Summer 2018: Sustainability Leadership


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Sustainability Leadership

Course: BIOL/OEAS/IDS 467, BIOL/OEAS 567 (three credits)
CRNs: 35510, 35861, 35874, 35855, 35856
Course title: Sustainability Leadership
Instructors: Dr. Hans-Peter Plag, Dr. Tatyana Lobova, Dr. Eddie Hill
Term: Summer 2018 (season 1)
Time: Mondays and Wednesday, 9:00 AM - 1:00 PM
Location: BAL 2068 -- SRC 1009


Class 4 (05/23/2018): Part 1: Systems theory — the Earth's life-support system. Part 2: Hazards

Class slides


Part 1: Systems theory — the Earth's life-support system

Systems theory provides a transdisciplinary approach to understand the behavior of a complex entity. “A system is a cohesive conglomeration of interrelated and interdependent parts that is either natural or man-made. Every system is delineated by its spatial and temporal boundaries, surrounded and influenced by its environment, described by its structure and purpose or nature and expressed in its functioning. In terms of its effects, a system can be more than the sum of its parts if it expresses synergy or emergent behavior. Changing one part of the system usually affects other parts and the whole system, with predictable patterns of behavior. For systems that are self-learning and self-adapting, the positive growth and adaptation depend upon how well the system is adjusted with its environment. Some systems function mainly to support other systems by aiding in the maintenance of the other system to prevent failure. The goal of systems theory is systematically discovering a system's dynamics, constraints, conditions and elucidating principles (purpose, measure, methods, tools, etc.) that can be discerned and applied to systems at every level of nesting.” (Wikipedia, 2018)

The concept of system of system allows to couple systems in various ways and to address complexity and levels of systems.

In the context of sustainability leadership, systems theory provides a basis to vitualizes the entity under consideration as a collection of interrelated parts bound together to operate sustainably. Each part can be considered as a system interacting with the other systems. The relationships between the parts are as important as the parts themselves. The whole of the system of interrelated systems (ecosystem, human community, humans and built environment embedded into the non-human environment) creates an environment that operates as the Earth's life-support system. This planetary system is interrelated with is extraterrestrial environment.

From a system-point of view, the Earth's life-support system is in a transition to a high-energy state, with potential severe changes in meteorological and hydrological hazards. This transition is caused by a single-species high-energy pulse and is associated with recent rapid climate change. The projected trajectory of the system includes more rapid climate change and a large sea level rise during the next centuries unparalleled by all changes experienced by civilization. This change in the overall state of the planetray system will have impacts on all systems within this system of systems.

An important concept for system observations is that of Essential Variables.

Reading List

Mandatory Readings

Academic Room, 2013. Systems Theory. html.

Kissling et al. (2018).

IPBES (2018)

Additional Readings

Barnosky et al., 2012

Hansen et al., 2016


Part 2: Hazards

In each group, work on identifying the hazards that could impact the system the group is considering. Take a time horizon of at least 50 years and up to 100 years.

Reading List

Mandatory Readings

Southeast Florida Regional Climate Change Compact Technical Ad hoc Work Group. April 2011. A Unified Sea Level Rise Projection for Southeast Florida. A document prepared for the Southeast Florida Regional Climate Change Compact Steering Committee. 27 p. pdf.

Caffrey, M. A., Beavers, R. L., Hoffman, C. H., 2018. Sea Level Rise and Storm Surge Projections for the National Park Service Natural Resource Report Series NPS/NRSS/NRR—2018/1648, pdf, local pdf.

Additional Readings

IPCC, 2013: Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [Stocker, T.F., D. Qin, G.-K. Plattner, M. Tignor, S.K. Allen, J. Boschung, A. Nauels, Y. Xia, V. Bex and P.M. Midgley (eds.)]. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom and New York, NY, USA, 1535 pp. Available at AR5. Extract information/projections for Florida.

Pachauri, R. K., Allen, M. R., Barros, V. R. et al., 2014. Climate Change 2014: Synthesis Report. Contribution of Working Groups I, II, and III to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), IPCC.

U.S. Climate Change Research Program, 2007. Our Changing Planet - The U.S. Climate Change Science Program for Fiscal Year 2008, U.S. Climate Change Research Program, Washington, D.C., A report by the U.S. Climate Change Research Program and the Subcommittee on Global Change Research, and a Supplement to the President's Budget for Fiscal Year 2008. Available at http://www.usgcrp.gov/usgcrp/Library/ocp2008/default.htm.

Boesch, D.F., Atkinson, L.P., Boicourt, W.C., Boon, J.D., Cahoon, D.R., Dalrymple, R.A., Ezer, T., Horton, B.P., Johnson, Z.P., Kopp, R.E., Li, M., Moss, R.H., Parris, A., Sommerfield, C.K.}, 2013. Updating Maryland's Sea-level Rise Projections, Special Report of the Scientific and Technical Working Group to the Maryland Climate Change Commission, 22 pp., University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, Cambridge, MD.

Gesch, D. B., Gutierrez, B. T., Gill, S. K., 2009. Coastal Elevations. In Titus, J. G., Anderson, K. E., Cahoon, D. R., Gesch, D. B., Gill, S. K., Gutierrez, B. T., Thieler, E. R., Williams, S J. (eds.): "Coastal Sensitivity to Sea Level Rise: A Focus on the {Mid-Atlantic Region", U.S. Climate Change Science Program, Synthesis and Assessment Product 4.1, 25-42.

National Research Council, 2013. Abrupt Impacts of Climate Change: Anticipating Surprises. National Research Council, Washington, D.C., 2013. Committee on Understanding and Monitoring Abrupt Climate Change and Its Impacts; Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate; Division on Earth and Life Studies.

Sanford, T., Frumhoff, P. C., Luers, A., Gulledge, J., 2014. The climate policy narrative for a dangerously warming world, Nature Climate Change, 4, 164-166.

Church, J. A., Clark, P. U., Cazenave, A., Gregory, J. M., Jevrejeva, S., Levermann, A., Merrifield, M. A., Milne, G. A., Nerem, R. S., Nunn, P. D., Payne, A. J., Pfeffer, W. T., Stammer, D., Unnikrishnan, A. S., 2013. Sea Level Change, In Stocker, T. F.,Qin, D., Plattner, G.-K., Tignor, M., Allen, S.K., Boschung, J., Nauels, A., Xia, Y., Bex, V., Midgley, P. M. (eds.): Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom and New York, NY, USA., pages 1137-1217.

Werners, S. E. et al. Thresholds, tipping and turning points for sustainability under climate change. Curr. Opin. Env. Sustain. 5, 334–340 (2013).

Sweet, W. V., Kopp, R. E., Weaver, C. P., Obeysekera, J., Horton, R. M., Thieler, E. R., Zervas, C., 2017. Global and Regional Sea Level Rise Scenarios for the United States. NOAA Technical Report NOS CO-OPS 083. pdf.

Flavelle, C., 2017. The Nightmare Scenario for Florida’s Coastal Homeowners - Demand and financing could collapse before the sea consumes a single house. Bloomberg. html.

Dangendorf, S., Marcos, M., Wöppelmann, G., Conrad, C. P., Frederikse, S., Riva, R., 2017. Reassessment of 20th century global mean sea level rise. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1616007114. html.


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