Download or read book Shock Waves written by Stephane Hallegatte and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2015-11-23 with total page 227 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ending poverty and stabilizing climate change will be two unprecedented global achievements and two major steps toward sustainable development. But the two objectives cannot be considered in isolation: they need to be jointly tackled through an integrated strategy. This report brings together those two objectives and explores how they can more easily be achieved if considered together. It examines the potential impact of climate change and climate policies on poverty reduction. It also provides guidance on how to create a “win-win†? situation so that climate change policies contribute to poverty reduction and poverty-reduction policies contribute to climate change mitigation and resilience building. The key finding of the report is that climate change represents a significant obstacle to the sustained eradication of poverty, but future impacts on poverty are determined by policy choices: rapid, inclusive, and climate-informed development can prevent most short-term impacts whereas immediate pro-poor, emissions-reduction policies can drastically limit long-term ones.

Download or read book Poverty written by Paul Spicker and published by Zed Books. This book was released on 2007-01-08 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A limited number of definitions have dominated academic and political discourse and poverty understanding over the last few decades. The aim of this "glossary" is to widen the choice of definitions available, thereby expanding the scientific field of poverty research so it gets closer to the complex reality of poverty and the lives of poor people. This book has over 200 definitions and explanations of terms used with poverty.--[from book].

Download or read book Health of People Health of Planet and Our Responsibility written by Wael Al-Delaimy and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2020-05-13 with total page 414 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This open access book not only describes the challenges of climate disruption, but also presents solutions. The challenges described include air pollution, climate change, extreme weather, and related health impacts that range from heat stress, vector-borne diseases, food and water insecurity and chronic diseases to malnutrition and mental well-being. The influence of humans on climate change has been established through extensive published evidence and reports. However, the connections between climate change, the health of the planet and the impact on human health have not received the same level of attention. Therefore, the global focus on the public health impacts of climate change is a relatively recent area of interest. This focus is timely since scientists have concluded that changes in climate have led to new weather extremes such as floods, storms, heat waves, droughts and fires, in turn leading to more than 600,000 deaths and the displacement of nearly 4 billion people in the last 20 years. Previous work on the health impacts of climate change was limited mostly to epidemiologic approaches and outcomes and focused less on multidisciplinary, multi-faceted collaborations between physical scientists, public health researchers and policy makers. Further, there was little attention paid to faith-based and ethical approaches to the problem. The solutions and actions we explore in this book engage diverse sectors of civil society, faith leadership, and political leadership, all oriented by ethics, advocacy, and policy with a special focus on poor and vulnerable populations. The book highlights areas we think will resonate broadly with the public, faith leaders, researchers and students across disciplines including the humanities, and policy makers.

Download or read book Renewable Energy Sources and Climate Change Mitigation written by Ottmar Edenhofer and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2011-11-21 with total page 1088 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Special Report (IPCC-SRREN) assesses the potential role of renewable energy in the mitigation of climate change. It covers the six most important renewable energy sources - bioenergy, solar, geothermal, hydropower, ocean and wind energy - as well as their integration into present and future energy systems. It considers the environmental and social consequences associated with the deployment of these technologies, and presents strategies to overcome technical as well as non-technical obstacles to their application and diffusion. SRREN brings a broad spectrum of technology-specific experts together with scientists studying energy systems as a whole. Prepared following strict IPCC procedures, it presents an impartial assessment of the current state of knowledge: it is policy relevant but not policy prescriptive. SRREN is an invaluable assessment of the potential role of renewable energy for the mitigation of climate change for policymakers, the private sector, and academic researchers.

Download or read book Energy Poverty Alleviation written by Carlos Rubio-Bellido and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2022-01-14 with total page 286 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book presents research on energy poverty alleviation, approaching the complex phenomenon topic holistically and with heterogeneity. It includes contributions from research teams studying the topic at a national, regional and local levels worldwide. The book is divided in two main blocks. The first part, New Approaches, involves novel assessments and concepts from a global and multidisciplinary point of view. The second part, Contexts, offers new theoretical diagnoses focused on case studies of different scales from around the world, and concepts for future trends. Energy Poverty Alleviation will be of interest to policy makers, stakeholders, academics and researchers with knowledge in the energy poverty field.

Download or read book Energy Indicators for Sustainable Development written by International Atomic Energy Agency and published by United Nations Publications. This book was released on 2005 with total page 176 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This publication presents a set of energy indicators for sustainable development and is an analytical tool for countries to track their progress on energy for sustainable development. The thematic framework, guidelines, methodologies and energy indicators set out in this publication reflect the expertise of five international agencies and organizations (International Atomic Energy Agency, United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, International Energy Agency, Eurostat and European Environment Agency). General guidelines and specific methodology sheets for 30 energy indicators are outlined in this report for statisticians, analysts, policy makers and academics to use in their efforts to analyse the effects of energy policies on the social, economic and environmental dimensions of sustainable development.

Download or read book World Development Report 2010 written by World Bank and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2009-11-06 with total page 444 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the crowded field of climate change reports, 'WDR 2010' uniquely: emphasizes development; takes an integrated look at adaptation and mitigation; highlights opportunities in the changing competitive landscape; and proposes policy solutions grounded in analytic work and in the context of the political economy of reform.

Download or read book Evaluating Climate Change Action for Sustainable Development written by Juha I. Uitto and published by Springer. This book was released on 2017-01-11 with total page 365 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is open access under a Creative Commons license. This authoritative book presents the ever progressing state of the art in evaluating climate change strategies and action. It builds upon a selection of relevant and practical papers and presentations given at the 2nd International Conference on Evaluating Climate Change and Development held in Washington DC in 2014 and includes perspectives from independent evaluations of the major international organisations supporting climate action in developing countries, such as the Global Environment Facility. The first section of the book sets the stage and provides an overview of independent evaluations, carried out by multilateral development banks and development organisations. Important topics include how policies and organisations aim to achieve impact and how this is measured, whether climate change is mainstreamed into other development programs, and whether operations are meeting the urgency of climate change challenges. The following sections focus on evaluation of climate change projects and policies as they link to development, from the perspective of international organisations, NGO’s, multilateral and bilateral aid agencies, and academia. The authors share methodologies or approaches used to better understand problems and assess interventions, strategies and policies. They also share challenges encountered, what was done to solve these and lessons learned from evaluations. Collectively, the authors illustrate the importance of evaluation in providing evidence to guide policy change to informed decision-making.

Download or read book Climate Impacts on Energy Systems written by Jane O. Ebinger and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2011 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "While the energy sector is a primary target of efforts to arrest and reverse the growth of greenhouse gas emissions and lower the carbon footprint of development, it is also expected to be increasingly affected by unavoidable climate consequences from the damage already induced in the biosphere. Energy services and resources, as well as seasonal demand, will be increasingly affected by changing trends, increasing variability, greater extremes and large inter-annual variations in climate parameters in some regions. All evidence suggests that adaptation is not an optional add-on but an essential reckoning on par with other business risks. Existing energy infrastructure, new infrastructure and future planning need to consider emerging climate conditions and impacts on design, construction, operation, and maintenance. Integrated risk-based planning processes will be critical to address the climate change impacts and harmonize actions within and across sectors. Also, awareness, knowledge, and capacity impede mainstreaming of climate adaptation into the energy sector. However, the formal knowledge base is still nascent?information needs are complex and to a certain extent regionally and sector specific. This report provides an up-to-date compendium of what is known about weather variability and projected climate trends and their impacts on energy service provision and demand. It discusses emerging practices and tools for managing these impacts and integrating climate considerations into planning processes and operational practices in an environment of uncertainty. It focuses on energy sector adaptation, rather than mitigation which is not discussed in this report. This report draws largely on available scientific and peer-reviewed literature in the public domain and takes the perspective of the developing world to the extent possible."

Download or read book Natural Disasters and Climate Change written by Stéphane Hallegatte and published by Springer. This book was released on 2014-09-17 with total page 214 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores economic concepts related to disaster losses, describes mechanisms that determine the economic consequences of a disaster, and reviews methodologies for making decisions regarding risk management and adaptation. The author addresses the need for better understanding of the consequences of disasters and reviews and analyzes three scientific debates on linkage between disaster risk management and adaptation to climate change. The first involves the existence and magnitude of long-term economic impact of natural disasters on development. The second is the disagreement over whether any development is the proper solution to high vulnerability to disaster risk. The third debate involves the difficulty of drawing connections between natural disasters and climate change and the challenge in managing them through an integrated strategy. The introduction describes economic views of disaster, including direct and indirect costs, output and welfare losses, and use of econometric tools to measure losses. The next section defines disaster risk, delineates between “good” and “bad” risk-taking, and discusses a pathway to balanced growth. A section entitled “Trends in Hazards and the Role of Climate Change” sets scenarios for climate change analysis, discusses statistical and physical models for downscaling global climate scenarios to extreme event scenarios, and considers how to consider extremes of hot and cold, storms, wind, drought and flood. Another section analyzes case studies on hurricanes and the US coastline; sea-level rises and storm surge in Copenhagen; and heavy precipitation in Mumbai. A section on Methodologies for disaster risk management includes a study on cost-benefit analysis of coastal protections in New Orleans, and one on early-warning systems in developing countries. The next section outlines decision-making in disaster risk management, including robust decision-making, No-regret and No-risk strategies; and strategies that reduce time horizons for decision-making. Among the conclusions is the assertion that risk management policies must recognize the benefits of risk-taking and avoid suppressing it entirely. The main message is that a combination of disaster-risk-reduction, resilience-building and adaptation policies can yield large potential gains and synergies.

Download or read book Climate Change and Global Poverty written by Lael Brainard and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2009-10-01 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Climate change threatens all people, but its adverse effects will be felt most acutely by the world's poor. Absent urgent action, new threats to food security, public health, and other societal needs may reverse hard-fought human development gains. Climate Change and Global Poverty makes concrete recommendations to integrate international development and climate protection strategies. It demonstrates that effective climate solutions must empower global development, while poverty alleviation itself must become a central strategy for both mitigating emissions and reducing global vulnerability to adverse climate impacts.

Download or read book How to Avoid a Climate Disaster written by Bill Gates and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2021-02-16 with total page 201 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: #1 NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER • In this urgent, authoritative book, Bill Gates sets out a wide-ranging, practical—and accessible—plan for how the world can get to zero greenhouse gas emissions in time to avoid a climate catastrophe. Bill Gates has spent a decade investigating the causes and effects of climate change. With the help of experts in the fields of physics, chemistry, biology, engineering, political science, and finance, he has focused on what must be done in order to stop the planet's slide to certain environmental disaster. In this book, he not only explains why we need to work toward net-zero emissions of greenhouse gases, but also details what we need to do to achieve this profoundly important goal. He gives us a clear-eyed description of the challenges we face. Drawing on his understanding of innovation and what it takes to get new ideas into the market, he describes the areas in which technology is already helping to reduce emissions, where and how the current technology can be made to function more effectively, where breakthrough technologies are needed, and who is working on these essential innovations. Finally, he lays out a concrete, practical plan for achieving the goal of zero emissions—suggesting not only policies that governments should adopt, but what we as individuals can do to keep our government, our employers, and ourselves accountable in this crucial enterprise. As Bill Gates makes clear, achieving zero emissions will not be simple or easy to do, but if we follow the plan he sets out here, it is a goal firmly within our reach.

Download or read book Decarbonizing Development written by Marianne Fay and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2015-06-09 with total page 185 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The science is unequivocal: stabilizing climate change implies bringing net carbon emissions to zero. This must be done by 2100 if we are to keep climate change anywhere near the 2oC warming that world leaders have set as the maximum acceptable limit. Decarbonizing Development: Three Steps to a Zero-Carbon Future looks at what it would take to decarbonize the world economy by 2100 in a way that is compatible with countries' broader development goals. Here is what needs to be done: -Act early with an eye on the end-goal. To best achieve a given reduction in emissions in 2030 depends on whether this is the final target or a step towards zero net emissions. -Go beyond prices with a policy package that triggers changes in investment patterns, technologies and behaviors. Carbon pricing is necessary for an efficient transition toward decarbonization. It is an efficient way to raise revenue, which can be used to support poverty reduction or reduce other taxes. Policymakers need to adopt measures that trigger the required changes in investment patterns, behaviors, and technologies - and if carbon pricing is temporarily impossible, use these measures as a substitute. -Mind the political economy and smooth the transition for those who stand to be most affected. Reforms live or die based on the political economy. A climate policy package must be attractive to a majority of voters and avoid impacts that appear unfair or are concentrated on a region, sector or community. Reforms have to smooth the transition for those who stand to be affected, by protecting vulnerable people but also sometimes compensating powerful lobbies.

Download or read book Review of the Draft Fourth National Climate Assessment written by National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2018-06-18 with total page 207 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Climate change poses many challenges that affect society and the natural world. With these challenges, however, come opportunities to respond. By taking steps to adapt to and mitigate climate change, the risks to society and the impacts of continued climate change can be lessened. The National Climate Assessment, coordinated by the U.S. Global Change Research Program, is a mandated report intended to inform response decisions. Required to be developed every four years, these reports provide the most comprehensive and up-to-date evaluation of climate change impacts available for the United States, making them a unique and important climate change document. The draft Fourth National Climate Assessment (NCA4) report reviewed here addresses a wide range of topics of high importance to the United States and society more broadly, extending from human health and community well-being, to the built environment, to businesses and economies, to ecosystems and natural resources. This report evaluates the draft NCA4 to determine if it meets the requirements of the federal mandate, whether it provides accurate information grounded in the scientific literature, and whether it effectively communicates climate science, impacts, and responses for general audiences including the public, decision makers, and other stakeholders.

Download or read book The Nexus Energy Environment and Climate Change written by Walter Leal Filho and published by Springer. This book was released on 2017-10-30 with total page 382 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book focuses on the water–energy–climate nexus, which can be used to improve energy security and quality of life for millions of people in developing countries. It enhances the reader’s understanding of the link between energy and climate, through the development of new approaches to and methods for energy generation, energy use, and climate change adaptation and resilience. By presenting case studies and research reports, the book addresses the relevant issues needed in order to analyze and successfully implement technologies in the water–energy–climate nexus. It focuses on the contributions of higher education institutions in terms of capacity-building for energy efficiency, energy access and energy security, as they relate to climate change mitigation. The book combines results from the authors’ own research with detailed analyses, and the research presented lays the foundation for innovative new concepts and ideas, which the authors subsequently discuss. The book will appeal to all those interested in the links between energy issues, sustainability and climate change, as it focuses on the exchange between science and technology experts, as well as decision makers. It also supports students studying renewable energies and energy security, while serving as a valuable reference source for researchers, professionals, practitioners and scientists.

Download or read book Reducing Poverty Protecting Livelihoods and Building Assets in a Changing Climate written by Dorte Verner and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2010-06-25 with total page 460 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Climate change is the defining development challenge of our time. More than a global environmental issue, climate change and variability threaten to reverse recent progress in poverty reduction and economic growth. Both now and over the long run, climate change and variability threatens human and social development by restricting the fulfillment of human potential and by disempowering people and communities in reducing their livelihoods options. Communities across Latin America and the Caribbean are already experiencing adverse consequences from climate change and variability. Precipitation has increased in the southeastern part of South America, and now often comes in the form of sudden deluges, leading to flooding and soil erosion that endanger people s lives and livelihoods. Southwestern parts of South America and western Central America are seeing a decrease in precipitation and an increase in droughts. Increasing heat and drought in Northeast Brazil threaten the livelihoods of already-marginal smallholders, and may turn parts of the eastern Amazon rainforest into savannah. The Andean inter-tropical glaciers are shrinking and expected to disappear altogether within the next 20-40 years, with significant consequences for water availability. These environmental changes will impact local livelihoods in unprecedented ways. Poverty, inequality, water access, health, and migration are and will be measurably affected by climate change. Using an innovative research methodology, this study finds quantitative evidence of large variations in impacts across regions. Many already poor regions are becoming poorer; traditional livelihoods are being challenged in unprecedented ways; water scarcity is increasing, particularly in poor arid areas; human health is deteriorating; and climate-induced migration is already taking place and may increase. Successfully reducing social vulnerability to climate change and variability requires action and commitment at multiple levels. This volume offers key operational recommendations at the government, community, and household levels with particular emphasis placed on enhancing good governance and technical capacity in the public sector, building social capital in local communities, and protecting the asset base of poor households.

Download or read book Energy Poverty written by Stefan Bouzarovski and published by Springer. This book was released on 2017-12-22 with total page 125 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This open access book aims to consolidate and advance debates on European and global energy poverty by exploring the political and infrastructural drivers and implications of the condition across a variety of spatial scales. It highlights the need for a geographical conceptualization of the different ways in which household-level energy deprivation both influences and is contingent upon disparities occurring at a wider range of spatial scales. There is a strong focus on the relationships among energy transformation, institutional change and place-based factors in determining the nature and location of energy-related injustices. The book also explores how patterns and structures of energy poverty have changed over time, as evidenced by some of the common measures used to describe the condition. In part, this means investigating the makeup of energy poor demographics across various social and spatial cleavages. More broadly, it also argues that energy sector reconfigurations are both reflected in and shaped by various domains of social and political organization, especially in terms of creating poverty-relevant outcomes.