Glossary

Ability to prepare

Primarily the social factors that enable individuals or communities to prepare for heat waves or floods. With respect to floods this includes factors such as income, insurance and local knowledge.

 

Lindley, S., O’Neill, J., Kandeh, J., Lawson, N., Christian, R. & O’Neill M. (2011) “Climate change, justice and vulnerability”, Joseph Rowntree Foundation Report, York

 

Which places are disadvantaged?

Ability to recover

Primarily the social factors that enable individuals and communities to immediately respond to heat waves and flood events, such as income, insurance, personal mobility, fear of crime, community networks and local knowledge.

 

Lindley, S., O’Neill, J., Kandeh, J., Lawson, N., Christian, R. & O’Neill M. (2011) “Climate change, justice and vulnerability”, Joseph Rowntree Foundation Report, York

 

Which places are disadvantaged?

Ability to respond

Primarily the social factors that enable individuals and communities to immediately respond to heat waves and flood events, such as income, insurance, personal mobility, fear of crime, community networks and local knowledge.

 

Lindley, S., O’Neill, J., Kandeh, J., Lawson, N., Christian, R. & O’Neill M. (2011) “Climate change, justice and vulnerability”, Joseph Rowntree Foundation Report, York

 

Which places are disadvantaged?

Adaptation (to climate change)

Actions to reduce the vulnerability of a system to the negative impacts of anticipated human-induced climate change.

 

UKCIP website, 2014

Adaptation Sub-Committee

The Adaptation Sub-Committee (ASC) is a sub-committee of the Committee on Climate Change (CCC), established under the UK’s Climate Change Act 2008.  The ASC provides expert advice and scrutiny through the CCC, ensuring that the Government’s programme for adaptation enables the UK to prepare effectively for the impacts of climate change.

 

From Ecocities

 

More about the Committee on Climate Change

Adaptive capacity

Adaptive capacity is the ability or potential of a system to respond successfully to climate variability and change, and includes adjustments in both behaviour and in resources and technologies.

 

IPCC 2007

Aggregate fuel poverty gap

(See also fuel poverty gap). The sum of the fuel poverty gap of all fuel poor households, or when talking about a specific subset of fuel poor households (e.g. those living in private rented accommodation), the sum of the fuel poverty gap for all households in that subset.

Allowable Solutions

This is part of the Government's Zero Carbon Homes policy. Allowable solutions allow off-site projects or measures that reduce carbon emissions, which house builders may support to achieve the zero carbon homes standard when building new homes rather than delivering all carbon reduction savings required on site. This could be done by the developer paying into a fund managed by a local authority, for example, which the local authority could then use for energy efficiency projects. See Next steps to Zero Carbon Homes Allowable Solutions consultation

 

 

Annual exceedance probability

Annual exceedance probability (AEP) describes the probability of an event (e.g. a flood of a given magnitude) occurring in any given year.  AEP is approximately equivalent to the inverse of return period (in years).  For example, 3.3% AEP refers to a return period of 1 in 30 years.  However, the return period is not the inverse of AEP for very frequent events (see Sayers et al., 2015).

Baseline

The baseline or reference climate is conventionally a 30-year average, relating to either climate observations or to model-simulated data. For UKCP09 the period 1961–1990 was selected as the baseline climate, meaning that all climate change projections are given relative to the modelled climate during this period.

 

From Ecocities, based on the UK Climate Projections 2009 website.

Brise Soleil

A device, such as a perforated screen or louvers, for shutting out direct or excessive sunlight.

 

Oxford Dictionary, 2014

Carbon Saving Community

These are low income areas identified as part of the ECO policy. Energy suppliers are required to install energy efficiency measures in households in these areas according to targets set on a per-supplier basis.

Carbon Storage and Sequestration

The process of increasing the carbon content of a reservoir/pool other than the atmosphere1 There are several ways that this can occur, including through industrial techniques. However, in the context of green infrastructure this primarily refers to natural processes, e.g. how “trees remove carbon in the form of CO2 from the atmosphere and store it as carbon in the form of wood”2.   

 

IPCC (2007) Glossary 

Forestry Commission (2014) 

Child Poverty Act (2010)

The Child Poverty Act (2010) aimed to define success in eradicating child poverty and create a framework to monitor progress at a national and local level. Four targets were identified for achievement by 2020. The Child Poverty Strategy for 2014-2017 was published in July 2014.

 

From parliament.co.uk, Child Poverty Act 2010: a short guide - Commons Library Standard Note, July 2014

Civil Contingencies Act (2004)

The Civil Contingencies Act, and accompanying non-legislative measures, delivers a single framework for civil protection in the UK. The Act is separated into 2 substantive parts: local arrangements for civil protection (Part 1); and emergency powers (Part 2). The Act sets out the basis for emergency planning in the UK.

 

Civil Contingencies Act (2004)

Climate

Climate is typically defined as the average weather (or more rigorously a statistical description of the average in terms of the mean and variability) over a period of time, usually 30 years. These quantities are most often surface variables such as temperature, precipitation, and wind. Climate in a wider sense is the state, including a statistical description, of the climate system.

 

UKCIP website, 2014

Climate disadvantage

Climate disadvantage is a function of (a) the likelihood and degree of exposure to a hazard and (b) individual or group vulnerability with regards to such hazards. It can be estimated and mapped through the combination of representations of hazard-exposure and representations of socio-spatial vulnerability. Also see flood and heat disadvantage.

 

Lindley, S., O’Neill, J., Kandeh, J., Lawson, N., Christian, R. & O’Neill M. (2011) “Climate change, justice and vulnerability”, Joseph Rowntree Foundation Report, York

 

Where are the most climate disadvantaged communities?

Climate Projection

A well-defined plausible climate future. Two climate change projections are considered here, namely a +2oC and +4oC change in Global Mean Temperature (GMT) by the 2080s.

Climate projections

Climate projections expressed in terms of absolute values (as opposed to the relative value expressed in future climate change projections). It is a  projection of the response of the climate system to scenarios based upon climate model simulations and past observations. Climate change projections are expressed as an absolute future climate, for example, that future average daily temperature in the summer will be 34°C for a given location, time period and emissions scenario.

 

From Ecocities, based on the UK Climate Projections 2009 website.

Co-production

Co‐production means delivering public services in an equal and reciprocal relationship between professionals, people using services, their families and their neighbours. Where activities are co‐produced in this way, both services and neighbourhoods become far more effective agents of change.

 

New Economics Foundation

Coastal flooding

Flooding from the sea arising when tidal surge, wave action or a combination of both overtop or overflow the shoreline boundary.

Collective Switching

Occurs when consumers group together, typically facilitated by an independent organisation, to negotiate with multiple suppliers in order to secure a better deal on their energy supply costs.

 

Ofgem

Collective switching schemes

Collective switching schemes involve a group of households banding together to negotiate a better deal with gas and electricity suppliers, with the lead organisation (which could be a local authority, non-profit organisation or business) acting as an intermediary agent.

Community energy

The Government’s Community Energy Strategy 2014 defines this as ‘community projects or initiatives focused on the four strands of reducing energy use, managing energy better, generating energy or purchasing energy.' (p20) They are owned, led and / or controlled by the community, which can be a community of place or a community of interest.

 

Community flood wardens

Flood Warden Schemes are owned and run by members of the Parish Council or the Local Community and supported by the Environment Agency. They consist of nominated volunteers who receive direct flood warnings from the Agency and pass these on to their neighbours. The number of flood wardens will depend on the size of the community and may be operated by a single individual.

 

Environment Agency leaflet on Flood Warden Schemes

Community resilience plans

According to gov.uk ‘Community Resilience is about communities using local resources and knowledge to help themselves during an emergency in a way that complements the local emergency services’. Part of that process involves planning. One example is a Community Emergency Plan, step-by-step guidance for which is available here.

 

Gov.uk guidance "Resilience in society: infrastructure, communities and businesses"

Compounded injustice

Compounded injustice refers to the way that different forms of injustice can combine to place additional and excessive disadvantage on individuals or groups.

Conversion factors (personal, social, environmental)

The personal, environmental and social factors that determine how positive or negative events are converted into gains and losses in well-being:

 

Personal: features of the individual such as disability, age and health that affect the way in which resources and hazards produce different effects on well-being;

 

Environmental: features of the physical environment such as the availability of green space, quality of housing stock, elevation of buildings and access to public space that affect the way in which resources and hazards produce different welfare effects on well-being;

 

Social: features of the social and institutional context and situation, such as the strength of social networks, the cohesion of neighbourhoods, the institutional regimes in nursing homes, and levels of inequality and income, which affect the way in which resources and hazards produce different welfare effects on well-being.

 

Lindley, S., O’Neill, J., Kandeh, J., Lawson, N., Christian, R. & O’Neill M. (2011) “Climate change, justice and vulnerability”, Joseph Rowntree Foundation Report, York

Data zones

Local areas containing around 500-1,000 residents with similar social characteristics. Data zones (DZ) are used by the Scottish Government for reporting social statistics, for example from the census.  

Decent Housing

A housing standard which requires homes to:

1. conform to minimum statutory standards

2. be reasonably maintained

3. have fairly modern facilities and services

4. allow occupants to live in reasonable thermal comfort

 

The Department for Communities and Local Government (2006) 'A Decent Home: Definition and guidance for implementation'

Decile

Each of ten equal groups into which a population can be divided according to the distribution of values of a particular variable.

 

Oxford Dictionaries website

Deprivation

Deprivation covers a broad range of issues and refers to unmet needs caused by a lack of resources of all kinds, not just financial.

 

Department for Communities and Local Government (2011) The English Indices of Deprivation 2010, page 2.

Direct emissions

Carbon emissions resulting directly through an individual’s own actions: household energy use and transport.

Disadvantage (geographic)

Geographic Flood Disadvantage (GFD) provides an ‘absolute’ interpretation of disadvantage (as proposed by Lindley et al., 2011) and enables those locations where high levels of social vulnerability combine with a large number of people exposed to flooding to be identified. GFD therefore identifies areas that are ‘hot spots’ of social flood risk.  

Disadvantage (systemic)

Systemic Flood Disadvantage (SFD) provides a ‘relative’ interpretation of disadvantage and enables bias in the flood risk faced by the most vulnerable when compared to the average to be explored. For example, SFD uses the average for all neighbourhoods within lenses of interest – i.e. UK, the coastal floodplains and cities in decline. As such, SFD measures the degree to which FRM policy (or its implementation in practice) can be considered to deliver a fair and socially just outcome. 

Distributive justice

Distributive justice concerns the ways in which the burdens,  benefits and responsibilities are allocated between different individuals and groups.  In the context of climate change it includes the following:

1. Unequal responsibilities: who bears greater responsibility for the emissions of greenhouse gases?

2. Unequal impacts of climate change: who is more adversely affected by the extreme weather events that will increase in frequency and intensity?

3. Unequal impacts of policy responses: who benefits and who bears the costs and burdens of mitigation and adaptation policy?

 

Adapted from the ClimateJust presentation Why are socially just responses to climate change important?

District heating

In a district heating scheme, instead of each property in an area having its own heating system, heat is generated at a central point and distributed to properties through a network of insulated pipes. Heat can be generated more efficiently in a district heating system, compared to within individual properties.  

Ecosystem services

Ecosystem services are “the benefits people obtain from ecosystems”1 including the supply of food and fuel (‘provisioning’); flood, temperature and erosion control (‘regulating’); opportunities for recreation and relaxation (‘social/cultural’) and areas for biodiversity (‘supporting’).  Their importance is recognised by national government with an initial and follow-on national ecosystem services assessment and a programme of related activities 2,3

 

  1. UKNEA (2011) UK National Ecosystem Assessment.
  2. UKNEA (2011) UK National Ecosystem Assessment: follow on phase reports
  3. Government guidance on ecosystem services

Emissions: per capita / per pound

Pollutant (in this case carbon) releases represented per head of population or per monetary unit.

Endogenous change

Purposeful adaptation to manage the probability of flooding, the exposure to floods and/or the vulnerability of those exposed.  

Energy Company Obligation (ECO)

A policy which requires the main energy suppliers to fund energy efficiency and heating system improvements in homes. It has three strands: the Carbon Emissions Reduction Target (CERO), the Carbon Saving Communities Obligation (CSCO), and the Home Heat Cost Reduction Obligation (HHCRO). CERO provides wall and loft insulation to any household with a suitable property. CSCO provides insulation to households living in specific low-income areas and households which are both receiving specific benefits and living in rural areas. HHCRO provides measures which reduce heating costs (including replacement boilers) to households receiving specific benefits, unless they live in social rented accommodation.

Energy Performance Certificate (EPC)

This is a certificate given to properties which have received an energy survey resulting in a SAP score and banding (see also SAP).

Energy vulnerability

A situation where a household has high energy needs relative to its ability to pay for energy

Enhanced exposure

Enhanced exposure refers to aspects of the physical environment, such as the availability of green space or housing characteristics, which tend to accentuate or offset the severity of heat wave or flood events. This includes aspects of the built environment which can be managed through adaptation and which may not all be included within available hazard-exposure mapping.

 

Lindley, S., O’Neill, J., Kandeh, J., Lawson, N., Christian, R. & O’Neill M. (2011) “Climate change, justice and vulnerability”, Joseph Rowntree Foundation Report, York

 

Which places are disadvantaged?

Epidemiology

Epidemiology is the study of how often diseases occur in different groups of people and why. Epidemiological information is used to plan and evaluate strategies to prevent illness and as a guide to the management of patients in whom disease has already developed.

 

The British Medical Journal

Equality Act (2010)

The Equality Act (2010) legally protects people from discrimination in the workplace and in wider society. It replaced previous anti-discrimination laws with a single Act, making the law easier to understand and strengthening protection in some situations. It sets out the different ways in which it’s unlawful to treat someone.

 

Equality Act 2010: Guidance

Equivilisation

A statistical process that normalises or levels incomes and costs to account for different compositions and numbers of people in any given household. In the fuel poverty context, the main objective is to account for larger households that generally have higher fuel bills and therefore require higher overall incomes to maintain the same quality of life as smaller households.

 

Office for National Statistics

Exogenous change

Changes that cannot be significantly influenced by FRM policy. Examples include climate change and population growth.

Expected Annual Damage (EAD)

The expected annual damage is the average of flood damages calculated over a number of events. The total damages for each event is then multiplied by the event probability to provide the annual damage.  This is then summed for all return periods to provide the Expected Annual Damage for all events. 

Exposure

The degree to which people or other systems come into contact with conditions or events with the capacity to cause harm.1

 

In the context of ClimateJust, this refers to potential exposure to climate-related events as measured by data from the Environment Agency and UKCP09. Exposure can also be taken as The presence of people; livelihoods; environmental services and resources; infrastructure; or economic, social, or cultural assets in places that could be adversely affected.2

 

  1. Adapted from IPCC (2001)
  2. IPCC, 2012: Glossary of terms. In: Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation [Field, C.B., V. Barros, T.F. Stocker, D. Qin, D.J. Dokken, K.L. Ebi, M.D. Mastrandrea, K.J. Mach, G.-K. Plattner, S.K. Allen, M. Tignor, and P.M. Midgley (eds.)]. A Special Report of Working Groups I and II of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, and New York, NY, USA, pp. 555-564 

Extreme weather events

The occurrence of a value of a weather or climate variable above (or below) a threshold value near the upper (or lower) ends of the range of observed values of the variable. This covers events which are very unusual in terms of baseline climate.

 

IPCC, 2012: Glossary of terms. In: Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation [Field, C.B., V. Barros, T.F. Stocker, D. Qin, D.J. Dokken, K.L. Ebi, M.D. Mastrandrea, K.J. Mach, G.-K. Plattner, S.K. Allen, M. Tignor, and P.M. Midgley (eds.)]. A Special Report of Working Groups I and II of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, and New York, NY, USA, pp. 555-564.

Flood

The temporary covering by water of land not normally covered by water. Coastal, fluvial and surface water flood sources are considered here. Note: Groundwater flooding is not considered.

Flood and Water Management Act (2010)

The Flood and Water Management Act provides for better, more comprehensive management of flood risk for people, homes and businesses, helps safeguard community groups from unaffordable rises in surface water drainage charges, and protects water supplies to the consumer.

 

Government guidance and information on flood risk management and surface water management

Flood disadvantage

Flood disadvantage shows how flood-related social vulnerability combines with the potential for exposure to flooding. It accounts for both the likelihood of coming into contact with a flood and also the severity of negative impacts on the health and wellbeing of local communities that could occur as a result of that contact.

 

ClimateJust

Flood groups or flood action groups

Flood Action Groups are ‘grass-roots’ community groups which provide a link between local communities and the range of partnership authorities involved in flood risk management. The groups help to support knowledge exchange and the adoption and maintenance of emergency response and wider adaptation measures. The National Flood Forum has a step-by-step guide to how to set up a flood action group.

 

Adapted from National Flood Forum, 2014

Flood hazard-exposure

Maps of flood hazard-exposure broadly show where flooding is more likely. They are based on the proportion of land area in a particular neighbourhood likely to be exposed to a moderate or significant flood event.

 

ClimateJust

Flood prone area

An area of land that could be flooded by any source of flooding (used here interchangeable with floodplain).

Flood resilience technologies

Technology which provides resilience to flooding, e.g. technologies with the ability to resist flooding and to enable protection to/from flooding.

 

Six Steps to Flood Resilience

Flood risk

Conventionally, the flood risk of an element at risk is considered to be a function of flood hazard (chance of occurring), flood exposure (extent and nature of contact) and flood vulnerability (susceptibility to damage). However, it can be used to represent the likelihood and extent of exposure, as in the case of Environment Agency flood risk maps.

Flood socio-spatial vulnerability

Flood socio-spatial vulnerability refers to mapped social vulnerability with respect to flooding. The map shows how the personal, social and environmental factors which help to explain uneven impacts on people and communities come together in particular neighbourhoods. It shows where negative social impacts are more likely. This information can then be combined with the likelihood of events occurring to understand how this social vulnerability and potential for negative impacts translates into disadvantage.

Floodplain

The area of land where water flows in time of flood (arising from any source of flooding, coastal, fluvial or surface water) or would flow but for the presence of structures and other flood controls. The limits of floodplain are notionally infinite, and are therefore defined by the maximum flood extent resulting from a given return period storm. Here, for practical reasons, the floodplain is defined by the 1:1000-year return period in the absence of any defences that may exist.  

Fluvial flooding

Flooding from a watercourse when water from an established river or drainage channel spills onto the floodplain.

Fuel poverty

A household is defined as fuel poor in England if it has low income and high energy costs i.e. if a household:

 

1. has required fuel costs that are above average (the national median level); and

 

2. were they to spend that amount they would be left with a residual income below the official poverty line.

 

This new definition follows the Hills review of fuel poverty for the Government and replaces the old definition of fuel poverty from the Homes and Energy Conservation Act (2000) and the UK’s first Fuel Poverty Strategy (2001) whereby a household was defined as ‘fuel poor’ if it needed to spend more than 10% of its income on fuel to maintain a satisfactory heating regime.

 

Fuel poverty statistics

Fuel poverty gap

The Hills review proposed that the depth of fuel poverty is measured by the fuel poverty gap. This is the extent to which a household’s total fuel costs are above the energy cost threshold or, if near the sloping income threshold, has costs above the latter.

 

ACE, CSE and Richard Moore (2012) Improving the Hills approach to measuring fuel poverty

Green Infrastructure

Green infrastructure is “an interconnected network of green space that conserves natural ecosystem values and functions and provides associated benefits to human populations”1. It can be comprised of natural or semi-natural areas of vegetation, water bodies and other non built-up land surface covers and can exist as managed or unmanaged, public or private and small or large zones 2,3. Together they provide multiple and often inter-connected ‘ecosystem services’: including the supply of food and fuel (‘provisioning’); flood, temperature and erosion control (‘regulating’); opportunities for recreation and relaxation (‘social/cultural’) and areas for biodiversity (‘supporting’)4.  Their importance is recognised by national government with an initial and follow-on national ecosystem services assessment and a programme of related activities5,6.

 

  1. Benedict, MA, McMahon, ET (2001) page 5 Green Infrastructure: Smart Conservation for the 21st Century. The Conservation Fund. Sprawlwatch Clearinghouse Mono-graph Series.
  2. Jones, S. and Somper, C. (2014) The role of green infrastructure in climate change adaptation in London The Geographical Journal, Vol. 180, No. 2, pp. 191–196
  3. Tzoulas, K. Korpela, K., Venn, S., Yli-Pelkonen, V., Kazmierczak, A., Niemela, J. and James, P. (2007) Promoting ecosystem and human health in urban areas using Green Infrastructure: A literature review Landscape and Urban Planning 81 167–178
  4. Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (2005) Ecosystems and Human Well-being: A Framework for Assessment. Island Press
  5. UKNEA (2011) UK National Ecosystem Assessment: Chapter 10 ‘Urban’
  6. https://www.gov.uk/ecosystems-services

 

Greenhouse gases

A gas within the atmosphere which absorbs and emits energy radiated by the Earth. Carbon dioxide (CO2) is the most important greenhouse gas being emitted by humans. The greenhouse effect is natural and without it the Earth would be considerably colder. The primary greenhouse gases are: water vapour (H2O), carbon dioxide (CO2), nitrous oxide (N2O), methane (CH4) and ozone (O3).

 

UKCIP website, 2014

Groundwater flooding

Flooding from the ground caused by high groundwater levels in aquifers. Note: Groundwater flooding is not considered.

Hazard

The potential occurrence of a natural or human-induced physical event that may cause loss of life, injury, or other health impacts, as well as damage and loss to property, infrastructure, livelihoods, service provision, and environmental resources.

 

IPCC, 2012: Glossary of terms. In: Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation [Field, C.B., V. Barros, T.F. Stocker, D. Qin, D.J. Dokken, K.L. Ebi, M.D. Mastrandrea, K.J. Mach, G.-K. Plattner, S.K. Allen, M. Tignor, and P.M. Midgley (eds.)]. A Special Report of Working Groups I and II of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, and New York, NY, USA, pp. 555-564.

Health and Social Care Act (2012)

The Health and Social Care (2012) Act represents a major re-organisation of health and social care. It encompasses clinically led commissioning, support for innovative practices, allowances for a greater voice for patients, a new focus on public health, more accountability and re-structured management.

 

Health and Social Care Act Factsheet

Health and Wellbeing Boards

A forum where key leaders from the health and care system work together to improve the health and wellbeing of their local population and reduce health inequalities’‘A forum where key leaders from the health and care system work together to improve the health and wellbeing of their local population and reduce health inequalities.

 

LGA, 2014 from the Health and Social Care Act (2012)

Heat disadvantage

The maps of heat disadvantage show how heat-related social vulnerability combines with the potential for exposure to heat-related events. They account for both the likelihood of coming into contact with high temperatures and also the severity of negative impacts on the health and wellbeing of local communities that could occur as a result of that contact.

 

ClimateJust

Heat hazard-exposure

The maps of heat hazard-exposure broadly show where there is likely to be a greater chance of coming into contact with heat-related events.

 

ClimateJust

Heat socio-spatial vulnerability

Heat socio-spatial vulnerability refers to mapped social vulnerability with respect to heat-related hazard. The map shows how the personal, social and environmental factors which help to explain uneven impacts on people and communities come together in particular neighbourhoods. It shows where negative social impacts are more likely.

 

ClimateJust

Heatwave

A heatwave is an extended period of hot weather relative to the expected conditions of the area at that time of year. The Met Office run the Heat-health watch system for England. The system works on regional thresholds ranging from the highest in London (32°C by day and 18°C by night) to the lowest in the North East (28°C by day and 15°C by night). These have to be exceeded for more than two consecutive days to trigger responses.

 

Met Office, 2014

Heatwave Plan for England

The Heatwave Plan for England is a plan intended to protect the population from heat-related harm to health.

 

Heatwave Plan for England 2014

 

 

Household

‘One person living alone, or a group of people (not necessarily related) living at the same address who share cooking facilities and share a living room or sitting room or dining area. This includes sheltered accommodation units in an establishment where 50 per cent or more have their own kitchens (irrespective of whether there are other communal facilities) and all people living in caravans on any type of site that is their usual residence (this will include anyone who has no other usual residence’ elsewhere in the UK). (Census, 2011).

Index of Multiple Deprivations (IMD)

The official measure of relative deprivation for neighbourhoods in England.  

Indirect emissions

Carbon emissions resulting indirectly from an individual’s purchase of goods or services. For example, through purchasing a book, an individual can be thought of as being responsible for the emissions resulting from the manufacture of the book, as well as the emissions created by shipping the book. In the case of services, a hair salon uses energy in heating, lighting and appliances, and the salon’s clients, by buying haircuts, can be considered responsible for these emissions. Emissions from transport services such as taxis and flights are considered direct emissions, rather than indirect emissions.

Intergenerational justice

Intergenerational justice concerns the ways in which burdens, benefits and responsibilities are distributed across generations. In the context of climate change problems of intergenerational injustice are raised by the extent to which future generations will be harmed by the extreme climate impacts that result from current emissions.

Joint Health and Wellbeing Strategies

Strategies developed from the outcomes of Joint Strategic Needs Assessments.

Joint Strategic Needs Assessment

JSNAs “analyse the health needs of populations to inform and guide commissioning of health, well-being and social care services within local authority areas.1 They provide ‘a comprehensive analysis of the current and future needs and assets’ of local areas. Assets are defined as ‘anything that can be used to improve outcomes and impact on the wider determinants of health. This could be facilities such as a One Stop Shop, or green spaces; but also local businesses, local providers with a specific expertise, or capacity within the local community, such as lunch clubs for isolated older people. This includes needs and assets relevant to health, social care and public health across the full lifecourse, covering children, young people and adults; and involves an analysis of the wider determinants of health’.2

 

  1. NHS confederation, 2011
  2. DoH (2011) Joint Strategic Needs Assessment and joint health and wellbeing strategies explained

Lead Local Flood Authorities (LLFAs)

LLFAs are Unitary Authorities or County Councils. They are responsible for developing, maintaining and applying a strategy for local flood risk management in their areas and for maintaining a register of flood risk assets. They also have lead responsibility for managing the risk of flooding from surface water, groundwater and ordinary watercourses.

 

Gov.uk, 2014

Local Climate Impacts Profile (LCLIP)

LCLIP is a simple tool designed to help organisations to assess their exposure to the weather. It can be used as a standalone tool, or as a step in a risk-based framework such as the Adaptation Wizard.1 An online version is now available through Kent County Council’s Severe Weather Impacts Monitoring System (SWIMS) tool.2

 

  1. UKCIP website
  2. Kent County Council. The SWIMS tool is now hosted by Climate UK.

Local Resilience Fora

Multi-agency partnerships made up of representatives from local public services, including the emergency services, local authorities, the NHS, the Environment Agency and others. These agencies are known as Category 1 Responders, as defined by the Civil Contingencies Act.

 

Gov.uk, 2014

Localism Act 2011

Statutory powers to devolve more decision-making around planning and housing to the local level, including to local communities. 

 

A plain English Guide to the Act 

 

Full text of the Act 

Long-term unemployment

Defined where a person has been continuously claiming Jobseeker’s Allowance  for 12 months or more.

 

Gov.uk, 2013

Lower Super Output Area

Compact areas with around 1,000-3,000 residents with similar social characteristics. LSOAs are used in England and Wales for reporting social statistics, for example the census.

 

 

Market-based insurance models

Flood insurance can take two broad forms.  Market based insurance models are typically individualistic and risk-sensitive  - forms of mutual insurance where individuals payment into the risk pool is proportional to their level of risk, as with private motor or travel insurance. These contrast with solidaristic, risk-insensitive models or ‘forms of insurance where those bearing lower levels of risk contribute to the support of those bearing higher risk, as with the UK National Health Service.

 

O’Neill, J. and O’Neill, M. (2011) Social justice and the future of flood insurance, Joseph Rowntree Foundation.

 

 

Memorandum of Understanding

A document that describes the general principles of an agreement between parties, but does not amount to a substantive contract.

 

Collins Dictionary, 2014

Mitigation (of climate change)

Reducing greenhouse gas emissions in order to slow or stop global climate change.

 

UKCIP website, 2014

National Planning Policy Framework

Guidance for local planning authorities and decision-takers, both in drawing up plans and making decisions about planning applications.

Neighbourhood

For the purposes of this website, neighbourhoods are taken as UK Census Middle Super Output Areas (MSOAs). They contain in the region of 7,800 people on average in 2011.

 

Office for National Statistics

Neighbourhood (new flood data)

Defined here as a spatial unit covering Lower Super Output Areas (LSOAs) in England and Wales, Data Zone (DZs) in Scotland and Super Output Areas (SOAs) in Northern Ireland.

Neighbourhood (original flood data & heat data)

Defined here as a spatial unit covering Medium Super Output Areas (MSOAs) (~7,200 people), but for original flood and heat data only.  

Neighbourhood Flood Vulnerability Index (NFVI)

Defined here based on a series of indicators that provide insight into the inherent social characteristics of a neighbourhood that make a community more or less vulnerable to a loss of well-being should a flood occur.

Off gas

Areas or households which do not have access to the mains gas network. Many rural areas are off-gas. Gas is the cheapest heating fuel, so properties which are off-gas tend to have higher heating costs.

Partnership working

Activities undertaken with one or more organisations where there are shared objectives or goals.

Passivhaus standards

A housing standard which is based on maintaining internal thermal comfort though maximising energy input from passive sources, like the sun, and minimising losses through the fabric of a building.

 

Passivhaus Trust

 

A map of certified passivhaus in the UK

Pluvial flooding

In England, usually referred to as urban flooding ‘caused by rainfall overwhelming drainage capacity’ (Parliamentary Office of Science andTechnology, 2007, p. 1)  Also called surface water flooding.

 

Houston, D (2011), p88.

Poverty

JRF's definition of poverty is ‘When a person’s resources (mainly their material resources) are not sufficient to meet their minimum needs (including social participation).’

Poverty premium

A ‘poverty premium’ occurs when the detriment to households of having low incomes is compounded by them having to pay more than others for essential goods and services.  For example, households on low incomes can have a heavily reduced choice in term of utility tariffs meaning that, despite relatively low consumption they pay more on average per unit consumed. This may include paying additional charges or higher prices because of the way they carry out transactions.

 

Hirsch, D. (2013) Addressing the Poverty Premium: Approaches to regulation. A report published by Consumer Futures with support from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation.

Probability

Probability is a way of expressing knowledge or belief that an event will occur, and is a concept most people are familiar with in everyday life. In mathematics, there are two types of probability. Most people are familiar with objective probability, which is the likelihood of an outcome based on empirical observations and information. The second type of probability, subjective probability, is where the likelihood of an outcome is based on the strength of belief in different outcomes.

 

From Ecocities, based on UK Climate Projections 2009

Procedural justice

Procedural justice concerns the ways in which decisions are made, in particular who has the power to affect policy responses to climate change and how decision making procedures benefit and burden different individuals and groups.

 

Adapted from the ClimateJust presentation Why are socially just responses to climate change important?

Proxy

Proxy indicators provide an indirect representation of the factor which they are intending to represent.

 

ClimateJust

Public Health Outcomes Framework

Healthy lives, healthy people: Improving outcomes and supporting transparency1 outlines aims for public health and provides indicators through which progress towards meeting them can be measured. Indicators are organised into four domains and updated quarterly2.

 

  1. Public Health Outcomes Framework 2013-2016
  2. Overarching Indicators

 

More information on health and vulnerability and what responses can be considered is available here

Rawlsian rationale

The Rawlsian rationale preferentially targets the most vulnerable to reduce flood risk in the socially vulnerable communities (first put forward by John Rawls,1971).

Receptor

The entity that may be harmed by a flood. For example, in the event of heavy rainfall (the source), flood water may propagate across the floodplain (the pathway) and inundate housing/householders (the receptor) that may suffer material damage (the harm or consequence).

Regressive policy

Policy that creates the unintended consequence of taking a proportionally greater amount in revenue from those on lower incomes than they have the potential to gain from the policy itself.

 

In the fuel poverty context this is usually used in reference to levies on domestic energy bills which penalise financially disadvantaged households due to the fact that fuel comprises a larger part of their domestic outgoings than higher income households.

Relative Economic Pain

A new metric proposed here that reflects the ratio of the uninsured loss to income. The REP is calculated as (1- insurance penetration) x Expected Annual Damages (direct residential) per household within the floodplain / Average Income per household within the neighbourhood.

Residential property

As defined by the national property datasets from England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland and used here to establish the presence of a single household.

Residual (flood) risk

The risk that remains after accounting for the performance of all FRM actions (i.e. measures to reduce the chance of flooding and those taken to reduce exposure or vulnerability).  

Resilience

Social resilience has been defined as the ability of groups or communities to cope with external stresses and disturbances as a result of social, political and environmental change1.

 

The IPCC defines social and ecological resilience as the ability of a social or ecological system to absorb disturbances while retaining the same basic structure and ways of functioning, the capacity for self-organisation, and the capacity to adapt to stress and change2.

 

Addressing the personal, environmental and social factors that affect the degree a community is vulnerable to a hazard such as flood, drought or heatwave will also address how well a community is able to bounce back after the impacts of the hazard.   A community that is better able to prepare for, respond to and recover from external hazards like floods or heatwaves will be more resilient to that hazard. 

 

Building resilience needs to account for: the degree to which the community comes into contact with a hazard capable of causing harm; the amount of inherent susceptibility to harm in that community; and the extent to which people in the community are able to make adjustments in order to avoid negative consequences. Also see Box 1, in Which places are disadvantaged?

 

  1. Adger, N. 2000, ‘Social and ecological resilience: are they related?’ Progress in Human Geography 24: pp. 347–364
  2. IPCC (2007) Climate Change 2007: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability. Contribution of Working Group II to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Parry, M. L., Canziani, O. F., Palutikof, J. P., van der Linden, P. J. and Hanson, C. E. (eds). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press p. 883

Return period

A statistical measure denoting the average recurrence interval in time that an event (e.g. an in-river water level) of a given magnitude equalled or exceeded (when considered over an extended period). While it is true that a 1 in 10-year event will, on average, be exceeded once within any 10-year period, this does not imply that it will not reoccur for ten years. The chance of encountering or exceeding such an event in the next 10 years is approximately 65% - the so-called encounter probability (see for example Sayers, 2015).  

Risk

The combination of the chance of an event (e.g. a flood), with the impact that the event would cause if it occurred. Risk therefore has two components - the chance (or probability) of an event occurring and the impact (or consequence) associated with that event.  

Risk-sensitive market regime

An individualistic risk-sensitive model of insurance is one where individuals’ payment into the ‘risk pool’ is proportional to their level of risk, as with private motor or travel insurance.’ It contrasts with solidaristic, risk-insensitive models or ‘forms of insurance where those bearing lower levels of risk contribute to the support of those bearing higher risk, as with the UK National Health Service’.

 

O’Neill, J. and O’Neill, M. (2011) Social justice and the future of flood insurance, Joseph Rowntree Foundation, page 17.

SAP (Standard Assessment Procedure)

This is the methodology used by the Government to assess and compare the energy and environmental performance of dwellings. The output of the assessment is a numerical score. Scores are organised into bands, with Band A being the best performing dwellings, and Band G being the worst.

 

Government guidance

Sensitivity

Sensitivity refers to personal biophysical characteristics which affect the likelihood that a heat wave or flood event will have negative health and welfare impacts. For example, older people tend to be more susceptible to the effects of high temperatures.

 

Lindley, S., O’Neill, J., Kandeh, J., Lawson, N., Christian, R. & O’Neill M. (2011) “Climate change, justice and vulnerability”, Joseph Rowntree Foundation Report, York

 

Which places are disadvantaged?

Social Flood Risk Index (SFRI)

Defined here as the product of Neighbourhood Flood Vulnerability Index weighted by a measure of the flood exposure. 

Social Flood Risk Index (Individual) is as the SFRI, but normalised by population.

Social isolation

Social isolation refers to an absence of meaningful social ties. These are ties which can provide a range of forms of support, for example someone to help in a crisis, someone to listen to problems or to provide comfort, someone to relax with and be appreciated by (Tomlinson et al., (2008); Ferragina et al, 2013). Social isolation may lead to feelings of loneliness but is not synonymous with loneliness (Steptoe et al, 2013).

 

Ferragina, E., Tomlinson, M and Walker, R (2013) Poverty, Participation and Choice. Joseph Rowntree Foundation 

 

Steptoe A, Shankar A, Demakakos P, Wardle J. Social isolation, loneliness, and all-cause mortality in older men and women. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 2013; 110: 5797–801

 

Tomlinson, M., Walker, R. and Williams, G (2008) Measuring poverty in Britain as a multi-dimensional concept, 1991-2003 Journal of Social Policy 37(4) pp597-620

Social justice

Social justice is concerned with justice in the distribution of resources, benefits and burdens in society, in the power and voice to make and affect social decisions, in the access to knowledge and other social goods, and in the proper recognition of different individuals and groups.

Social networks

The system of interconnections between people which support personal relationships and interactions. 

Social resilience

Social resilience has been defined as the ability of groups or communities to cope with external stresses and disturbances as a result of social, political and environmental change. Also see Resilience.

 

Adger, N. 2000, ‘Social and ecological resilience: are they related?’ Progress in Human Geography 24: pp. 347–364.

Social vulnerability

Social vulnerability is a matter of how external stresses impact on well-being. How vulnerable an individual or group will be to a climate related event depends upon not just  their personal sensitivity to the event, but also environmental and social factors that lead to losses in well-being.

Socially just adaptation

Adaptation responses which ensure distributive justice in the ways in which different individuals and groups benefit from or are burdened by climate change impacts or policies and procedural justice in the ways in which adaption policy is made.

 

Adapted from the ClimateJust presentation Why are socially just responses to climate change important?

Socially vulnerable groups

Groups of people who have shared characteristics in terms of their social vulnerability.

Socio-spatial vulnerability

Socio-spatial vulnerability refers to mapped social vulnerability with respect to a climate-related hazard. The map shows how the personal, social and environmental factors which help to explain uneven impacts on people and communities come together in particular neighbourhoods. It shows where negative social impacts are more likely.

Super Output Area (SOA)

Compact areas with similar social characteristics used in Northern Ireland for reporting social statistics, for example the census. These contain on average approximately 800 households and a population of 2,000.

Surface sealing or impermeable surface

Surface sealing refers to the process through which relatively permeable land covers are replaced by relatively impermeable ones. Such materials form a barrier through which water percolation is inhibited and can cause or increase surface water flooding or the impacts of other flood types. 

Surface Water Flooding

Surface water flooding has been defined as the situation “when heavy rainfall overwhelms the drainage capacity of the local area”1. The 2010 the Flood and Water Management Act includes any moving or standing water which is on the surface of the ground before having entered artificial drainage or sewerage systems or natural watercourses2. Howeverm definitions can vary, for example, to include “flooding from sewers, drains, groundwater, and runoff from land, small water courses and ditches that occurs as a result of heavy rainfall”3.

 

Environment Agency (2009) Flooding in England: A National Assessment of Flood Risk 

UKPGA Section 6 

Defra (2011) Surface Water Management Plan Technical Guidance

Susceptibility (to loss of well-being)

A dimension of vulnerability which reflects the characteristics of an individual (namely age and health status), which increase the likelihood that a flood event will have a negative impact on well-being.

Sustainable Development Management Plan

In the context of the Health and Social Care Act (2012) A Sustainable Development Management Plan (SDMP) is a current board approved document that assists organisations to clarify their objectives on sustainable development and set out a plan of action.

 

Public Health England (2014)

Telehealth / Telecare

Telecare and telehealth services are technology-based tools which aim to support more independent living for people with health problems or disabilities.

 

Adapted from NHS Choices, 2014

Thermal comfort

Thermal comfort is a subjectively defined state of mind where an individual feels neither too warm nor too cold. For the purposes of the British Standard BS EN ISO 7730, this is ‘that condition of mind which expresses satisfaction with the thermal environment.’ A person’s thermal comfort is determined by:

Air temperature (i.e. how hot or cold indoor and outdoor spaces are at a particular point in time)

Radiant temperature (heat given off by a warm object, e.g. the sun, a radiator, an oven)

Air velocity (e.g. drafts/breezes)

Humidity (i.e. moisture in the air, e.g. from weather conditions or internal sources such as drying of clothes)

Clothing Insulation (e.g. a key element of adaptation is being able to modify clothing to improve thermal comfort)

Metabolic heat (e.g. linked to activity rate, or some illnesses and medications)

Differences in the factors above means that levels of heating and cooling required to achieve thermal comfort can vary markedly. In recognition that there is no uniformly applicable threshold of comfort, The Health and Safety Executive HSE considers that a reasonable limit is to have a minimum of 80% of building occupants thermally comfortable in a work environment (What is thermal comfort?) Differences in thermal comfort within buildings can be exploited to help satisfy different comfort levels of building users, e.g. within residential homes (see the Building Comfort for Older Age report from the University of Manchester's Conditioning Demand project project).

 

Triple injustice

In the context of carbon mitigation policy and energy policy, the triple injustice refers to the situation where a household makes a relatively small contribution to carbon emissions, but pays disproportionately for the policies to reduce carbon emissions, and benefits less from those policies.  

UKCP09 Projections

UKCP09 provides probabilistic climate projections for UK land and marine regions. They are ‘A projection of future absolute climate that assigns a probability level to different climate outcomes’1 for:

1. Annual, seasonal and monthly climate averages.

2. Individual 25 km grid squares, and for pre-defined aggregated areas.

3. Seven 30 year time periods.

4. Three emissions scenarios.

5. Projections are based on change relative to a 1961-1990 baseline.2

 

  1. Probabilistic climate projection
  2. About the climate change projections

Urban Heat Island

The phenomenon whereby air and surface temperatures in towns and cities are elevated in relation to surrounding rural areas.

 

After Oke, 1982.

Vulnerability

Vulnerability of an individual or group is characterised by the degree to which an external event converts into losses in their well-being. The concept of vulnerability is used to describe the capacities of individuals and social groups to respond to the impacts of adverse events.

 

Lindley, S., O’Neill, J., Kandeh, J., Lawson, N., Christian, R. & O’Neill M. (2011) “Climate change, justice and vulnerability”, Joseph Rowntree Foundation Report, York

Well-being

Well-being is concerned with the quality of life of individuals and communities, with what makes their lives go well or badly.

Z-score

A statistical measurement of how an individual score relates to the mean (average value) in a group of scores. A Z-score of 0 means the score is the same as the mean (average value). A Z-score can be positive or negative, indicating whether it is above or below the mean and by how many standard deviations.  

Zero carbon homes

The zero carbon homes standard is a Government policy which will require house builders to decrease all carbon emissions from energy arising from fixed heating and lighting, hot water and other fixed building services (eg ventilation) in new homes from 2016. It does not include carbon emissions from appliances or ‘white goods’. See consultation from 2014