amy monaghan's List: VUSSC Environmental Science

Small and medium enterprises use around 50% of total UK business energy and are responsible for half of all business carbon emissions. Although SMEs tend to think that climate change does not affect them, the small changes they make to their way of working could have a positive, cumulative effect.

There is a great deal of information out there about the risk of climate change to businesses, government climate change policies and corporate responsibility. There are also numerous resources available to businesses that are unsure about how to assess their risk of exposure, how to manage that risk, and how to begin the process of adaptation.

This unit aims to bring together this information by addressing the key concepts of risk, corporate social responsibility and engaging employees, and to allow businesses to make informed decisions about this issue.

Energy and climate change are issues of critical importance for shaping a sustainable future, both in South Africa and globally. This book provides an innovative and strategic approach to climate policy, with local development objectives as its starting point.

Time: 18 hours
Level: Intermediate
Climate change is a key issue on today's social and political agenda. This unit explores the basic science that underpins climate change and global warming.

Time: 3 hours
Level: Intermediate
Climate change is not going to happen alone. As our climate changes other global environmental problems are going to carry on occurring, such as habitat destruction, pollution, soil erosion and species extinctions. What we currently have very little understanding of is how all these things will interact in the future. Climate change may make some of these problems much worse and some of them may themselves contribute to climate change creating a feedback loop. This unit identifies several global change problems that may interact with climate change.

Professor and Director of the UC Irvine Environment Institute Michael J. Prather delivers the first lecture in Earth System Science 280: Sustainability Science on Wednesday, September 29, 2010.

Professor and Director of the UC Irvine Environment Institute Michael J. Prather delivers the second lecture in Earth System Science 280: Sustainability Science on Wednesday, October 6, 2010.

Professor and Director of the UC Irvine Environment Institute Michael J. Prather delivers the second lecture in Earth System Science 280: Sustainability Science on Wednesday, October 20, 2010.

While this is currently a research work which outlines research and development objectives, it is envisaged that much of the material reviewed is also suitable for inclusion in teaching - particularly postgraduate teaching at University Masters level.

Published: November 17, 2011
Revised: January 24, 2012
The draft review examines the link between climate change and health with special reference to the Southern African region (SADC countries). It attempts to set the scene for determining pertinent research priorities in the region to contribute to knowledge on the one hand, and for identification, implementation and evaluation of adaptation interventions that are likely to be appropriate and effective in the region. This review has been conducted by Strategic Evaluation, Advisory and Development Consulting (SEAD), a health consultancy together with the COEHR, and is part of the Regional Climate Change Programme (RCPP) led by One World Sustainable Investments.

While this is currently a research work which outlines research and development objectives, it is envisaged that much of the material reviewed is also suitable for inclusion in teaching - particularly postgraduate teaching at University Masters level.
Institution: University of Cape Town

National Open University of Nigeria course ESM343.

Time: 15 hours
Level: Intermediate
What impact will global warming really have? This unit examines the potential problems faced by the people of the Pacific Island of Tuvalu as a result of rising sea levels. Where would you go if your island is only a few feet above sea level? Who would you blame?

Time: 12 hours
Level: Intermediate
This unit has been designed around Open Educational Resources (OER) with open content and open access whenever possible. Due to the 'open' nature of the resources there will be many differences in the style, appearance, and reliability of the resources, but these resources have been carefully selected to provide a useful educational starting-block for the study of this topic.

Time: 2 hours
Level: Intermediate
This short unit explains how decisions are taken about allocating scarce resources in a market economy, and why such decisions may have potentially disastrous effects on the environment including the climate.

Time: 2 hours
Level: Intermediate
This unit looks at how industrial agriculture is one of the anthropogenic causes of climate change. It goes on to consider what adaptations must be adopted in order to mitigate its impact on climate change. The concept of food security is introduced and its link to climate change explored. Finally, the notion of adapting agriculture through the way we design and live in cities is presented.

Time: 5 hours
Level: Intermediate
This short introduction discusses how elevated CO₂ together with increases in drought and high temperature may impact upon the growth and development of plants, particularly with reference to some agricultural systems.

This course module is one section of a larger course called Geography, Development and Environment that runs as a first year course in the Department of Environmental and Geographical Science at the University of Cape Town. The course work provided here is one of 3 modules including 1) the global economic environment, 2) regional dynamics of development, and 3) the North-South debates on environmental problems. This module falls under the theme of North-South debates on environmental problems. The courses use theories of underdevelopment and climatic change to explain global and regional inequalities and environmental problems. Key concepts in the course are: trade, foreign aid, regional integration, and climatic change. The objectives of this section of the course are to begin understanding: 1. the concepts of environmental justice and climate change, 2. the relationship between environmental change and development, and 3. the international politics of global environmental change, This topic provides the scope for debate among students because of the contentious nature of the subject, and the lack of clear answers. Importantly this course focuses on presenting multiple explanations and diverse viewpoints and is intended to provide context, history and structure for students' thinking. Students are not provided with solutions, but instead encouraged to develop their own explanations and responses to climate change and justice.

Time: 3 hours
Level: Introductory
The search for sustainable energy will dominate the twenty-first century. This unit provides an introductory overview of the present energy systems and takes a brief look at where the world may find energy in the future - cleaner use of fossil fuels or renewable energy sources?

Time: 10 hours
Level: Advanced
National and international mitigation is mediated by a range of governmental and intergovernmental bodies and policies. The most famous of these is probably the Kyoto Protocol, but this is only a starting point, with a more effective global agreement required to sufficiently reduce carbon emissions and avoid dangerous climate change.

Time: 15 hours
Level: Intermediate
In the increasingly complex world of change and uncertainty, particularly in the context of climate change, the notion of sustainability is often raised as the key issue for decision making in the 21st century. But sustainability is itself a contentious term and is often used in misguided ways depending on the context of use. This unit introduces ways in which systems thinking can help support processes of decision making amongst stakeholders with different, often contrasting, perspectives on sustainable development in order to generate purposeful action to improve situations of change and uncertainty. You will learn about systems practice for managing sustainable development, and find out how 'learning systems' are designed for purposeful action in the domain of sustainable development.

Time: 3 hours
Level: Introductory
Climate change is defining a new legislative and policty agenda for the United Kingdom, the European Union and globally. Whilst the overall direction is not yet fully defined, there is now clear national and international momentum towards substantive economic and planning intervention to control emissions of greenhouse gases and encourage the use of low carbon alternatives. This unit considers national, regional and local policy and legislation in the UK and elsewhere.