297
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020
P. Saundry, B. L. Ruddell (eds.), The Food-Energy-Water Nexus, AESS
Interdisciplinary Environmental Studies and Sciences Series,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-29914-9_11
Chapter 11
Climate Change
Peter Saundry
11.1 Introduction
Climate patterns (operating over years-to-centuries) and weather events (occurring
over minutes-to-months), significantly impact all aspects of food, energy, and water
(FEW) systems—from production to conversion processes, to infrastructure requirements, to demand. Recognition of climatic conditions is essential in all FEW systems that are not within controlled environments.
The purpose of this chapter is to frame FEW systems in the context of both natural climate conditions and variations, and in the context of anthropogenic climate
change. In this text, we will generally use the word “variable” and “variability,” to
describe natural fluctuations, oscillations, cycles, and changes in the earth’s climate,
while generally using the word “change” for human impact on the earth climate.
We will explore how anthropogenic climate change and efforts to mitigate it are
expected to impact FEW systems, individually and collectively. We will briefly look
at climate modeling and the lessons for integrating food, energy, and water systems.
While climate considerations are usually explicit in FEW system models, they are
also often included as implicit assumptions in models about crop choices, seasonal
changes in energy demand, or water flows. Many of the topics introduced in this
Chapter will be addressed in greater depth in later chapters.
A full exploration of climate change is beyond the scope of this book. For a
detailed summary of the extensive physical scientific basis for climate change, the
reader is referred to volume 1, the Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC 2013, 2014a, b). This chapter,
especially Sect. 11.4, includes many passages quoted from AR5. To avoid repetition
P. Saundry (*)
Energy Policy and Climate, Advanced Academic Programs, Krieger School of Arts
and Sciences, Johns Hopkins University, Washington, DC, USA
e-mail: psaundr1@jhu.edu
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020
P. Saundry, B. L. Ruddell (eds.), The Food-Energy-Water Nexus, AESS
Interdisciplinary Environmental Studies and Sciences Series,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-29914-9_11
Chapter 11
Climate Change
Peter Saundry
11.1 Introduction
Climate patterns (operating over years-to-centuries) and weather events (occurring
over minutes-to-months), significantly impact all aspects of food, energy, and water
(FEW) systems—from production to conversion processes, to infrastructure requirements, to demand. Recognition of climatic conditions is essential in all FEW systems that are not within controlled environments.
The purpose of this chapter is to frame FEW systems in the context of both natural climate conditions and variations, and in the context of anthropogenic climate
change. In this text, we will generally use the word “variable” and “variability,” to
describe natural fluctuations, oscillations, cycles, and changes in the earth’s climate,
while generally using the word “change” for human impact on the earth climate.
We will explore how anthropogenic climate change and efforts to mitigate it are
expected to impact FEW systems, individually and collectively. We will briefly look
at climate modeling and the lessons for integrating food, energy, and water systems.
While climate considerations are usually explicit in FEW system models, they are
also often included as implicit assumptions in models about crop choices, seasonal
changes in energy demand, or water flows. Many of the topics introduced in this
Chapter will be addressed in greater depth in later chapters.
A full exploration of climate change is beyond the scope of this book. For a
detailed summary of the extensive physical scientific basis for climate change, the
reader is referred to volume 1, the Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC 2013, 2014a, b). This chapter,
especially Sect. 11.4, includes many passages quoted from AR5. To avoid repetition
P. Saundry (*)
Energy Policy and Climate, Advanced Academic Programs, Krieger School of Arts
and Sciences, Johns Hopkins University, Washington, DC, USA
e-mail: psaundr1@jhu.edu