Climate change, landslide risk assessment and adaptation policies: The urban area of ancona municipality

Abstract

Adaptation, together with mitigation, is one of the two complementary actions that preferably must be undertaken jointly to cope with the problem of climate change. As stated by the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), mitigation aims at avoiding the unmanageable impacts, while adaptation aims at managing the unavoidable impacts and increasing the resilience of natural and human systems to current and future impacts of climate change. Starting from this idea, the scope of the present work is to describe the methodological approach adopted to run a geological (quantitative) risk assessment, including an economic valuation, for slow landslide and develop a cost-benefit analysis of adaptation measures at local level in the urban area of Ancona municipality (Marche Region, Italy). Such activity has being carried out within the framework of the Life Project –ACT— (Adapting to Climate change in Time), that deals with the development of Local Adaptation Plans based on predictable climate scenarios and environmental, social and economic impact assessment of climate change on some of the most vulnerable urban areas in the Mediterranean basin.