Analyses of river flow records since 1969 reveal there is “no compelling evidence for a decrease in overall runoff or low flows” in the summer, which finding “is contrary to trajectories of most future [model] projections”… Read More
Desert Plants in a Warming World of More Variable Precipitation (2 Apr 2013)
Salguero-Gomez et al. say their study “contributes two notable exceptions to the accepted view that short-lived species, regardless of habitat, are particularly vulnerable to climate change,” emphasizing that their findings “challenge the commonly held perception based on correlative approaches (e.g. bioclimatic envelope approaches) suggesting that desert organisms may be particularly vulnerable to climate change”… Read More
Hydrologic Variability Effects on Dryland Ecosystems (2 Apr 2013)
One would think they would be devastating. However, random hydrologic fluctuations may actually enhance the resilience of dryland ecosystems by obliterating threshold-like responses to external drivers, and that “by increasing biodiversity and the associated ecosystem redundancy, hydrologic variability can indirectly enhance post-disturbance recovery, i.e., ecosystem resilience”… Read More
Predicting Decadal to Multi-Decadal Variability in Precipitation (2 Apr 2013)
How well do the new CMIP5 models do? In the words of the authors of this study, “model hindcasts and predictions may be unable to capture the full magnitude of realizable decadal to multidecadal fluctuations in hydroclimate”… Read More
More Problems with Decadal Climate-Model Prediction Skills (3 Apr 2013)
Are we ever going to be able to resolve them? Will earmarking more money for simply doing more of the same ever get us to reality?… Read More
Xylogenesis in Black Spruce Trees of Canadian Boreal Forest (3 Apr 2013)
“Long-term increases in temperature can substantially extend wood formation and, consequently, the dynamics and productivity of cold ecosystems, by removing the thermal constraints to the activity of carbon sinks in trees”… Read More
On the Road to Predicting Changes in the Asian Summer Monsoon (3 Apr 2013)
The authors of this study analyzed “potential changes in Asian monsoon onset, retreat and duration simulated by 13 IPCC AR4 models,” finding that there “is no single outstanding model out of the 13 models used in the analysis”… Read More
Dr. Idso is the founder, former president, and currently chairman of the Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change.
