Met Office. The Recent Storms and Floods in the UK (Feb 2014) (by Diego Fdez-Sevilla PhD)

Posted on February 17, 2014 by Diego Fdez-Sevilla, PhD.

Met Office. The Recent Storms and Floods in the UK (Feb 2014) (by Diego Fdez-Sevilla PhD)

Diego Fdez-Sevilla PhD. CV english and español. Resume.

Pdf available at ResearchGate DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.15169.25449

(Feb 27, 2014. Updated)

Met Office has published a paper that documents the record-breaking weather and flooding, considers the potential drivers and discusses whether climate change contributed to the severity of the weather and its impacts.

The Recent Storms and Floods in the UK. February 2014 (pdf)

“The ‘buckling’ of the jet stream over the Pacific and North America became much more pronounced during January 2014, as the precipitation anomaly over Indonesia and the West Pacific strengthened. A notable feature of this anomalous area of tropical precipitation is its northwards extent into the winter hemisphere where it is able to interact with the North Pacific jet and generate Rossby waves that propagate along the jet and act to reinforce the huge meander of the jet stream off the west coast of North America. At the same time, Rossby waves propagate along the southern branch of the jet stream and enter the tropical East Pacific through the westerly duct, creating weather disturbances that can then get caught up in the entrance region of the Atlantic jet stream.

These Rossby wave interactions are very complex but appear to be fundamental to understanding this winter’s weather. The influence of the Pacific is very clear in the days preceding the major storm of 5/6th January.

A sequence of maps from 31st December to 5th January shows satellite infrared observations of cloudiness and 250mb winds. The wave disturbances entering the tropical East Pacific westerly duct can be clearly seen in the wind fields throughout the period. These waves move into the entrance region of the North Atlantic jet which reaches unusually far west into the tropical Pacific. At the same time it is evident that waves are also entering the North Atlantic jet from the north via the polar jet. The sequence of satellite imagery of cloudiness shows how these waves translate into the development of the major cyclone over the North Atlantic by 5th January.”

Back in Nov I wrote a post and discussed about the role of water vapour in atmospheric events (follow the link to see the post and comments at the bottom of the page: https://diegofdezsevilla.wordpress.com/2013/11/27/climate-variability-and-energy-balance/). Based on the publication from the Met Office I want to extend my previous evaluation of the role played by water in climatic events with the following comment in the subject:

What about studies looking at alterations in the role played by water in the atmosphere (absorbing heat and adiabatic behaviour inducing weather events) due to interaction with pollutants? I would like to know about studies looking at not only the increase of water vapour due to increases in temperature but also about how the interaction of pollutants with water could affect its properties throughout evaporation, condensation processes as well as in adiabatic processes.
I would like to explore the validity of an idea that is coming around my mind lately about the combined effect of:
In one hand, the effect of increasing amounts of aerosols leading to an increased capacity of the atmosphere to retain water. “Water drops in polluted cases are up to 50 percent smaller than in clean skies. The smaller size impedes the formation of rain clouds and the falling of rain. (http://phys.org/news169474977.html#jCp)”
and in another hand, greenhouse gases retaining heat allow the atmosphere to expand retaining more water vapour.
Could the combine effect be part of the strong effect described as “The ‘buckling’ of the jet stream over the Pacific and North America became much more pronounced during January 2014, as the precipitation anomaly over Indonesia and the West Pacific strengthened? A notable feature of this anomalous area of tropical precipitation is its northwards extent into the winter hemisphere where it is able to interact with the North Pacific jet and generate Rossby waves that propagate along the jet and act to reinforce the huge meander of the jet stream off the west coast of North America.

Throughout my career I have studied and discussed the influence of atmospheric water vapour in the aerodynamic behaviour of one particle being part of the aerosol, pollen grains. In my research I already pointed out the need for further research about the implications of the biological atmospheric particle load by being involved in climate events through the microphysics of cloud formation due to the nuclei drop activity of such particles. Aerodynamics_of_pollen_grains_involved_in_sampling_efficiency. Thesis_by_Diego_Fernandez-Sevilla (2007)

Here also I leave a related article:

Contribution of pollen to atmospheric ice nuclei concentrations. J. D. Hader, T. P. Wright, and M. D. Petters

http://www.atmos-chem-phys-discuss.net/13/31673/2013/acpd-13-31673-2013.html

Furthermore, I have studied the amount of pollen grains contained in a gram of pollen released outdoors from related species of the same genus (unpublished yet). It has been estimated that a birch tree releases more than 5.5 billion grains over a single year, alder 7.2 billion, and an oak less at 0.6 billion grains. Spruce also produced about 5.5 billion grains in a year. Cereal rye grass contained 4.25 million pollen grains per inflorescence.

Additionally, I also performed research about the impact that environmental heat increase and retention has in the atmospheric biological load due to the urban heat island effect. The results point out that the biological cycles of the biota are altered increasing the duration of their “pollen release” period. The scenario created by the urban heat island effect has been already applied to extrapolate global climatic alterations in the biota suggesting an increase in plant performance (metabolism) inducing more bioaerosol released into the atmosphere.

Assessment between pollen seasons in areas with different urbanization level related to local vegetation sources and differences in allergen exposure. Aerobiologia, Vol 26-1, 1-14. (2010)

Putting together my own experience in researching bioaerosols, my understanding of environmental processes and the findings by others I find enough dots connected to be very alert about the synergistic effects that the biota play and suffers as part of the whole system. For more about this topic follow the comments below and the post Resilience in our environment.

_________________________________

The aim of publishing my work openly is to allow for it to be exposed for an open review. So any constructive feedback is welcome. After a period of time of at least a month from the publishing date on this blog and at LinkedIn, if no comments are found discussing the value of the piece published I then publish it at ResearchGate generating a DOI for posterior references.

In order to protect my intellectual rights, more assessment in depth and the statistical and numerical analyses that I have performed to support my arguments can be discussed at my email: d.fdezsevilla(at)gmail.com

The performance of my work as independent researcher, with no institutional and economic support, is limited by my lack of access to resources and economic stability. So far what I have published in this blog is what I have been able to offer with those limitations.

If you find that my work is worthy to be acknowledged, share your thoughts openly and publicly because by sharing public acknowledging over the value of my work is what will overcome the limitations of my cv in order to find the attention from those able to allow me access to a job position or resources to increase the functionality of my research.

PerspectiveSince October 2013 I have been studying the behaviour of the Polar Jet Stream and the weather events associated as well as the implications derived into atmospheric dynamics and environmental synergies.

Many of the atmospheric configurations and weather and climate events we see these days are very similar with the progression followed since 2013. Please take a look at posts addressing those events from previous publications in this blog or look at the categories in the top menu. Also at research-gate. Feedback is always welcomed either in this blog or at my email (d.fdezsevilla(at)gmail.com). All my work is part of my Intellectual Portfolio, registered under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License,  WordPress.com license and it is being implemented at my profile in researchgate. I will fight for its recognition in case of misuse.

About Diego Fdez-Sevilla, PhD.

Data policy The products processed by "Diego Fdez-Sevilla PhD" are made available to the public for educational and/or scientific purposes, without any fee on the condition that you credit "Diego Fdez-Sevilla PhD" as the source. Copyright notice: © Diego Fdez-Sevilla PhD (year) orcid: orcid.org/0000-0001-8685-0206 and the link to its source at diegofdezsevilla.wordpress or permanent DOI found at Resarchgate. Profile and verified scientific activity also at: https://publons.com/researcher/3387860/diego-fernandez-sevilla/ Should you write any scientific publication on the results of research activities that use Diego Fdez-Sevilla PhD products as input, you shall acknowledge Diego Fdez-Sevilla's PhD Project in the text of the publication and provide an electronic copy of the publication to the author (d.fdezsevilla@gmail.com). If you wish to use the Diego Fdez-Sevilla PhD products in advertising or in any commercial promotion, you shall acknowledge Diego Fdez-Sevilla PhD Project and you must submit the layout to Diego Fdez-Sevilla PhD for approval beforehand (d.fdezsevilla@gmail.com). The work here presented has no economic or institutional support. Please consider to make a donation to support the means for making sustainable the energy, time and resources required. Also any sponsorship or mentoring interested would be welcome. Intellectual Property All articles and imagery are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. By Diego Fdez-Sevilla, PhD. More guidance on citing this web as a source can be found at NASA webpage: http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/bibliography/citations#! For those publications missing DOIs at the ResearchGate profile vinculated with this project, DOIs can be generated on demand by request at email: d.fdezsevilla(at)gmail.com. **Author´s profile: Born in 1974. Bachelor in General Biology, Masters degree "Licenciado" in Environmental Sciences (2001, Spain). PhD in Atmospheric Biology and Aerosols Dispersion (2007, UK). Lived, acquired training and worked in Spain, UK, Germany and Poland. I have shared the outcome from my work previous to 2013 as scientific speaker in events held in those countries as well as in Switzerland and Finland. After years performing research and working in institutions linked with environmental research and management, in 2013 I found myself in a period of transition searching for a new position or funding to support my own line of research. In the current competitive scenario, in order to demonstrate my capacities instead of just moving my cv waiting for my next opportunity to arrive, I decided to invest my energy and time in opening my own line of research sharing it in this blog. In March 2017 the budget reserved for this project has ended and its weekly basis time frame discontinued until new forms of economic and/or institutional support are incorporated into the project. The value of the data and the original nature of the research presented in this platform and at LinkedIn has proved to be worthy of consideration by the scientific community as well as for publication in scientific journals. However, without a position as member of an institution, it becomes very challenging to be published. I hope that this handicap do not overshadow the value of my achievements and that the Intellectual Property Rights generated with the license of attribution attached are respected and considered by the scientists involved in similar lines of research. **Any comment and feedback aimed to be constructive is welcome as well as any approach exploring professional opportunities.** In this blog I publish pieces of research focused on addressing relevant environmental questions. Furthermore, I try to break the barrier that academic publications very often offer isolating scientific findings from the general public. In that way I address those topics which I am familiar with, thanks to my training in environmental research, making them available throughout my posts. (see "Framework and Timeline" for a complete index). At this moment, I am living in Spain with no affiliation attachments. Free to relocate geographically worldwide. If you feel that I could be a contribution to your institution, team and projects, don´t hesitate in contact me at d.fdezsevilla (at) gmail.com or consult my profile at LinkedIn, ResearchGate and Academia.edu. Also, I'd appreciate information about any opportunity that you might know and believe it could match with my aptitudes. The conclusions and ideas expressed in each post as part of my own creativity are part of my Intellectual Portfolio and are protected by Intellectual Property Laws. Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial conditions. In citing my work from this website, be sure to include the date of access and DOIs found at the Framework and Timeline page and ResearchGate. (c)Diego Fdez-Sevilla, PhD, 2020. Filling in or/and Finding Out the gaps around. Publication accessed 20YY-MM-DD at https://diegofdezsevilla.wordpress.com/ ***
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24 Responses to Met Office. The Recent Storms and Floods in the UK (Feb 2014) (by Diego Fdez-Sevilla PhD)

  1. Prof. dr. Awni A. Abdulahad says:
    February 19, 2014 at 13:33

    I think dear that during this period we are at max. solar cycle (high sun spot number), which may be more energy input from sun to earth.

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  2. Diego Fdez-Sevilla says:
    February 20, 2014 at 13:43

    A comment I made in a different but related post: Cooking an environment. https://diegofdezsevilla.wordpress.com/2013/11/07/cooking-an-environment/

    From a generalist approach to the subject of global environmental perturbations (human and non humanly driven) I understand that our environment has mechanisms of resilience that get activated at local and global scale. Are we aware of those mechanisms? Temperature in our atmosphere can increase due to a number of factors. Greenhouse gases and solar radiation among others. Just playing, the human body uses temperature to react against pathogens. It rises from its balance state giving fever symptoms and this increase triggers the release of water as sweat to absorb the heat through evaporation. Consequently the human body loses water that needs to be replaced. So, in our global ecosystem, there is a debate about if there has been an increase in temperature. Which would be the mechanisms of resilience in our global environment working to absorb those increases in temperature (I would go with water as the heat carrier and the weather systems as the physical mechanics to redistribute and release heat. Like using a spoon to cold down your soup. see link to related post Met Office. The Recent Storms and Floods in the UK (Feb 2014) https://diegofdezsevilla.wordpress.com/2014/02/17/452/)? If they are working properly, “what about if the global ecosystem has mechanisms of resilience to absorb increases in temperature that makes our correlations weak?? Which other parts of our ecosystem are getting affected by the mechanism of resilience working to absorb the increase in temperature? Would the human species interfere with the right functionality of the earth mechanisms of resilience?
    Would we see an increase in global temperature just when the mechanism of resilience gets to the point of not being effective? Then, for how long has it been working already?

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  3. Devika says:
    February 22, 2014 at 05:39

    Weather depends on seasons and today it is influenced by anthropogenic factors. Today, the local aerosols make a difference to weather patterns. Air and water are natural resources, drawing boundaries seems a little inconvenient. Pollutant laden cloud can land in your territory if international standards on emissions are not laid down.

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  4. Pingback: Resilience in our environment. | diego fdez-sevilla

  5. Diego Fdez-Sevilla says:
    February 27, 2014 at 15:05

    In order to enhance the debate and unify the contribution generated about the present post in several groups at LinkedIn here I introduce those comments. Names are kept anonymously for privacy rights unless otherwise stated by the authors.
    ——————
    CEO at Enersphere Inc.

    The disruption of atmospheric rivers is a NEW field of study as far as I know. Since the renaissance the world climate has been a study in dynamic equilibrium. Now that we have upset that equilibrium in way that are not yet fully understood or even documented, climate science other than measures of CO2, CH4 and water vapour, are back to square one. NOTHING about future weather will be predictable on the basis of historic data. I would estimate that weather will not again stabilize until 100 to 200 years AFTER we have stopped adding CO2 and AFTER all the CH4 which has been sequestered in the permafrost and Arctic sea bed has leaked back into the atmosphere. It will be a different planet then. I put the following earlier today in another post: Carbon dioxide decrease, with a tipping point of 600 ppm, was the primary agent forcing Antarctic glaciation. (^ “Drop in carbon dioxide levels led to polar ice sheet, study finds”. Sciencedaily.com. 2 December 2011. doi:10.1126/science.1203909. Retrieved 14 May 2013.) Given that atmospheric CO2 is presently at 400 ppm, (up from 260 ppm in 250 years) and that there is enough sequestered C in fossil fuel reserves to put us at 1,000 ppm when we burn it all to enrich the owners, then what?? Melting all the glacial ice will raise sea level by 330′. Then what?? That is not ‘being alarmist” (although we should be very alarmed.) that is the absolute reality of the end of the path that we are on. And by the way, when data is ‘adjusted’ by qualified scientists it is to make it more accurate by removing biases, not to falsify it because of some global conspiracy. The ONLY conspiracy about GW and CC is the conspiracy by the owners (the .01% who own half of everything) to obfuscate and deny GW and CC for the sake of profits generated by the sale of fossil fuels. That does not consider CH4 (a major flaw in the IPCC report, OR water vapour. Another factor that has been totally ignored in the drop in the planetary albedo. So right now, all the news is bad.
    ————-
    Director at Ekogaia Consulting

    Very interesting and timely discussion. The rossby wave and jetstream diversion over the past few seasons and impacts on N. America, Russia and the UK emphasise the need to accelerate research on the issues raised by Diego (and others).
    How this links to altered albedos, local temperatures over the Arctic, water droplet sizes, particulates, etc demonstrates the multifaceted requirements to source data for this research. Human interference, both through ozone depletion, CO2 levels, particulates, etc is beyond doubt. Question is how these influences come together.
    ——–
    Diego Fernández Sevilla, Ph.D.
    Environmental Research Analyst     in active job search mode worldwide

    I would love to further this (and more) line of research but at this moment I don´t have the resources neither the position or the institutional and economic support to do it. At this moment my job is to find a job and my passion to do what I can with the activity that I love the most, research. I would love to be part of a multidisciplinary group willing to explore, discuss and unify efforts looking at the foundations of finding the appropriate questions, the design of a multidisciplinary synergistic approach to find answers and, to combine points of view in the interpretation of the results. Sure somewhere there is already all of that.
    ————–
    CEO at Enersphere Inc.

    Check out this IPCC summary for policymakers http://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/wg1/docs/WG1AR5_SPM_FINAL.pdf
    ———–
    Diego Fernández Sevilla, Ph.D.
    Environmental Research Analyst     in active job search mode worldwide

    Some thoughts about it (as usual I might be completely wrong):
    Page 16 “The rate and magnitude of global climate change is determined by radiative forcing, climate feedbacks and the storage of energy by the climate system.”
    Page 19. Modelling projections of changes in the climate system.

    My following comment is related with a previous post. Cooking an environment. https://diegofdezsevilla.wordpress.com/2013/11/07/cooking-an-environment/

    From a generalist approach to the subject of global environmental perturbations (human and non humanly driven) I understand that our environment has mechanisms of resilience that get activated at local and global scale. Are we aware of those mechanisms? Temperature in our atmosphere can increase due to a number of factors. Greenhouse gases and solar radiation among others. Just playing, the human body uses temperature to react against pathogens. It rises from its balance state giving fever symptoms and this increase triggers the release of water as sweat to absorb the heat through evaporation. Consequently the human body loses water that needs to be replaced. So, in our global ecosystem, there is a debate about if there has been an increase in heat or temperature. Which would be the mechanisms of resilience in our global environment working to absorb or release those increases in heat or temperature (I would go with water as the heat/energy carrier and the weather systems as the physical mechanics to redistribute and release heat/energy. Like using a spoon to cold down your soup. So I like to see the use of “storage of energy by the climate system” used to determine the range of climate perturbations)
    Now, I feel it is very important to understand the mechanisms of resilience at global scale. Which are they? Are they working properly? I don´t think the mechanisms of resilience against increases in temperature due to solar radiation are the same as increases in temperature due to greenhouse gases. Should not reflect such events the ionic charge of the atmosphere? And, would not they be more localised in time (start to finish) than constant heating from inside? (honestly curious) .
    So, models can only work with non sporadic events opposite to solar radiation. So, from an anthropogenic point of view, “What about if the global ecosystem has mechanisms of resilience to absorb increases in temperature that makes our correlations weak in time?? Are these mechanisms being incorporated in our predictive models? (I don´t think). The most provably repercussion from activating mechanisms of resilience would be to see cyclic patterns of change. Meaning, e.g. temperature raises, weather patterns would increase performance releasing energy until the atmosphere recovers to a point where to start again. However, the point of starting again might be each time different since the global ecosystem would adapt to the pressure of dominant increasing patterns of temperature. So each time the cycle would start at a higher temperature, inducing an adaptation to the biota to new conditions until the system would adapt to not feeling the perturbation or… the mechanism of resilience does not give a continuous predictable process. One mechanism activates another mechanism due to synergistic effects and so on. So, with each new mechanism activated a new model to be defined. I am not sure about if this is contemplated.

    Which other parts of our ecosystem are getting affected by the mechanism of resilience working to absorb the increase in temperature? Would the human species interfere with the right functionality of the earth’s mechanisms of resilience?
    Would we see an increase in global temperature just when the mechanism of resilience gets to the point of not being effective? Then, for how long has it been working already?
    —————-
    CEO at Enersphere Inc.

    The planet’s mechanism of resilience is glacial and sea ice. This increases the albedo when it exists and absorbs excess heat as it melt. Fortunately about 95% (by volume) of it is left but about 20% by area is gone. I previously posted this:The amount of glacial ice (not including the missing Arctic sea ice) disappearing worldwide recently has been 150,000,000,000 tonnes (150 Gt) per year. The heat of fusion is 333.55 cal/g. Therefore every year 2003 to 2010 the melting ice has absorbed over 50 sextillion (50 x 1018) calories of heat per year. This heat was absorbed by our planet’s natural buffer against global warming, that’s why the rate of global warming has temporarily decreased. That heat did NOT go into increasing the average surface temp. But, the glacial ice, our planet’s buffer against temperature fluctuation is finite, eventually it will be gone. The wild card is the release of CH4 by melting Arctic sea bed and melting permafrost. A secondary driver of Global Warming – release of CH4 (72 times more potent as a greenhouse gas) from the Arctic seabed and melted permafrost in northern Canada and Russia (caused by global warming), will make what has happened so far seem negligible. According to the National Science Foundation, release of even a fraction of the methane stored in the Vast East Siberian Arctic Shelf could trigger ABRUPT climate warming. Methane release from the not-so-perma-frost is the most dangerous amplifying feedback in the entire carbon cycle. Scientists learned last year that the permamelt contains a staggering 1.5 trillion tons of frozen carbon, about twice as much carbon as contained in the atmosphere, much of which would be released as methane. Methane is 25 times as potent a heat-trapping gas as CO2 over a 100 year time horizon, but 72 times as potent over 20 years. The carbon is locked in a freezer in the part of the planet warming up the fastest. Conservative estimates are that half the land-based permafrost would vanish by mid-century on our current emissions path. More than 50 billion tons of methane could be unleashed from Siberian lakes alone, more than 10 times the amount now in the atmosphere.
    ————-
    Diego Fernández Sevilla, Ph.D.
    Environmental Research Analyst     in active job search mode worldwide

    Tristam, I follow you and I understand your point, however, “glacial and sea ice” is just one of the planet’s mechanism of resilience. And it can be made a model to predict the performance of this individual mechanism (though I pointed out before what I think about the limitations of modelling synergistic outcomes). My concerns stand still, Which other parts of our ecosystem are getting affected by the mechanism of resilience working to absorb the increase in temperature?. We might be able to record a change in an ecosystem just when the mechanisms of resilience get overload. So there have been working already for a while. And therefore, we might just see the last resource of resilience being activated missing to identify the relevance of the previous processes sustaining the global resolution. Ice melting is a global response to the combine effects of local perturbations. And those perturbations come from more than one part of the ecosystem.
    I leave here an article that adds some information to my point.

    Click to access Amundson_Elements_07.pdf

    ———–
    CEO at Enersphere Inc.

    Actually Diego it’s simpler than you might think. There are only 2 ways that the planet can deal with extra heat. One way is to melt some ice (the best way because heat of fusion is very high). For example: The amount of glacial ice (not including the missing Arctic sea ice) disappearing worldwide recently has been 150,000,000,000 tonnes (150 Gt) per year. The heat of fusion is 333.55 cal/g. Therefore every year 2003 to 2010 the melting ice has absorbed over 50 sextillion (50 x 1018) calories of heat per year. This heat was absorbed by our planet’s natural buffer against global warming, that’s why the rate of global warming has temporarily decreased.
    The other method is by using the oceans as a heat sink. This is effect ONLY because our planet has a very large mass of water.
    —————-
    Director at Ekogaia Consulting

    Excellent report on possibility of El Nino this year along with in depth explanations of latest data, Kelvin waves, etc. here
    http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/comment.html?entrynum=2635
    ———————
    Member Board of Directors at Gujranwala Solid Waste Management Company

    Dear Diego Fernández Sevilla
    An excellent research article which is going act as guidelines/SOP forfor analysing such extreme weather events, particularly for the researchers for the developing countries which more prone to such extreme events. in fact , south-east asian countries , like Pakistan, Bangladesh and India, where 1/5 of the world population resides, are terribiliy expose to adverse impacts of climate change. Un-fortunately, due to lack of scientific expertise & sector knowledge, the poor people are suffering every year due to these weather extremes. Fast melting of snow from hamalyaian region( the asia,s water tower) is generating huge run-off in the indus basin. The floods of 2010 & 2011 in Pakistan are the classical examples of global warming impacts in Pakistan. Thanks for sharing such an informative research article which going to be a mile stone in addressing such extreme weather in Pakistan & in other asian countries- Best wishes
    —————
    Posgraduate Student on Energy & Environmental Management, Abertay University of Dundee

    I may be giving it a too simplistic and silly approach, but seems to me that if we accept that the planet is heating up and that there is Global Warming makes sense to assume that the evapotranspiration will increase, meaning that the amount of water in the atmosphere will increase as well. Doesn’t look hard to accept then that places that already had flood problems will see those cases increased as well.
    ————
    CEO at Enersphere Inc.

    Water vapor is a vicious cycle. High global temperature equals an atmosphere capable of holding more water vapor. Water vapor is a hothouse gas, so higher humidity equals more global warming equals less fresh water available through precipitation equals drought in areas that previously were semi-arid.
    ————
    Diego Fernández Sevilla, Ph.D.
    Environmental Research Analyst     in active job search mode worldwide

    I am sorry not to share a more updated piece of information but at the moment I believe this paper shares some of my previous points of view and I believe it is worthy of being known. (I have added a brief portion from the conclusions section. Notice alterations in the polar circulation due to variations in the water cycle as well as the difficulty of modelling synergistic interactions between different mechanisms of resilience being mentioned already in 1998).

    Resilience in our environment. (by Diego Fdez-Sevilla)


    ———
    CEO at Enersphere Inc.

    Good points and interesting research. One of the main problems we face is the often lack of appreciation of synergy evidenced in reports from scientists who should know better. Case in point – the IPCC report on climate change that did NOT include sea bed and perma-melt methane release because there were only climatologists, no geologists on board the committee.
    ———————
    Principle at Sustainable Visions: Environmental Management Services

    Good discussion but so far centred on climate issues. I don’t think any of us would disagree that we have to start dealing with GHG emissions in a serious manner, but equally we now have to face the fact that global climate change is a reality and something we are going to have to adapt to while we try to curb emissions. So we have to begin to think about ways we can make our natural and human ecosystems more resilient to the inevitable wild weather we will experience over the coming decades. My understanding from the “other side of the pond” is that much of the flooding in the Thames lowlands is a consequence of the Conservative Government’s incompetent agricultural policies that have provided incentives for farmers to extent intensive agriculture further into the upper Thames watersheds. Both the UK and Canadian Conservative Governments are at best climate change sceptics (if not outright deniers) and thus have not yet accepted the need for serious emission reductions or adaptation strategies. We don’t seem to learn until “nature” gives a good smack on the side of the head. Big question is how many more smacks will it take before our development-oriented politicians begin to pay attention.

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  21. Diego Fdez-Sevilla says:
    June 15, 2016 at 20:07

    New published study addressing the role of aerosols on convective developments updates the state of the discussion in this thread:
    http://news.utexas.edu/2016/06/13/aerosols-strengthen-storm-clouds-according-to-new-study

    Aerosols Strengthen Storm Clouds, According to New Study.
    June 13, 2016
    AUSTIN, Texas — An abundance of aerosol particles in the atmosphere can increase the lifespans of large storm clouds by delaying rainfall, making the clouds grow larger and live longer, and producing more extreme storms when the rain finally does come, according to new research from The University of Texas at Austin.

    The study, published in the journal of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on June 13, is the first to address the impact that aerosol particles have on the lifespans of large thunderstorm systems called mesoscale convective systems. These storms are complex, often violent systems that can span over several hundred kilometers. The systems are “the primary source of precipitation over the tropics and mid‐latitudes, and their lifetime can have a large influence on the variability of rainfall, especially extreme rainfall that causes flooding,” noted the paper.

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  22. Pingback: Climbing the Hill of Acknowledgement. Peer reviewed articles supporting previous assessments and research published in this blog. (by Diego Fdez-Sevilla, PhD.) | diego fdez-sevilla, PhD.

  23. Pingback: Climbing the Hill of Acknowledgement. Peer reviewed articles supporting previous assessments and research published in this blog. (by Diego Fdez-Sevilla, PhD.) | diego fdez-sevilla, PhD.

  24. Pingback: A pattern of change in the atmosphere beyond considering global warming or cooling. That is, global mixing. (by Diego Fdez-Sevilla PhD) | Diego Fdez-Sevilla, PhD.

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