Detecting patterns of climate change in long-term forecasts of marine environmental parameters

ABSTRACT

Forecasting environmental parameters in the distant future requires complex modelling and large computational resources. Due to the sensitivity and complexity of forecast models, long-term parameter forecasts (e.g. up to 2100) are uncommon and only produced by a few organisations, in heterogeneous formats and based on different assumptions of greenhouse gases emissions. However, data mining techniques can be used to coerce the data to a uniform time and spatial representation, which facilitates their use in many applications. In this paper, streams of big data coming from AquaMaps and NASA collections of 126 long-term forecasts of nine types of environmental parameters are processed through a cloud computing platform in order to (i) standardise and harmonise the data representations, (ii) produce intermediate scenarios and new informative parameters, and (iii) align all sets on a common time and spatial resolution. Time series cross-correlation applied to these aligned datasets reveals patterns of climate change and similarities between parameter trends in 10 marine areas. Our results highlight that (i) the Mediterranean Sea may have a standalone ‘response’ to climate change with respect to other areas, (ii) the Poles are most representative of global forecasted change, and (iii) the trends are generally alarming for most oceans.     

A relationship between solar activity and frequency of natural disasters in China

The relationship between the length of the solar cycle, a good indicator of long-term change in solar activity, and natural disasters (drought, flood, and strong earthquakes) in China during the last 108 years is analyzed. The results suggest that the length of solar cycle may be a useful indicator for drought/flood and strong earthquakes. When the solar activity strengthens, we see the length of the solar cycle shorten and more floods occur in South China and frequent strong earthquakes happen in the Tibetan Plateau,but the droughts in East China as well as the strong earthquakes in Taiwan and at the western boundary of China are very few. The opposite frequencies occur when the solar activity weakens. The current study indicates that the solar activity may play an important role in the climate extremes and behavior in the lithosphere.     

An evaluation of the role played by remote sensing technology following the World Trade Center attack

Remote sensing technology has been widely recognized for contributing to emergency response efforts after the World Trade Center attack on September 11th, 2001. The need to coordinate activities in the midst of a dense, yet relatively small area, made the combination of imagery and mapped data strategically useful. This paper reviews the role played by aerial photography, satellite imagery, and LIDAR data at Ground Zero. It examines how emergency managers utilized these datasets, and identifies significant problems that were encountered. It goes on to explore additional ways in which imagery could have been used, while presenting recommendations for more effective use in future disasters and Homeland Security applications. To plan adequately for future events, it was important to capture knowledge from individuals who responded to the World Trade Center attack. In recognition, interviews with key emergency management and geographic information system (GIS) personnel provide the basis of this paper. Successful techniques should not be forgotten, or serious problems dismissed. Although widely used after September 11th, it is important to recognize that with better planning, remote sensing and GIS could have played an even greater role. Together with a data acquisition timeline, an expanded discussion of these issues is available in the MCEER/NSF report “Emergency Response in the Wake of the World Trade Center Attack; The Remote Sensing Perspective” (Huyck and Adams, 2002)     

陕北春季森林火灾气象条件分析

通过对1989~2004年间陕北春季森林火灾发生期气象资料进行研究分析,指出春季2~5月份林火期气候特征、森林火灾易发期天气环流特征,林火的发生与冷空气活动密切相关。在春季森林火灾期地面气象要素也呈现出一定的变化规律。     

河西走廊春季强冻害成因及防御对策

应用酒泉、张掖、武威实况资料,从作物的各个生长发育期进行了对比分析,结果表明强冷空气爆发是造成冻害的直接原因,前期气温异常偏高使农作物生育期提前、气温和地温较低加剧了冻害程度。并提出了防御冻害发生的有效措施。     

黄河兰州以上气候要素长期变化趋势和突变特征分析

采用1960—2001年黄河流域兰州以上地区23个气象台站的气温、降水、日照时数和蒸发量4个气候要素的资料,分析了42年来兰州以上地区的气候变化和发展趋势。用非参数统计检验方法(Mann-Kendall法)分析了气候变化的长期变化趋势。结果表明,42年来全区平均变暖0.76℃,降水量、日照时数和蒸发量平均减少了17.89 mm,125.6 h和161.3 mm;用距平曲线法分析了气候变化的阶段性特征;用滑动T检验法(MTT法)、Ya-mamoto法和Mann-Kendall法对5年滑动平均的区域季节和年时间序列进行突变检测,讨论了黄河流域兰州以上地区的气候变化问题。MTT法的检测结果表明,气温、降水量和日照时数分别在20世纪80年代的末期、中期和初期发生了突变,蒸发量除了发生在80年代的突变外,90年代也有一次超过0.01显著性水平的突变;Yamamoto法检测结果表明,20世纪80年代的气候突变最为明显,1981年春季蒸发量和1985年的年气温均出现了强突变,年蒸发量突变的S/N值的位相明显提前于其他3个气候要素突变S/N值的位相;Mann-Kendall法检测结果表明,各气候要素年和季的突变年份中,气温主要发生在20世纪90年代,蒸发量主要发生在20世纪60年代,日照时数主要发生在20世纪80年代。这一事实也说明检测方法不同,评价结果会存在一定差异。     

遥感技术在防震减灾领域中的应用

为了有效地组织救灾和震后重建,快速地获取地震造成的破坏程度、破坏范围成为至关重要的一环。遥感技术本身所具有的宏观性、时效性、经济高效性使其被广泛应用于防震减灾事业中。本文简单介绍了遥感技术的原理、特点及其在防震减灾领域中的应用历史及现状。在借鉴已有成果的基础上较系统地阐述了遥感技术在地震防灾方面的应用及展望。     

Spatiotemporal analysis of precipitation trends in the Yangtze River catchment

Precipitation trends in the Yangtze River catchment (PR China) have been analyzed for the past 50 years by applying the Mann-Kendall trend test and geospatial analyses. Monthly precipitation trends of 36 stations have been calculated. Significant positive trends at many stations can be observed for the summer months, which naturally show precipitation maxima. They were preceded and/or followed by negative trends. This observation points towards a concentration of summer precipitation within a shorter period of time. The analysis of a second data set on a gridded basis with 0.5° resolution reveals trends with distinct spatial patterns. The combination of classic trend tests and spatially interpolated precipitation data sets allows the spatiotemporal visualization of detected trends. Months with positive trends emphasize the aggravation of severe situation in a region, which is particularly prone to flood disasters during summer. Reasons for the observed trends were found in variations in the meridional wind pattern at the 850 hPa level, which account for an increased transport of warm moist air to the Yangtze River catchment during the summer months.     

Quantifying anthropogenic influence on recent near-surface temperature change

We assess the extent to which observed large-scale changes in near-surface temperatures over the latter half of the twentieth century can be attributed to anthropogenic climate change as simulated by a range of climate models. The hypothesis that observed changes are entirely due to internal climate variability is rejected at a high confidence level independent of the climate model used to simulate either the anthropogenic signal or the internal variability. Where the relevant simulations are available, we also consider the alternative hypothesis that observed changes are due entirely to natural external influences, including solar variability and explosive volcanic activity. We allow for the possibility that feedback processes, other than those simulated by the models considered, may be amplifying the observed response to these natural influences by an unknown amount. Even allowing for this possibility, the hypothesis of no anthropogenic influence can be rejected at the 5% level in almost all cases. The influence of anthropogenic greenhouse gases emerges as a substantial contributor to recent observed climate change, with the estimated trend attributable to greenhouse forcing similar in magnitude to the total observed warming over the 20th century. Much greater uncertainty remains in the response to other external influences on climate, particularly the response to anthropogenic sulphate aerosols and to solar and volcanic forcing. Our results remain dependent on model-simulated signal patterns and internal variability, and would benefit considerably from a wider range of simulations, particularly of the responses to natural external forcing.     

Climate change and North Sea storm surge extremes: an ensemble study of storm surge extremes expected in a changed climate projected by four different regional climate models

The coastal zones are facing the prospect of changing storm surge statistics due to anthropogenic climate change. In the present study, we examine these prospects for the North Sea based on numerical modelling. The main tool is the barotropic tide-surge model TRIMGEO (Tidal Residual and Intertidal Mudflat Model) to derive storm surge climate and extremes from atmospheric conditions. The analysis is carried out by using an ensemble of four 30-year atmospheric regional simulations under present-day and possible future-enhanced greenhouse gas conditions. The atmospheric regional simulations were prepared within the EU project PRUDENCE (Prediction of Regional scenarios and Uncertainties for Defining EuropeaN Climate change risks and Effects). The research strategy of PRUDENCE is to compare simulations of different regional models driven by the same global control and climate change simulations. These global conditions, representative for 1961–1990 and 2071–2100 were prepared by the Hadley Center based on the IPCC A2 SRES scenario. The results suggest that under future climatic conditions, storm surge extremes may increase along the North Sea coast towards the end of this century. Based on a comparison between the results of the different ensemble members as well as on the variability estimated from a high-resolution storm surge reconstruction of the recent decades it is found that this increase is significantly different from zero at the 95% confidence level for most of the North Sea coast. An exception represents the East coast of the UK which is not affected by this increase of storm surge extremes.