Forget about the groundhog and his shadow. Scientists have discovered that the interplay between two layers of the atmosphere plays a major role in the arrival of spring — a finding that could lead to improved weather and climate forecasting.

“Our research indicates that the onset of spring is more rapid than suggested by the annual cycle of long-term daily averages and is linked to an event known as the stratospheric final warming,” said Robert Black, an associate professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology’s School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences (EAS).

Black will give a presentation, ‘Spring onset in the Northern Hemisphere: A role for the stratosphere?’ on June 16 at the American Meteorological Society’s 17th Conference on Climate Variability and Change in Cambridge, Mass. There, he will discuss a study begun last summer with co-researchers Walter Robinson, a professor of atmospheric sciences at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and Brent A. McDaniel, a post-doctoral scholar at Georgia Tech.

Results from this study, part of an ongoing project sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF), are expanding scientists’ understanding of atmospheric interaction.

For many years, scientists believed that the troposphere (the lowest region of atmosphere where weather occurs) drove changes in the stratosphere (atmospheric layer directly above the troposphere) without any feedback. Yet in the late 1990s, new studies found that the stratosphere can affect the tropospheric circulation.

These studies, however, focused on individual seasons. “Because the arrival of spring has a pronounced influence on the hydrological cycle, vegetative growing season and ecosystem productivity, we wanted to study the transition between seasons,” Black said. To that end, his team gathered observational data derived from a variety of sources and constructed a composite picture of spring�s arrival over a 40-year period.

As winter draws to a close, the westerly jet stream in the troposphere begins to weaken. At the same time, the westerly jet stream in the stratosphere above not only weakens, but eventually reverses direction to become easterly. Black and his colleagues discovered that this event, known as the stratospheric final warming, accelerates the weakening of the tropospheric winds.

“Instead of a gradual weakening over several weeks, it�s as if someone flipped a switch,” Black explained. “The transition from a winter to spring wind pattern occurs in about one week.”

Stratospheric final warming events are caused by large-scale Rossby waves, planetary waves that are produced when winds in the troposphere blow over different surfaces on the earth, such as major mountain ranges. These waves can extend into the stratosphere, where if their amplitude is great enough, they create a drag on the stratosphere�s westerly jet stream that can trigger a stratospheric final warming.

“These final warmings don’t happen at the same time every year,” Black said, noting that stratospheric final warmings occur as early as mid-March or as late as mid-May. The researchers also found that these events vary in their intensity, and final warmings that take place earlier in the year are typically more abrupt.

Granted, other factors also influence spring’s arrival, such as solar heating of the earth’s surface. “Still, stratospheric final warmings explain a significant part of the seasonal transition, especially in the Arctic,” Black said.

The next step is being able to accurately predict when a stratospheric final warming will occur. In the NSF-sponsored study, Black and his colleagues will attack the underlying physics of stratospheric final warming events that relate to spring onset.

“The ultimate goal is to provide concrete information for improving weather prediction models,” Black said. “Our study shows the extent to which the stratosphere is influencing the troposphere. So if we want to accurately predict spring onset in the troposphere, we need to be concerned about the stratosphere.”

There could also be implications for climate forecasting since global warming may impact how long the stratospheric jet stream persists every year. If spring arrives earlier or later, it can affect how efficiently the ecosystem functions. “Plants and animals may be able to adapt to a gradual change,” Black said, “but a dramatic change might wreak havoc.”

Original press release (includes graphs not shown here): Atmospheric Omens: Scientists Gain New Insights into Spring Onset; Better Forecasting Expected (Georgia Tech Research News)

The walls are up, the roof is on and the summer crew of Cornell University’s Solar Decathlon Team is working hard to finish its fully functional, self-sufficient, solar-powered house.

Scheduled for completion by the end of June, the only solar-powered house from an Ivy League school to enter the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) international Solar Decathlon competition will be moved to the National Mall in Washington, D.C., in time for the Oct. 7 to 16 competition.

The team consists of about 50 undergraduate students from six of the seven undergraduate colleges at Cornell — about 40 percent of them engineering majors, 40 percent architecture majors, 10 percent business or economics majors and 10 percent with other majors — as well as a handful of graduate students. Some of the undergraduates have been designing and building the solar home for more than two years. About a dozen students will work on the house throughout the summer, testing, adjusting and refining it.

The DOE challenged competitors to design and build an 800-square-foot sustainable house that derives all its power from the sun. The houses will be evaluated on criteria ranging from power acquisition and storage and everyday performance to advocating the use of household solar power to potential users. In addition to designing and building the home, decathlon teams also participate in 10 contests during the competition week in which the houses will be judged on such criteria as comfort and how well they perform in providing energy for heating and cooling, hot water, lights and appliances.

“The students will show us how we can live with abundance and comfort in beautiful, energy-efficient, completely solar-powered homes,” says the DOE Web site.

In addition to designing and building the home and soliciting donations for the house’s systems, appliances, furniture and finishing, the team has conducted an extensive outreach effort. “We have developed sustainability and alternative energy programs for local schools,” says Melissa Wrolstad, an incoming senior from Libertyville, Ill., majoring in mechanical and aerospace engineering, who serves as the team’s outreach coordinator. “Our aim is to spread renewable energy awareness to students, schools and parents and to encourage teachers to make sustainable energy a part of their curriculum.”

The team also is producing a documentary on the project that will be narrated by Bill Nye ‘77, a Frank H.T. Rhodes Class of ‘56 University Professor-at-Large at Cornell.

In 2003 10 undergraduates submitted a proposal to the DOE, which accepted the proposal and gave the team $5,000 in seed money. Since then, the team has recruited dozens of students to participate and has raised about $65,000 in cash from about 15 individuals, mostly alumni, and another $120,000 in product donations from about two dozen companies. The entirely student-run project also has received funding from Cornell’s College of Engineering and the College of Architecture, Art and Planning (AAP).

“Although we estimate that the whole project will cost about $250,000, including the cost of donated items, we think that the house could be replicated in the future for as little as $60,000,” says Emile Chin-Dickey, Arts and Sciences ‘05, an economics major from Fairbanks, Alaska, who serves as business manager of the project.

The 16-by-40-foot house consists of a living room/study/kitchen, bedroom and bathroom, numerous nooks and crannies for storage and a large array of photovoltaic cells, an evacuated solar tube collector and a large battery bank to collect and store enough energy to run all the appliances in the house as well as an electrically powered car. All the house’s systems will be controlled by a touchscreen remote. It will be fully furnished and landscaped (with portable trays full of grass, shrubs and flowers) when it joins the solar village in Washington, D.C., to compete against 17 other college and university teams.

“One of the most unique aspects of the house is a Cornell-designed, small-scale desiccant cooling system,” says Tim Fu, Engineering ‘05, from Arlington, Va., one of the major forces behind the project from the beginning and one of its project leaders. Desiccants are materials that absorb moisture (such as those found in pill jars and computer packaging). “The invention boosts the efficiency of the house’s air conditioning system by mediating its humidity and temperature,” he explains.

Project leaders also include Stephanie Horowitz, Architecture ‘05, of Princeton, N.J., and Benjamin Uyeda, a graduate student in architecture from Santa Barbara, Calif., who also have been on the project from the beginning. Although Fu, Horowitz, Uyeda and Chin-Dickey graduated in May, they all are putting their futures on hold until the October competition.

Zellman Warhaft, professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, has been serving as the project’s adviser from the beginning. Nick Rajkovich, visiting lecturer in AAP, is serving as an adviser and the building coordinator over the summer.

Original press release: Reaching for the sun, Cornell’s student-designed solar house is going up (Cornell University)

World Environment Day (WED) is celebrated on the 5th of June every year in more that 100 countries around the world. The city of San Francisco, California, hosted this year’s international event. It was the first time the event takes place in the United States. The programming for “Green Cities” spanned the first five days in June. Each day focused on a specific theme: Urban Power, Cities on the Move, Redesigning Metropolis, Pure Elements, and Flower Power.

The event was hosted by San Francisco Mayor, Gavin Newsom and the San Francisco Department of the Environment. Participants included California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, Al Gore, and UNEP Executive Director, Klaus Toepfer, heading the UNEP delegation.

Opening Ceremony at City Hall

The Opening Ceremony for World Environment Day took place in front of City Hall in Civic Center Plaza. It included a California Tomorrow Festival that showcased renewable energy technology products and services, while highlighting the companies that are leading the way in developing innovative solutions to global environmental challenges. The Festival showcased cutting edge photovoltaic systems, fuel cell and hybrid vehicles and a major installation from the Climate Group displayed global devastation resulting from climate change.

Time for Action

California Governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, stole the show at the Opening by unveiling a plan to combat global warming by setting goals for reducing California’s emissions of Greenhouse gases. Schwarzenegger’s executive order calls for reducing the state’s emissions of such gases to 2000 levels by 2010, 1990 levels by 2020 and 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050.

Schwarzenegger told an international audience of mayors and environmentalists at San Francisco City Hall. “I say the debate is over. We know the science, we see the threat and we know the time for action is now.”

Children’s Painting Competition Exhibit at Zeum

The global winners of UNEP’s Children’s Painting Competition were announced at a special ceremony on 3 June. An exhibition of the global winning entries was held at Zeum, the innovative arts and technology museum where youth and families bring the power of their imaginations to create stories, music, videos and art that reflect their world in relevant ways.

Atlas of our Changing Environment

Produced by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), One Planet Many People: Atlas of our Changing Environment was launched in San Francesco on WED. It sets out to compare and contrast spectacular satellite images of the past few decades with contemporary ones, some of which have never been seen before. The publication proved to be one of UNEP’s most successful ever, with spectacular sales record and unrivalled public demand for online and hard copies.

TUNZA Youth Workshop � Pledge for Greener Cities

Participants of the Pledge Workshop-San Francisco Bay Area (youth aged 13-17) identified actions they can commit to in order to create more sustainable lifestyles that will positively impact our communities and environment in the future. Each youth representative took the Youth Eco Pledge document back to their schools and communities and work on putting these ideas into action.

Environmental Expos

Two Expos, the Green Cities Expo and the Art Into Action Expo, were held jointly at the Fort Mason Festival Pavilion in San Francisco. They highlighted present and future possibilities for green living. Art Into Action, sponsored by the Natural World Museum, featured monumental exhibits from National Geographic, Conservation International,

California Academy of Sciences, Canon, and over 30 local and global environmental artists, featuring original works from the private family collections of Ansel Adams and Robert Bateman.

The Green Cities Expo featured more than 100 green businesses committed to environmental sustainability and social responsibility. Exhibitor categories included: organic foods, innovation and technology, renewable energy, recycling, sustainable agriculture, green building, natural health & body, and transportation.

Since its inception in 1972, World Environment Day has given a human face to environmental issues, and promoted an understanding that communities are pivotal to changing attitudes about the environment. UNEP provides leadership and encourages partnership in caring for the environment by inspiring, informing, and enabling nations and peoples to improve their quality of life without compromising that of future generations.

Original press release: A Memorable Even: WED 2005, San Francisco (UNEP)

Follow the carbon; this is the mantra of researchers seeking to understand climate change and forecast its likely extent. A workshop heard how improved detection of heat-trapping carbon dioxide from space promises to revolutionise carbon cycle understanding.

This week saw more than 60 researchers from Europe, the United States and Japan gather at ESRIN, ESA’s establishment in Italy, for the three-day Carbon from Space workshop, jointly organised by ESA, the International Geosphere Biosphere Programme (IGBP), the Integrated Global Carbon Observations Theme (IGCO) of the Integrated Global Observing Strategy (IGOS) and the Global Carbon Project (GCP), with support from the European Union’s CarboEurope project.

“Direct satellite measurements of carbon dioxide will have as dramatic an impact as the Hubble Space Telescope within the Earth science field,” said Philippe Ciais of the Laboratory for Climate Sciences and the Environment (LSCE) in Gif-sur-Yvette, France.

“It should give us a completely new picture of something more or less completely unknown, showing us the carbon flux across tropical areas such as South America and Africa, where we basically have no data available right now.”

The total number of carbon atoms on Earth is fixed; they are exchanged between the ocean, atmosphere, land and biosphere, through a set of processes known as the carbon cycle.

The fact that human activities are pumping extra carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, by burning carbon that has been locked up in the Earth, is well known - the overall concentration of this leading greenhouse gas has increased by a third since the Industrial Revolution.

However, only around half of the extra carbon dioxide human activity sends into the atmosphere stays there, unidentified ’sinks’ on the land or ocean surface absorb the rest. The rate of climate change would be much greater without this absorption, but as long as its distribution, strength and variability remains uncertain, the continuation of this effect cannot be taken for granted. In future, global warming may shut it off, or even throw it into reverse.

Scientists create intricate numerical models to try and improve their understanding of various segments of the carbon cycle within the Earth system, but significant knowledge gaps remain, especially concerning the exchange of carbon or ‘flux’ between the land surface and atmosphere.

Therefore another focus of discussion was how Earth Observation data on areas including forest and vegetation cover, fires, especially the amount of vegetation burned, biomass, humidity and land and sea photosynthesis can sharpen the accuracy of terrestrial carbon models.

The workshop also discussed the issue of the complexity of the models and the sparse nature of the data, focusing on ‘data assimilation’ - the process by which models make the most effective use of or ‘learn’ from the data available. A number of examples were presented on aspects of this topic from the use of continuous but sparse measurements of carbon flux, through better surface characterisation to the incorporation of the currently available satellite observations of carbon gases.

More precise information of where on the surface CO2 is being removed or emitted would go a long way to shrinking areas of uncertainties within current models. However ground-based carbon dioxide measurements are difficult and expensive to perform, requiring for example, complex equipment with pressurised bottles, lasers, spectrometers or towers measuring changes in carbon flux. There are only about a hundred such measuring stations to cover the entire Earth.

“Even low-resolution satellite measurements would be a useful addition,” explained Peter Rayner of LSCE. “They would improve the accuracy of the carbon inversions we perform � where we take the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere and follow it backward to try and identify sources. We could also use the information as a constraint on our models, ensuring they fit with observed reality.”

While satellite observation of the greenhouse gas carbon monoxide is well established, and last year Envisat’s Scanning Imaging Absorption Spectrometer for Atmospheric Chartography (SCIAMACHY) successfully observed atmospheric methane, carbon dioxide represents a harder target than other greenhouse gases. It is longer-lived and mixes well in the air, with the greatest variations located right on the surface; the far side of the atmosphere from any satellite sensor.

Even so, the workshop heard that CO2 has been demonstrated experimentally using satellite sensors including the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) aboard NASA’s weather and climate research satellite Aqua. A team from the University of Bremen is also exploring the ability of SCIAMACHY to map horizontal and vertical CO2 from space.

In the near future, the capacity to measure CO2 from space will increase, because the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) is gearing up for the launch of its Greenhouse gases Observing Satellite (GOSAT) in 2008, while NASA prepares its own CO2-detecting mission called the Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO) for 2007.

Principal Investigators Takashi Hamazaki of JAXA and David Crisp of NASA briefed the workshop on these missions, both of which take the spectral ‘fingerprints’ of reflected sunlight to measure carbon dioxide concentrations down to a 1% accuracy � around four parts per million molecules of air.

On the ESA side, the Agency is considering proposals for science missions studying various aspects of the carbon cycle as part of the new round of Earth Explorers. And a proposed new generation of operational Sentinel spacecraft would include geostationary and orbiting atmospheric-observing satellites.

In addition, ESA is active in generating products to serve the carbon research community through its �GLOB� series of projects within its Data User Element (DUE). GLOBCARBON, GLOBCOVER, GLOBAEROSOL and GLOBCOLOUR aim to provide high quality information on the distribution of burned areas, vegetation, particles in the atmosphere and the presence of carbon-fixing algae in the oceans globally.

A joint activity between ESA, IGBP and GCP on model-data fusion, known as the Optimisation Intercomparison Project (OptIC), will take products from GLOBCARBON in particular to comparatively evaluate data assimilation methods for the task of setting parameters for terrestrial carbon cycle and biogeochemical models.

Peter Rayner remarked that the workshop was helpful as a means of knowing what carbon-related data would be available in future, coordinating ground-based activity in support and validation of these new missions, and also in highlighting what gaps in knowledge remain to be tackled in future.

“The new spacecraft are reliant on reflected sunlight, for instance, but the carbon cycle does not stop when areas are in darkness,” he said. “Other methods will need to be developed to learn more.”

The three-day workshop was also significant as a contribution to the forthcoming Integrated Global Carbon Observation (IGCO) Implementation Plan of the Integrated Global Observing Strategy.

Intended for completion this September and aimed at an audience including Earth Observation agencies and United Nations agencies including the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Food and Agriculture Administration (FAO), the Plan will be a list of actions needed to create a semi-operational carbon observation system during the coming decade.

Roger Dargaville of IGCO stated that satellite systems would be an important part of the Implementation Plan, and the workshop had been a useful opportunity to learn about latest developments.

Original press release: Space measurements of carbon offer clearer view of Earth’s climate future (ESA)

Scientists are continually exploring different aspects of hurricanes to increase the understanding of how they behave. Recently, NASA-funded scientists from Florida State University looked at ozone around hurricanes and found that ozone levels drop as a hurricane is intensifying.

In a recent study, Xiaolei Zou and Yonghui Wu, researchers at Florida State University found that variations of ozone levels from the surface to the upper atmosphere are closely related to the formation, intensification and movement of a hurricane.

They studied ozone levels in 12 hurricanes and looked at total ozone levels, that is, from the ground to the upper atmosphere. Now scientists have clues on how a hurricane behaves when the ozone levels are high and low.

Zou and Wu noticed that over 100 miles, the area of a hurricane typically has low levels of ozone from the surface to the top of the hurricane. Whenever a hurricane intensifies, it appears that the ozone levels throughout the storm decrease. When they looked at the storm with ozone data a hurricane’s eye becomes very clear. Because forecasters always try to pinpoint the eye of the hurricane, this knowledge will help with locating the exact position and lead to better tracking.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Hurricane Center (NHC) is the agency that issues hurricane forecasts. Out of the 12 storms analyzed, the ozone data and the NHC official report differed on the mean distance between the estimated eye by less than 18 miles during the most intense stage of the storms. As such, when Zou and Wu added the satellite observed ozone levels around a hurricane into a computer forecast model, it greatly improved the predicted track that the hurricane would take.

“This research highlights the benefits of Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS) data in hurricane track and intensity prediction, an important forecasting problem since hurricanes strike regions of high population and property growth, resulting in large natural disasters,” said Zou.

The other interesting finding when analyzing ozone data around hurricanes, is that ozone levels give a clue that a storm will develop before other methods. The early spin of a tropical cyclone is weak and sometimes covered by clouds, and not easily detected by satellites that provide pictures of clouds. The ozone data gives scientists a “look beyond the clouds.”

Ozone is all around the world and in the upper and lower atmosphere. Ozone in the upper atmosphere protects life on Earth from harmful ultraviolet rays from the sun, which can cause sunburn and skin cancer. Ozone close to the surface is a pollutant, which on hot, humid days with little wind creates a haze, such as that over big cities, that is harmful to breathe.

By using NASA’s satellite Earth Probe/ TOMS total ozone data, forecasters can identify ozone amounts that are closely related to the formation, intensification, and movement of a hurricane. Zou and Wu also found a strong relationship between ozone, air pressure and spin within the hurricanes.

Zou said that the connections between ozone levels and hurricane behavior are a very important step in understanding the storms.

Original press release: Ozone Levels Drop When Hurricanes Are Strengthening
(NASA GSFC)

It looks like Cadarache in southern France has beaten out Rokkashomura, Aomori Prefecture, for the honor of hosting the hotly contested International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor.

A ministerial meeting of five countries and the European Union that are jointly developing the ITER project is expected to give the French site the green light later this month.

The Japanese government has bowed to the inevitable, officials said. In return for acquiescing, Japan is now placing priority on ensuring it receives as much as possible in the way of rewards, they said.

The split on where to build the futuristic facility came at a ministerial conference in December 2003. Japan, South Korea and the United States favored Rokkashomura, while China, the EU and Russia threw their support behind Cadarache.

Japan’s bid for the site was led by the Education, Science and Technology Ministry, which saw hosting the reactor as a way of ensuring that Japan would become the world’s leader in nuclear fusion energy.

The Finance Ministry, however, was skeptical about the idea, saying the cost of hosting the project would be huge.

The government was therefore far from being unified on the ITER issue from the outset.

According to sources close to the Prime Minister’s Office, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi instructed then Education, Science and Technology Minister Takeo Kawamura in August to settle the ITER issue “as early as possible,” even if it meant abandoning the idea of building the reactor in Rokkashomura.

Since then, the ministry has switched priorities to ways of securing rewards for forgoing the honor of hosting the reactor, the sources said.

During a vice-ministerial conference between Japan and the EU in September, Japan proposed that the country losing the ITER bid be granted rights to 20 percent of related contracts in exchange for bearing 10 percent of the project’s cost.

In a Japan-EU ministerial meeting in April, the EU broadly agreed to the proposal, prompting the ministry to study details of how Japan would be able to win related contracts, the sources said.

What rewards are likely?

A six-party vice-ministerial meeting on May 5 in Geneva, adopted a set of accords concerning preferential treatment for the losing candidate, including that it be:

• Allowed to have a remote-controlled ITER experiment unit, and one for the development of super heat-resistant materials for use in constructing an ITER.
• Awarded 20 percent of procurement contracts for building the main ITER structure, and entitled to provide 20 percent of the personnel for the planned ITER administration office.
• Entitled to fill the top position of the planned body.

The agreement to allow the losing candidate to have a remote-control facility is of especially high significance, according to experts.

The remote-control facility is envisaged as playing a key role in the ITER project, as it will be able to obtain all the data from the experimental fusion reactor via fiber-optic communications.

Given that Japan’s supercomputers are among the best in the world, they would be able to provide a nuclear fusion research environment as good as France’s, a senior science ministry official said.

The government has also proposed that all participants in the ITER project study the advisability of using the JT-60 system used at the Japan Atomic Energy Research Institute for plasma experiments, for building an experimental fusion reactor, the official said.

Original press release: Looking on bright side of losing ITER (Daily Yomiuri)