EPSO Administrator (AD) competitions — environment and climate profiles

European Union · European Personnel Selection Office · civil-service · unverified source

115practice questions written to this syllabus
18subjects

Format

Computer-based reasoning and EU-knowledge tests, field-related multiple-choice test, and assessment-centre or written tests; format differs by competition notice.

Sections

Over the years

Specialist environment competitions are run occasionally, not every year. Built from general knowledge.

Official source: https://eu-careers.europa.eu/

Subjects this exam draws on

Climate System Science13 questionsClimate Models, Scenarios & Downscaling3 questionsClimate Change Impacts on Agriculture & Food Systems8 questionsClimate Adaptation, Climate-Smart Agriculture & Disaster Risk22 questionsAgricultural Greenhouse Gas Emissions & Mitigation2 questionsAgricultural Water Conservation, Water Footprint & Governance1 questionsWater Quality & Agricultural Non-point Source Pollution2 questionsRemote Sensing & GIS for Environmental Monitoring2 questionsNutrient Stewardship & Nitrogen Management2 questionsLivestock & the Environment4 questionsEnvironmental Impact Assessment & Strategic Environmental Assessment12 questionsCarbon Accounting & Greenhouse Gas Inventories2 questionsCarbon Markets, Offsets & Payments for Ecosystem Services2 questionsSustainability Reporting & ESG Disclosure12 questionsSustainable Agri-food Supply Chains & Deforestation-free Sourcing7 questionsEnvironmental Law, Policy & International Agreements4 questionsClimate Finance, Climate Risk & Sustainable Investment13 questionsSustainability Transitions, Governance & Social Dimensions4 questions

Five practice questions, worked

Original questions written to this exam's published syllabus and pattern. Not past papers.

1. Climate, as opposed to weather, is conventionally described using statistics over a period of

  1. 30 years
  2. 5 years
  3. 300 years
  4. 1 year
Answer and working

A. 30 years

WMO convention uses 30-year periods (climatological normals) to describe climate, long enough to average out year-to-year weather and most interannual variability such as ENSO.

Climate System Science · The climate system and its components

2. In AR6 pathways that limit warming to 1.5 °C with no or limited overshoot (C1), by how much do global greenhouse gas emissions fall by 2030 relative to 2019?

  1. About 90 per cent
  2. About 43 per cent
  3. About 10 per cent
  4. About 27 per cent
Answer and working

B. About 43 per cent

AR6 WGIII: C1 pathways cut GHG emissions about 43% (and CO2 about 48%) by 2030 from 2019; C3 (likely below 2 °C) pathways cut GHG about 27%.

Climate Models, Scenarios & Downscaling · Integrated assessment models and mitigation pathways

3. AR6 Working Group II assessed the effect of climate change on global agricultural productivity growth over the past 50 years. What did it conclude?

  1. Climate change has reversed it to a steady decline
  2. Climate change has slowed it
  3. Climate change has accelerated it through CO₂ alone
  4. Climate change has had no detectable effect on it
Answer and working

B. Climate change has slowed it

AR6 WGII stated with high confidence that climate change has slowed agricultural productivity growth globally over the past 50 years. Productivity has still grown, so 'reversed to decline' is wrong, and CO2 fertilisation has not outweighed the negative effects.

Climate Change Impacts on Agriculture & Food Systems · Pathways of climate impact on food systems

4. Why can design standards based only on historical flood or drought records understate future risk?

  1. Design standards ignore probability and are based only on the most recent event
  2. Climate change makes hazard statistics non-stationary, so past return periods shorten
  3. Return periods are fixed physical constants that cannot change with the climate
  4. Historical records always overstate extremes because older gauges read too high
Answer and working

B. Climate change makes hazard statistics non-stationary, so past return periods shorten

With a changing climate, the probability distribution of extremes shifts; a flood that was a 100-year event may become more frequent. Old gauges are not systematically biased high, return periods are statistical estimates, and standards are probability-based.

Climate Adaptation, Climate-Smart Agriculture & Disaster Risk · Vulnerability, exposure, hazard and risk

5. Under the EU regulation on deforestation-free products, commodities must not come from land deforested after which cut-off date?

  1. 31 December 2015
  2. 1 January 2005
  3. 31 December 2020
  4. 31 December 2025
Answer and working

C. 31 December 2020

The regulation's cut-off is 31 December 2020. 2005 and 2015 are not used, and end-2025 is the SBTi FLAG no-deforestation target date, a different instrument.

Agricultural Greenhouse Gas Emissions & Mitigation · Emissions from land-use change and deforestation

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