Always Take The Weather With You [Jun 2005]
Global changes in weather
Always Take The Weather With You
Global changes in weather
Industrialised processes and society have had a damaging effect on our physical environment over the last few hundred years.
There is now increasing evidence to show that they have also had an effect on our weather and its extremes; this is known as climate change. From increasing numbers of weather related catastrophic events, rising sea levels, to changes in our health, these changes in the UK and the world will affect us in a variety of ways.
Climate controls every aspect of our lives. These changes can be very localised and immediately obvious, such as freak snowfalls, or certain events may take several decades to become apparent such as is the case with global warming trends. This article looks at the effects industry and society have had on the weather, what these changes mean, and how we can monitor the weather.
Economic
Weather and climate affect the wealth of a country. Where the climate is too inhospitable to grow much food, or for farmers to raise livestock, a country may have to import much of its foodstuffs. If they have no other sources of natural wealth, such as mining or oil, they may be restricted in their growth. Countries with good climates are able to grow enough produce and export any excess, helping their balance of payments. Some countries have regular droughts, with the associated famines and diseases that follow. Many developing countries rely on growing 'cash crops' which they can export and this may limit the amount of self sufficiency they can maintain in a time of crisis.
Our physical health
Weather has short and long term effects on our bodies; it affects the death rate and is linked to seasonal illnesses such as winter flu, asthma and other respiratory diseases. Every winter the elderly in extremely cold climates can suffer from hypothermia, whilst at the other extreme, during increasingly hot summers, they are also susceptible to heat. This was experienced in France during the summer of 2003 where several thousand elderly people died due to heat exhaustion.
There is now large concern over levels of melanomas and skin cancer due to over exposure to UV (ultra violet) rays. There has been a dramatic increase in skin cancers, with cases of the most lethal, melanoma, doubling every ten years. In some parts of the world the ozone layer has been partially depleted by pollutant chemicals being released to the atmosphere, allowing more of the harmful UV rays to get through.
Air pollution
Air pollution levels are very dependent upon the weather conditions, these may vary from mild hayfever symptoms to airborne pollen which is at its worst during the early summer, to deaths of people with chronic lung diseases such as bronchitis. The famous London smogs killed thousands of people when smoke from factories and house fires converted ordinary fog into lethal cocktails. These only stopped after the Clean Air Act of 1956 which outlawed smoke from coal fired chimneys. Today a new form of smog caused mainly by traffic exhaust emissions is giving us problems with air quality in some areas. Levels of SO2, Ozone, Oxides of Nitrogen and PM10 particulate levels are now routinely monitored in many towns and cities, with large nationwide networks of monitoring stations (AQMSs) being set up to look at local and national effects of pollutants. Localised monitoring of weather parameters on these systems is also very important, as local geography will affect the transportation of the pollutants.
Natural disasters
Every year there are natural disasters which cause millions of pounds of damage and result in thousands of deaths. It is a fact that the number of weather related catastrophes has risen 3 times faster than non-weather related over the past years. Flooding both in Europe and other countries now appears to be more prevalent, destroying crops, property, livestock and people. Pests and infestations are also very dependent upon the local weather conditions. In Africa, it is essential to monitor the rainfall levels, however small, as the locust swarms usually follow these. The global temperature distribution map is definitely changing.
Socio-economic effects
The stock market fluctuations and insurance payouts due to vagaries in the weather can also have huge ramifications upon the whole global economy. Trading on future harvests and periods of natural disaster may cause the market to fluctuate wildly. Insurance companies may suffer losses of billions of pounds, also de-stabilising certain industries as their losses and premiums mount up. Delays and penalties to international trade, construction work and manufacturing can also be affected greatly by weather events.
At a recent conference at the UK Met Office, presenters said that a major factor to take into consideration is that of social changes. They claimed that as climate changes societies will also be changing, and the flood of refugees out of some parts of the world could be significant. New technologies are likely to emerge, new discoveries will be made and population shifts are bound to occur. It is estimated that there could be 150 million refugees by 2050 caused by dramatic weather and flooding effects. Forecasting such changes is extremely difficult but climate change impacts must take into account changes to societies and how they will adapt.
Global changes in weather patterns
The Earth's climate is in a state of continuous change and has fluctuated many times in the last 3-4,000 million years. There will always be wild fluctuations in the weather, and this may well be the case over the next 25 years.
Until very recently, scientists and meteorologists thought that these changes were slow and gradual, but now there has been a sea change in these thoughts and the matter has become of great concern. Firstly it is believed that humans may now be responsible for causing significant changes of climate with harmful consequences. Secondly, it is now known that past changes of climate did in fact occur more rapidly than had at one time been thought; namely over less than a century rather than over several hundred years. There is growing evidence that the incidence of these events is increasing, the main cause of these is thought to be global warming. Without a natural greenhouse effect, the temperature of the Earth would be about -18°C instead of its present 14°C. So, the concern is not with the fact that we have a greenhouse effect, but whether human activities are leading to an enhancement of the greenhouse effect.
Global temperatures have risen by over 0.7°C in the last 300 years - climate change is therefore already taking place. However 0.5°C of this warming has occurred during the 20th century. In the UK there has been a slow warming since 1900 with a greater acceleration since 1970.
The main factors that contribute to global warming are general atmospheric pollution from vehicles and manufacturing, deforestation and forest fires. There are also the occasional natural pollution incidents such as the eruption of Mount St Helens in Washington, USA when in 1980 it was shaken by an earthquake measuring 5.1 on the Richter scale. The north face of the mountain collapsed in a massive rock debris avalanche. Nearly 230 square miles of forest was blown over or left dead and standing. At the same time a mushroomshaped column of ash rose thousands of feet skyward and drifted downwind, turning day into night as dark, gray ash fell over eastern Washington and beyond. The eruption lasted 9 hours, but Mount St. Helens and the surrounding landscape were dramatically changed within moments.
By far the greatest single contributory factor in global warming is the increase in levels of CO2 (carbon dioxide) and other "greenhouse gases" in the atmosphere. They cause the greenhouse effect as the gases combine with water vapour to trap outgoing longwave radiation i.e. the heat comes in and cannot escape. They are basically being formed as a by-product of incomplete combustion of fossil fuels and are increasing faster than the vegetation and oceans can absorb them, resulting in an annual net increase in levels. Pre-industrial levels of carbon dioxide (prior to the start of the Industrial Revolution) were about 280 parts per million by volume (ppmv), and current levels are about 370 ppmv. According to the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) Special Report on Emission Scenarios (SRES), by the end of the 21st century, we could expect to see carbon dioxide concentrations of anywhere from 490 to 1260 ppm (parts per million).
One of the first indicators of these changes is an increase in the global sea temperature which in turn affects the polar ice caps. There are many monitoring stations in these areas and studies are already showing that the sea ice coverage has started to diminish by some 10- 15% and the sea ice itself is already thinning by 40%. The ramifications of this will be a rise in sea levels, which have the potential to cause flooding in many low lying countries such as Bangladesh, causing millions of deaths and corresponding demographic changes.
Global mean sea level has been rising at an average rate of 1 to 2 mm/year over the past 100 years, which is significantly larger than the rate averaged over the last several thousand years.
We can forecast for the future that this trend will continue unless greenhouse gases are curbed.
In February 2005 the 1997 Kyoto Protocol became international law. The protocol is officially the first global legally binding contract to reduce greenhouse gases. All nations who sign up are legally bound to reduce their emissions of six greenhouse gases (collectively) by an average of 5.2% below their 1990 levels by the period 2008-2012. These gases are: Carbon Dioxide, Methane, Nitrous oxide, Ozone, Water vapour and Halocarbons. The EU and Japan have already promised to reduce pollution by 8% from their respective 1990 levels.
Global dimming
There is a current ongoing global reduction in global irradiance (flux of solar radiation reaching the earths surface). This is known as global dimming. The data for this comes from a network of radiometers around the globe. Some areas such as Australia show no increase, whilst the highest level is found in Japan. The average reduction is around 0.55W/m-2.
This equates to 2.7% per decade. The main cause for the reduction is thought to be the increase in aerosol concentrations in the atmosphere. These together with CO2 levels have risen dramatically over the last 100 years, both by-products of incomplete combustion of fossil fuels. The effects of these phenomena will be to reduce the amount of light reaching plants, which will affect growth rates and rainfall rates. The data from this will now have to be taken into account on any models for global warming and climate change.
Equipment for monitoring the weather
Man has always had an interest in the weather and equipment for monitoring meteorological conditions has been around for hundreds of years.
Simple manual equipment has been used for hundreds of years and still make up the backdrop for modern meteorological monitoring networks worldwide. These instruments include simple thermometers, soil thermometers, hygrometers, thermohygrographs, barometers and simple raingauges, to name but a few. They are generally used in traditional meteorological instrument enclosures (Stevenson Screens).
One of the most visual pieces of equipment used is an instrument to measure sunshine. The Cambell Stokes sunshine recorder is still the UK standard method for measuring this parameter. Data is still collected in this manner but is very labour intensive and time consuming. These manual instruments have now been slowly replaced with automatic weather stations (AWSs) which allow data to be accessed remotely via radio, GSM or satellite telemetry systems. This removes the operator from the equation and has allowed systems to be deployed in the remotest areas on earth. Most government ministries now set up and run whole networks of ground stations. The data from these can be accessed, then used and analysed by powerful computers to devise "climate models". The first step in any modelled projection of climate change is to first simulate the present climate and compare it to observations. It is therefore vital to have an extensive network of simple stations to validate the modelled data.
Most countries also still extensively use radio-sondes for upper atmosphere monitoring applications. These are small transmitters with sensors which are sent up to high altitudes via meteorological balloons. Data from all the ground and upper air systems can then be processed centrally and disseminated to all relevant bodies.
With the internet, this data can now be accessed in "real-time". This is critical data which can provide instant displays of extreme weather events either locally or via live satellite images of earth from space.
There is also an extensive global network of hydrological, oceanographic and polar ice cap monitoring equipment and stations, and these help to monitor the effects on rainfall, sea levels, currents and the condition of the ice caps, and it is the damage and changes to these that will have the greatest consequence and potential threat to human life. Here the effects of global warming will have the most obvious damage in the long run. Water is the most valuable resource on earth and by measuring its distribution and patterns, the effects of urbanisation, de-forestation and other global effects can be monitored.
"Weather" systems are really local "environmental monitoring systems" and the data can be incorporated to give global pictures, but more and more applications such as industrial processes now have requirements to monitor local conditions to help monitor emissions of pollutants, or chemical spills from their site boundaries.
Conclusion
Everything we do is dictated by the weather and industrialised societies have undoubtedly had an effect on the environment which in turn has affected our weather patterns and trends. We now have the technology to monitor the weather conditions in very exact detail, and with extensive modelling packages try to help predict
what may happen in the future. This equipment is becoming more affordable, even for the poorest countries of the world, and every piece of monitoring helps assess the overall picture and take necessary action.
We all live inside the same global envelope and action to make changes to our environment even at a local level will have global implications.
In 1961 meteorologist Edward Lorenz coined the term the "Butterfly Effect", which concluded that the weather could not be predicted as the smallest of factors would affect the outcome, even the flapping of a butterfly's wings.
We cannot control the outcomes of weather and events of nature, they are very difficult if not impossible to predict in the longer term. But we can control and have an influence on the damage we cause to our environment. This in turn will start to have a cumulative restorative effect. It is the responsibility of every body, of government bodies right down to the private individual, to affect these changes for the better.
We all play a part in this global weather equation, we directly influence our environment, which has global effects on our weather. We are all butterflies, and we ignore this fact at our peril.
Author
Gary A Noakes (45), BSc(Hons) FRSH Product Manager Casella CEL Ltd
In 1981 Gary graduated from Exeter University in the UK with a degree in Zoology. He then spent ten years as a customer service manager for a controlled atmosphere storage equipment manufacturer. Gary started working for Casella in 1991 as Technical Sales Engineer, based in the South East, selling a complete range of environmental and personal monitoring equipment. In 2001 he moved to the position of Product Manager based at Casella's headquarters in Bedford. Gary is now responsible for all new product development and marketing strategies for the Casella range of personal monitoring, meteorological, and ambient monitoring equipment.
Gary is a Fellow of the Royal Institute of Public Health & Hygiene (FRSH), and an active participant at BOHS conferences. He has a Certifi cate of competency in Noise & Vibration Monitoring & Sampling for toxic substances (BIOH Certifi cates). Gary is also Chairman of his local village Trust.
For further information on climate change:
http://www.met-offi ce.gov.uk
http://www.ipcc.ch
http://www.stabilisation2005.com
http://www.gria.no/climate/ipcc_tar
For further information on Meteorlological monitoring equipment:
http://www.casellameasurement.com
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