@article {bnh-8236, title = {Implications of climate change for emergency services operations - insights from the literature}, number = {699}, year = {2021}, month = {10/2021}, institution = {Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC}, address = {Melbourne}, abstract = {

Greenhouse gas emissions to date and existing pledges for emissions reduction from national governments suggest that the world is tracking a medium emissions future at best, and possibly a high emission one. This report consolidates available knowledge of the potential impacts of climate change on key issues that influence the (emergency management services (EMS) in Australia and New Zealand, through a systematic review of the literature (both peer reviewed and grey literature) combined with an analysis of relevant inquiries. It is an output of the Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC project entitled Preparing emergency services for a climate-challenged world.

For the EMS, one of the most immediate and visceral impacts of climate change is increasing frequency and severity of disaster-inducing natural hazards. Yet, it would be a mistake to assume that this is the extent of the challenge: interacting climatic, social, demographic and economic trends will result in transformations in our societies and way of life. For the EMS, the climate change adaptation challenge is more than just {\textquoteleft}more of the same{\textquoteright}. The increasingly significant impacts that climate change is having on the natural and human systems that support livelihoods and wellbeing in Australia and New Zealand present a profound challenge for all communities, businesses and services.

In the decades ahead, Australia is expected to experience increased warming across the whole of the continent with rainfall declines over much of the southern parts of the country very likely. These changes are not unfolding linearly. Already it is clear that the climate has altered over recent decades through a serious of step changes or {\textquoteleft}breaks{\textquoteright}. This means that current rates of change are an unreliable indicator of future rates of change.

Similarly, New Zealand is already registering warming and changing rainfall in some regions. These trends are expected to continue and include increasing average temperatures and more hot days for norther areas, significant shifts in rainfall patterns and more extreme rainfall, and profound increases in the time spent in drought by 2040. Sea level rise is also a major concern for the island nation, with sea level rise around New Zealand projected to be up to 10\% higher than the global average.

For Australia and New Zealand, climate change means more heatwaves, more extreme precipitation events, more bushfire weather, more storms, fewer but more intense cyclones, and more landslides. It also means more compound events and cascading impacts, where multiple extreme events occur simultaneously {\textendash} as was seen in Black Summer, where bushfires, heatwaves and floods were experienced during a long-term drought. Climate change is also increasing the risk that second and third order impacts of disasters, such as a disease outbreak following a flood, themselves cascade into another event of equal or greater severity.

Increasing frequency and severity of climatic hazards are intersecting with growing exposure and changing vulnerability patterns to drive disaster risk. Some of the desirable features of contemporary lifestyles {\textendash} such as high levels of consumption and technology-dependent, centralised systems {\textendash} are further increasing disaster risk. A no-regrets approach to climate change adaptation is\ to build {\textquoteleft}adaptive capacity{\textquoteright}, which is made up of five interlinked domains: assets, flexibility, social organisation, learning, and agency. Building adaptive capacity/reducing vulnerability requires looking beyond direct climate change impacts (e.g. managing heat) to address structural and systemic constraints on the ability of people and ecosystems to adapt to ongoing change, such as social inequalities, low environmental sustainability and poor governance.

Climate change adaptation incorporates a range of objectives and areas of effort. While it necessarily involves {\textquotedblleft}coping{\textquotedblright} at any moment in time, it also extends far beyond just coping to also better {\textquotedblleft}fit{\textquotedblright} emerging conditions and to proactively adjust to, and help positively shape, the future. Criteria of success of a climate change adaptation initiative include effectiveness, efficiency, equity, accounting for externalities, and having an extended time horizon. The inverse of good adaptation is maladaptation: actions that may lead to increased risk of adverse climate related outcomes, increased vulnerability to climate change, or diminished welfare, now or in the future.

Adaptation faces limits and barriers. As climate change worsens, it is likely impacts will exceed some systems{\textquoteright} and groups{\textquoteright} capacity to manage them. Uneven structural vulnerabilities and engrained issues such as downplaying climate change risks means some groups are continually or regularly unable to cope or adapt well. One of the risks of the {\textquotedblleft}shared responsibility{\textquotedblright} paradigm of disaster risk management in Australia is that {\textquoteleft}communities often are left to manage residual risks shifted towards individuals, whether or not they have the financial, physical, mental, or social capacity to manage them{\textquoteright}. It is often assumed that a lack of climate change information or adaptation knowledge is the main barrier to effective and timely adaptation action. While knowledge and information are important, analysis of barriers to adaptation suggests that institutional barriers (e.g. lack of clear mandate, roles, responsibilities, willingness to act) are often more significant.

One of the enablers of good climate change adaptation is systems thinking {\textendash} appreciating systemic relationships and how to manage them. When it comes to the EMS, a systems-based approach widens our understanding of the sector and the many implications of climate change for it. This report presents two frameworks that are useful for contextualising the EMS in a wider context, identifying how climate change might influence various elements of this system, and where the EMS can direct different types of adaptation strategies.

The academic literature provides some valuable insights into the drivers at work in the EMS context. However, very little research addresses the {\textquotedblleft}question of the future{\textquotedblright} per se and that which does, does not do so in a comprehensive manner that incorporates climate change or challenges the assumption that existing trends will unfold linearly. We therefore need to bring together different insights in order to piece together what the future may entail for the EMS. One useful way to begin this process is to systematically consider the {\textquoteleft}STEEP drivers{\textquoteright} - that is, insights into Social, Technological, Environmental, Economic and Policy/Political drivers {\textendash} and to then start thinking through how they may interact with climate change. In response to input from the scenarios team (the other part of this project), we have included a sixth category {\textendash} legal {\textendash} into the framework. This report provides examples of the types of changes and uncertainties the EMS may need to consider as it encounters the climate change adaptation undertaking.

We draw on the literature review to present analysis provided to the scenarios process. This includes a summary of biophysical impacts of climate change to 2035, including a plausible (but not predictive) climate hazard event map. We then summarise the likely flow-on effects to 2035 and finally the likely implications of those flow-on effects for water and environment, agriculture and aquaculture, infrastructure, human health and wellbeing, and society in general. Finally, we explore what adaptive capacity might look like under the four plausible futures developed by the scenarios team. In this way, the EMS has a comprehensive picture of what climate change impacts might influence them and what resources they might have to manage them.\ 

}, keywords = {Climate change, Emergency management, governance, Planning, Scenarios}, issn = {699}, author = {Lauren Rickards and Adriana Keating} } @article {bnh-8235, title = {Preparing emergency services for operations in a climate-challenged world - summary report}, number = {689}, year = {2021}, month = {10/2021}, institution = {Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC}, address = {Melbourne}, abstract = {

EMS agencies are learning to adapt and be prepared for futures where the changing climate will influence the services they deliver, and how they deliver those services. This research project was designed to help the sector to better prepare for these futures and take action to more quickly adapt as it unfolds, and importantly take action to shape the future in ways that reduce the risks of the hazards ahead.

In 2020 and 2021 this research project, under the stewardship of Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC and AFAC and led by Reos Partners and RMIT University, collaborated with a select group of leaders and professionals (a scenario team) from across the Australia and New Zealand EMS. The research project was completed in three integrated parts:

  1. A synthesis of the literature conducted by RMIT on the implications of climate change for emergency services operation
  2. A series of participatory workshops with the project scenario team to develop an explorative and adaptable methodology that is then used to create transformative scenarios (2021-2035)
  3. Develop EMS guidance for using transformative scenarios in a climate-challenged world for planning and decision-making in EMS.

By involving key people from across the EMS in the construction and application of the scenarios (the scenario team), this project has helped to build the sector{\textquoteright}s understanding and capabilities in scenario development and in scenario use and application. The project has not only strengthened the scenario thinking capability of the participants across a range of agencies, but secured positive support and endorsement from the scenario team who can continue to share and apply the project methods across the EMS.

A range of documents and resources are available from www.bnhcrc.com.au/research/climatescenarios. These include a workbook, and a research and methodology pack:

Transformative scenarios in a climate-challenged world {\textendash} workbook:

Transformative scenarios in a climate-challenged world {\textendash} research and methodology:\ 

}, keywords = {Climate change, Emergency management, governance, Planning, Scenarios}, issn = {689}, author = {Stephen Atkinson and Geoff Brown and Russell Fisher and Zoe Fitzgerald and Lauren Rickards and Adriana Keating} } @article {bnh-8232, title = {Transformative scenarios in a climate challenged world - a guide for using scenarios in the emergency management sector}, number = {708}, year = {2021}, month = {10/2021}, institution = {Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC}, address = {Melbourne}, abstract = {

During 2020 and 2021, under the stewardship of Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC and AFAC and led by Reos Partners and RMIT University, a select group of leaders and professionals from across the Australia and New Zealand emergency management sector (EMS) and related organisations worked together to better understand the driving forces in the world that interact to shape the future in unpredictable and volatile ways; ways that humans cannot reliably forecast or predict.

Using these driving forces, the team constructed a set of plausible futures that invite the EMS and the organisations within it to examine their current thinking about the future and challenge their existing assumptions. These scenarios explore what might happen over 2021-2035 in a climate-challenged world and how these futures might plausibly come about.

While this Guide references the breadth of ways in which scenarios can be applied in practice, the core purpose of this Guide is to outline one practical way for EMS organisations to start using these scenarios. The Guide outlines a simple, yet powerful way (wind tunnelling) for organisations to test and improve decision making and planning in an uncertain world where the volatility, frequency and magnitude of climate events will challenge the sector like never before. Experimenting with this {\textquotedblleft}wind tunnelling{\textquotedblright} approach and becoming familiar with its use in the context of one{\textquoteright}s own organisation, will provide leaders and decision-makers with the strategic insights required to strengthen and improve their strategy work and support their organisations to more effectively adapt to and influence the future.

This Guide is designed to be used in conjunction with the other documents in the Transformative scenarios in a climate-challenged world: workbook, which includes:

You will also need to access Transformative scenarios in a climate-challenged world: research and methodology, which includes:\ \ 

All of these documents can be found here.

The Guide draws on the global experience of Reos Partners in developing and applying scenarios in many different contexts, the climate change research conducted for the project by RMIT University, the wisdom and hands-on experience of the sector-wide scenario team and a little bit of collective imagination.

}, keywords = {Climate change, Emergency management, governance, Planning, Scenarios}, issn = {708}, author = {Reos Partners} } @article {bnh-8233, title = {Transformative scenarios in a climate challenged world - emergency management sector case studies as worked examples}, number = {710}, year = {2021}, month = {10/2021}, institution = {Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC}, address = {Melbourne}, abstract = {

During 2020 and 2021, under the stewardship of BNHCRC and AFAC and led by Reos Partners and RMIT University, a select group of leaders and professionals from across the Australia and New Zealand emergency management sector (EMS) and related organisations worked together to better understand the driving forces in the world that interact to shape the future in unpredictable and volatile ways; ways that humans cannot reliably forecast or predict.

Using these driving forces, the team constructed a set of plausible futures that invite the EMS and the organisations within it to examine their current thinking about the future and challenge their existing assumptions. These scenarios explore what might happen over 2021-2035 in a climate-challenged world and how these futures might plausibly come about.

The purpose of Emergency management sector case studies as worked examples is to provide a {\textquoteleft}light{\textquoteright} version of a wind-tunneling process using four case examples from the perspective of different Emergency Service agency types:

  1. Urban firefighting services\  \  \  {\textquotedblleft}urban operations{\textquotedblright}
  2. Rural firefighting services\  \  \  \  {\textquotedblleft}rural operation{\textquotedblright}
  3. Land management agencies\  \  \ {\textquotedblleft}land management{\textquotedblright}
  4. State emergency services\  \  \  \  \ {\textquotedblleft}emergency services{\textquotedblright}

Abridged versions of four strategies or plans have been selected as {\textquoteleft}cases{\textquoteright} to illustrate the application of the wind-tunnelling process described in\ Transformative scenarios in a climate-challenged world: a guide for using scenarios in the emergency management sector.

The cases are:

Case 1 {\textendash} Urban Operations: State Emergency Response Plan Extreme Heat Sub-Plan (2017)

Case 2 {\textendash} Rural Operations: Barwon South West Bushfire Management Strategy (2020)

Case 3 {\textendash} Land Management: City of Ipswich Floodplain Management Strategy (2019)

Case 4 {\textendash} Emergency Services: NZ Risk Reduction Strategy (2019-29)

The Case Studies draw on the experience of the sector-wide scenario team in developing the scenarios and have been designed to be used in conjunction with the other documents in the Transformative scenarios in a climate-challenged world: workbook, including:

You will also need to access Transformative scenarios in a climate-challenged world: research and methodology, which includes:\ \ 

All of these documents can be found\ here.

Note that wind-tunnelling is a rigorous process requiring significant time and resources, and that these Case Studies are a {\textquoteleft}light{\textquoteright} version of a wind-tunnelling process developed for illustrative purposes only in order to show ways in which the worked examples may be tested and improved.

Note also that not every step in each worked example of the case studies has been fully completed. Parts have been deliberately left blank with an invitation for the reader to engage and complete the exercise. Again, what{\textquoteright}s provided is by way of example is for illustrative purposes only.

Finally, none of the results of wind-tunnelling provided here should be seen as a recommendation for any improvement to any of the strategies selected as EMS Case Studies.

}, keywords = {Climate change, Emergency management, governance, Planning, Scenarios}, issn = {710}, author = {Reos Partners} } @article {bnh-8234, title = {Transformative scenarios in a climate challenged world - research methodology for scenario development}, number = {709}, year = {2021}, month = {10/2021}, institution = {Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC}, address = {Melbourne}, abstract = {

During 2020 and 2021, under the stewardship of BNHCRC and AFAC and led by Reos Partners and RMIT University, a select group of leaders and professionals from across the Australia and New Zealand emergency management sector (EMS) and related organisations worked together to better understand the driving forces in the world that interact to shape the future in unpredictable and volatile ways; ways that humans cannot reliably forecast or predict.

Using these driving forces, the team constructed a set of plausible futures that invite the EMS and the organisations within it to examine their current thinking about the future and challenge their existing assumptions. These scenarios explore what might happen over 2021-2035 in a climate-challenged world and how these futures might plausibly come about.

This document presents the research methodology behind the development of the scenarios.

It is designed to be read in conjunction with the other documents in the Transformative scenarios in a climate-challenged world: workbook and the Transformative scenarios in a climate-challenged world: research and methodology pack, which includes:

All of these documents can be found\ here.

}, keywords = {Climate change, Emergency management, governance, Planning, Scenarios}, issn = {709}, author = {Reos Partners} } @article {bnh-5694, title = {Exploratory scenario analysis for disaster risk reduction: Considering alternative pathways in disaster risk assessment}, journal = {International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction}, year = {2019}, month = {07/2019}, abstract = {

Disaster risk is a combination of natural hazards, along with society{\textquoteright}s exposure and vulnerability to them. Therefore, to ensure effective, long-term disaster risk reduction we must consider the dynamics of each of these components and how they change over extended periods due to population, economic and climatic drivers, as well as policy and individual decisions. This paper provides a methodology to capture these factors within exploratory scenarios designed to test the effectiveness of policy responses to reduce disaster losses. The scenarios developed and subsequent analysis of them combine knowledge and insight from stakeholders and experts, and make use of simulation modelling to enable scenarios with qualitative and quantitative elements to be integrated within risk assessment processes and contribute to strategic risk treatments. The methodology was applied to a case-study in Greater Adelaide, Australia, and used to assess how disaster risk for earthquakes, bushfire and coastal inundation changes from 2016 to 2050 under five exploratory scenarios for the future of the region. This analysis can be applied more broadly to consider how future risks impacts on regional viability, and suitability for investment related to the need to gain a better understanding of governmental and organisational exposure to physical risks.

}, keywords = {Disaster risk, Risk assessment, Scenarios, Simulation modelling, Stakeholder engagement}, doi = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2019.101230}, url = {https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212420919302286}, author = {Graeme Riddell and Hedwig van Delden and Holger Maier and Aaron Zecchin} } @mastersthesis {bnh-6661, title = {Foresight for risk {\textendash} using scenarios for strategic risk assessment and management of emergent disaster risk}, year = {2019}, month = {12/2019}, school = {University of Adelaide}, address = {Adelaide}, abstract = {

Disaster impacts around the world are increasing with 2011 and 2017 the largest on record in terms of total losses from disasters in recorded history (USD 444billion and USD 341billion, respectively). The reasons for the increase in losses are multiple. Climate change is increasing the likelihood and intensity of several natural hazard types, and as the world{\textquoteright}s population and economy grow, and humans increasingly develop in areas exposed to natural hazard (e.g. along rivers, and coastal areas), the values exposed are also rapidly increasing. These multiple factors contribute to the complex nature of disaster risk, which is considered to be the combination of natural hazard intensity and extent, exposure (assets, people, other values), and vulnerabilities of the exposed values to the characteristics of the hazards. This can be considered the risk triangle {\textendash} hazard, exposure and vulnerability {\textendash} and each of these factors change into the future impacted by a range of drivers; population and economic change, technology, urbanisation rates, political actions etc.

To reduce the impacts of disasters, risk management and reduction activities are designed and implemented, and are typically underpinned by risk assessments. Risk assessments use qualitative and/or quantitative approaches to attempt to characterise the likelihood and impact of disaster types for a region or organisation. Currently, risk assessments do not capture future changes across all dimensions of risk in a manner that provides insight into the strategic threats and opportunities of emergent disaster risks. Therefore, there is a need for approaches to consider realistic degrees of complexity within the disaster risk system and account for the uncertainty in emergent risk. By capturing this within disaster risk assessments, treatment options can be developed and tested that strategically manage these risks over time.

This research has developed these approaches and provides three key contributions through the use of foresight, primarily scenarios within disaster risk assessment processes, to support effective policy and investment decision making to reduce future impacts. The thesis is organised around three publications, all contributing to the development of a generic framework which integrates foresight into disaster risk management and specific approaches to develop and use scenarios for strategic risk assessment and management of emergent disaster risk. The first paper (Chapter 2) proposes and demonstrates this generic framework for the incorporation of the principles of foresight into risk assessment and management processes. The second paper (Chapter 3) focuses on the design of scenarios to support policy making for disaster risk reduction through several improvements to the methodological approach for constructing relevant and challenging scenarios using an {\textquotedblleft}outcomes of interest{\textquotedblright} framing. The third paper (Chapter 4) outlines and applies an approach for the use of exploratory scenarios within quantitative disaster risk assessment through the development of alternative pathways of disaster risk using scenarios and integrated risk models.

}, keywords = {Disaster risk management, Foresight, modelling, Risk assessment, Scenarios}, url = {https://digital.library.adelaide.edu.au/dspace/handle/2440/122575}, author = {Graeme Riddell} } @article {bnh-6260, title = {Tomorrow{\textquoteright}s disasters {\textendash} Embedding foresight principles into disaster risk assessment and treatment}, journal = {International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction}, year = {2019}, month = {12/2019}, abstract = {

Disaster risk is a complex, uncertain and evolving threat to society which changes based on broad drivers of hazard, exposure and vulnerability such as population, economic and climatic change, along with new technologies and social preferences. It also evolves as a function of decisions of public policy and public/private investment which alters future risk profiles. These factors however are often not captured within disaster risk assessments and explicitly excluded from the UN General Assembly definition of a disaster risk assessment which focuses on the current state of risk. This means that 1) we cannot adequately capture changes in risk and risk assessments are out of date as soon as published but also 2) we cannot show the benefit of proactive risk treatments in our risk assessments. This paper therefore outlines a generic, scale-neutral, framework for integrating foresight {\textendash} thinking about the future {\textendash} into risk assessment methodologies. This is demonstrated by its application to a disaster risk assessment of heatwave risk in Tasmania, Australia, and shows how risk changes across three future scenarios and what proactive treatments could be possible mitigating the identified drivers of future risk.

}, keywords = {Disaster risk management, Foresight, Risk assessment, Risk treatment, Scenarios}, doi = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2019.101437}, url = {https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212420919305588}, author = {Graeme Riddell and Hedwig van Delden and Holger Maier and Aaron Zecchin} }