Climate certainty, uncertainty, and human water availability in a warming world
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- Human combustion of fossil fuels is changing the radiative balance of the planet, causing global warming. In the global mean, the temperature response to such greenhouse gas emissions is well constrained. However, at the local and regional scales where people's adaptations to climate change will take place, projections of global warming and its attendant impacts can be highly uncertain. This uncertainty arises from (1) unknown future greenhouse gas emissions, (2) imperfect understanding of how the climate system works, and (3) the variation innate to the climate system, called internal variability. Such uncertainty complicate people's decisions on how best to respond to climate change. But in projections of future climate, only internal variability presents an irreducible form of uncertainty. The goal of this dissertation is to identify the irreducible range of future outcomes from internal variability in predictions of hydroclimate and water availability for people and ecosystems. My first chapter examines the irreducible uncertainty in future water resources and population exposure to water stress. My second chapter quantifies snow's present and future potential to supply water for people. My third chapter tests the relative likelihoods of wintertime snow accumulation increases versus decreases in the near-term decades given the same global warming. Identifying the range of outcomes is critical to informing proactive adaptations, particularly if adaptations are to be robust, meaning they should be beneficial across the broadest range of potential outcomes.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Form | electronic; electronic resource; remote |
| Extent | 1 online resource. |
| Publication date | 2015 |
| Issuance | monographic |
| Language | English |
Creators/Contributors
| Associated with | Mankin, Justin Staller |
|---|---|
| Associated with | Emmett Interdisciplinary Program in Environment and Resources (Stanford University) |
| Primary advisor | Diffenbaugh, Noah S |
| Primary advisor | Stedman, Stephen John |
| Thesis advisor | Diffenbaugh, Noah S |
| Thesis advisor | Stedman, Stephen John |
| Thesis advisor | Lambin, Eric F |
| Thesis advisor | Rajaratnam, Balakanapathy |
| Thesis advisor | Schultz, Kenneth A |
| Advisor | Lambin, Eric F |
| Advisor | Rajaratnam, Balakanapathy |
| Advisor | Schultz, Kenneth A |
Subjects
| Genre | Theses |
|---|
Bibliographic information
| Statement of responsibility | Justin Staller Mankin. |
|---|---|
| Note | Submitted to the Emmett Interdisciplinary Program in Environment and Resources. |
| Thesis | Thesis (Ph.D.)--Stanford University, 2015. |
| Location | electronic resource |
Access conditions
- Copyright
- © 2015 by Justin Staller Mankin
- License
- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial 3.0 Unported license (CC BY-NC).
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