From Roger Pielke Sr.
New Paper “Impacts Of Land Use Land Cover Change On Climate And Future Research Priorities” By Mahmood Et Al 2009
We have a new multi-authored paper that has been accepted. This paper illustrates the breadth and diversity of scientists who have concluded that land use/land cover change is a first order climate forcing.
The paper is
Mahmood, R., R.A. Pielke Sr., K.G. Hubbard, D. Niyogi, G. Bonan, P. Lawrence, B. Baker, R. McNider, C. McAlpine, A. Etter, S. Gameda, B. Qian, A. Carleton, A. Beltran-Przekurat, T. Chase, A.I. Quintanar, J.O. Adegoke, S. Vezhapparambu, G. Conner, S. Asefi, E. Sertel, D.R. Legates, Y. Wu, R. Hale, O.W. Frauenfeld, A. Watts, M. Shepherd, C. Mitra, V.G. Anantharaj, S. Fall,R. Lund, A. Nordfelt, P. Blanken, J. Du, H.-I. Chang, R. Leeper, U.S. Nair, S. Dobler, R. Deo, and J. Syktus,
2009: Impacts of land use land cover change on climate and future research priorities (PDF). Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., accepted.
The paper starts with the text
“Human activities have modified the environment for thousands of years. Significant population increase, migration, and accelerated socio-economic activities have intensified these environmental changes over the last several centuries. The climate impacts of these changes have been found in local, regional, and global trends in modern atmospheric temperature records and other relevant climatic indicators.”
In our conclusions, we write
“It is the regional responses, not a global average, that produce drought, floods and other societally important climate impacts.”
as well as make the following recommendations
“we recommend, as a start, to assess three new climate metrics:
1. The magnitude of the spatial redistribution of land surface latent and sensible heating (e.g., see Chase et al. 2000; Pielke et al. 2002). The change in these fluxes into the atmosphere will result in the alteration of a wide variety of climate variables including the locations of major weather features. For example, Takata et al. (2009) demonstrated the major effect of land use change during the period 1700-1850 on the Asian monsoon. As land cover change accelerated after 1850 and continues into the future, LULCC promises to continue to alter the surface pattern of sensible and latent heat input to the atmosphere.
2. The magnitude of the spatial redistribution of precipitation and moisture convergence (e.g., Pielke and Chase 2003). In response to LULCC, the boundaries of regions of wet and dry climates can change, thereby affecting the likelihood for floods and drought. This redistribution can occur not only from the alterations in the patterns of surface sensible and latent heat, but also due to changes in surface albedo and aerodynamic roughness (e.g., see Pitman et al. 2004; Nair et al. 2007).
3. The normalized gradient of regional radiative heating changes. Since it is the horizontal gradient of layer-averaged temperatures that force wind circulations, the alteration in these temperatures from any human climate forcing will necessarily alter these circulations. In the evaluation of the human climate effect from aerosols, for example, Matsui and Pielke (2006) found that, in terms of the gradient of atmospheric radiative heating, the role of human inputs was 60 times greater than the role of the human increase in the well-mixed greenhouse gases. Thus, this aerosol effect has a much more significant role on the climate than is inferred when using global average metrics. We anticipate a similar large effect from LULCC. Feddema et al. (2005), for example, have shown that global averages mask the impacts on regional temperature and precipitation changes. The above climate metrics can be monitored using observed data within model calculations such as completed by Matsui and Pielke (2006) for aerosols, as well as by using reanalyses products, such as performed by Chase et al (2000) with respect to the spatial pattern of lower tropospheric heating and cooling. They should also be calculated as part of future IPCC and other climate assessment multi-decadal climate model simulations.”
We also write
“With respect to surface air temperatures, for example, there needs to be an improved quantification of the biases and uncertainties in multi-decadal temperature trends, which remain inadequately evaluated in assessment reports such as from the Climate Change Science Program (CCSP 2006). We also recommend that independent committees (perhaps sponsored by the National Science Foundation) conduct these assessments.”
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Personal note: I am in the list of authors. I had an equal role with the other co-authors, resulting in the first climate science publication for which I am listed as an author. Note the sections in the PDF speaking of the issues with USHCN. – Anthony
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“Global warming, Ozone depletion, the loss of living species, deforestation-they all have a common cause: the new relationship between human civilization and the earth’s natural balance”
Al Gore’s “Earth in the balance”
The only problem with this statement is that there is NO natural balance on earth. There are swings one way and another, each swing being affected by a myriad different factors which, in themselves, are varying all the time. There has NEVER been stasis on earth.
REPLY: Large cities make effects on local weather, such as UHI induced downwind convection and rain shadows. – Anthony
I have done some rough calculations and would say that the UHI effect from large cities can in some circumstances be regional rather than just local. But I suppose it depends on how you define regional/local.
If the city is included by a basin, it would be regional. If the city is not included by a basin, it would be local.
Some cities have advanced into basins and the results have been significant deficiencies of resources from the host basin.
Nogw (09:08:56) :
Andre (08:43:56) :
Just another human’s crime before mother Nature, “we have to do something about”, much like AGW, ozon holes and so on.
It is very easy, there are several euthanasia methods for you to use, in case you need to sincerely cooperate in population reduction. If you take that decision there will be one less polluting being damaging our environment. Don’t you think so?
It was joke, sir. I’ll show ‘sarcasm’ next time.
Anthony,
Thanks for all your hard work. I’m very excited to see the Surface stations project when completed.
George E. Smith (10:49:05) : “I gather the bottom line is that humans and other alien creatures are bad for gaia.”
But aren’t we Gaia’s only chance to defend herself from asteroid impacts (after we’ve grown up a little)?
You da’ (published) man, Anthony!
Congratulations Anthony on your first paper with many more to come. I note that this is an essay which points to additional research on land use effects which is an important element of observed warming.
I recall reading the paper by John Christy at Univ of Alabama Huntsville several years ago which I see you quoted in this paper. Christy showed how land use in the California central valley affected temperatures, especially at night.
WUWT now has the cachet of being run by a peer reviewed author just like Steve McIntyre at Climate Audit.
I look forward to laughing at claims that A. Watts is not a climate researcher, that he’s a geography researcher.
Cool!
😉
Yes, deliberate… Don’t hit!…
Andrew P (00:19:41) :
So you’re responsible for the Griffin forest then?
Yes – partly! 11,000 acres planted over about 3 or 4 years from 1980 to 1984 and about 90% Sitka Spruce. Me and a couple of mates (‘Big’ Ian Cameron, a Billy Connolly type Glaswegian, and Liverpudlian Ken carr) who worked together formed a Pythonesque ‘Sitka Spruce Society’. We had to whistle all the ‘esses’ and we had a Masonesque handshake where we lifted our left leg, and put the right hand through and under the knee. I don’t know what I was on in those days but it was good. The inspiration for the whistled esses was my excellent Physics teacher at Breadalbane Academy, Mr. Price.
All the tree planting in Scotland at that time was a response to Maggie Thatcher’s scheme where an investor would put up 25% of the cost of planting and the government would put up the remaining 75%. In return, the investor got to keep 100% of the returns. The Griffin Forest was originally planted by Lloyd’s bank. Their corporate emblem is that winged mythical creature – a Gryphon! It was later bought over by the Rolls Royce pension fund. In later years Conservative loyalists such as radio DJ Terry Wogan and snooker player Steve Davis also invested.
I got a lot out of it too: I saved up a lot of the money I earned and paid my way through university. (Maybe that should read: drank my way through university) I am also proud of the fact that I planted over a million trees: the vast majority of which were Sitka Spruce. The Sitka Spruce Society still lives on as I still meet up with Big Ian on my rare visits back to Aberfeldy.
May I add my heartiest congratulations, Anthony. Well done. Bathe in the glory while it lasts because you just know somebody somewhere will say, “You can’t beleive anything he says, he’s a denier & he runs that denialist website WUWT!”.
One thought, as I understand it man & early man (homonids?) learned to use fire to manipulate his envirnoment & the landscape, possibly over hundreds of thousands of years or even a million years, as opposed to just thousands of years. Am I wrong?
AtB
I hope it’s not too late to add these extracts, which I have posted previously but I think are appropriate. The first extract was from a book on slavery and was printed in 1863 and describes clearing jungle for sugar cane plantation:
[1]
“At six o’clock in the morning the overseer forces the poor slave, still exhausted from the evening’s labors, to rise from his rude bed and proceed to his work. The first assignment of the season is the chopping down of the forests for the next year’s planting, using a scythe to hack down the smaller trees. This work normally goes on for two months, depending upon the type of jungle being cut and the stamina of the slaves.
The next step is the destruction of the large trees, and this, like the previous work, continues for twelve hours each day. At night the slaves return home, where evening work of two or more hours awaits them, depending upon the character of the master. They set fire to the devastated jungle, and then they cut and stack the branches and smaller tree trunks which have escaped the fire and which, occupying the surface of the earth, could hinder development of the crop.
These mounds of branches are again burned, and the result is a sad and devastating scene! Centuries-old tree trunks which two months before had produced a cool, crisp atmosphere over a broad stretch of land, lie on the surface of a field ravaged by fire and covered with ashes, where the slaves are compelled to spend twelve hours under the hot sun of the equator, without a single tree to give them shelter.
This destruction of the forests has exhausted the soil, which in many places now produces nothing but grasses suitable for grazing cattle. The temperature has intensified, and the seasons have become irregular. The rains at times damage the crops, and at other times there is not rain at all. The streams and certain shallow rivers, such as the Itapucuru, have dried up or have become almost unnavigable, and lumber for building has become very rare, or is only found at a great distance from the settlements.”
The second extract appeared in The Times in 2007 in an article (The return of the sea) about the restoration of part of the Aral sea,
[2]
Even the climate is changing for the better. “It’s true. In April, May and June we now have rain,” exclaims Nazhmedin Musabaev, Aralsk’s jovial Mayor. There is more grass for livestock. Summers are a little cooler.
Here is a link to a BBC article on the falling water tables in NW India:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/richardblack/2009/08/it_comes_from_an_unexpected.html#comments
The comments are worth a read also.
The article begins:
“It comes from an unexpected source: but Nasa’s just-released finding that water tables in the northwest of India are falling by about 4cm (1.6in) per year is a striking microcosm of the unsustainable strain that modern societies are putting on the Earth’s natural resources…”