Annex II - Glossary

1 1757 IIGlossaryEditorial Board Co-Chairs:John Agard (Trinidad and Tobago), E. Lisa F. Schipper (Sweden)Editorial Board:Joern Birkmann (Germany), Maximiliano Campos (Costa Rica), Carolina Dubeux (Brazil),Yukihiro Nojiri (Japan), Lennart Olsson (Sweden), Balgis Osman-Elasha (Sudan), Mark Pelling(UK), Michael J. Prather (USA), Marta G. Rivera-Ferre (Spain), Oliver C. Ruppel (Namibia),Asbury Sallenger (USA), Kirk R. Smith (USA), Asuncion L. St. Clair (Norway)TSU Facilitation:Katharine J. Mach (USA), Michael D. Mastrandrea (USA), T. Eren Bilir (USA)ANNEX1758 Annex II GlossaryIIAbrupt climate changeA large-scale change in the climate system that takes place over a fewdecades or less, persists (or is anticipated to persist) for at least a fewdecades, and causes substantial disruptions in human and natural to foodOne of the three components underpinning food security, the other twobeing availability and utilization.

2 Access to food is dependent on (1) theaffordability of food ( , people have income or other resources toexchange for food); (2) satisfactory allocation within the household orsociety; and (3) preference ( , it is what people want to eat, influencedby socio-cultural norms). See also Food change in functional or morphological traits occurring once or repeatedly( , seasonally) during the lifetime of an individual organism in itsnatural environment. Through acclimatization the individual maintainsperformance across a range of environmental conditions. For a cleardifferentiation between findings in laboratory and field studies, the termacclimationis used in ecophysiology for the respective phenomenawhen observed in well-defined experimental settings. The term(adaptive) plasticitycharacterizes the generally limited scope of changesin phenotype that an individual can reach through the process Adaptive process of adjustment to actual or expected climate and its human systems, adaptation seeks to moderate or avoid harm or exploitbeneficial opportunities.

3 In some natural systems, human interventionmay facilitate adjustment to expected climate and its effects. Incremental adaptationAdaptation actions where the centralaim is to maintain the essence and integrity of a system or processat a given adaptation Adaptation that changes thefundamental attributes of a system in response to climate and also Autonomous adaptation, Evolutionary adaptation, assessmentThe practice of identifying options to adapt to climate change andevaluating them in terms of criteria such as availability, benefits, costs,effectiveness, efficiency, and feasibility. Adaptation constraintFactors that make it harder to plan and implement adaptation actionsor that restrict deficitThe gap between the current state of a system and a state thatminimizes adverse impacts from existing climate conditions andvariability.

4 Adaptation limitThe point at which an actor s objectives (or system needs) cannot besecured from intolerable risks through adaptive adaptation limitNo adaptive actions are possible to avoidintolerable adaptation limitOptions are currently not available to avoidintolerable risks through adaptive needsThe circumstances requiring action to ensure safety of populations andsecurity of assets in response to climate opportunityFactors that make it easier to plan and implement adaptation actions,that expand adaptation options, or that provide ancillary optionsThe array of strategies and measures that are available and appropriatefor addressing adaptation needs. They include a wide range of actionsthat can be categorized as structural, institutional, or social. Adaptive capacityThe ability of systems, institutions, humans, and other organisms toadjust to potential damage, to take advantage of opportunities, or torespond to managementA process of iteratively planning, implementing, and modifying strategiesfor managing resources in the face of uncertainty and change.

5 Adaptivemanagement involves adjusting approaches in response to observationsof their effect and changes in the system brought on by resultingfeedback effects and other variables. Aggregate impactsTotal impacts integrated across sectors and/or regions. The aggregationof impacts requires knowledge of (or assumptions about) the relativeimportance of different impacts. Measures of aggregate impacts include,for example, the total number of people affected, or the total economiccosts, and are usually bound by time, place, and/or benefitsSee Co-benefits. AnomalyThe deviation of a variable from its value averaged over a referenceperiod. 1 Reflecting progress in science, this Glossary entry differs in breadth and focus from the entry used in the Fourth Assessment Report and other IPCC definition builds from the definition used in Park et al.

6 (2012).3 This Glossary entry builds from definitions used in previous IPCC reports and the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MEA, 2005).1759 Glossary Annex IIIIA nthropogenic Resulting from or produced by human emissionsEmissions of greenhouse gases, greenhouse gas precursors, andaerosols caused by human activities. These activities include the burningof fossil fuels, deforestation, land use changes, livestock production,fertilization, waste management, and industrial zone Areas where vegetation growth is severely constrained due to limitedwater availability. For the most part, the native vegetation of arid zonesis sparse. There is high rainfall variability, with annual averages below300 mm.

7 Crop farming in arid zones requires Multi-decadal Oscillation/Variability (AMO/AMV)A multi-decadal (65- to 75-year) fluctuation in the North Atlantic, inwhich sea surface temperatures showed warm phases during roughly1860 to 1880 and 1930 to 1960 and cool phases during 1905 to 1925and 1970 to 1990 with a range of approximately C. See AMO Indexin WGI AR5 Box General Circulation Model (AOGCM)See Climate Detection and adaptationAdaptation in response to experienced climate and its effects, withoutplanning explicitly or consciously focused on addressing climate referred to as spontaneous The baseline (or reference) is the state against which change is baseline period is the period relative to which anomalies are baseline concentration of a trace gas is that measured at a locationnot influenced by local anthropogenic variability among living organisms from terrestrial, marine, andother ecosystems.

8 Biodiversity includes variability at the genetic, species,and ecosystem derived from any form of biomass such as recently living organismsor their metabolic fuel, generally in liquid form, developed from organic matter orcombustible oils produced by living or recently living plants. Examplesof biofuel include alcohol (bioethanol), black liquor from the paper-manufacturing process, and soybean manufactured biofuelFirst-generationmanufactured biofuel is derived from grains, oilseeds, animal fats,and waste vegetable oils with mature conversion biofuel Second-generation biofuel uses non-traditional biochemical and thermochemical conversion processesand feedstock mostly derived from the lignocellulosic fractions of,for example, agricultural and forestry residues, municipal solidwaste, biofuel Third-generation biofuel would bederived from feedstocks such as algae and energy crops byadvanced processes still under second- and third-generation biofuels produced through newprocesses are also referred to as next-generation or advanced biofuels,or advanced biofuel The total mass of living organisms in a given area or volume.

9 Deadplant material can be included as dead biomass. Biomass burning is theburning of living and dead biome is a major and distinct regional element of the biosphere,typically consisting of several ecosystems ( , forests, rivers, ponds,swamps within a region). Biomes are characterized by typical communitiesof plants and The part of the Earth system comprising all ecosystems and livingorganisms, in the atmosphere, on land (terrestrial biosphere), or in theoceans (marine biosphere), including derived dead organic matter, suchas litter, soil organic matter, and oceanic organizationA bridging institution, social arrangement, or network that acts as anintermediary between science and As Usual (BAU)Business as usual projections are based on the assumption that operatingpractices and policies remain as they are at present. Although baselinescenarios could incorporate some specific features of BAU scenarios( , a ban on a specific technology), BAU scenarios imply that nopractices or policies other than the current ones are in place.

10 See alsoBaseline/reference, Climate scenario, Emission scenario, RepresentativeConcentration Pathways, Scenario, Socioeconomic scenario, and building The practice of enhancing the strengths and attributes of, and resourcesavailable to, an individual, community, society, or organization to respondto Glossary entry builds from definitions used in the Global Biodiversity Assessment (Heywood, 1995) and the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MEA, 2005).1760 Annex II GlossaryIICarbon cycleThe term used to describe the flow of carbon (in various forms, , ascarbon dioxide) through the atmosphere, ocean, terrestrial and marinebiosphere, and lithosphere. In this report, the reference unit for theglobal carbon cycle is GtC or equivalently PgC (1015g).