This question was posed by Dr Kelly Klima, Center for Clean Air Policy, Washington, in a vivid discussion in the discussion group "Adaptability, Climate Adaptation Network" on the LinkedIn forum. The discussion started a month ago and has attracted 41 comments. The discussion that took its point of departure in the figure below started very broadly although emphasizing on building resilience - more of building environmental resilience for the benefit of human being - but ended in a discussion more focused on adaptation per se.

 
Penney 2008
The discussion was very interesting, a problem was however that it focused more on definitions of the terminology and less on the issue of building resilience, and with a rather developed country perspective.

What is interesting although depressing to see is that this figure that at first sight looks rather comprehensive, including the field where the suggested measures could benefit both mitigation and adaptation, still only takes water aspects into account from a Water and Energy Conservation-perspective. This “northern-biased” perspective lacks much of the integrated approach needed to succeed in implementing adaptation and mitigation.

Maybe the approach represented in this figure is one explanation why the interlinked climate and water still has not gained the full acceptance in the UNFCCC-negotiations. To overcome this lack of acceptance the Water and Climate Coalition has actively worked to achieve an increased interest among the national delegations to bring the issue higher on the official UNFCCC agenda. As a consequence of such an increased understanding the UNFCCC COP at its seventeenth session (Decision 6/CP.17) "requested the secretariat to organize a technical workshop on water, climate change impacts and adaptation strategies, in collaboration with Nairobi work programme partner organizations and other relevant organizations". The workshop, bringing together experts from different organizations, came up with proposals that will be brought back to the next UNFCCC COP-meeting.

One of the interesting activities presented at the workshop held 18-20 July, 2012, in Mexico City, was the "Water Security and Climate Resilient Development; AMCOW Strategic Framework", that has been developed by AMCOW (African Ministers' Council on Water) with the assistance of Global Water Partnership. This Strategic Framework was discussed during the African Water Forum in May, 2012 and was officially launched to the full international audience during the World Water Week in August, 2012. The GWP program that has assisted in developing the Strategic Framework is the "Water, Climate and Development Programme for Africa" with the 'aims to integrate water security and climate resilience in development plans in Africa'. Hence, even though the rather 'northern-biased' discussion on adaptation and climate resilience that has just been ongoing in the LinkedIn adaptation group, the countries most in need for building climate resilience linked to their transboundary waters are increasingly aware of the burning needs and are on their way addressing those needs.
 

The main theme for the 6th World Water Forum was "Time for solutions" and one of the sub-themes dealt with at the thematic sessions was "Respond to climate and global changes in an urbanizing world". The sub-themes under the 6th World Water Forum were, however, not only themes developed and discussed at the Forum as such, but they were prepared during an ongoing process initiated after the 5th WWF in Istanbul 2009 and leading up to the 6th WWF. The process concerned the Water and Climate-theme identified that water management would require holistic and multidisciplinary responses to the increasingly complex challenges, including those linked to responses to climate and global changes. Hence, under the theme seven different targets were identified with different target-and-solution-group coordinators, which would all contribute to the process.

The issue of Water and Climate Change was debated and discussed during high level political round tables, such as the closed session on "Adaptation to Climate Change" convened by the National Water Commission of Mexico, CONAGUA, the Jordan Ministry of Water and Irrigation, and the Portuguese Ministry of Agriculture, Sea, Environment and Spatial Planning. This Roundtable resulted in a set of Recommendations on

• Improving water governance horizontally as well as vertically;
• Improving water management financing, including by a mainstreaming of funding strategies; and
• The need to ensure for decision making under uncertainty, in combination with no regrets strategies as key components of the enabling environment to manage water resources.

The three convening countries and other stakeholders “commit to build the consensus and outcomes of this roundtable into ongoing processes, such as the UNFCCC and the Rio+20 Conference”.

One of the high level panels was “Water Debate: Increasing Resilience to Climate Change: What is the Role of Water Storage”, which included panelists Maria Mutagamba, Minister of Water and Environment, Uganda, Gabriel Azavedo, Director of Sustainability, Odebrecht Energy, Brazil, and Rachel Kyte, Vice President for Sustainable Development, World Bank and the former key water person at the World Bank and one of the initiators to the World Commissions on Dams, now professor of Environmental Engineering at Harvard University, John Briscoe. The panel discussed the role of man-made water storage as part of a solution for building resilience to changing water futures. However, the discussions revealed not very much of new suggestions.

There were also side events, such as the one on “Improving Water Resources Management Through the Global Framework for Climate Services /GFCS)” convened by WMO, and regional sessions such as the one convened by the Korea Water Forum on "Water Education Center for Sustainable Future: Meeting Challenges of Climate Change in Northeast Asia", and the session by Inter-American Development Bank and Mexico National Water Commission (CONAGUA): "Top-Down or Bottom-Up Approaches to Water-Based Climate Change Adaptation in the Americas: the 'Chicken and Egg' Syndrome", all discussing suggested solutions to water adaptation to climate change. Also the high level roundtable on the "Future of Water Desalination" suggested more concrete solutions.

Among the key events under the thematic sessions on "Respond to climate and global changes in an urbanizing world" was the one on "Building Blocks for Integrating Water into the Climate Regime - Raising the Profile of Water in the Global Climate Discourse" convened by Water and Climate Coalition/SIWI. This session, with contributions from among others Freshwater Action Network, CONAGUA Mexico, BRAC University Bangladesh, UNFCCC secretariat and the Unit for Adaptation to Climate Change, EC, in a panel discussion convened by Karin Lexén, SIWI, agreed that water expertise needs to be represented where decisions are made. The chairperson to the UNECE Convention on the 'Protection and Use of Transboundary Watercourses and International Lakes', suggested that as that convention is now open also for partners outside UNECE, its third workshop on "Water and Adaptation to Climate Change in Transboundary Basins: Making adaptation work" to be held in Geneva, 25-26 April 2012 might be a useful opportunity for following-up and intensifying the discussions towards a more pertinent place for water on the UNFCCC agenda.

The water community has taken significant steps in the right direction at COP 17 in Durban. Despite a very small team, the Water and Climate Coalition was able to follow the discussions of our key issues; the continuation of the Nairobi Work Programme, the negotiations on the Adaptation Committee and the Green Climate Fund. We have had great help and support by members from FAN, CI and Green Cross and a very good collaboration with our partners GWP and CONAGUA. We have been able to support a major push by a number of parties, and we will most likely see Mexico, LDCs and African countries speak up for the cause of water.

On December 3rd and December 6th WCC, African Ministers Council on Water (AMCOW), African Union Commission (AUC), African Development Bank (AfDB), United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), Department of Water Affairs, (DWA) South Africa and Global Water Partnership (GWP) arranged Water, Climate and Development Day events. December 3rd was an all-day event and December 6th was a high level panel where key messages from the 3rd were highlighted and discussed. Both meetings took place in the Africa Pavilion at COP 17 in Durban.

Africa Pavilion, December 3rd

Both events were well attended, with over 100-140 persons in the audience, and we received numerous positive and spontaneous comments regarding the content and the value of the topic and discussions.

Water, and its interconnectedness with Climate Change and how this is addressed and managed on the development and funding agendas, is a theme which clearly is on the rise. The concluding statements of the dignitaries sent us off knowing that we had addressed the key questions that make waters case in the climate context AND that the collaboration between WCC and numerous African and international institutions had successfully ensured and, established, the issue of water on the climate agenda.

Mountain regions in the world have experienced above-average warming in recent years. More than 50 % of the world’s population depends on water resources from the mountains. The Himalaya- HK-region is currently providing the necessary water for large parts of the population in Asia. But the current pace in glacier melting as an impact of climate change has significant implications for the ecosystem goods and services the mountain regions provide to humanity, which are especially critical for the survival of poor and indigenous communities.

Even in Sweden the glaciers are melting at an unforeseen pace and measurements of the highest peak, the southern peak of Kebnekaise, covered by a small glacier, in September showed that the top now only reaches 2099.7 m a.s.l., which is the very lowest that has ever been measures and is calculated as the lowest level during the last 1000 years! And the melting speed has increased steadily, not only in Sweden and the Himalayas but also at other high mountain regions. Even the glaciers and large ice masses at Greenland, Arctic and Antarctic are currently increasing their melting pace.

This increasing melting is beyond what scientists have calculated and what is shown in different scenarios as we so far have "only" increased the mean temperature by about 1oC. The impact by the glacier melting in the Himalayas, in particularly as Glacier Lake Outburst Floods, GLOFs, was emphasized in an early version of the NAPA-document of the government of Nepal, and is also described as what can cause catastrophes in valleys also in the NAPA of 2010. This of course may cause detrimental effects to the living conditions for the people living in the valleys. The melting of the Himalaya glaciers may result in an early flood situation and, above all, access to water will be very undeterminable.

Scientists also warn for that the rapid melting of the larger ice masses may result in a more rapidly sea level rise which then would threaten a important amount of world’s population living in low-lying areas, close to the sea.

The International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development, ICIMOD, is arranging a Mountain Day on December 4th, 2011, at the UNFCCC COP-17 in Durban, South Africa. This day will assemble a high-level panel to advocate the value and the critical role of mountains and thereby promote policy actions to ensure the contribution of mountain ecosystem goods and services in particularly the vital access to water.

The United Nations Convention on Climate Change (COP16) is drawing to an end and the world is still waiting for a binding agreement on climate policy. While there is still hope for an eventual deal on mitigation policies, it is time to recognize that climate change is already upon us and that additional budgets and adaptive solutions will be necessary to deal with the consequences.

Climate change increases the likelihood of extreme weather events and the resulting natural disasters. The floods in Pakistan that directly affected 20 million people this summer are a striking example. Yet, while the storms and floods make the headlines it is the after-effects that may take the greatest toil. In Pakistan, a widespread waterborne disease outbreak following the floods has so far been avoided, but the current situation in Haiti proves that sustained action must be taken in post-disaster areas to prevent the spread of disease. In October, ten months after the earthquake, cholera was detected in Haiti. As of December 4, the Haitian Ministry of Public Health & Population reported a total of 93,222 hospital visits and 2,120 deaths due to cholera. Waterborne diseases such as cholera will be one of the most significant risk factors resulting from climate-change disasters. Currently, 5000 children die a day from diarrhoeal diseases that are closely linked to lack of hygiene, clean water and proper management of human waste. In a changing world where extreme weather events destroy or compromise the functionality of our sanitation systems, these numbers are likely to be even higher.

Adapting to climate change means major changes in how vital systems, such as sanitation, in our society are managed.  If major waterborne disease outbreaks as a result of climate change are to be avoided, many nations, especially in developing countries, will need support in adapting sanitation systems to manage the source of disease, wastewater. However, to date donor spending on sanitation and water is very low. Today, Sweden spends less than 2.5% of the state’s aid budget on sanitation and water, down from 5% several years ago. If we are to overcome the challenges of climate adaptation this figure will need to be higher. Similarly, technology innovation in the sector is low and today’s sanitation systems are generally inflexible, fixed infrastructures with little variation across the globe. In the future, we will need flexible technical solutions that can be implemented quickly in post-disaster areas or adapt to prolonged droughts.

There are opportunities for Swedish actors to support this change, both by lobbying for better sanitation policy and funding, and through the development of innovative and adaptive sanitation solutions. The initiative of Peepoople (collaboration SLU and KTH) is one example of Swedish researchers testing the limits of traditional sanitation services and offering possibilities to sterilize human waste in a fast and infrastructure-free manner.  More work is needed to make sanitation systems more flexible to varying water flows resulting from climate change. Other adaption possibilities include coupling sanitation systems to the energy grid (biogas) or decoupling the centralized system to smaller treatment centres during crisis periods. Climate change may be the opportunity we have been waiting for to finally take our pioneering ideas for new sanitation systems off the shelf and put them into reality. The world is waiting.
 

by Jennifer McConville, Chalmers

Världens länder är i Cancún, Mexico för att fortsätta förhandlingarna om ett nytt internationellt avtal . Målsättningen med mötet, COP 16, kan tyckas lågt. ”att ta några steg framåt” till ett rättsligt bindande avtal. Detta kommer att kräva kompromisser, både av i- och av u-länderna. Därför är det anmärkningsvärt och högst obegripligt att Japan redan under de inledande förhandlingarna uttalar att ”Japan will not inscribe its target under the KP on any conditions or under any circumstance”. Vilket betyder att Japan sa att de inte kommer att föra in deras mål (för minskning av växthusgasutsläpp) i Kyotoprotokollet under ”några som helst förutsättningar eller under några som helst omständigheter”. Uttalandet vittnar tydligt om Japan inte tänker förhandla om en andra åtagande period under Kyotoprotokollet som tar slut 2012.
Hur förhandlar man gentemot en sådan part? Eller är det helt enkelt så att Japan lägger det politiska spelets ribba så pass lågt att vem som helst kommer att bli imponerad om Japan senare glider över 1.85 men en lätt darrning på ribban.

FN flaggan och den Mexikanska flaggar utan för konferenscentret Moon Palace i Cancún

Det förhandlas inte enbart om Kyotoprotokollets vara eller icke-vara. Parallella förhandlingar förs inom en massa andra områden här i Cancún. Skogsfrågor förhandlas om, finansieringsfrågor förhandlas om, rapporteringssystem och institutioner och jordbruk förhandlas om. Men det förhandlas inte om vatten. Trots att klimatförändringar i mångt och mycket är förändringar av den hydrologiska cykeln; mer regn, mindre regn, glaciäravsmältning och ökenspridning, försämringar av färskvatten kvalité och påverkan av jordbruksproduktion. Tänk om man verkligen skulle ta och uppmärksammade detta, uppmärksammade vart problemen ligger. Då blir det ju enklare att vida rätt åtgärder. 

Flera länder håller med. De märker redan nu hur deras länder drabbas av klimatförändringar och att vidta åtgärder inom vattenområdet har blivit en självklar och prioriterad fråga för dem. Att tydliggöra vattnets roll inom de internationella klimatförhandlingarna skulle vara ett viktig steg i att vidta åtgärder där problemet ligger.

Jag hoppas att budskapet bokstavligt talat börjat sipprar in till förhandlarna i Moon Palace…

by Hanna Wolf, Swedish Water House i Cancún, Mexico

This week, when the Cancun negotiations are supposed to move into top gear, I feel it is relevant to give some thoughts to how climate change (or even the perception of it) may affect transboundary water management. While this is certainly not the focus of discussions or negotiations in Mexico, it is an important area that needs to be further understood.

Much of the knowledge we have, as well as existing agreements/regimes over transboundary water are increasingly volatile because of increased water use. Also, they are becoming  unworkable due to the perception that climate change is altering the basic parameters for water governance. Whether correct or not, perceptions of climate change are undermining existing agreements.

According to the Oregon State Database on transboundary water agreements over the period of the last 200 years, riparian countries have signed nearly 400 water-sharing agreements. While that is a positive sign one  key question is, however, dual: to what extent are these agreements actually contributing to meaningful cooperation, and how can they be kept functioning particularly in the face of climate change induced uncertainty? Many of these agreements are essentially rigid instruments that are modifiable only under certain limited conditions. Thus, it is not only that we need functional agreements on transboundary waters; we also need the agreements to be sustainable, lasting and progressive Unfortunately, more than 40% of present agreements do not even mention ‘uncertainty’ in their texts.

Transboundary waters need to be dealt with. However, this is not an easy process. The increasing competition and the difficulties emanating from the altering parameters caused (or so claimed) by climate change are creating further uncertainties. Agreements on transboundary waters are in general not adapted to deal with uncertainties and a changing world, but are often characterised by rigid volumetric allocations of the resource, based on averages of a historical pattern. The keyword that is lacking is flexibility. States are not prone to  sign agreements with uncertain consequences for them in the future. So even though we may know now that agreements should be more focused on sharing waters in percentage terms rather than in cubic metres, it  does not mean it will be easy to get there. 

To address these issues the Uppsala Centre for Sustainable Development, Stockholm International Water Institute (www.siwi.org) and Peace and Development Research at School of Global Studies at Gothenburg University have joined forces to research this important area. The basic thrust of the research (funded by Sida-SAREC) will focus on the question: how are Transboundary Waters to be governed given the increasing demands on global water resources and the increasing perceptions of a Global Climate Change?

The research, which starts in 2011, will draw upon cases from Africa (Nile and Niger), Middle East (Jordan Basin and Asia (Mekong and Ganges-Brahmaputra).
While some countries recently have called for the water issues to be more prominent in the Cancun meeting it is receiving less attention than it should. Knock on effects of climate change (or the mere perception of it) such as the one described above merits more attention in the future. It is important also to address future scenarios and adaptation options  at river basin level . Sweden is currently financing a UNEP led project to address such questions in the Nile Basin. Such regional analysis coupled with political and governance research will equip us better for the challenges that are coming.

by Dr Anders Jägerskog, Associate Professor of Peace and Development, School of Global Studies, Göteborg University and;
Senior Programme Manager, Water Resources
Regional Team for Economic and Environmental Development (REED), Sida
Embassy of Sweden, Nairobi, Kenya

Preparations for Bonn Climate Change Talks June 2010 is in full spin here at the office; text editing, ordering catering, putting together invitations, inviting speakers, briefing speakers, contacting media, writing press releases, talking to delegates as well as coordinating ourselves and our partners all around the world. 

Swedish Water House is involved in the negotiation through SIWI and together with Stakeholder Forum and UN-Water, we are planning a Water Day in Bonn on 2 June. The Water Day is a follow up to last year’s Water Day arranged during the climate negotiations in Barcelona, 2nd - 6th November, 2009. The main objective is to keep up the pressure for the integration of water and climate policy in the negotiations towards COP16, as well as to discuss the vital and possible pathways on how to implement water resource management to cope with climate change.

As always during the negotiations a lot of things are going on and everyone has a lot on their agendas. The challenge for us the following two weeks is to be as sharp and concise as possible in our message and deliver concrete examples on how to integrate water into the negotiated texts.

by Hanna Wolf 

Browsing the internet trying to find information on the Baltic Sea I ended up on www.havet.nu (which is a great portal with all kind of publications and information on the sea and related topics). One publication in specific caught my interest - State of the World 2009: Into a Warming World. It’s from Worldwatch Institute and is mainly focusing on climate change.

“Worldwatch has gathered the best thinking from 47 experts to answer the following question: How do we keep climate change at manageable levels and how do we adapt to what is coming our way, no matter how successful we are in reducing future greenhouse gas emissions?”

It is definitely worth checking out. The different chapters can be downloaded separately here:
http://www.worldwatch.org/node/5658

by Ingrid Stangberg
-Ingrid is an assistant for the World Water Week team at SIWI.

A New Climate for Copenhagen

It’s hard to miss the fact that the world is likely to see a new treaty on climate change emerge from the fifteenth conference of parties of the Climate Convention in Copenhagen this December. Considering the negotiations have been underway for some time now, hopes are high that the treaty will be strong enough to have a real impact. Several factors now seem to be in play.
 

Less money, more problems

The global economic crisis puts the rhetoric about climate and sustainable development to the test. Do our politicians dare to decide on measures with harsh, short term economic consequences, but that are necessary on the long term? Are we prepared ourselves for the consequences of these decisions? How will business manage to stick to codes of Corporate Social Responsibility and environmental strategies as the need for profitability gets more urgent? Finally, are we really prepared to include the most vulnerable people in the measures needed to meet the effects of climate change? If we are, how will we do that?

No trust

A successful treaty most somehow overcome the serious crisis of trust between rich and poor nations. Too often, commitments and promises about resource allocation have remained only words on paper. The Monterrey meeting with the 0.7-goal is just one example. Both rich and poor countries must work at closing the confidence gap between them for the treaty to engage all stakeholders. In some case, the elite in developing countries will need to reconsider their privileges and contribute resources of their own.
 

Efforts for the climate

During the year, a range of global meetings will happen outside the climate change agenda. These can be important checkpoints for preparing messages for work in Copenhagen. The first of these meetings is the World Water Forum in Istanbul in March, whose organisers are hoping for a political declaration firmly putting water issues on the climate negotiation agenda. CSD-17 in New York in May has agriculture as its main theme and is a perfect stepping stone for increasing awareness that efficient water use in the entire chain field to fork – not least in the consumption of virtual water- is a crucial adaptation measure in water poor regions. In August, our own World Water Week takes place with Sweden as the new chair of the EU and when the run-up to Copenhagen has begun for real.

Apart from technique and research, something more is needed: the political will to see and move beyond national and economic interests. Everyone needs to agree on the ethical grounding for what we want to achieve and why.  This will require everyone to contribute based on their own strength and areas of influence. 
 

Hope

Even caught in a time of global economic unrest and difficult conflicts, many of us greeted Barack Obama’s presidential accession with great joy. Not that we have illusions about everything changing suddenly, or that the USA has a more “European” president. The most important breaking point between old and new in Washington is that the most powerful leader in the world is now someone who clearly sees real global leadership as something founded on equal rights, dialogue and common humanity. Obama summed it up in his inauguration speech when he declared that his nation has “chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord”.
 

 change...yes we can?

Whether the Copenhagen meeting will succeed or not depends on if we want to see new possibilities in this challenge - and if we choose to let the economic crisis pave the way to new strategies and ways of thinking – or if we choose to return to an outdated view of growth and safety, and thereby step into a dead-end. The civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. said in one of his famous speeches about equality between people of different colour that worse than the evil deeds of the wicked people, is the appalling silence of the good people. This year and coming years, the driving force of all people with good will is needed. The year 2009 has started in hope – and in despair.

Now it is time to role up the sleeves and make sure that the rhetoric about sustainable development is translated into brave decisions that make a real impact on real lives.

by Karin Lexén, Director, Swedish Water House