NPLCC Climate Science Digest - September 2013

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North Pacific LCC
Climate Science Digest
September 2013













The NPLCC is pleased to provide you with the first issue of our Climate Science Digest. This new monthly publication is our way of increasing access to climate change information important to natural and cultural resource managers throughout the North Pacific LCC region. Much of this information was compiled by David Patte, Climate Change Coordinator, US Fish and Wildlife Service, Portland, Oregon, in support of the NPLCC and its mission.

Each Science Digest focuses on 1) learning opportunities; 2) effects to species, habitats, and ecosystems; 3) adaptation 4) research on reducing emissions; 5) climate trends reports; and 6) significant climate change findings.

A monthly e-newsletter aimed at helping North Pacific LCC partners and others stay connected to management-relevant climate change science integral to their work. Do you have a new published article you would like to share? Please send it our way And many thanks to those who have provided material for this edition!





Table of Contents
• Learning Opportunities - Upcoming Webinars and Meetings
• Making Climate Change Adaptation Real - Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife
• Biodiversity/Species and Ecosystem Response - Journal Articles & Other Publications
• Aquatic Ecosystems/Water Resources/Hydrology
• Contaminants
• Coastal/Marine Ecosystems/Ocean Acidification
• LCC Announcements
• Climate Change (General) Journal Articles/Publications/News
• Climate and Weather Reports and Services
• Greenhouse Gas Emissions/Reductions
• Funding Opportunities
• Vulnerability Assessments
• List Servers
• Other Resources and Tools




Learning Opportunities- Upcoming Webinars and Meetings

Sept 10, 11-noon (Pacific Time) Wetlands as Sentinels and Mitigators of Climate Change, Dr. Judith Drexler, from the USGS California Water Science Center. NCTC Conservation Science and Policy Webinar Register here

Sept 17, Climate in the Pacific Northwest – A Primer, Univ WA Webinar, Lara Whitely Binder, UW Climate Impacts Group; representatives from Washington State Department of Ecology, GreenWA, Pacific Northwest Tribal Climate Consortium, and the Alliance for Climate Education (student speaker) will provide background about their organizations and the resources they offer. The webinar will focus on research in four key sectors: water resources, aquatic and marine ecosystems, forests, and coasts. Students participating will be asked to complete a brief survey at the end of the webinar. The survey will help provide background information for the Statewide Youth Summit on Climate being held on October 1st, 2013 in Bellevue, WA and webcast throughout the state. Register: https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/198478714

Sept. 18-20 Second Ocean Acidification Principal Investigators' Meeting, Washington, D.C. For information and registration, please visit this site.

Setp. 18, 11a.m.-noon (Pacific Time) The Land Treatment Digital Library — A centralized database for managers and scientists, Justin L. Welty, USGS Forest and Rangeland Ecosystem Science Center. GNLCC Webinar. Learn more and register here

August 27-29, 2013 - Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment NCTC Course ALC3184

Oct 3, 12:30p.m. (Pacific Time) Climate change and Rocky Mountain ungulates, Mattew Kauffman, USGS Wyoming Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Unit. National Climate Change and Wildife Science Center Webinar. Learn more and register here.

October 9-11 Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment NCTC course ALC3184 in Jackson, WY, in collaboration with the USGS North Central Climate Science Center.

Oct. 16, Great Basin Climate Forum, Bishop, CA. This meeting will focus on issues relevant to the Great Basin region and focus on issues more specific to the southern side of the region. Sponsors: The California Nevada Applications Program (CNAP), Great Basin Landscape Conservation Cooperative, and the Western Regional Climate Center. Learn more and register here

October 28-November 1, 2013 - Climate Smart Conservation NCTC Course ALC3195 - development led by the National Wildlife Federation. This pilot course is based on a forthcoming guide to the principles and practice of Climate-Smart Conservation.



Making Climate Change Adaptation Real - Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife

Recorded C3 Aug 27 webinar: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZURUnhCr2xs







Biodiversity/Species and Ecosystem Response-- Journal Articles & Other Publications

Projecting demographic responses to climate change: adult and juvenile survival respond differently to direct and indirect effects of weather in a passerine population: Projecting demographic responses to climate change can identify not only how populations will be affected by climate change but also indicate the demographic process(es) and specific mechanisms that may be responsible. This information can, in turn, inform climate change adaptation plans, help prioritize future research, and identify where limited conservation resources will be most effectively and efficiently spent.

Using a long-term mark-recapture data set, researchers examined the influence of multiple direct and indirect effects of weather on adult and juvenile survival for a population of Song Sparrows in California. They found evidence for a positive, direct effect of winter temperature on adult survival, and a positive, indirect effect of prior rainy season precipitation on juvenile survival, which was consistent with an effect of precipitation on food availability during the breeding season. These relationships were then used with climate projections of significantly warmer and slightly drier winter weather by the year 2100, to project a significant increase in mean adult survival (12–17%) and a slight decrease in mean juvenile survival (4–6%) under the B1 and A2 climate change scenarios. (Kristen E. Dybala, John M. Eadie, Thomas Gardali, Nathaniel E. Seavy, Mark P. Herzog. Global Change Biology, 2013; 19 (9): 2688 DOI: 10.1111/gcb.12228)

Riparian Ecosystems in the 21st Century: Hotspots for Climate Change Adaptation? Current knowledge is synthesized on the vulnerability of riparian ecosystems to climate change by assessing the potential exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity of their key components and processes, as well as ecosystem functions, goods and services, to projected global climatic changes. The authors review key pathways for ecological and human adaptation for the maintenance, restoration and enhancement of riparian ecosystem functions, goods and services and present emerging principles for planned adaptation. The synthesis suggests that, in the absence of adaptation, riparian ecosystems are likely to be highly vulnerable to climate change impacts. However, given the critical role of riparian ecosystem functions in landscapes, as well as the strong links between riparian ecosystems and human well-being, considerable means, motives and opportunities for strategically planned adaptation to climate change also exist. The need for planned adaptation of and for riparian ecosystems is likely to be strengthened as the importance of many riparian ecosystem functions, goods and services will grow under a changing climate. Consequently, riparian ecosystems are likely to become adaptation ‘hotspots’ as the century unfolds. (Capon et al., Ecosystems, April 2013, Volume 16, Issue 3, pp 359-381, DOI: 10.1007/s10021-013-9656-1 )

Dramatic response to climate change in the Southwest: Robert Whittaker's 1963 Arizona Mountain plant transect revisited: This research provides the first documentation of significant upward shifts of lower elevation range boundaries in Southwestern montane plant species over decadal time, confirming that previous hypotheses are correct in their prediction that mountain communities in the Southwest will be strongly impacted by warming, and that the Southwest is already experiencing a rapid vegetation change. Researchers reexamined Robert Whittaker's 1963 plant transect in the Santa Catalina Mountains of southern Arizona, finding that this process is already well underway. Our survey, five decades after Whittaker's, reveals large changes in the elevational ranges of common montane plants, while mean annual rainfall has decreased over the past 20 years, and mean annual temperatures increased 0.25°C/decade from 1949 to 2011 in the Tucson Basin. Although elevational changes in species are individualistic, significant overall upward movement of the lower elevation boundaries, and elevational range contractions, have occurred. (Brusca et al., Ecology and Evolution, 2013; DOI: 10.1002/ece3.720)

Indicators of Climate Change in CA- This new report presents 36 indicators tracking trends in atmospheric gases that influence climate, changes in the state's climate, and the impacts of climate change on California's environment and people. (Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment, California Environmental Protection Agency. Indicators of Climate Change in California, August 2013. Available online at http://www.oehha.ca.gov/multimedia/epic ... eport.html )







Aquatic Ecosystems/Water Resources/Hydrology

Stream temperature climate scenarios for the upper Snake/Bear River basins now available: These have been developed from data the local aquatics community contributed to the NorWeST project (http://www.fs.fed.us/rm/boise/AWAE/proj ... rWeST.html). The stream temperature database for this area is a compilation from more than a dozen resource agencies and consists of 1,173 summers of monitoring effort at 672 unique stream sites. See the website for other completed basins and those scheduled for the remainder of 2013 and for 2014.

The NorWeST team has develops three “value added” products from these data:

#1) GIS shapefiles showing the temperature predictions from an accurate model that was used to develop a consistent set of historical climate scenario maps at 1-kilometer resolution for all 54,000 stream kilometers in this area. (Historical scenarios consist of each year’s mean August stream temperature from 1993-2011 and two scenarios that are 10- and 19-year averages over this period. Future scenarios for the 2040s and 2080s based on IPCC warming trajectories are under development and will be available later this fall.) The NorWeST stream temperature model predicts an August mean temperature because it’s the one month monitored most consistently across the region, it allowed us to use the largest proportion of everyone’s data in the model, because August is a thermally stressful period for many fishes, and it’s also relatively easy to directly link a monthly mean temperature to outputs from global climate models to create an integrated system for translating broad climate patterns to local effects on stream temperatures.

#2) GIS shapefile showing the precision associated with the stream temperature model predictions (Scenario 34), which is useful for identifying areas in streams that are not redundant with existing information and could aid in designing efficient monitoring strategies.

#3) Daily summaries (max/min/mean) of temperature data and georeferenced locations of monitoring sites across all agencies to facilitate coordinated monitoring efforts and new temperature research.



Contaminants

EPA and the U.S. Geological Survey Publish Report on Modeling Mercury Dynamics in Watersheds under Future Climate Change Scenarios: Future shifts in climatic conditions may impact watershed mercury dynamics and transport. EPA's National Exposure Research Laboratory and the U.S. Geological Survey's Mercury in Stream Ecosystem Study have collaborated to develop a paper entitled "Climate change and watershed mercury export: A multiple projection and model analysis." The paper focuses on the McTier Creek basin in South Carolina An ensemble of watershed models was applied in the study to simulate and evaluate the responses of hydrological and total mercury fluxes from the landscape to the watershed outlet and in-stream total mercury concentrations to contrasting climate change projections for a watershed in the southeastern coastal plain of the United States. To view this publication and others, visit: http://water.usgs.gov/nawqa/mercury/pubs/.







Coastal/Marine Ecosystems/Ocean Acidification

Sensitivities of extant animal taxa to ocean acidification: Anthropogenic CO2 emitted to the atmosphere is absorbed by the oceans, causing a progressive increase in ocean inorganic carbon concentrations and resulting in decreased water pH and calcium carbonate saturation. This phenomenon, called ocean acidification, is in addition to the warming effects of CO2 emissions. Ocean acidification has been reported to affect ocean biota, but the severity of this threat to ocean ecosystems (and humans depending on these ecosystems) is poorly understood. Here we evaluate the scale of this threat in the context of widely used representative concentration pathways (RCPs) by analyzing the sensitivities of five animal taxa (corals, echinoderms, molluscs, crustaceans and fishes) to a wide range of CO2 concentrations. Corals, echinoderms and molluscs are more sensitive to RCP8.5 (936 ppm in 2100) than are crustaceans. Larval fishes may be even more sensitive than the lower invertebrates, but taxon sensitivity on evolutionary timescales remains obscure. The variety of responses within and between taxa, together with observations in mesocosms and palaeo-analogues, suggest that ocean acidification is a driver for substantial change in ocean ecosystems this century, potentially leading to long-term shifts in species composition. (Wittmann and Pörtner, 2013, Nature Climate Change, published online August 25, DOI: 10.1038/NCLIMATE1982)

Global sea level rise temporarily dampened by 2010-11 Australia floods: Three atmospheric patterns came together above the Indian and Pacific Oceans in 2010 and 2011. When they did, they drove so much precipitation over Australia that the world's ocean levels dropped measurably. Unlike other continents, the soils and topography of Australia prevent almost all its precipitation from flowing into the ocean. The 2010-11 event temporarily halted a long-term trend of rising sea levels caused by higher temperatures and melting ice sheets, according to a team of researchers at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder, Colo., and other institutions. Now that the atmosphere's circulation has returned to its previous patterns, the seas are again rising. (Fasullo et al., 2013, accepted article Geophysical Research Letters, DOI: 10.1002/grl.50834)

Climate Sensitivity of the National Estuarine Research Reserve System: This report examines some of the factors that make estuaries and the communities dependent on estuarine resources susceptible to climate change. The work is focused in the National Estuarine Research Reserve System (NERRS) a collection of 28 reserves located around the U.S. and Puerto Rico, which are managed as a partnership between the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the coastal states for long-term research, ecosystem monitoring, education, and coastal stewardship. To our knowledge, this is the first national climate sensitivity analysis of U.S. estuaries and it is unique in that it examines both the biophysical and socio-demographic sensitivities of reserve sites to climate change. The report provides management recommendations based on its key findings. (Available at NERRS.NOAA.GOV website and via the following links: Full Report Executive Summary (only)

A possible mechanism for the North Pacific regime shift in winter of 1998/1999: This study examines a possible mechanism for the North Pacific regime shift in the winter of 1998/1999. Since the 1976/1977 climate regime shift, the sea surface temperature (SST) in the North Pacific has exhibited a long-term warming trend in the western and central regions, which is mainly due to the two regime shifts that occurred in the winter of 1988/1989 and 1998/1999, respectively. In particular, the 1998/1999 regime shift is characterized by a dipole-like structure along 40°N where a significant warming is prominent in the southwestern and central North Pacific. The slow dynamic adjustments of SST and zonal wind to the meridional heat exchange through thermal advection may be responsible for the 1998/1999 regime shift. We also assert that an intrinsic multidecadal SST oscillation in the North Pacific contributes to the 1998/1999 regime shift. Furthermore, another possibility, which is associated with the oceanic teleconnection from the tropics to the midlatitude, is also briefly discussed. (Jo, H.-S., S.-W. Yeh, and C.-H. Kim (2013), A possible mechanism for the North Pacific regime shift in winter of 1998/ 1999, Geophys. Res. Lett., 40, doi:10.1002/grl.50798)

Past decade saw unprecedented warming in the deep ocean (This summary is from Eos, Vol. 94, No. 32, 6 August 2013) Since 1975 the global surface ocean has shown a pronounced—though wavering— warming trend. Starting in 2004, however, that warming seemed to stall. Researchers measuring the Earth’s total energy budget—the balance of sunlight streaming in compared to the amount of light and heat leaving from the top of the atmosphere—saw that the planet was still holding on to more heat than it was letting out. However, with that energy not warming the surface ocean—a traditionally important energy sink—scientists were not sure where it went. It became known, in some circles, as a case of “missing heat.” Through a reanalysis of global ocean heat content measurements, Balmaseda et al. found the missing heat. The authors show that though the upper ocean waters, from the surface to 700 meters depth, showed no warming from 2004 to 2008, the waters from 700 to 2000 meters were warming at an unprecedented rate. They found that during the past decade, of the excess energy trapped by the anthropogenic greenhouse effect that has gone into warming the ocean, 30% of it has contributed to warming the deep ocean. The authors also found that throughout the observational record the warming of the surface ocean has stalled before because of large volcanic eruptions or swings of the El Niño– Southern Oscillation. They also note that changes in surface wind patterns are an important factor in driving ocean heat content from the surface layers to the deep ocean. (Balmaseda et al., 2013, Distinctive climate signals in reanalysis of global ocean heat content, Geophysical Research Letters, 40, 1754–1759, doi:10.1002/grl.50382)

Coastal adaptation with ecological engineering: The use of combined approaches to coastal adaptation in lieu of a single strategy, such as sea-wall construction, allows for better preparation for a highly uncertain and dynamic coastal environment. Although general principles such as mainstreaming and no- or low-regret options exist to guide coastal adaptation and provide the framework in which combined approaches operate, few have examined the interactions, synergistic effects and benefits of combined approaches to adaptation. This Perspective provides three examples of ecological engineering — marshes, mangroves and oyster reefs — and illustrates how the combination of ecology and engineering works. (Cheong et al., Nature Climate Change, vol 3, 787-791, 2013 DOI: 10.1038/NCLIMATE1854)



LCC Announcements

Climate Change: Various Adaptation Efforts Are Under Way at Key Natural Resource Management Agencies This GAO report examines (1) steps key federal natural resource management agencies--Forest Service, NOAA, Fish and Wildlife Service, National Park Service, and Bureau of Land Management--have taken since 2007 to address adaptation and (2) how these agencies have collaborated at the national level on adaptation since 2007. GAO analyzed the agencies' climate change adaptation guidance and planning documents and interviewed agency officials. GAO also visited one field location for each agency, selected using a nonprobability approach, so the results are not generalizable to all of the agencies' field locations. (GAO Report-13-253, May 31, 2013)

Scenario planning for climate change adaptation: A guidance for resource managers. A new document, produced by Point Blue Conservation Science (formerly PRBO) and the California Coastal Conservancy, provides resource managers with guidance for scenario planning in the context of climate change. This document is a step-by-step guide to developing scenarios and using them to plan for climate change adaptation. The intended audience includes natural resource managers, planners, scientists, and other stakeholders working at a local or regional scale to develop resource management approaches that take climate change impacts and other important uncertainties into account. Scenario planning is a tool that embraces uncertainty rather than trying to reduce or eliminate it. It can help resource managers generate creative approaches to climate change adaptation by thinking outside the historical or most obvious trends to incorporate uncertainty as a factor in prioritizing management actions. (Moore, S.S., N.E. Seavy, and M. Gerhart. 2013. Scenario planning for climate change adaptation: A guidance for resource managers. Point Blue Conservation Science and California Coastal Conservancy.)

Habitat Restoration and Climate Change: Dealing with Climate Variability, Incomplete Data, and Management Decisions with Tree Translocations: Restoration programs need to increasingly address both the restitution of biodiversity and ecosystem services and the preparation of habitats for future climate change. One option to adapt habitats to climate change in the temperate zone is the translocation of southern populations to compensate for climate change effects—an option known as assisted migration (AM). Although AM is widely criticized for endangered species, forest managers are more confident that tree populations can be translocated with success because of previous experiences within native ranges. Here, researchers contend that translocations of tree populations are also subject to uncertainties, and they extract lessons for future programs of AM within species ranges from a well-documented failed case of population translocation of Pinus pinaster Ait. in Europe. The failure of these translocations originated from the unawareness of several unpredictable ecological and social events: cryptic maladaptation of the introduced populations, underestimation of climate variability differences between the source and target sites, and complexity in the management schemes, postponing decisions that could have been undertaken earlier. Under the no-analog conditions that are expected with climate change, management decisions need to be made with incomplete data, implying that a certain degree of maladaptation should always be expected when restoring plant populations from local or external seed sources. (Marta Benito-Garzon et al 10 JUN 2013 DOI: 10.1111/rec.12032 © 2013 Society for Ecological Restoration)

Fostering knowledge networks for climate adaptatIon: The authors propose forging network connections among rapidly changing communities of decision-makers and researchers to foster the social learning necessary for effective adaptation to climate risks. (Bidwell, Dietz and Scavia, July, 2013, Nature Climate Change, Vol 3)






Climate Change (General) Journal Articles/Publications/News

Overestimated global warming over the past 20 years: Recent observed global warming is significantly less than that simulated by climate models. This difference might be explained by some combination of errors in external forcing, model response and internal climate variability…. For example, the forced trends in models are modulated up and down by simulated sequences of El Nino Southern Oscillation events, which are not expected to coincide with the observed sequence of such events…. Another possible driver of the difference between observed and simulated global warming is increasing stratospheric aerosol concentrations (a cooling effect) which are not taken account by climate models. (Fyfe et al, Nature Climate Change, commentary, vol 3, 767-769 (2013), doi:10.1038/nclimate1972)

Hidden heat: Scientists are homing in on the reasons for the current hiatus in global warming, but all must recognize that the long-term risk of warming from carbon dioxide remains high. (28 August 2013 Nature editorial, see Kosaka and Xie, below)

Recent global-warming hiatus tied to equatorial Pacific surface cooling: Despite the continued increase in atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations, the annual-mean global temperature has not risen in the twenty-first century, challenging the prevailing view that anthropogenic forcing causes climate warming. Various mechanisms have been proposed for this hiatus in global warming, but their relative importance has not been quantified, hampering observational estimates of climate sensitivity. Here researchers show that accounting for recent cooling in the eastern equatorial Pacific reconciles climate simulations and observations. Kosaka and Xie present a novel method of uncovering mechanisms for global temperature change by prescribing, in addition to radiative forcing, the observed history of sea surface temperature over the central to eastern tropical Pacific in a climate model. Although the surface temperature prescription is limited to only 8.2% of the global surface, the model reproduces the annual-mean global temperature remarkably well with correlation coefficient r = 0.97 for 1970–2012 (which includes the current hiatus and a period of accelerated global warming). Moreover, the simulation captures major seasonal and regional characteristics of the hiatus, including the intensified Walker circulation, the winter cooling in northwestern North America and the prolonged drought in the southern USA. The results show that the current hiatus is part of natural climate variability, tied specifically to a La-Niña-like decadal cooling. Although similar decadal hiatus events may occur in the future, the multi-decadal warming trend is very likely to continue with greenhouse gas increase. (Y. Kosaka and S.-P. Xie Nature, published online Aug 28, http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature12534; 2013).
DOI:

Warming climate increases rainfall extremes (Lau et al., as summarized in Eos): In recent years there have been a number of prolonged heat waves and heavy rain events, and studies are showing that global climate warming is increasing the risk of extreme rainfall and drought. To add to the evidence linking climate warming and extreme precipitation and provide a regional as well as global perspective, Lau et al. analyzed projections from 14 different climate models that are part of the CMIP5 project, which is organized by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in preparation for its upcoming fifth assessment report. The authors examined not only total rain but also changes in heavy, moderate, and light rain, as well as drought, on global and regional scales. They found that under a 1% per year increase in carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, which is comparable to a business- as- usual scenario, the ensemble of models predicts that by the time CO2 emissions triple, globally extremely heavy rain would increase by 100% to 250%, moderate rain would decrease by 5% to 10%, and light rain would increase by 10% to 15%. There would also be a global increase in dry months of up to 16%, with the largest risk of drought in areas that are already dry, including northern Africa, southern Africa, and southern Europe as well as the southwestern United States and Mexico and northeastern Brazil. The increased heavy precipitation would likely be concentrated in wet regions, including the equatorial Pacific Ocean and Asian monsoon areas. The results add to growing evidence that increased CO2 emissions will change global precipitation patterns. The increased risk of severe floods and droughts globally is associated with an adjustment in the large-scale circulation in response to the heat imbalance induced by global warming. (Geophysical Research Letters, doi:10.1002/grl.50420, 2013)

El Niño modulations over the past seven centuries: The El Niño/Southern Oscillation exhibits considerable natural variability on interdecadal to centennial timescales making it difficult to understand how climate change affects it. A reconstruction now shows there has been anomalously high activity in the late twentieth century, relative to the past seven centuries. This is suggestive of a response to global warming, and will provide constraints to improve climate models and projections. (Li, et al., Nature Climate Change, vol 3, 822-826, doi:10.1038/nclimate1936)

American Geophysical Union Releases Revised Position Statement on Climate Change: Highlights How Human Activities Are Changing Earth’s Climate and the Harmful Impact of that Change on Society, 5 August 2013; AGU Release No. 13-38

2012 State of the Climate Report: Worldwide, 2012 was among the 10 warmest years on record according to the report released on August 3 by the American Meteorological Society (AMS). The peer-reviewed report, with scientists from NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, NC serving as lead editors, was compiled by 384 scientists from 52 countries. It provides a detailed update on global climate indicators, notable weather events, and other data collected by environmental monitoring stations and instruments on land, sea, ice, and sky. The full report can be viewed by visiting this site. Key findings include:
• Warm temperature trends continue near Earth’s surface: Four major independent datasets show 2012 was among the 10 warmest years on record, ranking either 8th or 9th, depending upon the dataset used. The United States and Argentina had their warmest year on record.
• La Niña dissipates into neutral conditions
• The Arctic continues to warm; sea ice extent reaches record low
• Antarctica sea ice extent reaches record high
• Sea surface temperatures increase
• Ocean heat content remains near record levels
• Sea level reaches record high
• Ocean salinity trends continue (precipitation is increasing in already rainy areas and evaporation is intensifying in drier locations)
• Tropical cyclones near average
• Greenhouse gases climb (spring 2012, for the first time, the atmospheric CO2 concentration exceeded 400 ppm at several Arctic observational sites)
• Cool temperature trends continue in Earth’s lower stratosphere (increasing greenhouse gases and decline of stratospheric ozone tend to cool the stratosphere while warming the planet near-surface layers)
• Less snow (Northern hemisphere annual average snow cover extent has not exceeded the long-term average even once since 2003)

Time-dependent climate sensitivity and the legacy of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions: This study examines both shorter term “fast-feedback” effects of greenhouse gas emission increases and those longer than millennia (e.g., changes in ice sheets, vegetation, ocean circulation, biogeochemical cycling, etc.). Compared with earlier studies, these results predict a much longer lifetime of human-induced future warming (23,000–165,000 years), which increases the likelihood of large ice sheet melting and major sea level rise…. Long-lived peak warming (>∼10,000 years) as suggested in this study is more consistent with, albeit shorter than the duration of large climate perturbations in the past associated with massive carbon release such as the Paleocene–Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM). The PETM is considered the best analog for anthropogenic carbon input and independent dating techniques suggest a PETM main phase duration of intense warming of >50,000 y. One hypothesis for the longevity of the PETM warming involves additional carbon release from various reservoirs, mobilized as a feedback to the initial warming. If the present/ future carbon cycle operates in a similar fashion, future warming could be more intense and longer lasting than previously thought. (Zeebe, Richard E., PNAS, Published online before print August 5, 2013, doi: 10.1073/pnas.1222843110)

Science-Based Methods for Entity-Scale Quantification of Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Sources and Sinks from Agriculture and Forestry Practices: This report outlines a set of consensus methods for quantifying GHG emissions and carbon storage at the local farm, ranch or forest scale. A Federal Register Notice is included on the web site and provides detailed instructions for comment submission (comments must be received within 45 days of the August 28, 2013 publication of the Notice). For more information on USDA's Climate Change activities, please visit: www.usda.gov/oce/climate_change/index.htm.




Climate and Weather Reports and Services

NOAA: July global temperatures sixth highest on record : According to NOAA scientists, the globally-averaged temperature for July 2013 was the sixth highest July since record keeping began in 1880. It also marked the 37th consecutive July and 341st consecutive month (more than 28 years) with a globally-averaged temperature above the 20th century average. The last below-average July temperature was July 1976 and the last below-average temperature for any month was February 1985. Additional information can be found on the following web sites: http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/2013/07/

The Office of the Washington State Climatologist issues a monthly newsletter that summarizes the WA climate for the previous month, includes a precipitation and temperature outlook, and also includes a brief summary of an interesting aspect of the weather or climate of WA, among a few other sections: See www.climate.washington.edu/newsletter for copies and to join the listserv.

PNW Climate Outlook: This quarterly report from the Pacific Northwest Climate Impacts Research Consortium (CIRC) provides a seasonal wrap up of relevant regional issues along with an outlook for the coming season in Idaho, Oregon, Washington and Western Montana. To subscribe send an email to John Stevenson.

Great Basin Weather and Climate Dashboard: this website provides up to date climate and weather data and forecasts/outlooks for the Great Basin including temperature, precipitation, drought, snowpack and hydrologic information. (Some of the information includes the entire western U.S.) The Dashboard is a joint effort amongst the Western Regional Climate Center, California and Nevada Applications Program, the USDA Farm Service Agency and the Great Basin LCC.

NOAA Climate Connection E-Newsletter: Free monthly e-newsletter designed to increase climate literacy and communication capacity for NOAA and its partners. Subscription requests can be sent to NOAAClimateConnection@noaa.gov. Click here to view the June 2013 NOAA Climate Connection e-newsletter.

NOAA Monthly Drought Outlook: The monthly drought outlook complements the weekly drought condition updates via the U.S. Drought Monitor. See this site.

NOAA Climate Portal: http://www.climate.gov/ National Snow and Ice Data Center: http://nsidc.org




Greenhouse Gas Emissions/Reductions

Energy Dept. Reports (Aug 6): U.S. Wind Energy Production and Manufacturing Reaches Record Highs. In 2012, over 13 gigawatts of new wind power capacity was added to the U.S. grid – nearly double the wind capacity deployed in 2011. This tremendous growth helped us surpass 60 gigawatts of total capacity at the end of 2012 – enough capacity to power all the homes in California and Washington State combined. As energy production goes, so does manufacturing. The 2012 Wind Technologies Market Report estimates that 72 percent of the wind turbine equipment – including towers, blades and gears – installed in the U.S. last year was made in America. This growth in domestic wind manufacturing is creating thousands of new jobs across the country. Industry estimates the wind sector employs more than 80,000 American workers across a variety of sectors, including finance, engineering, construction and project development…. Still, as these reports make clear, wind energy projections for future years are uncertain, due in part to policy uncertainty.

Powering Los Angeles with renewable energy: The City of Los Angeles is nearly two thirds of the way towards its goal of generating a third of its electricity from renewable sources by 2020; cities around the world can glean valuable technical, economic and political lessons from its experience. (Mayor Villaraigosa et al., Nature Climate Change, vol 3, 771-775, doi:10.1038/nclimate1985)







Funding Opportunities

NOAA's Climate Program Office Announces Funding Opportunity for Fiscal Year 2014
NOAA is accepting individual applications for nine competitions, organized around the Climate Program Office's Climate v Observations and Monitoring; Earth System Science; Modeling, Analysis, Predictions, and Projections; and Climate and Societal Interactions Programs. Letters of intent are due by 5 p.m. Eastern Time, September 10, 2013, and the deadline for final applications is 5:00 p.m. Eastern Time, November 14, 2013. To read the announcement, visit: http://www.grants.gov/view-opportunity. ... pId=239854. For program information sheets with specifics on the topics for the proposals, visit: http://cpo.noaa.gov/GrantsandProjects.aspx.

National Science Foundation Solicits Proposals for Water Sustainability and Climate Program
One of the most urgent challenges facing the world today is ensuring the continuance of an adequate supply and quality of water. This solicitation from the National Science Foundation (NSF) seeks proposals to determine how our built water systems and our governance systems can be made more reliable, resilient, and sustainable to meet diverse needs. This activity allows the partner agencies - NSF and the U.S. Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture (USDA/NIFA) - to combine resources to identify and fund projects that support their respective missions. Successful proposals are expected to study water systems in their entirety and to enable a new interdisciplinary paradigm in water research. Proposals that do not broadly integrate across the biological sciences, geosciences, engineering, and social sciences may be returned without review. Projects supported under this solicitation may establish new observational sites or utilize existing observational sites and facilities already supported by NSF or other federal and state agencies. The application deadline for proposals is September 10, 2013. For more information, visit: http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2013/nsf13535/nsf13535.htm.




Vulnerability Assessments

U.S. Geological Survey Moves to Create Climate Change Vulnerability Database: USGS is moving to create a registry of climate change vulnerability to better protect wildlife, ecosystems, and dams. The registry will collect and display information on climate change adaptation projects underway across the country and will pool from federal, state, local, and tribal governments. A notice to gather information for the registry was filed on August 15, 2013 in the Federal Register. The USGS will collect comments on the proposal for a 60-day period, after which it will go to the White House Office of Management and Budget. For more information, see: http://www.ofr.gov/OFRUpload/OFRData/2013-20361_PI.pdf




List Servers
• NCTC Climate Change List server (upcoming webinars and courses): send an email to Danielle Larock at danielle_larock@fws.gov
• LCC list servers (see your LCC’s website)
• OneNOAA Science Webinars
• EPA Climate Change and Water E-Newsletter
• Climate CIRCulator (Oregon Climate Change Research Institute)
• Climate Impacts Group (Univ. Washington)
• US Forest Service Fish & Wildlife Research Updates




Other Resources and Tools

FWS Climate Change Response: How do partnership efforts such as Landscape Conservation Cooperatives and the National Fish, Wildlife, and Plants Climate Adaptation Strategy fit into the Service's overall response to accelerating climate change? How is our agency reducing its carbon footprint? What is our agency doing now to reduce the impacts of climate change on fish, wildlife and plants? Learn more

Landscape Conservation Cooperatives: Natural systems and landscapes are impacted by increasing land use pressures and widespread resource threats amplified by a rapidly changing climate. These changes are occurring at an unprecedented pace and scale. By leveraging resources and strategically targeting science to inform conservation decisions and actions, Landscape Conservation Cooperatives (LCCs) are a network of partnerships working in unison to ensure the sustainability of America’s land, water, wildlife, and cultural resources. Learn more

National Fish, Wildlife, and Plants Climate Adaptation Strategy: The National Fish, Wildlife, and Plants Climate Adaptation Strategy will provide a unified approach—reflecting shared principles and science-based practices—for reducing the negative impacts of climate change on fish, wildlife, plants, habitats and associated ecological processes across geographic scales. Learn more

FWS Climate Change Information Toolkit: A key part of the Service's climate change strategy is to inform FWS staff about the impacts of accelerating climate change and to engage partners and others in seeking collaborative solutions. Through shared knowledge and communication, we can work together to reduce the impacts of climate change on fish, wildlife, plants and their habitats. Here are some resources that can help.

Climate Change, Wildlife, and Wildlands Toolkit: The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, in partnership with the National Park Service and with input from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, developed a kit for use when talking with the public about how climate change is affecting our nation's wildlife and public lands. Learn more .

Safeguarding Wildlife from Climate Change Web Conference Series: The FWS and National Wildlife Federation have developed a series of web conferences to increase communication and transfer of technical information between conservation professionals regarding the growing challenges of climate change. Learn more






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