Losses and damages connected to glacier retreat in the Cordillera Blanca, Peru
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Losses and damages connected to glacier retreat in the Cordillera Blanca, Peru Alina Motschmann 1 & Christian Huggel 1 & Mark Carey 2 & Holly Moulton 3 & Noah Walker-Crawford 4 & Randy Muñoz 1 Received: 6 May 2019 / Accepted: 14 June 2020/ # Springer Nature B.V. 2020
Abstract
The mountain cryosphere is one of the strongest affected systems by climate change. Glacier shrinkage leads to cascading impacts, including changes in river flow regimes, availability of water resources for downstream populations and economy, changes in the occurrence and severity of natural hazards, and cultural changes associated with landscape character and identity. In this study, we analyze impacts of mountain cryosphere change through a lens of Loss and Damage (L&D), a mechanism of international climate policy that tries to evaluate and reduce negative consequences of climate change for societies. We analyze the effects of climate change on glacier change, glacier lake formation and growth, hydrological regimes, and associated impacts on human societies in the Cordillera Blanca in the Peruvian Andes, now and under future scenarios. We use various methods such as literature review, glacial lake outburst flood, and hydrologic modeling to examine three major dimensions of cryospheric change and associated human impacts: (i) ice loss; (ii) glacial hazards; and (iii) variability of water availability. We identify the damage and losses in terms of the number of people affected by glacial hazards, monetized agricultural crop loss due to water loss, and non-economic values local people attribute to glacier loss. We find that different levels of warming have important negative but differentiated effects on natural and human systems. We also contend that the extent of loss and damage will largely be determined by governance and adaptation decisions such as water resource management and disaster risk management. We suggest that these lines of evidence are more explicitly taken into account in L&D policies. Keywords Cordillera Blanca, Peru . Mountain cryosphere . Glacier shrinkage . Loss and Damage
* Alina Motschmann [email protected] Extended author information available on the last page of the article
Climatic Change
1 Introduction The mountain cryosphere is one of the systems that are most affected by climate change (Hock et al. 2019). Glaciers are shrinking rapidly across most parts of the world, leading to cascading impacts on downstream systems and profoundly influencing the natural environment (Huss et al. 2017; Marzeion et al. 2018). Major changes to flow regimes, altered water availability for human society, and changes in the frequency and severity of natural hazards in the mountain cryosphere will continue to occur, along with cultural changes associated with landscape character, identity, and religion (Dunbar and Marcos 2012; Milner et al. 2017). These impacts affect both residents of mountainous areas and communities living downstream, who depend on meltwater from glaciers and snow for drinking water supplies, irrigation
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