Transformation and resilience on urban coasts
Lead Research Organisation:
King's College London
Department Name: Geography
Abstract
Transformation opens new opportunities for living with risk where existing systems generate vulnerability and hazard, or where preventing systems failure is impossible. In a world where risk is increasingly associated with cities, and cities increasingly growing on the coast, TRUC is focussed on the relationships between development, risk, resilience and transformation in six coastal megacities: Kolkata, Lagos, London, New York, Shanghai and Tokyo. TRUC will build an original, integrated, participatory framework in collaboration with stakeholders to first characterise and then identify interactions between bio-physical, land-use and decisionmaking processes. The aim is to reveal the pathways and trade-offs through which systems interactions constrain or open opportunities for resilience or transformation and how these outcomes themselves interact and influence sustainable development; offering scope for considerable theoretical, methodological and practical advancement.
TRUC meets the need for more integrated science to inform policy by combining an urban biophysical model (SUEWS) with the WorldRiskIndex (WRI), developed by consortium PIs. This adds considerable value to past investments as well as offering substantial research gains over a relatively short period. Research will have neighbourhood level resolution and be city-wide. Flexibility is built into the modelling and analysis process to accommodate divergent data and stakeholder availability. Local teams will head-up data acquisition and liaise with stakeholders to help frame local questions and ensure effective dissemination. The consortium includes natural and social scientists and each partner will be involved in conceptual or methodological and case study research. Research will feed into international scientific discussion on development pathways and scenarios within the IPCC, AR5 (three consortium members are authors in AR5). The project will be a flagship research for the IGBP-IHDP project Land Ocean Interaction on the Coastal Zone with three scientific steering committee members included.
TRUC meets the need for more integrated science to inform policy by combining an urban biophysical model (SUEWS) with the WorldRiskIndex (WRI), developed by consortium PIs. This adds considerable value to past investments as well as offering substantial research gains over a relatively short period. Research will have neighbourhood level resolution and be city-wide. Flexibility is built into the modelling and analysis process to accommodate divergent data and stakeholder availability. Local teams will head-up data acquisition and liaise with stakeholders to help frame local questions and ensure effective dissemination. The consortium includes natural and social scientists and each partner will be involved in conceptual or methodological and case study research. Research will feed into international scientific discussion on development pathways and scenarios within the IPCC, AR5 (three consortium members are authors in AR5). The project will be a flagship research for the IGBP-IHDP project Land Ocean Interaction on the Coastal Zone with three scientific steering committee members included.
Planned Impact
TRUC is a policy-facing research project, its design structure is built to maximize opportunity for stakeholder involvement from the start of the project, through data collection to analysis and beyond. Indeed stakeholder engagement - and more than this, influence - is essential for the success of TRUC which embeds co-production of knowledge within its integrated risk assessment approach. A harmonized set of learning resources targeted at professionals and post-graduate students will facilitate formal learning post-project (see below). This adds considerable value to the proposal. Hosting the project website with a permanent international research and policy centre - the National Centre for Sustainable Coastal Management, Chennai, guarantees its long-term and continuing access to TRUC PIs for stakeholders as well as researchers and students beyond the life of the project. PIs welcome this opportunity for extended engagement, exploring additional opportunities for this during the project is a specific aim of the TRUC Communication and Impact Committee.
TRUC will build on lines of engagement and impact that are already in place, will strengthen these, and add new dimensions so that post-project relations will have a strong likelihood of persisting. This is important, impact can sometimes be delivered over the short-term but more often it comes from a process of shared learning between research teams and policy makers. Letters of support from each city case study and from the international science-policy communication projects UGEC and LOICZ evidence the strong basis for these claims and the preparatory work that has already been undertaken to introduce key policy communities to TRUC, there are of course many other linkages that can be drawn upon as would be expected from the senior project team assembled as TRUC PIs.
Practitioner impact (Task 6.3) will focus on:
1. A conceptual and methodological sourcebook including illustrative material drawn from case study experiences and findings. To be published online by LOICZ. This will provide guidelines on data management and model building, including the rationale for the principal data (i.e. indicators, variables and attributes) that should be made available or created. There will be a discussion of how barriers to data access might be overcome (e.g. by broadening searches across other accessible datasets or through the use of proxy variables) and will lay out the steps (e.g. data-collection; participatory activities; integration), which need to be undertaken by those wishing to use the TRUC integrated approach. This output will be structured in a modular way, which lays out the detailed procedures relative to each main phase of an integrated vulnerability assessment and the way the framework can be used to inform local resilience-building plans, programmes and projects. The sourcebook will be produced in consultation with the External Advisory Group who will be able to target it better to audience needs.
2. Peer-to-peer learning exchanges are made possible through TRUC's participatory approach and multi-case structure. Local scientists and practitioners will be encouraged to enter into dialogue to reflect on the process and findings of research and associated policy considerations between cities. This will be supported by - and provide a sharp vulnerability reduction/resilience building focus to - existing inter-city networks (e.g., ICLEI) and bilateral relationships (e.g. between London and New York) in which our research teams are already embedded.
TRUC will build on lines of engagement and impact that are already in place, will strengthen these, and add new dimensions so that post-project relations will have a strong likelihood of persisting. This is important, impact can sometimes be delivered over the short-term but more often it comes from a process of shared learning between research teams and policy makers. Letters of support from each city case study and from the international science-policy communication projects UGEC and LOICZ evidence the strong basis for these claims and the preparatory work that has already been undertaken to introduce key policy communities to TRUC, there are of course many other linkages that can be drawn upon as would be expected from the senior project team assembled as TRUC PIs.
Practitioner impact (Task 6.3) will focus on:
1. A conceptual and methodological sourcebook including illustrative material drawn from case study experiences and findings. To be published online by LOICZ. This will provide guidelines on data management and model building, including the rationale for the principal data (i.e. indicators, variables and attributes) that should be made available or created. There will be a discussion of how barriers to data access might be overcome (e.g. by broadening searches across other accessible datasets or through the use of proxy variables) and will lay out the steps (e.g. data-collection; participatory activities; integration), which need to be undertaken by those wishing to use the TRUC integrated approach. This output will be structured in a modular way, which lays out the detailed procedures relative to each main phase of an integrated vulnerability assessment and the way the framework can be used to inform local resilience-building plans, programmes and projects. The sourcebook will be produced in consultation with the External Advisory Group who will be able to target it better to audience needs.
2. Peer-to-peer learning exchanges are made possible through TRUC's participatory approach and multi-case structure. Local scientists and practitioners will be encouraged to enter into dialogue to reflect on the process and findings of research and associated policy considerations between cities. This will be supported by - and provide a sharp vulnerability reduction/resilience building focus to - existing inter-city networks (e.g., ICLEI) and bilateral relationships (e.g. between London and New York) in which our research teams are already embedded.
Publications
Tan J
(2015)
Urban Integrated Meteorological Observations: Practice and Experience in Shanghai, China
in Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society
Ward H
(2013)
Multi-season eddy covariance observations of energy, water and carbon fluxes over a suburban area in Swindon, UK
in Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics
Ward H
(2014)
Multi-Scale Sensible Heat Fluxes in the Suburban Environment from Large-Aperture Scintillometry and Eddy Covariance
in Boundary-Layer Meteorology
Ward H
(2017)
Assessing the impact of changes in surface cover, human behaviour and climate on energy partitioning across Greater London
in Landscape and Urban Planning
Ward H
(2017)
Impact of temporal resolution of precipitation forcing data on modelled urban-atmosphere exchanges and surface conditions
in International Journal of Climatology
Ward H
(2016)
Surface Urban Energy and Water Balance Scheme (SUEWS): Development and evaluation at two UK sites
in Urban Climate
Warren E
(2022)
Spatial variability of forward modelled attenuated backscatter in clear-sky conditions over a megacity: Implications for observation network design.
in Quarterly journal of the Royal Meteorological Society. Royal Meteorological Society (Great Britain)
Yunus A
(2016)
Uncertainties in Tidally Adjusted Estimates of Sea Level Rise Flooding (Bathtub Model) for the Greater London
in Remote Sensing
Description | We have developed and applied a conceptual framework which makes a distinction between a range of possible adaptation options for large city planners. Research analysis focused on building linkages between a risk and hazard model and also in design of an urban scenario methodology to surface future visions for city development and the adaptation pathways that might help or hinder this progress. |
Exploitation Route | We built linkages with city planners. |
Sectors | Environment Other |
URL | http://www.bel-truc.org/ |
Description | The scenario method was deployed with urban planners in London and New York and has contributed to a revision of long-term climate adaptation planning in New York City. |
First Year Of Impact | 2017 |
Sector | Environment |
Title | Site for undertaking measurements |
Description | Site for undertaking urban meteoological observations |
Type Of Material | Improvements to research infrastructure |
Year Produced | 2011 |
Provided To Others? | Yes |
Impact | Several papers Instruments at other sites Providing modelling results to LCCP, PHE, etc |
URL | http://www.urban-climate.net/content/ |
Title | London - data 2011-2013 @ KCL - KSS and KSSW |
Description | London - data 2011-2013 @ KCL - KSS and KSSW Data used to evaluate SUEWS (Ward et al. 2016). All relevant references for this data set are below Forcing data and evaluation data London data: https://zenodo.org/deposit/3747380 Swindon data https://zenodo.org/deposit/3747491 Acknowledge: 10.13039/501100000690::NE/H52479X/1 10.13039/501100000690::NE/H003231/1 10.13039/501100000690::NE/L008971/1 637519 211345 283201 UK-China Research & Innovation Partnership Fund through the Met Office Climate Science for Service Partnership (CSSP) China as part of the Newton Fund Other grants listed below |
Type Of Material | Database/Collection of data |
Year Produced | 2020 |
Provided To Others? | Yes |
URL | https://zenodo.org/record/3747379 |
Title | London - data 2011-2013 @ KCL - KSS and KSSW |
Description | London - data 2011-2013 @ KCL - KSS and KSSW Data used to evaluate SUEWS (Ward et al. 2016). All relevant references for this data set are below Forcing data and evaluation data London data: https://zenodo.org/deposit/3747380 Swindon data https://zenodo.org/deposit/3747491 Acknowledge: 10.13039/501100000690::NE/H52479X/1 10.13039/501100000690::NE/H003231/1 10.13039/501100000690::NE/L008971/1 637519 211345 283201 UK-China Research & Innovation Partnership Fund through the Met Office Climate Science for Service Partnership (CSSP) China as part of the Newton Fund Other grants listed below |
Type Of Material | Database/Collection of data |
Year Produced | 2020 |
Provided To Others? | Yes |
URL | https://zenodo.org/record/3747380 |
Title | Swindon- data 2011-2013 |
Description | Swindon- data 2011-2013 Data used to evaluate SUEWS (Ward et al. 2016). All relevant references for this data set are below Forcing data and evaluation data London data: https://zenodo.org/deposit/3747380 Swindon data https://zenodo.org/deposit/3747491 Acknowledge: 10.13039/501100000690::NE/H52479X/1 10.13039/501100000690::NE/H003231/1 10.13039/501100000690::NE/L008971/1 637519 211345 283201 UK-China Research & Innovation Partnership Fund through the Met Office Climate Science for Service Partnership (CSSP) China as part of the Newton Fund Other grants listed below |
Type Of Material | Database/Collection of data |
Year Produced | 2020 |
Provided To Others? | Yes |
URL | https://zenodo.org/record/3747491 |
Title | Swindon- data 2011-2013 |
Description | Swindon- data 2011-2013 Data used to evaluate SUEWS (Ward et al. 2016). All relevant references for this data set are below Forcing data and evaluation data London data: https://zenodo.org/deposit/3747380 Swindon data https://zenodo.org/deposit/3747491 Acknowledge: 10.13039/501100000690::NE/H52479X/1 10.13039/501100000690::NE/H003231/1 10.13039/501100000690::NE/L008971/1 637519 211345 283201 UK-China Research & Innovation Partnership Fund through the Met Office Climate Science for Service Partnership (CSSP) China as part of the Newton Fund Other grants listed below |
Type Of Material | Database/Collection of data |
Year Produced | 2020 |
Provided To Others? | Yes |
URL | https://zenodo.org/record/3747490 |
Description | FL |
Organisation | University of Gothenburg |
Department | Department of Earth Sciences |
Country | Sweden |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | development and analysis of the surface information for London preparation of papers co-development of models |
Collaborator Contribution | development and analysis of the surface information for London preparation of papers co-development of models |
Impact | Conference papers Research Journal papers contributor to contents of invited talks Were invited to put in a joint proposal to GLA but unfortunately KCL could not prepare the paperwork in time for this to be undertaken 2015 in press Onomura S, CSB Grimmond, F Lindberg, B Holmer, S Thorsson BLUEWS - Meteorological forcing data for urban outdoor thermal comfort models from a coupled convective boundary layer and surface energy balance scheme Urban Climate Magliulo V, P Toscano, CSB Grimmond, S Kotthaus, L Järvi, H Setälä, F Lindberg, R Vogt, T Staszewski, A Bubak, A Synnefa, M Santamouris Environmental measurements in BRIDGE case studies (Chapter 5) Understanding Urban Metabolism ed N Chrysoulakis, E Castro, E Moors, Routledge, 45-57 http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415835114/ Grimmond CSB, L Järvi, F Lindberg, S Marras, M Falk, T Loridan, G Pigeon, DR Pyles, D Spano Urban Energy Budget Models (Chapter 9) Understanding Urban Metabolism ed N Chrysoulakis, E Castro, E Moors, Routledge, 91-105 http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415835114/ Lindberg F, CSB Grimmond, N Yogeswaran, S Kotthaus, L Allen 2013 Impact of city changes and weather on anthropogenic heat flux in Europe 1995-2015 Urban Climate,4, 1-15 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.uclim.2013.03.002 Loridan T, F Lindberg, O Jorba, S Kotthaus, S Grossman-Clarke, CSB Grimmond 2013 High resolution simulation of surface heat flux variability across central London with Urban Zones for Energy partitioning. Boundary Layer Meteorology, 147, 493-523. DOI: 10.1007/s10546-013-9797-y Lindberg F & CSB Grimmond 2011: Nature of vegetation and building morphology characteristics across a city: influence on shadow patterns and mean radiant temperatures in London Urban Ecosystems 14: 617-634 doi:/10.1007/s11252-011-0184-5 Allen L, F Lindberg, CSB Grimmond 2011: Global to city scale model for anthropogenic heat flux, International J. of Climatology, 31, 1990-2005 doi: 10.1002/joc.2210 http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/joc.2210/pdf pdf Lindberg F & CSB Grimmond 2011: The influence of vegetation and building morphology on shadow patterns and mean radiant temperatures in urban areas: Model development and evaluation Theoretical and Applied Climatology, 105:311-323 doi:10.1007/s00704-010-0382-8 Lindberg F & CSB Grimmond 2010: Continuous sky view factor from high resolution urban digital elevation models, Climate Research, 42: 177-183 doi:10.3354/cr00882 |
Description | Honjo |
Organisation | Chiba University |
Department | Department of Chemistry |
Country | Japan |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | Suggested an analysis that would be interesting to explore. Discussed analyses, Prepared Paper |
Collaborator Contribution | Provided Extensive Temperature data set across Tokyo. Understook detailed analysis. Lead on paper |
Impact | Honjo et al. Publication Mult-disciplainary |
Start Year | 2013 |
Description | LJ |
Organisation | Institute for Molecular Medicine Finland |
Country | Finland |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | Development of model Preparation of papers |
Collaborator Contribution | Development of model Preparation of papers |
Impact | Ward et al. (2016) UC Järvi L, CSB Grimmond, M Taka, H Setälä, A Nordbo, IB Strachan 2014 Development of the Surface Urban Energy and Water balance Scheme (SUEWS) for cold climate cities Geoscientific Model Development, 7, 1691-1711 http://www.geosci-model-dev-discuss.net/7/1063/2014/gmdd-7-1063-2014.pdf; http://www.geosci-model-dev.net/7/1691/2014/gmd-7-1691-2014.pdf Moors EJ, CSB Grimmond, A Veldhuizen, L Järvi, F van der Bolt Urban water balance and hydrology models (Chapter 10) Understanding Urban Metabolism ed N Chrysoulakis, E Castro, E Moors, Routledge, 106-116 http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415835114/ Järvi L, CSB Grimmond, A Christen 2011: The Surface Urban Energy and Water Balance Scheme (SUEWS): Evaluation in Vancouver and Los Angeles. J. of Hydrology, 411, 219-237 doi: 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2011.10.001 Loridan T, CSB Grimmond, BD Offerle, DT Young, T Smith, L Järvi, F Lindberg 2011: Local-Scale Urban Meteorological Parameterization Scheme (LUMPS): longwave radiation parameterization & seasonality related developments J. of Applied Meteorology & Climatology. 50: 185-202 doi: 10.1175/2010äMC2474.1 Plus conference papers |
Start Year | 2009 |
Description | SIMS |
Organisation | Chinese Meteorological Administration |
Country | China |
Sector | Public |
PI Contribution | Co-Authorship of papers Extensive discussions of data analyses |
Collaborator Contribution | Data Model evaluation and application |
Impact | Ao et al. (2016) International J. Climatology Tan et al. (2015) Ao et al. (2016) JAMC Peng et al. (2017) |
Start Year | 2013 |
Title | LUMA-LUMO |
Description | Software for collecting and processing all the data that are collected |
Type Of Technology | Software |
Year Produced | 2008 |
Impact | This allows the data to be processed from the instrument all the way through to the database |
URL | http://www.met.reading.ac.uk/micromet/data-observations/ |
Title | SUEWS |
Description | SUEWS - Surface Urban Energy and Water Balance Scheme |
Type Of Technology | Software |
Year Produced | 2011 |
Impact | 1) People in multiple countries working on the development 2) Participated in a number of model evaluations 3) Being used for a wide range of applications to provide ongoing continuity 4) Provide long term heat stress impacts |
URL | http://www.urban-climate.net/umep/SUEWS |
Title | UMEP |
Description | Ubran Multi-scale Environmental Predictor |
Type Of Technology | Software |
Year Produced | 2015 |
Open Source License? | Yes |
Impact | 1) Numerous people starting to download and use 2) Consistency of methods between group methods and across groups 3) Interest from a wide audience (resarchers, teachers, planners etc) |
URL | http://www.urban-climate.net/umep/UMEP |
Description | Kolkata scenario workshop |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Scenario workshop to coproduce key themes for interviews and integrated modeling parameters. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2015 |
Description | Lagos scenario workshop |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Scenario workshop to coproduce key themes for interviews and integrated modeling parameters. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2015 |
Description | London integrated model results presentation |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Key results of the integrated model presented to the London Climate Change Partnership to help build an impact strategy. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
Description | London integrated model verification workshop |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | To work with practitioners to verify the choice of input variables and weighting for model integration. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2016 |
Description | London scenario workshop |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Scenario workshop to coproduce key themes for interviews and integrated modeling parameters. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2015 |
Description | New York scenario workshop |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Scenario workshop to coproduce key themes for interviews and integrated modeling parameters. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2015 |