Thursday 25 June 2009

1-2pm, in Fenner School's HANCOCK SEMINAR ROOM, 6th Floor, W.K. Hancock West Building no. 43

An Overview of Key Advances in Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation - Updating the IPCC 4th Assessment 2 Years On

Michael H. Smith, Research Fellow, Fenner School of Environment and Society

Download Michael Smith's seminar (PDF, 1.1MB)

Abstract

Now that the physical science of climate change has become more certain, attention is shifting both amongst policy makers and researchers to the questions of how best to mitigate and adapt to climate change. The IPCC 4th Assessment Mitigation and Adaptation Working Groups produced significantly expanded and improved reports for decision and policy makers. The good news is that two years on, scientific innovation and design breakthroughs have occurred, which will enable larger CO² reductions to be achieved, than was reported by the IPCC’s last assessment. Also there are a number of gaps in the sectors covered by the IPCC Mitigation Working Group’s work that deserve to be addressed.

The first three quarters of this presentation will overview some of these exciting advances in climate change mitigation strategies for the following sectors - Industry (eg: mining, cement, chemicals, paper and pulp, ICT) Buildings, Transport, Agriculture, Food Processing and Food Retail (from the farm gate to consumers). The last quarter of this presentation will overview recent research on energy water efficiency nexus opportunities that seeks to address and fill some of the gaps in the IPCC’s 2008 Climate Change and Water Technical report, a key aspect of Climate Change Adaptation.

This talk draws heavily on research for the forthcoming book von Weizsäcker, E., Hargroves, K., Smith, M., Desha, C. and Stasinopoulos, P. (2009) Factor 5: Transforming the Global Economy through 80% Improvements to Resource Productivity (Earthscan, forthcoming).

Bio

Michael Smith has been a researcher at the Fenner School for Environment and Society for the last 3 years. He is also Co-Founder and Research Director of The Natural Edge Project - an Australian Sustainability Think Tank - www.naturaledgeproject.net Whilst at the Fenner School, Michael has worked on a range of publications and online educational resources with his colleagues from The Natural Edge Project (TNEP) - Karlson Hargroves, Cheryl Desha, Peter Stasinopolous, and Stacey Hargroves. For instance he has co-authored Whole System Design: An Integated Approach to Sustainable Engineering (Earthscan, 2008), Factor 5: Transforming the Global Economy through 80% Improvements to Resource Productivity (Earthscan, 2009, forthcoming) and a new publication on the “growth discourses” entitled Cents and Sustainability: Making Sense of How to Grow Economies, Build Community and Restore the Environment In Our Lifetimes. (Earthscan, 2009, forthcoming). Michael is also lead author of a new 600 page 30 lecture online Climate Change Mitigation resource to be published as a textbook in late 2010 entitled Energy Transformed Vol. 1: Sustainable Energy Solutions to Climate Change Mitigation (Earthscan 2010). Currently he is working with his colleagues from TNEP on a new comprehensive online Climate Change Adaptation education & training program funded by the Department of Climate Change. This research from the last three years informs this presentation.

This seminar will be held in the HANCOCK SEMINAR ROOM, 6th Floor, W.K. Hancock West Building no. 43, Biology Place, Australian National University, Canberra
Take the lift to the 5th floor, and go up the stairs to the 6th floor.

The seminar will start at 13:00 and finish at 14:00