Climate Change scenarios and linkages to marine resources
W Marine Projects need to utilize information from various global circulation models to develop a range of scenarios that will be accepted by governments within the region on potential climate change. These can then be utilized, together with socio-economic models assessing industry, agricultural, population changes to provide estimates of water resource availability and demand, and potential impacts on the dependent ecosystem health. Such approach has been adopted in the UNEP-MAP GEF MedPartnership project, where a specific project on adaptation to climate variability and change in coastal areas through ICZM was developed. The approach utilizes, among other, the DIVA model, which is a method for building modular integrated computer models by bringing together knowledge from natural and social disciplines. The explicit incorporation of adaptation is an important innovation that DIVA contributes to vulnerability research and modeling. The impacts calculated do not only depend on the scenarios but also on the adaptation strategy. The DIVA tool enables users to choose scenarios and adaptation strategies, and to compare results for different scenarios and adaptation strategies. While DIVA is applied for large areas (region and above), the specific methodology is utilized to down scale it to the local level.
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Spatio-temporal structure of the SST across the ocean basin scale explored. An understanding of the spatio-temporal structure of plankton abundance and its temporal drivers is of interest to marine policy makers because of the impact the plankton has on the rest of the marine ecosystem and to various industries such as fisheries. Even though there is a general trend towards rising temperatures, there are regions of the North Atlantic that have been cooling over the past few decades, as well as other regions that have been warming at a quicker rate. The reasons for this spatial heterogeneity comprise various physical features, such as bathymetry, currents and the positioning of high and low pressure centers. The Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO) influences temperature changes across the North Atlantic but this influence is stronger where the effects of overturning ocean currents are particularly influential. The AMO may also have an impact on the occurrence of hurricanes in the Atlantic. Since it is thought to be connected to the circulation of the North Atlantic, the AMO might influence plankton abundance through changes in circulation rather than changes in temperature. Multidecadal Atlantic Climate Variability and its Impact on Marine Pelagic Communities, Journal of Marine Systems, In Press (Ref. Doc. 1) |
