Kochi,India case study of climate adaptation to floods: Ranking local government investment options

Climate adaptation is uniquely linked to location, making it predominantly a local government and community responsibility. Despite the obligation to act, local governments are hindered by the absence of applicable guides to adaptation decision-making, especially adaptation to extreme events. In this paper, we describe a framework for prioritising adaptation options that could be locally implemented and illustrate it with a study of flooding in Kochi: a city in southern India. Unlike many demand driven, economics based studies, our new framework also incorporates non-economic dimensions of the extremes and potential adaptation options. Local knowledge is used to tackle data gaps and uncertainty related to extreme events: local experts select adaptation options that offer additional benefits besides those related to climate change. These co-benefits aid decision making under uncertainty by giving weight to community priorities. The Indian case study reveals that, risk evaluation and reduction need to be locally contextualised based on resources available, immediate community requirements, planning periods and local expert knowledge. Although there will be residual damage even after implementing selected options, we argue that, climate response will be most likely to be accepted when it also supports pressing needs.     

Dynamics behind warming of the southeastern Arabian Sea and its interruption based on in situ measurements

A study of the inter-annual variability of the warming of the southeastern Arabian Sea (SEAS) during the spring transition months was carried out from 2013 to 2015 based on in situ data from moored buoys. An attempt was made to identify the roles of the different variables in the warming of the SEAS (e.g., net heat flux, advection, entrainment, and thickness of the barrier layer during the previous northeast monsoon season). The intense freshening of the SEAS (approximately 2 PSU) occurring in each December, together with the presence of a downwelling Rossby wave, supports the formation of a thick barrier layer during the northeast monsoon season. It is known that the barrier layer thickness, varying each year, plays a major role in the spring warming of the SEAS. Interestingly, an anomalously thick barrier layer occurred during the northeast monsoon season of 2012–2013. However, the highest sea surface temperature (31 °C) was recorded during the last week of April 2015, while the lowest sea surface temperature (29.7 °C) was recorded during the last week of May 2013. The mixed layer heat budget analysis during the spring transition months proved that the intense warming has been mainly supported by the net heat flux, not by other factors like advection and entrainment. The inter-annual variability analysis of the net heat flux and its components, averaged over a box region of the SEAS, showed a substantial latent heat flux release and a reduction in net shortwave radiation in 2013. Both factors contributed to the negative net heat flux. Strong breaks in the warming were also observed in May due to the entrainment of cold sub-surface waters. These events are associated with the cyclonic eddy persisting over the SEAS during the same time. The entrainment term, favoring the cooling, was stronger in 2015 than that in 2013 and 2014. The surface temperatures measured in 2013 were lower than those in 2014 and 2015 despite the presence of a thick barrier layer. The substantial decrease in net heat flux along with entrainment cooling has been identified as causes for this behavior.     

Time should be considered in developmental ecotoxicity test

Developmental toxicity tests are often used for the hazard assessment of chemicals and environmental media. One of the most widely used is the oyster embryo larval test (OEL), in which the development of oyster larvae is arrested at a single fixed time (e.g. 24 or 48 h) of toxic exposure, and the proportion of normal larvae measured. However, a major problem with this conventional approach is the lack of information on temporal trends in development. In this study, Pacific oyster Crassostrea gigas embryos were exposed to nominal concentrations of copper (CuSO₄) of <0.001 (control), 0.60, 1.25, 2.5, 5.0, 10.0 and 20.0 μg l⁻¹ (at 20 °C, salinity 35‰ and pH 8.1). Three replicates from each group were arrested and examined every 8 h during 24–72 h of exposure, and the number of viable larvae developed to D-shape was determined. The results revealed that the number of viable D-shape larvae in the control increased rapidly and reached an optimum at 32 h, before declining gradually due to starvation. Analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) showed that larval developmental rates during 0–32 h were significantly inhibited by Cu at all concentrations. This paper demonstrates that arrest and measurement at different time periods are important and should be incorporated into the OEL test. This would maximise the sensitivity of the test in detecting developmental effects in spiked or environmental samples.     

Nitrogen in chondritic metal

We report new nitrogen isotopic data in metals of H-, L- and one LL -chondrites, with N abundances in the range of ∼0.3 to 3.3 ppm and half of these <1 ppm. Nitrogen isotopic signatures in metals with low indigenous N concentrations are modified by cosmic ray spallation components; corrections are required to determine the indigenous N signatures. The metals of type 4 and 5 show uniform indigenous nitrogen (δ¹⁵N = −6.8 ± 0.5 ‰) and confirm a reported possible genetic association of chondritic metal with metal in IIE and IVA iron meteorites. Distinct isotopic signatures are observed in two metal samples of the Portales Valley (H6) meteorite which both are inconsistent with signatures in H4 and H5 chondrites, but possibly reveal a record of impact-induced melting and metamorphism on the parent asteroid. Anomalous nitrogen signatures in metals of type 3 chondrites, on the other hand, may reflect residues of surviving presolar isotopic signatures.     

Prediction of magnetite segregation in dense medium cyclone using computational fluid dynamics technique

Multi-phase simulations of turbulent driven flow in a dense medium cyclone with magnetite medium have been conducted in Fluent, using the Algebraic Slip Mixture model to model the dispersed phases and the air-core, and both the Large Eddy Simulation turbulence model (LES) and Reynolds Stress Models (RSM) for turbulence closure. The predicted air-core shape and diameter were found to be close to the experimental results measured by gamma ray tomography. It is possible to use the LES turbulence model with ASM multi-phase model to predict the air/slurry interface accurately. Multi-phase simulations (air/water/medium) show appropriate medium segregation effects but over-predict the level of segregation compared to that measured by gamma ray tomography near the wall. This is believed to be because of unaccounted back-mixing of the dispersed phase due to turbulence in the basic Algebraic Slip Mixture model. The predictions of accurate axial segregation of magnetite medium are investigated using the LES turbulence model in conjunction with the multi-phase mixture model and viscosity corrections according to the feed particle loading factor. At higher feed densities the agreement between the Dunglison [Dunglison, M.E., 1999, A general model of the dense medium cylone, PhD thesis, JKMRC, University of Queensland] correlations and experimental measurements and the CFD is reasonably good, but the overflow density is lower than the model predictions. It is believed that the excessive underflow volumetric flow rates are responsible for under prediction of the overflow density. The effect of size distribution of the magnetite has been fully studied. As expected, the ultra-fine magnetite sizes (i.e. 2 and 7 microns) are distributed uniformly throughout the cyclone. As the size of magnetite increases, more segregation of magnetite occurs close to the wall.