climate change
Climate change may strongly influence species distribution and, thus, the structure and function of ecosystems. This paper describes simulated changes in the position of the upper treeline in the Swedish mountains in response to predicted climate change. Data on predicted summer temperature changes, the current position of the treeline, and a digital elevation model were used to predict the...
The recently published fourth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC 4AR) (IPCC, 2007) concludes that warming of the global climate system is unequivocal, as is now evident from observations of increases in global average air and ocean temperatures, widespread melting of snow and ice, and rising global average sea level. The report concludes that the average...
The decrease in extent and volume of mountain glaciers represents one of the most visible consequences of climate change in mountains. Mountain glaciers are commonly regarded as a sensitive instrument to observe the combined effects of the changes of a number of climatic variables such as temperature, solar radiation, evaporation and precipitation. With the exception of some maritime regions,...
The summit area of the Apennines is quickly changing and the mid latitude cryosphere is contemporarily shrinking and degrading due to global warming. In such an environmental framework suffering of the sole glacier in the Apennine belt, the Calderone glacier, and general reduction of the cryosphere is widely inducing permafrost degradation; variation in time and spatial distribution of snow cover...
The notion of “Melting Mountains” is very appropriate as a metaphor for mountain regions since it may concern water in both its solid and liquid state and links these to current trends in climate and man-induced global change. In this statement, “melting” can also be considered as a metaphor for “loss” in the sense of melting, sublimation or evaporation of snow, ice, glaciers and permafrost. The...
The industrial development provoked huge greenhouse gazes release into the atmosphere. This greenhouse effect enhancing, combined with natural climatic variability, led to the so-called “Global Warming”. Even if the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports giving more and more details about the possible impacts and the observed climatic variations, many uncertainties remain,...
There is hardly any region in the world where there is no fret about environmental changes, especially the issue of climate change. The Lebialem highlands have experienced a fair bit of environmental changes. What is distressing is that these changes could be attributed to climatic changes and they have a vital impact on rural livelihoods. For a community with very little to fall back on in...
Mountains host sensitive indicators of global climate change. As the world heats up, mountain glaciers - the source of water for many of the world’s river systems and people - are melting at unprecedented rates, while rare plants and animals struggle to survive over ever diminishing areas, and mountain people, already among the world’s most disadvantaged, face greater hardships. We cannot reverse...
Global climate change in the history of earth is a natural phenomenon due to continental drift, earth axis and orbital variations, variants in solar energy output and frequent volcanic activity. With the end of Little Ice Age (15th to 18th centuries), the behaviour of average surface temperature on earth depicts an increasing trend. Over the past few decades, since industrialization human...
Throughout the Holocene epoch glaciers have proven to be excellent indicators of climate variations. There are a number of studies on the recent trend of Bolivian glacier disappearance, which analyse complicated interactions of geo-meteorological conditions of the sub-tropical high mountains. Currently, practically no research has been carried out on the consequences of melting and eventual...
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