TY - JOUR A1 - Nussbaumer, S. A1 - Schaub, Y. A1 - Huggel, C. A1 - Walz, Ariane T1 - Risk estimation for future glacier lake outburst floods based on local land-use changes JF - Natural hazards and earth system sciences N2 - Effects of climate change are particularly strong in high-mountain regions. Most visibly, glaciers are shrinking at a rapid pace, and as a consequence, glacier lakes are forming or growing. At the same time the stability of mountain slopes is reduced by glacier retreat, permafrost thaw and other factors, resulting in an increasing landslide hazard which can potentially impact lakes and therewith trigger far-reaching and devastating outburst floods. To manage risks from existing or future lakes, strategies need to be developed to plan in time for adequate risk reduction measures at a local level. However, methods to assess risks from future lake outbursts are not available and need to be developed to evaluate both future hazard and future damage potential. Here a method is presented to estimate future risks related to glacier lake outbursts for a local site in southern Switzerland (Naters, Valais). To generate two hazard scenarios, glacier shrinkage and lake formation modelling was applied, combined with simple flood modelling and field work. Furthermore, a land-use model was developed to quantify and allocate land-use changes based on local-to-regional storylines and three scenarios of land-use driving forces. Results are conceptualized in a matrix of three land-use and two hazard scenarios for the year 2045, and show the distribution of risk in the community of Naters, including high and very high risk areas. The study underlines the importance of combined risk management strategies focusing on land-use planning, on vulnerability reduction, as well as on structural measures (where necessary) to effectively reduce future risks related to lake outburst floods. Y1 - 2014 U6 - https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-14-1611-2014 SN - 1561-8633 VL - 14 IS - 6 SP - 1611 EP - 1624 PB - Copernicus CY - Göttingen ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Walz, Ariane A1 - Braendle, J. M. A1 - Lang, D. J. A1 - Brand, Fridolin Simon A1 - Briner, Simon A1 - Elkin, C. A1 - Hirschi, C. A1 - Huber, R. A1 - Lischke, H. A1 - Schmatz, D. R. T1 - Experience from downscaling IPCC-SRES scenarios to specific national-level focus scenarios for ecosystem service management JF - Technological forecasting & social change N2 - Scenario analysis is a widely used approach to incorporate uncertainties in global change research. In the context of regional ecosystem service and landscape management where global IPCC climate simulations and their downscaled derivates are applied, it can be useful to work with regional sodo-economic scenarios that are coherent with the global IPCC scenarios. The consistency with the original source scenarios, transparency and reproducibility of the methods used as well as the internal consistency of the derived scenarios are important methodological prerequisites for coherently downscaling pre-existing source scenarios. In contrast to well-established systematic-qualitative scenario techniques, we employ here a formal technique of scenario construction which combines expert judgement with a quantitative, indicator-based selection algorithm in order to deduce a formally consistent set of focus scenario. In our case study, these focus scenarios reflect the potential development pathways of major national-level drivers for ecosystem service management in Swiss mountain regions. The integration of an extra impact factor ("Global Trends") directly referring to the four principle SRES scenario families, helped us to formally internalise base assumptions of IPCC SRES scenarios to regional scenarios that address a different thematic focus (ecosystem service management), spatial level (national) and time horizon (2050). Compared to the well-established systematic-qualitative approach, we find strong similarities between the two methods, including the susceptibility to personal judgement which is only partly reduced by the formal method. However, the formalised scenario approach conveys four clear advantages, (1) the better documentation of the process, (2) its reproducibility, (3) the openness in terms of the number and directions of the finally selected set of scenarios, and (4) its analytical power. (C) 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. KW - Nested scenarios KW - Formalised scenario analysis KW - Regional ecosystem service management KW - Downscaling socio-economic scenarios KW - IPCC Y1 - 2014 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2013.08.014 SN - 0040-1625 SN - 1873-5509 VL - 86 SP - 21 EP - 32 PB - Elsevier CY - New York ER - TY - GEN A1 - Rolinski, Susanne A1 - Rammig, Anja A1 - Walz, Ariane A1 - von Bloh, Werner A1 - van Oijen, M. A1 - Thonicke, Kirsten T1 - A probabilistic risk assessment for the vulnerability of the European carbon cycle to weather extremes BT - The ecosystem perspective T2 - Postprints der Universität Potsdam : Mathematisch naturwissenschaftliche Reihe (487) N2 - Extreme weather events are likely to occur more often under climate change and the resulting effects on ecosystems could lead to a further acceleration of climate change. But not all extreme weather events lead to extreme ecosystem response. Here, we focus on hazardous ecosystem behaviour and identify coinciding weather conditions. We use a simple probabilistic risk assessment based on time series of ecosystem behaviour and climate conditions. Given the risk assessment terminology, vulnerability and risk for the previously defined hazard are estimated on the basis of observed hazardous ecosystem behaviour. We apply this approach to extreme responses of terrestrial ecosystems to drought, defining the hazard as a negative net biome productivity over a 12-month period. We show an application for two selected sites using data for 1981-2010 and then apply the method to the pan-European scale for the same period, based on numerical modelling results (LPJmL for ecosystem behaviour; ERA-Interim data for climate). Our site-specific results demonstrate the applicability of the proposed method, using the SPEI to describe the climate condition. The site in Spain provides an example of vulnerability to drought because the expected value of the SPEI is 0.4 lower for hazardous than for non-hazardous ecosystem behaviour. In northern Germany, on the contrary, the site is not vulnerable to drought because the SPEI expectation values imply wetter conditions in the hazard case than in the non-hazard case. At the pan-European scale, ecosystem vulnerability to drought is calculated in the Mediterranean and temperate region, whereas Scandinavian ecosystems are vulnerable under conditions without water shortages. These first model- based applications indicate the conceptual advantages of the proposed method by focusing on the identification of critical weather conditions for which we observe hazardous ecosystem behaviour in the analysed data set. Application of the method to empirical time series and to future climate would be important next steps to test the approach. T3 - Zweitveröffentlichungen der Universität Potsdam : Mathematisch-Naturwissenschaftliche Reihe - 487 KW - global vegetation model KW - climate extremes KW - fire emissions KW - drought KW - forest KW - productivity KW - reduction KW - events KW - assimilation KW - uncertainty Y1 - 2018 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-407999 SN - 1866-8372 IS - 487 SP - 1813 EP - 1831 ER -