Compounding Crises

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Compounding Crises
Climate Change in a Complex World
Will Steffen Executive Director, The ANU Climate
Change Institute The Australian National
University
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Possible Explanations for the Collapse of Early
Civilisations

• Tainter - increasing complexity decreasing
  resilience
• Friedman - waves of globalisation to an upper
  limit of
• system compatibility
• Diamond - inflexibility of core societal values

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The Greenland Norse
Jette Arneborg
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The Human Enterprise, 1750-2000
Steffen et al. 2004
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The Earth System, 1750-2000
Steffen et al. 2004
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Compounding Global Crises
Adapted from Walker et al. 2009
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Compounding Global Crises Syndrome 1 Expanding
cascade

• Attributes
• Complex system no single agent in control
• Amplifying feedbacks driving the cascading
  effect
• Breakdown in trust and cooperation
• Recovery without learning

Examples Global Financial Crisis Global
overfishing
Inconvenient Feedbacks/Global Dynamics Workshop,
SRC, 2010
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Compounding Global Crises Syndrome 2 Double
whammy

• Attributes
• Largely independent stressors
• Highly interconnected systems that link impacts
• Concentrated vulnerable areas or systems
• Non-connected or ineffective regulatory systems

Examples Global food crises Collapse of coral
reefs Pandemic (potential)
Inconvenient Feedbacks/Global Dynamics Workshop,
SRC, 2010
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Analysis of the Global Food Crisis

• Global-scale concatenation of processes produce
  shocks
• that emerge simultaneously, spread rapidly and
  interact.
• The 2008 global food price crisis - (i) the 2007
  oil price
• spike, (ii) pro-biofuel policies (iii)
  reactionary protectionism
• The ingredients for a compounding crisis?
• Powerful global scale drivers
• Propagation of shocks through increased global
  connectivity
• Knock-on effects of management responses
  elsewhere

Biggs et al. 2010
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Peak Oil A production or a supply-demand
problem?
Sorrell et al. 2009
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Oil and food price trends, 1999 - 2011
World Bank Commodity Price Data
FAO Food Price Index
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Compounding Global Crises Syndrome 3 Long fuse
big bang

• Attributes
• Global scale big lag between drivers and
  consequences
• Known consequences but far in future
• Risk of irreversible changes
• Lack of adequate regulatory institutions

Examples Climate change increasing resistance
to antibiotics increasing economic social
inequality
Inconvenient Feedbacks/Global Dynamics Workshop,
SRC, 2010
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The Critical Decade


Adapted from Meinshausen et al. 2009
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Earth System moves to a new state modern
civilisation collapses?
Committed Climate Change
Now
IGBP PAGES
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Climate-related Risks in a 4 C (or more) World
Australia
Increasing economic social impacts from extreme
events crossing a socio-economic tipping point
(note impacts of Qld floods in 2011) - LONG FUSE
BIG BANG EXPANDING CASCADE Deteriorating human
health from heat waves, malnutrition and
mental stress coupled with increasing resistance
to antibiotics leading to pandemics, drop in life
expectancy and decreasing population - LONG FUSE
BIG BANG x 2 Degradation, and eventually
irreversible loss, of Australias most iconic
natural areas - Great Barrier Reef, Kadadu
wetlands, Alpine ecosystems, Wet tropics high
altitude rainforests - owing to climatic other
stressors DOUBLE (OR TRIPLE) WHAMMY
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Climate Risks in a 4 C (or more) World
Global (but with implications for Australia)
Simultaneous droughts in USA and China -
disruption of global food supply starvation,
conflict, insurrection and migration -
DOUBLE WHAMMY EXPANDING CASCADE Collapse of
the West Antarctic ice sheet - several metres of
sea-level rise within 100-200 years widespread
flooding, inundation and loss of coastal
infrastructure - LONG FUSE BIG BANG Regional-scal
e climate-triggered conflicts break out -
resource wars in the Arctic conflict over water
resources in South Asia land conflicts in Africa
- lead to breakdown of global order, collapse of
WTO, increase in inequality, move towards
Fortress World - DOUBLE (OR TRIPLE) WHAMMY
EXPANDING CASCADE
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Tipping Elements in the Earth System
Source Schellnhuber, after Lenton et al, PNAS,
2008
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Vulnerable tipping elements in the climate system
Tipping Element Warming level Transition Timescale Impact
Greenland ice sheet 1-2 oC gt300 yr (slow) Sea level 2-7 m
W. Antarctic ice sheet 3-5 oC gt300 yr (slow) Sea level 5 m
Indian summer monsoon N/A ca 1 yr (fast) Drought starvationD
Amazon rainforest 3-4 oC ca 50 yr (gradual) Extinctions decrease in rainfall
Atlantic THC (Gulf stream) 3-5 oC ca 100 yr (gradual) Regional cooling ITCZ shift








Lenton et al. 2008
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The Earth System Expanding Cascade
Tibetan Albedo Change?
Bistability of Saharan Vegetation
Source H.J. Schellnhuber
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The Earth System Expanding Cascade
Atlantic Deep Water Formation
Instability of West Antarctic Ice Sheet?
Source H.J. Schellnhuber
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Three Challenges for Planetary Stewardship
Stabilise the climate at a state within which
human societies can thrive. Halt the decline in
biological and cultural diversity, and in
social-ecological complexity. Solve the equity
problem - both within countries and between
countries.
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