Geographical Linked Data: The Administrative Geography of Great Britain on the Semantic Web

Ordnance Survey, the national mapping agency of Great Britain, is investigating how semantic web technologies assist its role as a geographical information provider. A major part of this work involves the development of prototype products and datasets in RDF. This article discusses the production of an example dataset for the administrative geography of Great Britain, demonstrating the advantages of explicitly encoding topological relations between geographic entities over traditional spatial queries. We also outline how these data can be linked to other datasets on the web of linked data and some of the challenges that this raises.     

Public support for carbon dioxide removal strategies: the role of tampering with nature perceptions

Climatic Change - Carbon dioxide removal (CDR) describes a suite of controversial approaches to mitigating climate change that involve removing existing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Through...     

Using an inverse modelling approach with equifinality control to investigate the dominant controls on snowmelt nutrient export

There is great interest in modelling the export of nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) from agricultural fields because of ongoing challenges of eutrophication. However, the use of existing hydrochemistry models can be problematic in cold regions because models frequently employ incomplete or conceptually incorrect representations of the dominant cold regions hydrological processes and are overparameterized, often with insufficient data for validation. Here, a process‐based N model, WINTRA, which is coupled to a physically based cold regions hydrological model, was expanded to simulate P and account for overwinter soil nutrient biochemical cycling. An inverse modelling approach, using this model with consideration of parameter equifinality, was applied to an intensively monitored agricultural basin in Manitoba, Canada, to help identify the main climate, soil, and anthropogenic controls on nutrient export. Consistent with observations, the model results suggest that snow water equivalent, melt rate, snow cover depletion rate, and contributing area for run‐off generation determine the opportunity time and surface area for run‐off–soil interaction. These physical controls have not been addressed in existing models. Results also show that the time lag between the start of snowmelt and the arrival of peak nutrient concentration in run‐off increased with decreasing antecedent soil moisture content, highlighting potential implications of frozen soils on run‐off processes and hydrochemistry. The simulations showed TDP concentration peaks generally arriving earlier than NO₃ but also decreasing faster afterwards, which suggests a significant contribution of plant residue Total dissolved Phosphorus (TDP) to early snowmelt run‐off. Antecedent fall tillage and fertilizer application increased TDP concentrations in spring snowmelt run‐off but did not consistently affect NO₃ run‐off. In this case, the antecedent soil moisture content seemed to have had a dominant effect on overwinter soil N biogeochemical processes such as mineralization, which are often ignored in models. This work demonstrates both the need for better representation of cold regions processes in hydrochemical models and the model improvements that are possible if these are included.     

Simulation of the size distribution and erosivity of raindrops and throughfall drops

This paper presents a model that simulates the size distribution and erosivity of raindrops and throughfall drops. It utilizes existing models of rainfall drop size distribution and fall velocity and combines them with newly collated evidence of throughfall drop size distributions. A sensitivity analysis reveals that the model is sensitive to parameters that are easily measured or estimated: rainfall intensity, the mean volume drop diameter of the intercepted throughfall, canopy cover, and canopy height. The results of the model may be used at two levels. Firstly, to calculate specifically the size and fall velocity of individual drops, parameters that are needed in studies examining the response of soil surfaces to forces applied by rainfall. Secondly, to produce erosivity indices, based on rainfall intensity but which take account of the effects of a vegetation canopy. The paper shows that while the kinetic energy of rainfall (E(0), J mm^?1 m^?2) may be calculated from an equation of the familiar form: the kinetic energy of throughfall under any canopy may be calculated by combining this equation with another that relates the energy of drops under a 100 per cent canopy cover (E(100)) and the canopy height: .     

Dissolved and particulate trace metal fluxes through the central English Channel, and the influence of coastal gyres

Measurements of dissolved Cd, Co, Cu, Mn, Ni, Pb, and Zn have been made on a seasonal basis at five stations on a north–south transect across the central English Channel between Cherbourg and the Isle of Wight. Vertical and horizontal distributions of dissolved Cd, Pb, Cu and Zn are relatively uniform except for sampling sites near the English coast. Dissolved Mn and Co show increased concentrations in the English coastal waters, and for Mn the seasonal trend in concentration follows the pattern seen in the Strait of Dover with higher values in the late summer. Ni and Cu are higher in concentration on the English side, which reflects mainly riverine sources. Measurements were also made of particulate forms of the metals above plus particulate Al, Ca, Fe, Mg, Sr and Ti. Water column concentrations of particulate metals broadly follow the distribution of suspended particulate matter, with highest concentrations near the UK coast. Trace metal concentrations have been integrated with modelled data on fluxes of water to provide estimates of fluxes for these elements into the eastern Channel, and an initial comparison is made with data for fluxes of metals through the Strait of Dover obtained during an earlier study. A major influence on the fluxes of particulate metals through the Isle of Wight-Cherbourg transect is the gyre system to the South east to the Isle of Wight, which has important east to west as well as west to east transport components. For those elements where the dissolved form of the metal dominates, the large flow of water in the central Channel waters leads to major fluxes of the metals towards the east and the Strait of Dover. However, the high suspended particulate matter loadings in the coastal waters and impact of the gyre system lead to net east to west fluxes of particulate Al, Fe, Mn and Ti. Comparison of these fluxes with data on the net west to east transport of these materials through the Strait of Dover infers that there must be a significant supply of these particulate metals to the eastern Channel.     

Distribution and geochronology of Oregon Plateau (U.S.A.) flood basalt volcanism: The Steens Basalt revisited

The timing and petrogenesis of mid-Miocene flood basalt volcanism in the northwest United States has been extensively addressed, yet the chemical characteristics and temporal details of the Steens Basalt, exposed on the Oregon Plateau, are poorly defined. Steens Basalt volcanism has generally been accepted to have occurred at ∼ 16.6 Ma, coeval and/or just prior to the onset of Columbia River Basalt Group volcanism to the north. New major and trace element analyses and nine ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar ages ranging from 15.51 ± 0.28 to 16.58 ± 0.18 Ma were obtained on Oregon Plateau flood basalt lava flows from stratigraphic sections in close proximity to Steens Mountain. Additionally, new ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar ages were obtained on the uppermost and thirty-first lava flow down from the top of the ∼ 1 km section of Steens Basalt exposed at Steens Mountain and yield eruption ages of 16.59 ± 0.10 and 16.55 ±0.10 Ma, respectively. Field relations between these basalt sections suggest that multiple eruptive centers were present in the vicinity of Steens Mountain.     

A modelling framework to simulate field‐scale nitrate response and transport during snowmelt: The WINTRA model

Modelling nutrient transport during snowmelt in cold regions remains a major scientific challenge. A key limitation of existing nutrient models for application in cold regions is the inadequate representation of snowmelt, including hydrological and biogeochemical processes. This brief period can account for more than 80% of the total annual surface runoff in the Canadian Prairies and Northern Canada and processes such as atmospheric deposition, overwinter redistribution of snow, ion exclusion from snow crystals, frozen soils, and snow‐covered area depletion during melt influence the distribution and release of snow and soil nutrients, thus affecting the timing and magnitude of snowmelt runoff nutrient concentrations. Research in cold regions suggests that nitrate (NO₃) runoff at the field‐scale can be divided into 5 phases during snowmelt. In the first phase, water and ions originating from ion‐rich snow layers travel and diffuse through the snowpack. This process causes ion concentrations in runoff to gradually increase. The second phase occurs when this snow ion meltwater front has reached the bottom of the snowpack and forms runoff to the edge‐of‐the‐field. During the third and fourth phases, the main source of NO₃ transitions from the snowpack to the soil. Finally, the fifth and last phase occurs when the snow has completely melted, and the thawing soil becomes the main source of NO₃ to the stream. In this research, a process‐based model was developed to simulate hourly export based on this 5‐phase approach. Results from an application in the Red River Basin of southern Manitoba, Canada, shows that the model can adequately capture the dynamics and rapid changes of NO₃ concentrations during this period at relevant temporal resolutions. This is a significant achievement to advance the current nutrient modelling paradigm in cold climates, which is generally limited to satisfactory results at monthly or annual resolutions. The approach can inform catchment‐scale nutrient models to improve simulation of this critical snowmelt period.     

Mapping geochemical singularity using multifractal analysis: Application to anomaly definition on stream sediments data from Funin Sheet,Yunnan, China

Most conventional statistical methods aiming at defining geochemical concentration thresholds for separating anomalies from background have limited effectiveness in areas with complex geological settings. This paper uses multifractal analysis to combine the characteristics of geochemical frequency distribution and spatial dispersion in order to map geochemical singularities instead of using conventional statistically derived concentration thresholds. The model, termed radius–areal Productivity (r–P) model, employs a stable measure and a scale-increasing method to estimate geochemical singularities spatially on geochemical landscape for delineating potential anomalies. The model is applied to geochemical data of regional stream sediments from the Funin Sheet, Yunnan, China.     

THE IMPACT OF A DIAGNOSTIC CLOUD SCHEME ON FORECASTS WITH A GLOBAL ATMOSPHERE MODEL

Experiments were conducted to test the impact of a cloud diagnosis scheme in place of prescribed zonalaverage cloud on medium and long range integrations with the Australian Bureau of Meteorology ResearchCentre(BMRC)global atmosphere model.The cloud scheme was shown to improve the temperature bias inthe lower troposphere but there was deterioration in the upper troposphere,especially in the tropics,asso-ciated with underestimation of high cloud amount.Thirty day mean fields in a January integration showed greater amplitude in the Northern Hemisphereplanetary waves and a deeper Antarctic circumpolar trough than the control experiment or a simulation withno cloud.The results for the diagnosed cloud case agree more closely with corresponding observed fields.There was also some reduction in the zonal average zonal wind component reflecting the additional zonalasymmetry introduced by the diagnostic cloud scheme.Similar trends were also noted in medium and longrange forecasts for January and July conditions,although the impact on predictive skill was slight and insome cases detrimental.Areas for improving the diagnostic cloud scheme are noted.