The MINK Project: A New Methodology for Identifying Regional Influences of, and Responses to, Increasing Atmospheric CO2 and Climate Change

1991 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 313-322 ◽  
Author(s):  
Norman J. Rosenberg ◽  
Pierre R. Crosson
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Energy Supply ◽  
Climate Models ◽  
Supply And Demand ◽  
Greenhouse Warming ◽  
Future Change ◽  
Adaptation To Climate Change ◽  
Resource Limitations ◽  
The Future ◽  
Current Water

In a study that was recently completed at Resources for the Future, the impacts of a future change in climate on the total economy of the Missouri–Iowa–Nebraska–Kansas (MINK) region were assessed, as were the possibilities of response (including adaptation) to the climatic change. Impacts on agriculture, forestry, water resources, and energy, were emphasized. The study was future-oriented, focusing on the year 2030, by which time the effects of ‘greenhouse’ warming may be felt. The records of the AD 1930s were used to provide an analog of the kinds of climate change (warmer and drier) that climate models predict will occur in the MINK region.Our results indicate that impacts of the projected climate change on agriculture, at least in the future, are expected to be profound, but that likely-to-be available technologies should facilitate substantial adaptation; that current water-resource limitations in the region would be exacerbated and lead to an eastward shift in irrigation; that impacts on forestry would be severe, and that opportunities for forestry adaptation would be very limited unless biomass production were to become economically viable; and that the net impacts on energy supply and demand would be small and adaptation to them relatively simple.Climate change in the MINK region could, of course, go somewhat beyond the conditions represented by the AD 1930s analog, in which case the findings of this study may be too optimistic. However, the future-oriented ‘MINK methodology’ is not scenario-dependent, and can be used to test other, more severe (or benign), scenarios as well. Further, the capacity for adaptation to climate change demonstrated in this study, may remain applicable even in more stringent circumstances.

Dam reoperation in an era of climate change

2011 ◽  
Vol 62 (3) ◽  
pp. 321 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. J. Watts ◽  
B. D. Richter ◽  
J. J. Opperman ◽  
K. H. Bowmer
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Water Supply ◽  
Management Practices ◽  
Supply And Demand ◽  
Flood Management ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Adaptation To Climate Change ◽  
Future Supply ◽  
Current Water ◽  
Desalination Plants

Climate change is predicted to affect the future supply and demand for water resources. Current water-management practices may not adequately cope with the impacts of climate change on the reliability of water supply, flood risk, health, agriculture, energy generation and aquatic ecosystems. Water managers can adapt to climate variability by structural change, such as increasing the size or number of dams, building desalination plants and transferring water between catchments; however, a broader set of alternatives with multiple beneficial outcomes for society and the environment should be explored. We discuss how modifying dam operations, ‘dam reoperation’, can assist with adaptation to climate change and help restore ecosystems. The main operating purpose of a dam (e.g. flood management, hydropower or water supply) will influence dam reoperation strategies. Reoperation may require integration across sectors or involve multiple dams, enhancing benefits such as water supply or hydropower while simultaneously achieving ecosystem restoration. We provide examples of lessons learned during extreme scenarios (e.g. floods and droughts), where operational flexibility has been demonstrated. We contrast structural climate-change adaptation strategies (e.g. building new dams) and their resulting detrimental environmental outcomes with dam reoperation, which can maximise benefits for ecosystems and society.

scholarly journals Application of SWAT in Hydrological Simulation of Complex Mountainous River Basin (Part II: Climate Change Impact Assessment)

Water ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (11) ◽  
pp. 1548
Author(s):  
Suresh Marahatta ◽  
Deepak Aryal ◽  
Laxmi Prasad Devkota ◽  
Utsav Bhattarai ◽  
Dibesh Shrestha
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
River Basin ◽  
Climate Models ◽  
Assessment Tool ◽  
Swat Model ◽  
Global Climate Models ◽  
Climate Data ◽  
The Future ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Mountainous River

This study aims at analysing the impact of climate change (CC) on the river hydrology of a complex mountainous river basin—the Budhigandaki River Basin (BRB)—using the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) hydrological model that was calibrated and validated in Part I of this research. A relatively new approach of selecting global climate models (GCMs) for each of the two selected RCPs, 4.5 (stabilization scenario) and 8.5 (high emission scenario), representing four extreme cases (warm-wet, cold-wet, warm-dry, and cold-dry conditions), was applied. Future climate data was bias corrected using a quantile mapping method. The bias-corrected GCM data were forced into the SWAT model one at a time to simulate the future flows of BRB for three 30-year time windows: Immediate Future (2021–2050), Mid Future (2046–2075), and Far Future (2070–2099). The projected flows were compared with the corresponding monthly, seasonal, annual, and fractional differences of extreme flows of the simulated baseline period (1983–2012). The results showed that future long-term average annual flows are expected to increase in all climatic conditions for both RCPs compared to the baseline. The range of predicted changes in future monthly, seasonal, and annual flows shows high uncertainty. The comparative frequency analysis of the annual one-day-maximum and -minimum flows shows increased high flows and decreased low flows in the future. These results imply the necessity for design modifications in hydraulic structures as well as the preference of storage over run-of-river water resources development projects in the study basin from the perspective of climate resilience.

scholarly journals Multimodel assessment of climate change-induced hydrologic impacts for a Mediterranean catchment

2018 ◽  
Vol 22 (7) ◽  
pp. 4125-4143 ◽  
Author(s):  
Enrica Perra ◽  
Monica Piras ◽  
Roberto Deidda ◽  
Claudio Paniconi ◽  
Giuseppe Mascaro ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Water Content ◽  
Soil Water ◽  
Soil Water Content ◽  
Climate Models ◽  
Actual Evapotranspiration ◽  
Soil Conditions ◽  
Hydrologic Models ◽  
The Future ◽  
The Mediterranean

Abstract. This work addresses the impact of climate change on the hydrology of a catchment in the Mediterranean, a region that is highly susceptible to variations in rainfall and other components of the water budget. The assessment is based on a comparison of responses obtained from five hydrologic models implemented for the Rio Mannu catchment in southern Sardinia (Italy). The examined models – CATchment HYdrology (CATHY), Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT), TOPographic Kinematic APproximation and Integration (TOPKAPI), TIN-based Real time Integrated Basin Simulator (tRIBS), and WAter balance SImulation Model (WASIM) – are all distributed hydrologic models but differ greatly in their representation of terrain features and physical processes and in their numerical complexity. After calibration and validation, the models were forced with bias-corrected, downscaled outputs of four combinations of global and regional climate models in a reference (1971–2000) and future (2041–2070) period under a single emission scenario. Climate forcing variations and the structure of the hydrologic models influence the different components of the catchment response. Three water availability response variables – discharge, soil water content, and actual evapotranspiration – are analyzed. Simulation results from all five hydrologic models show for the future period decreasing mean annual streamflow and soil water content at 1 m depth. Actual evapotranspiration in the future will diminish according to four of the five models due to drier soil conditions. Despite their significant differences, the five hydrologic models responded similarly to the reduced precipitation and increased temperatures predicted by the climate models, and lend strong support to a future scenario of increased water shortages for this region of the Mediterranean basin. The multimodel framework adopted for this study allows estimation of the agreement between the five hydrologic models and between the four climate models. Pairwise comparison of the climate and hydrologic models is shown for the reference and future periods using a recently proposed metric that scales the Pearson correlation coefficient with a factor that accounts for systematic differences between datasets. The results from this analysis reflect the key structural differences between the hydrologic models, such as a representation of both vertical and lateral subsurface flow (CATHY, TOPKAPI, and tRIBS) and a detailed treatment of vegetation processes (SWAT and WASIM).

scholarly journals Global Potato Yields Increase Under Climate Change With Adaptation and CO2 Fertilisation

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stewart A. Jennings ◽  
Ann-Kristin Koehler ◽  
Kathryn J. Nicklin ◽  
Chetan Deva ◽  
Steven M. Sait ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Climate Models ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Climate Change Impacts ◽  
Global Scale ◽  
Global Climate Models ◽  
Adaptation To Climate Change ◽  
National Scale ◽  
Modeling Studies ◽  
Potato Yields

The contribution of potatoes to the global food supply is increasing—consumption more than doubled in developing countries between 1960 and 2005. Understanding climate change impacts on global potato yields is therefore important for future food security. Analyses of climate change impacts on potato compared to other major crops are rare, especially at the global scale. Of two global gridded potato modeling studies published at the time of this analysis, one simulated the impacts of temperature increases on potential potato yields; the other did not simulate the impacts of farmer adaptation to climate change, which may offset negative climate change impacts on yield. These studies may therefore overestimate negative climate change impacts on yields as they do not simultaneously include CO2 fertilisation and adaptation to climate change. Here we simulate the abiotic impacts of climate change on potato to 2050 using the GLAM crop model and the ISI-MIP ensemble of global climate models. Simulations include adaptations to climate change through varying planting windows and varieties and CO2 fertilisation, unlike previous global potato modeling studies. Results show significant skill in reproducing observed national scale yields in Europe. Elsewhere, correlations are generally positive but low, primarily due to poor relationships between national scale observed yields and climate. Future climate simulations including adaptation to climate change through changing planting windows and crop varieties show that yields are expected to increase in most cases as a result of longer growing seasons and CO2 fertilisation. Average global yield increases range from 9 to 20% when including adaptation. The global average yield benefits of adaptation to climate change range from 10 to 17% across climate models. Potato agriculture is associated with lower green house gas emissions relative to other major crops and therefore can be seen as a climate smart option given projected yield increases with adaptation.

scholarly journals The Effect of Explicit Convection on Couplings between Rainfall, Humidity, and Ascent over Africa under Climate Change

2020 ◽  
Vol 33 (19) ◽  
pp. 8315-8337 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lawrence S. Jackson ◽  
Declan L. Finney ◽  
Elizabeth J. Kendon ◽  
John H. Marsham ◽  
Douglas J. Parker ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Climate Models ◽  
Regional Climate ◽  
Hadley Circulation ◽  
Moist Convection ◽  
Rain Belt ◽  
Adaptation To Climate Change ◽  
Convective Scale ◽  
Mean Climate

AbstractThe Hadley circulation and tropical rain belt are dominant features of African climate. Moist convection provides ascent within the rain belt, but must be parameterized in climate models, limiting predictions. Here, we use a pan-African convection-permitting model (CPM), alongside a parameterized convection model (PCM), to analyze how explicit convection affects the rain belt under climate change. Regarding changes in mean climate, both models project an increase in total column water (TCW), a widespread increase in rainfall, and slowdown of subtropical descent. Regional climate changes are similar for annual mean rainfall but regional changes of ascent typically strengthen less or weaken more in the CPM. Over a land-only meridional transect of the rain belt, the CPM mean rainfall increases less than in the PCM (5% vs 14%) but mean vertical velocity at 500 hPa weakens more (17% vs 10%). These changes mask more fundamental changes in underlying distributions. The decrease in 3-hourly rain frequency and shift from lighter to heavier rainfall are more pronounced in the CPM and accompanied by a shift from weak to strong updrafts with the enhancement of heavy rainfall largely due to these dynamic changes. The CPM has stronger coupling between intense rainfall and higher TCW. This yields a greater increase in rainfall contribution from events with greater TCW, with more rainfall for a given large-scale ascent, and so favors slowing of that ascent. These findings highlight connections between the convective-scale and larger-scale flows and emphasize that limitations of parameterized convection have major implications for planning adaptation to climate change.

scholarly journals Asset management using a hybrid backcasting/forecasting approach

Facilities ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 33 (11/12) ◽  
pp. 701-715 ◽  
Author(s):  
Keith Jones ◽  
Api Desai ◽  
Mark Mulville ◽  
Aled Jones
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Conceptual Framework ◽  
Asset Management ◽  
Management Strategies ◽  
Management Plan ◽  
Adaptation To Climate Change ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Alternative Pathways ◽  
Future State ◽  
The Future

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present an alternative approach to facilities and built asset management adaptation planning to climate change based on a hybrid backcasting/forecasting model. Backcasting envisions a future state and examines alternative “pathways of approach” by looking backwards from the future state to the present day. Each pathway is examined in turn to identify interventions required for that pathway to achieve the future state. Each pathway is reviewed using forecasting tools and the most appropriate is selected. This paper describes the application of this approach to the integration of climate change adaptation plans into facilities and built asset management. Design/methodology/approach – The researchers worked with various stakeholders as part of a participatory research team to identify climate change adaptations that may be required to ensure the continued performance of a new educational building over its life cycle. The team identified 2020, 2040 and 2080 year end-goals and assessed alternative pathways of approach. The most appropriate pathways were integrated into the facilities and built asset management plan. Findings – The paper outlines a conceptual framework for formulating long term facilities and built asset management strategies to address adaptation to climate change. Research limitations/implications – The conceptual framework is validated by a single research case study, and further examples are needed to ensure validity of the approach in different facilities management contexts. Originality/value – This is the first paper to explore backcasting principles as part of facilities and built asset management planning.

scholarly journals Selection of Bias Correction Methods to Assess the Impact of Climate Change on Flood Frequency Curves

Water ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (11) ◽  
pp. 2266 ◽  
Author(s):  
Enrique Soriano ◽  
Luis Mediero ◽  
Carlos Garijo
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Bias Correction ◽  
Climate Models ◽  
Climate Model ◽  
Control Period ◽  
Flood Frequency ◽  
Climate Projections ◽  
The Future ◽  
Flood Quantiles ◽  
The Impact

Climate projections provided by EURO-CORDEX predict changes in annual maximum series of daily rainfall in the future in some areas of Spain because of climate change. Precipitation and temperature projections supplied by climate models do not usually fit exactly the statistical properties of the observed time series in the control period. Bias correction methods are used to reduce such errors. This paper seeks to find the most adequate bias correction techniques for temperature and precipitation projections that minimizes the errors between observations and climate model simulations in the control period. Errors in flood quantiles are considered to identify the best bias correction techniques, as flood quantiles are used for hydraulic infrastructure design and safety assessment. In addition, this study aims to understand how the expected changes in precipitation extremes and temperature will affect the catchment response in flood events in the future. Hydrological modelling is required to characterize rainfall-runoff processes adequately in a changing climate, in order to estimate flood changes expected in the future. Four catchments located in the central-western part of Spain have been selected as case studies. The HBV hydrological model has been calibrated in the four catchments by using the observed precipitation, temperature and streamflow data available on a daily scale. Rainfall has been identified as the most significant input to the model, in terms of its influence on flood response. The quantile mapping polynomial correction has been found to be the best bias correction method for precipitation. A general reduction in flood quantiles is expected in the future, smoothing the increases identified in precipitation quantiles by the reduction of soil moisture content in catchments, due to the expected increase in temperature and decrease in mean annual precipitations.

scholarly journals Quantification of the Expected Changes in Annual Maximum Daily Precipitation Quantiles under Climate Change in the Iberian Peninsula

Proceedings ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos Garijo ◽  
Luis Mediero
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Iberian Peninsula ◽  
Climate Models ◽  
Climate Model ◽  
Global Climate ◽  
Global Climate Model ◽  
Regional Climate ◽  
Control Period ◽  
Regional Climate Models ◽  
The Future

Climate model projections can be used to assess the expected behaviour of extreme precipitations in the future due to climate change. The European part of the Coordinated Regional Climate Downscalling Experiment (EURO-CORDEX) provides precipitation projections for the future under various representative concentration pathways (RCPs) through regionalised Global Climate Model (GCM) outputs by a set of Regional Climate Models (RCMs). In this work, 12 combinations of GCM and RCM under two scenarios (RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5) supplied by the EURO-CORDEX are analysed for the Iberian Peninsula. Precipitation quantiles for a set of probabilities of non-exceedance are estimated by using the Generalized Extreme Value (GEV) distribution and L-moments. Precipitation quantiles expected in the future are compared with the precipitation quantiles in the control period for each climate model. An approach based on Monte Carlo simulations is developed in order to assess the uncertainty from the climate model projections. Expected changes in the future are compared with the sampling uncertainty in the control period. Thus, statistically significant changes are identified. The higher the significance threshold, the fewer cells with significant changes are identified. Consequently, a set of maps are obtained in order to assist the decision-making process in subsequent climate change studies.

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