In these days of incredible loss in California, I want to remind ourselves, that not everything we see is “climate change due to greenhouse gas emissions”. But that the way we treat our land, nature and water directly influences our landscapes. Heating up the surfaces through loss of vegetation and build-up of infrastructure, reducing natural evapotranspiration, thus cooling, reducing humidity which would otherwise serve as rain, reducing the soils capability of storing water, feeding natural
Here is an interesting video from Andrew Millison from Africa, in which a guy from the World Food Programme says, standing in an area which has been successfully re-greened in the Sahel: These areas are 5-8°C cooler than the neighbouring ones without vegetation. What a cooling potential, if we implement this in a million places around the world!
The amount of freshwater found on our planet has dropped significantly in the last decade, NASA satellites have found. An international team of scientists reviewed observations taken by the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellites operated by NASA, the German Aerospace Center and the German Research Center for Geosciences. The data collected by GRACE revealed that beginning in May 2014, there was a plunge in Earth’s freshwater supply, and the planet has still not
New research shows plants absorb 31% more CO2 than previously estimated, raising the global Terrestrial Gross Primary Production (GPP) to 157 petagrams* per year. Using carbonyl sulfide as a proxy for photosynthesis, this study highlights tropical rainforests’ critical role as carbon sinks and stresses the importance of accurate photosynthesis modeling for climate predictions. * One petagram equals 1 billion metric tons, which is roughly the amount of CO2 emitted each year from 238 million gas-powered
Here is the result of the publication entitled “Assessing the cooling potential of climate change adaptation measures in rural areas“, which indicates that there are large potentials for cooling the landscapes with water retention measures and increased vegetation. “Our studies show that targeted land use changes can achieve significant cooling of up to 3.5 °C in the Elbe-Elster district. This would be an important contribution to adapting the region to climate change,” explains Prof. Dr.
Very interesting study: Continents as sponge landscapes versus deserts. What happens climatically and atmospherically when there is no more water available for evaporation over the continents? temperatures rise (due to reduced evaporative cooling) precipitation decreases (because evaporation is greatly reduced) continental cloud cover decreases (due to lower evaporation) this causes the land surface to heat up more the residence time of atmospheric water vapor increases by about 50 percent (presumably because there is too little
That’s an important paper and message: Leipzig researchers have found that large-scale deforestation has a greater warming effect on the climate than previously assumed. The cooling effect of cloud cover is reduced by almost half as a result. Experts led by Hao Luo and Johannes Quaas from the Institute of Meteorology at the University of Leipzig demonstrated a reduction in clouds in these deforested areas by analyzing computer simulations and observations. Deforestation has a warming
I wrote two chapters in this book “3 Degrees more” about nature based solutions to climate change – one about carbon sequestration in the soils, and the other about the potential of vegetation to cool the climate. This open access book describes in detail what life on this planet would be like if its average surface temperature were to rise 3 degrees Celsius above the preindustrial level. On this basis, the book argues that it
Permaculture instructor Andrew Millison journeys to Senegal to see a movement of forest gardens which are contributing to Africa’s Great Green Wall. Andrew accompanies the organization Planet Wild to visit the excellent work of Trees for the Future. Planet Wild is funding the planting of 40,000 trees in this project so we are here to assess the system and report on the situation on the ground. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1LCTVO_Y5Rs
Permaculture Instructor Andrew Millison visits the largest reforestation project in the world in the Southern Indian States of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka with the Isha Foundation, founded by Sadhguru. Andrew spent 5 days traveling around the Cauvery River watershed looking at the work of the Isha Foundations’ Cauvery Calling project, touring farms, nurseries, temples, and talking with Isha’s field agents. Andrew then went to Isha’s ashram in Tennessee and was able to directly question Sadhguru
Trees, forests, vegetation cools the planet! We have stated that again and again. Here is another very interesting study, underlining the function of vegetation for the climate: In the course of global warming due to climate change, temperatures in North America have risen by an average of 0.7 degrees Celsius. Except on the US East Coast, which cooled by around 0.3 degrees Celsius between 1900 and 2000, which scientists refer to as a “warming hole”.
Permaculture instructor Andrew Millison journeys with the UN World Food Programme to the Northern border of Senegal to see an innovative land recovery project within the Great Green Wall of Africa that is harvesting rainwater, increasing food security, and rehabilitating the ecosystem. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCli0gyNwL0
Frontiers is looking for paper submission on the subject “Rehydrating Planet Ear”. Perhaps interesting for somebody reading this blog? Pretty cool thing it’ll be, that final publication! “We are particularly interested in the synthesis of watershed or landscape level restoration efforts that provide vivid examples of how the scaling up of restoration efforts can have synergistic effects on water cycling or recycling that small-scale projects cannot attain on their own. We seek 12-20 manuscripts from
Solar parks with gigantic dimensions are particularly worthwhile in dry, inhospitable areas with many hours of sunshine. A study using weather models shows that the dark areas can ultimately produce rain in arid areas: Air inevitably rises above such a large and warming area. This creates convection currents, which are responsible for cloud formation. Only one more ingredient is missing: moisture in the air. And this is exactly what is found in the Persian Gulf,
Interesting article from Erica Gies: “Decisions about land use and infrastructure have left little space for water, amplifying the effects of natural disasters and climate change.” Society has dammed and diverted two-thirds of the world’s large rivers, drained as much of 87% of global wetlands and degraded 75% of Earth’s land area. A study found that, from 1992 to 2019, humans have encroached on 600,000 square kilometres of floodplains — an area about the size
The last post on heat extremes in soils states (from the press release of the scientific publication): When the temperature in the soil is higher than in the air, additional heat is released to the lower atmosphere – causing temperatures in the atmosphere to rise. “Soil temperature acts as a factor in the feedback loop between soil moisture and temperature and can thus intensify heat waves in certain regions”. I find this sentence particularly interesting
Interesting study: “For a long time, little attention was paid to soil temperatures because, in contrast to near-surface air temperatures, there was hardly any reliable data available due to the significantly more complex measurement process. A research team led by the Helmholtz Center for Environmental Research (UFZ) has now established not only that ground and air temperatures can differ, but also that climate change has a much greater impact on the intensity and frequency of
Research highlights benefits forests bring surrounding regions in terms of cooler air and more rainfall. Deforestation has a far greater impact on regional temperatures than previously believed, according to a new study of the Brazilian Amazon that shows agricultural businesses would be among the biggest beneficiaries of forest conservation. The paper demonstrated Amazon deforestation causes warming at distances up to 60 miles (100km) away. The greater the forest clearance, the higher the temperature. More recently,
Trees make clouds by releasing small quantities of vapors called “sesquiterpenes.” Scientists are learning more—and it’s making climate models hazy. Half of Earth’s cloud cover forms around stuff like sand, salt, soot, smoke, and dust. The other half nucleates around vapors released by living things or machines, like the sulfur dioxide that arises from burning fossil fuels. Trees emit natural volatiles like isoprene and monoterpenes, which can spark cloud-forming chemical reactions. The team shows that
Very important article on the link between deforestation, evapotranspiration and rainfall: Even at a small scale, they found an impact, but the decline became more pronounced when the affected area was greater than 50km squared (2,500 sq km). At the largest measured scale of 200km squared (40,000 sq km), the study discovered rainfall was 0.25 percentage points lower each month for every 1 percentage point loss of forest. This can enter into a vicious cycle,
