The atmospheric role in the Arctic water cycle: A review on processes, past and future changes, and their impacts

This is the final version of the article. Available from the publisher via the DOI in this record.Atmospheric humidity, clouds, precipitation, and evapotranspiration are essential components of the Arctic climate system. During recent decades, specific humidity and precipitation have generally increased in the Arctic, but changes in evapotranspiration are poorly known. Trends in clouds vary depending on the region and season. Climate model experiments suggest that increases in precipitation are related to global warming. In turn, feedbacks associated with the increase in atmospheric moisture and decrease in sea ice and snow cover have contributed to the Arctic amplification of global warming. Climate models have captured the overall wetting trend but have limited success in reproducing regional details. For the rest of the 21st century, climate models project strong warming and increasing precipitation, but different models yield different results for changes in cloud cover. The model differences are largest in months of minimum sea ice cover. Evapotranspiration is projected to increase in winter but in summer to decrease over the oceans and increase over land. Increasing net precipitation increases river discharge to the Arctic Ocean. Over sea ice in summer, projected increase in rain and decrease in snowfall decrease the surface albedo and, hence, further amplify snow/ice surface melt. With reducing sea ice, wind forcing on the Arctic Ocean increases with impacts on ocean currents and freshwater transport out of the Arctic. Improvements in observations, process understanding, and modeling capabilities are needed to better quantify the atmospheric role in the Arctic water cycle and its changes.We thank all colleagues involved in the Arctic Freshwater Synthesis (AFS) for fruitful discussions. In particular, John Walsh is acknowledged for his constructive comments on the manuscript. AFS has been sponsored by the World Climate Research Programme’s Climate and the Cryosphere project (WCRP-CliC), the International Arctic Science Committee (IASC), and the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme (AMAP). The work for this paper has been supported by the Academy of Finland (contracts 259537 and 283101), the UK Natural Environment Research Council (grant NE/J019585/1), the US National Science Foundation grant ARC-1023592 and the Program “Arctic” and the Basic Research Program of the Presidium Russian Academy of Sciences. NCAR is supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation. We gratefully acknowledge the project coordination and meeting support of Jenny Baeseman and Gwenaelle Hamon at the CliC International Project Office. No new data were applied in the manuscript. Data applied for Figures 2 and 3 are available from the JRA-55 archive at http://jra. kishou.go.jp/JRA-55/index_en. html#usage

Review of flood stage frequency estimates for the City of Fort McMurray: Final report

This study was undertaken for the Technical Committee, Canada-Alberta Flood Damage Reduction Program in response to concerns raised by the City of Fort McMurray over the validity of the elevation established in previous studies as representing the 1 in 100 year design flood level. The specific objectives were first, to examine the historic data and assess it reliability and second, to update the flood frequency analysis, incorporating additional data collected in recent years. The main conclusions arising from the study are: a) In spite of some limitations, the information available on the 1875 ice jam event and most other historic events is considered to be sufficiently reliable for inclusion in the flood frequency analysis, b) the 1 in 100 year break-up stage at Fort McMurray based on the updated frequency analysis is 250.0 m, and c) The estimated return period for the 1875 event is in the order of 350 years and corresponds to a flood stage 2.0 m above the 1 in 100 year stage. Designation of flood risk areas based on an historical flood that has exceeded the 1 in 100 year event is an option under the Flood Damage Reduction Program. However, given the extreme magnitude of the maximum historic event at Fort McMurray, it is felt to be unreasonable and inappropriate to designate to such a level. Instead, it is recommended that the updated 1 in 100 year breakup stage of 250.0 m be adopted as the design flood level for designation under the Flood Damage Reduction Program

Stormwater Runoff Quality and Quantity from Small Watersheds in Austin, TX: Updated through 2008

This report contains a variety of water quality data from several Waller Creek locations.EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: Almost all stormwater quality activities rely upon monitoring as their foundation to one degree or another. Design and construction of water quality controls or other best management practices (BMPs) are, or should be, based on monitoring data to ensure the BMP meets the desired goals. Rules and regulations that are not based on monitoring data may reflect the desire of the rule maker more than the science of the physical world. Modeling, which may be used to develop rules and design guidelines, is dependent on monitoring to first develop the stochastic or physical theories on which the model is based and then to calibrate the model for a specific location. The City of Austin (COA) engages in all of the above activities; proposing and enforcing development rules and regulation, developing design guidelines for and construction of BMPs, and modeling small and large watersheds. These activities are all based on a solid foundation of stormwater monitoring that has encompassed more than twenty-five years. The City participated in the Nationwide Urban Runoff Program (NURP) in 1981 (Engineering Science and COA, 1983) and included monitoring of two water quality control systems in their 1983-84 cooperative monitoring program agreement with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). These two monitoring projects were limited in both scope and duration (COA, 1984; USGS, 1987). In the mid-1980s, COA initiated a more comprehensive monitoring program to collect data to support a series of watershed management ordinances adopted by the City (COA, 1985). The original plan was to monitor eleven sites including seven water quality controls over a five-year period. The longer monitoring period was supposed to allow for monitoring that better reflected the local rainfall and runoff patterns since the earlier programs focused mainly on smaller events. The data from this program were the basis for much of the quality and quantity information in the current COA Environmental Criteria Manual (ECM) as well as initial discussions on the first-flush phenomena and design criteria for the Austin sand filter design. In 1990 COA started a comprehensive monitoring program to meet the City's ongoing stormwater monitoring needs (COA, 1996). These needs include evaluating the design and iii performance of different types of structural BMPs, evaluating effectiveness of education programs, evaluating and refining quality and quantity of runoff from different types of land use and meeting the requirements of the City's MS4 discharge permit under the National Pollution Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) and Texas Pollution Discharge Elimination System (TPDES) portions of the Clean Water Act. Through 2008, the Stormwater Quality Evaluation (SQE) Section of the Watershed Protection Department has collected runoff quality and quantity data from more than one hundred monitoring locations including twenty-eight BMPs and ten watersheds greater than five hundred acres. This report is intended to summarize the runoff quality and quantity data collected by the city of since 1981. During the preceding thirty years collection techniques, equipment and personnel have changed, all having an impact on data quality. However, the data used in this report represent a unique dataset in both scope and duration. While far from an exhaustive examination of the data, this report does verify some existing hypotheses and also challenges some existing assumptions. The relationship between total impervious cover (TIC) and Rv found in this report differs significantly from that found in the COA ECM (2009). If the relationship found in this report is adopted there will be no changes in capture volume requirements for BMPs currently found in the COA ECM except wet ponds which would be larger for most cases. There could be impacts on the designs for alternative controls as well. An earlier COA study (2006) found no difference between the runoff from recharge and non-recharge areas, so only one relationship is presented here. It was demonstrated that some mean pollutant concentrations changed with development conditions. Ammonia (NH3), lead (Pb) and zinc (Zn) increased exponentially with impervious cover. Total phosphorus (TP), dissolved phosphorus (DP), total Kjeldahl nitrogen (TKN) and total nitrogen (TN) increased as the fraction of non-urban land decreased. Chemical oxygen demand (COD), 5-day biochemical oxygen demand (BOD), cadmium (Cd) and copper (Cu) increased linearly as total impervious cover increased. Fecal coliform (FCOL) increased as the fraction of single-family residential (SFR) land use increased while volatile suspended solids (VSS) varied with changes in SFR and commercial land uses. Nitrate + nitrite (NO3+NO2) iv concentrations were different between developed and undeveloped areas but there were no significant relationships with impervious cover or land use. Fecal streptococci (FSTR), total organic carbon (TOC) and total suspended solids (TSS) were not significantly related to any changes in development condition tested in this report. A table was prepared to replace the existing COA ECM (2009) stormwater concentration assumption in Tables 1.10 and 1.11. This change would have no impact on existing BMP designs but would impact the design of alternative controls. It was found that using disconnected impervious area (DCIA) instead of TIC did not result in improved predictions of mean concentrations or runoff-rainfall ratios, Rv. DCIA was estimated in this report based on empirical relationships developed elsewhere. If local relationships are developed or if DCIA were actually measured, this conclusion may be different. Significant relationships were developed to predict event mean concentrations (EMCs) for the pollutants studied and four classes of development. The models used one or more of the following as predictive variables: preceding dry time, 15-minute peak rainfall intensity and total rainfall. While these models were statistically significant, most models resulted in predictions that were no better than using the mean of the observed values. Better physical models are needed to predict EMCs, rather than relying on stochastic relationships. The analyses confirmed results of earlier studies that indicated runoff concentrations are not constant during a runoff event in small watersheds with moderate to high impervious cover. The first-flush effect was less pronounced (even non-existent for some pollutants) in undeveloped areas. While other studies focused solely on impervious cover, this report also examined the type of land use associated with the impervious cover. It was found that in SFR areas, nutrients, especially dissolved nutrients, exhibited a last-flush with pollutant concentrations increasing rather than decreasing as runoff volume increased. This effect may have a substantial impact future BMP design. Testing of proposed modifications to the NRCS curve number method found a slight improvement over the currently accepted method but it still under predicts runoff volumes for v smaller events: those of most concern for water quality design. While the curve number method may still be used for flood design, models based on physical processes should be employed when attempting to perform continuous simulations for water quality design.Waller Creek Working Grou

First General Meeting : the Adaptation Network; We're Up to the Climate Challenge!, Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens, Cape Town, 4 November 2009

The aim was to formalize the network of practitioners and establish an administrative structure and core direction of the Adaptation Network’s work. The meeting was attended by 32 adaptation practitioners from South Africa; participants broke into small groups to discuss what values, principles and objectives the new network should be based upon. The report outlines activities that took place during the meeting

Accumulation, temporal variation, source apportionment and risk assessment of heavy metals in agricultural soils from the middle reaches of Fenhe River basin, North China

The Fenhe River basin is the main agricultural and industrial developed area in Shanxi province, China. In recent years, agricultural non-point source pollution in the Fenhe River basin intensified, threatening soil quality and safety in the area. Accumulation of eight heavy metals (HMs) including chromium (Cr), nickel (Ni), copper (Cu), zinc (Zn), arsenic (As), cadmium (Cd), lead (Pb) and mercury (Hg) has been detected in soil samples from 50 agricultural sites (0-20 cm) from the middle reaches of the Fenhe River basin. The ecological and human health risk and potential sources of the eight HMs were investigated. In addition, the human health and ecological risks imposed by the possible sources of the eight HMs were quantitatively apportioned. The enrichment factor (EF) values of Cr, Ni, Cu, Pb and Zn were lower than 2, indicating minimal enrichment, while values for As, Cd and Hg were between 2 and 5, exhibiting moderate enrichment. Temporal variation analysis suggested that most HMs in the study area exhibited low concentrations after 2015, except As. The potential ecological risk index was 174.09, indicating low ecological risk. The total hazard index and cancer risk values were 0.395 and 5.35 x 10(-4) for adults and 2.75 and 3.63 x 10(-4) for children, indicating the accepted standard levels were exceeded for non-carcinogenic risk for children and carcinogenic risks for both adults and children. Four potential sources were identified: (1) natural sources, (2) farming activities, (3) coal combustion, and (4) exhaust emissions. Natural sources represented the largest contributor to ecological risk, accounting for 57.42% of the total. Coal combustion was the major contributor to human health risks, accounting for 43.27% and 43.73% of the total non-carcinogenic risk and carcinogenic risk for adults, respectively, and 42.72% and 43.88% for children, respectively

Environmental impact assessments of the Three Gorges Project in China: issues and interventions

The paper takes China's authoritative Environmental Impact Statement for the Yangzi (Yangtze) Three Gorges Project (TGP) in 1992 as a benchmark against which to evaluate emerging major environmental outcomes since the initial impoundment of the Three Gorges reservoir in 2003. The paper particularly examines five crucial environmental aspects and associated causal factors. The five domains include human resettlement and the carrying capacity of local environments (especially land), water quality, reservoir sedimentation and downstream riverbed erosion, soil erosion, and seismic activity and geological hazards. Lessons from the environmental impact assessments of the TGP are: (1) hydro project planning needs to take place at a broader scale, and a strategic environmental assessment at a broader scale is necessary in advance of individual environmental impact assessments; (2) national policy and planning adjustments need to react quickly to the impact changes of large projects; (3) long-term environmental monitoring systems and joint operations with other large projects in the upstream areas of a river basin should be established, and the cross-impacts of climate change on projects and possible impacts of projects on regional or local climate considered. © 2013 Elsevier B.V.Xibao Xu, Yan Tan, Guishan Yan

Summary Report on 2015 Residue Monitoring of Irish Farmed Finfish and 2015 Border Inspection Post Fishery and Fishery Product Sample Testing

On behalf of the Department of Agriculture, Food and Marine (DAFM), the Marine Institute carries out monitoring of chemical residues in finfish for aquaculture sector. This monitoring is set out in the annual National Residue Control Plan, which is approved by the European Commission, and is an important component of the DAFM food safety controls and is implemented under a service contract with the Food Safety Authority of Ireland. Since 1999, the Marine Institute has implemented the National Residues Monitoring Programme for aquaculture. This is carried out on behalf of the Sea Fisheries Protection Authority, which is the responsible organisation for residue controls on farmed finfish. The outcome for residues levels in farmed finfish during 2015 remains one of consistently low occurrence. In 2015, in excess of 676 tests and a total of 1,845 measurements were carried out on 128 samples (i.e. 124 target samples & 4 suspect samples) of farmed finfish for a range of chemical substances, including banned and unauthorised substances, various authorised veterinary treatments and environmental contaminants

The new psychoactive substances 5-(2-aminopropyl)indole (5-IT) and 6-(2-aminopropyl)indole (6-IT) interact with monoamine transporters in brain tissue

In recent years, use of psychoactive synthetic stimulants has grown rapidly. 5-(2-Aminopropyl)indole (5-IT) is a synthetic drug associated with a number of fatalities, that appears to be one of the newest 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) replacements. Here, the monoamine-releasing properties of 5-IT, its structural isomer 6-(2-aminopropyl)indole (6-IT), and MDMA were compared using in vitro release assays at transporters for dopamine (DAT), norepinephrine (NET), and serotonin (SERT) in rat brain synaptosomes. In vivo pharmacology was assessed by locomotor activity and a functional observational battery (FOB) in mice. 5-IT and 6-IT were potent substrates at DAT, NET, and SERT. In contrast with the non-selective releasing properties of MDMA, 5-IT displayed greater potency for release at DAT over SERT, while 6-IT displayed greater potency for release at SERT over DAT. 5-IT produced locomotor stimulation and typical stimulant effects in the FOB similar to those produced by MDMA. Conversely, 6-IT increased behaviors associated with 5-HT toxicity. 5-IT likely has high abuse potential, which may be somewhat diminished by its slow onset of in vivo effects, whereas 6-IT may have low abuse liability, but enhanced risk for adverse effects. Results indicate that subtle differences in the chemical structure of transporter ligands can have profound effects on biological activity. The potent monoamine-releasing actions of 5-IT, coupled with its known inhibition of MAO A, could underlie its dangerous effects when administered alone, and in combination with other monoaminergic drugs or medications. Consequently, 5-IT and related compounds may pose substantial risk for abuse and serious adverse effects in human users

Adapting with enthusiasm : climate change adaptation in the context of participatory action research

The core of this successful climate change adaptation project is the quarterly climate change preparedness workshops conducted every 3 months. These provide a platform for reporting back to the larger community, to share new ideas with fellow farmers and scientists, and to plan next steps. Through a case study of Rooibos tea growers, this paper documents a community-based climate change adaptation project in the Suid Bokkeveld district of South Africa. It explores methods to unlock the adaptive capacity of vulnerable groups by fostering problem solving capacity and engendering a positive and empowered attitude, using a participatory action research approach