Meteorological drought is referred as a precipitation deficiency, in comparison to normal or base line condition. We use Standardized Precipitation index (SPI-n, where n = 3, 6, 9 and 12 months accumulation period) as an index of meteorological drought. SPI represents a statistical z-score or the number of standard deviations (following a probability distribution, usually Gamma and back transformed to standard normal distribution) above or below that an event is from the mean (McKee et al. 1993; Sims et al., 2002). SPI is spatially invariant and probabilistic in nature and able to capture different drought states ranging from short, medium and long-term drought conditions depending on the length of the accumulation period. SPI has number of advantages, such as (Lloyd-Hughes and Saunders, 2002); (i) The SPI is based on precipitation and requires computation of only two …show more content…
(iii) It can be tailored to specific needs for impact assessment. For example, it’s variable time scales are useful for modelling wide range of meteorological, agricultural, and hydrological applications. The temporal nature of the index facilitates understanding drought dynamics, such as onset and cessation, which is difficult to be tracked by other indices. (iv) Standardized nature ensures that the frequency of extreme events at any location and on any time scale is consistent. Conversely, application of SPI has few potential disadvantages: (i) the quantity and reliability of the data used to fit a suitable probability distributions. (ii) Due to standardized nature, SPI is incapable of identifying regions that are more “drought prone” than others, and (iii) Employing SPI at shorter time scales (such as, 1, 2, and 3 months) to the regions with low seasonal precipitation, resulting into erroneous large positive or negative SPI
The book “In Search of April Raintree” is a passionate adventure of two Metis sisters trying to find their true identity. April had difficulties throughout her life with her ethnicity, gender and her personal life. Wondering one day if she’ll ever find happiness being a Metis woman.
Desert Solitaire aims to draw attention to the activities of a man voluntarily isolated in nature. It seeks to identify the strife that Abbey faces with modern day human’s treatment of his nature. As such, the argument that Abbey poses in one his earlier chapters Rocks is, that the Modern Day man is destructive and cannot be trusted to preserve nature as is.
The constant shifting of tectonic plates can lead a future of rough, uneven or desturbed terrain. Often times when plates collide mountain ranges or volcanoes are formed but the relationship and distance between continents can also change. In the book “April Raintree” by Beatrice Culleton, the constant shifts in April’s life cause a permanent confusion as to who she is and how she identifies herself later on in life. This confusion results in many struggles due to her erratic shifts in Relationships, lifestyles, and emotions.
Droughts in Wyoming’s future are unpredictable and uncertain; however, Richard Guldin of the Rocky Mountain Forest and Range Experiment Station in Fort Collins, Colorado, has made some predictions for the water situati...
Didactic Reliance on Technology: Analysis of “August 2026: There Will Come Soft Rain” and “The Machine Stops”
On the heart (center) of California is a flat area with miles and miles of farms and up to 230 different crops. The central valley agriculture is essential to the United States; it not only delivers almost half of the produce but also helps the economy by also giving more job opportunities (California Department of food and agriculture, 2014). Many families depend on the central valley agriculture to survive economically in the United States. It is a well-known fact that rain and snows in the Sierra Nevada Mountains are a very important element in the central valley. No rain in the central valley can cause many devastating issues to occur quickly. Recently in the year of 2013 California received less rainfall than years before. The small amount of water the central valley is receiving is harming not only to the land but humans and animals as well. It’s destroying the habitats of animals with forest fires caused from the dry spells occurring. The central valley is going through a drought, so much that around this time of year the central valley usually accumulates enough rain for the necessities in the valley, agriculture for example. This year, however, has been different, the central valley hasn’t received enough water and this has caused a drought in the valley. Water is an important element in this world for not only human life, but for the environment in general, a shortage of water supply can bring issues to the environment and those living in it. The central valley holds the largest percent of class one soil, not only that, the valley grows a third of all the produce being grown in the United States, that’s more than 230 crops that are being grown in the central valley. However, this drought isn’t only affecting the resident...
For example, then, drought is difficult to define in modern standards, it is typically classified as a shortage of water, usually associated with a deficit of rainfall. That is, drought occurs when the demand or use for water exceeds the current supply of water. It follows, then, the Colorado river drought does not solely affect one area, it’s grandeur has affected the whole southwestern United States. Additionally, the Colorado River Basin Water Management: Evaluating and Adjusting to Hydroclimatic provides information on the meager volume of rain fall. In theory, then, combined with increased temperatures from global warming, and a deficient of rainfall both circumstances have had a descending effect on most surrounding
...xpected weather conditions over time, previous weather conditions, possible areas of less deteriorating weather conditions, expected duration of bad weather condition.
In order to understand the content of this lab report, some major concepts must first be understood. It was once said that in short, geographers study “what is where, why, and so what”(Fairbanks and Sato). One concept that is needed to be known in order to understand the why aspect of this question is insolation. Insolation or incoming solar radiation is energy intercepted by a unit area on the Earth’s surface (Fairbanks and Sato). Insolation is a term needed to be understood in order to fully comprehend different patterns in climate. Second, within this lab report, potential evapotranspiration will be studied in order to help determine the water budget for each given city. Potential evapotranspiration is the amount of water that would be removed from the surface of a grid cell by evaporation and transpiration, if the amount of water already present in the...
The rise in temperature is having a significant impact on levels of rainfall, which in turn effects water run-off. Satellite observations since 1987 have shown that, as global temperatures have increased, global mean precipitation has increased in parallel at a rate of 7.4 ± 2.6% per ◦C ...
Already scientists have observed that more than 75% of the recent economic losses are caused by natural hazards which can be attributed to wind storms, floods, droughts and other climate related hazards. In the year 2008, the U.S. state of Iowa was on the front pages of newspapers all around the world. Weeks of heavy rain in the Midwest caused rivers to swell and levees to break. Millions of acres of farmland are now underwater, their plantings most likely destroyed. By March, Iowa had tied its third-highest monthly snowfall in 121 years of record keeping, and then came the rain. April’s st...
McMean, G. (2007, June). Artic climate impact assessment (C. Symon, Ed.). New York, NY: Cambridge Univercity Press. http://www.acia.uaf.edu/pages/scientific.html
Since 1960s both minimum and maximum temperatures have exhibited a rising trend; with minimum increasing by a range of 0.7-2.0 degrees Celsius and maximum by 0.2-1.3 degree Celsius varying by region and season. Notable also is variability of rainfall patterns such as below normal rainfall in the long rains season and more during the short rainfall season, some regions have recorded more intense rainfall and downpours that have resulted to floods and infrastructural impairments. Extinction or near extinction of flora and fauna, changes in flowering and maturity patterns in crops are all attributable to climate change. These changes have had and are expected to have far reaching impacts on the economic sectors of the economy. Some of the expected sectoral impacts are discussed
Like most problems, the answer is not simple. The obvious first choice is the military. History shows that the concept of weather warfare is not new to them and that they have considered weather manipulation as a tactical advantage.
(2009). The 'Standard' of the 'Standard'. Drought - a fact sheet. Retrieved from: http://www.ifad.org/lrkm/factsheet/cc.pdf The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC, (2007).