Cargando…

Evaluating the economic impact of water scarcity in a changing world

Water scarcity is dynamic and complex, emerging from the combined influences of climate change, basin-level water resources, and managed systems’ adaptive capacities. Beyond geophysical stressors and responses, it is critical to also consider how multi-sector, multi-scale economic teleconnections mi...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Dolan, Flannery, Lamontagne, Jonathan, Link, Robert, Hejazi, Mohamad, Reed, Patrick, Edmonds, Jae
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Nature Publishing Group UK 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7997906/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33772023
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-021-22194-0
_version_ 1783670431327191040
author Dolan, Flannery
Lamontagne, Jonathan
Link, Robert
Hejazi, Mohamad
Reed, Patrick
Edmonds, Jae
author_facet Dolan, Flannery
Lamontagne, Jonathan
Link, Robert
Hejazi, Mohamad
Reed, Patrick
Edmonds, Jae
author_sort Dolan, Flannery
collection PubMed
description Water scarcity is dynamic and complex, emerging from the combined influences of climate change, basin-level water resources, and managed systems’ adaptive capacities. Beyond geophysical stressors and responses, it is critical to also consider how multi-sector, multi-scale economic teleconnections mitigate or exacerbate water shortages. Here, we contribute a global-to-basin-scale exploratory analysis of potential water scarcity impacts by linking a global human-Earth system model, a global hydrologic model, and a metric for the loss of economic surplus due to resource shortages. We find that, dependent on scenario assumptions, major hydrologic basins can experience strongly positive or strongly negative economic impacts due to global trade dynamics and market adaptations to regional scarcity. In many cases, market adaptation profoundly magnifies economic uncertainty relative to hydrologic uncertainty. Our analysis finds that impactful scenarios are often combinations of standard scenarios, showcasing that planners cannot presume drivers of uncertainty in complex adaptive systems.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-7997906
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2021
publisher Nature Publishing Group UK
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-79979062021-04-16 Evaluating the economic impact of water scarcity in a changing world Dolan, Flannery Lamontagne, Jonathan Link, Robert Hejazi, Mohamad Reed, Patrick Edmonds, Jae Nat Commun Article Water scarcity is dynamic and complex, emerging from the combined influences of climate change, basin-level water resources, and managed systems’ adaptive capacities. Beyond geophysical stressors and responses, it is critical to also consider how multi-sector, multi-scale economic teleconnections mitigate or exacerbate water shortages. Here, we contribute a global-to-basin-scale exploratory analysis of potential water scarcity impacts by linking a global human-Earth system model, a global hydrologic model, and a metric for the loss of economic surplus due to resource shortages. We find that, dependent on scenario assumptions, major hydrologic basins can experience strongly positive or strongly negative economic impacts due to global trade dynamics and market adaptations to regional scarcity. In many cases, market adaptation profoundly magnifies economic uncertainty relative to hydrologic uncertainty. Our analysis finds that impactful scenarios are often combinations of standard scenarios, showcasing that planners cannot presume drivers of uncertainty in complex adaptive systems. Nature Publishing Group UK 2021-03-26 /pmc/articles/PMC7997906/ /pubmed/33772023 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-021-22194-0 Text en © The Author(s) 2021 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
spellingShingle Article
Dolan, Flannery
Lamontagne, Jonathan
Link, Robert
Hejazi, Mohamad
Reed, Patrick
Edmonds, Jae
Evaluating the economic impact of water scarcity in a changing world
title Evaluating the economic impact of water scarcity in a changing world
title_full Evaluating the economic impact of water scarcity in a changing world
title_fullStr Evaluating the economic impact of water scarcity in a changing world
title_full_unstemmed Evaluating the economic impact of water scarcity in a changing world
title_short Evaluating the economic impact of water scarcity in a changing world
title_sort evaluating the economic impact of water scarcity in a changing world
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7997906/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33772023
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-021-22194-0
work_keys_str_mv AT dolanflannery evaluatingtheeconomicimpactofwaterscarcityinachangingworld
AT lamontagnejonathan evaluatingtheeconomicimpactofwaterscarcityinachangingworld
AT linkrobert evaluatingtheeconomicimpactofwaterscarcityinachangingworld
AT hejazimohamad evaluatingtheeconomicimpactofwaterscarcityinachangingworld
AT reedpatrick evaluatingtheeconomicimpactofwaterscarcityinachangingworld
AT edmondsjae evaluatingtheeconomicimpactofwaterscarcityinachangingworld