Collaborative Research: Glacier Recession and Livelihood Vulnerability in the Peruvian Andes

世界上冰川迅速和几乎无处不在的减少对许多依赖这些重要水文水库满足其淡水需求的社会和生态系统产生了严重影响。热带安第斯冰川对气候变化特别敏感，是主要贫穷的发展中国家季节性干旱高原地区的重要水文水库，近几十年来，这些地区持续的负物质平衡伴随着剧烈的景观变化。然而，由于缺乏对冰川水库和水文通量的了解，研究人员无法评估这些融化的冰川目前的影响。需要开展跨学科研究，以便更清楚地了解气候变化对冰川供水造成的影响的程度，并评估人类对水资源短缺的脆弱性，为适应和缓解日益不确定和冲突的未来的战略提供信息。该项目将审查在世界上冰川化程度最高的热带山脉-秘鲁的科迪勒拉布兰卡山脉-发生的环境变化的复杂性质，并评价这些变化的后果如何与人类决策和行为相联系。该项目的具体研究目标是：1）量化冰川体积的变化; 2）评估冰川融化对季节性和年际水供应和质量的区域影响; 3）评估人类对冰川衰退造成的水文变异性增加的脆弱性;以及4）评估家庭获得资源的变化如何有助于生计适应和变化。调查人员将在三个具有代表性的支流流域进行实地观察，结合地理空间分析，家庭调查，关键访谈和焦点小组，这些流域具有不同的冰川化百分比，可变的水文特征和不同的生计追求，以了解和测量水文过程，校准水化学混合模型，并评估人类脆弱性和家庭生计适应和变化。分析将通过描述性和定量分析程序联系起来，重点是波动的水文资源及其对理解物理和人类变化过程的重要性。地理信息系统和遥感技术将综合人类和自然因素以及研究结果，并扩大分析范围。最后，该项目的特点是一个创新的教育计划，在国际跨学科的背景下整合研究生研究，公共教育和推广。这项研究将增加对人类和社会动态及其与水文过程和热带高地冰川衰退的关系的了解，这是一个目前缺乏数据的地区。这项工作的预期成果包括：1）就气候变化引起的冰川衰退、不断变化的水文过程以及人类生计的脆弱性和适应性的当前速度和规模产生最前沿的经验数据和理论见解;（二）完善严格和可转让的跨学科研究方法和信息传播战略，有可能解决由全球化带来的复杂性，全球变化进程的不确定性和可变性; 3）形成持久的伙伴关系，说明将领先的学术研究与注重保护的民间社会组织的实地能力联系起来的重要价值;以及4）制定一系列有效的针对具体地点的教育推广方案，能力建设战略和政策建议，协助当地人民和治理机构努力适应和缓解迅速恶化的气候变化影响，冰川衰退和水资源短缺对人类社会的影响。

The rapid and near ubiquitous decline in the world's glaciers has grave repercussions for many of the social and ecological systems that depend upon these critical hydrologic reservoirs for their freshwater needs. Tropical Andean glaciers are particularly sensitive to climate changes and represent critical hydrologic reservoirs in seasonally arid, highland regions in predominantly poor, developing nations, where sustained negative mass balance over recent decades has accompanied dramatic landscape changes. However, a lack of knowledge about the volume of glacial reservoirs and hydrological fluxes hampers researchers ability to assess the current impact of these melting glaciers. Interdisciplinary research is needed to integrate a clearer understanding of the magnitude of climate-induced changes to glacier-fed water supplies with assessments of human vulnerability to water scarcity to inform strategies for adaptation to and mitigation of increasingly uncertain and conflicted futures. This project will examine the complex nature of environmental change taking place across local and regional scales of analysis in the world's most glacierized tropical mountain range, the Cordillera Blanca, Peru, and evaluates how the consequences of these changes are linked to human decision-making and behavior. The specific research objectives of the project are to: 1) quantify changes in glacial volume; 2) evaluate the regional impact of glacier melt on seasonal and interannual water availability and quality; 3) assess human vulnerability to increasing hydrological variability due to glacier-recession; and 4) evaluate how changing household access to resources is contributing to livelihood adaptation and change. The investigators will integrate in situ observations with geospatial analyses, household surveys, key interviews, and focus groups in three representative tributary watersheds with different percent glacierization, variable hydrological characteristics and diverse livelihood pursuits to understand and measure hydrologic processes, calibrate hydrochemical mixing models, and evaluate human vulnerability and household livelihood adaptation and change. Analyses will be linked through descriptive and quantitative analytical procedures that focus on fluctuating hydrological resources and their importance for understanding both physical and human processes of change. GIS and remote sensing techniques will integrate the human and physical components and findings of the research, and extend analyses. Finally, the project features an innovative education program that integrates graduate research, public education and outreach in an internationally transdisciplinary context. This research will increase the understanding of human and social dynamics and their relationship to hydrologic processes and glacial recession in tropical highlands, an area that is currently data-poor. The expected outcomes of this work include: 1) the generation of cutting-edge empirical data and theoretical insights into the current rate and magnitude of climate change-induced glacial recession, shifting hydrological processes and human livelihood vulnerability and adaptation; 2) the refinement of rigorous and transferable interdisciplinary research methods and information dissemination strategies that have the potential to address the complexities posed by the uncertainty and variability of global change processes; 3) the formation of enduring partnerships that illustrate the critical value of linking leading academic research with the on-the-ground capacities of conservation-focused civil society organizations; and 4) the generation of an array of effective site-specific educational outreach programs, capacity-building strategies and policy recommendations that will assist local people and governance institutions in their efforts to adapt to and mitigate the rapidly worsening impacts of climate change, glacial recession, and water scarcity on human societies.