Analyzing global surface temperature anomalies at 1 km resolution, we find that daytime summer temps in urban areas are 3.21 °C warmer than surrounding rural areas on average, but that changing vegetation and albedo could substantially mitigate the effect. Explore the new dataset.
We estimate country-, process-, GHG- and product-specific land-use emissions 1961-2017. Total emissions have increased to 14.6 GtCO2-eq in 2017 (~25% of anthropogenic GHG emissions). Our results may help prioritize mitigation efforts, but suggest drastic reductions in emissions will require similarly drastic changes in agricultural production and/or practices.
PhD student Gonzales and coauthors estimate the value of irrigation water in California and compare the agricultural costs of water shortages under both the existing water rights framework and an alternate system that allows for trading of water and could reduce the costs of water shortages by $390 million per year (4.6% of California's net agricultural revenue).
Between 2005 and 2016, Co-PI Burney estimates that decommissioning of coal-fired units in the U.S. saved roughly 23,000 lives and 329 million bushels of corn and also altered regional atmospheric reflectivity, raising average top of atmosphere instantaneous radiative forcing by 0.50 W m-2.
By analyzing 35 years of temperature, ozone levels, and crop yield data, we estimate the impacts of warming and ozone pollution on perennial fruits and nuts in California. These crops, which represent ~38% of the state's agriculture by value, suffer damages of about $1 billion per year due to ozone in recent years. With 2°C of warming, almond yields will drop by ~10%.
Some water uses are more or less flexible than others due to larger curtailment costs or social impacts. We construct and present a new water stress index that integrates water scarcity, flexibility, and variability, and use it to evaluate the most-stressed basins worldwide.