Climate Adaptation
A Scoping Study for Climate Action Planning in Kauaʻi
This report documents best practices for county-level climate action plans (CAPs), with considerations for Kaua‘i. A CAP is primarily a process by which a jurisdiction agrees upon greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction strategies and policies. This report is based on the gathering of studies and protocols addressing climate action planning and GHG mitigation best practices.
Read MoreEstimating Cost-Effectiveness of Hawaiian Dry Forest Restoration Using Spatial Changes in Water Yield and Landscape Flammability Under Climate Change
Resource managers increasingly seek to implement cost-effective watershed restoration plans for multiple ecosystem service benefits. Using locally adapted ecosystem service tools and historical management costs, we quantified spatially explicit management costs and benefits (in terms of groundwater recharge and landscape flammability) to assist a state agency in evaluating cobenefits for a predefined restoration scenario (focused […]
Read MoreElectric Vehicle Greenhouse Gas Emission Assessment for Hawaii
This study estimates greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of electric vehicles (EVs) compared to that of other popular and similar cars in Hawaii, by county over an assumption of 150,000 miles driven. The GHG benefits of EVs depend critically on the electricity system from which they derive their power. The analysis shows that EVs statewide are […]
Read MoreIntergenerational Games with Dynamic Externalities and Climate Change Experiments
Dynamic externalities are at the core of many long-term environmental problems, from species preservation to natural hazard resilience mitigation. We use laboratory experiments to compare welfare outcomes and underlying behavior in games with dynamic externalities under two distinct settings: traditionally studied games with infinitely-lived decision makers, and more realistic intergenerational games. We show that if […]
Read MorePayments for Watershed Services as Adaptation to Climate Change: Upstream Conservation and Downstream Aquifer Management
Economically optimal groundwater extraction allocates water over space and time to its highest and best social use. But optimal management of water resources also requires optimal investment in watershed capital, even as the climate is changing. We augment a standard coastal groundwater management model with stock-dependent extraction costs to include recharge-enhancing natural and produced capital […]
Read MoreUnderstanding the Links Between Local Ecological Knowledge, Ecosystem Services, and Resilience
By Kim Burnett and Cheryl Geslani UHERO’s Project Environment has received funding from the National Science Foundation to participate in an interdisciplinary, international project that spans the natural and social sciences as well as the terrestrial and marine spheres. UHERO is partnering with scientists, resource managers, cultural practitioners and private landowners in Hawaii and Fiji. […]
Read MoreHow Do We Measure Social-Ecological Resilience?
By Alex Frost and Kim Burnett Two UHERO graduate researchers, Alex Frost and Cheryl Scarton, attended a field course about social-ecological resilience of island systems in Nadave, Fiji. Participants of the field course were students and environmental practitioners from places throughout the Pacifc like Fiji, Vanuatu, Micronesia and the Solomon Islands. On day three of […]
Read MoreIn the Eye of the Storm: Coping with Future Natural Disasters in Hawaii
Hurricane Iniki, that hit the island of Kauai on September 11th, 1992, was the strongest hurricane that hit the Hawaiian Islands in recorded history, and the one that wrought the most damage, estimated at 7.4 billion (in 2008 US$). We provide an assessment of Hawaii’s vulnerability to disasters using a framework developed for small islands. […]
Read MoreQuantifying Household Social Resilience: A Place-based Approach in a Rapidly Transforming Community
In an era of ecological degradation, global climate change, demographic shifts and increasing intensity and frequency of natural hazards, the Pacific Islands including the State of Hawai‘i face heightened risk. Human and environmental well-being are tightly coupled; thus, science-based solutions must marry place-based, culturally relevant processes that link disaster preparedness, relief and recovery with resilience […]
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