cold conditions, • Amazon wilts and burns due to heat and drought Global in scale but very unlikely to occur ( with T) Local thresholds of criticality Any activity where: • the harm caused exceeds given levels of tolerance • impacts become non-viable with no reasonable substitute Local in scale, number and severity increasing with T, benefits fewer with T

5. Socio-economic system Climate system Impacted activity Current climate Current adaptations Future climate Future adaptations Linking climate to adaptation over time

6. Measuring the ability to cope

7. Coping under climate change

8. Mitigative capacity ← Assess risk No adaptation Manage risk Mitigation Critical risk Autonomous adaptation Adaptation →Adaptive capacity Danger Coping range Adapting through the coping range

9. Mitigative capacity ← Assess risk No adaptation Manage risk Mitigation Critical risk Autonomous adaptation Adaptation →Adaptive capacity Danger Coping range Autonomous adaptation Improve technology access Institutional reform Improved equity Access to information Build social capital Access to wealth creation Adapting (generic) Mainstreaming adaptation Natural resource management New technology Disaster planning Retrofit existing structures Build resilience/resistance Adapting (specific) Replace activity Abandon activity Transform activity Adapting (transformative)

10. Different activities have different adaptive capacities Coral Reefs Developed Country Agriculture Developing Country Agriculture Protected Coastal Infrastructure

11. Adaptation and mitigation • Adaptation increases the coping range through biological and social means • Mitigation reduces the magnitude and frequency of greenhouse-related climate hazards Therefore, they are complementary, not interchangeable. They also reduce different areas of climate uncertainty

12. Some major methods • Natural hazards method Risk = Hazard ×Vulnerability (what are the likely damages?) • Vulnerability-based method Risk = Probability × Consequence (what is the likelihood of exceeding a given state of vulnerability?) • Policy assessment Does a given policy increase or decrease risk under climate change?

13. Natural Hazard Probabilities of hazard constrained Main drivers known Chain of consequences understood P(Hazard) × Consequences Exploratory Vulnerability Probabilities not constrained Many drivers Multiple pathways and feedbacks P(Vulnerability) e.g. critical threshold exceedance Normative Selecting a method

14. Likelihood of threshold exceedance

15. Low probability, extreme outcomes Considerable damage to most systems Least likely Increased damage to many systems, fewer benefits Moderately likely Highly likely Damage to the most sensitive, many benefits Almost certain Happening now Vulnerable to current climate Probability Consequence Core benefits of adaptation and mitigation Probability – the likelihood of reaching or exceeding a given level of global warming Consequence – the effect of reaching or exceeding a given level of global warming Risk = Probability × Consequence

16. Activities most at risk Those where • critical thresholds are exceeded at low levels of global warming, • adaptive capacity is low and/or adaptation is prohibitively expensive, difficult or unknown and • the consequences of exceeding those thresholds are judged to be serious

17. Resources • UNDP Adaptation Policy Framework www.undp.org/cc/apf.htm • UKCIP Willow and Connell (2003) www.ukcip.org.uk/risk_uncert