Building resilience to extreme weather and climate events in the rural water and wastewater sectors

Abstract

Extreme weather and climate events pose significant risks to rural water and wastewater systems. We examine the vulnerability of the water sector to weather and climate extremes in rural, predominantly Indigenous and underserved coastal areas and analyze how networks support resilience. Drawing on the analysis of 39 web‐based questionnaire responses and 19 interviews with rural water and wastewater managers and service providers in southern Louisiana and western Alaska, this article reports a range of interrelated historical, environmental, and social factors that influence vulnerability to extreme weather events. Formal and informal social networks serve multiple roles in building resilience. These roles include building technical and financial capacities, supporting emergency response and operational‐ to long‐term planning, fostering data collection and monitoring, supporting information sharing and innovative research, and providing institutional support. Results from this research enrich our understanding of the social, relational, and networking processes that condition community resilience to extreme weather events.

Climate Change and Human Health in the Arctic: A Review

“…The remaining 31 papers focus on specific consequences of climate change, including extreme weather events like heat waves or cold spells, or cold climate implications in general (12) [67][68][69][70][71][72][73][74][75][76][77][78][79][80]. Additionally, topics such as wild fires and the associated air pollution (4) [81][82][83][84], permafrost degradation (5) [85][86][87][88][89], and health challenges connected with the impact of climate change on food and water security in the Arctic (10) [90][91][92][93][94][95][96][97][98][99], are explored. Most of the articles were studies from Russia (17) [50,51,58,63,[73][74][75][76]79,[83][84]…”

“…Additionally, topics such as wild fires and the associated air pollution (4) [81][82][83][84], permafrost degradation (5) [85][86][87][88][89], and health challenges connected with the impact of climate change on food and water security in the Arctic (10) [90][91][92][93][94][95][96][97][98][99], are explored. Most of the articles were studies from Russia (17) [50,51,58,63,[73][74][75][76]79,[83][84][85][86][87]90,91,93], Canada (14) [44,46,48,54,57,62,[66][67][68]88,…”

“…Shifts in environmental conditions caused by climate change can alter the dynamics of food and water-borne illnesses, with implications for food security and safety in Arctic communities: changes in ice cover and sea surface temperatures are impacting marine ecosystems and the availability of traditional food sources, potentially affecting the nutritional status and susceptibility to infectious diseases among Indigenous populations, which is observed for the northern areas of Canada [94,95,97,99], Russia [90,91,93], and the USA (Alaska) [92,98]. The reduction of access to traditional food resources, along with a decline in their availability and quality [90,92,94,99], as well as a decrease in the access to good-quality drinking water [91,[95][96][97][98], can have a crucial impact on the nutritional status of Indigenous populations. The consequences of climate change not only diminish the availability and distribution of subsistence resources, but also alter access for harvesters, resulting in resource shortages [92].…”

“…Despite the diverse challenges and health impacts of climate change, these efforts underscore the importance of taking consistent steps towards adaptation. This includes bolstering institutional initiatives, such as strengthening the healthcare infrastructure to ensure resilience in the face of climate-related health risks [44,50,56,82,87,93,96]. These strategies involve the implementation of comprehensive early warning systems for extreme weather events, air and ground pollution, and floods, enabling a timely response, as well and mitigation efforts, regarding these events, [49,50,57,70,71,73,74,77,78].…”

“…These strategies involve the implementation of comprehensive early warning systems for extreme weather events, air and ground pollution, and floods, enabling a timely response, as well and mitigation efforts, regarding these events, [49,50,57,70,71,73,74,77,78]. Additionally, these strategies call for the establishment of robust environmental monitoring mechanisms to track and address environmental changes effectively [45,46,57,60,61,64,65,87,91,93,96,97,99].…”