Redirecting
Screening Government Development Projects for Climate Risk and Natural Disaster: A Case Study of Developing Screening Tools and Methodology for Bangladesh View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Dr. Md. Sirajul Islam, Dr. Nurun Nahar, Dr. Mst. Farida Perveen, Dr. Md. Golam Mahabub Sarwar, Dr. Shameem Hassan Bhuiyan
Bangladesh is undergoing unprecedented economic growth in recent years. However, considering its geographical location and the resulting vulnerability to climate change and natural disasters, it become a burning question, how to safeguard this development efforts to be sustainable in the long run. To improve the climate change and disaster resiliency of the country as a whole, government as a timely step, developed a methodology to screen the development projects according to risk score. At the first step, a Risk Atlas at district level has been formulated following Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) guidelines of HEVR model. Ten hazards were selected for the analysis as Flood, Drought, Cyclone & Storm surge, River erosion, Seal level rise, Salinity, Landslide and two future climate change scenarios (RCP4.5, RCP 8.5) of temperature and precipitation. In a GIS platform, through overlay approach, the resulting risk maps were prepared. After then a Climate Risk Screening (CSR) and detailed Climate Risk Vulnerability Assessment (CRVA) tool was developed to conduct the screening of the development projects, in terms of their level of risk that is exposed to during the project period. In a web based platform, disaster risk score of a development project, with proper weightage assigned considering its nature and relation to a particular hazard was done. Depending on the risk score, provision is there to propose appropriate measures for their long term sustainability. Ultimately, it can serve as a guideline or decision making tool for identifying CCA, and DRR options to safeguard government development projects.
Climate Change an Existential Threat Today View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session William Van Brunt
This work focuses on the two aspects of climate change, global warming and the increasing incidence and strength of catastrophic weather. The objective of this research is to consider the driver(s) of these aspects of climate change and whether the rate of increase of either or both can be limited and whether the increases in either or both can be reversed. This research was undertaken because of the damages caused and the monumental threat posed by global warming and the tenfold increase in the devastation wrought by catastrophic weather since the seventies. The goal of this work is to add to the teachings on climate change. NOAA global land and sea temperature, global humidity and land precipitation records, satellite measurements of the moisture content of the atmosphere and data on the global impact of catastrophic weather since the seventies were analyzed in accordance with the laws of thermodynamics. The research shows that water vapor, the primary greenhouse gas, is a key contributor to global warming drives evaporation and the increasing moisture content of the atmosphere. This is validated by the match to the historic data. The physics indicate that the recent historic global mismatch between evaporation and precipitation, the resulting increases in the concentration of water vapor and the effects of these increases, that the rate of increase in both global warming and catastrophic weather can be limited and if the rate of precipitation can be increased to exceed the evaporative rate, the effects of both can be reversed.
