DALHOUSIE UNIVERSITYClimate Change Adaptation Planning

Rochelle Owen, Director Office of Sustainability

Dalhousie University Campuses

100+ buildings/houses on 79-acres in downtown Halifax, Nova Scotia Canada.50+ buildings AC campus

Includes 5.8 million gross square feet of building space.

A campus population of approximately 26,500 (19,000 students, 7500 faculty and staff).

Four Campus: Studley, Carleton, Sexton – Downtown Halifax, AC – Truro Bible Hill

Two District Heating Systems

Dalhousie University Campus

12 faculties and more than 3,600 courses in 180 areas of study.

Dalhousie has a College of Sustainability, Office of Sustainability, Student Union Sustainability Office.

Largest university in the Maritimes.

200 year anniversary in 2018.

Purpose of the Session

• Demonstrate planning steps for implementing a climate change adaptation process at a university/college

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Agenda

• Introduction: to each other and climate change terms (10 min)

• Climate Change Planning – Setting the scope and vulnerabilities (20 min)• Identifying vulnerabilities from a university/college sitting within your

group• Share examples and compare to Dalhousie data

• Climate Change Planning – Identifying risk related to vulnerabilities (45min)• Using vulnerabilities created in the group to assign risks and adaptation

strategies• Share examples and compare to Dalhousie plan and actions

• Follow-up Resources (5 min)5

Climate Change

• MITIGATION• Reduce GHG emissions

and carbon footprint• Energy and water

efficiency• Conserve energy• Fuel switching and

renewable energy • Bike/walk/bus to campus• Carbon sinks

• ADAPTATION• Planning for inevitable

climate changes• How will XXX

university/college be affected?

Adaptation

• “Adjustment in natural or human systems in response to actual or expected climatic stimuli or their effects, which moderates harm or exploits beneficial opportunities.

• Various types of adaptation can be distinguished, including anticipatory, autonomous and planned adaptation” (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), 2007, p.869).

Year

Tem

pera

ture

(ºC

)Annual Average Temperature

Nova Scotia, 1895-19981895-1998 Average 6.3ºCTrend +0.5ºC/century

Average of Yarmouth and Sydney

Slide from EC

Atlantic Canada Impacts

Adaptation Plan Development Process

Data -Vulnerabilities,

Risks, Strategies

Group work

• In your group, pick a university/ college at your table and explain the location – geography, weather impacts – 5 min

• Identify vulnerabilities for this university/college as a group using the sheet provided or electronic version available for a lap top (examples of vulnerabilities will be provided from Dal from our surveys and workshops as an example. – 15 min

• Share a few vulnerabilities from the groups

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Some Dal Findings

VULNERABILITIES

1. Energy

2. Transportation

3. Built Environment

IMPACTS

Finances

Classes

Food

Transportation

Housing

Administration

Energy

Health Services *How you define vulnerabilities and the scale will impact the categories and detail - ex one specific vulnerability identified was the roof of the Dalplex and road at the AC

Scenario Development

• Creating future scenarios can help the process of identifying risks associated with vulnerabilities and potential strategies

• Some organizations express risk qualitatively and/or quantitatively (probability and impact) to rank scenarios and measures

• The scale of the analysis can be at the person, building (detailed study of building systems, occupant comfort, operations), campus, community, regional levels.

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Partners

• Environment Canada and Dept of Environment• Provided climate change adaptation science presentation

and information to the committee• Helped select climate models and ran local weather data

through climate models to give projections for 2030, 2050, 2080

• Participated in the workshop

• Models saying: hotter, wettier, more extreme weather, impacts on water

ΔTMAX (C) ΔTMIN (C) PCPN % Change

Tri-decade

2020s 2050s 2080s 2020s 2050s 2080s 2020s 2050s 2080s

Shearwater(CGCM2)

1.52 2.15 3.11 1.54 2.09 2.88 8 12 12

Shearwater(HadCM3)

1.17 2.12 3.51 1.87 2.73 4.00 17 14 12

The first row are values from downscaling output from the Canadian Coupled Global Climate Model version 2 (CGCM2) and the second row are values based on the Hadley (UK) Climate Model version 3 (HadCM3).” (Lines et al., 2009)

Climate Change Planning Workshop

• Future weather scenarios• 6 scenarios

• Repetitive freeze/thaw, ice storm, hurricane, snow loading, heat wave, flooding

• Group of participants given a scenario on paper and created six mini movies with slides and voice overs that we showed the group

• Identified associated vulnerabilities, levels of risk, and adaptations

Climate Change Planning Workshop

• Sample future weather scenario:• A category three hurricane has made landfall in Halifax. A deadly path of

destruction has been left as 100 mm of rain has dropped in 24 hours with howling winds of 185 km an hour, and a 7 meter storm surge on the coast. This is Heather Haliday reporting from the Henry Hicks building on this September 12, 2050, a day that will always be remembered. Windows have been blown out, trees knocked over, power lines are down and there has been back up of storm/sewage water onto the roads. It is a disaster zone here on campus. Residence staff and students have been moved to the Dalplex where geothermal and solar energy provides electricity for power and cooking. Dalhousie University estimates over $20 million dollars of damage in broken windows and roofs. The President is desperately trying to secure diesel fuel for the backup generators for universities’ data center and research labs as power is projected to be off for well over a week.

Climate Change Planning Workshop

• Priority Assessment• Vulnerabilities, risks, and adaptations written on flip chart

paper and posted• Using dots participants assigned their top four priorities for

each category

Group work

• In your groups discuss potential future climate scenarios (5 min)• Then fill out the risk columns associated with each vulnerability

(as many as you can do) for probability and impact (high, medium, low) and then a blended risk impact – you could use numbers (20 min)

• Take you top vulnerabilities and brainstorm some potential adaptation strategies (ex from Dal provided) (10 min)

• Share with larger group

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Some Dal Findings

• EMO Plan and communications – more detailed (pantry plans), community considerations

• Campus retrofit priorities – Dalplex roof, Data center, Bury power lines

• Energy security – tri-generation • New design guidelines for buildings/grounds– bigger storm

water intake, cistern, green roof, swales, more natural areas and less solid surfaces (asphalt), windows and skins

• TDM – more infrastructure for active modes/teleworking• Further study – storm water and natural environment mapping

Integration

• Adaptation measures should be integrated into climate change planning as together the important mitigation and adaptation measures may provide more priority for certain projects• Ex. Dalplex roof, Combined Heat and Power projects

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Resources

• Dalhousie Office of Sustainability - our site – Climate Change Adaptation Literature Review, Climate Change Plan (more resources this year with addition of AC campus planning), article published in IJSHE March 2013

• Governments –flood risk maps (state/prov/mun); climate models and potential human support (EPA, EC, NOAA, Nrcan, Health Canada); research and plans – all levels, funding –potentially

• PIEVC - http://www.pievc.ca/e/index_.cfm - Engineering protocol

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