Distributed modelling of climate change impacts on snow sublimation in Northern Mongolia

Sublimation of snow is an important factor of the hydrological cycle in Mongolia and is likely to increase according to future climate projections. In this study the hydrological model TRAIN was used to assess spatially distributed current and future sublimation rates based on interpolated daily data of precipitation, air temperature, air humidity, wind speed and solar radiation. An automated procedure for the interpolation of the input data is provided. Depending on the meteorological parameter and the data availability for the individual days, the most appropriate interpolation method is chosen automatically from inverse distance weighting, Ordinary Least Squares interpolation, Ordinary or Universal Kriging. Depending on elevation simulated annual sublimation in the period 1986–2006 was 23 to 35 mm, i.e. approximately 80% of total snowfall. Moreover, future climate projections for 2071–2100 of ECHAM5 and HadCM3, based on the A1B emission scenario of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, were analysed with TRAIN. In the case of ECHAM5 simulated sublimation increases by up to 17% (26...41 mm) while it remains at the same level for HadCM3 (24...34 mm). The differences are mainly due to a distinct increase in winter precipitation for ECHAM5. Simulated changes of the all-season hydrological conditions, e.g. the sublimation-to-precipitation ratio, were ambiguous due to diverse precipitation patterns derived by the global circulation models

Participatory agro-climate information services: A key component in climate resilient agriculture

The brief promotes participatory agro-climate information services as a key component in achieving climate-smart agriculture. The brief emphasizes that actionable agro-climate information starts with—and responds to—gender-based needs of farmers, integrated at all stages of the value chain. Timely forecasts and accurate agroclimate advisories have been proven to provide farmers with production, adaptation, and mitigation benefits

Modelling historical and current irrigation water demand on the continental scale

Abstract. Water abstractions for irrigation purposes are higher than for any other pan-European water use sector and have a large influence on river runoff regimes. This modelling experiment assesses historic and current irrigation water demands for different crops in five arc minute spatial resolution for pan-Europe. Two different modelling frameworks have been applied in this study. First, soft-coupling the dynamic vegetation model LPJmL with the land use model LandSHIFT leads to overestimations of national irrigation water demands, which are rather high in the southern Mediterranean countries. This can be explained by unlimited water supply in the model structure and illegal or not gauged water abstractions in the reported data sets. The second modelling framework is WaterGAP3, which has an integrated conceptual crop specific irrigation module. Irrigation water requirements as modelled with WaterGAP3 feature a more realistic representation of pan-European water withdrawals. However, in colder humid regions, irrigation water demands are often underestimated. Additionally, a national database on crop-specific irrigated area and water withdrawal for all 42 countries within pan-Europe has been set up and integrated in both model frameworks

Supported ionic liquids for the efficient removal of acetylsalicylic acid from aqueous solutions

Acetylsalicylic acid, commercially available as aspirin, is one of the most used drugs in the world, being detected in several environmental compartments, including drinking water supplies. Given its environmental impact, the development of a cost‐effective technology capable of removing this pharmaceutical from water samples is of high relevance, for which materials based on silica chemically modified with ionic liquids (SILs) can be foreseen as a promising alternative. In this work, four SILs (with the chloride anion and imidazolium or tetraalkylammonium cations of different alkyl side chain length) were synthesized and characterized, and their potential for the adsorption of acetylsalicylic acid appraised by adsorption kinetics and isotherms. Envisioning their use to treat drinking water, the toxicity of all SILs towards the liver cell line Hep2G was determined. The best identified SIL, comprising the dimethylbutylammonium cation, displays a maximum adsorption capacity of 0.08 mmol/g, being 1 g of this material sufficient to treat ca. 14,500 L of water containing 1 μg/L of acetylsalicylic acid (under ideal conditions). Furthermore, this material has a negligible toxicity towards the liver cell line Hep2G. The results obtained reinforce the potential of SILs as alternative adsorbents to effectively remove a cetylsalicylic acid from aqueous solutions, and may be envisioned as a promising strategy for the treatment of wastewater and drinking water.publishe

Quantification of uncertainties in global grazing systems assessments

Livestock systems play a key role in global sustainability challenges like food security and climate change, yet, many unknowns and large uncertainties prevail. We present a systematic, spatially explicit assessment of uncertainties related to grazing intensity (GI), a key metric for assessing ecological impacts of grazing, by combining existing datasets on a) grazing feed intake, b) the spatial distribution of livestock, c) the extent of grazing land, and d) its net primary productivity (NPP). An analysis of the resulting 96 maps implies that on average 15% of the grazing land NPP is consumed by livestock. GI is low in most of worlds grazing lands but hotspots of very high GI prevail in 1% of the total grazing area. The agreement between GI maps is good on one fifth of the world's grazing area, while on the remainder it is low to very low. Largest uncertainties are found in global drylands and where grazing land bears trees (e.g., the Amazon basin or the Taiga belt). In some regions like India or Western Europe massive uncertainties even result in GI > 100% estimates. Our sensitivity analysis indicates that the input-data for NPP, animal distribution and grazing area contribute about equally to the total variability in GI maps, while grazing feed intake is a less critical variable. We argue that a general improvement in quality of the available global level datasets is a precondition for improving the understanding of the role of livestock systems in the context of global environmental change or food security

Since 2015 the SinoGerman research project SIGN supports water quality improvement in the Taihu region, China

The Taihu (Tai lake) region is one of the most economically prospering areas of China. Due to its location within this district of high anthropogenic activities, Taihu represents a drastic example of water pollution with nutrients (nitrogen, phosphate), organic contaminants and heavy metals. High nutrient levels combined with very shallow water create large eutrophication problems, threatening the drinking water supply of the surrounding cities. Within the international research project SIGN (SinoGerman Water Supply Network, www.water-sign.de), funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), a powerful consortium of fifteen German partners is working on the overall aim of assuring good water quality from the source to the tap by taking the whole water cycle into account: The diverse research topics range from future proof strategies for urban catchment, innovative monitoring and early warning approaches for lake and drinking water, control and use of biological degradation processes, efficient water treatment technologies, adapted water distribution up to promoting sector policy by good governance. The implementation in China is warranted, since the leading Chinese research institutes as well as the most important local stakeholders, e.g. water suppliers, are involved

Temporal and spatial variation in pharmaceutical concentrations in an urban river system

Many studies have quantified pharmaceuticals in the environment, few however, have incorporated detailed temporal and spatial variability due to associated costs in terms of time and materials. Here, we target 33 physico-chemically diverse pharmaceuticals in a spatiotemporal exposure study into the occurrence of pharmaceuticals in the wastewater system and the Rivers Ouse and Foss (two diverse river systems) in the city of York, UK. Removal rates in two of the WWTPs sampled (a conventional activated sludge (CAS) and trickling filter plant) ranged from not eliminated (carbamazepine) to >99% (paracetamol). Data comparisons indicate that pharmaceutical exposures in river systems are highly variable regionally, in part due to variability in prescribing practices, hydrology, wastewater management, and urbanisation and that select annual median pharmaceutical concentrations observed in this study were higher than those previously observed in the European Union and Asia thus far. Significant spatial variability was found between all sites in both river systems, while seasonal variability was significant for 86% and 50% of compounds in the River Foss and Ouse, respectively. Seasonal variations in flow, in-stream attenuation, usage and septic effluent releases are suspected drivers behind some of the observed temporal exposure variability. When the data were used to evaluate a simple environmental exposure model for pharmaceuticals, mean ratios of predicted environmental concentrations (PECs), obtained using the model, to measured environmental concentrations (MECs) were 0.51 and 0.04 for the River Foss and River Ouse, respectively. Such PEC/MEC ratios indicate that the model underestimates actual concentrations in both river systems, but to a much greater extent in the larger River Ouse

The importance of over-the-counter-sales and product format in the environmental exposure assessment of active pharmaceutical ingredients

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T?cnicas de Producci?n y calidad del carb?n vegetal en los robledales de altura de Costa Rica

Ilus. 21 tab. 22 ref. Tambi?n como serie interna: Colecci?n Silvicultura y Manejo de Bosques Naturales, no.