In recent years the term “storyline” has been used to describe a range of methods, and storyline approaches are increasingly used in the climate science community to quantify and describe past and future climate events, their impacts and uncertainties.
Storylines, defined as “physically self-consistent unfoldings of past events, or of plausible future events or pathways,” can be used to systematically describe climate-driven trends or extreme events, and the associated risk while accounting for uncertainty. Storylines allow the integration of both quantitative and qualitative data and identify causal, plausible links between both climate and non-climate risk drivers. With this they can be used to study the interplay between hazard, exposure, vulnerability and response, and hence become tools to explore the complexity of multi-risk, stress-test preparedness of civil protection and role of improved early warning systems or adaptation policies. As multiple plausible futures can also be explored, storylines can support decision-making in high-uncertainty conditions, helping prioritize and optimize interventions to reduce negative impacts.
In this session we aim to bring together the growing interdisciplinary community of researchers working with storylines. We want to invite abstracts that highlight a) the range of existing storyline approaches, including studies focusing on storylines for event attribution or assessment of future plausible events, b) innovative methods to integrate quantitative and qualitative knowledge, c) the use of conceptual models for the development of storylines, and d) the use of storylines for stress testing and impact assessment and e)applications of storylines for decision-making.