Senior Researcher
Head: Adaptation and Social Learning
Guest Researcher at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research
Lecturer at the Department of Resource Economics at Humboldt University, Berlin

Contact

Tel. +49 30-2060738-20
Fax. +49 30-2060738-33
hinkel(at)globalclimateforum.org
www.pik-potsdam.de/members/hinkel

Address

Global Climate Forum e.V. (GCF)
Neue Promenade 6
10178 Berlin, Germany

 

Research Interests

My research aims at understanding the governance of human-environment interactions in social-ecological systems (SESs) in the context of climate change impacts, vulnerability and adaptation, with a particular focus on coastal and natural resource systems.

Specifically, I am interested in collective action problems related to adaptation such as the provisioning of public goods that protect against climate hazards (e.g., dikes to protect against flooding) and the management of resources that are threaten by climate change (e.g., water, land and infrastructure). Towards a better understanding of these, I am applying and advancing approaches from transaction cost economics and the work of Elinor Ostrom on the sustainability of social-ecological systems.

 

Current projects and research activities

Since 2012

Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change (IPCC). I am Lead Author on the coastal chapter of the Working
Group II contribution to this forthcoming Fifth Assessment Report.

Since 2011

Habilitation on human-environment interactions in the Division of Resource
Economics at the Faculty of Agriculture and Horticulture, Humboldt
University, Berlin.

Since 2011

IMPACT2C (Quantifying projected impacts under 2C warming,
funded by European Commission’s DG Research under the 7th Framework
Programme. This project assesses impacts and adaptation under
low-stabilisation scenarios. I am involved in the coastal assessment for
Europe and the Maldives.

Since 2011

PROVIA (Programme of Research on Climate Change Vulnerability,
Impacts and Adaptation) Guidance, funded by UNEP. PROVIA is a
global initiative which aims to provide direction and coherence at the
international level for research on climate change vulnerability, impacts
and adaptation (VIA). Towards this end, PROVIA is revising the IPCC
Guidelines (1994) and the UNEP Handbook (1996) to produce a guidance
on tools and research methodologies for VIA. I am the coordinating
lead author of this guidance.

Since 2010

MEDIATION (Methodology for Effective Decision-making on Impacts
and AdaptaTION), funded by European Commission’s DG Research
under the 7th Framework Programme (project number 2444012). The
objective of MEDIATION is to develop an integrated methodology for
assessing climate change impacts, vulnerability and adaptation. I lead
the development of the integrated methodology.

Since 2008

SES Club. The SES Club is a small group of European and North
American scholars that collectively develops a common framework for
the rigorous analysis of social-ecological and socio-technical systems.
The group is led by Elinor Ostrom at Indiana University and involves,
amongst others, GCF, Delft University of Technology, Humboldt University
Berlin, the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis
(IIASA) and the Stockholm Resilience Center. I initiated, together with
Elinor Ostrom, the first meeting of this group.

Since 2001

DIVA model (Dynamic and Interactive Vulnerability Assessment).
DIVA is a global, integrated model of coastal systems developed collaboratively
by several European research institutes for assessing biophysical
and socio-economic consequences of sea-level rise and socioeconomic
development taking into account adaptation in terms of raising
dikes and nourishing beaches. I lead the model development and
maintain its code.

Completed projects (selection)

2011 – 2012

Costs of Adaptation to Rising Coastal Water Levels for People’s Republic
of China, Japan and the Republic of Korea, funded by the Asian
Development Bank. I have done the simulations of costs and impacts.
2010 Economics of Adaptation to Climate Change (EACC): Aggregate Track
Infrastructure - Coastal Component, funded by the World Bank. The
project developed a global estimate of adaptation costs for informing
climate negotiations and adaptation decision making. I was involved
in the coastal assessment.

2010

Economic Analysis of Coastal Adaptation to Climate Change in Senegal
and Gambia, funded by the World Bank. The project assessed
coastal impacts, vulnerability and adaptation using the DIVA Model
for Senegal and Gambia.

2010

Climate Change Adaptation in Rural Areas of India, funded by the
Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH.
The project developed a methodology for assessing the vulnerability of
Indian States to climate change.

2009 – 2010

Vulnerability Mapping, funded by European Topic Centers at the German
and European Environmental Agency. An assessment of the vulnerabilities
of several European sectors was carried out and incorporated
in the 2010 State of the Environment Report published by the European
Environmental Agency. I carried out the coastal assessment.

2009

Preliminary assessment and road-map for the elaboration of
Climate Change Vulnerability Indicators at regional level,
funded by European Commission’s DG Environment (Reference:
ENV.G.1/ETU/2008/0092r). The project conducted a review of
vulnerability indicators from a theoretical and methodological perspective
and developed and applied a process for the construction of
vulnerability indicators.

2008 – 2011

CLIMATECOST (the Full Cost of Climate Change), funded by European
Commission’s DG Research under the 7th Framework Programme.
The project is a study of the economics of climate change to
inform policy on long-term targets, the economic costs of inaction, and
the costs and benefits of adaptation. The project is quantifying the costs
of climate change impacts, as compared with the costs and benefits of
adaptation. I was involved in the coastal work.

2005 – 2009

ADAM (Adaptation and Mitigation Strategies - Supporting European
Climate Policy), funded by European Commission’s DG Research under
the Sixth Framework Programme (Project Reference: 18476). I
co-lead the ADAM Workpackage A1 that developed a formal framework
of CCIVA concepts, conducted a meta-analysis of European
CCIVA studies, explored how barriers to adaptation could be overcome
through social learning, and developed a Digital Adaptation Compendium.

2005 – 2009

FAVAIA (Formal Approaches to Vulnerability that Inform Adaptation).
FAVAIA was a joint research project between PIK and the Stockholm
Environment Institute (SEI) which aimed at alleviating some of the conceptual
difficulties present in the field of CCIVA by formalising vulnerability
and related concepts. I lead the PIK work.

2005 – 2009

NeWater (New Approaches to AdaptiveWater Management under Uncertainty),
funded by European Commission’s DG Research under the
Sixth Framework Programme (contract no 511179). I was involved in
a case study of range land management in Lesotho and in comparing
and improving indicator and model-based methods for assessing water
vulnerability.

2001 – 2004

DINAS-COAST (Dynamic and Interactive Assessment of National, Regional
and Global Vulnerability of Coastal Zones to Sea-Level Rise),
funded by European Commission’s DG Research under the 5th Framework
Programme (Contract No. EVK2-2000-22024). The project developed
the DIVA model. I coordinated the development.

 

Publications

Peer-reviewed journal articles

Hinkel, J., 2011. “Indicators of vulnerability and adaptive capacity”: towards a clarification of the science policy interface. Global Environmental Change, 21, 198–208.

Hinkel, J., Brown, S., Exner, L., Nicholls, R.J., Vafeidis, A.T. and Kebede, A.S., 2011. Sealevel rise impacts on Africa and the effects of mitigation and adaptation: an application of DIVA. Regional Environmental Change, 12, 207–224.

Hofmann, M., Hinkel, J. andWrobel, M., 2011. Classifying knowledge on climate change impacts, adaptation, and vulnerability in Europe for informing adaptation research and decision-making: a conceptual meta-analysis. Global Environmental Change, 21, 1106–1116.

Lass, W., Haas, A., Hinkel, J. and Jaeger, C., 2011. Avoiding the avoidable: Towards a European heat waves risk governance. International Journal of Disaster Risk Science, 2, 1–14.

van Vuuren, D.P., Isaac, M., Kundzewicz, Z.W., Arnell, N., Barker, T., Criqui, P., Berkhout, F., Hilderink, H., Hinkel, J., Hof, A., Kitous, A., Kram, T., Mechler, R. and Scrieciu, S., 2011. The use of scenarios as the basis for combined assessment of climate change mitigation and adaptation. Global Environmental Change, 21, 575–591.

Bisaro, A., Hinkel, J. and Kranz, N., 2010a. Multilevel water, biodiversity and climate adaptation governance: evaluating adaptive management in Lesotho. Environmental Science and Policy, 13(7), 637–647.

Bisaro, A., Wolf, S. and Hinkel, J., 2010b. Framing climate vulnerability and adaptation at multiple levels: Addressing climate risks or institutional barriers in Lesotho. Climate and Development, 2(2), 161–175.

Hinkel, J., Nicholls, R.J., Vafeidis, A., Tol, R.S.J. and Avagianou, T., 2010. Assessing risk of and adaptation to sea-level rise in the European Union: an application of DIVA.Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, 5(7), 1–17.

Kranz, N., Menniken, T. and Hinkel, J., 2010. Climate change adaptation strategies in the Mekong and Orange-Senqu basins: What determines the state-of-play? Environmental Science and Policy, 13(7), 648–659.

Mcleod, E., Hinkel, J., Vafeidis, A.T., Nicholls, R.J., Harvey, N. and Salm, R., 2010a. Sealevel rise vulnerability in the countries of the Coral Triangle. Sustainability Science, 5(2), 207–222.

Mcleod, E., Poulter, B., Hinkel, J., Reyes, E. and Salm, R., 2010b. Sea-level rise impact models and environmental conservation: A review of models and their applications. Ocean & Coastal Management, 53, 507–517.

Miller, F., Osbahr, H., Boyd, E., Thomalla, F., Bharwani, S., Ziervogel, G.,Walker, B., Birkmann, J., van der Leeuw, S., Rockström, J., Hinkel, J., Downing, T., Folke, C. and Nelson, D.R., 2010. Resilience and vulnerability: Complementary or conflicting concepts? Ecology and Society, 15(3).

Nicholls, R.J., Marinova, N., Lowe, J.A., Brown, S., Vellinga, P., de Gusmao, D., Hinkel, J. and Tol, R.S.J., 2010. Sea-level rise and its possible impacts given a “beyond 4 degree world” in the 21st century. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, 369, 161–181.

Hinkel, J., 2009. PIAM: A modular approach to integrated assessment modelling. Environmental Modelling and Software, 24, 739–748.

Hinkel, J. and Klein, R.J.T., 2009. The DINAS-COAST project: developing a tool for the dynamic and interactive assessment of coastal vulnerability. Global Environmental Change, 19(3), 384–395.

Ionescu, C., Klein, R.J.T., Hinkel, J., Kumar, K.S.K. and Klein, R., 2009. Towards a formal framework of vulnerability to climate change. Environmental Modelling and Assessment, 14, 1–16.

Vafeidis, A.T., Nicholls, R.J., McFadden, L., Tol, R.S.J., Hinkel, J., Spencer, T., Grashoff, P.S., Boot, G. and Klein, R.J.T., 2008. A new global coastal database for impact and vulnerability analysis to sea-level rise. Journal of Coastal Research, 24(4), 917–924.

Warren, R., de la Nava Santos, S., Arnell, N.W., Bane, M., Barker, T., Barton, C., Ford, R., Füssel, H.M., Hankin, R.K.S., Hinkel, J., Klein, R., Linstead, C., Kohler, J., Mitchell, T.D., Osborn, T.J., Pan, H., Raper, S.C.B., Riley, G., Schellnhuber, H.J., Winne, S. and Anderson, D., 2008a. Erratum to “Development and illustrative outputs of the Community Integrated Assessment System (CIAS) and a multi-institutional modular integrated assessment approach for modelling climate change” [Environ Model Softw 23(5) (2008) 592–610]. Environmental Modelling & Software, 23(9), 1215–1216.

Warren, R., de la Nava Santos, S., Arnell, N.W., Bane, M., Barker, T., Barton, C., Ford, R., Füssel, H.M., Hankin, R.K.S., Klein, R., Linstead, C., Kohler, J., Mitchell, T.D., Osborn, T. J., Pan, H., Raper, S.C.B., Riley, G., Schellnhuber, H.J., Winne, S. and Anderson, D., 2008b. Development and illustrative outputs of the Community Integrated Assessment System (CIAS) and a multi-institutional modular integrated assessment approach for modelling climate change. Environmental Modelling & Software, 23(5), 592–610. 

Hinkel, J., 2005. DIVA: an iterative method for building modular integrated models. Advances in Geosciences, 4, 45–50.

Book chapters

Hinkel, J., 2011. Climate impacts: from numbers to stories. In: C.C. Jaeger, K. Hasselmann, G. Leipold, D. Mangalagiu and J.D. Tabara (eds.), Reframing the Problem of Climate Change: From Zero Sum Game to Win-Win Solutions, pp. 35–53. Earthscan, Oxon, UK, New York, USA & Canada.

Hinkel, J., Bisaro, S., Downing, T., Hofmann, M.E., Lonsdale, K., Mcevoy, D. and Tàbara, J. D., 2009. Learning to adapt. Narratives of decision makers adapting to climate change. In: M. Hulme and H. Neufeldt (eds.), Making Climate Change Work for Us: European Perspectives on Adaptation and Mitigation Strategies, pp. 113–134. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK.

Neufeldt, H., Jochem, E., Hinkel, J., Huitema, D., Massey, E., Watkiss, P., McEvoy, D., Rayner, T., Hof, A., Lonsdale, K., Barker, T., Held, A., Hulme, M., Reiter, U., Turton, H., van Vuuren, D.P. and Werners, S.E., 2009. Climate policy and inter-linkages between adaptation and mitigation. In: M. Hulme and H. Neufeldt (eds.), Making Climate Change Work for Us: European Perspectives on Adaptation and Mitigation Strategies, pp. 3–30. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK.

Russel, D., Haxeltine, A., Huitema, D., Nilsson, M., Hinkel, J. and Rayner, T., 2009. Climate change appraisal in the EU: current trends and future challenges. In: M. Hulme and H. Neufeldt (eds.), Making Climate Change Work for Us: European Perspectives on Adaptation and Mitigation Strategies, pp. 31–53. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK.

van Vuuren, D.P., Isaac, M., Kundzewicz, Z.W., Arnell, N., Barker, T., Criqui, P., Bauer, N., Berkhout, F., Hilderink, H., Hinkel, J., Hof, A., Kitous, A., Kram, T., Mechler, R. and Scrieciu, S., 2009. Scenarios as the basis for assessment of mitigation and adaptation.
In: M. Hulme and H. Neufeldt (eds.), Making Climate Change Work for Us: European
Perspectives on Adaptation and Mitigation Strategies, pp. 54–86. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK.

Hinkel, J., 2008. A framework for analysing methodologies of vulnerability assessments.
In: A.G. Patt, D. Schröter, A.C. de la Vega-Leinert and R.J.T. Klein (eds.), Environmental Vulnerability Assessment. Earthscan, London, UK.

Klein, R.J.T. and Hinkel, J., 2008. The DINAS-COAST project: developing a tool for the dynamic and interactive assessment of coastal vulnerability. In: A.G. Patt, D. Schröter, A.C. de la Vega-Leinert and R.J.T. Klein (eds.), Environmental Vulnerability Assessment. Earthscan, London, UK.

Hinkel, J. and Klein, R.J.T., 2007. Integrating knowledge for assessing coastal vulnerability.
In: L.M. Fadden, R.J. Nicholls and E. Penning-Rowsell (eds.), Managing Coastal
Vulnerability. Earthscan, London, UK.

Reports

Nicholls, R., Hanson, S. and Hinkel, J., 2012. Costs of Adaptation to Rising Coastal Water Levels for People’s Republic of China, Japan and the Republic of Korea. Technical report, Asian Development Bank.

Nicholls, R., Hanson, S., Brown, S. and Hinkel, J., 2010. Economics of Coastal Zone Adaptation to Climate Change. The World Bank Discussion Paper No. 10. Technical report, World Bank,Washington, DC.

Under review

Binder, C.R., Hinkel, J. and Pahl-Wostl, C., 2012. Comparison of frameworks for

analysing social-ecological systems. Special Feature in Ecology & Society on the Ostrom (2009) framework for analysing social-ecological systems. Under review.

Hinkel, J., Bots, P. and Schlüter, M., 2012a. Towards a common framework for analyzing the sustainability of social-ecological systems: a meta-framework. Special Feature in Ecology & Society on the Ostrom (2009) framework for analysing social-ecological systems. In preparation.

Hinkel, J., van Vuuren, D.P., Nicholls, R.J. and Klein, R.J.T., 2012b. The effects of mitigation and adaptation on coastal impacts in the 21st century. Climatic Change, 2nd revised version. Under review.

Koerth, J., Vafeidis, A., Sterr, H., Hinkel, J., Daschkeit, A. and Carretero, S., 2012. Anticipatory adaptation: How are coastal dwellers preparing for sea-level rise and climate related changes in storm surges? Global Environmental Change. Under review.

Schlüter, M., Hinkel, J., Bots, P. and Arlinghaus, R., 2012. Application of the Ostrom (2009) framework for model-based analysis of the dynamics of social-ecological systems. Special Feature in Ecology & Society on the Ostrom (2009) framework for analysing socialecological systems. Under review.

Wolf, S., Hinkel, J., Ionescu, C., Hofman, M., Bisaro, S., Linke, D. and Klein, R.J.T., 2012. Vulnerability definitions and methodologies: A clarification by formalisation. Under review.