Tsunami threats underestimated in current models, new research shows

An analysis of historical seismic events by a USC Dornsife scientist finds the near-trench region affects tsunami severity

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA

 

IMAGE: USC RESEARCHERS FOUND THAT LARGE EARTHQUAKE-GENERATED TSUNAMIS EMERGE AFTER HORIZONTAL OCEANIC WATER MOVEMENT IS TRANSFERRED TO UPLIFT IN THE TSUNAMI EXCITATION ZONE, THE OUTER WEDGE OF SEDIMENT BETWEEN THE CONTINENTAL SHELF AND THE DEEP OCEAN TRENCH. view more 

CREDIT: MESA SCHUMACHER AND EDWARD SOLETO

The 2004 Sumatra earthquake generated one of the most destructive tsunamis ever recorded, with 100-foot waves that killed nearly 230,000 and resulted in an estimated $10 billion in damage. It also ushered in a new understanding that potent tsunamis are triggered by shallow earthquake ruptures of underwater fault lines. Future tsunamis are likely to be just as severe, if not worse, potentially killing even more people and wiping out whole communities. Although current research points to rupture depth as a key factor in predicting tsunami severity, those models fail to explain why large tsunamis still occur following relatively small earthquakes.

Now, USC researchers have found a correlation between tsunami severity and the width of the outer wedge — the area between the continental shelf and deep trenches where large tsunamis emerge — that helps explain how underwater seismic events generate large tsunamis. Drawing insights from a survey of previous tsunamis, the authors analyzed the geophysical, seismic and bathymetric data of global subduction zones to identify and discuss potential tsunami hazards.

Their latest study revealed that current predictive models underestimate tsunami severity by as much as 100%. The work appears in the journal Earth-Science Reviews.

“Close to half of the human population is coastal, leaving our population and infrastructure vulnerable to seismic and tsunami hazards,” said USC’s Sylvain Barbot, associate professor of Earth sciences at USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Science sand co-author of the study. “To maintain our livelihoods and our economy, we need to protect ourselves from these very violent hazards that are relatively infrequent but still happen. We cannot stop this hazard, so we need to mitigate its effects.

“That means having evacuation plans for tsunamis and developing an urban development plan to avoid having schools and hospitals in inundation regions. There are preemptive measures we can take to protect ourselves against tsunamis and flooding long-term, and our study provides a description of how to define the area affected by these hazards.”

Tsunami threat: Excitation zone width highly correlated with severity

To develop their new model, Barbot and co-author Qiang Qiu, now at the South China Sea Institute of Oceanology under the Chinese Academy of Sciences, analyzed the structural and tectonic settings of nearly a dozen global earthquake-generated tsunamis. Varying in location and intensity, the analysis found that particularly large tsunamis emerge after horizontal movement is transferred to uplift in the outer wedge of sediment located between the continental shelf and the deep ocean trench. The many faults and folds of the outer wedge of accretionary prisms efficiently redirect the sub-oceanic horizontal motion generated by great and giant trench-breaking earthquakes into potentially devastating tsunamis.

“We can very quickly determine where and how big earthquakes are at subduction zones,” Barbot said. “If they happen to be fairly shallow, our results can quickly determine what tsunami height they can generate. This can help improve already existing short-term mitigation strategies for early warning systems.”

The survey of earthquake-generated tsunamis illuminated a correlative relationship between the width of the outer wedge and maximum tsunami strength resulting from earthquakes measuring 7.1 to 8.2 in moment magnitude (Mw). In doing so, the researchers were able to generate estimates of future tsunami severity generated by a range of seismic events.

Middle East, Alaska and Pacific Northwest among regions facing tsunami threat

The authors investigated another 30 active subduction zones. Utilizing the correlation between the width of the outer wedge with tsunami run-ups, they shed light on the threat posed by potential tsunamis. The authors identified the Western Makran (Iran), Western Aleutian, Lesser Antilles, Hikurangi (New Zealand) and Cascadia subduction zones as having the potential to produce the highest tsunami run-ups. For instance, the Cascadia subduction zone — located off the U.S. West Coast near Oregon and Washington — could suffer tsunamis 160 feet high in the wake of a major quake, double what current models project.

“The region that should be the most alert to this is Iran and Pakistan,” Barbot said. “Much of their industry and population is located on their southern coast, exposing them to the largest potential tsunami run-up hazard — perhaps up to 90 meters [nearly 300 feet] in the event of a 9.0 Mw earthquake. However, the threat is nearly as bad in other subduction zones. In the Pacific Northwest, they already have tsunami mitigation measures in place, but they may be preparing for a lower run-up than will happen.”

While these findings better explain how severe tsunamis result from shallow seismic events, future efforts should incorporate three-dimensional imaging of the outer wedge, according to the authors. Understanding the pathway from earthquake to tsunami depends on identifying the structural and rheological controls that turn a rupture into a trench-breaking earthquake.

“With this study, we were able to find this correlation simply because we have a lot of data now,” Barbot said. “It’s the benefit of hindsight that allowed us to discover this really very simple correlation. There is much of this we don’t know yet, so it needs more detailed research, but the relationship between outer-wedge width and tsunami run-up is clear enough that it can be extrapolated.”

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JOURNAL

Earth-Science Reviews

DOI

10.1016/j.earscirev.2022.104054 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Computational simulation/modeling

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Tsunami excitation in the outer wedge of global subduction zones

Critical global water questions

New research has drawn together expert voices from across the globe to help address current and future water challenges

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF LEEDS

Recent intense heatwaves in India and widespread US droughts have highlighted the need for a global approach to tackling chronic water shortages.

Now, new research has drawn together expert voices from across the globe to help address current and future water challenges.

Key areas identified include water scarcity, sanitation and climate dynamics. But the main concern is the way governments are equipped to deal with these challenges.

“One of the key issues raised was governance,” said report co-author Dr Alesia Ofori, a Research Fellow in Water and Sanitation Governance at the University of Leeds’ School of Politics and International Studies.

“In the Global South, respondents are asking why they have to listen to the Global North. Those in the Global South know what the issues are, and they are calling for big changes in access to data so they can better prepare for extreme weather.”

More than 400 respondents took part in the study, in which questions about global water challenges were submitted from countries across the globe including the UK, , India, Spain, Colombia, Peru,

Mexico, Argentina, South Africa and Tanzania.

“A recurring theme was the call for water justice,” said Dr Ofori. “They want justice for the marginalised populations who suffer from the excess consumption and pollution of the rich.

“There is also a call for justice for the local and planetary ecosystems that have been despoiled through a failure of governance on a global level.”

The study, ‘The top 100 global water questions: results of a scoping exercise’, has just been published in One Earth and includes co-authors from the University of York, University of Bradford and Global Water Partnership-Tanzania.

The research team collected more than 4,000 responses from the 400 respondents, which were then narrowed down to 100 crucial water questions facing the planet today.

The 100 questions were grouped under the themes of water and sanitation for human settlements; water and sanitation safety risk management; water security and scarcity; hydroclimate-ecosystem- Anthropocene dynamics; multi-level governance; and knowledge production.

According to the research team, water sector partnerships are needed on a global scale to inform government decision-making on water issues that range from household to planetary levels.

Co-author Professor Anna Mdee, also at Leeds’ School of Politics and International Studies, said: “The 100 top global water questions demonstrate a demand from the global water sector to address the consequences of human governance failure of water resources.

"These failures are evident on a daily basis across the planet - from ongoing droughts in the US to the catastrophic effects of heatwaves in India - and highlight the need for concerted efforts in interdisciplinary research and action.

“These 100 questions also highlight the importance of justice for marginalised human populations and the need for cooperation to ensure water and sanitation policies align with the current needs of individuals, populations at different scales.”

Co-author Dr Victor Kongo, from the Global Water Partnership Tanzania, said: “This study provides a good platform for reflecting and internalizing our research trajectory - what we know, what we don’t know and what we urgently need to know.”

Further information

“The top 100 global water questions: results of a scoping exercise”, was published in One Earth on 20 May, 2022.

The study was funded by water@leeds (water.leeds.ac.uk) at the University of Leeds as part of its 10th anniversary in leading interdisciplinary global water research.

Respondents included United Kingdom (79), India (71), Spain (31), Colombia (19), Peru (18), Mexico (17), Argentina (15), South Africa (13) and Tanzania (13), representing more than 60% of total survey participants.

For further details, contact University of Leeds media relations manager Ian Rosser via i.rosser@leeds.ac.uk.

ENDS

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JOURNAL

One Earth

DOI

10.1016/j.oneear.2022.04.009 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Survey

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

The top 100 global water questions: results of a scoping exercise

A quarter of the world's Internet users rely on infrastructure that is susceptible to attacks

Reports and Proceedings

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA - SAN DIEGO

 

IMAGE: FRACTION OF EACH COUNTRY'S IP ADDRESSES THAT ARE EXPOSED TO OBSERVATION OR SELECTIVE TAMPERING BY COMPANIES THAT CONNECT INTERNET SERVICE PROVIDERS TO THE GLOBAL INTERNET. COUNTRIES ARE SHADED IN PROGRESSIVE SHADES OF BLUE, WITH WOST EXPOSED COUNTRIES IN THE DARKEST BLUE. COUNTRIES IN GRAY EXCLUDED FROM THE STUDY. view more 

CREDIT: UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SAN DIEGO

About a quarter of the world’s Internet users live in countries that are more susceptible than previously thought to targeted attacks on their Internet infrastructure. Many of the at-risk countries are located in the Global South. 

That’s the conclusion of a sweeping, large-scale study conducted by computer scientists at the University of California San Diego. The researchers surveyed 75 countries. 

“We wanted to study the topology of the Internet to find weak links that, if compromised, would expose an entire nation’s traffic,” said Alexander Gamero-Garrido, the paper’s first author, who earned his Ph.D. in computer science at UC San Diego. 

Researchers presented their findings at the Passive and Active Measurement Conference 2022 online this spring.

The structure of the Internet can differ dramatically in different parts of the world. In many developed countries, like the United States, a large number of Internet providers compete to provide services for a large number of users. These networks are directly connected to one another and exchange content, a process known as direct peering. All the providers can also plug directly into the world’s Internet infrastructure.

“But a large portion of the Internet doesn’t function with peering agreements for network connectivity,” Gamero-Garrido pointed out. 

In other nations, many of them still developing countries, most users rely on a handful of providers for Internet access, and one of these providers serves an overwhelming majority of users. Not only that, but those providers rely on a limited number of companies called transit autonomous systems to get access to the global Internet and traffic from other countries. Researchers found that often these transit autonomous system providers are state owned. 

This, of course, makes countries with this type of Internet infrastructure particularly vulnerable to attacks because all that is needed is to cripple a small number of transit autonomous systems. These countries, of course, are also vulnerable if a main Internet provider experiences outages. 

In the worst case scenario, one transit autonomous system serves all users. Cuba and Sierra Leone are close to this state of affairs. By contrast, Bangladesh went from only two to over 30 system providers, after the government opened that sector of the economy to private enterprise. 

This underlines the importance of government regulation when it comes to the number of Internet providers and transit autonomous systems available in a country. For example, researchers were surprised to find that many operators of submarine Internet cables are state-owned rather than privately operated.

Researchers also found traces of colonialism in the topology of the Internet in the Global South. For example, French company Orange has a strong presence in some African countries. 

Researchers relied on Border Gateway Protocol data, which tracks exchanges of routing and reachability information among autonomous systems on the Internet. They are aware that the data can be incomplete, introducing potential inaccuracies, though these are mitigated by the study’s methodology and validation with real, in-country Internet operators. 

Next steps include looking at how critical facilities, such as hospitals, are connected to the Internet and how vulnerable they are. 

Quantifying Nations’ Exposure to Traffic Observation and Selective Tampering (PDF)

 Alberto Dainotti (now at Georgia Institute of Technology),  Alexander Gamero-Garrido (now at Northeastern University), Bradley Huffaker and Alex C. Snoeren, University of California San Diego Esteban Carisimo, Northwestern University 
Shuai Hao, Old Dominion University 

 

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METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Quantifying nations’ exposure to traffic observation and selective tampering

University of Surrey launches Future of Work Research Centre

Business Announcement

UNIVERSITY OF SURREY

The new Research Centre will focus on people management and job quality in a rapidly changing working environment characterised by rapid technological advancements, economic developments, and societal value changes. These changes have transformed the nature and organisation of work, as well as conditions of employment.  

Professor Ying Zhou, Director of the Future of Work Research Centre at the University of Surrey, said: 

“With so much uncertainty in our work environment, we’ll be looking at the critical questions facing the future workplace – from analysis of job quality and digital technologies through to the hopes and perils of hybrid working. 

“Artificial intelligence, machine learning and robotics technologies are changing the nature of jobs, with massive implications for training, skills, and careers. Our new Future of Work Research Centre will draw on world-leading expertise across the University of Surrey, covering artificial intelligence, digital technology, and human resource management, as well as working alongside industry and policy partners. Across our work, we’ll be looking to offer advice on how fairness and justice can be secured in an increasingly diverse workforce.” 

Furthermore, the Research Centre is being established just as the UK Government launches its own Future of Work Review headed by MP Matt Warman. 

The launch event will feature Professor Glenn Parry, Head of the Department of Digital Economy, Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Professor Francis Green, Professor of Work and Education Economics at UCL Institute of Education, and Jonny Gifford, Senior Advisor for Organisational Behaviour at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development. 

More details on the Future of Work Research Centre can be found here. 

[Ends] 

The University of Surrey is a research-intensive university and has been ranked in the top 20 in the UK for the overall quality of research outputs in the Research Excellence Framework (REF) 2021 - the UK’s system for independently assessing the quality of research in higher education institutions. 

This year, the University of Surrey launched an ambitious new global campaign – The Future Says Surrey. The campaign will aim to raise £60 million in three years to invest in the University’s leading research and to support students from diverse backgrounds to thrive at Surrey – securing its place as one of the UK’s leading research and educational institutions.  

Note to Editors 

• Professor Ying Zhou is available for interview upon request 
• For media enquiries, please contact the University of Surrey’s press office at mediarelations@surrey.ac.uk

New Work Foundation Index reveals UK

 workers suffering most from insecure

 employment

New in-depth analysis of UK job market data reveals women, disabled people, ethnic minorities and young workers have been consistently trapped in insecure employment over the last twenty years.

Reports and Proceedings

LANCASTER UNIVERSITY

 

IMAGE: BEN HARRISON, DIRECTOR OF THE WORK FOUNDATION view more 

CREDIT: WORK FOUNDATION

New in-depth analysis of UK job market data reveals women, disabled people, ethnic minorities and young workers have been consistently trapped in insecure employment over the last twenty years.

The Work Foundation, a leading think-tank dedicated to improving work in the UK, today launches its new ‘UK Insecure Work Index’ that details the prevalence of in-work insecurity felt by workers across the UK, and reveals how this insecurity has changed over the last two decades.

Using ONS labour market data from 2000 to 2021, the Work Foundation index focuses on three elements that can constitute insecurity at work – employment contracts, personal finances and access to workers’ rights.

Results reveal four groups of workers consistently trapped in the most severe category of in-work insecurity over the last twenty years, which has affected 20-25% of workers every year on average and an estimated 6.2 million employees just last year:

• Young workers who are two and half times more likely to be in severely insecure work than those in the middle of their working lives (43% of 16-24-year olds vs. 17% of 25-65-year olds)
• Women who are 10% more likely to be in severely insecure work than men (25% compared to 15%)
• Ethnic minority workers are more likely to be in severely insecure work than white workers (24% versus 19%). Men from ethnic minority backgrounds are 10% more likely to experience severely insecure work compared to white men (23% versus 13%)
• Disabled workers who are 6% more likely to suffer severely insecure work, compared to non-disabled workers (25% compared to 19%).

Data also reveals the sectors most at risk of severe in-work insecurity are hospitality, services and agriculture, which see one in three workers affected, compared to one in five nationally.

Ben Harrison, Director of the Work Foundation at Lancaster University, said, “At a time of a cost of living crisis, those in insecure and low paid work are among the groups at most risk. Wages have stagnated and while millions more people may be in employment, the quality and security of the jobs they are in often means they are unable to make ends meet.”

Job market data captured during the pandemic demonstrates that those in severely insecure work face the biggest risks in a crisis. During Covid-19, these workers were at greater risk of losing their jobs, were ten times more likely to receive no sick pay, were more likely to lose out on support through furlough or other schemes.

 “Our analysis shows that job insecurity is impacting certain groups more than others – in particular if you are a young person, a woman in work, from an ethnic minority background or have disabilities, you are more likely to experience severe insecurity in work,” Harrison continues. “With the Bank of England predicting inflation could potentially rise to 10% by the end of 2022, workers may be facing the largest real-term wage cut we’ve seen in generations.”

Former Chair of the Social Mobility Commission, Rt Hon. Alan Milburn, said: “The challenges facing millions of UK families due to job insecurity, low pay and lack of full-time work shouldn’t be underestimated. As the country faces the worst cost of living crisis in living memory, it is clear that more urgently needs to be done.

 “Social mobility has stagnated over recent decades and the UK Insecure Work Index confirms that severely insecure work significantly reduces people’s chances of escaping poverty. It is a stark reminder of the need to focus on access to more secure, better paid and higher quality jobs if we are to truly level-up the UK.”

TUC General Secretary, Frances O’Grady, welcomed the UK Insecure Work Index. She said: “Up and down the country, millions are trapped in jobs that have wildly unpredictable hours, low pay, and limited rights.

“For years working people were promised improved rights and protections. But ministers have now shelved the Employment Bill, which they said would help make Britain the best place in the world to work. 

 “Instead of tackling insecure work, ministers have sat on their hands and allowed it to flourish. In the midst of a cost-of-living emergency, it’s more important than ever that the government clamps down on low-paid precarious work.

“The time for excuses is over. We need to see government action to boost workers’ rights and end exploitative practices like zero hours contracts.”

Lord Gavin Barwell, Chief of Staff to the Prime Minister (2017-19) said: "Today for the first time ever, we have fewer people out of work than job vacancies. But, if low unemployment is a UK success story, the government and employers now face two challenges. First, how do we encourage people back into the market to meet the demand for labour? And second, how do we improve the security of those jobs and thereby level up the country?

“This timely report provides recommendations for what the government can do to improve security while maintaining the benefits of the UK's current approach. The government is on the search for ways to use the regulatory freedom we now enjoy outside the EU: building on the success of the UK economy in creating jobs by ensuring those jobs are secure in the broadest sense of the word would be a great place to start."

Ben Harrison adds: “In the immediate term, the Chancellor must raise Universal Credit in line with predicted inflation to ensure support through this cost of living crisis is targeted to those in low-paid and insecure work.

“And while plans for an Employment Bill that could have addressed many of these issues appear to have been shelved, the fact remains Government cannot hope to deliver on its ambition to Level Up the country without driving up employment standards and increasing the number of higher quality, better paid and more secure jobs on offer.”

The launch of the UK Insecure Work Index is the benchmark for the Work Foundation’s Insecure Work Research Programme, which aims to produce timely insights on insecure work in the UK going forward.

The UK Insecure Work Index report is published and available in full on the Work Foundation’s website on 26 May 2022: www.theworkfoundation.com.             

Ends

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METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

Spines of life: Fast-breeding sea urchin provides new model for genetic research

Researchers from the University of Tsukuba establish a sea urchin species, Temnopleurus reevesii, as a new model for genetic research

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF TSUKUBA

 

IMAGE: PROVIDE GENETIC INFORMATION AND ESTABLISH A PORTAL SITE FOR WEST PACIFIC SEA URCHIN GENETIC DATA view more 

CREDIT: UNIVERSITY OF TSUKUBA

Tsukuba, Japan—Many people may not realize that the humble sea urchin is a titan when it comes to the study of biology. Now, researchers from Japan have discovered that sea urchins could help biological studies go further than ever before.

In a study published in this month in Development, Growth and Differentiation, researchers from the University of Tsukuba have revealed that a particular species of sea urchin may be a game changer, opening up new avenues for genetic research.

Sea urchins have been used for over a hundred year as a model for understanding how biological systems work. These organisms have enabled the identification of mechanisms underlying biological phenomena, ranging from gene regulatory networks to the proteins involved in cell cycles. However, there is a catch—the model species used so far take 2 years to reach reproductive maturity, making them unsuitable for genetic studies.

"To be able to study genetics in sea urchins, we need to find species with short breeding cycles, or to speed up the cycles of the current model species," says senior author of the study, Professor Shunsuke Yaguchi. "In our study, we looked for a species with a short reproductive cycle."

The researchers identified Temnopleurus reevesii as a candidate species because it only takes 6 months to produce the next generation, and eggs and sperm can be collected continuously throughout the year when kept at a temperature over 20°C. Most other model sea urchins don't have these features, which make this species useful for culturing in a lab.

The team assembled a draft genome of T. reevesii and constructed two genome databases, TrBase and the Western Pacific Sea Urchin Genome Database (WestPac-SUGDB), the latter containing genomic information on T. reevesii and another model urchin species, Hemicentrotus pulcherrimus. The aim of creating these databases was to provide genetic information and establish a portal site for West Pacific sea urchin genetic data. WestPac-SUGDB also has search programs for comparing the two datasets.

"We predict that these databases will contribute not only to sea urchin genetic research, but also to evolutionary research and comparative genomics," says Professor Yaguchi.

The results of this study have opened up the possibility of using T. reevesii as a new model species for research in a number of fields, including cell, developmental, experimental, and evolutionary biology. Additionally, the researchers suggest that investigations in the near future will identify another sea urchin species as an improved model organism for medicine and the life sciences.

Original Paper:

The article, "TrBase: A genome and transcriptome database of Temnopleurus reevesii," was published in Development, Growth and Differentiation at DOI: 10.1111/dgd.12780

Correspondence:

Associate Professor YAGUCHI Shunsuke
Faculty of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Tsukuba

Related Link:

Faculty of Life and Environmental Sciences
Shimoda Marine Research Center
TrBase: https://cell-innovation.nig.ac.jp/Tree/

 

WestPac-SUGDB: https://cell-innovation.nig.ac.jp/WPAC/

 

---

DOI

10.1111/dgd.12780 

ARTICLE TITLE

TrBase: A genome and transcriptome database of Temnopleurus reevesii

Reshaping global policies for circular economy

Peer-Reviewed Publication

TSINGHUA UNIVERSITY PRESS

 

IMAGE: THE PROGRESSIVE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION OF THE PAST TWO CENTURIES RELIED ON THE EXTRACTION OF NATURAL RESOURCES FROM THE LITHOSPHERE, AND THEN THEY ARE PROCESSED AND TRANSFORMED INTO DESIRED PRODUCTS, WHICH AT THE END OF THEIR USEFUL LIFE (EOL) BECAME WASTES OF UNCERTAIN ENVIRONMENTAL FATE. IN THIS ONE-DIRECTIONAL LOGISTICS, MOST MATERIALS FLOW TO SINKS, AT WHICH THE NOTORIOUS SUBSTANCES CONTAMINATE THE ENVIRONMENT. IT HAS BEEN RECOGNIZED THAT SOME MATERIALS IN EOL PRODUCTS MAY BE TRANSFORMED INTO USEFUL PRODUCTS AGAIN, IN A PROCESS KNOWN AS REVERSE LOGISTICS (WASTE RECLAMATION), THROUGH THE COLLECTION, COMPONENT HARVESTING, REFURBISHMENT, REUSE, REMANUFACTURING, RECYCLING, AND MATERIAL EXTRACTION PROCESS, ALL POSITIONED WITHIN THE CIRCULAR ECONOMY FRAMEWORK TO DECREASE EXTERNALIZED WASTE. view more 

CREDIT: ZENG AND LI, 2021, REPRINTED WITH PERMISSION © THE AUTHOR(S)

Circular economy may not always be effective or even desirable owing to the spatiotemporal dimensions of environmental risk of materials, and variability of global policies. Circular flows involving toxic materials may impose a high risk on the environment and public health such that overemphasis on anthropogenic circularity is not desirable. Moreover, waste flows at a global scale might result in an uneven distribution of risks and costs associated with a circular economy. Challenges remain in implementing and enforcing international policies across national boundaries. The United Nations Basel Convention on the Transboundary Movement of Hazardous Waste and their disposal is used here as an example to illustrate the challenges and to propose a way forward for anthropogenic circularity.

 

A paper describing the results appeared in the journal Circular Economy on 19 May 2022. (DOI 10.1016/j.cec.2022.100003)

 

Circular economy remains the following challenges and opportunities in implementing and enforcing international policies across national boundaries. 

 

Controlling toxic releases across material lifecycles. Despite attempts to use policies and economic incentives to avoid toxic releases and exposures during the lifecycle of such products, fugitive emissions occur and vulnerable populations and environment are impacted adversely. Insufficient investments in environmental protection in low- and middle-income countries have resulted in a high burden of toxic pollution-related mortality rates. Therefore, it may be more desirable to eliminate some toxic materials from the circular economy of products to avoid the disincentive of diminishing returns on investments in collection and recycling. Another vital aspect of circular economy is the issue of mixing materials in recycling which can compromise the quality of the products.

 

International flow of materials and products. The illegal transboundary flow of e-waste occurred frequently in the 2000s from affluent industrialized nations to poorer countries. The improper recycling in poverty regions resulted in disastrous environmental quality and public health consequences. The sustainability of long-distance transportation of materials and waste are depending on fluctuations of transportation cost, potential for leakage, energy expenditure, carbon footprint, and supply chain logistics. Thus, lifecycle thinking includes acknowledgment of trade-off subject to subjective values of stakeholders within the circular economy.

 

Harmonization of international policies and regulation. Globally, the Basel Convention focus on protecting human health and the environment against the adverse effect of hazardous wastes, which were notoriously and unfairly traded across national boundaries due to the imbalance and diversity of policies. The EU, Japan, and China are leading in e-waste regulation and policy, but most countries with economies in transition are still in the early stages. Within individual countries such as China, regulation and policy have stipulated the rigorous governance for products and components. Two major gaps exist in the existing regulation: lack of adequate attention to the recovered materials and substances and no control of substances to avoid toxic metals which are manufactured in new products.

 

Classification of anthropogenic resources. Secondary raw materials from anthropogenic resources are getting more attention in the context of climate protection and circular economy. The initiatives for classifying anthropogenic resources facilitate the development of recovery projects but are challenged by essential differences between natural and anthropogenic resources. In analogy to geogenic resources, the classification of anthropogenic resources enables comparable estimates of anthropogenic and geogenic resource availabilities. It facilitates sustainable recovery project development and national resource management if environmental, social, and governance criteria are considered. These factors can be integrated into the United Nations Framework Classification (UNFC) in order to communicate the viability of recovery projects to governments, investors, industry, and the public.

 

Although spatiotemporal, geographic, and international dimensions pose major challenges to the effectiveness of circular economy, there are opportunities to transition from a linear model of material and energy flows, including innovations in technology and policy capacities. Despite many economic, environmental, and social challenges, the harmonization and compatibility of regulations and policies among the countries, regions, and even provinces are needed in the circular economy policy support framework so that the updating and revising of circular economy implementation in the US, the EU, Japan, and China can be achieved without delay.

 

###

 

About Circular Economy

 

Circular Economy is an international journal serving as a sharing and communication platform for novel contributions and outcomes on innovative techniques, systematic analysis, and policy tools of global, regional, national, local, and industrial park's waste management system to improve the reduce, reuse, recycle, and disposal of waste in a sustainable way.

Circular Economy is a fully open access journal. It is co-published by Tsinghua University Press and Elsevier, and academically supported by the School of Environment, Tsinghua University, and the Circular Economy Branch, Chinese Society for Environmental Sciences. At its discretion, Tsinghua University Press will pay the Open Access Fee for all published papers from 2022 to 2024.

 

About Tsinghua University Press

 

Established in 1980, belonging to Tsinghua University, Tsinghua University Press (TUP) is a leading comprehensive higher education and professional publisher in China. Committed to building a top-level global cultural brand, after 41 years of development, TUP has established an outstanding managerial system and enterprise structure, and delivered multimedia and multi-dimensional publications covering books, audio, video, electronic products, journals and digital publications. In addition, TUP actively carries out its strategic transformation from educational publishing to content development and service for teaching & learning and was named First-class National Publisher for achieving remarkable results.

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JOURNAL

Circular Economy

DOI

10.1016/j.cec.2022.100003 

ARTICLE TITLE

Reshaping global policies for circular economy

Siberian tundra could virtually disappear by mid-millennium

AWI study shows: only ambitious climate protection measures can still save a third of the tundra

Peer-Reviewed Publication

ALFRED WEGENER INSTITUTE, HELMHOLTZ CENTRE FOR POLAR AND MARINE RESEARCH

 

IMAGE: COTTON GRASSES ON THE BANKS OF THE LOWER ILERNEY, RUSSIA view more 

CREDIT: ALFRED-WEGENER-INSTITUT / STEFAN KRUSE

Due to global warming, temperatures in the Arctic are climbing rapidly. As a result, the treeline for Siberian larch forests is steadily advancing to the north, gradually supplanting the broad expanses of tundra which are home to a unique mix of flora and fauna. Experts from the Alfred Wegener Institute have now prepared a computer simulation of how these woods could spread in the future, at the tundra’s expense. Their conclusion: only consistent climate protection measures will allow roughly 30 percent of the Siberian tundra to survive to mid-millennium. In all other, less favourable scenarios, the unique habitat is projected to disappear entirely. The study was just released in the journal eLife.

The climate crisis can especially be felt in the Arctic: in the High North, the average air temperature has risen by more than two degrees Celsius over the past 50 years – far more than anywhere else. And this trend will only continue. If ambitious greenhouse-gas reduction measures (Emissions Scenario RCP 2.6) are taken, the further warming of the Arctic through the end of the century could be limited to just below two degrees. According to model-based forecasts, if the emissions remain high (Scenario RCP 8.5), we could see a dramatic rise in the average summer temperatures in the Arctic – by up to 14 degrees Celsius over today’s norm by 2100.

“For the Arctic Ocean and the sea ice, the current and future warming will have serious consequences,” says Prof Ulrike Herzschuh, Head of the Polar Terrestrial Environmental Systems Division at the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI). “But the environment on land will also change drastically. The broad expanses of tundra in Siberia and North America will be massively reduced, as the treeline, which is already slowly changing, rapidly advances northward in the near future. In the worst-case scenario, there will be virtually no tundra left by the middle of the millennium. In the course of our study, we simulated this process for the tundra in northeast Russia. The central question that concerned us was: which emissions path does humanity have to follow in order to preserve the tundra as a refuge for flora and fauna, as well its role for the cultures of indigenous peoples and their traditional ties to the environment?”

The tundra is home to a unique community of plants, roughly five percent of which are endemic, i.e., can only be found in the Arctic. Typical species include the mountain avens, Arctic poppy and prostrate shrubs like willows and birches, all of which have adapted to the harsh local conditions: brief summers and long, arduous winters. It also offers a home for rare species like reindeer, lemmings and insects like the Arctic bumblebee.

For their simulation, Ulrike Herzschuh and AWI modeller Dr Stefan Kruse employed the AWI vegetation model LAVESI. “What sets LAVESI apart is that it allows us to display the entire treeline at the level of individual trees,” Kruse explains. “The model portrays the entire lifecycle of Siberian larches in the transition zone to the tundra – from seed production and distribution, to germination, to fully grown trees. In this way, we can very realistically depict the advancing treeline in a warming climate.”

The findings speak for themselves: the larch forests could spread northward at a rate of up to 30 kilometres per decade. The tundra expanses, which can’t shift to colder regions due to the adjacent Arctic Ocean, would increasingly dwindle. Since trees aren’t mobile and each one’s seeds can only reach a limited distribution radius, initially the vegetation would significantly lag behind the warming, but then catch up to it again. In the majority of scenarios, by mid-millennium less than six percent of today’s tundra would remain; saving roughly 30 percent would only be possible with the aid of ambitious greenhouse-gas reduction measures. Otherwise, Siberia’s once 4,000-kilometre-long, unbroken tundra belt would shrink to two patches, 2,500 kilometres apart, on the Taimyr Peninsula to the west and Chukotka Peninsula to the east. Interestingly, even if the atmosphere cooled again in the course of the millennium, the forests would not completely release the former tundra areas.

“At this point, it’s a matter of life and death for the Siberian tundra,” says Eva Klebelsberg, Project Manager Protected Areas and Climate Change / Russian Arctic at the WWF Germany, with regard to the study. “Larger areas can only be saved with very ambitious climate protection targets. And even then, in the best case there will ultimately be two discrete refuges, with smaller flora and fauna populations that are highly vulnerable to disrupting influences. That’s why it’s important that we intensify and expand protective measures and protected areas in these regions, so as to preserve refuges for the tundra’s unparalleled biodiversity,” adds Klebelsberg, who, in collaboration with the Alfred Wegener Institute, is an advocate for the establishment of protected areas. “After all, one thing is clear: if we continue with business as usual, this ecosystem will gradually disappear.”

Original publication:

Stefan Kruse, Ulrike Herzschuh: Regional opportunities for tundra conservation in the next 1000 years. eLife (2022). DOI: 10.7554/eLife.75163

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JOURNAL

eLife

DOI

10.7554/eLife.75163 

ARTICLE TITLE

Regional opportunities for tundra conservation in the next 1000 years

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

24-May-2022

 Choking local funding prevents terrorism

Research by Nicola Limodio, Bocconi University, Milan, supports the use of financial counterterrorism. Terrorists depend on local funding availability, as they struggle to move money around, and we should limit their ability to access financing

Peer-Reviewed Publication

BOCCONI UNIVERSITY

 

IMAGE: RESEARCH BY NICOLA LIMODIO, BOCCONI UNIVERSITY, MILAN, SUPPORTS THE USE OF FINANCIAL COUNTERTERRORISM. TERRORISTS DEPEND ON LOCAL FUNDING AVAILABILITY, AS THEY STRUGGLE TO MOVE MONEY AROUND, AND WE SHOULD LIMIT THEIR ABILITY TO ACCESS FINANCING view more 

CREDIT: WEIWEI CHEN

Terrorist attacks are highly responsive to local funding availability, and financial counter-terrorism can, thus, be effective in reducing terrorism casualties, according to new research by Nicola Limodio (Department of Finance, Bocconi University) forthcoming in Econometrica.

There has been a record number of terrorist attacks in the past decade. Many scholars agree that this might be driven by increases in the ability of terrorist organizations to secure funding and recruit new members. As a response, several financial counter-terrorism measures were launched. These are often efforts to ‘follow the money’ and freeze bank accounts of potential terrorists and their supporters. But financial counter-terrorism has been criticized as not only very costly but also ineffective, as terrorist organizations may be able to swiftly dissipate their funds through affiliates in several locations and to use it where and when they wish.

Nicola Limodio challenges the critics of financial counter-terrorism, offering evidence on the financial frictions faced by terrorist groups and the role of counterterrorism in further tightening these frictions. In his recent paper “Terrorism Financing, Recruitment and Attacks,” Prof. Limodio provides a pioneering quantitative assessment of terrorism, recruitment and financing. He shows that terrorist attacks are sensitive to local funding: terrorist organizations launch attacks where and when they receive funds. This is of clear policy relevance. If terrorism depends on local funding availability, financial counter-terrorism can be effective insofar as it limits the ability of terrorist organizations to access funds.

To arrive at this finding, Prof. Limodio studied the variation in funding to terrorist groups across time and place in Pakistan and the effects on the incidence of terrorist attacks. He did this via a rather unexpected channel: the Zakat, a practice whereby Muslims make a charitable donation to the poor during the period of the Ramadan. Unfortunately, lack of oversight and the fact that many extremist groups have a legal charity branch imply that some of these funds end up in the hands of terrorists.

In the same period, the Pakistani government collects, from Sunni Muslims, a Zakat levy (to be used in aid to the vulnerable population after Ramadan) equal to 2.5% of individual bank deposits above a certain threshold. Such a threshold corresponds to the price of 612.32 grams of silver. Therefore, when the price of silver is higher, a smaller part of the deposits is levied, and people have more money to donate in the Zakat. Indeed, Limodio finds that a higher price of silver leads to more donations. Thus, changes in the price of silver affect how much funding goes to terrorist organizations and allows us to observe how funding affects the decisions of terrorist groups to launch attacks.

Prof. Limodio finds that more funding driven by higher prices of silver leads to more terrorist attacks in cities with a Sunni majority (the group that is subject to the levy on deposits). Terrorist attacks are thus sensitive to funding: if a terrorist group receives more funds in a given city, it will increase attacks in this city. And this happens only for capital-intense terrorist activities such as bombs and heavily armed assaults. Terrorist events with low financing are not responsive to variations in funding.

Additionally, Prof. Limodio uses AI to obtain measures of terrorist recruiting in online forums and using this measure, he finds that in periods of strong terrorist recruitment, the effect of additional funding on attacks is even stronger.

These results give us an important insight about the role and importance of financing in terrorist organizations. If such organizations had no constraints in moving funds across time and space, more funding in a given place wouldn’t necessarily lead to more attacks there. Thus, Prof. Limodio’s research provides evidence that terrorist organizations are indeed limited in their ability to move funds. As Limodio mentions “showing the existence of financial frictions through data is crucial to understand the behaviour of terrorist groups and study the most effective policies to empower financial counterterror to lower attacks and casualties”.

Nicola Limodio, “Terrorism Financing, Recruitment and Attacks,” Econometrica, Forthcoming Papers.

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JOURNAL

Econometrica

ARTICLE TITLE

Terrorism Financing, Recruitment and Attacks