Natural Hazards and Climate Change Impacts in the State of Rio de Janeiro: A Landscape Historical Analysis

Abstract

Floods, landslides, and mudslides are frequent phenomena in Rio de Janeiro state (RJ). In the past decades, several catastrophic events have occurred and caused severe damages to people and infrastructure. In contrast, the persistent droughts that affected Southeast Brazil between 2014 and 2017 are phenomena that were not known earlier – at least in such frequency and intensity. Climate scenarios predict that extreme events will further increase in the future leading to increased heavy rainfall events on the one hand and longer dry spells on the other. In this chapter, we provide an overview on the different types of natural hazards, their occurrence (frequency) and intensity, and historical disasters caused by these hazards in RJ. Furthermore, we reconstruct in how far climate variability and human impact (in particular deforestation) affected the occurrence of hydrometeorological hazards in the Holocene. Based on the analysis of historical trends and modeling outcomes under different climate scenarios, we discuss potential future hazards.