On February 28, 2022, the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Working Group II released its Sixth Assessment Report: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability. The writing of this report involved more than 270 scientists who spent the past three years reviewing an extensive body of literature to assess the impact of climate change on human and natural systems and better understand the role of adaptation in alleviating some climate-related impacts.
The International Water Management Institute’s Dr. Aditi Mukherji was one of the coordinating lead authors of the report’s water chapter, which reviews observed and anticipated hydrological shifts, gauges the risks these changes pose to human and natural systems, and explores the potential for water-related climate adaptation measures.
In this webinar, IWMI brings together six of the lead authors who contributed to that chapter to walk you through some of their key findings.
Background:
The water chapter reiterates findings from the IPCC Working Group I report about the intensification of the water cycle, and shows how ecosystems and all economic sectors have been affected by climate-induced water cycle intensification. Indeed, the majority of world’s population — especially those involved in climate-sensitive occupations like agriculture — are experiencing impacts of climate change through shifts in the water cycle. Such impacts can assume the form of extreme precipitation, accelerated glacial melt, crippling drought, or severe flooding.
But if water is the primary medium through which people feel the impacts of climate change, it is also a part of the solution. The majority of adaptation options available to us today either exist in response to water-related hazards, or are themselves water-related adaptation measures, such as soil moisture conversation, enhanced rainwater harvesting, improved water storage, and more.
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Speaker Profiles
Dr. Martina Angela Caretta is a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Human Geography at Lund University, Sweden. She holds a PhD in Geography from Stockholm University. She is coordinating as Lead Author of the “Water” Chapter in the forthcoming (March 2022) WGII IPCC 6th Assessment Report. She is a feminist geographer with expertise in water, climate change adaptation, gender and participatory methodologies. She has carried out extensive fieldwork in East Africa, Latin America and Appalachia. Her work has been published in Gender, Place and Culture; Annals of the AAG, Climate & Development, Frontiers Water, Qualitative Research among others
Prof. Richard Betts (MBE FRMetS), is Head of Climate Impacts Research at the Met Office Hadley Centre and University of Exeter. He has worked in climate modelling since 1992, specialising in terrestrial ecosystems. He has been a Lead Author on three IPCC Assessment Reports, including most recently the 6th Assessment Report as a Lead Author on the Working Group 2 chapter on Water. He coordinated a major EU Framework 7 project HELIX (High-End climate Impacts and extremes) and directed the production of the Technical Report for the UK’s 3rd National Climate Change Risk Assessment.
Dr. Tabea Lissner, is Co-head of Science at Climate Analytics and leads the team’s work on climate change adaptation and vulnerability. She is also Co-head of Programme Strategies, providing strategic guidance as part of the Executive Team. With more than 10 years of experience in the field of climate change impacts, vulnerability and adaptation, her work focusses on the analysis of human-environmental systems, using conceptual as well as quantitative modelling approaches and spatial analysis methods. Tabea is Lead Author in the upcoming IPCC Sixth Assessment Report, contributing to Working Group II on Chapter 4 Water and is a Drafting Author of the report’s Summary for Policy Makers (SPM).
Dr. Yukiko Hirabayashi, is Professor of Department of Civil Engineering (since 2018) and Head of laboratory of hydrology in the Shibaura Institute of Technology, Japan. Lead Author of Chapter 2 (High Mountain) in IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on climate change) Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a changing Climate; Chapter 4 (Water) in IPCC WG2 AR6. Principal research interest and expertise: global water cycle, extreme hydrological events, climate change impacts. Awards: Tison Award of International Association of Hydrological Sciences (2009) and Prize of Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (2020).
Dr. Ruth Morgan, is Director of the Centre for Environmental History at the Australian National University (ANU). She has published widely on the climate and water histories of Australia and the British Empire, including her award-winning book, Running Out? Water in Western Australia (2015). Her current project, on environmental exchanges between British India and the Australian colonies, has been generously supported by the Australian Research Council and the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. Her next book, Climate Change and International History, is under contract with Bloomsbury.
Dr. Aditi Mukherji, is a Principal Researcher at the
International Water Management Institute. Aditi is a Coordinating Lead Author (CLA) of the Water Chapter in the Working Group II of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC,) and a member, Core Writing Team of the IPCC’s AR6 Synthesis Report. Her areas of specialization are groundwater governance, energy-irrigation nexus, climate change adaptation and community management of water resources.
Program:
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- 14:00-14:10 IST: Opening remarks and introducing the speakers – Dr. Mark Smith, Director General, IWMI
- 14:10-14:15 IST: IPCC WGII Water Chapter Overview: Dr. Aditi Mukherji, IWMI, India
- 14:15-14:35 IST: Observed and projected changed in precipitation, soil moisture, cryosphere and drought and their societal impacts: Prof. Richard Betts, Met Office Hadley Centre and University of Exeter, UK
- 14:35-14:50 IST: Observed and projected changes in floods and societal impacts – Dr. Yukiko Hirabayashi, Shibaura Institute of Technology, Japan, Japan
- 14:50-15:00 IST: Disproportionate impacts on women, marginal communities, and indigenous People – Dr. Ruth Morgan, Australian National University, Australia and Dr. Martina Angela Caretta, Lund University, Sweden
- 15:00-15:15 IST: Current water-related adaptation and their benefits – Dr. Aditi Mukerji, IWMI, India
- 15:15-15:30 IST: Effective of future adaptation at higher levels of global warming – Dr. Tabea Lissner, Climate Analytics, Germany
- 15:30-15:55 IST: Q&A session
- 15:55-16:00 IST: Dr. Rachael McDonnell, Deputy Director General, IWMI
