GEOG301 FINAL
In terms of RCPs, what does "business as usual" refer to?
"Business as usual" refers to RCP8.5 of the RCP's. It is a nightmarish event and the worst case of all the RCP's. It assumes the fastest population growth (a doubling of Earth's population to 12 billion), the lowest rate of technological development, slow GDP growth, a massive increase in world poverty, plus high energy use and emissions. It is called "Business as usual" due to the take that some have on policy change. As a future without policy action, may result in a RCP8.5 scenario, which some policy makers do not take this as serious or see it as a "business as usual" situation. Which in that case would lead to unrestrained growth in energy consumption in our lifetime.
Do large volcanic events usually cause global warming or cooling? What is the primary mechanism for this? Do these effects last on the order of days, years, centuries, or millennia?
**He said in one of his lectures that "I hope by the end of this course you can explain, if a climate change denier says to you 'volcanic eruptions do more to influence climate change by emitting more CO2 than humans ever could'"** Large volcanic events usually cause a global cooling because of the amount of ash and soot that is shot up into the atmosphere drastically reduces income solar radiation. Primary mechanism: blocking solar radiation from entering Earth's surface. The soot and ash is removed within a time order of several days to weeks CO2 and sulfate aerosols appear to take only a few years to settle out of the atmosphere, which is one of the reasons their effects are so widespread and long lasting
What are the most novel or unique features of NASA-CMS?
*Biomass Pilot*. The goals of the Biomass Pilot are to: Utilize satellite and in situ data to produce quantitative estimates (and uncertainties) of aboveground terrestrial vegetation biomass on a national and local scale. Assess the ability of these results to meet the nations need for monitoring carbon storage/sequestration. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- *Flux Pilot*. The objectives of the Flux Pilot are to: Combine satellite data with modeled atmospheric transport initiated by observationally-constrained terrestrial and oceanic models to tie the atmospheric observations to surface exchange processes. Estimate the atmosphere-biosphere CO2 exchange. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- *Scoping Efforts*. The objectives of the Scoping Efforts are to: Identify research, products, and analysis system evolutions required to support carbon policy and management as global observing capability increases.
For each of the natural impacts listed above, describe how this natural impact can affect humans.
1. Change in temperature -> Droughts/Heat waves -> food scarcity 2. Sea level rise -> Destroying homes -> landslides/mudslides 3. More frequent/intense disturbances (fire, hurricanes) -> destruction of people's homes -> forest fires
How can deforestation benefit societies? Give concrete examples.
1. It allows for civilization and industrialization. 2. It gives us the chance to produce more food. 3. It allows people to generate more revenue. 4. It produces more usable material. Concrete example 1: Indonesia clearing land for palm oil plantations help the economy by creating millions of jobs, helping reduce poverty and brings schools, roads and other infrastructure to rural communities. Concrete example 2: When settlers first came to the United States they began to cut down forests for resources to help sustain agriculture. This reduced the amount of poverty due to availability of food and housing from these new farms and villages created from the resources.
List three sources of alternative energy production. For each, describe a benefit and limitation of this technology.
1. Natural Gas Benefit: Clean(er) •Cheap(er) •Less CO2 •Huge Supplies Limitation: Can lead to water contamination if wells break. 2. Nuclear Benefit: •Clean! •Cheap! •Reliable! Limitation: Nuclear Waste 3. Hydro Benefit: •Clean! •Cheap! •Reliable! •Can be used to store energy Limitation: Bad for fish, floods valleys, reservoirs degrade over time
What are the Milankovich cycles? How do they contribute to long-term climate change?
A Milankovitch cycle is a cyclical movement related to the Earth's orbit around the Sun. There are three of them: eccentricity, axial tilt, and precession. According to the Milankovitch Theory, these three cycles combine to affect the amount of solar heat that's incident on the Earth's surface and subsequently influence climatic patterns. These times of increased or decreased solar radiation directly influence the Earth's climate system, thus impacting the advance and retreat of Earth's glaciers. It is of primary importance to explain that climate change, and subsequent periods of glaciation, resulting from the following three variables is not due to the total amount of solar energy reaching Earth. The three Milankovitch Cycles impact the seasonality and location of solar energy around the Earth, thus impacting contrasts between the seasons.
How does the greenhouse effect work?
The Greenhouse Effect is one of Earth's natural processes. Gases in the atmosphere serve to as a way to prevent solar radiation from emitting back into space. In essence trapping heat on earth and thus warming its surface. The Greenhouse Effect therefore can warm the surface of earth to 33*C. Solar radiation comes in (short wave), most of that short wave solar radiation makes its way to Earths surface and absorbed by the surface and thus heats it. Part of that incoming radiation is reflected by the surfaces albedo back to space. As well some of that short wave solar radiation is reflected by the earths atmosphere (clouds make about 30% of it). When the surface absorbed the solar radiation it is converted to heat (infrared radiation) therefore causing emissions of long wave radiation. Some of this long wave radiation is lost to space as it is emitted. Another portion of this long wave radiation is essentially deflected by earths atmosphere by greenhouse gases and therefore sent back down to Earth, now gaining more surface temperature. Longwave radiation is then again emitted the same cycle repeats over and over until it can escape into space. Important to the Greenhouse Effect are climate feedbacks, because they amplify or moderate the radiative effects and changes that affect Earth's climate. As well as snow and ice albedo feedbacks, these have some moderate impact on modern global warming, as Earth's climate cools, the extend of glacial variations increases and as ice and snow increase as does Earth albedo and thus its temperature decreases as more light is reflected. Without the natural flow of Earth being warmed by the absorption of visible radiation from the Sun and cooled by the emission of infrared radiation from space, much of the radiation emitted by Earth surface is being absorbed and remitted by atmospheric gases. The most important gases to the Greenhouse Effect are H20 and C02, These gases absorb infrared radiation by changing the rate at which individual molecules vibrate. A huge part of the Greenhouse effect is regulated by Earth's climate system feedbacks. The climate system is regulated and stabilized by a strong negative feedback loop between surface temperature and the outgoing infrared flux. The system is destabilized by a positive feedback loop involving snow and ice cover due to the effects of albedo. Clouds may as be contributing to this climate feedback. It is important to note and to understand the laws which govern this emitted radiation entering and leaving Earth. They are as follows: Planks radiation law which gives one the general shape or curve of a blackbody, then there is Weins law which essentially gives the peak radiation or where most of the radiation is clustered into, the wavelength where most radiation occurs, the final is Stefan-Boltzmanns law which gives one the total energy emitted under the blackbody radiation curve. These are useful in describing and analyzing the Greenhouse effect and it's levels of magnitude. Essentially, greenhouse gases let the sun's shortwave radiation (visible light) reach the earth, but trap some of the long wave (infrared or heat) radiation coming from the warm Earth.
The United States may very well adopt a carbon tax in the not-so-distant future. In 1-2 paragraphs, create an argument for, or against, this policy. Use at least one sentence to acknowledge a drawback of your position.
• Adopting a carbon tax may be a step in the right direction for the United States. Pricing carbon by the gigaton will most likely lead to lower usage and lower CO2 emissions. One drawback of this tax could be the simple possibility that people could find a way out of paying the tax. • American companies would move to China or other countries that don't have a carbon tax to save money. So not only would it hurt the economy but it will still pollute the environment. They could essentially export their pollution/carbon elsewhere.
List three natural impacts of climate change.
1. Changes in temperature 2. Sea Level Rise 3. More frequent/intense disturbances (fire, hurricanes)
What latitudinal zone has the most potential for afforestation globally? Why?
Between 23.5S and 23.5N latitude we have the Tropics: 1. Because it's where most deforestation has occurred already. 2. Trees are very productive there. 3. And because tropics have hotspots and it will keep the biodiversity
What is a major driver of deforestation in boreal forests? How about in tropical forests?
Boreal: Wild forest fires Tropical: Soil degradation and erosion, (Mainly Farming)
What is the NASA-CMS?
Congressional Direction (Summary) "pilot initiatives for the development of a carbon monitoring system...". .."replicate state and national carbon and biomass inventory processes that provide statistical precision and accuracy with geo-spatially explicit associated attribute data..." ..."development of a prototype Monitoring Reporting and Verification (MRV) system which can provide transparent data products achieving levels of precision and accuracy required by current carbon trading protocols...." ..."[development of] a plan...incorporating such a [MRV] system into its operating plan and long-term budget projection..."
Create several "and, but, therefore:" statements combining two or more of the following concepts, including additional concepts as needed: albedo, longwave radiation, carbon, biogeochemical cycling, deforestation, climate change, heat waves, costal flooding, volcanoes, biodiversity hotspots, migration, koalas, etc...
Deforestation of boreal forests increases albedo and migration of species but also lowers the temperature of Earth. Therefore we should consider a balance between these two things. By continuing to burn fossil fuels at the rate we are going climate change will lead to heat waves and costal floods but if instead we alter our behaviors we can see the lowering of CO2 emissions. Therefore we will not have to witness the koala bear migration. ...
Where do fossil fuels come from (i.e. how were they created)?
Fossil fuels refer to a group of fuels that originate from organic waste. such as anaerobic decomposition of buried dead organisms, containing energy originating in ancient photosynthesis. There are three major forms of fossil fuels: coal, oil and natural gas. All three were formed many hundreds of millions of years ago before the time of the dinosaurs.
Define IPCC. What does this body do?
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is a scientific and intergovernmental body under the auspices of the United Nations, set up at the request of member governments, dedicated to the task of providing the world with an objective, scientific view of climate change and its political and economic impacts.
What is data assimilation?
Is the process by which observations of a system are incorporated into the model state of a numerical model of that system
To what extent is the Mona Loa curve representative of the global atmosphere?
It it quite accurate. The measurements collected at Mauna Loa show a steady increase in mean atmospheric CO2 concentration from about 315 parts per million by volume (ppmv) in 1958 to 401 ppmv as of April 2014.
Considering available land area, forest growth rates, and other major co-benefits to reforestation, what types of land areas have the most potential for reforestation/afforestation in MD?
Land areas: Farmlands, soccer fields, pastures. More?
What kind of instrument is it?
Lidar: Light Detection and Ranging. An active sensor.
How do NASA's unique capabilities of observing the carbon system augment the information in the global carbon budgets and trends discussed in Kump and/or lecture? Give an example.
NASA augments the information in the global carbon budgets and trends by using the full range of satellites to model/analyze the carbon data. By having an accurate model of the carbon system we can better assess and investigate carbon sinks and have a clearer version of what we can do to mitigate climate change it.
What kind of data will it collect?
Not sure of this: high resolution data set of ecosystem structure
What latitudinal zone has the most potential for loss of forest carbon globally? Why?
The boreal forests between 50 and 60 degrees north. They stores a great majority of carbon.
What are its major goals?
To advance our ability to characterize the effects of changing climate and land use on ecosystem structure and dynamics
List three benefits and three drawbacks of large-scale international agreements for limiting carbon emissions.
X not 100% on this
What is the GEDI mission
he GEDI mission provides the Earth's first comprehensive and high resolution data set of ecosystem structure
List three common causes of deforestation.
1. Forest fires 2. Illegal & unsustainable logging 3. Farming/commercial agriculture
Describe an example of data assimilation of CO2 data.
Effect of Data Assimilation Parameters on The Optimized Surface CO2 Flux in Asia. Uses CO2 data to determine estimations of surface CO2 fluxes in Asia.
How is the mission relevant to what we have studied in G301?
GEDI enables ED to estimate current forest carbon stock conditions. GEDI enables ED to assess sequestration potential through time under varying land use and climate change scenarios Using GEDI information on canopy height and structure we can better understand the role of forests in the global carbon cycle and to help preserve and promote habitat and biodiversity
What key technology is revolutionizing the accuracy and precision of forest biomass maps, and model estimates of afforestation/reforestation potential?
GEDI/lidar
What does GEDI stand for?
Global Ecosystem Dynamics Investigation
What is the potential for afforestation/reforestation in MD to mitigate for fossil fuel emissions from MD?
Low potential. This is because even if we afforested all of MD there is not enough land per square-meter to offset the amount of CO2 we pump into the atmosphere.
Rank each of the above fossil fuels from cleanest to dirtiest to burn
Ranked from cleanest to dirtiest: 1. Natural gas (emits as much as 50% less CO2 than coal) 2. Oil 3. Coal
List all major fossil fuels and rank them from most to least abundant
Ranked from most abundant to least: 1. Coal ~3800 gigatons 2. Oil ~680 gigatons 3. Natural gas ~570 gigatons
Define RCP.
Representative Concentration Pathways. They are four greenhouse gas concentrations trajectories. They describe four possible climate futures, all of which are considered possible depending on how much greenhouse gases are emitted in the years to come. The four RCPs, RCP2.6, RCP4.5, RCP6, and RCP8.5, are named after a possible range of radiative forcing values in the year 2100 relative to pre-industrial values (+2.6, +4.5, +6.0, and +8.5 W/m2, respectively).
How does the time series of atmospheric CO2 at the South Pole compare to the Mona Loa curve? Which record has higher seasonal variation? Why?
The Mauna Loa record can now be placed in the context of the variations in CO2 over the past 400,000 years, based on reconstructions from polar ice cores. During ice ages, the CO2 levels were around 200 ppm, and during the warmer interglacial periods, the levels were around 280 ppm. The levels in 2005 were around 378 ppm. So the Mona Loa curve is much higher.
For each fossil fuel, describe how that resource is extracted and list two major environmental hazards of such extraction.
Coal is extracted by extracting it close to the upper portion of the earth's crust, called surface mining, or from deep within the earth through underground mining. Recovering coal through surface mining is relatively easy; shovels and bulldozers are effective at extracting coal near the surface. Major environmental hazards by extracting coal are: 1. Strip mining severely alters the landscape, which reduces the value of the natural environment in the surrounding land. 2. Surface mining may impair groundwater in numerous ways: by drainage of usable water from shallow aquifers; lowering of water levels in adjacent areas and changes in flow direction within aquifers; contamination of usable aquifers below mining operations due to infiltration (percolation) of poor-quality mine water; and increased infiltration of precipitation on spoil piles. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Oil is extracted by offshore oil rigs and on shore oil derricks pumping most of the petroleum that is extracted throughout the world. A hole is drilled into a potential oil patch and the oil is pumped out through a long tube. Major environmental hazards by extracting oil are: 1. Oil spills on land and offshore drilling sites 2. Disruption of wildlife migration routes and habitats from noise pollution, traffic and fences ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Natural gas and oil are often found on the same sites. Scientists look for gas and oil deposits with special equipment that causes a vibration in the ground as certain frequencies are associated with oil and gas. Then pumps separate oil and gas on site. Major environmental hazards by extracted natural gas are: 1. If wastewater is mishandled or a pipeline leaks, our farmlands and groundwater could become contaminated - sometimes for decades. And if it is used to irrigate food crops before we know more about toxicity levels, public health could be put at risk. 2. Methane that is vented or leaked from oil and gas facilities contributes to global warming. EPA estimates that oil and gas facilities emit more than 8 million tons of methane into the atmosphere every year.
What is the potential for afforestation/reforestation globally to mitigate for fossil fuel emissions globally?
Globally the potential would certainly be high because these trees would act as carbon sinks. Especially in the tropic zones. Also considering the RCP model of +2.6, this would result in low to nil emissions.
For each RCP describe the likely environmental impacts by the year 2100. What are the engineering, economic, and sociopolitical behaviors that would lead us along each RCP?
RCP +2.6: By 2100 a 0.9C - 2.3C increase. Negative global emissions engineering - high rates of technological development economic - high GDP growth sociopolitical - policy makers step in to make drastic changes to avoid "business as usual" ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- RCP +4.5: By 2100 a 1.7C - 3.2C increase, ~ 4.4Wm^-2 radiative forcing ~20 gigatons/yr global emissions engineering - intermediate rates of technological development economic - intermediate GDP growth sociopolitical - policy makers make moderate changes to avoid "business as usual" ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- RCP +6.0: By 2100 a 2.0C - 3.2C increase, ~4.5Wm^-2 radiative forcing ~50 gigatons/yr global emissions engineering - poor rates of technological development economic - poor GDP growth sociopolitical - policy makers make poor changes to avoid "business as usual" ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- RCP +8.5: By 2100 a 3.2C - 5.4C increase, ~8.5WM^-2 radiative forcing ~110 gigatons/yr global emissions engineering - lowest level of technological development economic - lowest level of GDP growth sociopolitical - little to no changes made to avoid "business as usual"