A climate impact assessment for the future of Greece and its adaptation capacity as influenced by socio-economic factors

Abstract

The occurrence of climate change will have a significant impact on society and adapting to a more sustainable environment is of key importance. The dangers of climate change will include temperature and precipitation patterns becoming more extreme creating a substantial impact on society. Greece’s location and climate make it particularly vulnerable to a changing climate and climate impact assessments will become increasingly valuable for enhancing Greece’s adaptability to the effects in the future. This study uses two separate climate models with the latest CORDEX data, inputted with a set of climate indices in order to assess the potential future characteristics of both temperature and precipitation for the whole of Greece and to recognise any patterns in the modelled outputs. Both climate models displayed an increase in both the occurrence of extreme temperature and an increase in the consecutive number of days by which these temperatures are seen. The majority of model simulations displayed a substantial increase between different time periods, often the occurrence of ‘extreme events’ in one time period became a normality and average event in the following time period. Drastic increases were also displayed from the near future to the far future. These scenarios provide an overall image of how climate change may impact the country of Greece, the impacts will be quite significant, particularly for various different sectors such as the tourism industry. Water and energy will be placed under a particularly high demand should the climate effects become apparent, therefore carefully planning adaptation strategies to reduce the overall damage inflicted to Greece will become an important field to consider.

Popular Abstract

Climate Change is a significant issue that our planet is currently experiencing and the effects in the future will intensify if we do not take necessary action. Temperature and precipitation are some of the main meteorological patterns that will be altered if climate change continues and the occurrence of more intense and extreme events takes place around the world.
The country of Greece is quite an exciting country to study. Its situation in the eastern section of the Mediterranean is one of the most prone areas in the Northern Hemisphere to climate change. Extreme events such as heatwaves and droughts are generally quite a common occurrence, so if climate change is exacerbated this is only going to worsen the implications that the country will face in the future. Despite the relative small size of the country, Greece is considerably affected by a complex topography with lot of variation in temperature and precipitation making an impact assessment for the whole country an ideal project to create a greater understanding for the future.
One of the most ideal ways of illustrating future climate is by running a set of different climate model simulations for the next 100 years which will take into consideration various inputs and an emission scenario that forms the basis of the projections. The most intense emission scenario of 8.5 is quite commonly used for impact assessments because this is the ‘worst case’ pathway that our climate will follow if action against climate change is not addressed. Climate indices can be used to simplify results to indicate how often an increase above a specific threshold is maintained for. This provides the possibility to compare different sections of future time periods and see if the intensity of extreme events changes up to 2100.
Using this procedure, the occurrence of hotter and extremely high temperatures during the day and night will become apparent for the majority of Greece, heatwaves will become more frequent and extend for longer time periods. The significant increase of heatwaves will bring a large amount of implications for different aspects of society in Greece, particularly the urban areas of the 2 mains cities of Athens and Thessaloniki. The fear is that temperatures will become too intense to attract visitors during the popular summer months coinciding with the highest demand for water and energy supply needed for cooling, extended periods of high temperature will also have considerable health implications for local residents.
Due to a troubled 10 years economically, Greece is only now beginning to place more emphasis on climate adaptation in the future, there is much potential that can be exploited to help tackle the climate effects in the future, mainly through renewable energy supplies that Greece’s geography is favourable for. Climate models set up with a suitable set of indices can help provide an effective representation of how extreme events may unfold in the future, they can help guide adaptation procedures and highlight potential areas that look particularly vulnerable in order to take action for protecting different aspects of society from the threats of climate change.

• author: Leaver, Jordan
• supervisor: Anna Maria Jönsson
• organization: Dept of Physical Geography and Ecosystem Science
• course: NGEM01 20181
• year: 2018
• type: H2 - Master's Degree (Two Years)
• subject: Earth and Environmental Sciences
• keywords: Physical Geography and Ecosystem Analysis, climate change, climate modelling, impact assessment, RCP8.5, Greece, Mediterranean
• publication/series: Student thesis series INES
• report number: 467
• language: English
• id: 8967983
• date added to LUP: 2019-01-25 16:56:27
• date last changed: 2019-01-25 16:56:27