Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
will result in cooling effects to some extent and make the near-surface temperature
decrease in most seasons except the spring.
The third case study aimed to model the potential climatological variability
caused by future tropical deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon over the twenty-
first century. The study results show that the forests in the Brazilian Amazon will
primarily convert into dryland cropland and pasture in the northwest part and into
cropland/woodland mosaic in the southeast part, with 5.12 and 13.11 % of the
study area, respectively. These land surface changes will therefore lead to the
significant reduction of the sum of sensible heat flux and latent heat flux and
precipitation and the increase of the surface temperature. Furthermore, the vari-
ability of surface temperature is observed with close link to the deforested areas.
The fourth case study simulated the climatological changes caused by future
grassland changes in Mongolia for the years 2010-2020 and 2040-2050. In order
to detect the impact on climate change, two experiments were designed in this
study: control experiment and simulation experiment. And the simulation results
showed that the future grassland degradation will lead to an increasing trend on
temperature and a decreasing trend on precipitation in some areas of Mongolia.
The result of this study can provide some theoretical and scientific support for the
development and strategy plan in Mongolia.
In the last case, some evidences for influences of future urban expansion on
regional climate in the Northeast megalopolis, USA, were presented. The model-
based analysis shows that future urban expansion will significantly jeopardize the
regional climate change. The warming effect of future urban expansion in original
and new urban area and drought effects in nonurban area will be more serious in
summer than in winter. However, a cooling effect will turn up in original urban area
in winter. All these indicate that the future urban expansion in the Northeast meg-
alopolis will be a serious climate signal. In addition, this research further shows that
study at the scale of megalopolis helps to understand the integrated effect of com-
bination and interaction of multiple cities and their surroundings, which may cru-
cially determine regional climate pattern and should be highly valued in the future.
References
Roy SB, Avissar R (2002) Impact of land use/land cover change on regional hydrometeorology in
Amazonia. J Geophys Res Atmos (1984-2012), 107:LBA 4-1-LBA 4-12
Bala G, Caldeira K, Wickett M, Phillips T, Lobell D, Delire C et al (2007) Combined climate and
carbon-cycle effects of large-scale deforestation. Proc Natl Acad Sci 104:6550-6555.
Barger NN, Ojima DS, Belnap J, Shiping W, Yanfen W, Chen Z (2004) Changes in plant
functional groups, litter quality, and soil carbon and nitrogen mineralization with sheep
grazing in an Inner Mongolian grassland. Rangeland Ecol Manag 57:613-619
Basara JB, Basara HG, Illston BG, Crawford KC (2010) The impact of the urban heat island
during an intense heat wave in Oklahoma City. Advances in Meteorology 2010
Bathiany S, Claussen M, Brovkin V, Raddatz T, Gayler V (2010) Combined biogeophysical and
biogeochemical effects of large-scale forest cover changes in the MPI earth system model.
Biogeosciences 7:1383-1399
