Cyclone builds in south India, oilfield closes

A cyclone intensified over the Bay of Bengal on Wednesday, forcing a southern Indian oilfield to shut and cut its gas output, and the evacuation of some 50,000 people in the region, officials said.

Officials also voiced concerns the cyclone, with wind gusts of up to 155 kph (100 mph), could slow the progress of the monsoon rains, vital for India's trillion-dollar economy.

Tropical Cyclone Laila was set to hammer the coast of the southern state Andhra Pradesh on Thursday, prompting Reliance Industries to stop oil production and reduce gas output from the region by 10 per cent, company sources said.

"We are monitoring the situation and if we find that the cyclone will directly hit our facilities, then our FPSO (Floating Production Storage and Offloading facility) may have to be taken to a safer location," said a company source, which declined to be named, as he is not authorised to speak to the media.

The cyclone is forecast to move towards Orissa after striking Andhra Pradesh, but it is likely to weaken by the time it reaches the Paradip port, a hub for iron ore exports.

G.K. Biswal, deputy conservator of Paradip port, said port authorities were on alert although they did not expect any disruption.

Concerns for monsoon

Last year some forecasters blamed a cyclone in May for the failure of monsoon rains, but scientists are divided about the impact of tropical storms on the monsoon.

India has been hit by street protests due steep food prices, partly the result of last year's poor monsoon rains.

"We have to observe the post-Laila scenario," said Ajit Tyagi, the director general of India's Meteorology Department.

Tyagi said the weather office was standing by its forecast last month, which said the June-September monsoon rains would be 98 per cent of average.

Monsoon rains reached India's Andaman and Nicobar Islands and several parts of the Bay of Bengal on Monday, three days ahead of schedule.

"Conditions are favourable for further advance of southwest monsoon," the weather office said in its latest five-day forecast.

Local officials said heavy rainfall would help the rice crop that will be sown next month as rains would boost soil moisture and facilitate ploughing.

"Due to pre-monsoon rains, summer planning has started. If the state receives rain, the ploughing will further pick up," said Babaji Giri, director of the agriculture department in the eastern state of Orissa.

Officials in Bangladesh said they had also alerted ports and fishing vessels.

Heavy rains and lightning have already killed 10 people in Andhra Pradesh.A cyclone intensified over the Bay of Bengal on Wednesday, forcing a southern Indian oilfield to shut and cut its gas output, and the evacuation of some 50,000 people in the region, officials said.

Officials also voiced concerns the cyclone, with wind gusts of up to 155 kph (100 mph), could slow the progress of the monsoon rains, vital for India's trillion-dollar economy.

Tropical Cyclone Laila was set to hammer the coast of the southern state Andhra Pradesh on Thursday, prompting Reliance Industries to stop oil production and reduce gas output from the region by 10 per cent, company sources said.

"We are monitoring the situation and if we find that the cyclone will directly hit our facilities, then our FPSO (Floating Production Storage and Offloading facility) may have to be taken to a safer location," said a company source, which declined to be named, as he is not authorised to speak to the media.

The cyclone is forecast to move towards Orissa after striking Andhra Pradesh, but it is likely to weaken by the time it reaches the Paradip port, a hub for iron ore exports.

G.K. Biswal, deputy conservator of Paradip port, said port authorities were on alert although they did not expect any disruption.

Concerns for monsoon

Last year some forecasters blamed a cyclone in May for the failure of monsoon rains, but scientists are divided about the impact of tropical storms on the monsoon.

India has been hit by street protests due steep food prices, partly the result of last year's poor monsoon rains.

"We have to observe the post-Laila scenario," said Ajit Tyagi, the director general of India's Meteorology Department.

Tyagi said the weather office was standing by its forecast last month, which said the June-September monsoon rains would be 98 per cent of average.

Monsoon rains reached India's Andaman and Nicobar Islands and several parts of the Bay of Bengal on Monday, three days ahead of schedule.

"Conditions are favourable for further advance of southwest monsoon," the weather office said in its latest five-day forecast.

Local officials said heavy rainfall would help the rice crop that will be sown next month as rains would boost soil moisture and facilitate ploughing.

"Due to pre-monsoon rains, summer planning has started. If the state receives rain, the ploughing will further pick up," said Babaji Giri, director of the agriculture department in the eastern state of Orissa.

Officials in Bangladesh said they had also alerted ports and fishing vessels.

Heavy rains and lightning have already killed 10 people in Andhra Pradesh.

Cyclone builds in south India, oilfield closes- Hindustan Times

1 comments RSS Posted by Alluri Girish at 8:43 PM

Earthquake in Chile: A complicated fracture

After closer analysis of the seismic waves radiated by this earthquake during the first 134 seconds after start of the rupture, the researchers came to the conclusion that only the region around the actual epicentre was active during the first minutes. In the second minute the active zone moved north towards Santiago. After that the region south of Concepción became active for a short time. This rupturing trend agrees well with the distribution of the aftershocks during the following three days, as observed by the GEOFON-measuring network of the GFZ up to 03.03.2010.
In the year 1960, the strongest earthquake measured at all to date, with a magnitude of M=9.5, had its origin at Valdivia, south of the region affected now. "The quake of 27 February connects directly to the rupture process of Valdivia," explains Professor Jochen Zschau, Director of the Earthquake Risk and Early Warning Section at the GFZ. "With this, one of the last two seismic gaps along the west coast of South America might now be closed. With the exception of one last section, found in North Chile, the entire earth crust before the west coast of South America has been ruptured within the last 150 years."
The underlying plate tectonic procedure is such that the Nazca-Plate as part of the Pacific Ocean Floor moves eastwards with approximately seventy millimetres per year, collides with South America and thereby pushes under the continent. The hereby developing earthquakes belong to the strongest world-wide. In the course of about one century, the Earth's ruptures completely in a number of strong quakes from Patagonia in the South to Panama in the North. Even Darwin reported, in his diary, of the strong earthquake in Concepción on 20 February 1835 and the resulting Tsunami.
In order to examine the aftershock activity in the now fractured seismic gap, scientists from the GFZ are travelling to Chile on March 13, 2010 where, together with the Chilean Seismological Service, they will set-up a seismological-geodetic network in the area of Concepción-Santiago. Partners from Germany (IFM Geomar, Kiel; Free University of Berlin) and from abroad (Institut de Physique du Globe, Paris; University of Liverpool; United States Geological Survey; IRIS) are also taking part in this measuring campaign. The mission will last about three months. The results, one expects, will be able to provide an insight into the mechanisms of the fracture in the Earth’s crust. This activity is financed on the German side by the GFZ.
Scientists from the GFZ have been examining the collision of the Nazca plate and the South American continent since 1994. As a result of numerous expeditions and measuring campaigns in this area this Potsdam Helmholtz Centre avails of the probably the most dense data record on such a subduction zone. “Within the framework of the DFG Priority Programme “Deformation processes in the Andes”, and with the Geotechnology Project TIPTEQ we have just been able to collect a unique data record for the southern part of the Andes” says Professor Onno Oncken, Director of the Department Geodynamics and Geomaterials at the GFZ, and leader of these studies. "The current quake puts us in the position to precisely compare the tectonics before and afterwards, a unique situation both internationally and in Earth science."
Earthquake in Chile: A complicated fracture

0 comments RSS Posted by Krasugir & Co at 10:01 PM

First phase of pan-tropical forest mapping debuts

The Woods Hole Research Center (WHRC) has initiated a three-year project focused on producing spatially consistent pan-tropical data sets to support the monitoring of forest cover and associated carbon stocks stored in above-ground forest biomass. A circa-2007 high-resolution, cloud-free radar data set from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's (JAXA) ALOS/PALSAR sensor is the cornerstone of the pan-tropical forest cover mapping effort. A circa-2005 500-meter biomass product is being produced through the fusion of optical (MODIS) and lidar (ICESat/GLAS) data provided by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Pantropical mosaics of ALOS/PALSAR and MODIS data are now complete and can be viewed for the first time on Google Earth.
According to Josef Kellndorfer, an associate scientist at the Woods Hole Research Center who is leading the radar-mapping portion of the project, "Japan's cloud-penetrating ALOS/PALSAR sensor has greatly advanced satellite-based forest observation. JAXA's Kyoto and Carbon Initiative has been instrumental in pushing a global radar-based data acquisition and observation strategy since 2006. Given the strong sensitivity of the PALSAR sensor to forest classification, pan-tropical remote sensing of forests has been significantly improved, aiding countries in their ability to build robust national carbon accounting systems."
NASA's MODIS and IceSAT sensors are used in the project to build consistent pantropical maps of forest carbon stocks. Alessandro Baccini, an assistant scientist at WHRC involved with this initiative, explains, "The unprecedented quality and high temporal resolution of MODIS data allow us to produce cloud-free mosaics with many optical information channels, overcoming cloud-cover which affects optical remote sensing in the tropics. Coupled with lidar measurements that provide information on the vertical structure of the vegetation, as well as targeted field observations, it is possible to generate increasingly accurate maps of above-ground carbon stored in woody vegetation across the pan-tropical belt."
According to Craig Dobson, NASA Program Scientist, "NASA is pleased to support this effort through provision of the MODIS and IceSAT data and the processing of JAXA's ALOS PALSAR data. The combination of frequent MODIS coverage with the forest structural information provided by the IceSAT/GLAS lidar and the PALSAR radar data provides a rich data set for monitoring forests. The public release of the pantropical products by WHRC is both timely and a testament to the value of multi-agency and multi-institutional collaboration with unrestricted access to data. This effort is very much in tune with the spirit of the Group on Earth Observations's (GEO) Global Earth Observing System of Systems (GEOSS)."
The Woods Hole Research Center is a partner in this GEO Task on Forest Carbon Tracking. "Satellite observations will be key to measure trends in forest carbon. We are impressed by the Woods Hole Research Center's work, in partnership with JAXA and NASA. Systematically generated data sets such as the present pan-tropical compilation will significantly strengthen national forest tracking capabilities," said José Achache, Executive Director of GEO, the Group on Earth Observations.
The WHRC mapping initiatives are accompanied by on-the-ground work. Through workshops, a visiting scholars program, and other related activities, new maps will be produced, assessed, disseminated and discussed with various stakeholders within countries -- including representatives from government, civil society, indigenous and traditional forest communities, and the private sector. An integral part of the project is to transfer knowledge and skills of forest and carbon mapping to those countries that are increasingly engaged in international efforts to slow deforestation and enable these countries to evaluate alternative options for management of their forest resources. Nadine Laporte, an associate scientist at WHRC who coordinates in-country activities states "field measurements coupled with the satellite observations are an essential part of producing accurate maps of tropical forests, and building capacity with stakeholders in the region."
Luis Solorzano of the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation (GBMF) states, "As funders, we are proud of the work advanced by WHRC. Our support to WHRC is part of a growing partnership between GBMF, Google.org and the David and Lucile Packard Foundation. Our unusual partnership brings together scientists, private sector, governments and philanthropies, all motivated by a shared commitment to halt the most severe threats to our global environment. Our common goal is to create the capacity to broadly deploy data, information, and analysis tools for the global community to transparently monitor and improve the management of global environment. Most essential, we seek to initiate open spaces for the collaborative creation of knowledge, and to freely share and use it in broad and transparent ways. This work by WHRC is uniquely important for its contribution to our primary purposes and principles."
This work is a partnership project of the Woods Hole Research Center, JAXA's Kyoto and Carbon Initiative, NASA, the Alaska Satellite Facility, SARMAP, Boston University, and SpotImage PlanetAction. Funding for this work has been provided by The Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, the David & Lucile Packard Foundation, Google.org, and NASA.First phase of pan-tropical forest mapping debuts

0 comments RSS Posted by Krasugir & Co at 11:51 AM

Digital avalanche rescue dog: Geolocation system can locate victims to within centimeters

For many skiers and snowboarders, there is nothing quite like being the first to make tracks in the virgin snow, off the regular piste. But this can be a fateful decision, because the risk of avalanche is many times greater here. Once buried under a mass of snow, a person's only hope of survival is if their location can be pinpointed swiftly. If not rescued within half an hour, their chances of being found alive diminish rapidly. Victims stand the best chance of being saved if the uninjured members of their group start searching for them immediately -- but for that the buried victim needs to be wearing an avalanche beacon.
"In the experience of rescue teams not everyone actually carrys beacons," says Wolfgang Inninger of the Fraunhofer Institute for Material Flow and Logistics IML. "However, nearly everyone has a cellphone. This is why we decided to enhance our automatic geolocation system that works with Galileo, the future European satellite navigation system."
To do so, two new components have been added to the 'avalanche rescue navigator' ARN: a cellphone location function and software that calculates the position of the buried victim on the basis of local measurements. Starting from the approximate place where the victim is thought to be lying under the snow, the rescuers measure the field strength of the signal transmitted by the cellphone or beacon at three to five reference points. The system then uses a highly precise calculation algorithm to pinpoint the source of the signal, indicating with high probability the location of the buried victim. In this kind of situation, the position relative to the rescue team's starting point is more important than the absolute position relative to global coordinates, which may be subject to measurement inaccuracies. This gives the rescuers immediate information on the direction and distance from their present location at which the victim can be found.
For their development work on the system, the researchers are using the GATE Galileo test and development environment in Berchtesgaden, where transmitter antennas installed on six mountain peaks simulate the Galileo signals. The researchers intend to combine these signals -- and the real ones, after 2012 -- with signals from existing satellite navigation systems such as the American GPS and the Russian Glonass, and to add signals for error estimation and correction. The project is being implemented by a consortium of regional companies, institutes and universities in collaboration with the Berchtesgaden mountain rescue service and the police, and is being sponsored by the German Aerospace Center DLR.
Digital avalanche rescue dog: Geolocation system can locate victims to within centimeters

0 comments RSS Posted by Krasugir & Co at 11:51 AM

Australia carbon laws in doubt

CANBERRA, Dec. 1 (Reuters) - Australia's plans to cut carbon emissions were set for defeat in a hostile Senate after the election of a new opposition leader opposed to carbon-trade laws, setting the stage for a possible early 2010 election.

New Liberal opposition leader Tony Abbott, elected Tuesday, said conservative Senators, many climate change skeptics, would reject the government's carbon emissions trading laws if they are not deferred until early 2010.

Mr. Abbott said he believed in climate change, but told reporters he was opposed to the government's emissions trading scheme model, and was not afraid of fighting an election on the issue.

"As leader, I am not frightened of an election on this issue. This is going to be a tough fight. But it will be a fight. You cannot win an election without a fight," said Mr. Abbott, a boxer in his university days who once studied for the priesthood.

Greg Combet, assistant climate change minister, said the government would still push for its carbon trade laws to be passed this week. He hoped some opposition lawmakers would side with the government and defy Mr. Abbott.

"The extremists have gained control of the Liberal Party. They are opposed to taking action on climate change, they dispute the science," Mr. Combet told reporters.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has struggled to have his climate change legislation passed in the Senate before parliament adjourns until February.

Mr. Rudd, who was in Washington on Monday meeting President Barack Obama, was keen to take a lead role at next week's Copenhagen summit on climate change by enacting a "cap-and-trade" scheme requiring polluters to buy permits for their emissions.

Mr. Rudd wants emissions trading to start in Australia in July 2011, covering 75 percent of emissions in the developed world's bigger per capita emitter. The planned carbon-trade scheme would be the biggest outside Europe.

The United States is closely watching Australia's debate and a political agreement on carbon trading in Australia would help garner support for action from other countries.

If the Senate ends up rejecting the carbon scheme for a second time, Rudd will have a trigger to call an early 2010 election on climate change, most likely for March of April, with polls suggesting his government would win an increased majority.

Business, election uncertainty
Mr. Abbott said while the opposition rejected the emissions trading scheme, it still backed the government's emissions reduction target of at least 5 percent from 2000 levels by 2020, with a 25 percent target if nations agree on an ambitious climate pact in Copenhagen.

The prolonged political debate has caused some dismay among companies, coal and power firms in particular, who see some sort of scheme as inevitable and are looking for pricing certainty.

Banks and fund managers see the emissions trading scheme, the biggest economic policy change in modern Australian history, as a boon for traders, investors and new green technologies, while major polluters generally oppose it as a tax on heavy industry.

International Power Australia, a unit of International Power and Australia's largest private-sector generator, says the uncertainty has impinged on talks with its lenders.

Major miners such as BHP Billiton and oil and gas firms such as Woodside Petroleum have criticized the scheme, though have been mollified somewhat by government pledges last month to raise state compensation.

"This is the worst possible outcome for us, as this guy (Mr. Abbott) is the figurehead for the climate change skeptics within the conservative party," said Tim Hanlin, managing director Australian Climate Exchange Limited.

"Australian industry is now thrown into total uncertainty regarding a price on carbon and therefore cannot make any informed investment decisions," said Mr. Hanlin.

"This is going to put Kevin Rudd under enormous pressure to call an election on this issue."

But Monash University analyst Nick Economou said Rudd would now miss his Copenhagen deadline and be in no rush for an election, putting the chances of an early poll at 20 percent.

"They may as well play the long game, the patient game," Mr. Economou said, saying Mr. Rudd would prefer a normal election later in 2010, giving him time to build up an attack against Mr. Abbott's Liberals, with the carbon laws waiting to be passed.

Mr. Rudd has repeatedly said he does not want an early poll and would prefer elections to be held on time in late 2010.

If Mr. Rudd wins a double dissolution election of both houses of parliament, he can then push his climate policy through a special joint sitting of the houses.
Australia carbon laws in doubt

0 comments RSS Posted by Krasugir & Co at 3:24 AM

Arctic Heats Up More Than Other Places: High Sea Level Rise Predicted

As a result, glacier and ice-sheet melting, sea-ice retreat, coastal erosion and sea level rise can be expected to continue.
A new comprehensive scientific synthesis of past Arctic climates demonstrates for the first time the pervasive nature of Arctic climate amplification.
The U.S. Geological Survey led this new assessment, which is a synthesis of published science literature and authored by a team of climate scientists from academia and government. The U.S. Climate Change Science Program commissioned the report, which has contributions from 37 scientists from the United States, Germany, Canada, the United Kingdom and Denmark.
The new report also makes several conclusions about the Arctic:
Taken together, the size and speed of the summer sea-ice loss over the last few decades is highly unusual compared to events from previous thousands of years, especially considering that changes in Earth's orbit over this time have made sea-ice melting less, not more, likely.
Sustained warming of at least a few degrees (more than approximately 4° to 13°F above average 20th century values) is likely to be sufficient to cause the nearly complete, eventual disappearance of the Greenland ice sheet, which would raise sea level by several meters.
The current rate of human-influenced Arctic warming is comparable to peak natural rates documented by reconstructions of past climates. However, some projections of future human-induced change exceed documented natural variability.
The past tells us that when thresholds in the climate system are crossed, climate change can be very large and very fast. We cannot rule out that human induced climate change will trigger such events in the future.
"By integrating research on the past 65 million years of climate change in the entire circum-Arctic, we have a better understanding on how climate change affects the Arctic and how those effects may impact the whole globe," said USGS Director Mark Myers. "This report provides the first comprehensive analysis of the real data we have on past climate conditions in the Arctic, with measurements from ice cores, sediments and other Earth materials that record temperature and other conditions."
Arctic Heats Up More Than Other Places: High Sea Level Rise Predicted

0 comments RSS Posted by Krasugir & Co at 3:25 AM

Carbon Emissions Linked To Global Warming In Simple Linear Relationship

These findings will be published in the next edition of Nature, to be released on June 11, 2009.
Until now, it has been difficult to estimate how much climate will warm in response to a given carbon dioxide emissions scenario because of the complex interactions between human emissions, carbon sinks, atmospheric concentrations and temperature change. Matthews and colleagues show that despite these uncertainties, each emission of carbon dioxide results in the same global temperature increase, regardless of when or over what period of time the emission occurs.
These findings mean that we can now say: if you emit that tonne of carbon dioxide, it will lead to 0.0000000000015 degrees of global temperature change. If we want to restrict global warming to no more than 2 degrees, we must restrict total carbon emissions – from now until forever – to little more than half a trillion tonnes of carbon, or about as much again as we have emitted since the beginning of the industrial revolution.
"Most people understand that carbon dioxide emissions lead to global warming," says Matthews, "but it is much harder to grasp the complexities of what goes on in between these two end points. Our findings allow people to make a robust estimate of their contribution to global warming based simply on total carbon dioxide emissions."
In light of this study and other recent research, Matthews and a group of international climate scientists have written an open letter calling on participants of December's Conference of the Parties to the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change to acknowledge the need to limit cumulative emissions of carbon dioxide so as to avoid dangerous climate change.
Carbon Emissions Linked To Global Warming In Simple Linear Relationship

0 comments RSS Posted by Krasugir & Co at 3:16 AM

Abrupt Climate Change: Will It Happen This Century?

"Abrupt" changes can occur over decades or less, persist for decades more, and cause substantial disruptions to human and natural systems.
A new report, based on an assessment of published science literature, makes the following conclusions about the potential for abrupt climate changes from global warming during this century.
Climate model simulations and observations suggest that rapid and sustained September arctic sea ice loss is likely in the 21st century.
The southwestern United States may be beginning an abrupt period of increased drought.
It is very likely that the northward flow of warm water in the upper layers of the Atlantic Ocean, which has an important impact on the global climate system, will decrease by approximately 25-30 percent. However, it is very unlikely that this circulation will collapse or that the weakening will occur abruptly during the 21st century and beyond.
An abrupt change in sea level is possible, but predictions are highly uncertain due to shortcomings in existing climate models.
There is unlikely to be an abrupt release of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, to the atmosphere from deposits in the earth. However, it is very likely that the pace of methane emissions will increase.
The U.S. Geological Survey led the new assessment, which was authored by a team of climate scientists from the federal government and academia. The report was commissioned by the U.S. Climate Change Science Program with contributions from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the National Science Foundation.
"This report was truly a collaborative effort between world renowned scientists who provided objective, unbiased information that is necessary to develop effective adaptation and mitigation strategies that protect our livelihood," said USGS Director Mark Myers. "It summarizes the scientific community's growing understanding regarding the potential for abrupt climate changes and identifies areas for additional research to further improve climate models."
Further research is needed to improve our understanding of the potential for abrupt changes in climate. For example, the report's scientists found that processes such as interaction of warm ocean waters with the periphery of ice sheets and ice shelves have a greater impact than previously known on the destabilization of ice sheets that might accelerate sea-level rise.
http://www.climatescience.gov/default.php
Abrupt Climate Change: Will It Happen This Century?

0 comments RSS Posted by Krasugir & Co at 3:16 AM

In The Warming West, Climate Most Significant Factor In Fanning Wildfires' Flames

"We found that what matters most in accounting for large wildfires in the Western United States is how climate influences the build up—or production—and drying of fuels," said Jeremy Littell, a research scientist with the University of Washington's Climate Impacts Group and lead investigator of the study. "Climate affects fuels in different ecosystems differently, meaning that future wildfire size and, likely, severity depends on interactions between climate and fuel availability and production."
To explore climate-fire relationships, the scientists used fire data from 1916 to 2003 for 19 ecosystem types in 11 Western States to construct models of total wildfire area burned. They then compared these fire models with monthly state divisional climate data.
The study confirmed what scientists have long observed: that low precipitation and high temperatures dry out fuels and result in significant fire years, a pattern that dominates the northern and mountainous portions of the West. But it also provided new insight on the relationship between climate and fire, such as Western shrublands' and grasslands' requirement for high precipitation one year followed by dry conditions the next to produce fuels sufficient to result in large wildfires.
The study revealed that climate influences the likelihood of large fires by controlling the drying of existing fuels in forests and the production of fuels in more arid ecosystems. The influence of climate leading up to a fire season depends on whether the ecosystem is more forested or more like a woodland or shrubland.
"These data tell us that the effectiveness of fuel reductions in reducing area burned may vary in different parts of the country," said David L. Peterson, a research biologist with the Forest Service's Pacific Northwest Research Station and one of the study's authors. "With this information, managers can design treatments appropriate for specific climate-fire relationships and prioritize efforts where they can realize the most benefit."
Findings from the study suggest that, as the climate continues to warm, more area can be expected to burn, at least in northern portions of the West, corroborating what researchers have projected in previous studies. In addition, cooler, wetter areas that are relatively fire-free today, such as the west side of the Cascade Range, may be more prone to fire by mid-century if climate projections hold and weather becomes more extreme.
In The Warming West, Climate Most Significant Factor In Fanning Wildfires' Flames

0 comments RSS Posted by Krasugir & Co at 3:12 AM

Scientists argue for a new type of climate target

"The implications are that global emissions must peak around 2015 and be cut by roughly half between the peak and the year 2030," Steffen Kallbekken, scientist at CICERO, said.
In a new paper in Nature Reports Climate Change Steffen Kallbekken, Nathan Rive, Glen P. Peters and Jan S. Fuglestvedt from CICERO Center for International Climate and Environmental Research -- Oslo, argue for a new type of climate target to be considered:
"Focusing climate policy on a long-term target, such as the EU 2-degree target, provides limited guidance for mitigation over the next few decades, and gives the impression that there is time to delay," said Steffen Kallbekken.
The researchers propose that, in addition to a long-term cumulative emissions budget, a maximum limit on the rate of warming should also be considered as an element in the design of climate policies.
Required mitigation rates are 4-8 percent per year, which far exceeds anything achieved in history.
"A short-term target provides clearer guidance on mitigation in the near term, limits potentially dangerous rates of warming, and allows easier inclusion of potent and toxic short-lived climate components," Kallbekken said.
"A short-term cumulative emissions target, for example 190 GtC for the period 2010-2030, is a useful approach to limit the rate of warming, while at the same time keeping the focus on what matters in the long term: reducing CO2 emissions."
Scientists argue for a new type of climate target

0 comments RSS Posted by Krasugir & Co at 3:10 AM

Including Environmental Data Improves Effectiveness Of Invasive Species Range Predictions

Inés Ibáñez of the University of Michigan and her colleagues examined not only historical and current climatic data, but also historical environmental information from both the native and invaded ranges of three New England invasive plants: Japanese barberry, bittersweet and winged euonymus (or burning bush). The models took into account human development, disturbances and agricultural land use; habitat measures of local ground cover, such as forest type and wetlands type, were also included.
The researchers found that although climate plays a large role in predicting invasive species distribution, the inclusion of land use and habitat data improve the explanatory power of their models. In some instances, the combination of an unfavorable climate with a suitable landscape cover increased the probability of species establishment. On the other hand, some areas with favorable climates became less so when their unfavorable habitat data were included.
Most importantly, the researchers write, their models can be modified and used in other systems to predict biological invasions anywhere in the world.
Including Environmental Data Improves Effectiveness Of Invasive Species Range Predictions

0 comments RSS Posted by Krasugir & Co at 2:50 AM

Paleoecologists Offer New Insight Into How Climate Change Will Affect Organisms

According to Booth and his colleagues, one of the biggest challenges facing ecologists today is trying to predict how climate change will impact the distribution of organisms in the future. Combining the environmental conditions that allow a particular species to exist with the output from climate models is a commonly used approach to determining where these conditions will exist in the future. However, according to the authors, there some potential problems with the correlational approach that ecologists have traditionally used.
"This traditional prediction approach on its own is insufficient," said Booth. "It needs to be integrated with mechanistic and dynamic ecological modeling and systematic observations of past and present patterns and dynamics."
The paper uses examples from recent paleoecological studies to highlight how climate variability of the past has affected the distributions of tree species, and even how events that occurred many centuries ago still shape present-day distributions patterns. For example, the authors note that some populations of a Western US tree species owe their existence to brief periods of favorable climatic conditions allowing colonization in the past, such as a particularly wet interval during the 14th century.
"The climate system varies at all ecologically relevant time scales," said Booth. "We see differences year to year, decade to decade, century to century and millennia to millennia. When trying to understand how species and populations will respond to changing climate, it's not just changes in the mean climate state that need to be considered, but also changes in variability "
The article was written by Stephen Jackson of the Department of Botany and Program in Ecology at the University of Wyoming, Julio Betancourt of the U.S. Geological Survey in Arizona, Robert Booth of the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Lehigh University, and Stephen Gray of the Wyoming Water Resources Data System and Wyoming State Climate Office of the University of Wyoming. It was published on Sept. 23, 2009.
Paleoecologists Offer New Insight Into How Climate Change Will Affect Organisms

0 comments RSS Posted by Krasugir & Co at 2:48 AM

Plants Could Override Climate Change Effects On Wildfires

Philip Higuera of Montana State University and his colleagues show that although changing temperatures and moisture levels set the stage for changes in wildfire frequency, they can often be trumped by changes in the distribution and abundance of plants. Vegetation plays a major role in determining the flammability of an ecosystem, he says, potentially dampening or amplifying the impacts that climate change has on fire frequencies.
"Climate is only one control of fire regimes, and if you only considered climate when predicting fire under climate-change scenarios, you would have a good chance of being wrong," he says. "You wouldn't be wrong if vegetation didn't change, but the greater the probability that vegetation will change, the more important it becomes when predicting future fire regimes."
Higuera and his colleagues examined historical fire frequency in northern Alaska by analyzing sediments at the bottom of lakes. Using meter-long samples, called sediment cores, Higuera and his colleagues measured changes in the abundance of preserved plant parts, such as pollen, to determine the types of vegetation that dominated the landscape during different time periods in the past. Like rings in a tree, different layers of sediment represent different times in the past.
The researchers used radiocarbon dating to determine the sediment's age, which dates as far back as 15,000 years. They then measured charcoal deposits in the sediment to determine fire frequency during time periods dominated by different vegetation. Finally, they compared their findings to known historical climate changes.
In many cases, the authors discovered, changes in climate were less important than changes in vegetation in determining wildfire frequency. Despite a transition from a cool, dry climate to a warm, dry climate about 10,500 years ago, for example, the researchers found a sharp decline in the frequency of fires. Their sediment cores from that time period revealed a vegetation change from flammable shrubs to fire-resistant deciduous trees, a trend which Higuera thinks was enough to offset the direct effects of climate on fire frequencies.
"In this case, a warmer climate was likely more favorable for fire occurrence, but the development of deciduous trees on the landscape offset this direct climatic effect. Consequently, we see very little fire," Higuera says.
Similarly, during the development of the modern spruce-dominated forest about 5000 years ago, temperatures cooled and moisture levels increased, which – considered alone – would create unfavorable conditions for frequent fires. Despite this change, the authors observed an increase in fire frequency, a pattern they attribute to the high flammability of the dense coniferous forests.
Higuera thinks this research has implications for predictions of modern-day changes in fire regimes based on climate change. These findings, Higuera says, emphasize that predicting future wildfire frequency shouldn't hinge on the direct impacts of climate change alone.
"Climate affects vegetation, vegetation affects fire, and both fire and vegetation respond to climate change," he says. "Most importantly, our work emphasizes the need to consider the multiple drivers of fire regimes when anticipating their response to climate change."
Plants Could Override Climate Change Effects On Wildfires

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