Flavio Lehner was a graduate student working with computer models simulating Earths climate at the University of Berne in Switzerland when he had a chance to join a research vessel collecting sea temperatures and measuring ocean currents between Greenland and Svalbard, Norway.
As a lifestyle, field work is very agreeable, Lehner said. But for me, it was a watershed moment. I had to decide which way to go.
Was it to be a life in the real world of ocean voyages or mathematical abstractions?
Climate is changing, Colorado researchers agree. But how will it change snow and water in the West?
They had been measuring ocean currents for 10 years, Lehner said. In real-world data collection, you look at one fraction of the Earth for a long time. With models, you can look at the big-picture questions.
Two of those big-picture questions are how much snow will fall on the mountains of the West and how much water will be available for the regions forests, farms and cities in a world growing warmer as greenhouse gases build up in the atmosphere.
Today, Lehner, 35, and his colleagues at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, are trying to divine answers through a welter of mathematical calculations designed to reflect how the world works.
Those equations are linked together in NCARs Community Earth System Model, a sort of algorithmic Rube Goldberg machine, which connects a set of algorithms representing the laws of physics that govern the planet thermodynamics, transfer of radiation and global conservation of momentum and water and uses them to generate a picture of the future.
It takes years to construct such a model, and it is hoped it accurately reflects the world. The models do have deficiencies, and we work on those, Lehner said.
For example, there is a tongue of cold water in the tropical Pacific Ocean near the equator. The position and shape of it dont look realistic in a lot of models, Lehner said, and that in turn, could affect predicted rain patterns.
If you think of a map of the world overlaid by a checkerboard, you get a vision of the cells into which the data is distributed Greenland ocean temperatures into the Greenland cell and Rocky Mountain snowfall into the Colorado cell. The cells are big 60 miles by 60 miles to as much as 150 miles on a side.
The smaller the cells the better the resolution in the model and the clearer the picture, but more computer power and detailed data are required.
The model is run on various scenarios to see what will happen to the world. Seeing what happens to rain and snow in the West is trickier.
Temperature on a regional scale is clear, Lehner said. If it is particularly warm in Boulder, it is going to be warm in Denver, but it can rain in Boulder and not in Denver.
The mountains make the Western cells even more difficult to model. As a result, predicting what is going to happen to rain and snow in the West is challenging.
The big models dont even agree on whether there will be more or less precipitation in the West as the world warms.
As the air gets hotter, it can hold more moisture 7% more for each 1-degree Celsius increase in temperature but whether that translates to more rain or just a few heavier storms is unclear.
Hot air that rises at the equator moves hundreds of miles north and south, descending to create a band of deserts around the world, including the Sahara, Gobi and the American Southwests Sonoran.
The models show the Southwest deserts advancing north as the world heats up, but by just 10 miles in some, and by 100 miles in others. It is easier to see the movement over the oceans, which are flat, Lehner said, but more complicated once mountains and valleys are added. So, over land it is not always clear what will happen to the rainfall and deserts.
To better calibrate the Earth system models, 30 of the big model groups around the world from Japan to China to Russia to Canada to Boulder are participating in an exercise called the Climate Model Intercomparison Project, or CMIP, in which they all run the same data set to see where their models differ.
It isnt straightforward when you see these models dont agree, Lehner said. Then its a lot of detective work to figure out why.
NCARs model is housed in Eagle, the centers supercomputer in Cheyenne, and Lehner can tap into it from his laptop (a bit like checking your bank balance online) and run simulations.
While Eagle is the fastest supercomputer in the world dedicated to energy research performing 8 million-billion calculations per second to run the data through the models mass of algorithms takes at least 24 hours for a 20-year projection; a century will take weeks.
While modelers try to sort out the glitches and differences, all the models do agree on quite a lot, including the basic fact that as the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere rises, the world will be warmer and in many places drier.
In the political realm, if we dont have the answer for sure, we dont know anything, Lehner said. We dont yet know with any certainty what will happen to precipitation over the Southwest, but we can anticipate that in a warmer world and a warmer world is certain we will see more stresses on water resources.
To get a better sense of what will happen at a regional level, researchers take the data from Earth system models and downscale it to smaller models.
United States Geological Survey researcher Gregory McCabe, for example, constructed a hydrological water balance model taking into account variables such as precipitation, temperature, soil moisture and snow accumulation and melt. The cells in this model were approximately 2 miles by 2 miles.
The model showed that since 1980 there have been lower-than-average snow conditions in the western U.S. that are unprecedented within the context of 20th century climate.
When the model was applied to the Upper Colorado River Basin with a future average temperature increase of 0.86 degrees Celsius, stream flow declined by 8%. When the average temperature was increased to 2 degrees Celsius, stream flow dropped 17%.
Weve seen a shift in peak runoff to earlier in the year, McCabe said. So, the water is coming off sooner in several places in the West that has implications of how much water there will be in the river in July.
Models can be run backward into the past as well into the future. Using paleoclimate data from tree rings going back to 1490, McCabe and his colleagues reconstructed snowfall and stream flow in the Upper Colorado River basin which includes parts of Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming.
Using the historical record, they concluded that under the warmer temperatures used in the hydrology model, the basin is likely to experience periods of water shortage more severe than anything in the past 500 years.
Lehner was part of a team that did a similar paleo study of the Upper Rio Grande Basin looking at how much of the snow made it into the river and concluded that the current, steep declining trend is unprecedented in the context of the last 445 years.
Katrina Bennett, a hydrologist at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, downscaled Earth system model output into a hydrological model (with cells about 3.7 miles a side) to look at what would happen to stream flows as forests were lost to fire and pests in the San Juan Basin and found that that their disappearance alone could reduce stream flows in basin 6 to 11%.
Over the next 50 to 100 years as forests are replaced with shrubs and the water balance shifts, Bennett said, the question is how far?
MORE: Climate change is transforming Western forests. And that could have big consequences far beyond wildfires.
Between 2000 and 2014, the Colorado River suffered the worst 15-year drought on record. Bradley Udall, a research scientist at Colorado State University, and Jonathan Overpeck, at the University of Arizona, sought to parse what was happening to the river.
Using the temperature-water flow sensitives of a hydrological model, they concluded that while droughts in the past were driven by a lack of rain and snow, this drought was in large part caused by high temperatures.
About a third of the lost flow was the result of record-setting temperatures that caused evaporation from streams and soils, as well as evapotranspiration as plants suck up water. By 2050, they projected heat could reduce the Colorado River flows 20%.
You can already see the effects of heat, Udall said. I spent a week hiking in the Red River Valley in Utah at 10,000 feet. Wed had a wet winter, but by September, it was extremely dry. Streams were dry, marshy wetlands crunched underfoot.
McCabes work on stream flows, Lehners centuries look back on the Rio Grande, Bennetts examination of the interplay of San Juan forests and streams and Udalls assessment of the impact of heat on the Colorado River are each smaller pictures of what is happening and what may happen in the future.
Science is reliant on models from big global climate to smaller hydrology models, Udall said. What weve learned out of these global climate models are the extremes, the best and worst case. It gives you the sense of the range, but not what is most probable.
The struggle of what we know and what we dont know should not paralyze us, he said. We know a lot, and it should tell us to be cautious. Since 2000, weve learned a lot, and it is mostly bad.
CORRECTION: This story was updated at 1:42 p.m. on Jan. 22, 2020, to correctly describe the states in the Upper Colorado River basin included in Gregory McCabes research.
This reporting is made possible by our members. You can directly support independent watchdog journalism in Colorado for as little as $5 a month. Start here: coloradosun.com/join
Excerpt from:
- New Microsoft Ads Take Aim at Mac Pricing - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Adobe Flash Comes to TV - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Microsoft Introduces Windows 7 Starter Edition - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Mac Viruses and Trojans Becoming More Prevalent - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Apple ‘Customer Experience’ Continues to Trounce PCs - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Seagate Introduces ‘Replica’ Drive to Backup Entire PC - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Still Love XP? Run it on Windows 7! - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- Is Microsoft Ditching Vista? - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- The Kindle DX: Not Exactly a Textbook Killer - November 8th, 2009 [November 8th, 2009]
- The Smart Shopper’s Guide to Buying a Wireless Router - May 19th, 2010 [May 19th, 2010]
- iTunes 10: So Long, Ringtone Creator - Thanks for the Memories - October 17th, 2010 [October 17th, 2010]
- iTunes 10: So Long, Ringtone Creator – Thanks for the Memories - February 14th, 2011 [February 14th, 2011]
- How to Make Your Laptop Last Longer - February 14th, 2011 [February 14th, 2011]
- Client Build 5 UPDATE: Personal Super Computer 2011 (SR-2 X5690 OCZ Vertex 3 GTX590 Nvidia Tesla) - Video - March 29th, 2012 [March 29th, 2012]
- Super Micro Computer, Inc. Announces 3rd Quarter 2012 Financial Results - April 25th, 2012 [April 25th, 2012]
- Super Micro Computer Q3 Profit Slips - Quick Facts - April 25th, 2012 [April 25th, 2012]
- Super Computer Maker Cray and Intel strike Partnership - April 25th, 2012 [April 25th, 2012]
- Super Micro Computer Q3 12 Earnings Conference Call At 5:00 PM ET - April 25th, 2012 [April 25th, 2012]
- Herd mentallity and the information super highway - Video - April 25th, 2012 [April 25th, 2012]
- Brain vs. Computer - Video - May 4th, 2012 [May 4th, 2012]
- Minecraft World First - Most wanted redstone device - Video - May 4th, 2012 [May 4th, 2012]
- PS3 Jailbreak Tutorial 4.11 WORKING - Video - May 4th, 2012 [May 4th, 2012]
- China's Tianhe-1 supercomputer begins operations - Video - May 4th, 2012 [May 4th, 2012]
- June 2011 TOP500 Review looks at Japan's K Supercomputer - Video - May 4th, 2012 [May 4th, 2012]
- Super Vision for Soldiers - May 5th, 2012 [May 5th, 2012]
- The Super Sonic Show Episode 0-Computer Help - Video - May 7th, 2012 [May 7th, 2012]
- Why Super Micro Computer's Earnings May Be Less Than Awesome - May 10th, 2012 [May 10th, 2012]
- Magnetic bacteria may help build computer hard drives - May 10th, 2012 [May 10th, 2012]
- SUPER WHY! Around the World Adventure Kicks off PBS KIDS Summer Learning Initiative This June - May 10th, 2012 [May 10th, 2012]
- Tutorial SUPER COMPUTER girl 3750 sylvia Vs fem game 4 (3550) - Video - May 10th, 2012 [May 10th, 2012]
- SUPER COMPUTER Wii best 3750 sylvia Vs learn chess 4 (3550) - Video - May 10th, 2012 [May 10th, 2012]
- SUPER COMPUTER girls city 3750 sylvia Vs RYBKA 4 (3550) - Video - May 10th, 2012 [May 10th, 2012]
- John Laban - Open University Super Computer Room - Video - May 10th, 2012 [May 10th, 2012]
- Can A Super Computer Save Banking? Part 2 of 2 - Video - May 10th, 2012 [May 10th, 2012]
- Supermicro® Launches Widest Range of UP Server Platforms Supporting Intel® Xeon® E3-1200 v2 - May 16th, 2012 [May 16th, 2012]
- Supermicro® Debuts New X9 DP and 4-Way MP Platforms - May 16th, 2012 [May 16th, 2012]
- Supermicro® Launches Widest Range of Server Platforms Supporting Intel® Xeon® E3-1200 v2 - May 16th, 2012 [May 16th, 2012]
- Invention kit for banana pianos, alphabet soup keyboards - May 16th, 2012 [May 16th, 2012]
- A few errors could be key to super-efficient computer chips - May 20th, 2012 [May 20th, 2012]
- Supermicro® Highlights Latest GPU SuperServer®, SuperBlade® and ... - May 20th, 2012 [May 20th, 2012]
- Kontron HPEC Platform Chosen by Military Embedded Systems Magazine for Editor's Choice Award - May 20th, 2012 [May 20th, 2012]
- Raspberry Pi to rebirth an era of Woz-like super creativity? - May 20th, 2012 [May 20th, 2012]
- Taste and tale of success - May 20th, 2012 [May 20th, 2012]
- 1 Reason to Expect Big Things From Super Micro Computer - May 25th, 2012 [May 25th, 2012]
- Bump's Super Popular App Just Got A Million Times Cooler With Its Latest Update - May 25th, 2012 [May 25th, 2012]
- Is The Computer 'Cloud' Compromising You Privacy? - May 26th, 2012 [May 26th, 2012]
- Super MP3 Download 4.8.2.6 - May 28th, 2012 [May 28th, 2012]
- Radiohead's Kid A and OK Computer, Now in 8-Bit - May 29th, 2012 [May 29th, 2012]
- ASUS P6T7 WS Super Computer MoBo - Video - May 29th, 2012 [May 29th, 2012]
- Photonic Super Computer 2012 - Video - May 29th, 2012 [May 29th, 2012]
- Kaspersky discovers super-complex Flame malware - May 30th, 2012 [May 30th, 2012]
- Supermicro® X9 5x GPU SuperWorkstation Delivers Maximum Performance with NVIDIA Maximus Certification - May 30th, 2012 [May 30th, 2012]
- Super-virus Flame raises the cyberwar stakes - May 30th, 2012 [May 30th, 2012]
- Super-stealthy ‘Flame' computer virus spies on Iran - May 31st, 2012 [May 31st, 2012]
- Super-stealthy ‘Flame' computer virus spies on Iranians - May 31st, 2012 [May 31st, 2012]
- Was flame virus written by gamers? Code similar to apps such as Angry Birds - May 31st, 2012 [May 31st, 2012]
- Massive cyber attack on Iran came from U.S., report says - June 2nd, 2012 [June 2nd, 2012]
- Massive cyber attack on Iran came from US, report says - June 2nd, 2012 [June 2nd, 2012]
- Supermicro® Exhibits its Latest X9 Server and Storage Innovations at Computex, Taiwan - June 5th, 2012 [June 5th, 2012]
- Supermicro® Hadoop Solutions Accelerate Innovation with Launch of EMC® ... - June 5th, 2012 [June 5th, 2012]
- Super 57000 Video Game (Family Computer) - Video - June 5th, 2012 [June 5th, 2012]
- Security Cameras Turn into Super-Fast Sleuths - June 7th, 2012 [June 7th, 2012]
- Quantum computers move closer to reality, thanks to highly enriched and highly purified silicon - June 7th, 2012 [June 7th, 2012]
- Research Makes Ultrafast Quantum Computer Concept a Reality - June 9th, 2012 [June 9th, 2012]
- Supermicro's New Compact Embedded Server Appliance Supports 3rd Generation Intel® Core™ i7/i5/i3 Processors - June 11th, 2012 [June 11th, 2012]
- The PC which is truly personal: 'Computer' on a memory stick offers COMPLETE privacy for browsing and documents - June 11th, 2012 [June 11th, 2012]
- 'Purified' silicon nudges quantum computing ahead - June 11th, 2012 [June 11th, 2012]
- Apple serves up 15.4-inch MacBook Pro with Retina Display - June 11th, 2012 [June 11th, 2012]
- Apple debuts next-gen MacBook Pro, iOS 6 - June 11th, 2012 [June 11th, 2012]
- How to Invest Like the Super-Rich - June 13th, 2012 [June 13th, 2012]
- Super Computer for Sale - Video - June 13th, 2012 [June 13th, 2012]
- Supermicro® Launches FatTwin™ Architecture - June 15th, 2012 [June 15th, 2012]
- Computer Workstation utilizes NVIDIA® Maximus(TM) technology. - June 15th, 2012 [June 15th, 2012]
- Supermicro® Launches FatTwinâ„¢ Architecture - June 15th, 2012 [June 15th, 2012]
- Acer: Aspire S5, super-thin Ultrabook, coming to U.S. in late June - June 15th, 2012 [June 15th, 2012]
- Supermicro(R) Launches FatTwin(TM) Architecture - June 15th, 2012 [June 15th, 2012]
- Sheldon Adelson: 7 surprising facts about 2012's biggest donor - June 15th, 2012 [June 15th, 2012]
- lego super computer - Video - June 17th, 2012 [June 17th, 2012]
- Age of Empires: The Conqurors - vsing Duke AI 1.6 - Super computer - Video - June 17th, 2012 [June 17th, 2012]
- Supermicro® FatTwin™ Takes Center Stage at International Supercomputing Conference 2012 - June 18th, 2012 [June 18th, 2012]