Climate Change – Integra LLC

Asia, Blog, Climate Change, Climate Change, Environment, Environment, Irrigation and Water, Natural Resources Management, Water

Water at Wilson: An Event to Explore Solutions to Central and South Asia Water Challenges

In the intricate dance of geopolitics, water security stands out as a common concern and a potential catalyst for collaboration. Central and South Asia, regions endowed with abundant rivers and basins, face the dual challenges of water scarcity and the impacts of climate change. USAID is working with Central Asia Governments and research institutions—under the Asia Emerging Opportunities (AEO) mechanism—to evaluate the status and possible causes of lower-than-usual regional water supplies. Over the past year, Integra has delivered snowmelt and glacier melt training modules in Central Asia using data from eight primary river basins to continue this work.

The Wilson Center, a renowned institution for advancing policy dialogue, partnered with Integra to host an event titled “Water at Wilson: MODSNOW – A New Tool for Water Security in Central and South Asia.” The gathering convened experts and stakeholders to explore innovative solutions to the region’s pressing water challenges.

Kicking off with a warm welcome from Lauren Risi, Program Director of the Environmental Change and Security Program at the Wilson Center, the event proceeded with opening remarks from esteemed representatives, including Änjali Kaur, Deputy Assistant Administrator, Asia Bureau, USAID and Ambassador Sridhar Khatri of Nepal. Deputy Administrator Kaur stated, “We’re proud to have partnered with Integra to develop the simple yet remarkably effective MODSNOW, designed to empower governments and Asian communities to monitor water flows from high mountains. This is critical not only for the immediate needs of the present but also for the long-term sustainability and prosperity of future generations.” Echoing this sentiment, Ambassador Khatri shared that in coordination with Nepal’s ongoing efforts, “the MODSNOW tool developed by Dr. Abror Gafurov, will provide real-time information of water resources and help us to better prepare for disaster response.” Ambassador Baktybek Amanbaev of the Kyrgyz Republic and Ambassador Farrukh Hamralizoda of Tajikistan also spoke about how water security and tools such as MODSNOW are important to their respective countries. These introductory sessions underscored the significance of collaborative efforts in addressing water security issues, setting the stage for a deeper dive into research insights.

Dr. Abror Gafurov, the Innovative Water & Environmental Solutions (IWES) lead researcher, delivered an informative presentation on MODSNOW, a groundbreaking tool designed to revolutionize water resource management by predicting snowmelt patterns in the Hindu Kush Himalayan region. The subsequent facilitated discussion, expertly moderated by Michael Kugelman, Director of South Asia at the Wilson Center, provided a platform for diverse perspectives and robust dialogue among panelists, including Dr. Eric Rudenshiold, Sherri Goodman, and Mary Melnyk. Audience engagement peaked during the dynamic question-and-answer session, where in-person and online attendees posed thought-provoking queries to the panelists. As the event drew to a close, it left a resonant message of hope and possibility, emphasizing the transformative potential of collaboration and innovation in safeguarding water resources for the future of Central and South Asia.

At its core, MODSNOW represents a fusion of innovation and necessity. The tool leverages advanced modeling techniques to predict snowmelt patterns in a region, often called the “Water Tower of Asia,” as it is the source of major river systems that sustain millions of people downstream. The significance of MODSNOW lies in its ability to provide timely and accurate information about snowmelt dynamics. By integrating satellite data, climate models, and ground observations, the tool offers policymakers and stakeholders crucial insights into water availability and potential risks. This information is invaluable for devising adaptive strategies to mitigate water-related challenges, such as floods, droughts, and the management of transboundary rivers.

During the event, experts highlighted MODSNOW’s multifaceted benefits. By enhancing the understanding of snowmelt processes, the tool empowers governments to make informed decisions regarding water allocation, infrastructure development, and climate adaptation measures. Furthermore, MODSNOW fosters regional cooperation by facilitating data sharing and collaborative research initiatives, transcending political boundaries to pursue shared water security goals.

August 6, 2024/by jschur

Climate Change, Environment, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

New ICT Routes to Climate Change Adaptation

The International Development Research Centre (IDRC) and the Centre for Development Informatics (CDI) at the University of Manchester released a case study prepared by Dr. Blane Harvey and Dr. Tom Mitchell entitled “ICT-Enabled Knowledge Sharing in North-South Partnerships: Lessons from the AfricaAdapt Network.”

The AfricaAdapt Network is a knowledge-sharing network on climate change adaptation in Africa that was established in 2008 in collaboration with Environment and Development in the Third World (ENDA-TM) (Senegal), the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA) (Ghana), IGAD Climate Prediction and Applications Center (ICPAC) (Kenya), and the Institute of Development Studies (IDS) (U.K.). The case study states that an online network such as AfricaAdapt can “help to build a community of practice around climate change adaptation, validate adaptation processes and information, offer users a sense of potential options and outcomes from adaptation actions, based on others’ experiences, as well as space to document their own experiences.” It is open to researchers, policy makers, civil society organizations, and communities throughout Africa, allowing new connections to be formed across disciplines such as geography, science, and disaster management. A key premise of the AfricaAdapt network is that “knowledge on climate change adaptation is often poorly documented and rarely shared in forms that are accessible to those who need it the most.”

AfricaAdapt encourages communication among active groups through key technologies such as Skype, wikis, Delicious, Twitter, YouTube and email. Benefits to the initiative include institutional capacity-strengthening through the usage of such online tools that allow for management and implementation between the hosting partners and the learning of ICTs for internal management. Hence, it forms a connection between international and locally generated knowledge on responding to climate impacts in Africa.

The network’s operating principles involve:

being demand responsive in how it selects and translates adaptation information;
building alliances and partnerships that maximize the benefits of knowledge sharing and promote visibility with diverse stakeholders;
addressing capacity constraints to knowledge access, sharing and use; and
demonstrating the added value of a culture of knowledge sharing

Examples of projects carried out through this initiative includes rural radio and video broadcasting and applying learning on rainwater harvesting from another African initiative (available on the AfricaAdapt website) in 20 villages in Malawi.

Concerns of the project include a general lack of bandwidth, limiting communication to being mainly text-based. It was also difficult to implement wikis among managing partners, as there was resistance towards adding another layer of navigation for accessing documents. Therefore, such steps must be implemented strategically. Network partners must be willing to learn and experiment by “regularly reviewing existing approaches, document and learn from successes and failures, and adopt new approaches where existing ones are not satisfactory.”

The takeaway message from the case-study is that openness, participation, institutional hierarchy, and connectivity across partners is the key formula for a successful deployment of ICTs. This strength and effectiveness leads to experimental learning, innovation, and reflective practice that moves beyond the core towards broader membership of the issue.

March 21, 2012/by actualize

Agriculture, Climate Change, Environment, Environment, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

Enduring Change: Entrusting Women as Planners

It’s stacked against them. Climate change is impacting developing countries in a real way, disrupting ancestral patterns used by the rural poor for farming, fishing, and daily life. On top of this, women and men experience climate change differently as gender inequalities worsen women’s coping. Women traditional are responsible for the tasks most likely to be affected by climate change: agriculture, food security, and water management.

How can women in these communities be empowered? For one, there needs to be a gender-responsive approach towards climate change policymaking and programming so that women can be important stakeholders when addressing climate change with their skills related to mitigation, adaption, and the reduction of risks.

A manual has been created for including women in the design process by the Global Gender and Climate Alliance (GGCA). CRiSTAL, which stands for Community-based Risk Screening Tool – Adaptation and Livelihoods, is designed to help project planners and managers integrate climate change adaption and risk reduction into community-level projects. It defines gender and includes warm-up activities and exercises that explain climate change that empower poor women to be powerful agents of change. The CRiSTAL approach also “provides a gender-specific vulnerability analysis for different parts of the population, highlighting the specific coping strategies of women, and resulting in clear pointers for how gender specific measures will need to be incorporated into projects.” From this manual, women gain access to knowledge about different hazards, risk reduction, resources and technology that reshape negotiations of comprehensive regimes on climate change. The manual includes examples of natural resource management projects focusing on drought coping strategies in Bangladesh, Mali, Nicaragua, Tanzania and Sri Lanka.

The manual concludes with a call for more government and NGO support, including providing skill transfer through ICT training for women that can change the perception of women in their communities.

March 8, 2012/by actualize

Agriculture, Climate Change, Energy, Environment, Environment, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

CARMA: the destiny of carbon

Power generation accounts for about one-quarter of global carbon emissions, a major cause of global warming. CARMA (Carbon Monitoring for Action) was created to inventory and monitor this massive output to “equip individuals with the information they need to forge a cleaner, low-carbon future.” There are over 50,000 power plants and 4,000 power companies worldwide available on CARMA’s database, which is produced and financed by the Confronting Climate Change Initiative at the Center for Global Development. CARMA can be used by consumers, investors, shareholders, and policymakers to name a few for influencing decisions on power generation.

For power plants within the U.S., CARMA uses E.P.A. data. For non-reporting plants, CARMA estimates emissions using a statistical model that utilizes detailed data on plant-level engineering and fuel specifications. The database is updated quarterly to reflect changes in ownership, construction, renovation, planned expansions, and plant retirements. The plants can generate power from any number of sources, including hydroelectric, fossil fuels, and nuclear. According to the site, “CARMA does not endorse or favor any particular technology. Our goal is to simply report the best available information on sources of power sector carbon emissions.” In many cases data can be downloaded from the site.

March 6, 2012/by actualize

Climate Change, Environment, Environmental Education, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

Youth on Climate Change

Photo Credit: Climate EduXchange

How should we engage youth in discussing climate change and how it affects our lives? Climate EduXchange, a partnership between TERI (The Energy and Resources Institute) and Dell Inc, wishes to do just that in India.

TERI has for a long time been involved in educating youth on environmental issues through its Youth Education and Action Group that has “been working with educational institutions to sensitize students to the environment, inculcate the right values and attitudes about the environment in them, and help them grow as responsible citizens of the world.” TERI chose India for implementing this project because of its great geographical and climatic diversity that is impacted in varying ways throughout all sectors of life.

Climate EduXchange reaches out to students, teachers and the community on the key issue of climate change through information and communication technology by providing a platform (interactive project website) for “students from identified parts of the country to share information and ideas across disciplines – about how climate change is affecting them, and how India might best secure a path towards sustainable development.” The project is time-bound, with a structured methodology for rolling out the program in each city. Climate EduXchange is currently taking place in Shimla, Jaipur, Mumbai, Puducherry, Medak, Mysore, Bangalore, Delhi, Hyderabad, Chennai, Mohali, and Prune.

On the website there are useful lesson plans, radio broadcasts, and videos that can be used in the classroom. Through this platform students have the opportunity to improve upon their technical skills by managing webpages and forums using the computers and Internet facilities provided. Climate EduXchange has spawned new activities including project resources, student exchange, competitions, outreach, and workshops.

February 28, 2012/by actualize

Climate Change, Environment, Natural Resources Management, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

Combating Climate Change in Nepal

How can mobile phones address issues raised by a changing climate? A study by Shrandha Giri and Yuwan Malakar of the University of Manchester with support of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) looks at a successful campaign in Nepal that takes advantage of the widespread usage of mobile phones.

Greater variation in precipitation, higher average temperatures, and a fragile geography prone to flooding have been noted by Nepalese farmers as signs of climate change. In light of these concerns, a phone-based early warning system was created to exchange information on flood signs and other occurrences among communities. The system also provides a list of service providers and traders in the agricultural field. The study notes three critical ways in which mobile phones benefit these farmers:

1. Agricultural Practices: alongside the typical problems of low-productivity agricultural practices and poor access to inputs, farmers in the villages are also reporting with a presumed link to climate change the arrival of new pests and diseases about which they have limited knowledge. This has affected the level of outputs because of the novelty of these challenges and the lack of availability of local agricultural technicians. The project provides the farmers with the phone contacts of technical service providers, which they have then used to get advice about treating crops and livestock. They also use this service for more general advice on seed varieties, planting times and methods with the aim of raising incomes and thus reducing vulnerabilities.

2. Market Prices: in order to reach the nearest market, farmers in Kirtipur have to walk 10km along a train route and then travel a further 5km by bus. Because of the higher costs of reaching other markets and complete uncertainty about prices in those markets, farmers would always sell in the nearest market at whatever price the local traders would offer. With climate change and flooding potentially suppressing the level of outputs they could achieve, this was a severe threat to income levels. The project therefore also provided the farmers with a phone contact list of agricultural traders in a number of nearby markets. As a result, not only are they better informed about reasonable market price levels for their outputs, they can also compare prices between traders and justify journeys to whichever trader is offering them the best price.

3. Disaster Early Warning: Flooding, particularly the recent growth in occurrences and severity which is assumed to be linked to climate change, causes problems to the farmers in loss of crops and livestock, inability to access markets when there are landslides, and more general dangers to life and property. The project provided a phone list of key contacts in both upstream and downstream communities. When there is continuous heavy rain, those in the upstream areas phone and warn those in the downstream communities, who are then able to prepare and evacuate livestock, property, family, etc. They also warn about landslides that may block planned transport routes. In return, those in the downstream, more populated, better connected and more commercial areas, provide information on markets, agricultural practice and development opportunities.

The information needed to create this network was provided through a participatory vulnerability assessment (PVA) conducted by Practical Action, village development committees, and agricultural groups affiliated with government district offices. In this survey farmers noted the changing dry season, erratic rainfall, and movement of farmers due to a lack of irrigation. The project is deemed successful because it involved local people’s motivations such as financial gain. The use of ICTs reduces vulnerabilities and makes communities more resistant and perhaps productive by mitigating long-term changes in the local climate.

February 9, 2012/by actualize

Agriculture, Climate Change, Environment, Environment, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

Cheat Sheet: ICTs for Climate Change

How can ICTs be used to combat climate change? Stan Karanasios’s paper entitled “New & Emergent ICTs and Climate Change in Developing Countries” outlines emerging ICTs in 3 steps:

monitoring of climate change and the environment
disaster management
climate change adaptation

Excerpts from the paper outline uses of ICTs for climate change:

Monitoring of climate change and the environment

For developing countries to better understand their local climate and be able to anticipate climate change impacts, they must have adequate local and national observation networks, and access to the data captured from other global and regional networks.

Types of technology include:

satellite systems
wireless broadband technologies
wireless sensor networks (WSN)
mobile phones
hand-held devices

Examples of environmental monitors:

Rainfall and Landslide- In hilly regions of western India, SenSlide, a distributed sensor system, predicts rather than just detects landslides. Landslides occur frequently, often during the monsoon when rain causes significant damage. SenSlide makes use of WSN and strain gauges, providing data to a network.
Fire- In South Africa, FireHawk, a forest fire system of cameras with zoom lenses and microwave transmitters and receivers was implemented in mountainous and extreme temperate locations. The system automatically detects fires, even at night, limiting the impact of damage.
Flood- In Honduras, a WSN for flood monitoring was developed that was able to withstand river flooding and the severe stromes causing the floods, communicate over a 10,000 km river basin, predict flooding autonomously, and limit cost, allowing feasible implementation of the system.
Impacts of Agriculture- In India a WSN-based agriculture management system named COMMON-Sense Net, was deployed to support rain-fed agriculture and provide farmers with environmental data. Wireless sensors were deployed in geographical clusters, each with one base-station that was connected to a local server via a Wi-Fi link and organized in groups, each corresponding to a particular application, such as crop modeling, water conservation measures, or deficit irrigation management.

Disaster management

Responding to natural disasters in a timely and effective manner has emerged as an important climate change theme particularly in developing countries; where in addition to the immediate crisis vulnerable communities suffer excessively from the secondary post-disaster effects that compound the tragedy. In many cases, the existing telecommunication infrastructure will be significantly or completely destroyed by an extreme weather event, and hence rapidly deployable networks and other communication services need to be employed for disaster relief operations.

Communication Methods:

Emergency Communication Systems- In Bangladesh an Integrated Information and Communication System is underway which will use satellite, wireless broadband, mobile phones and community radio services strengthening communication links between rescue and relief units and Emergency Operation Centers (EOC).
Rapidly Deployable Communications
Social Networking- During Typhoon Ondoy in the Philippines in 2009, local volunteers organized and disseminated information online through websites such as Facebook and Twitter. Organizations and affected people used these sites for timely reports concerning the extent of damage, to provide information on the resources required tand to allocate relief resources.
GIS & Other Information Systems- Visualize high risk zones; evacuation routes, shelters and the catalogue of available resource and their proximity
Early Warning Systems- satellite radio, mobile phones, cell broadcasting system, the web, WSNs, and CAP (common alerting protocol) can be coupled with climate data for immediate and short/medium/long-term warnings to minimize harm to vulnerable communities.

Disaster Management Project Example: Project DUMBO

Mesh Networks and Disaster Response in Thailand DUMBO, a project initiated by the Asian Institute of Technology Internet Education and Research Laboratory, developed and tested asystem for response to emergency scenarios in Thailand . Making use of the concept of wireless mesh networks, DUMBO uses lightweight portable mobile nodes to broaden coverage and penetrate deep into areas not accessible by roads or where the telecommunication infrastructure has been destroyed. During the trials in Thailand, laptops were carried on elephants to extend thewireless mesh network coverage. On the networking side, the solution utilised hybrid WiFi and satellite connectivity. The second application component involved sensors, which allowed for readings of environmental data such as temperature, humidity, pressure, windspeed, wind direction, rainfall and CO2. The third application component involved facial recognition software that allowed rescuers to compare facial images captured from the site to the collection of known faces. This is one of a few systems in developing countries that make use of emergent technologies and combine communications with integrated disaster applications

Climate change adaptation

To cope with current and future climate stress, communities – particularly those most vulnerable to developing countries – must build their resilience, including adopting appropriate technologies, while making the most of traditional knowledge, and diversifying their livelihoods. For instance, monitoring networks can inform habitat location (provide information to house communities away from a flood or landslide in prone areas), better agriculture (based on informed climate information or water allocation) and provide early warnings, amongst other applications. Mobile technology should be scaled-up for adaptation.

There is a lot of room for growth in developing ICTs for adapting to climate change through collecting, analyzing and disseminating information particularly in space-based systems, GIS, WSNs, wireless broadband technology, mobile technology, and soft technologies such as Web-based tools. By doing so, bottom-up local coping strategies will be encouraged.

February 7, 2012/by actualize

Climate Change, Environment, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

Mexico’s Climate Challenge: ICTs pave environmental policy

Mexico’s bouquet of distinct ecosystems features an assorted variety of species, making the country one of the most biologically diverse in the world. The gem of Mexico’s ecological abundance is in great danger due to the forces of climate change. The country’s coastal regions risk destruction from tropical storms. Other problems include heavy rains that increase flash flooding and pollution that dulls overall health. Environmental deterioration and degradation can be traced as a root cause of current social and economic problems in Mexico, especially as poverty is agitated by the effects of climate change.

In June 2011 the Association of Progressive Communications (APC) released “ICTs and environmental sustainability: Mapping national policy-making and climate change strategies“. In the report, the authors note the potential for ICTs in Mexico but warn of the overall disconnect between policy-making and climate change strategies. A critical piece missing is the general lack of communication infrastructure. The report cites a study that states that Mexico has the second lowest broadband density of all countries in the OECD and in comparison to other countries Internet is slow and expensive. In 2010, only 30 out of 110 million Mexicans had access to Internet.

There is great potential for ICTs to litigate climate change in Mexico. The report points towards solutions for integrating ICT into the sector, noting the limited budget and lack of private investment in technology. Despite this, in 2010 Ericsson declared that they supported launching a public-private partnership for low-carbon solutions at the Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change held in Cancun (COP16).

Some proposed areas where ICTs can be introduced include:

tracking carbon footprints and using sensors to improve energy use efficiency
surveying water use
using geographic data for flood prevention
creating information dissemination and consultation systems to prevent and issue early warning in vulnerable situations such as natural disasters that can coordinate members of the National Civil Protection System
updating the national volcanological monitoring system
forming a surveillance system for land conservation

January 31, 2012/by actualize

Agriculture, Climate Change, Energy, Environment, Environment, Environmental Compliance, Natural Resources Management, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

5 Areas to Watch for ICTs, Environment & Climate Change in 2012!

The Sustainability Director of Ericsson, Matilda Gennevi Gustafsson stated at the just ended United Nations COP17 Climate Change Conference that “In order to meet the needs of the 9 billion people estimated to populate the world by 2050, there must be a shift from incremental to transformative solutions to solve climate change. The opportunity for the transformational power of ICT to put us on the path of a low-carbon economy and spur socio-economic development has never been greater.”

So as we enter 2012, we expect the rise of ICT applications and solutions with the potential to mitigate the impact of the global climate change on our environment. Below are 5 selected areas with specific examples to watch for transformative solutions as the year progresses:

Photo Credit: Travel Outback

1. ICTs for Weather Information

While farming remains a predominant occupation for the rural people across the developing world, the increasing effects of climate change is being felt in almost all areas of their farming activities. From shorter and unpredictable rainfalls patterns to increasing flooding, poor quality and quantity of forage for livestock the general changes in temperature. As a result, concerns and questions among farmers and to scientists about these unpredictable weather patterns in recent years continue to rise. The focus for the scientists now is to try and quickly response to these concerns from the farmers and ICT applications and solutions are expected to rise in this area as well.

a) Weather Information for Africa

This is an initiative by Ericsson which addresses the lack of quality weather forecasts in Africa. It assists national meteorological services to design customized forecasts and promotes the use of cellphones to distribute the information. Local weather information such as storm warnings not only enables disaster, but can also improve economic opportunities for the millions of people working in industries such as fisheries, agriculture and small business development. The initiative is already showing positive benefits which can be of use for the 3.5 million people living alongside Lake Victoria, Africa’s largest lake.

b) Using SMS to Fast-Track Responses to Farmers’ Climate Change Questions in Zambia

Example is seen in Zambia where climate change questions can now receive quick answers via SMS from a new feedback SMS system developed by the country’s National Agricultural Information Services (NAIS) together with, a local software developer, SMSize and International Institute for Communication and Development (IICD).

c) Using ICTs to Minimize Weather Hazards on Farmers

Also in Ghana, Ignitia is presenting a hands-on opportunity, where it can deliver daily weather forecasts and warnings to initially 90,000 farmers. The farmer gets a daily forecast in his/her mobile phone by an automatically generated text message, tailored to the farmer’s specific location by GPS coordinates.

Photo Credit: Eon

2. ICTs to Facilitate Connectivity and Commute

a) Virtual Meetings

In a not too distant future there may not be any travel agencies, only meeting agencies (where the default suggestion is a virtual meeting, and a physical meeting is booked only if necessary), the Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI). The statement continues that virtual meetings may have started as a smarter way to do conferences, and this shift alone has resulted in significant reductions of GHG emissions, but virtual meetings could also help accelerate sustainable production around the world by increasing transparency.

b) Teleworking

Teleworking, according to the Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI) is the possibility of working wherever is best and avoiding travel when you can get access to documents and information without it. It allows people to get things done in a much smarter way which not only saves time, money, and energy directly, but also promotes investments in an infrastructure that is very resource efficient. Much of today’s information and material can be stored in the “cloud” to allow access from any mobile device. Today there is no need to keep investing in an infrastructure based on the assumption that every person must move from the home to a physical office every day.

c) Connectivity

Through the work of Ericsson, the daily commute for residents of Curitiba (southern Brazil) is now easy and efficient. The new HSPA-based public transport system is enabling the 3.2 million citizens of Curitiba to use an electronic ticketing and fleet management system to reduce their congested transportation system. The city’s bus fleet is connected through a high-speed mobile broadband network that provides up-to-the-second information on a range of services. The fleet management system provides up-to-date information on bus services and timetables, directly to their mobile device.

Photo Credit: Euogo.com

3. Using Solar Chargers

The Social Energy Marketplace

At a recently ended Web 2.0 Summit held in San Francisco California, a Berlin-based startup called Changers announced the release of a portable solar charging system that aims to reduce global warming by shifting society to the use of a currency backed by the sun. The Changers Solar System gives the user a way to harness the sun’s energy, liberates the user from the grid, recharges all kinds of devices, helps the user to socialize his/her energy production, and enables him/her to compete with others to earn Changers Credits that can be spent in the Changers Marketplace. The Changers Kalhuohfummi is a simple, one-button device that communicates with Changers.com. Inside is advanced intelligence that accurately measures how much energy it captures and stores in the built-in battery, ready to charge any smartphone or tablet. The Changers Kalhuohfummi solar battery is powered by the Changers Maroshi flexible solar module, which generates up to four Watts per hour — enough to charge the Kalhuohfummi battery in four hours. The Changers Maroshi solar panel, which is produced in Colorado, USA, can be attached to any window or sunny surface.

Photo Credit: EventCamp

4. App Challenges for Climate Change

Crowdsourcing has come to stay and the innovative use of this approach to generate knowledge will rise in the years to come. We expect to see more calls and challenges in 2012 giving opportunities to techies and those interested in applying these technologies for sustainable environment to work on apps that will have impact. An on-going challenge is Poliwiki.

Poliwiki – Crowd Sourcing APP to Combat Climate Change

Poliwiki, the first digital channel of its kind in the world, aims at assessing climate change related legislation. It is a timely and effective on-line platform to help policy makers and innovators combat climate change in a smart and transparent way, says James Lovegrove Managing Director of TechAmerica Europe. The Poliwiki will be expanded to include more countries and data in an active campaign during 2012 and 2013 by the ICT For Energy Efficiency Forum (www.ict4ee.eu) – an industry initiative in Europe that is mobilizing ICT to facilitate the transition to an energy-efficient, low-carbon economy.

Photo Credit: iPhone Developer Labs

5. New and Emerging Apps to Follow

We have seen a number of challenges already in this area of ICTs and Climate Change such as the APPS4AFRICA. The results of the West Africa APPS4AFRICA below may be an inspiration for others as they launch into 2012. These and others that will be released in 2012 will be worth following:

a) 1st prize – HospitalManager

HospitalManager is a web-based application that helps hospitals and health organizations prepare for disasters such as floods and storms. More frequent heat spells, rains, and floods are leading to heath emergencies, both due to the event itself, and later to water related disease. HospitalManager will help hospitals in Nigeria, and potentially throughout Africa, identify patterns in patient visits following rains and floods, so that staff can better prepare for these situations and save more lives. Hospitals can anticipate incoming disease and emergency patterns using real time climate forecasts. On longer time scales it will allow policy makers to plan locations of new hospitals.

b) 2nd prize – Eco-fund Forum

Eco-fund Forum is a web-based community organizer and geo-localized data exchange tool to help individuals and communities working on sustainable resource management throughout Africa to share their own experiences on best practices. Thus they will better understand and respond to the climate change challenges impacting each specific local context. For example, coastal communities in Senegal that suffer from erosion can learn from neighbors that are successfully and durably overcoming the same problem by regenerating and preserving a littoral forest. Furthermore, the Forum will give those communities a voice which should alert political decision makers to address climate change challenges in time.

c) 3rd prize – Farmerline

Farmerline is a mobile and web-based system that furnishes farmers and investors with relevant agricultural information to improve productivity and increase income. Lack of information about weather patterns and about which crops grow best in a changing climate hurts rural farmers’ yields. Cell phone use is growing rapidly throughout Ghana, including in rural areas. This mobile tool can help farmers in Ghana to get information about agricultural best practices down to the farm level, including choosing crops best suited for their specific location, and how to prepare for changes in weather patterns (including dry spells, changes in seasonal onset, and extreme events).

d) iPhone App for Ecosystems Approach

Finally, you may want to follow this app that was launched by the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) at the Eye on Earth summit in Abu Dhabi that takes a different approach to the climate change issue. The UNEP app draws attention to the critical role played by ecosystems such as salt marshes, mangroves, tropical forests and seagrasses in tackling climate change. Users of the app can calculate their personal carbon footprint for journeys taken by air, train or road. They will then be shown the equivalent area of a particular ecosystem (such as a tropical forest) that can store this amount of carbon dioxide. The free iPhone app is already available online in English, Arabic, Chinese, French, Japanese, Russian and Spanish and can be downloaded from the Apple Store

December 22, 2011/by actualize

Agriculture, Climate Change, Environment, Environment, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

ICTs and Climate Change Gain Importance During COP17 Conference in Durban

As the United Nations COP17 Climate Change Conference wraps up today after two weeks of intense meetings and negotiations among world leaders, ICTs have frequently surfaced as significant in helping solve the global climate change problem.

While the task of positioning the role of ICTs within climate change negotiations is challenging, groups like the newly formed Coalition on ICTs and Climate Change have been actively working to raise awareness, mobilize political will, and encourage governments to include ICTs within their climate change policies. The result has been for COP17 to give more visibility to the role of ICTs in climate change action.

Techies at the Durban climate change conference

Photo credit: Notes on ICTs, Climate Change and Development (NICCD)

During the conference, there were side meetings focused on ICTs, an “ICT Day,” and a Digital Media Lounge that provided a platform for experts and practitioners to have a tele-presence. In addition, tech companies Techamerica and Digital Europe launched an online crowdsourcing app called “Poliwiki.” The tool is the first digital channel of its kind in the world, and serves as an “online platform to help policy-makers and innovators combat climate change in a smart and transparent way.”

ICT buffs have been blogging and tweeting throughout the conference on ICTs and climate change. Sunil Bharti Mittal of the Times of India wrote an article about the enormous opportunity that ICTs hold to “usher in transformational changes in the carbon intensity of growth.” He believes that investment in the ICT sector can deliver “exponential returns in terms of emissions reduction.” His article provides instances of this, such as smart grids whereby electric companies utilize ICTs to reduce losses, prevent outages and provide customers with information on how to manage their own carbon footprints, potentially leading to a 5-9% reduction in greenhouse gases in the United States.

The 2011 Apps4Africa competition, which searches for the most innovative solutions to global challenges, made its theme “Climate Challenge” in order to center around the strategic themes that coincide with policy decisions made during COP17. The winners of the West Africa Climate Challenge were announced on Wednesday, December 7 during the conference, with the first prize of $15,000 going to a web-based app called HospitalManager that helps hospitals and health organizations prepare for natural disasters.

Poliwiki: www.transformative-step.net

While no follow-up to the Kyoto Protocol was secured, and many felt that the conference ended in “political fudge,” tech enthusiasts seem to have made progress in demonstrating the critical role ICTs have to play in solving the climate change crisis.

December 9, 2011/by actualize