MAPPING AND MONITORING OF WETLAND ECOSYSTEMS: A CASE STUDY ON HARIKE AND KESHOPUR WETLAND OVER PUNJAB REGION, INDIA

Wetland plays a vital role in sustainable ecological development. They hold balanced environment conditions and filter the surface and sub-surface water and moderate the local weather condition. But now-a-days wetlands are shrinking quickly all over world due to climate change & anthropogenic activities and extinction of wetlands agitates the local environmental conditions with contexts to water and soil conditions. This study is mainly focused on climate change impacts on wetland ecosystems over Harike and Keshopur wetland in Punjab region, India. Harike wetland is one of largest wetland in northern part of India, which is designated as Ramsar site. The Landsat imageries and climate parameters (includes land surface temperature and rainfall) have been used to extract spatial and temporal information over wetlands during period from 2009 to 2020. Landsat data have been analysed in two phases: Pre-monsoon and Post-Monsoon. Wetland area has been classified into five different classes: agriculture, water, built-up, aquatic vegetation1, and aquatic vegetation2. These analyses showed that wetland area has been reduced over a period of ten years and much area has been converted in agricultural land and built-up. The intense anthropogenic activities have resulted more changes in the wetland over both regions. The present study specifies that wetland ecosystem monitoring is essential for policy makers for sustainable management and also concluded that the significant reduction of highly biodiversity wetland area is required to conserve.

Download Full-text

Performance evaluation of global hydrological models in six large Pan-Arctic watersheds

Climatic Change ◽

10.1007/s10584-020-02892-2 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 163 (3) ◽

pp. 1329-1351 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Anne Gädeke ◽

Valentina Krysanova ◽

Aashutosh Aryal ◽

Jinfeng Chang ◽

Manolis Grillakis ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Performance Evaluation ◽

Land Surface ◽

Snow Water Equivalent ◽

Explanatory Power ◽

Model Performance ◽

Climate Change Impacts ◽

Hydrological Processes ◽

Climate Data ◽

Seasonal Discharge

AbstractGlobal Water Models (GWMs), which include Global Hydrological, Land Surface, and Dynamic Global Vegetation Models, present valuable tools for quantifying climate change impacts on hydrological processes in the data scarce high latitudes. Here we performed a systematic model performance evaluation in six major Pan-Arctic watersheds for different hydrological indicators (monthly and seasonal discharge, extremes, trends (or lack of), and snow water equivalent (SWE)) via a novel Aggregated Performance Index (API) that is based on commonly used statistical evaluation metrics. The machine learning Boruta feature selection algorithm was used to evaluate the explanatory power of the API attributes. Our results show that the majority of the nine GWMs included in the study exhibit considerable difficulties in realistically representing Pan-Arctic hydrological processes. Average APIdischarge (monthly and seasonal discharge) over nine GWMs is > 50% only in the Kolyma basin (55%), as low as 30% in the Yukon basin and averaged over all watersheds APIdischarge is 43%. WATERGAP2 and MATSIRO present the highest (APIdischarge > 55%) while ORCHIDEE and JULES-W1 the lowest (APIdischarge ≤ 25%) performing GWMs over all watersheds. For the high and low flows, average APIextreme is 35% and 26%, respectively, and over six GWMs APISWE is 57%. The Boruta algorithm suggests that using different observation-based climate data sets does not influence the total score of the APIs in all watersheds. Ultimately, only satisfactory to good performing GWMs that effectively represent cold-region hydrological processes (including snow-related processes, permafrost) should be included in multi-model climate change impact assessments in Pan-Arctic watersheds.

Download Full-text

JULES-crop: a parametrisation of crops in the Joint UK Land Environment Simulator

Geoscientific Model Development Discussions ◽

10.5194/gmdd-7-6773-2014 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 7 (5) ◽

pp. 6773-6809

Author(s):

T. Osborne ◽

J. Gornall ◽

J. Hooker ◽

K. Williams ◽

A. Wiltshire ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Land Surface ◽

Land Surface Model ◽

Water Security ◽

Climate Change Impacts ◽

Heat Fluxes ◽

Surface Model ◽

Yield Model ◽

Area Index ◽

The Impact

Abstract. Studies of climate change impacts on the terrestrial biosphere have been completed without recognition of the integrated nature of the biosphere. Improved assessment of the impacts of climate change on food and water security requires the development and use of models not only representing each component but also their interactions. To meet this requirement the Joint UK Land Environment Simulator (JULES) land surface model has been modified to include a generic parametrisation of annual crops. The new model, JULES-crop, is described and evaluation at global and site levels for the four globally important crops; wheat, soy bean, maize and rice is presented. JULES-crop demonstrates skill in simulating the inter-annual variations of yield for maize and soy bean at the global level, and for wheat for major spring wheat producing countries. The impact of the new parametrisation, compared to the standard configuration, on the simulation of surface heat fluxes is largely an alteration of the partitioning between latent and sensible heat fluxes during the later part of the growing season. Further evaluation at the site level shows the model captures the seasonality of leaf area index and canopy height better than in standard JULES. However, this does not lead to an improvement in the simulation of sensible and latent heat fluxes. The performance of JULES-crop from both an earth system and crop yield model perspective is encouraging however, more effort is needed to develop the parameterisation of the model for specific applications. Key future model developments identified include the specification of the yield gap to enable better representation of the spatial variability in yield.

Download Full-text

Impacts of climate change on groundwater flooding and ecohydrology in lowland karst

Hydrology and Earth System Sciences ◽

10.5194/hess-25-1923-2021 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 25 (4) ◽

pp. 1923-1941

Author(s):

Patrick Morrissey ◽

Paul Nolan ◽

Ted McCormack ◽

Paul Johnston ◽

Owen Naughton ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Agricultural Land ◽

Karst Aquifer ◽

Global Climate Models ◽

Small Scale ◽

Wetland Ecosystems ◽

Extreme Flooding ◽

Karst Systems ◽

The Impact ◽

Impacts Of Climate Change

Abstract. Lowland karst aquifers can generate unique wetland ecosystems which are caused by groundwater fluctuations that result in extensive groundwater–surface water interactions (i.e. flooding). However, the complex hydrogeological attributes of these systems, linked to extremely fast aquifer recharge processes and flow through well-connected conduit networks, often present difficulty in predicting how they will respond to changing climatological conditions. This study investigates the predicted impacts of climate change on a lowland karst catchment by using a semi-distributed pipe network model of the karst aquifer populated with output from the high spatial resolution (4 km) Consortium for Small-scale Modelling Climate Lokalmodell (COSMO-CLM) regional climate model simulations for Ireland. An ensemble of projections for the future Irish climate were generated by downscaling from five different global climate models (GCMs), each based on four Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs; RCP2.6, RCP4.5, RCP6.0 and RCP8.5) to account for the uncertainty in the estimation of future global emissions of greenhouse gases. The one-dimensional hydraulic/hydrologic karst model incorporates urban drainage software to simulate open channel and pressurised flow within the conduits, with flooding on the land surface represented by storage nodes with the same stage volume properties of the physical turlough basins. The lowland karst limestone catchment is located on the west coast of Ireland and is characterised by a well-developed conduit-dominated karst aquifer which discharges to the sea via intertidal and submarine springs. Annual above ground flooding associated with this complex karst system has led to the development of unique wetland ecosystems in the form of ephemeral lakes known as turloughs; however, extreme flooding of these features causes widespread damage and disruption in the catchment. This analysis has shown that mean, 95th and 99th percentile flood levels are expected to increase by significant proportions for all future emission scenarios. The frequency of events currently considered to be extreme is predicted to increase, indicating that more significant groundwater flooding events seem likely to become far more common. The depth and duration of flooding is of extreme importance, both from an ecological perspective in terms of wetland species distribution and for extreme flooding in terms of the disruption to homes, transport links and agricultural land inundated by flood waters. The seasonality of annual flooding is also predicted to shift later in the flooding season, which could have consequences in terms of ecology and land use in the catchment. The investigation of increasing mean sea levels, however, showed that anticipated rises would have very little impact on groundwater flooding due to the marginal impact on ebb tide outflow volumes. Overall, this study highlights the relative vulnerability of lowland karst systems to future changing climate conditions, mainly due to the extremely fast recharge which can occur in such systems. The study presents a novel and highly effective methodology for studying the impact of climate change in lowland karst systems by coupling karst hydrogeological models with the output from high-resolution climate simulations.

Download Full-text

The Sensitivity of Regional Climate Projections to SSP-Based Land Use Changes in the North American CORDEX Domain

10.5194/egusphere-egu2020-5906 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Melissa Bukovsky ◽

Linda Mearns ◽

Jing Gao ◽

Brian O'Neill

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Land Use ◽

North American ◽

Land Surface ◽

Agricultural Land ◽

Climate Model ◽

Regional Climate ◽

Climate Projections ◽

Rcp Scenarios ◽

The North

In order to assess the combined effects of green-house-gas-induced climate change and land-use land-cover change (LULCC), we have produced regional climate model (RCM) simulations that are complementary to the North-American Coordinated Regional Downscaling Experiment (NA-CORDEX) simulations, but with future LULCCs that are consistent with particular Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs).&#160; In standard, existing NA-CORDEX simulations, land surface characteristics are held constant at present day conditions.&#160; These new simulations, in conjunction with the NA-CORDEX simulations, will help us assess the magnitude of the changes in regional climate forced by LULCC relative to those produced by increasing greenhouse gas concentrations.&#160;&#160; &#160;&#160;Understanding the magnitude of the regional climate effects of LULCC is important to the SSP-RCP scenarios framework. &#160;Whether or not the pattern of climate change resulting from a given SSP-RCP pairing is sensitive to the pattern of LULCC is an understudied problem.&#160; This work helps address this question, and will inform thinking about possible needed modifications to the scenarios framework to better account for climate-land use interactions.Accordingly, in this presentation, we will examine the state of the climate at the end of the 21st century with and without SSP-driven LULCCs in RCM simulations produced using WRF under the RCP8.5 concentration scenario.&#160; The included LULCC change effects have been created following the SSP3 and SSP5 narratives using an existing agricultural land model linked with a new long-term spatial urban land model.&#160;

Download Full-text

Nitrogen cycles in terrestrial ecosystems: climate change impacts and mitigation

Environmental Reviews ◽

10.1139/er-2015-0066 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 24 (2) ◽

pp. 132-143 ◽

Cited By ~ 14

Author(s):

Zhenzhu Xu ◽

Yanling Jiang ◽

Guangsheng Zhou

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Environmental Changes ◽

Anthropogenic Activities ◽

Water Status ◽

Climate Change Impacts ◽

Terrestrial Ecosystems ◽

N Deposition ◽

N Balance ◽

N Cycle ◽

Change Factors

The nitrogen (N) cycle and N balance have primarily been modified by anthropogenic activities and environmental changes at various scales, including biological individual, ecosystem, local landscape, continental region, and global. These modifications have drastically affected the structures and functions of natural and agricultural ecosystems in terrestrial and aquatic areas. In this manuscript, we first present a modified view of the global N cycle that includes N transport, conversion, and exchange processes. Second, several crucial issues concerning N balance, including N deposition and excessive addition and the dynamics of N and other nutrients, are reviewed. Third, the effects of climate change factors, including water status, warming, and elevated CO2 concentrations, on N balance and the N cycle and their interactions within and with other environmental factors are outlined. Finally, intervention strategies for improving N balance and N cycling to address rapid continual climatic change and socio-economic development are presented and discussed. It is highlighted that the altered N balance and N cycle between the geosphere, biosphere, and atmosphere have produced the profoundly critical challenge of maintaining N levels within an appropriate range, which should be considered by relevant people and sectors, including researchers, managers, and policy makers from ecological, environmental, and sustainable development sectors.

Download Full-text

The role of interactions in a world implementing adaptation and mitigation solutions to climate change

Philosophical Transactions of The Royal Society A Mathematical Physical and Engineering Sciences ◽

10.1098/rsta.2010.0271 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 369 (1934) ◽

pp. 217-241 ◽

Cited By ~ 60

Author(s):

Rachel Warren

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Ecosystem Services ◽

Agricultural Land ◽

Carbon Sink ◽

Climate Change Impacts ◽

Natural Systems ◽

Global Mean Temperature ◽

Mitigation And Adaptation ◽

Single Region ◽

Integrated Assessments

The papers in this volume discuss projections of climate change impacts upon humans and ecosystems under a global mean temperature rise of 4°C above preindustrial levels. Like most studies, they are mainly single-sector or single-region-based assessments. Even the multi-sector or multi-region approaches generally consider impacts in sectors and regions independently, ignoring interactions. Extreme weather and adaptation processes are often poorly represented and losses of ecosystem services induced by climate change or human adaptation are generally omitted. This paper addresses this gap by reviewing some potential interactions in a 4°C world, and also makes a comparison with a 2°C world. In a 4°C world, major shifts in agricultural land use and increased drought are projected, and an increased human population might increasingly be concentrated in areas remaining wet enough for economic prosperity. Ecosystem services that enable prosperity would be declining, with carbon cycle feedbacks and fire causing forest losses. There is an urgent need for integrated assessments considering the synergy of impacts and limits to adaptation in multiple sectors and regions in a 4°C world. By contrast, a 2°C world is projected to experience about one-half of the climate change impacts, with concomitantly smaller challenges for adaptation. Ecosystem services, including the carbon sink provided by the Earth’s forests, would be expected to be largely preserved, with much less potential for interaction processes to increase challenges to adaptation. However, demands for land and water for biofuel cropping could reduce the availability of these resources for agricultural and natural systems. Hence, a whole system approach to mitigation and adaptation, considering interactions, potential human and species migration, allocation of land and water resources and ecosystem services, will be important in either a 2°C or a 4°C world.

Download Full-text

Climate change and maize agriculture among Chepang communities of Nepal: A review

Journal of Maize Research and Development ◽

10.3126/jmrd.v3i1.18922 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 3 (1) ◽

pp. 53-66

Author(s):

Pratiksha Sharma ◽

Rishi Ram Kattel ◽

Ananta Prakash Subedi

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Agricultural Land ◽

Resource Constraints ◽

Climate Change Impacts ◽

Climate Scenario ◽

Adaptation Strategies ◽

Maximum Temperature ◽

Productivity Change ◽

Tree Plantation ◽

Temperature And Precipitation

This paper reviews recent literature concerning effects of climate change on agriculture and its agricultural adaptation strategies, climate change impacts on Chepang communities and their maize farming. Climate change is perhaps the most serious environmental threat to agricultural productivity. Change in temperature and precipitation specially has greater influence on crop growth and productivity and most of these effect are found to be adverse. Climate change has been great global threat with global temperature rise by 0.83 °C and global sea level rise by 0.19 m. Poor countries of the world are more vulnerable to changing climate due to different technological, institutional and resource constraints. In context of Nepal, practices like tree plantation, lowering numbers of livestock, shifting to off farm activities, sloping agricultural land technology (SALT) and shifting cultivation are most common coping strategies. Chepang, one of the most backward indigenous ethnic groups of Nepal are also found to perceive change in the climate. Perception and adaptation strategies followed by different farmers of world including Chepang is mainly found to be effected by household head’s age, size of farm, family size, assessment to credit, information and extension service, training received and transportation. Maize is second most important crop in Nepal in which increase in temperature is favorable in Mountain and its yield is negatively influenced by increase in summer rain and maximum temperature. Local knowledge of indigenous people provides new insights into the phenomenon that has not yet been scientifically researched. So, government should combine this perceptive with scientific climate scenario and should conduct activities in term of adoption strategies and policies to insist targeted and marginalized farmers.

Download Full-text

Integration of Abandoned Lands in Sustainable Agriculture: The Case of Terraced Landscape Re-Cultivation in Mediterranean Island Conditions

Land ◽

10.3390/land10050457 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 10 (5) ◽

pp. 457

Author(s):

Michalia Sakellariou ◽

Basil E. Psiloglou ◽

Christos Giannakopoulos ◽

Photini V. Mylona

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Crop Production ◽

Local Community ◽

Agricultural Land ◽

Arable Land ◽

Climate Change Impacts ◽

Climate Data ◽

Local Climate ◽

Rainfed Farming ◽

Smart Agriculture

Agriculture terraces constitute a significant element of the Mediterranean landscape, enabling crop production on steep slopes while protecting land from desertification. Despite their ecological and historical value, terrace cultivation is threatened by climate change leading to abandonment and further marginalization of arable land imposing serious environmental and community hazards. Re-cultivation of terraced landscapes could be an alternative strategy to mitigate the climate change impacts in areas of high vulnerability encouraging a sustainable agroecosystem to ensure food security, rural development and restrain land desertification. The article presents the case study of abandoned terrace re-cultivation in the Aegean Island of Andros, using a climate smart agriculture system, which involves the establishment of an extensive meteorological network to monitor the local climate and hydrometeorological forecasting. Along with terrace site mapping and soil profiling the perfomance of cereal and legume crops was assessed in a low-input agriculture system. The implementation of a land stewardship (LS) plan was indispensable to overcome mainly land fragmentation issues and to transfer know-how. It was found that climate data are key drivers for crop cultivation and production in the island rainfed farming system. The study revealed that terrace soil quality could be improved through cultivation to support food safety and stall land degradation. In line with global studies this research suggest that cultivation of marginal terraced land is timely through a climate smart agriculture system as a holistic approach to improve land quality and serve as means to combat climate change impacts. The study also discusses land management and policy approaches to address the issue of agricultural land abandonment and the benefits gained through cultivation to the local community, economy and environment protection and sustainability.

Download Full-text

Spatio-temporal vegetation dynamics and relationship with climate over East Africa

10.5194/hess-2016-502 ◽

2016 ◽

Cited By ~ 10

Author(s):

John Musau ◽

Sopan Patil ◽

Justin Sheffield ◽

Michael Marshall

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

East Africa ◽

Land Surface ◽

Global Climate ◽

Regional Climate ◽

Spatial Regression ◽

Climate Change Impacts ◽

Southern Ethiopia ◽

Area Index ◽

Vegetation Feedback

Abstract. Vegetation plays a key role in the global climate system via modification of the water and energy balance. Its coupling to climate is therefore important particularly in the tropics, where severe climate change impacts are expected. Vegetation growth is mutually controlled by temperature and water availability while it modifies regional climate through latent heat flux and changes in albedo. Consequently, understanding how projected climate change will impact vegetation and the forcing of vegetation on climate for various land cover types in East Africa is vital. This study provides an assessment of the vegetation trends in East Africa using Leaf Area Index (LAI) time series for the period 1982 to 2011, lead/lag correlation analysis between LAI and climate, a statistical estimation of vegetation feedback on climate using lagged covariance ratios as well as spatial regression analysis. Our results show few significant changes in current LAI trends though persistent declining vegetation trends are shown from Southern Ethiopia extending through Central Kenya into Central Tanzania. Precipitation (temperature) exerts widespread positive (negative) forcing on lagging vegetation except in forests. Positive correlations between the lagging Antecedent Precipitation Index (API) and LAI were dominant compared to temperature. Positive vegetation feedback on precipitation dominates across the region while a stronger negative forcing is exerted on Tmin compared to Tmax. Spatial dependence was also shown as a key component in the vegetation-climate interactions in the region. Given the vital role of land surface dynamics on local and regional climate, these results provide a valuable point of reference for evaluating the land-atmosphere coupling in the region.

Download Full-text

Spatiotemporal patterns of global land use change: Understanding processes and drivers

10.5194/egusphere-egu21-14471 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Karina Winkler ◽

Richard Fuchs ◽

Mark Rounsevell ◽

Martin Herold

Keyword(s):

Climate Change ◽

Land Use ◽

Land Use Change ◽

Land Surface ◽

Agricultural Land ◽

Spatiotemporal Patterns ◽

Sustainable Land Use ◽

Environmental Drivers ◽

Climate Mitigation ◽

Global Land

Land use change is a major contributor to greenhouse gas emissions and biodiversity loss and, hence, a key topic for current sustainability debates and climate change mitigation. To understand its impacts, accurate data of global land use change and an assessment of its extent, dynamics, causes and interrelations are crucial. However, although numerous observational data is publicly available (e.g. from remote sensing), the processes and drivers of land use change are not yet fully understood. In particular, current global-scale land change assessments still lack either temporal consistency, spatial explicitness or thematic detail. Here, we analyse the patterns of global land use change and its underlying drivers based on our novel high-resolution (~1x1 km) dataset of global land use/cover (LULC) change from 1960-2019, HILDA+ (Historic Land Dynamics Assessment+). The data harmonises multiple Earth Observation products and FAO land use statistics. It covers all transitions between six major LULC categories (urban areas, cropland, pasture/rangeland, forest, unmanaged grass-/shrubland and no/sparse vegetation). On this basis, we show (1) a classification of global LULC transitions into major processes of land use change, (2) a quantification of their spatiotemporal patterns and (3) an identification of their major socioeconomic and environmental drivers across the globe. By using temporal cross-correlation, we study the influence of selected drivers on processes such as agricultural land abandonment, deforestation, forest degradation or urbanisation. With this, we are able to map the patterns and drivers of global land use change at unprecedented resolution and compare them for different world regions. Giving new data-driven and quantitative insights into a largely untouched field, we identify tele-coupled globalisation patterns and climate change as important influencing factors for land use dynamics. Learning from the recent past, understanding how socio-economic and environmental factors affect the way humans use the land surface is essential for estimating future impacts of land use change and implementing measures of climate mitigation and sustainable land use policies.

Download Full-text