ORCID Profile
0000-0003-2269-5598
Current Organisations
University of Amsterdam
,
University of Wisconsin–Madison
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Publisher: Informa UK Limited
Date: 22-05-2020
Publisher: Oxford University Press (OUP)
Date: 07-2022
DOI: 10.1093/PNASNEXUS/PGAC115
Abstract: Fire is an integral component of ecosystems globally and a tool that humans have harnessed for millennia. Altered fire regimes are a fundamental cause and consequence of global change, impacting people and the biophysical systems on which they depend. As part of the newly emerging Anthropocene, marked by human-caused climate change and radical changes to ecosystems, fire danger is increasing, and fires are having increasingly devastating impacts on human health, infrastructure, and ecosystem services. Increasing fire danger is a vexing problem that requires deep transdisciplinary, trans-sector, and inclusive partnerships to address. Here, we outline barriers and opportunities in the next generation of fire science and provide guidance for investment in future research. We synthesize insights needed to better address the long-standing challenges of innovation across disciplines to (i) promote coordinated research efforts (ii) embrace different ways of knowing and knowledge generation (iii) promote exploration of fundamental science (iv) capitalize on the “firehose” of data for societal benefit and (v) integrate human and natural systems into models across multiple scales. Fire science is thus at a critical transitional moment. We need to shift from observation and modeled representations of varying components of climate, people, vegetation, and fire to more integrative and predictive approaches that support pathways toward mitigating and adapting to our increasingly flammable world, including the utilization of fire for human safety and benefit. Only through overcoming institutional silos and accessing knowledge across erse communities can we effectively undertake research that improves outcomes in our more fiery future.
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 10-11-2022
DOI: 10.1038/S41893-022-00995-5
Abstract: The Sustainable Development Goals aim to improve access to resources and services, reduce environmental degradation, eradicate poverty and reduce inequality. However, the magnitude of the environmental burden that would arise from meeting the needs of the poorest is under debate—especially when compared to much larger burdens from the rich. We show that the ‘Great Acceleration’ of human impacts was characterized by a ‘Great Inequality’ in using and damaging the environment. We then operationalize ‘just access’ to minimum energy, water, food and infrastructure. We show that achieving just access in 2018, with existing inequalities, technologies and behaviours, would have produced 2–26% additional impacts on the Earth’s natural systems of climate, water, land and nutrients—thus further crossing planetary boundaries. These hypothetical impacts, caused by about a third of humanity, equalled those caused by the wealthiest 1–4%. Technological and behavioural changes thus far, while important, did not deliver just access within a stable Earth system. Achieving these goals therefore calls for a radical redistribution of resources.
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 03-2022
Publisher: Wiley
Date: 22-04-2020
DOI: 10.1111/FAF.12462
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 31-05-2023
DOI: 10.1038/S41586-023-06083-8
Abstract: The stability and resilience of the Earth system and human well-being are inseparably linked 1–3 , yet their interdependencies are generally under-recognized consequently, they are often treated independently 4,5 . Here, we use modelling and literature assessment to quantify safe and just Earth system boundaries (ESBs) for climate, the biosphere, water and nutrient cycles, and aerosols at global and subglobal scales. We propose ESBs for maintaining the resilience and stability of the Earth system (safe ESBs) and minimizing exposure to significant harm to humans from Earth system change (a necessary but not sufficient condition for justice) 4 . The stricter of the safe or just boundaries sets the integrated safe and just ESB. Our findings show that justice considerations constrain the integrated ESBs more than safety considerations for climate and atmospheric aerosol loading. Seven of eight globally quantified safe and just ESBs and at least two regional safe and just ESBs in over half of global land area are already exceeded. We propose that our assessment provides a quantitative foundation for safeguarding the global commons for all people now and into the future.
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 02-03-2023
Publisher: Informa UK Limited
Date: 24-07-2023
No related grants have been discovered for Thea Whitman.