ISU Climate Science Initiative

1. ISU Climate Science Initiative Meeting objectives: * To assess the level of faculty interest in research relating to climate science at ISU * To identify opportunities to build partnerships at ISU between climate science and programs in bioeconomy, plant sciences, cyberinfrastructure, and climate-sensitive areas of research in agriculture, water resources, natural systems, and engineering for establishing ISU as a regional/national leader in climate science and impacts of climate change.

2. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) • Established in 1988 by • World Meteorological Organization (WMO) • United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Supports the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) First Assessment Report - 1990 Second Assessment Report - 1995 Third Assessment Report (TAR) - 2001 Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) - 2007 Plus: special reports, technical papers, methodology reports and supporting material. (source: www.ipcc.ch)

3. Understanding and Attributing Climate Change Continental warming likely shows a significant anthropogenic contribution over the past 50 years

4. U.S. Climate Change Science Program Mission: Facilitate the creation and application of knowledge of the Earth’s global environment through research, observations, decision support, and communication. Integrates climate research of 13 federal agencies Primary Products: 21 Synthesis & Assessment Reports • Improve knowledge of the Earth's past and present climate and environment • Improve quantification of the forces bringing about climate changes • Reduce uncertainty in projections of future climate change • Understand the sensitivity and adaptability to climate change • Explore the limits of evolving knowledge to manage risks and opportunities (source: www.climatescience.gov/)

5. What is a climate model? (IPCC TAR, Ch. 1)

6. How can a numerical model represent all of this? • Options: • Global model • resolve continental scales • simulate 10s-100s yr • Regional model • resolve broad human scales (river basins, agricultural zones, etc.) • simulate 10s-100s yr

7. Example Regional Model Domain

8. North American Regional Climate Change Assessment Program (NARCCAP) • An international project to evaluate regional climate change for North America. • Uses nested regional climate models: fine-scale models that use results of coarse global models as input. • How does uncertainty propagate from global models through regional models? • Develop multiple realizations of regional climate change for use in climate change impact assessment (patterned on global model data for the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report).

9. North America Regional Climate Change Assessment Program: Participants Raymond Arritt, David Flory, William Gutowski, Gene Takle, Iowa State University, USA Richard Jones, W. Moufouma-Okia, Hadley Centre, UK Daniel Caya, Sébastien Biner, OURANOS, Canada David Bader, Phil Duffy, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories, USA Filippo Giorgi, Abdus Salam ICTP, Italy Isaac Held, NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory, USA René Laprise, Univ. de Québec à Montréal, Canada Ruby Leung, Y. Qian, Pacific Northwest National Laboratories, USA Linda Mearns, Don Middleton, Doug Nychka National Center for Atmospheric Research, USA Ana Nunes, John Roads, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, USA Steve Sain, Univ. of Colorado at Denver, USA Lisa Sloan, Mark Snyder, Univ. of California at Santa Cruz, USA

10. GFDL CCSM CGCM3 HADCM3 Provide boundary conditions MRCC Quebec, Ouranos RegCM3 UC Santa Cruz ICTP HADRM3 Hadley Centre RSM Scripps WRF NCAR/ PNNL MM5 Iowa State NARCCAP PLAN Current climate or Scenario global climate models 2041-2070 future 1971-2000 current regional climate models

11. Seasonal Forecasting (MRED project) • Weather forecasting is short-term (few days to 2 weeks) • Climate projection is for decades • Seasonal forecasting has had less attention, despite practical needs: • agriculture, construction and repair, transportation, etc.

12. Seasonal Forecasting (MRED project) • MRED project is patterned after NARCCAP: • uses output from the National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) global model as input to fine-scale regional models • many of the same participants as NARCCAP • ISU has done some exploratory work using a similar approach. • Project has been proposed to NOAA.

13. Examples of Studying Impacts of Climate Change • Global climate models have demonstrated skill in simulation of future climates (1980s GCMs projected accelerated warming in the Arctic that now is being observed) • Regional model output is being used for studying • Impact on land-use and climate change on landscape change (C. Kling, CARD) • Impact of climate change on streamflow in UMRB (C. Kling, P. Gassman, M. Jha, CARD) • Impact of climate change on tile drainage flow (A. Kalieta, M. Helmers, A&BE) • Changes in wind speed (wind power) under climate change (S. Pryor, Indiana U) • Pavement performance under climate change (C. Williams, CCEE) http://www.rcmlab.agron.iastate.edu/

14. Examples of Studying Impacts of Climate Change • Regional model output is being used for studying • Seasonal climate forecasts (MRED: J Roads, R. Leung, C. Anderson, H. Juang) • Impact of climate change on crop yields (Z. Pan, SLU) • Impact of climate change on plant disease (X. B. Yang, Plant Pathology, and Z. Pan) • Others? • Discussions on climate change impacts • Montane plant and butterfly changes (D. Debinski, EEOB) • Soil erosion (R. Cruse, Agron) • Buffer strips, cloud forests (H. Asbjornsen, NREM) • Turtle populations (F. Janzen, EEOB) • Carbon sequestration (P. Schnable, Agron) • Bioeconomy (R. Brown, S. Fales, J. Miranowski) http://rcmlab.agron.iastate.edu/

15. Midwest Consortium for Climate Assessment (MiCCA) MiCCA’s mission is to translate and enhance the latest NOAA climate forecast products to maximize economic gains for agricultural producers and their agribusiness service providers in the U.S. Midwest through use of advanced regional models, interactive web-based decision-making tools, and high-volume customized delivery and feedback through the existing integrated regional, state, and county level extension service network throughout the 9-state region (MN, IA, MO, WI, IL, MI, IN, OH, KY). http://rcmlab.agron.iastate.edu/

16. Iowa Environmental Mesonet • Goal: Build a centralized clearing house for environmental data in Iowa • "Network of networks": Collect, process and archive data from pre-existing networks • Build two-way partnerships with data providers and data users; foster interdisciplinary collaboration and research • Daily data processing: • IEM ingests over 300,000 obs/day (~111 million in 1996) • 20 GB of compressed Level2 NEXRAD data is processed, 10,000+ Level3 NEXRAD radar attribute files are ingested into the spatial database • Thousands of NWS issued text products are processed to extract data and information. • 99% of processing done in real-time.

17. Observation Archive (as of 10/2006)

18. Virtual Environmental Observatories • Assemble comprehensive historical databases on • environment measurements (meteorological, soil moisture, soil carbon, crop status, ground water, streamflow, water quality, air quality, etc.) • landscape information (elevations, soil types, land-use, land cover, animal/bird populations, drainage, tillage, cropping patterns, chemical application, conservation practices, ownership, etc.) • human demographics (population, built environment, pollutant sources, etc.) • Assemble dynamical models for imposing constraints and consistencies • Physical laws, balances, plausibility • Forecast future conditions with applications to • * extreme weather events,flood/drought impacts forecasting, emergency management, advanced preparedness, toxic releases, crop development, chemical/seed purchase, chemical application, planting/marketing planning, recreational opportunities, etc. http://rcmlab.agron.iastate.edu/

19. What’s it going to cost us? Total cost of large-scale carbon capture and storage: $76 - $450/tC Example: Added cost to drive your car. $(0.076-0.450)/kg C x (12 kg C/44 kg CO2) x 10.4 kg CO2/gal x (1 gal/25 mi) x 12,000 mi/yr = $103 - $613/yr ($0.22 - $1.28/gal)

20. An Investment Opportunity? Total cost of large-scale carbon capture and storage: $76 - $450/tC Current price of sequestered carbon on Chicago Climate Exchange: ~$10/tC

23. Center for Carbon-Capturing Crops Rising atmospheric CO2 concentrations/global climate change Produce crops with cell walls that are “resistant” to microbial degradation • Sequester carbon in soil • Increase organic matter • Increase farm income

24. Genetic Approaches Cell wall composition varies among genotypes* Use genetic variation to identify genes that regulate resistance of roots to microbial degradation (“guilt by association”) *Hazen et al., 2003 Plant Physiol.

25. Sampling Nested Association Mapping Lines * *6,000 recombinant inbred lines generated to sample the genetic diversity of maize

26. Root Samples from the NAM Lines N=2 x 6,000 Samples Sarah Hargreaves

27. Genetic Variation in Distribution of Vascular Bundles and Lignification among 25 NAM Parents NC358 CML277

28. Next Steps - Near Term • Website • Directory of ISU climate related research and interests (short CV, pubs, grants, ideas) • Seminar series • Office of climate-change and climate-impacts research • One full-time position • Educational initiatives and support • Proposal collaboration • Long-term vision statement

29. Next Steps - Long-Term • Center or institute • Faculty positions • Graduate assistantships • Named chair