Landscape level characterization of seasonal floodplains under community based aquaculture: illustrating a case of the Ganges and the Mekong Delta

The project 'Community-based Fish Culture in Seasonal Floodplains' (henceforward the community-based fish culture project), CGIAR Challenge Program on Water and Food, aims to enhance fish production in seasonal floodplains to improve and sustain rural livelihoods in Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, Mali and Vietnam. Based on the premise that production from these water bodies could be enhanced by stocking locally important fish species, the community-based fish culture project seeks to develop technologies and institutional arrangements to support collective fish culture in the flood season. The current report provides a landscape level characterization of seasonal floodplains in two of these areas. We compare the Ganges seasonal floodplain agro-ecology in Bangladesh to that in the Mekong Delta of Cambodia and Vietnam. In both areas the project has been under implementation since the outset, but has met with contrasting resultsFlood plains, Aquaculture, Remote sensing

Tropical Agrarian landscape classification using high-resolution GeoEYE data and segmentationbased approach

We examine the use of high spatial resolution ‘GeoEYE’ imagery for land use classification in a tropical landscape. Image objects (I-Os) derived from features identification provide a basis for segmentation process and the Geographic Object Based Image Analysis (GEOBIA) framework. eCognition software with I-Os as classification unit and maximum likelihood algorithm facilitated the process. Supervised classification approaches (SCA) and rule set classification approach (RSCA) were used and performance and transferability of two approaches compared. Main conclusions: (a) high degree of details in GeoEYE data enables delineation of diverse land use zones, and (b) segmentation based analysis is more effective to tackle spatial intermixing. © 2016 by the authors.BMB

Impacts of salinity parameterizations on temperature simulation over and in a hypersaline lake

In this paper, we introduced parameterizations of the salinity effects (on heat capacity, thermal conductivity, freezing point and saturated vapor pressure) in a lake scheme integrated in the Weather Research and Forecasting model coupled with the Community Land Model (WRF-CLM). This was done to improve temperature simulation over and in a saline lake and to test the contributions of salinity effects on various water properties via sensitivity experiments. The modified lake scheme consists of the lake module in the CLM model, which is the land component of the WRF-CLM model. The Great Salt Lake (GSL) in the USA was selected as the study area. The simulation was performed from September 3, 2001 to September 30, 2002. Our results show that the modified WRF-CLM model that includes the lake scheme considering salinity effects can reasonably simulate temperature over and in the GSL. This model had much greater accuracy than neglecting salinity effects, particularly in a very cold event when that effect alters the freezing point. The salinity effect on saturated vapor pressure can reduce latent heat flux over the lake and make it slightly warmer. The salinity effect on heat capacity can also make lake temperature prone to changes. However, the salinity effect on thermal conductivity was found insignificant in our simulations. © 2015, Chinese Society for Oceanology and Limnology, Science Press and Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

Incorporating Ecosystem Services into Water Resources Management—Tools, Policies, Promising Pathways

Ecosystems provide a range of services, including water purification, erosion prevention, and flood risk mitigation, that are important to water resource managers. But as a sector, water resources management has been slow to incorporate ecosystem protection and restoration, for a variety of reasons, although related concepts such as nature-based solutions and green infrastructure are gaining traction. We explain some of the existing challenges to wider uptake of the ecosystem services concept in water resources management and introduce some promising avenues for research and practice, elaborated in more detail through 12 papers, spanning five continents and a variety of contexts, which make up a Special Issue on “Incorporating Ecosystem Services into Water Resources Management”. Cross-cutting themes include (A) ecosystem services as a flexible concept to communicate with stakeholders; (B) participatory processes to involve stakeholders in research; (C) multiple values, and valuation methods, of water-related services; and (D) applications of decision-support tools. We conclude with a summary of research gaps and emphasize the importance of co-producing knowledge with decision makers and other stakeholders, in order to improve water resources management through the integration of ecosystem services. © 2022, The Author(s)

The co-constitution of regional politics and massive infrastructures in the Transaqua water project

Large-scale water infrastructure projects have seen a sudden surge to the top of the political agenda in many countries as a means of addressing developmental goals at both national and regional levels, despite a decline in funding for these projects in the 1990s and 2000s. The Transaqua inter-basin water transfer (IBWT) project, a 2400 km-long canal aiming to connect the Lake Chad and Congo River basins, has been recently hailed by the Lake Chad basin countries, international and regional organizations, and the private sector as the most feasible solution to revitalize Lake Chad’s declining water levels. It has also started to reconfigure the regional politics of two of Africa’s largest basins. This article focuses on this case study and analyses how regional features shape Transaqua and how it simultaneously reconfigures regional politics. Based on concepts such as ‘region’, ‘regionalism’ and ‘regionalisation’ within the international relations discipline and applying mixed methods of discourse, document and media analysis, we show how the project is influencing regional dynamics, alliances and power relations in the Lake Chad and Congo River basins, and how the Transaqua discourse evolves along with regional features such as droughts, water abundance and regional insecurities, despite being in the planning stage

Impacts of the Two Biggest Lakes on Local Temperature and Precipitation in the Yellow River Source Region of the Tibetan Plateau

The Tibetan Plateau harbors thousands of lakes; however few studies focus on impacts of lakes on local climate in the region. To investigate and quantify impacts of the two biggest lakes (Ngoring Lake and Gyaring Lake) of the Yellow River source region in the Tibetan Plateau on local climate, two simulations (with and without the two large lakes) from May 2010 to July 2011 are performed and analyzed using the WRF-CLM model (the weather research and forecasting model coupled with the community land model). Differences between simulated results show that the WRF-CLM model could provide realistic reproduction of surface observations and has better simulation after considering lakes. Lakes mostly reduce the maximum temperature all year round and increase the minimum temperature except in March due to the large heat capacity that makes lakes absorb (release) more energy for the same temperature change compared to land. Lakes increase precipitation over the lake area and in the nearby region, mostly during 02-14 BT (Beijing Time) of July to October when the warm lake surface induces the low level horizontal convergence and updraft over lake and provides energy and vapor to benefit the development of the convection for precipitation

A Single Step Catalytic Process for the Production of Higher Range Hydrocarbon Fuel Stocks from Naphtha

A novel concept of cracking-based oligomerization of naphtha (C5-C8) to produce higher range hydrocarbons (C9-C15) suitable for the jet fuel applications has been explored by using various zeolite type catalysts. Among the bi-metallic BEA, MOR, Y, ZSM-5 and Nano ZSM-5 based catalysts, the bi-functional Pt-Sn/Nano ZSM-5 catalyst exhibited promising catalytic activity to give higher range hydrocarbons in a single step vapor phase reaction. The catalyst produced 47 wt.% higher range hydrocarbons (C9-C15) from naphtha (C5-C8) at 400 ºC and 15 bar pressure, which is first of its kind to observe on any solid acid catalyst to the best of our knowledge. Further, the studies are also conducted on various other zeolites metal functionalized by similar manner so as to understand the effect of zeolite type and the metals

Wetland dynamics: Links with spatial, ecological and socio-economic related issues in the western coastal belt of Sri Lanka

WetlandsAssessmentLagoonsMarshesEcologyEcosystemsSocial aspectsEconomic aspects

Perspectives on tipping points in integrated models of the natural and human earth system: cascading effects and telecoupling

© Copyright 2022 The Author(s). The Earth system and the human system are intrinsically linked. Anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions have led to the climate crisis, which is causing unprecedented extreme events and could trigger Earth system tipping elements. Physical and social forces can lead to tipping points and cascading effects via feedbacks and telecoupling, but the current generation of climate-economy models do not generally take account of these interactions and feedbacks. Here, we show the importance of the interplay between human societies and Earth systems in creating tipping points and cascading effects and the way they in turn affect sustainability and security. The lack of modeling of these links can lead to an underestimation of climate and societal risks as well as how societal tipping points can be harnessed to moderate physical impacts. This calls for the systematic development of models for a better integration and understanding of Earth and human systems at different spatial and temporal scales, specifically those that enable decision-making to reduce the likelihood of crossing local or global tipping points.Institute for Basic Science (IBS), Republic of Korea, under IBS-R028-D1; European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No. 820712 (REmote Climate Effects and their Impact on European sustainability, Policy and Trade (RECEIPT)); CLICCS Cluster of Excellence (Grant ID: 2037) funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG)