Solar Radiation, Air Temperature, Relative Humidity, and Dew Point Study: Damak, Jhapa, Nepal

Monitoring and prediction of the climatic phenomenon are of keen interest in recent years because it has great influence in the lives of people and their environments. This paper is aimed at reporting the variation of daily and monthly solar radiation, air temperature, relative humidity (RH), and dew point over the year of 2013 based on the data obtained from the weather station situated in Damak, Nepal. The result shows that on a clear day, the variation of solar radiation and RH follows the Gaussian function in which the first one has an upward trend and the second one has a downward trend. However, the change in air temperature satisfies the sine function. The dew point temperature shows somewhat complex behavior. Monthly variation of solar radiation, air temperature, and dew point shows a similar pattern, lower at winter and higher in summer. Maximum solar radiation (331 Wm-2) was observed in May and minimum (170 Wm-2) in December. Air temperature and dew point had the highest value from June to September nearly at 29°C and 25°C, respectively. The lowest value of the relative humidity (55.4%) in April indicates the driest month of the year. Dew point was also calculated from the actual readings of air temperature and relative humidity using the online calculator, and the calculated value showed the exact linear relationship with the observed value. The diurnal and nocturnal temperature of each month showed that temperature difference was relatively lower (less than 10°C) at summer rather than in winter.

Anomaly technique for expression the Indian Ocean Dipole in South Java Sea

The longer period of time series of anomaly data was usually used to express the climatic phenomena. Even it is common, however, there were limited study discusses how powerful anomaly technique for understanding the climatic phenomena that occur in the period of time. The objective of this study is to understand the nature of anomaly, to identify an unusual fluctuation of data, and to detect the climate change impact to the Sea Surface Temperature (SST). The eleven years satellite Aqua Modis data and Dipole Mode Index were applied to this study. The raw data were averaged and removed seasonal trend using anomaly technique and then plotted to both MS Excel and Surfer ver. 6. The result shows that the monthly average of SST was indicated a seasonal/ sinusoidal pattern. Furthermore, anomaly analysis provides an unusual SST trend that has a direct impact on the climatic phenomenon as Indian Ocean Dipole. It is suggested that an anomaly technique may provide a good tool for expression unusual phenomena due to climate change.

STRATEGI ADAPTASI PERUBAHAN IKLIM PADA PETANI DATARAN TINGGI (Studi Petani di Dataran Tinggi Dieng, Kabupaten Banjarnegara)

<p>ABSTRACT<br />Climate change in the Dieng Plateau area is characterized into five local climatic phenomenon: (1) extreme rainfalls, (2) drought in agriculture, (3) hurricans, (4) extreme temperature, and (5) the unpredictable season. Farmers adaptation strategy towards those adverse impacts is identified by occupation of agriculture land. This land occupation also determines access to capital and intensity level of climate change vulnerability. If a farmer household occupies larger lands, so the access to capital is also more and the intensity level of climate change vulnerability becomes lower. On the contrary, smaller lands occupied leaves farmer households with low access to capital and high climate change vulnerability.<br />Keywords: climate change, adaptation strategy, vulnerability, farmer household</p><p>ABSTRAK<br />Perubahan iklim di Dataran Tinggi Dieng ditandai oleh lima fenomena iklim lokal yaitu: (1) curah hujan yang semakin ekstrem, (2) kekeringan yang melanda pertanian, (3) angin ribut, (4) suhu ekstrem, dan (5) musim yang sulit diprediksi. Strategi adaptasi untuk menghadapi kondisi iklim tersebut dilakukan oleh rumah tangga petani berdasarkan tingkat penguasaannya terhadap lahan pertanian. Luas lahan pertanian yang dikuasai oleh rumah tangga menentukan akses terhadap modal dan intensitas tingkat kerentanan terhadap perubahan iklim. Semakin luas lahan yang dikuasai oleh rumah tangga petani maka nilai akses terhadap modal relatif lebih tinggi dan tingkat kerentanannya terhadap perubahan iklim semakin rendah. Sebaliknya, Semakin luas lahan yang dikuasai oleh rumah tangga petani maka nilai akses terhadap modal akan semakin rendah dan tingkat kerentanannya terhadap perubahan iklim semakin tinggi.<br />Kata kunci: perubahan iklim, strategi adaptasi, kerentanan, rumah tangga petani</p>

Snakebites are associated with poverty, weather fluctuations, and El Niño

Snakebites are environmental and occupational health hazards that mainly affect rural populations worldwide. The ectothermic nature of snakes raises the issue of how climate change’s impact on snake ecology could influence the incidence of snakebites in humans in ways that echo the increased predation pressure of snakes on their prey. We thus ask whether snakebites reported in Costa Rica from 2005 to 2013 were associated with meteorological fluctuations. We emphasize El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO), a climatic phenomenon associated with cycles of other neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) in the region and elsewhere. We ask how spatial heterogeneity in snakebites and poverty are associated, given the importance of the latter for NTDs. We found that periodicity in snakebites reflects snake reproductive phenology and is associated with ENSO. Snakebites are more likely to occur at high temperatures and may be significantly reduced after the rainy season. Nevertheless, snakebites cluster in Costa Rican areas with the heaviest rainfall, increase with poverty indicators, and decrease with altitude. Altogether, our results suggest that snakebites might vary as a result of climate change.

Fuzzy Clustering-Based Ensemble Approach to Predicting Indian Monsoon

Indian monsoon is an important climatic phenomenon and a global climatic marker. Both statistical and numerical prediction schemes for Indian monsoon have been widely studied in literature. Statistical schemes are mainly based on regression or neural networks. However, the variability of monsoon is significant over the years and a single model is often inadequate. Meteorologists revise their models on different years based on prevailing global climatic incidents like El-Niño. These indices often have degree of severity associated with them. In this paper, we cluster the monsoon years based on their fuzzy degree of associativity to these climatic event patterns. Next, we develop individual prediction models for the year clusters. A weighted ensemble of these individual models is used to obtain the final forecast. The proposed method performs competitively with existing forecast models.

Fog Collection by Mimicking Nature

Research on fog harvesting for drinking water is uncommon because it is not a continuous climatic phenomenon and concerns only arid and semi-arid regions abundant with fog. This paper proposes a new biomimetic-inspired method of harvesting fog by mimicking the skin of the Namib desert beetle. Stainless steel mesh panels are subjected to ultra shortening and annealing to create a hierarchical nano/micro hybrid surface, and an emulsion of PTFE, polyvinyl acetate and sodium benzene sulfonate is sprayed over the steel mesh. This produces hydrophilic nano/micro mounts and hydrophobic troughs. This method, although initially costly, offers a sustainable fog collecting system which can be adopted for arid and semi-arid regions of Pakistan and other similar regions.

Drought in the sertão as a natural or social phenomenon: establishing the Inspetoria Federal de Obras Contra as Secas, 1909-1923

This paper examines interpretations of the drought problem in Brazil's northeast sertão during the First Republic. It compares analysis of drought as primarily a natural or climatic phenomenon - embraced by civil engineers working for the Inspetoria [Federal] de Obras Contra as Secas (IFOCS) - with analyses emphasizing social and political conditions that made drought a crisis for the sertanejo poor. The latter are evident in the report of doctors Belisário Penna and Artur Neiva describing their expedition through the sertão sponsored by IFOCS in 1912. This comparison allows for consideration of the intersection between natural (geographic, climatic) and social (political, cultural) factors that produced the region's periodic crisis. The analysis is informed by the work of social scientists who highlight the multi-dimensional causes underlying natural disasters in politically marginal communities. Technocrats' faith in the context-independent utility of their expertise lay at the heart of IFOCS's ultimate failure to rescue sertanejos from famine, migration and poverty. Because the drought agency's technical personnel never had the political will or muscle to confront the social organization underlying the sertão's recurrent calamity, their ability to alleviate the human suffering that droughts precipitated was severely limited.

Temperature conditions on July 2007 as extreme climatic phenomenon in Serbia

According to other parts of the world extreme climatic phenomenon have passed beside Serbia. However, some of them appeared in our country. Beside extreme climatic phenomenon, extreme climatic seasons have great significance for geographic environment. During the 2007 July was has had high temperatures long lasted. The absolute maximal temperature has been achieved in Serbia. In Smederevska Palanka was registered 44.9?C. Those events deserves great scientific attention. in this paper we have considered in detailed those temperature conditions as unsuitable climatic phenomenon, especially in relation to range of extremity of temperature in Serbia.

Precipitation as adverse climatic phenomenon in Negotin

Climatology is traditionally connected to different conditions of the atmosphere. However, many occurrences appear from time to time. Those occurrences are defined as extreme. Nowadays it is important to study extreme occurrences for every geographical area. In this paper we have investigated one segment of extreme climatic conditions in Eastern part of Serbia - adverse characteristics of precipitation. Data for Negotin were analyzed, as a representative of the climate in this area. Extreme values of precipitation in one place were taken as dangerous occurrences. We have calculated thresholds above which we consider daily amount of precipitation as dangerous. Thresholds for dangerous lengths of rainy and droughty periods were calculated, too.