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According to an analysis released on December 4 by the Global Carbon Project, an international collaboration of scientists, "emissions rose 5.9% in 2010 ... almost certainly the largest absolute jump in any year since the Industri...
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According to an analysis released on December 4 by the Global Carbon Project, an international collaboration of scientists, "emissions rose 5.9% in 2010 ... almost certainly the largest absolute jump in any year since the Industrial Revolution, and the largest percentage increase since 2003. The increase solidified a trend of ever-rising emissions that scientists fear will make it difficult, if not impossible, to forestall severe climate change in coming decades. The researchers said the high growth rate reflected a bounce-back from the 1.4% drop in emissions in 2009, the year the recession had its biggest impact.
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There is general agreement that changes in the frequency or intensity of extreme weather and climate events are likely to have profound impacts on society and the environment (Karl et al., 1997). A Workshop on Indices and Indicato...
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There is general agreement that changes in the frequency or intensity of extreme weather and climate events are likely to have profound impacts on society and the environment (Karl et al., 1997). A Workshop on Indices and Indicators for Climate Extremes was held in Asheville, North Carolina, 3-6 June 1997, to encourage the development of data sets, and analysis techniques, to determine whether such extreme events are becoming more extreme or variable. Over 100 participants, from 23 countries, including representatives from 15 insurance and re-insurance countries (which have a clear interest in extreme weather and climate), examined the following questions.
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In June Charles Clover reported in The Times that the National Farmers'Union had deferred to a proposal by the EU Commission President that Pillar II agri-environment schemes be abolished. This was, Clover opined, a betrayal of al...
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In June Charles Clover reported in The Times that the National Farmers'Union had deferred to a proposal by the EU Commission President that Pillar II agri-environment schemes be abolished. This was, Clover opined, a betrayal of all those farmers who had enlisted in Higher Level Stewardship schemes to bring back or at least stem the loss of biodiversity on farmland. However, groups such as the RSPB campaigned strongly on what they saw as a 'disaster for wildlife, especially in the uplands' and the proposal was withdrawn.
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In this paper, the influence of climate variability and change on the environment was studied over southern Africa using ground-based and remotely sensed data. A time series analysis of rainfall and temperature anomalies indicated...
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In this paper, the influence of climate variability and change on the environment was studied over southern Africa using ground-based and remotely sensed data. A time series analysis of rainfall and temperature anomalies indicated that there was a high rainfall and temperature variability in the region. The influence of global teleconnections on rainfall patterns over southern Africa showed that in some areas there was a spatial variation in their strength, increasing from west to east. Maps of NDVI, from 1982 to 2004, showed that changes in vegetation cover were more apparent during the dry season than during the wet season. The study also revealed that climate variability and change are linked to decreasing rainfall and hence, decreasing regional water resources and biodiversity and increasing environmental degradation. With the regional population expected increase, this depletion of resources poses the greatest regional environmental challenge to humankind.
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Global temperatures have increased at a historically unprecedented pace. This paper finds that the negative effect of temperature on output in countries with hot climates runs through reduced investment, depressed labor productivi...
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Global temperatures have increased at a historically unprecedented pace. This paper finds that the negative effect of temperature on output in countries with hot climates runs through reduced investment, depressed labor productivity, poorer human health, and lower agricultural and industrial output. We find that hot low-income countries suffer the largest costs. In a median lowincome country, aggregate output is about 2 percent lower and investment is about 10 percent lower seven years after a 1 degree increase in average annual temperature. We also find that economic development, in general, helps to shield countries from temperature shocks, with hot regions in high-income countries on average sustaining less economic damage from rising temperatures than hot regions in low-income countries.
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AMMA - the African Monsoon Multidisciplinary Analysis - is the biggest programme of research into environment and climate ever attempted in Africa. AMMA has involved a comprehensive field experiment bringing together ocean, land a...
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AMMA - the African Monsoon Multidisciplinary Analysis - is the biggest programme of research into environment and climate ever attempted in Africa. AMMA has involved a comprehensive field experiment bringing together ocean, land and atmospheric measurements, on time-scales ranging from hourly and daily variability up to the changes in seasonal activity over a number of years. Many of the publications in this special issue make use of subsets of the AMMA measurements, collected from a diverse set of sensors. As a general introduction to the special issue, this paper provides a comprehensive overview of the AMMA observational programme, and summarises the scientific strategy which has defined the field deployment. The relationship between the existingobservational monitoring networks of the region and the new sensors deployed for AMMA, and for the future, is described. Making use of regional and sub-regional maps, the main groups of sensors are described in terms of their deployment periods and their spatial co-ordination. The key linkages between different groups of measurements are also outlined, in terms of the strategy for their combined use and in terms of their interdependence. Some brief summaries of conditions sampled during the three yearsof the AMMA Extended Observing Period are also given.
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The urban morphology has impacts on the urban thermal environment, which has drawn extensive attention, especially in metropolitan regions with intensive populations and high building densities. This study explored the relationshi...
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The urban morphology has impacts on the urban thermal environment, which has drawn extensive attention, especially in metropolitan regions with intensive populations and high building densities. This study explored the relationship between the urban morphology and spatial variation of land surface temperature (LST) in Wuhan by using the local climate zone (LCZ) and seven natural and social factors. A deep learning model (light LCZ model) was used to generate LCZ map in Wuhan, and a geographic detector model was utilized to explore the driving mechanism of LST spatial differentiation. The results show that the LST difference between LCZ classes in summer is greater than that in winter, and the LST of the built-up classes (LCZ 1–10) are significantly higher than that of the vegetation classes in summer. Among the six residential building classes (i.e., LCZ 1–6), LCZ 1 is characterized by compact and high buildings and has the largest average LST. Building density and height have a warming effect, and the building density has a stronger effect than the height. Compared with other natural and social factors, LCZ has the largest explanatory power for LST spatial differentiation in the main urban area and surrounding areas of Wuhan, with explanatory power (q) values reaching 0.660 (summer) and 0.316 (winter). The types of interaction for all pairwise cases are mutual and nonlinear. The strongest interaction is MNDWI-NDBI combination (0.780) in summer and LCZ-NDBI combination (0.460) in winter.
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Occupant behaviour (OB) is impacted by several interdisciplinary factors: environmental, psychosocial, cultural and economic. One of these impacting factors is the climate. In this study, the patterns of OB interactions with heati...
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Occupant behaviour (OB) is impacted by several interdisciplinary factors: environmental, psychosocial, cultural and economic. One of these impacting factors is the climate. In this study, the patterns of OB interactions with heating, cooling, lighting, equipment, windows and shading collected in questionnaire surveys were used as input data in the simulation models of two university buildings. The buildings, a green-rated and a non-rated one, are in Western Sydney University in Sydney, Australia. Then, the models were simulated in eight different climate zones in Australia. Therefore, this research aimed to understand how different climate zones may impact the energy related to OB and compare this impact between a green-rated building and a building without any rating. The results showed that there is no correlation between climate and OB and the levels of discomfort are related to the cooling season. The green building is less subjected to external changes, indicating that in buildings with automatic and properly controlled centralised management systems, the impacts related to the misuse of energy due to OB would be almost irrelevant. The results of this study should not be extended to other occupant behavioural patterns or situations. The results should be confined within the present research and context.
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