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New research, December 11-17, 2017

Posted on 21 December 2017 by Ari Jokimäki

A selection of new climate related research articles is shown below.

The figure is from paper #4.

Climate change

1. The Response of Ice Sheets to Climate Variability

"Resulting oscillations in grounded ice volume amplitude is shown to grow as a nonlinear function of ocean forcing period. This implies that slower oscillations in climatic forcing are disproportionately important to ice sheets. The ice shelf residence time offers a critical time scale, above which the ice response amplitude is a linear function of ocean forcing period and below which it is quadratic. These results highlight the sensitivity of West Antarctic ice streams to perturbations in heat fluxes occurring at decadal time scales."

2. Attributable human-induced changes in the likelihood and magnitude of the observed extreme precipitation during Hurricane Harvey

"We find that human-induced climate change likely increased the chances of the observed precipitation accumulations during Hurricane Harvey in the most affected areas of Houston by a factor of at least 3.5. Further, precipitation accumulations in these areas were likely increased by at least 18.8% (best estimate of 37.7%), which is larger than the 6-7% associated with an attributable warming of 1° C in the Gulf of Mexico and Clausius-Clapeyron scaling."

3. Global land surface air temperature dynamics since 1880

"For the period of 1901–2010, the warming trend was found to be 0.109 °C decade−1 with 95% confidence intervals between 0.081 °C and 0.137 °C. Additionally, warming exhibited different spatial patterns in different periods. In the early 20th century (1923–1950), warming occurred mainly in the mid-high latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere, whereas in the most recent decades (1977–2014), warming was more spatially extensive across the global land surface."

4. Rainfall over the African continent from the 19th through the 21st century

"• Around 1968 a change to more arid conditions occurred in the Sahel and North Africa.

For the continent as a whole more arid conditions began in the 1980s.
In equatorial regions, the boreal spring has become drier and the boreal autumn wetter."

5. Evolving Understanding of Antarctic Ice-Sheet Physics and Ambiguity in Probabilistic Sea-Level Projections

"Without protective measures, revised median RSL projections would by 2100 submerge land currently home to 153 million people, an increase of 44 million."

6. Timescales of AMOC decline in response to fresh water forcing

7. Global mean sea-level rise in a world agreed upon in Paris

8. Long-term drainage reduces CO2 uptake and CH4 emissions in a Siberian permafrost ecosystem

9. Greenland Ice Sheet Surface Melt and Its Relation to Daily Atmospheric Conditions

10. Ice stream slowdown will drive long-term thinning of the Ross Ice Shelf, with or without ocean warming

11. Glaciological settings and recent mass balance of Blåskimen Island in Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica

12. Quantifying the Sensitivity of Sea Level Change in Coastal Localities to the Geometry of Polar Ice Mass Flux

13. Surface lowering of the debris-covered area of Kanchenjunga Glacier in the eastern Nepal Himalaya since 1975, as revealed by Hexagon KH-9 and ALOS satellite observations

14. Surge-type glaciers in Karakoram Mountain and possible catastrophes alongside a portion of the Karakoram Highway

15. Snowmelt response to simulated warming across a large elevation gradient, southern Sierra Nevada, California

16. Attribution of extreme rainfall from Hurricane Harvey, August 2017

17. Potential For Changing Extreme Snowmelt And Rainfall Events in the Mountains of the Western United States

18. A continuum model for meltwater flow through compacting snow

19. Decrease of tropical cyclone genesis frequency in the western North Pacific since 1960s

20. Impacts of SST patterns on rapid intensification of Typhoon Megi (2010)

21. On the dynamics of Austral heat-waves

22. Heat wave exposure in India in current, 1.5 °C, and 2.0 °C worlds

23. Synoptic characteristics, atmospheric controls, and long-term changes of heat waves over the Indochina Peninsula

24. Evaluation of six indices for monitoring agricultural drought in the south-central United States

25. Changes in the Mechanisms Causing Rapid Drought Cessation in the Southeastern United States of America

26. Climate change enhances the severity and variability of drought in the Pearl River Basin in South China in the 21st century

27. Spatio-temporal variability and trends of precipitation and extreme rainfall events in Ethiopia in 1980–2010

28. Time of observation adjustments to daily station precipitation may introduce undesired statistical issues

29. Unraveling the Role of Temperature and Rainfall on Active Fires in the Brazilian Amazon Using a Nonlinear Poisson Model

30. Role of latent heating over the tropical western Pacific in surface temperature change over North America during Boreal Spring

31. The character and causes of elevation-dependent warming in high-resolution simulations of Rocky Mountain climate change

32. Storm wave clustering around New Zealand and its connection to climatic patterns

33. Spatial and temporal trends of dust storms across desert regions of Iran

34. The diversity of cloud responses to twentieth-century sea surface temperatures

35. On effective radiative forcing of partial internally and externally mixed aerosols and their effects on global climate

36. Strong dependence of U.S. summertime air quality on the decadal variability of Atlantic sea surface temperatures

37. What drove the Pacific and North America climate anomalies in winter 2014/15?

38. Sixty years of radiocarbon dioxide measurements at Wellington, New Zealand: 1954–2014

39. Reconciliation of top-down and bottom-up CO2 fluxes in Siberian larch forest

40. What controls the atmospheric methane seasonal variability over India?

41. Effects of El Niño on summertime ozone air quality in the eastern United States

Climate change impacts

42. Climate warming is associated with smaller body size and shorter lifespans in moose near their southern range limit

"In particular, we document: (i) a trend of increasing winter temperatures and concurrent decline in skull size (decline of 19% for males and 13% for females) and (ii) a negative correlation between skull size and winter temperatures during the first year of life. These patterns could be plausibly interpreted as an adaptive phenotypic response to climate warming given that latitudinal/temperature clines are often accepted as evidence of adaptation to local climate. However, we also observed: (iii) that moose with smaller skulls had shorter lifespans, (iv) a reduction in lifespan over the 4-decade study period, and (v) a negative relationship between lifespan and winter temperatures during the first year of life. Those observations indicate that this phenotypic change is not an adaptive response to climate change. However, this decline in lifespan was not accompanied by an obvious change in population dynamics, suggesting that climate change may affect population dynamics and life-histories differently."

43. Evidence for declining forest resilience to wildfires under climate change

"Results highlight significant decreases in tree regeneration in the 21st century. Annual moisture deficits were significantly greater from 2000 to 2015 as compared to 1985–1999, suggesting increasingly unfavourable post-fire growing conditions, corresponding to significantly lower seedling densities and increased regeneration failure. Dry forests that already occur at the edge of their climatic tolerance are most prone to conversion to non-forests after wildfires."

44. Assessment of climate variability and trend on wheat productivity in West Bengal, India: crop growth simulation approach

"District average yield of wheat varied from 1757 kg ha−1 at Jalpaiguri to 2421 kg ha−1at Birbhum. The actual yield trend ranged from − 4.7 kg ha−1 year−1 at Nadia to 32.8 kg ha−1 year−1 at Birbhum. Decreasing trend of potential yield was observed in Terai (Jalpaiguri), New Alluvial Zone (Nadia) and Coastal saline zone (South 24 Parganas), which is alarming for food security in West Bengal."

45. Thermal comfort in urban open spaces: Objective assessment and subjective perception study in tropical city of Bhopal, India

46. A synthesis of barriers to and enablers of pro-poor climate change adaptation in four South African municipalities

47. Africa's urban adaptation transition under a 1.5° climate

48. Planning for adaptation to climate change: exploring the climate science-to-practice disconnect

49. Impacts of climate change on rice production in Africa and causes of simulated yield changes

50. Adaption to climate change: a case study of two agricultural systems from Kenya

51. Contribution of crop model structure, parameters and climate projections to uncertainty in climate change impact assessments

52. Observed and predicted impacts of climate change on the estuaries of south-western Australia, a Mediterranean climate region

53. Climate-driven diversity change in annual grasslands: drought plus deluge does not equal normal

54. Shifted energy fluxes, increased Bowen ratios, and reduced thaw depths linked with drainage-induced changes in permafrost ecosystem structure

55. Concomitant impacts of climate change, fragmentation and non-native species have led to reorganization of fish communities since the 1980s

56. Larger temperature response of autumn leaf senescence than spring leaf-out phenology

57. Variations in the temperature sensitivity of spring leaf phenology from 1978 to 2014 in Mudanjiang, China

58. Earlier leaf-flushing suppressed ecosystem productivity by draining soil water in the Mongolian Plateau

59. Contrasting responses of grassland water and carbon exchanges to climate change between Tibetan Plateau and Inner Mongolia

60. Asymmetric responses of the end of growing season to daily maximum and minimum temperatures on the Tibetan Plateau

61. No consistent evidence for advancing or delaying trends in spring phenology on the Tibetan Plateau

62. Calling phenology of a diverse amphibian assemblage in response to meteorological conditions

63. Estimating aboveground live understory vegetation carbon in the United States

Climate change mitigation

64. United States non-cooperation and the Paris agreement

"We argue that US non-cooperation does not fundamentally alter US emissions, which are unlikely to rise even in the absence of new federal climate policies. Nor does it undermine nationally determined contributions under pledge and review, as the Paris Agreement has introduced a new logic of domestically driven climate policies and the cost of low-carbon technologies keeps falling."

65. The Paris warming targets: emissions requirements and sea level consequences

"For an eventual 2 °C warming target, this could be achieved even if CO2 emissions remained positive. For a 1.5 °C target, CO2 emissions could remain positive, but only if a substantial and long-lasting temperature overshoot is accepted. In both cases, a warming overshoot of 0.2 to 0.4 °C appears unavoidable. If the allowable (or unavoidable) overshoot is small, then negative emissions are almost certainly required for the 1.5 °C target, peaking at negative 1.3 GtC/year. In this scenario, temperature stabilization occurs, but cumulative emissions continue to increase, contrary to a common belief regarding the relationship between temperature and cumulative emissions. Changes to the Paris Agreement to accommodate the overshoot possibility are suggested. For sea level rise, tipping points that might lead to inevitable collapse of Antarctic ice sheets or shelves might be avoided for the 2 °C target (for major ice shelves) or for the 1.5 °C target for the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. Even with the 1.5 °C target, however, sea level will continue to rise at a substantial rate for centuries."

66. Global Energy Consumption in a Warming Climate

"Almost all continents experience increases in energy demand, driven by the commercial and industrial sectors. In Europe declines in energy use by residences drive an overall reduction in aggregate final energy. Energy use increases in almost all G20 economies located in the tropics, while outside of Europe G20 countries in temperate regions experience both increasing and declining total energy use, depending on the incidence of changes in the frequency of hot and cold days. The effect of climate change is regressive, with the incidence of increased energy demand overwhelmingly falling on low- and middle-income countries, raising the question whether climate change could exacerbate energy poverty."

67. Simulated effect of carbon cycle feedback on climate response to solar geoengineering

"By year 2100, solar geoengineering reduces the burden of atmospheric CO2 by 47 PgC with enhanced carbon storage in the terrestrial biosphere. As a result of reduced atmospheric CO2, consideration of the carbon cycle feedback reduces required insolation reduction in 2100 from 2.0 to 1.7 W m-2. With a higher climate sensitivity the effect from carbon cycle feedback becomes more important."

68. Co-benefits of greenhouse gas mitigation: a review and classification by type, mitigation sector, and geography

"We find that the co-benefits from GHG mitigation that have received the largest attention of researchers are impacts on ecosystems, economic activity, health, air pollution, and resource efficiency. The co-benefits that have received the least attention include the impacts on conflict and disaster resilience, poverty alleviation (or exacerbation), energy security, technological spillovers and innovation, and food security. Most research has investigated co-benefits from GHG mitigation in the agriculture, forestry and other land use (AFOLU), electricity, transport, and residential sectors, with the industrial sector being the subject of significantly less research."

69. Do perceptions of international climate policy stimulate or discourage voluntary climate protection activities? A study of German and US households

"The econometric analyses provide suggestive evidence that higher perceived justification and effectiveness of international climate policy crowd in voluntary individual climate protection activities in the US and Germany. In both countries, these activities are also positively related to the warm glow indicator, confirming that feelings which go beyond pure altruism help explain individual voluntary climate protection efforts. For the German (but not the US) sample, the effect of warm glow is stronger when international climate policy is believed to be ineffective."

70. Community resilience for a 1.5 °C world

71. Local governments as drivers for societal transformation: towards the 1.5 °C ambition

72. Is Trade in Permits Good for the Environment?

73. Optimal Climate Policy for a Pessimistic Social Planner

74. Austrian climate policies and GHG-emissions since 1990: What is the role of climate policy integration?

75. Empirical calibration of climate policy using corporate solvency: a case study of the UK’s carbon price support

76. Carbon management at the household level: a definition of carbon literacy and three mechanisms that increase it

77. Challenges in financing public sector low-carbon initiatives: lessons from private finance for a school district in British Columbia, Canada

78. Inequality, poverty, and the carbon intensity of human well-being in the United States: a sex-specific analysis

79. Climate Change in the Media: Poland’s Exceptionalism

80. The potential influence of the carbon market on clean technology innovation in China

81. Strategies for the utilization of alternative fuels in the cement industry

82. Potential air quality benefits from increased solar photovoltaic electricity generation in the Eastern United States

83. Rooftop solar photovoltaic potential in cities: how scalable are assessment approaches?

84. Exploring optimal mitigation and adaptation investment strategies in China

Other papers

85. Geographic evidence of the early anthropogenic hypothesis

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