Quantifying relations and similarities of the meteorological parameters among the weather stations in the Alberta Oil Sands region

Our objective was to quantify the similarity in the meteorological measurements of 17 stations under three weather networks in the Alberta oil sands region. The networks were for climate monitoring under the water quantity program (WQP) and air program, including Meteorological Towers (MT) and Edge Sites (ES). The meteorological parameters were air temperature (AT), relative humidity (RH), solar radiation (SR), barometric pressure (BP), precipitation (PR), and snow depth (SD). Among the various measures implemented for finding correlations in this study, we found that the use of Pearson’s coefficient (r) and absolute average error (AAE) would be sufficient. Also, we applied the percent similarity method upon considering at least 75% of the value in finding the similarity between station pairs. Our results showed that we could optimize the networks by selecting the least number of stations (for each network) to describe the measure-variability in meteorological parameters. We identified that five stations are sufficient for the measurement of AT, one for RH, five for SR, three for BP, seven for PR, and two for SD in the WQP network. For the MT network, six for AT, two for RH, six for SR, and four for PR, and the ES network requires six for AT, three for RH, six for SR, and two for BP. This study could potentially be critical to rationalize/optimize weather networks in the study area.

Canada climate plan will wrong-foot Conservatives

Significance The plan eyes net-zero emissions by 2050, under the Paris climate agreement, but risks further alienating Canada’s western, natural-resource-dependent provinces as well as rural Canadians and economic conservatives. The plan comes as Canada battles COVID-19 and ahead of an expected pre-term election in the coming months. Impacts Support for small-scale nuclear reactors will increase, particularly in areas currently reliant on diesel for most electricity. Petrol prices in rural Canada will rise, stirring discontent towards the Liberals. The northern Alberta oil sands’ decline will accelerate, meaning reduced investment and job losses. Canada-US action to put a sunset date on the future production of petrol-powered vehicles is possible.