Climate Change and Wildfires: Impacts and Solutions

HONR 229L: Climate Change: Science, Economics, and Governance Impacts of Climate Change Your name here 8 October 2019

You have a challenging discussion to organize. My suggestion is to spend about 10 mins each on the four main topic areas: wildfires sea level rise ocean acidification public health This discussion could go in many directions. Great if you can incorporate as much material as possible from the websites into the presentation as possible, trying to provide interesting graphics and/or words to provoke class discussion. Since each student has to write an essay on two of the topics, hopefully there will be good participation throughout the discussion. Feel free to use as much or as little of the suggestions that follow as you see fit.

Here are some suggestions for the wildfire part of the discussion. Last year in class I showed three slides (to follow) from the two recent scholarly papers that attempted to relate climate change and wildfires: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0188486&type=printable http://www.pnas.org/content/115/36/E8349 Should you so desire, you are more than welcome to show these same three slides. If so, might want to relate to the Wet gets Wetter, Dry gets Dryer paradigm for how precipitation will change, as global warming occurs (slides 6 & 7 of this package). Material in these 5 slides combined with info off the assigned websites should easily fill 10 minutes on this topic. I will be delighted to meet with you on Monday and walk you through the meaning of the graphs on the next three slides.

Recent papers linking fires to climate change Trends in temperature for: (a) Winter (JFM) (b) spring (AMJ) (c) summer (JAS) over the 1972–2006 time period This paper links increased burn area to warmer conditions during winter (mainly) and spring (secondary) http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0188486&type=printable

Recent papers linking fires to climate change Linear trends in wetting rain days (left top), the logarithm of area burned (left bottom), and wetting rain days versus logarithm of area burned (right) This paper concludes declines in summer precipitation and wetting rain days have likely been a primary driver of increases in wildfire area burned, and points to future climate projections that predict further decreases in summer precipitation and longer dry periods between rain events across much of the West. http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2018/08/14/1802316115

Recent papers linking fires to climate change This is a salacious exchange on twitter about these papers.

Connection to Climate ChangeWWDD: Wet-gets-Wetter, Dry-gets-Drier (WWDD) paradigm Spatial Distribution of Precipitation Changes, 2081 2100 relative to 19862005 Climate model projections, RCP 8.5 (aggressive growth of GHGs) IPCC 2013 https://www.cnbc.com/2017/08/28/the-stunning-images-from-record-setting-flooding-in-houston-texas.html

Connection to Climate ChangeWWDD: Wet-gets-Wetter, Dry-gets-Drier (WWDD) paradigm http://www.windows2universe.org/vocals/images/HadleyCell_small.jpg

Here are some suggestions for the ocean acidification part of class. Would be great to let the class know that as humans emit CO2 to the atmosphere due to the combustion of fossil fuels, only about half of the emitted carbon actually stays in the atmosphere. The rest of this CO2 is taken up by either the world’s oceans or the terrestrial biosphere. Should you so desire, you could show the following figure that comes from our book and had the following caption: Caption: (a) Time series of CO2 (global mean as well as amount measured at Mauna Loa Observatory; (b) total anthropogenic emissions of CO2 from fossil fuel & land use change (green bars) atmospheric growth (blue bars) and major volcanic eruptions (red triangle, for Mt Agung, El Chichón, Fuego, and Mt Pinatubo); (c) tropical Pacific ENSO 3.4 index (red denotes El Niño events; blue denotes strong La Niña conditions); and (d) Airborne Fraction of CO2 (i.e., amount that remains in the atmosphere each year), three 3 yr running mean of AF (black), and trend-line of a least squares fit to the 3 yr running mean (blue). You could make this point with or without the use of this figure

For the portion of anthropogenic CO2 taken up by the world’s oceans, the acidity of the oceans rises. Would be too much in my opinion to actually go through the chemistry. You could however show the following table, that I use in my other, higher level class: If you use this figure, fine to attribute to me  I assume given your STEM background you can understand that: The ocean is “basic” (i.e., with our without humans, pH is less than 7 Basic state of the oceans means acidic materials will dissolve As atmospheric CO2 rises, pH falls … which means the ocean will be less basic and hence more acidic If you could talk the class through these simple points, would be most wonderful.

Now the problem with rising ocean acidity is actually quite simple to state. Many organisms have shells that they “precipitate” that are chalky like substances (think Pepto Bismol). Wetake Pepto Bismol to help our calm our acidic stomachs … this works because Pepto neutralizes the acid in our stomachs by dissolving. Alas, as the oceans become more acidic … the organisms have a harder and harder time precipitating their shells, due to presence of more H+ ions (protons) in the water that attack the shells. Here is an image from the Scientific American article written by Scott Doney that you’re welcome to use. Doney, The Dangers of Ocean Acidification, Scientific American, March, 2006

Here are some suggestions for Sea Level rise. First, you can show students this time series of Arctic Sea Ice (i.e., ice that is formed in the Artic ocean) and ask the students what effect melting sea ice will have on sea level. I expect most will think that this will cause sea level to rise! If you are able to read through this blog http://www.skepticalscience.com/Sea-level-rise-due-to-floating-ice.html and provide a synopsis of what is stated, I think the students would really appreciate having this explained! https://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index

Speaking of sea level rise … you can also show this figure, which is Fig SPM.9 of the http://www.atmos.umd.edu/~rjs/class/honr229L/readings/WG1AR5_SPM_FINAL_carbon.pdf If you show, might want to ask the students some questions: a) how many feet is 1 meter (you can get the answer, but first see if anyone knows) b) if the entire Greenland ice sheet were to melt, how much would sea level rise?

Speaking of sea level rise … you can also show this figure, which is Fig SPM.9 of the http://www.atmos.umd.edu/~rjs/class/honr229L/readings/WG1AR5_SPM_FINAL_carbon.pdf If you show, might want to ask the students some questions: a) how many feet is 1 meter (you can get the answer, but first see if anyone knows) b) if the entire Greenland ice sheet were to melt, how much would sea level rise? (answer is 7 meters)

Speaking of sea level rise … you can also show this figure, which is Fig SPM.9 of the http://www.atmos.umd.edu/~rjs/class/honr229L/readings/WG1AR5_SPM_FINAL_carbon.pdf If you show, might want to ask the students some questions: a) how many feet is 1 meter (you can get the answer, but first see if anyone knows) b) if the entire Greenland ice sheet were to melt, how much would sea level rise? (answer is 7 meters) Note: collapse of the Greenland ice sheet causes sea level to rise because this ice sheet lies on top of land: i.e., Greenland is a continental sized land mass. Sea ice, on the other hand, lies on top of the ocean (is buoyant in water). Reading states collapse of Greenland ice sheet would take a millennium (1000 years), but some are concerned this is poorly understood and could happen sooner)

Consider clicking through these slides … if you do so, please be sure to relate that each step is in units of meters, and IPCC forecasts sea level to rise by 1 meter, end of century, if RCP 8.5 scenario for GHGs holds. Images end at 6 meter rise in sea level, which is just under the 7 meter rise that should be present on student’s minds, should Greenland collapse Source: Jeremy Weiss and Jonathan Overpeck, University of Arizona

Also consider showing the animated GIF embedded below, which is from https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/vulnerable-maryland-weighs-threat-of-sea-level-rise/2013/07/21/37201d50-efe9-11e2-bed3-b9b6fe264871_story.html If you show, please make clear the animations are for today, as well as 5, 12, and 25 feet of water (you’re welcome to convert feet to meter)

Here are some suggestions for the climate change and disease part of the discussion: • Can review some of the ways climate change can impact the spread of disease, such as: • Creates more favorable conditions for some disease-carrying insects, like mosquitoes • Increases flooding, which leads to standing water and the contamination of water sources • Destroys habitats of animals, bringing them into contact with humans more frequently Here is a graphic from one of the websites:

Here are some suggestions for the climate change and disease part of the discussion: Might then want to provide a detailed description of two specific diseases linked to climate change (can choose between cholera, dengue fever, ebola, hantavirus) with perhaps one slide per disease, then prepare a final overview slide listing the other diseases. Feel free to take this part of the discussion in whatever direction you’d like, pulling material off of: https://www.scidev.net/global/policy/feature/climate-change-and-insect-borne-disease-facts-and--1.html (assigned) https://www.livescience.com/49152-cholera-outbreaks-climate-change.html (auxiliary) https://blogs.ei.columbia.edu/2014/09/04/how-climate-change-is-exacerbating-the-spread-of-disease (auxiliary)

Climate Change and Wildfires: Impacts and Solutions