Presentation delivered by Professor David Hulme at IUB University and ICCCAD in Dhaka, Bangladesh.
Bangladesh Confronts Climate Change is avaiable here: www.anthempress.com/bangladesh-confronts-climate-change-pb
1. Bangladesh Confronts
Climate Change:
Keeping our heads above water
18 February 2017
David Hulme,
Global Development Institute,
University of Manchester (and thanks to Kevin Anderson)
www.gdi.manchester.ac.uk www.effective-states.org
3. IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change)
predicts climate change will make
Bangladeshi environment more harsh:
โข Stronger cyclones (but no increase in number)
โข Increased and more intense rainfall.
โข Increased river flooding
โข Sea level rise
4. Can Bangladesh cope?
Until 2055, Bangladesh can cope โ at high cost.
After that, temperature matters:
โข 1.5ยฐC (over pre-industrial levels). (Now 1.2 ยฐC)
global warming peaks in 2050 and Bangladesh copes
โข 2.0ยฐC โ global warming peaks in 2100 โ
much higher cost but Bangladesh could cope.
โข 2.7ยฐC โ promised in Paris last year ๏จ >3.0ยฐC next century.
A different world โ parts of Bangladesh drown
5. Bangladeshi scientists leading on
climate change for 30 years.
๏ฐ Bangladeshis know what is coming
๏ท ๏ธ
International negotiation to More
Reduce carbon emissions Adaptation
Agreements so far are not enough
6. Bangladesh is one of most vulnerable
countries in the world โ
but refuses to be a helpless victim
โข Taking the lead for LDCs in global negotiations โ
pushing for 1.5ยฐC limit to global warming.
โข Climate Vulnerable Forum and V20
โข Using its own expertise to adapt to climate
change โ often building on vast experience of
living in a challenging environment.
8. Starting point:
a living delta
Water from the Himalayas + 1 billion tonnes/year of
sediment create the delta.
Annual floods & monsoon rain create rich farmland.
But
โข Erosion - rivers shift, banks eroded, new islands.
โข Catastrophic floods, roughly once a decade.
Plus annual cyclones.
And 1/3 of Bangladesh < 3m above sea level
9. Basket case to
development success
1971 โ independence โ Kissinger aide:
Bangladesh is a โbasket caseโ
Now โ Feeds itself
Better health standards than India
Fertility rate 2.2 births/woman
How? โ Economic growth (6% for 20 years)
Demographic dividend + human devโt
Innovation, adaptation, research โ eg local
improved boro rice, microfinance, solar
10. Cyclone deaths down 99%
Three โsuper cyclonesโ How?
1970 โ 500,000 dead Shelters
1991 โ 138,000 dead Early warning
2007 โ 3,363 dead 50,000 volunteers
11.
12. BUT, megacities are a challenge
to understanding and action
โข Climate change has profound implications for Dhaka and
Chittagong and especially their poor and low income households
โ more than 40% of city populations
โข What climate changes means for people who live in bustees
(informal settlements) and work informally is not well understood
โข They live in highly vulnerable locations in housing without building
standardsโฆflooding, cyclone damage, disrupted livelihoods
โข Bangladeshโs Climate Change Strategy and Action Plan identifies
20 priority actions, none related to the deepening problems of
earning a living, accessing water and sanitation services, keeping
healthy and raising children in poor urban communities in an era
of climate change
13. Raising the land to
match sea level rise
Complex living delta.
Annual floods bring 1 billion tonnes of sediment
from the Himalayas. Most to Bay of Bengal.
Sediment builds new islands in rivers & on coast.
Sediment compacts and land level falls.
But land same level above sea as centuries ago.
What is happening?
Monsoon โ keeps sea water out.
Dry season โ tides reach 300 km inland โ
bringing sediment & raising the land
15. Tidal river management
to raise the land
โข Historic system of temporary embankments โ keep in
monsoon rains for rice crop, then cut to allow tidal
flooding.
โข 1980s local people cut the embankments. Dry season
tidal floods raised land 1.5m in 2 years.
โข Communities worked with government engineers &
scientists to develop โTidal River Managementโ โ flood
polder for 3 years every 30 years.
โข Perhaps land rise can be managed to match sea level
rise โ But who will pay?
16. Bangladesh did not cause
global warming
โข Bangladeshis know what is coming โ worse
floods, more devastating cyclones, sea level rise
โข Strong understanding of what must be done
โข Already spending $1 bn/year on climate โ
ยพ own funds & much of rest World Bank loans
โข Who will pay for more & stronger cyclone
shelters, research, raising the land?
17. The countries who have
caused global warming?
โข 2008, PM Gordon Brown pledged ยฃ75 mn immediately
and ยฃ75 mn later. For climate change in Bangladesh
โข 2016: Only ยฃ61 mn disbursed - ยฃ14mn returned to UK!
โข International agencies insistence on establishment of a
Multi-Donor Trust Fund stalled disbursements
โข MDTF was to be managed by World Bank โ strong
objections to its fees (10-15%) and external control
โข More effective modalities? Green Climate Fund: disbursed
$40 mn in 2015 for coastal infrastructure
โข But nowโฆTrump and climate change as a โhoaxโ
18. Mitigation, NETS and Equity
โข My thanks to Kevin Anderson at U-Manchester
โข Serious mitigation needs to start today
โข Carbon budget targets better than TยบC targets
โข Technological fixes - can we rely on negative
emissions technologies (NETS) and Biomass
energy + carbon capture and storage (BECCS)?
โข Equity - who needs to change?
19. 0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
1990 2000 2010 2020 2030 2040 2050
CO2emissions(GtCO2/yr)Carbondioxideemissions
A
We emit additional CO2
A
If we delay stringent
mitigation today
23. NETS and BECCS 1
โข NETS - Negative emissions technologies
โข BECCS โ Biomass energy with carbon
capture and storage
โข Grow trees, harvest, burn in power stations,
capture CO2, liquefy CO2, pump underground
24. NETS and BECCS 2
โข But, this has never been done at scale, huge
technical and economic unknowns, profound
implications for food supply and biodiversity
โข Means planting an area the size of India
(perhaps 2 or 3 times the size) every yearโฆyear
after yearโฆand secure underground storage
โข Means โParisโ can pretend mitigation not urgent
25. Emissions and equity
โข 50% of global CO2 is from 10% of population
โข Top 10% of emitters have a carbon footprint
2500 x higher than bottom 10%
โข If top 10% of global emitters reduced their
carbon footprint to the EU averageโฆ
โข Global emissions cut by around 33%
31. Conclusions
โข Serious mitigation has to start now
โข Top 10% of emitters have to changeโฆnow
GDI RCs โ 50% of international meetings virtual
Kevin Anderson โ zero flying, no car, no fridge
โข CVF and G77 countries, such as Bangladesh, are not
waiting to be saved by rich countries โ already
adapting and financing adaptation
32. Bangladesh is not the
helpless victim presented
in the West
โข Rich countries and richer people (including
Donald Trump) must cut carbon emissions now.
โข Bangladesh is adaptating โ cyclone shelters,
flood protection, raising the land, improved
crops. But who pays?
And who
decides
what to
do?
33. THANK YOU
โข Anderson, K. (2015) โTalks in the city of light generate
more heatโ Nature Vol.528.
โข Anderson, K. and Peters, G. (2016) โThe trouble with
negative emissionsโ Science Vol.354 (6309): 182-183.
โข Anderson, K. and Bows, A. (2012) โA new paradigm for
climate changeโ, Nature Climate Change Vol.2: 639โ640
โข Roy, M. Hanlon, J. and Hulme, D. (2017) Bangladesh
Confronts Climate Change: Keeping Our Heads Above
Water, London, Anthem Press.