Climate change and conservation policies in Australia: coping with change that is far away and not yet certain

1994 ◽  
Vol 1 (4) ◽  
pp. 308 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lesley Hughes ◽  
Mark Westoby
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Native Species ◽  
Regional Scale ◽  
Natural Populations ◽  
Future Climate ◽  
Conservation Strategies ◽  
Conservation Policies ◽  
Temperature And Precipitation ◽  
Wait And See ◽  
Projected Changes

Projected changes in temperature and precipitation as a result of the enhanced greenhouse effect suggest that climatic zones could shift several hundred kilometres towards the poles and several hundred metres upwards in elevation over the next 50 years. The potential consequences of such changes for sustainability of natural populations are enormous due to both physiological stresses on individuals and changes in competitive regimes. Despite this, few positive policy initiatives have yet been undertaken in Australia to mitigate the changes for Australia's flora and fauna. Climate change is generally perceived as a distant problem and the uncertainties surrounding the magnitude and rate of changes, especially at a regional scale, have encouraged a wait-and-see approach. In this paper we summarize some of the likely consequences for Australia's native species and outline five directions in which vigorous action is needed within this decade if we are to ameliorate the effects of future climate changes. Four of the five directions are already recognized as important conservation strategies, and more vigorous action is a matter of overcoming political and administrative impediments. The fifth strategy is to transplant selected long-lived, habitat-structuring, plant species into their estimated future climate envelopes, beginning now in order to give them time to develop as future habitat. Such a transplantation programme implies deliberately creating novel species-mixtures, as well as increasing gene flow between related species that previously were geographically separated. While many conservationists will oppose such a transplantation programme, in the name of "community integrity", it is possible that the damage done by transplanting is likely to be less than the damage done by inaction. Among the purposes of this paper is to open a debate on the scientific issues relating to a transplantation programme, because it is now urgent to conduct that debate and to resolve it.

scholarly journals Projected Changes of Grassland Productivity along the Representative Concentration Pathways during 2010–2050 in China

2013 ◽  
Vol 2013 ◽  
pp. 1-9 ◽  
Author(s):  
Feng Wu ◽  
Xiangzheng Deng ◽  
Fang Yin ◽  
Yongwei Yuan
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Regional Scale ◽  
Grassland Management ◽  
Tibet Plateau ◽  
Climate System Model ◽  
Temperature And Precipitation ◽  
Grassland Productivity ◽  
Projected Changes ◽  
Economic Zones ◽  
The Relationship

The grassland is an important land use type that plays an important role in the ecosystem services supply in China. It is of great significance to the grassland management to determine the changing trend of grassland productivity and its response to climate change. Firstly, the relationship between grassland productivity and climate change, geographical conditions, and human activities was analyzed with the panel data of the whole China during 1980–2010 in this study. The result indicated that the temperature and precipitation were very important to grassland productivity at the national scale. Secondly, the grassland in China was divided into 7 grassland ecological-economic zones according to the ecosystem service function and climate characteristics. The relationship between grassland productivity and climate change was further analyzed at the regional scale. The result indicated that the temperature is more beneficial to the increase of the grassland productivity in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau and the Southwest Karst shrubland region. Thirdly, the increase of the temperature and precipitation can increase the grassland productivity and consequently relieve the pressure according to the climate factors of simulation with the community climate system model v4.0 (CCSM). However, the simulation result indicates that the human pressure on grasslands is still severe under the four RCPs scenarios and the grassland area would reduce sharply due to the conversion from the grassland to the cultivated land. What is more, there is still a great challenge to the increase of total grassland productivity in China.

Mediterranean climate change projections: an update from CMIP5 and CMIP6.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Josep Cos ◽  
Francisco J Doblas-Reyes ◽  
Martin Jury
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Hot Spot ◽  
Weighting Scheme ◽  
Temperature And Precipitation ◽  
High Emission ◽  
The Mediterranean ◽  
Model Ensembles ◽  
Projected Changes ◽  
Model Weighting

<p>The Mediterranean has been identified as a climate change hot-spot due to increased warming trends and precipitation decline. Recently, CMIP6 was found to show a higher climate sensitivity than its predecessor CMIP5, potentially further exacerbating related impacts on the Mediterranean region.</p><p>To estimate the impacts of the ongoing climate change on the region, we compare projections of various CMIP5 and CMIP6 experiments and scenarios. In particular, we focus on summer and winter changes in temperature and precipitation for the 21st century under RCP2.6/SSP1-2.6, RCP4.5/SSP2-4.5 and RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 as well as the high resolution HighResMIP experiments. Additionally, to give robust estimates of projected changes we apply a novel model weighting scheme, accounting for historical performance and inter-independence of the multi-member multi-model ensembles, using ERA5, JRA55 and WFDE5 as observational reference. </p><p>Our results indicate a significant and robust warming over the Mediterranean during the 21st century irrespective of the used ensemble and experiments. Nevertheless, the often attested amplified Mediterranean warming is only found for summer. The projected changes vary between the CMIP5 and CMIP6, with the latter projecting a stronger warming. For the high emission scenarios and without weighting, CMIP5 indicates a warming between 4 and 7.7ºC in summer and 2.7 and 5ºC in winter, while CMIP6 projects temperature increases between 5.6 and 9.2ºC in summer and 3.2 to 6.8ºC in winter until 2081-2100 in respect to 1985-2005. In contrast to temperature, precipitation changes show a higher level of uncertainty and spatial heterogeneity. However, for the high emission scenario, a robust decline in precipitation is projected for large parts of the Mediterranean during summer. First results applying the model weighting scheme indicate reductions in CMIP6 and increases in CMIP5 warming trends, thereby reducing differences between the two ensembles.</p>

scholarly journals Projected changes in temperature and precipitation over mainland Southeast Asia by CMIP6 models

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Supharatid ◽  
J. Nafung ◽  
T. Aribarg
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Coupled Model ◽  
Southwest Monsoon ◽  
Future Climate Change ◽  
Boreal Summer ◽  
Northeast Monsoon ◽  
Adaptation Measures ◽  
Mitigation And Adaptation ◽  
Temperature And Precipitation ◽  
Projected Changes

Abstract Five mainland SEA countries (Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Vietnam, and Thailand) are threatened by climate change. Here, the latest 18 Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6) is employed to examine future climate change in this region under two SSP-RCP (shared socioeconomic pathway-representative concentration pathway) scenarios (SSP2-4.5 and SSP5-8.5). The bias-corrected multi-model ensemble (MME) projects a warming (wetting) over Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Vietnam, and Thailand by 1.88–3.89, 2.04–4.22, 1.88–4.09, 2.03–4.25, and 1.90–3.96 °C (8.76–20.47, 12.69–21.10, 9.54–21.10, 13.47–22.12, and 7.03–15.17%) in the 21st century with larger values found under SSP5-8.5 than SSP2-4.5. The MME model displays approximately triple the current rainfall during the boreal summer. Overall, there are robust increases in rainfall during the Southwest Monsoon (3.41–3.44, 8.44–9.53, and 10.89–17.59%) and the Northeast Monsoon (−2.58 to 0.78, −0.43 to 2.81, and 2.32 to 5.45%). The effectiveness of anticipated climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies under SSP2-4.5 results in slowing down the warming trends and decreasing precipitation trends after 2050. All these findings imply that member countries of mainland SEA need to prepare for appropriate adaptation measures in response to the changing climate.

scholarly journals An update of IPCC climate reference regions for subcontinental analysis of climate model data: definition and aggregated datasets

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 2959-2970
Author(s):  
Maialen Iturbide ◽  
José M. Gutiérrez ◽  
Lincoln M. Alves ◽  
Joaquín Bedia ◽  
Ruth Cerezo-Mota ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Climate Model ◽  
Climate Adaptation ◽  
Regional Climate ◽  
Atmospheric Model ◽  
Future Climate Change ◽  
Intergovernmental Panel ◽  
Temperature And Precipitation ◽  
Scatter Plots ◽  
Projected Changes

Abstract. Several sets of reference regions have been used in the literature for the regional synthesis of observed and modelled climate and climate change information. A popular example is the series of reference regions used in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Special Report on Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Adaptation (SREX). The SREX regions were slightly modified for the Fifth Assessment Report of the IPCC and used for reporting subcontinental observed and projected changes over a reduced number (33) of climatologically consistent regions encompassing a representative number of grid boxes. These regions are intended to allow analysis of atmospheric data over broad land or ocean regions and have been used as the basis for several popular spatially aggregated datasets, such as the Seasonal Mean Temperature and Precipitation in IPCC Regions for CMIP5 dataset. We present an updated version of the reference regions for the analysis of new observed and simulated datasets (including CMIP6) which offer an opportunity for refinement due to the higher atmospheric model resolution. As a result, the number of land and ocean regions is increased to 46 and 15, respectively, better representing consistent regional climate features. The paper describes the rationale for the definition of the new regions and analyses their homogeneity. The regions are defined as polygons and are provided as coordinates and a shapefile together with companion R and Python notebooks to illustrate their use in practical problems (e.g. calculating regional averages). We also describe the generation of a new dataset with monthly temperature and precipitation, spatially aggregated in the new regions, currently for CMIP5 and CMIP6, to be extended to other datasets in the future (including observations). The use of these reference regions, dataset and code is illustrated through a worked example using scatter plots to offer guidance on the likely range of future climate change at the scale of the reference regions. The regions, datasets and code (R and Python notebooks) are freely available at the ATLAS GitHub repository: https://github.com/SantanderMetGroup/ATLAS (last access: 24 August 2020), https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3998463 (Iturbide et al., 2020).

Projecting future vegetation change for northeast China using CMIP6

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wei Yuan ◽  
Shuang-ye Wu ◽  
Shugui Hou
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Vegetation Change ◽  
Management Strategies ◽  
Future Climate ◽  
Future Climate Change ◽  
Vegetation Changes ◽  
Emission Scenarios ◽  
Climate Data ◽  
Climate Conditions ◽  
Temperature And Precipitation

<p>This study aims to establish future vegetation changes in the east and central of northern China (ECNC), an ecologically sensitive region in the transition zonal from humid monsoonal to arid continental climate. The region has experienced significant greening in the past several decades. However, few studies exist on how vegetation will change with future climate change, and great uncertainties exist due to complex, and often spatially non-stationary, relationships between vegetation and climate. In this study, we first used historical NDVI and climate data to model this spatially variable relationship with Geographically Weighted Logit Regression. We found that temperature and precipitation could explain, on average, 43% of NDVI variance, and they could be used to model NDVI fairly well. We then establish future climate change using the output of 11 CMIP6 models for the medium (SSP245) and high (SSP585) emission scenarios for the mid-century (2041-2070) and late-century (2071-2100). The results show that for this region, both temperature and precipitation will increase under both scenarios. By late-century under SSP585, precipitation is projected to increase by 25.12% and temperature is projected to increase 5.87<sup>o</sup>C in ECNC. Finally, we used future climate conditions as input for the regression models to project future vegetation (indicated by NDVI). We found that NDVI will increase under climate change. By mid-century, the average NDVI in ECNC will increase by 0.024 and 0.021 under SSP245 and SSP585. By late-century, it will increase by 0.016 and 0.006 under SSP245 and SSP585 respectively. Although NDVI is projected to increase, the magnitude of increase is likely to diminish with higher emission scenarios, possibly due to the benefit of precipitation increase being gradually encroached by the detrimental effects of temperature increase. Moreover, despite the overall NDVI increase, the area likely to suffer vegetation degradation will also expands, particularly in the western part of ECNC. With higher emissions and later into the century, region with low NDVI is likely to shift and/or expand north-forward. Our results could provide important information on possible vegetation changes, which could help to develop effective management strategies to ensure ecological and economic sustainability in the future.</p>

scholarly journals Locomotion of Slope Geohazards Responding to Climate Change in the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau and Its Adjacent Regions

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (19) ◽  
pp. 10488
Author(s):  
Yiru Jia ◽  
Jifu Liu ◽  
Lanlan Guo ◽  
Zhifei Deng ◽  
Jiaoyang Li ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Climatic Factors ◽  
High Sensitivity ◽  
Spatial Location ◽  
Future Climate ◽  
Tibet Plateau ◽  
The South ◽  
Climate Conditions ◽  
Temperature And Precipitation ◽  
Qinghai Tibet Plateau

Slope geohazards, which cause significant social, economic and environmental losses, have been increasing worldwide over the last few decades. Climate change-induced higher temperatures and shifted precipitation patterns enhance the slope geohazard risks. This study traced the spatial transference of slope geohazards in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau (QTP) and investigated the potential climatic factors. The results show that 93% of slope geohazards occurred in seasonally frozen regions, 2.6% of which were located in permafrost regions, with an average altitude of 3818 m. The slope geohazards are mainly concentrated at 1493–1988 m. Over time, the altitude of the slope geohazards was gradually increased, and the mean altitude tended to spread from 1984 m to 2562 m by 2009, while the slope gradient varied only slightly. The number of slope geohazards increased with time and was most obvious in spring, especially in the areas above an altitude of 3000 m. The increase in temperature and precipitation in spring may be an important reason for this phenomenon, because the results suggest that the rate of air warming and precipitation at geohazard sites increased gradually. Based on the observation of the spatial location, altitude and temperature growth rate of slope geohazards, it is noted that new geohazard clusters (NGCs) appear in the study area, and there is still a possibility of migration under the future climate conditions. Based on future climate forecast data, we estimate that the low-, moderate- and high-sensitivity areas of the QTP will be mainly south of 30° N in 2030, will extend to the south of 33° N in 2060 and will continue to expand to the south of 35° N in 2099; we also estimate that the proportion of high-sensitivity areas will increase from 10.93% in 2030 to 14.17% in 2060 and 17.48% in 2099.

scholarly journals Impact of Future Climate and Vegetation on the Hydrology of an Arctic Headwater Basin at the Tundra–Taiga Transition

2019 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 197-215 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sebastian A. Krogh ◽  
John W. Pomeroy
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Snow Accumulation ◽  
Future Climate ◽  
The Arctic ◽  
Climate Projections ◽  
Mean Annual Temperature ◽  
Permafrost Degradation ◽  
Blowing Snow ◽  
Projected Changes ◽  
The Impact

Abstract The rapidly warming Arctic is experiencing permafrost degradation and shrub expansion. Future climate projections show a clear increase in mean annual temperature and increasing precipitation in the Arctic; however, the impact of these changes on hydrological cycling in Arctic headwater basins is poorly understood. This study investigates the impact of climate change, as represented by simulations using a high-resolution atmospheric model under a pseudo-global-warming configuration, and projected changes in vegetation, using a spatially distributed and physically based Arctic hydrological model, on a small headwater basin at the tundra–taiga transition in northwestern Canada. Climate projections under the RCP8.5 emission scenario show a 6.1°C warming, a 38% increase in annual precipitation, and a 19 W m−2 increase in all-wave annual irradiance over the twenty-first century. Hydrological modeling results suggest a shift in hydrological processes with maximum peak snow accumulation increasing by 70%, snow-cover duration shortening by 26 days, active layer deepening by 0.25 m, evapotranspiration increasing by 18%, and sublimation decreasing by 9%. This results in an intensification of the hydrological regime by doubling discharge volume, a 130% increase in spring runoff, and earlier and larger peak streamflow. Most hydrological changes were found to be driven by climate change; however, increasing vegetation cover and density reduced blowing snow redistribution and sublimation, and increased evaporation from intercepted rainfall. This study provides the first detailed investigation of projected changes in climate and vegetation on the hydrology of an Arctic headwater basin, and so it is expected to help inform larger-scale climate impact studies in the Arctic.

Resilience or Vulnerability of the Rear-Edge Distributions of Pinus halepensis and Pinus pinaster Plantations Versus that of Natural Populations, under Climate-Change Scenarios

2019 ◽  
Vol 66 (2) ◽  
pp. 178-190 ◽  
Author(s):  
E Silvério ◽  
J Duque-Lazo ◽  
R M Navarro-Cerrillo ◽  
F Pereña ◽  
G Palacios-Rodríguez
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Pinus Pinaster ◽  
Potential Distribution ◽  
Pinus Halepensis ◽  
Natural Populations ◽  
Future Climate ◽  
Future Climate Change ◽  
Forest Plantations ◽  
Climate Change Scenarios ◽  
Natural Stands

Abstract It is predicted that changes in climate will lead to episodes of large forest decline and mortality. Therefore, the distributions of forest plantations and natural stands might already be facing such impacts. We selected the most arid zone of south-eastern Europe (eastern Andalusia) to assess how the distributions of Pinus halepensis Miller. and Pinus pinaster Aiton forest plantations and natural stands cope with climate change and to determine whether natural or planted distributions would be more stable under future climate-change scenarios. We used presence-point locations from natural distributions, obtained from the third Spanish National Forest Inventory, to develop ensemble species distribution models. The forecast predicted a slight increase in the potential distribution of both species by 2040, with a subsequent drastic decrease until 2099. Pinus halepensis had larger current and future potential distributions than P. pinaster but a slightly greater decrease with time in the potential distribution than that of P. pinaster. On the other hand, the natural and planted distributions of P. halepensis were more vulnerable to future climate change scenarios than those of P. pinaster. Natural populations will likely be more resilient to climate change than planted populations.

scholarly journals Evaluation of Climate Change Impacts on the Potential Distribution of Styrax sumatrana in North Sumatra, Indonesia

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 462
Author(s):  
Muhammad Hadi Saputra ◽  
Han Soo Lee
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Future Climate ◽  
Ex Situ ◽  
Conservation Strategies ◽  
Future Climate Change ◽  
Slope Aspect ◽  
Climate Change Scenarios ◽  
The Future ◽  
Suitable Area ◽  
North Sumatra

This study aims to assess the impact of climate change on the distribution of Styrax sumatrana in North Sumatra by applying the maximum entropy (MaxEnt) model with biophysical factors (elevation, slope, aspect, and soil), climatic factors (19 bioclimate data sets for 2050 and 2070), and anthropogenic factors (land use land cover (LULC) changes in 2050 and 2070). The future climate data retrieved and used are the output of four climate models from Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5), namely, the CCSM4, CNRM-CM5, MIROC5, and MRI-CGCM3 models, under the Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs) 4.5 and 8.5 scenarios. The MaxEnt modelling results showed the importance of the mean temperature of the coldest quarter and the LULC variables. Styrax sumatrana rely on environmental conditions with air temperatures ranging from 13 to 19 °C. The potentially suitable land types for Styrax sumatrana are shrubs, gardens, and forests. The future predictions show that the suitable habitat for Styrax sumatrana is predicted to decrease to 3.87% in 2050 and to 3.54% in 2070 under the RCP4.5 scenario. Under the RCP8.5 scenario, the suitable area is predicted to decrease to 3.04% in 2050 and to 1.36% in 2070, respectively. The degradation of the suitable area is mainly due to increasing temperature and deforestation in future predictions. The modelling results illustrate that the suitable habitats of Styrax sumatrana are likely to be reduced under future climate change scenarios or lost in 2070 under the RCP8.5 scenario. The potential future extinction of this species should alert authorities to formulate conservation strategies. Results also demonstrated key variables that should be used for formulating ex situ conservation strategies.

scholarly journals Monitoring the Responses of Deciduous Forest Phenology to 2000–2018 Climatic Anomalies in the Northern Hemisphere

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (14) ◽  
pp. 2806
Author(s):  
Kevin Bórnez ◽  
Aleixandre Verger ◽  
Adrià Descals ◽  
Josep Peñuelas
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Northern Hemisphere ◽  
Deciduous Forest ◽  
Regional Scale ◽  
The United States ◽  
Deciduous Forests ◽  
Area Index ◽  
Temperature And Precipitation ◽  
Phenological Metrics ◽  
The Impact

Monitoring the phenological responses of deciduous forests to climate is important, due to the increasing frequency and intensity of extreme climatic events associated with climate change and global warming, which will in turn affect vegetation seasonality. We investigated the spatiotemporal patterns of the response of deciduous forests to climatic anomalies in the Northern Hemisphere, using satellite-derived phenological metrics from the Copernicus Global Land Service Leaf Area Index, and multisource climatic datasets for 2000–2018 at resolutions of 0.1°. Thereafter, we assessed the impact of extreme heatwaves and droughts on this deciduous forest phenology. We assumed that changes in the deciduous forest phenology in the Northern Hemisphere for the period 2000–2018 were monotonic, and that temperature and precipitation were the main climatic drivers. Analyses of partial correlations of phenological metrics with the timing of the start of the season (SoS), end of the season (EoS), and climatic variables indicated that changes in preseason temperature played a stronger role than precipitation in affecting the interannual variability of SoS anomalies: the higher the temperature, the earlier the SoS in most deciduous forests in the Northern Hemisphere (mean correlation coefficient of –0.31). Correlations between the SoS and temperature were significantly negative in 57% of the forests, and significantly positive in 15% of the forests (P < 0.05). Both temperature and precipitation contributed to the advance and delay of the EoS. A later EoS was significantly correlated with a positive Standardized Precipitation Evapotranspiration Index (SPEI) at the regional scale (~30% of deciduous forests). The timings of the EoS and SoS shifted by > 20 d in response to heatwaves throughout most of Europe in 2003, and in the United States of America in 2012. This study contributes to improve our understanding of the phenological responses of deciduous forests in the Northern Hemisphere to climate change and extreme climate events.

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