This book contains most of the papers presented at the final LASHIPA workshop in St Petersburg, Russia 2-4 November 2009. The workshop was organized to finalize the bilateral LASHIPA Russia-Netherlands project and to discuss possible future cooperation between the participants of the sub-project of the Eurocore Boreas project and the participants of the International Polar Year project Large Scale Historical Exploitation of Polar Areas (LASHIPA). LASHIPA and CEE/Boreas are linked together by different fields of expertise. The common grounds of the two projects are the relation between industrial resource development and science in an international perspective. Knowledge production and knowledge transfer from science to industry as well as between different national communities of resource users are very important in the Arctic as is transfer of legitimacy. All these fields might give opportunities for future research. The different contributions in this book try to answer some of these questions.

The global climate is changing. The trend towards warmer average surface temperatures for the period since 1976 is roughly three times that of the past 100 years as a whole. In recent years warming seems to be attributable to human activities (man-made environmental changes) like land-use changes, deforestation, urbanisation and the reduction of wetlands. Global climate change is likely to be accompanied by an increase in frequency and intensity of extreme weather events. This brings with it increased health risks and hence a demand for an adequate response from local health authorities to meet these risks. In 2004, the WHO Regional Office for Europe and the European Environment Agency organized an expert meeting to exchange information and develop recommendations on public health and environmental responses to weather and climate extremes, floods, heat-waves and cold spells. This book reflects a collection of case studies and experiences of experts, ministries and international organizations.

This book offers an overview of recent scientific and professional literature on urban greening and urban ecology, focusing on diverse disciplines such as landscape architecture, geography, urban ecology, urban climatology, biodiversity conservation, urban governance, architecture and urban hydrology. It includes contributions in which academics, public policy experts and practitioners share their considerable knowledge on the multi-faceted aspects of greening cities. The greening of cities has witnessed a global resurgence over the past two decades and has made a significant contribution to urban liveability and sustainability, as well as increasing resilience. As urban greening efforts continue to expand, it is useful to promote recent advances in our understanding of various aspects of planning, design and management of urban greenery, but at the same time, it is also important to realize that there are important gaps in our knowledge and that further research is needed. The book is organized in three main parts: concepts, functions and forms of urban greening. The first part examines the historical roots of greening cities and how the burgeoning field of urban ecology can contribute useful principles and strategies to guide the planning, design and management of urban greening. The second part shifts the focus to the diverse range of services – the functions – provided by urban greening, such as those related to urban climate, urban biodiversity, human health, and community building. The final part explores conventional, often neglected, but important forms of urban greenery such as urban woodlands and urban farms, as well as relatively recent forms of urban greenery like those integrated with buildings and waterways. It offers a ready reference resource for researchers, practitioners and policy-makers to grasp the critical issues and trigger further studies and applications in the quest for high-performance green cities.

This is a unique book addressing the integration of risk methodology from various fields. It will stimulate intellectual debate and communication across disciplines, promote better risk management practices and contribute to the development of risk management methodologies. Individual chapters explain fundamental risk models and measurement, and address risk and security issues from diverse areas such as finance and insurance, the health sciences, life sciences, engineering and information science. Integrated Risk Sciences is an emerging discipline that considers risks in different fields, aiming at a common language, and at sharing and improving methods developed in different fields. Readers should have a Bachelor degree and have taken at least one basic university course in statistics and probability. The main goal of the book is to provide basic knowledge on risk and security in a common language; the authors have taken particular care to ensure that all content can readily be understood by doctoral students and researchers across disciplines. Each chapter provides simple case studies and examples, open research questions and discussion points, and a selected bibliography inviting readers to further study.