The authors propose a new climatic drought index: the standardized precipitation evapotranspiration index (SPEI). The SPEI is based on precipitation and temperature data, and it has the advantage of combining multiscalar character with the capacity to include the effects of temperature variability on drought assessment. The procedure to calculate the index is detailed and involves a climatic water balance, the accumulation of deficit/surplus at different time scales, and adjustment to a log-logistic probability distribution. Mathematically, the SPEI is similar to the standardized precipitation index (SPI), but it includes the role of temperature. Because the SPEI is based on a water balance, it can be compared to the self-calibrated Palmer drought severity index (sc-PDSI). Time series of the three indices were compared for a set of observatories with different climate characteristics, located in different parts of the world. Under global warming conditions, only the sc-PDSI and SPEI identified an...

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A Multiscalar Drought Index Sensitive to Global Warming: The Standardized Precipitation Evapotranspiration Index

Two studies investigated the tendency of people to be unrealistically optimistic about future life events. In Study 1, 258 college students estimated how much their own chances of experiencing 42 events differed from the chances of their classmates. Overall, they rated their own chances to be above average for positive events and below average for negative events, ps<.001. Cognitive and motivational considerations led to predictions that degree of desirability, perceived probability, personal experience, perceived controllability, and stereotype salience would influence the amount of optimistic bias evoked by different events. All predictions were supported, although the pattern of effects differed for positive and negative events. Study 2 tested the idea that people are unrealistically optimistic because they focus on factors that improve their own chances of achieving desirable outcomes and fail to realize that others may have just as many factors in their favor. Students listed the factors that they thought influenced their own chances of experiencing eight future events. When such lists were read by a second group of students, the amount of unrealistic optimism shown by this second group for the same eight events decreased significantly, although it was not eliminated.

http://psych415.class.uic.edu/Readings/Weinstein,%20Unrealistic%20optimism,%20JPSP,%201980.pdf

Unrealistic optimism about future life events

This paper reviews the concept of adaptation of human communities to global changes, especially climate change, in the context of adaptive capacity and vulnerability. It focuses on scholarship that contributes to practical implementation of adaptations at the community scale. In numerous social science fields, adaptations are considered as responses to risks associated with the interaction of environmental hazards and human vulnerability or adaptive capacity. In the climate change field, adaptation analyses have been undertaken for several distinct purposes. Impact assessments assume adaptations to estimate damages to longer term climate scenarios with and without adjustments. Evaluations of specified adaptation options aim to identify preferred measures. Vulnerability indices seek to provide relative vulnerability scores for countries, regions or communities. The main purpose of participatory vulnerability assessments is to identify adaptation strategies that are feasible and practical in communities. The distinctive features of adaptation analyses with this purpose are outlined, and common elements of this approach are described. Practical adaptation initiatives tend to focus on risks that are already problematic, climate is considered together with other environmental and social stresses, and adaptations are mostly integrated or mainstreamed into other resource management, disaster preparedness and sustainable development programs. r 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

/pdf/adaptation-adaptive-capacity-and-vulnerability-3txg5bpzf9.pdf

Adaptation, adaptive capacity and vulnerability

Global environmental change and sustainability science increasingly recognize the need to address the consequences of changes taking place in the structure and function of the biosphere. These changes raise questions such as: Who and what are vulnerable to the multiple environmental changes underway, and where? Research demonstrates that vulnerability is registered not by exposure to hazards (perturbations and stresses) alone but also resides in the sensitivity and resilience of the system experiencing such hazards. This recognition requires revisions and enlargements in the basic design of vulnerability assessments, including the capacity to treat coupled human–environment systems and those linkages within and without the systems that affect their vulnerability. A vulnerability framework for the assessment of coupled human–environment systems is presented.

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A framework for vulnerability analysis in sustainability science

There is considerable research interest on the meaning and measurement of resilience from a variety of research perspectives including those from the hazards/disasters and global change communities. The identification of standards and metrics for measuring disaster resilience is one of the challenges faced by local, state, and federal agencies, especially in the United States. This paper provides a new framework, the disaster resilience of place (DROP) model, designed to improve comparative assessments of disaster resilience at the local or community level. A candidate set of variables for implementing the model are also presented as a first step towards its implementation.

A place-based model for understanding community resilience to natural disasters

/pdf/the-natural-history-of-selborne-with-a-naturalist-s-calendar-1f0unakg38.pdf

The natural history of Selborne : with a naturalist's calendar and additional observations. / by Gilbert White; with a preface by Richard Jefferies.

/pdf/the-natural-history-of-selborne-by-gilbert-white-edited-with-1jgemdj1ik.pdf

The natural history of Selborne / by Gilbert White ; edited with notes by Grant Allen ; illustrated by Edmund H. New.

The Wetlands Controversy

TO show graphically what proportion of land area is in floodplain might be useful in studying land use relative to the flood hazard or in comparing experiences among areas with flood problems. Data on land subject to inundation commonly are aggregated by states or large drainage basins. Until now there has been no map showing the spatial distribution of land in floodplain. The map herewith represents a first approximation of these spatial differences.

Obtaining floodplain data 

The few estimates for the United States of the land area in floodplain differ by as much as 25 percent. There are several reasons for the discrepancy among estimates: the difficulty of determining the area actually subject to inundation; double counting of some areas while omitting others; use of inconsistent criteria, such as a two percent chance of occurrence (50-year) versus a one percent (100-year) flood definition; and the natural variability associated with the methods of statistical sampling on which the estimates are based.

As part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Inventory of Soil and Water Conservation Needs, which was conducted from 1959 through 1962, estimates of land area in floodplain were made for 12,711 watersheds …

A national floodplain map

The World Water Conference held in Argentina in March 1977 reaffirmed the HABITAT targets of providing safe drinking water to all the world's population by 1990 The World Bank, through its support of water supply projects, is equally concerned that all people, whatever their income levels, obtain a potable supply This paper used as a discussion paper at Bank staff seminars, examines the implications of this policy The purpose is to examine major issues in applying the Bank policy on the urban poor to sector study, project appraisal and project monitoring in the field of water supply The following topics are discussed: (a) the selection of the target population; (b) the various types of service that could be considered; (c) appropriate standards of quality and quantity in relation to the net health hazard; and (d) pricing policies which ensure affordability and replicability It also discusses: (e) the potential for increased community involvement in water supply activities; and (f) the associated research needs

Gilbert F. White

Papers

The natural history of Selborne : with a naturalist's calendar and additional observations. / by Gilbert White; with a preface by Richard Jefferies.

The natural history of Selborne / by Gilbert White ; edited with notes by Grant Allen ; illustrated by Edmund H. New.

The Wetlands Controversy

A national floodplain map

Water supply service for the urban poor : issues