Policy to Mitigate Effects of ENSO-Related Climate Variability

1. Policy to Mitigate Effects of ENSO-Related Climate Variability James W. Hansen

2. The Big Picture • What do you know about El Niño and La Niña? • From a policy perspective, how would you view El Niño and La Niña? • an impending disaster? • a degree of foreknowledge? • an opportunity? • …all of the above. http://www.davidsuzuki.org/Climate_Change/Impacts/Extreme_Weather/El_Nino.asp

3. What would you do differently with advance information? “…then there was famine in all the lands, but in all the land of Egypt there was bread.” -- Genesis 41:54

4. What would you do differently with advance information? • Who are you? • What decisions do you make that are sensitive to climate? • What information does ENSO state give you? • What additional information do you need? How will you get it? • With whom do you need to cooperate?

5. INTERMISSION

6. climate predictability human vulnerability decision capacity What conditions must be in place for society to benefit from ENSO information? opportunity Benefit results when prediction leads to decisions that reduce vulnerability to impacts of climate variability.

7. predictability vulnerability opportunity decision capacity Preconditions for Benefit • Vulnerability & motivation • Decision options • Predictability of climate • Communication • Institutions and policy Forecast information is useful when it addresses need that is real and recognized. Decision makers must be aware of climate risk, and motivated to use forecasts to manage that risk.

8. predictability vulnerability opportunity decision capacity Preconditions for Benefit • Vulnerability & motivation • Decision options • Predictability of climate • Communication • Institutions and policy Benefits are conditioned on the existence and understanding of decision options that are sensitive to information in forecasts, and compatible with goals and constraints.

9. predictability vulnerability opportunity decision capacity Preconditions for Benefit • Vulnerability & motivation • Decision options • Predictability of climate • Communication • Institutions and policy Relevant components of climate variability must be predictable in relevant periods, at an appropriate scale, with sufficient accuracy and lead time for decisions.

10. predictability vulnerability opportunity decision capacity Preconditions for Benefit • Vulnerability & motivation • Decision options • Predictability of climate • Communication • Institutions and policy Successful use requires that the right people receive, understand, and correctly interpret the right information at the right time, in a form that can be applied to their climate-sensitive decisions.

11. predictability vulnerability opportunity decision capacity Preconditions for Benefit • Vulnerability & motivation • Decision options • Predictability of climate • Communication • Institutions and policy Sustained operational use of forecasts requires institutional commitment to provide information and other support, and policies that support institutions and farmers.

12. How will El Niño impacts us?The Attribution Problem • Societally-important impacts of ENSO? • Does El Niño imply adverse impacts? • Are impacts of El Niño & La Niña opposite? • Would you expect impacts of the next El Niño to be the same as the last El Niño? • Magnitude • Timing • Spatial patterns • Other oceans • Chaotic atmosphere

13. How will El Niño impacts us?The Attribution Problem • Temporal consistency • Probabilistic thinking • Appropriate use of time-series data • Statistical hypothesis testing • Spatial coherence • Mechanistic understanding • Secondary and tertiary impacts • Be open to surprise

14. How will El Niño impacts us? Ex-post vs. ex-ante • Ex-post: • Losses that follow a climate shock • Possibly persistent impacts of coping responses • Ex-ante: • Opportunity costs associated with conservative strategies of risk-averse decision makers in anticipation of the possibility of a shock

15. What would you do differently? • Forecasts have no intrinsic value. • Improved outcomes associated with improved decisions do.

16. What would you do differently? Sectors • Agriculture • Food insecurity early warning and response • Water resource management • Health • Vectors • Sanitation • Energy • Demand • Hydropower supply • Disaster management

17. What would you do differently? Scales • Examples from agriculture: • Field-scale crop management • Farm-scale resource allocation • Community decisions, e.g., Florida potato farmers • Watershed-scale irrigation distribution • Sub-national scale food stock management • National requests for international food aid • Individual vs. market vs. vs. public policy

18. What would you do differently? Scales

19. What would you do differently? Hazard vs. Development • What is more valuable, a skillful forecast of adverse or favorable climatic conditions? • Hazard perspective: • Crisis response • Ex-post impacts • Development perspective • Managing variability • Includes ex-ante impact • Both address “risk management” • Competing or complementary?

20. Safety Nets “Cargo Nets” Disaster aid Intensification Coping strategies FOREFITED OPPORTUNITY HARDSHIP CRISIS

21. Where Does Public Policy Enter? • Policy drives institutions. • Institutional mandate • Allocation of public resources • Policy constrains or enhances flexibility, therefore resilience, of decision makers. • Policy influences overall economy. • Policy influences risk. • Tactical, climate-sensitive policy decisions.

22. Where Does Public Policy Enter? Interventions • Crisis response Crises tend to affect diverse populations and sectors, crossing traditional institutional mandates. Crisis response often calls for coordination or consolidation among diverse institutions.

23. Where Does Public Policy Enter? Interventions • Crisis response • Disaster preparedness Advanced preparation improves effectiveness and reduces cost of response, but requires ongoing political will, and solid probabilistic understanding of potential impacts.

24. Where Does Public Policy Enter? Interventions • Crisis response • Disaster preparedness • Institutional support for prediction Primarily national meteorological services. Due to cost of ocean monitoring and dynamic prediction capacity, international institutions play a role. Met services must support meteorological observation networks.

25. Where Does Public Policy Enter? Interventions • Crisis response • Disaster preparedness • Institutional support for prediction • Institutional support for communication Goals should be timeliness, equitable access, relevance, and honest characterization of uncertainty. Options include internet, media, extension services. Media low cost but few safeguards against abuse.

26. Where Does Public Policy Enter? Interventions • Crisis response • Disaster preparedness • Institutional support for prediction • Institutional support for communication • Institutional support for individual/community response Key questions: Is information enough? Based in stakeholder or climate institutions? Existing or new institutions? Key challenge: Gap between meteorological and stakeholder institutional networks.

27. Thank you