Modeling our climate future; Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution to lead ocean current research

New NOAA-funded project investigating role of western boundary current variability in climate change

Grant and Award Announcement

WOODS HOLE OCEANOGRAPHIC INSTITUTION

 

IMAGE: SWIRLING PARCELS OF WATER, CALLED OCEAN EDDIES, SPIN OFF FROM THE WARM GULF STREAM, THE POWERFUL NORTHWARD-FLOWING CURRENT THAT HUGS THE U.S. EAST COAST BEFORE VEERING EAST ACROSS THE ATLANTIC OCEAN. THIS VISUALIZATION WAS GENERATED BY A NUMERICAL MODEL THAT SIMULATES OCEAN CIRCULATION. WHOI RESEARCHERS ARE STUDYING WESTERN BOUNDARY OCEAN CURRENTS, LIKE THE GULF STREAM, AND HOW THEIR BEHAVIOR CAN BE ASSOCIATED WITH CLIMATE. IMAGE view more 

CREDIT: CREDIT: NASA/GODDARD SPACE FLIGHT CENTER SCIENTIFIC VISUALIZATION © NASA, GODDARD SPACE FLIGHT CENTER

Woods Hole, Mass. (October 6, 2021) -- Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) senior scientist of physical oceanography, Dr. Young-Oh Kwon, and WHOI adjunct scientist, Dr. Claude Frankignoul, have received a new research grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Modeling, Analysis, Predictions and Projections (MAPP) Program, funding their research project focusing on western boundary ocean currents and their correspondence with the atmosphere in relation to modern day climate.

Western boundary currents (WBCs), such as the Kuroshio-Oyashio Extension in the North Pacific Ocean and the Gulf Stream in the North Atlantic Ocean, are the regions of largest ocean variability and intense air-sea interaction. This WBC variability generates strong ocean-to-atmosphere heat transfer, resulting in warming that can impact large-scale atmospheric circulation and heat transport toward the poles in both the ocean and atmosphere.

The project suggests that this WBC behavior and its associated air-sea interaction play fundamental roles in regulating our climate, as well as have a significant impact on extreme weather, coastal ecosystem, and sea-level. However, their representation in climate models needs to be improved. This study looks to investigate the nature and impacts of the WBC variability in state-of-the-art climate models based on a set of model diagnostics. Kwon and his team will develop the diagnostics for this study based on various observational datasets. Then, they will be used to determine the differences between observations and the climate model simulations (or model biases) at standard and higher resolutions.

According to Kwon, the findings would lead to a system of quantifying the oceanic and atmospheric variability in the WBCs resulting from air-sea interactions, and improved understanding of the links between the model biases in simulating WBCs and the simulated large-scale atmospheric and oceanic circulations.

“The recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report was very clear: climate change is widespread, rapid and intensifying, hence the research to improve our physical understanding of the climate system and model biases are needed more than ever,” said Kwon.

“Our overall goals are to advance scientific understanding, monitoring, and prediction of climate and its impacts, enable effective decisions, especially since the improvement in the climate model processes related to the WBC variability and associated air-sea interaction has significant implications for the prediction of our climate and its impacts,” Kwon added.

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About Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) is a private, non-profit organization on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, dedicated to marine research, engineering, and higher education. Established in 1930, its primary mission is to understand the ocean and its interaction with the Earth as a whole, and to communicate an understanding of the ocean’s role in the changing global environment. WHOI’s pioneering discoveries stem from an ideal combination of science and engineering—one that has made it one of the most trusted and technically advanced leaders in basic and applied ocean research and exploration anywhere. WHOI is known for its multidisciplinary approach, superior ship operations, and unparalleled deep-sea robotics capabilities. We play a leading role in ocean observation and operate the most extensive suite of data-gathering platforms in the world. Top scientists, engineers, and students collaborate on more than 800 concurrent projects worldwide—both above and below the waves—pushing the boundaries of knowledge and possibility. For more information, please visit www.whoi.edu

Study: New Pacific Ocean circulation findings may hold key to better predicting impact of El Niño and La Niña

Peer-Reviewed Publication

YORK UNIVERSITY

TORONTO, Oct. 4, 2021 — For years scientists have been trying to understand variations in El Niño and La Niña to accurately predict year-to-year disruptions to weather patterns. New findings from York University scientists at the Lassonde School of Engineering suggest that a conveyer-like motion of heat across the equator in the Pacific Ocean — called the “Cross Equatorial Cell” (CEC) — may influence what a specific El Niño or La Niña looks like.

“What this CEC is doing, essentially, is sloshing water and heat back and forth between just north of the equator and just south of the equator,” said Neil Tandon, assistant professor in the Department of Atmospheric Science at the Lassonde School of Engineering and co-author of the study. “In this study, we looked at what is physically causing this motion in the ocean. Understanding this is crucial, because a small change in the location of ocean heat in turn shifts the locations of the atmospheric jet streams, which sets off a chain reaction, disturbing weather around the globe.”

El Niño and La Niña are both known to have global impacts on weather, from severe flooding to droughts and wildfires — impacting economies in every country. El Niño is a warming of the ocean in the tropical Pacific over a year, while La Niña is a cooling in this region. But not all El Niños and La Niñas are the same: some are stronger than others, and they can arise in different locations in the Pacific Ocean. 

Tandon says the movement of heat by the CEC may help explain this range of behaviour and improve our ability to predict year-to-year changes in weather patterns. Such improvements would benefit countries around the globe across a broad range of sectors, including agriculture, transportation, emergency response services, hydroelectric utilities and the insurance industry.

“When scientists see that there's going to be a strong El Niño or a strong La Niña, everybody pays attention because no country is unaffected by that, “said Tandon.  “If we can make any incremental step in improving our prediction of the impact of El Niño or La Niña, that has benefits for everybody in terms of being able to prepare for consequences such as severe flooding or droughts.”

Tandon and lead author, Devanarayana Rao, a Master’s student in Tandon’s lab, examined the CEC using multiple data sets. In the study, the team analyzed relationships between physical quantities to illustrate what this circulation looks like and why this circulation exists. Their analysis found that the CEC arises from the following sequence of events:

• Year-to-year changes in winds generate changes in the density of ocean water north and south of the equator in the Pacific.
• These density changes generate changes in pressure north and south of the equator.
• These pressure changes in turn generate a flow of water across the equator in the upper ocean.
• This flow in the upper ocean generates waves that extend to the deep ocean, where they drive flow in the opposite direction across the equator.

“This research is a part of ongoing efforts to improve our understanding of the climate system and to develop real-world solutions to the ongoing climate crisis,” said Rao. “In general, most [previous] studies focused on deep ocean circulation in the Atlantic Ocean, which is projected to have a ‘slowing down’ in the next 100 years. But, here, in the Pacific, the year-to-year variability of the deep ocean is much stronger than in the Atlantic, which can potentially influence the global weather patterns, the deep oceanic carbon reserve, and marine habitat.”

“I think an important next step in this research would be to start looking at the models that we use to predict El Niño and La Niña and specifically focus on what are those models doing as far as the CEC,” said Tandon. “If they're doing something very different from what is actually observed then what are the consequences? If we correct what the model is doing, does that lead to a better prediction?”

The study is published today in the American Geophysical Union’s Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans.

York University is a modern, multi-campus, urban university located in Toronto, Ontario. Backed by a diverse group of students, faculty, staff, alumni and partners, we bring a uniquely global perspective to help solve societal challenges, drive positive change and prepare our students for success. York’s fully bilingual Glendon Campus is home to Southern Ontario’s Centre of Excellence for French Language and Bilingual Postsecondary Education. York’s campuses in Costa Rica and India offer students exceptional transnational learning opportunities and innovative programs. Together, we can make things right for our communities, our planet, and our future.

About Lassonde School of Engineering

Located in the heart of the multicultural Greater Toronto Area, the Lassonde School of Engineering at York University is home to engineers, scientists and entrepreneurs, representing a diverse community of students, faculty, staff, alumni and partners. With 11 undergraduate programs, seven graduate programs and a host of certificates and accessible study options, Lassonde is shaping the next generation of creators who will tackle the world’s biggest challenges and devise creative solutions through interdisciplinary learning opportunities. Lassonde’s creators think in big systems rather than small silos, design with people in mind and embrace ambiguity.

 

Media contact: Anjum Nayyar, York University Media Relations, cell 437-242-1547, anayyar@yorku.ca

 

 

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JOURNAL

Journal of Geophysical Research Oceans

DOI

10.1029/2021JC017509 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Mechanism of Interannual Cross-Equatorial Overturning Anomalies in the Pacific Ocean

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

4-Oct-2021

New Jersey’s tidal marshes in danger of disappearing, study shows

Peer-Reviewed Publication

RUTGERS UNIVERSITY

New Brunswick, N.J. (October 6, 2021) – New Jersey’s tidal marshes aren’t keeping up with sea level rise and may disappear completely by the next century, according to a study led by Rutgers researchers.

The findings, which include potential solutions for preserving the marshlands, appear in the journal Anthropocene Coasts. The research team’s study follows its 2020 report on the same issue for the Science Advisory Board of New Jersey’s State Department of Environmental Protection (NJDEP.)

“Faced with sea level rise, a marsh has two options -- it can either increase its elevation at a rate equal to that of sea level rise or it can migrate inland,” said lead author Judith Weis, a professor emerita of biological sciences at Rutgers-Newark. “Otherwise, it will be submerged and drown.”

Tidal marshes –where the oceans meet the land and become vulnerable to sea level rise -- are vital habitats for many aquatic organisms, such as fishes, crabs and shrimp, as well as birds and mammals and provide a buffer against storm surges, winds and flooding. They also absorb pollutants such as toxic metal; nitrogen, which reduces algal blooms and carbon dioxide and contributes to climate change. 

The research team reviewed previous studies of coastal marsh systems in New Jersey, focusing on the Meadowlands, Raritan Bay, Barnegat Bay and Delaware Bay. For each marsh system, they examined horizontal changes – changes in marsh area over time – and vertical changes in elevation.

For the Meadowlands, the researchers couldn’t determine losses to sea level because due to the extent of human development on the marshes. For the Raritan Bay, they found no published data and little evidence that marsh area is being lost.

But they found that Barnegat Bay has lost a large amount of area to erosion, and Delaware Bay has similarly had considerable erosion from the edges, although those losses have been compensated for by inland migration of the marshes into coastal areas. The march migration, however, is causing “ghost forests,” where many trees have died due to sea water intrusion. Such migration isn’t possible in more developed parts of the state, where roads and buildings immediately inland of the marshes act as barriers.

The researchers found that most marshes throughout the state are not increasing their elevation as rapidly as the sea level is rising, which was 5-6 mm/year as of 2019 when the last data were collected. The rate of sea level rise in the mid-Atlantic is higher than the worldwide average for various geophysical reasons.

The only marshes elevating substantially faster than the rate of sea level rise were two marshes in the Meadowlands dominated by the common reed Phragmites australis, an invasive plant that reduces plant diversity in tidal marshes.

The team looked at four strategies to mitigate the loss of New Jersey’s marshes. First, they would encourage municipalities to buy and demolish houses that prevent marshes from migrating inland. Such a “managed retreat” program would be expensive and likely face political and social opposition.

Under the second strategy, marshland managers would remove fewer invasive reeds, which are currently killed using toxic herbicides and replaced with native cordgrass when funding is available. Although the reeds slightly reduce biodiversity, they have some benefits, such as absorbing pollutants, nitrogen and carbon dioxide more effectively than native marsh grasses. The reeds, which are denser and taller than native grasses, also are a better buffer against flooding and enable marshes to elevate faster. When they die, they create more dead plant material that doesn’t decay as rapidly as other marsh plants, which traps more sediments that enable the marsh to elevate more rapidly.

“Some reeds should be left on the marsh surface to give the marsh a better chance of keeping up with sea level rise,” said Weis. “This will be controversial and likely opposed by many marsh managers, which will require a revolutionary change in marsh management.”

The third strategy would involve adding new sediments on top of marshes that are not elevating as fast as they need to. One such method called “thin layer deposition” involves spraying sediment from creeks up onto the marsh surface. This experimental method is being tried at sites in South Jersey and shows promising results. A symptom of a marsh “in trouble” is retaining water on the marsh surface at low tide. This “ponding” can kill grasses adapted to being under water only periodically. Digging narrow channels, called “runnels,” from ponded areas to nearby tidal creeks can help drain the water.

The fourth strategy, called “living shorelines,” would involve experimental techniques to slow erosion at the edge of a marsh. Harder materials, preferably oyster or mussel reefs but sometimes concrete blocks, can be placed in front of the marsh edge to shield waves that erode the marsh edge. These techniques are being tested in several locations in the Delaware Bay and are yielding valuable information on suitable locations and materials.

The study’s authors include Weis, Elizabeth Watson of Drexel University, Elizabeth Ravit of Rutgers’ Center for Environmental Sustainability, Charles Harman of Wood Environmental and Metthea Yepsen of the NJDEP. 

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Broadcast interviews: Rutgers University has broadcast-quality TV and radio studios available for remote live or taped interviews with Rutgers experts. For more information, contact Emily Everson Layden at ee261@echo.rutgers.edu. 

ABOUT RUTGERS—NEW BRUNSWICK
Rutgers University–New Brunswick is where Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, began more than 250 years ago. Ranked among the world’s top 60 universities, Rutgers’s flagship is a leading public research institution and a member of the prestigious Association of American Universities. It has an internationally acclaimed faculty, 12 degree-granting schools and the Big Ten Conference’s most diverse student body.

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JOURNAL

Anthropocene Coasts

DOI

10.1139/anc-2020-0020 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

The status and future of tidal marshes in New Jersey faced with sea level rise

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

6-Oct-2021

City leaders invited to discover how real-time monitoring of urban greenhouse gases can help tackle climate change

Meeting Announcement

OPTICA

City and regional government leaders and policymakers are being invited to discover how real-time monitoring of urban greenhouse gases (GHGs) can help them in their efforts to tackle climate change.

The Cities are the Key to the Climate Solution Summit, organised by the Global Environmental Measurement and Monitoring (GEMM) Initiative, will showcase a pilot urban air quality monitoring project in Glasgow as the city hosts the COP26 climate change conference in November.

The project is establishing a dense network of 25 sensors monitoring levels of GHGs and particulate matter across Glasgow in real-time.

Data from the network of sensors, coupled with ‘inverse modelling’, can help to identify sources of GHG emissions, providing city leaders and policymakers with information to help them decide on climate change policies and observe their impact almost immediately.

Currently, most data on GHG emissions is calculated based on consumption of fossil fuels and is only available months or years later, whereas sensor networks offer the opportunity for direct, real-time atmospheric observations.

The GEMM Initiative-supported project is a collaboration between the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow City Council, Stanford University, the University of California at Berkeley (UC Berkeley), Optica (formerly OSA), the American Geophysical Union, the Met Office and the National Physical Laboratory.

The Cities are the Key to the Climate Solution summit will showcase these new technologies and methodologies for the monitoring of GHG emissions and air pollutants in real-time, consider the economic and legal perspectives of adopting this approach and will feature a roundtable discussion on the opportunities and challenges cities face in meeting GHGs and air pollution reduction goals.

The hybrid summit – online and in-person – will take place on 3 November in Strathclyde’s Technology & Innovation Centre and feature speakers including: Susan Aitken, Leader of Glasgow City Council, David Miller, Director of International Diplomacy at C40 Cities, Professor Donna Strickland, 2018 Nobel Laureate in Physics, and Professor Guy Brasseur of the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology.

Optica and AGU – international scientific societies partnering under the GEMM Initiative – are working with policymakers worldwide on new technology and scientific developments for local impact. 

“We want to make city leaders aware of this technology, the opportunities it brings and encourage them to set up their own sensor network projects,” said Tom Baer, co-lead and Director of Stanford Photonics Research Center at Stanford University, USA.

“Recent deployments of low-cost, high-density sensors across several cities around the world are demonstrating the utility of mapping GHG and air pollution levels in real time.”

University of Strathclyde Professor Allister Ferguson, co-lead of the project, said: “Cities account for more than 70% of all GHG emissions and therefore have a key role to play in taking measures to tackle climate change. Indeed, many cities around the world are already committing to action and have set net-zero targets, including Glasgow.

“Analyses of COVID-19 emissions reductions during government stay-at-home orders have shown that determining the emission contributions from various source sectors with detailed mapping and timing across the full daily cycle are possible and can provide invaluable information on governmental policies affecting GHG emission levels.”

The Glasgow pilot project uses GHG sensors developed by Professor Ron Cohen at UC Berkeley which cost a fraction of the price of traditional monitoring stations.

Professor Cohen has been operating a large network of sensors in the San Francisco Bay area for eight years as part of the BEACO2N project. During the ‘shelter-in-place’ orders imposed in California as a result of COVID-19 he was able to see how the decrease in vehicular traffic had on CO2 emissions in the area.

He said: “When the COVID ‘shelter-in-place’ order began in California, almost immediately there was a tremendous reduction in CO2 emissions in the San Francisco Bay Area. Regional carbon dioxide emissions dropped by 25%, almost all of it due to a nearly 50% drop in road traffic.

“It really allowed us to test our ideas of how much of the CO2 is from industry and how much is from cars. This is what it would look like for CO2 if we electrified the vehicle fleet.

“The implication is that emissions on the roads could be changed quickly and dramatically by policy, and we have a tool to follow that relatively quickly. This is the way to know we are on track to meet our goals.”

For more information and to register for the Cities are the Key to the Climate Solution summit visit: https://www.strath.ac.uk/workwithus/globalenvironmentalmeasurementmonitoring/citiesarekeytotheclimatesolution/

ENDS

About Optica

Optica (formerly OSA) is dedicated to promoting the generation, application, archiving and dissemination of knowledge in optics and photonics worldwide. Founded in 1916, it is the leading organization for scientists, engineers, business professionals, students and others interested in the science of light. Optica’s renowned publications, meetings, online resources and in-person activities fuel discoveries, shape real-life applications and accelerate scientific, technical and educational achievement.

 

Further information

Stuart Forsyth

Corporate Communications Manager

University of Strathclyde

Stuart.m.forsyth@strath.ac.uk

0141 548 4373

Ranking of European cities with highest mortality due to lack of green space

Cities in Europe could prevent up to 43,000 deaths each year if they achieved the WHO recommendations on access to green space

Peer-Reviewed Publication

BARCELONA INSTITUTE FOR GLOBAL HEALTH (ISGLOBAL)

A team from the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), a centre supported by the ”la Caixa” Foundation, has identified the European cities with the highest and lowest rates of mortality attributable to a lack of green space. The team analysed more than 1,000 cities in 31 European countries and concluded that up to 43,000 premature deaths could be prevented each year if these cities were to achieve the WHO recommendations regarding residential proximity to green space. The data were published in The Lancet Planetary Health and the city ranking is available at www.isglobalranking.org.

Green space is associated with a number of health benefits, including lower premature mortality, longer life expectancy, fewer mental health problems, less cardiovascular disease, better cognitive functioning in children and the elderly and healthier babies. It also helps to mitigate air pollution, heat and noise levels, contributes to CO2 sequestration and provides opportunities for physical exercise and social interaction.

Based on a review of the scientific evidence, the WHO recommends universal access to green space and sets that there should be a green space measuring at least 0.5 hectares at a linear distance of no more than 300 metres from every home. On the basis of these guidelines and data from previous studies, a team from ISGlobal’s Urban Planning, Environment and Health Initiative estimated the mortality attributable to a lack of green space in 978 cities and 49 metropolitan areas.  

To calculate the amount of green space in each city, the study used the Normalised Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) as the main proxy. NDVI is an indicator that measures how green an area is. It takes into account all types of vegetation, from street trees to private gardens and it is calculated using satellite images. Since the type of vegetation differs among cities and regions and not all of them have the same kind of greenness, the team translated the WHO recommendation into a specific NDVI value for each city.

The team obtained data from 2015 on natural-cause mortality and green space levels for each city. Using a quantitative health impact assessment methodology and data from previous large meta-analyses of existing studies on the association between green space and mortality, they estimated the number of deaths from natural causes that could be prevented if each city were to comply with the WHO recommendation.

Over 60% of Population Has Insufficient Access to Green Space

The overall NDVI results showed that 62% of the population lives in areas with less green space than recommended. This lack of green space is associated with 42,968 deaths—2.3% of all deaths from natural causes—which could be prevented through compliance with the WHO recommendations.

“Our findings show that green space is very unevenly distributed across European cities, with mortality attributable to insufficient exposure to green space ranging from 0% to 5.5% of all natural deaths, depending on the city,” commented ISGlobal researcher Evelise Pereira, lead author of the study. “However, the uneven impact is not only between cities, but also between different areas within the cities, which puts some people at a disadvantage, depending on which city or neighbourhood they live in. Too often green spaces are not close to where people live, and people don’t get the health benefits”, she added.

The list of cities with the highest rates of mortality attributable to a lack of green space includes cities in Greece, Eastern Europe, the Baltic republics and Italy, as well as most of the continent’s capital cities. Specifically, the capital cities with the highest mortality rates were Athens, Brussels, Budapest, Copenhagen and Riga.
“This study provides an overview that shows that there is much work to be done in terms of re-greening cities and that the reduction of mortality could be even greater if we were to set more ambitious targets than the WHO recommendations,” remarked Mark Nieuwenhuijsen, Director of the Urban Planning, Environment and Health Initiative at ISGlobal and last author of the study.

“European cities should focus on reclaiming urban land for green space, introducing nature-based solutions such as green roofs and vertical gardens, and other measures such as rerouting traffic, digging up asphalt and replacing it with  green space, green corridors, street trees and pocket parks across the board. Our study also shows that it is important that green spaces are accessible and close to residences,” added Nieuwenhuijsen.

Percentage of green areas

The study included a second analysis using a different green space proxy: the percentage of green areas (%GA). Unlike the NDVI, this indicator measures the percentage of an area that is officially declared as green space and only takes into account public green areas. The estimations of the mortality burden associated to this proxy were based on less robust previous evidence and the results were not statistically significant. This second analysis showed a lower number of preventable deaths: 17,000 in total.

An important limitation of the study is that it did not consider the presence of blue spaces, such as rivers or beaches, whose possible health benefits, therefore, have not been estimated.

Full Rankings at www.isglobalranking.org

This study is the second in a series dedicated to measuring urban exposures in European cities. A ranking of cities by mortality attributable to air pollution was published in January 2021. The data and lists for both rankings are available at www.isglobalranking.org.

Top 5 Cities With Highest Burden of Mortality

The 5 cities with more than 100,000 inhabitants with the highest mortality burden due to low normalised difference vegetation index (NDVI) are as follows:

Rank	City	Country	Preventable deaths - NDVI	% of population below recommended levels
1	Trieste	Italy	145	74 %
2	Turin	Italy	546	92%
3	Blackpool	United Kingdom	144	73%
4	Gijón	Spain	138	71%
5	Brussels	Belgium	426	78%

Top 5 Cities With Lowest Burden of Mortality

The 5 cities with more than 100,000 inhabitants with the lowest mortality burden due to low normalised difference vegetation index (NDVI) are as follows:

Rank	City	Country	Preventable deaths - NDVI	% of population below recommended levels
1	Elche/Elx	Spain	4	20%
2	Telde	Spain	2	33%
3	Guimarães	Portugal	3	18%
4	Perugia	Italy	10	31%
5	Cartagena	Spain	10	51%

Reference

Pereira Barboza E, Cirach M, Khomenko S, Iungman S, Mueller N, Barrera-Gómez J, Rojas-Rueda D, Kondo M, Nieuwenhuijsen M, Green space and mortality in European cities: a health impact assessment study, Lancet Planet Health 2021; 5: e718–30. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2542-5196(21)00229-1.

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JOURNAL

The Lancet Planetary Health

DOI

10.1016/S2542-5196(21)00229-1 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Green space and mortality in European cities: a health impact assessment study

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

7-Oct-2021

Nature-based activities can improve mood and reduce anxiety, new study shows

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF YORK

Outdoor nature-based activities are effective for improving mental health in adults, including those with pre-existing mental health problems, a new study has found.

The research - led by the University of York - showed that taking part in outdoor, nature-based activities led to improved mood, less anxiety, and positive emotions.

The study found that activities lasting for 20 to 90 minutes, sustained for over the course of 8 to 12 weeks, have the most positive outcomes for improving mood and reducing anxiety.

Gardening and exercise were among the activities associated with mental health benefits. Engaging in conservation activities was also reported to make people feel better, as did ‘forest bathing’ (stopping in a forest to take in the atmosphere).

Nature-based interventions (NBIs) support people to engage with nature in a structured way to improve mental health.

As part of the study, researchers screened 14,321 NBI records and analysed 50 studies.

Lead author of the study, Dr Peter Coventry from the Department of Health Sciences, said: “We've known for some time that being in nature is good for health and wellbeing, but our study reinforces the growing evidence that doing things in nature is associated with large gains in mental health.

“While doing these activities on your own is effective, among the studies we reviewed it seems that doing them in groups led to greater gains in mental health.”

However, the study found there was less evidence that outdoor activities led to improved physical health. The research suggests that there needs to be more appropriate ways to measure the short and longer-term impact of nature-based activities on physical health.

The paper argues there is a need for substantial, sustained investment in community and place-based solutions such as nature-based interventions, which are likely to play important role in addressing a post-pandemic surge in demand for mental health support.

“One of the key ideas that might explain why nature-based activities are good for us is that  they help to connect us with nature in meaningful ways that go beyond passively viewing nature”, Dr Coventry adds.

The research forms part of the new ‘Environment and Health’ research theme, supported by the York Environmental Sustainability Institute (YESI). As part of the same theme, Dr Coventry and co-author Professor Piran White are now working with partners at the University of Central Lancashire to understand the health benefits of green social prescribing, in a study funded by the West Yorkshire and Harrogate Health and Care Partnership. 

Academics from the Department of Health Sciences, Department of Environment and Geography, York Environmental Sustainability Institute (YESI), Hull York Medical School and Stockholm Environment Institute at York contributed to the study.

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Notes to editors

‘Nature-based outdoor activities for mental and physical health: Systematic review and meta-analysis’ is published in SSM - Population Health.

University of York academics from the Department of Health Sciences, Department of Environment and Geography, York Environmental Sustainability Institute, Stockholm Environment Institute contributed to the study, as well as researchers from the National Centre for Social Research, Hull York Medical School, Centre for Sustainable Healthcare, Oxford, and the Bradford Institute for Health Research.

The project is funded by the UKRI Closing the Gap Network and the NIHR Yorkshire and Humber ARC.

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JOURNAL

SSM - Population Health

DOI

10.1016/j.ssmph.2021.100934 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Systematic review

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Nature-based outdoor activities for mental and physical health: Systematic review and meta-analysis

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

1-Oct-2021

I AM OF COURSE A COFFEE COGNOSETI

Drinking our way to sustainability, one cup of coffee at a time

UMass Amherst researchers win NSF award to help re-envision the growing, selling and buying of coffee

Grant and Award Announcement

UNIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS AMHERST

 

IMAGE: MARTIM MURILLO MEASURES WATER QUALITY OF RIO JACAGUA, ASSISTED BY FARLEM ESPANA. view more 

CREDIT: DAVID KING

AMHERST, Mass. – Coffee, that savior of the underslept, comes with enormous environmental and social costs, from the loss of forest habitats as woodlands are converted to crops, to the economic precarity of small-scale farmers whose livelihoods depend on the whims of international markets. Now, thanks to a National Science Foundation (NSF) grant of $979,720, Timothy Randhir, University of Massachusetts Amherst professor of environmental conservation, and David King, of the USDA Forest Service Northern Research Station, will embark upon a five-year effort to make Honduran coffee sustainable across environmental, economic and social fronts.

The research, which is part of a $3.4 million collaboration between UMass, Tulane University, the University of North Carolina Wilmington and Indiana University in Pennsylvania, centers around one question: “How can we make sustainable agriculture and forest conservation actually pay for itself?” asks King.

The answer lies in what Randhir has previously called “a convergence approach,” which is a way of tying the ultra-local—such as the work done by the small Honduran coffee planters with whom the team will work—to the global both socially, economically and environmentally. About 70% of the world’s coffee is produced on working landscapes at high altitudes on formerly forested land, primarily by small-scale, family farms in low- and middle-income countries. In many of these places, coffee production is the principal source of economic activity, yet conventional methods of coffee production combined with yield and market volatility have resulted in interlinked problems of environmental degradation, economic hardship and social crises.

Randhir and his colleagues have developed a suite of extremely sensitive models, collectively referred to as the Multi-Scale Ecosystem Framework, to study the many interactions between humans, the environment, and global economies so that they can understand which interventions will have what effect, both on a local and global scale.

The trick the team will perform is to figure out how environmentally sustainable coffee-growing practices, which leverage the ecosystem services provided by rainforest, conserved on coffee farms, can yield higher and more stable incomes for local Honduran growers while also supplying the world’s coffee drinkers with a steady quantity of high-quality liquid caffeine. A major part of this research involves installing and studying the effects that a new generation of solar-powered industrial coffee dryers, which will replace older, wood-fired dryers, has on environmental and economic sustainability.

It’s no understatement to say that Randhir and King’s project will touch upon just about everything. “I got into this through my interest in songbird conservation,” says King. Most of the warblers here in Massachusetts, that we think of as “ours,” spend their winters in the tropics, including in Honduras. “Unless their winter habitat is secured,” says King, “we can’t support what we think of as our native birds.” Human migration, too, is affected by the coffee industry, notes Randhir. “As small farmers’ livelihoods start to deteriorate, they migrate. If we can figure out how to help sustain the farms themselves, then farmers can remain in their homes.”

The team is partnering with the Mesoamerican Development Institute, in Lowell, Mass., and the Honduran coffee producing organization “Birding Coffee.” The work will take place in the Yoro region of Honduras. Honduras is the fifth largest coffee producer in the world and the largest coffee producer in Central America; coffee is the principal source of income for more than 100,000 Honduran families and provides employment for about a million people. The team will focus their efforts on the 12,000 square-kilometer Yoro Biological Corridor as a test-case to scale up their model, providing insights that the team anticipates will help inform global agricultural policy and practice.

“The biggest attraction of our research,” says Randhir, “is the way that the environmental, economic and social all come together toward a sustainable approach to agriculture.”

Unprecedented rise of heat and rainfall extremes in observational data

Peer-Reviewed Publication

POTSDAM INSTITUTE FOR CLIMATE IMPACT RESEARCH (PIK)

A 90-fold increase in the frequency of monthly heat extremes in the past ten years compared to 1951-1980 has been found by scientists in observation data. Their analysis reveals that so-called 3-sigma heat events, which deviate strongly from what is normal in a given region, now on average affect about 9 percent of all land area at any time. Record daily rainfall events also increased in a non-linear way – on average, 1 in 4 rainfall records in the last decade can be attributed to climate change. Already today, extreme events linked to human-caused climate change are at unprecedented levels, the scientists say, and they must be expected to increase further.

“For extreme extremes, what we call 4-sigma-events that have been virtually absent before, we even see a roughly 1000-fold increase compared to the reference period. They affected about 3 percent of global land area in 2011-20 in any month,” says lead-author Alexander Robinson from Complutense University of Madrid, Spain, and Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, Germany. “This confirms previous findings, yet with ever-increasing numbers. We are seeing extremes now which are virtually impossible without the influence of global warming caused by greenhouse gas emissions from burning fossil fuels.” The term ‘sigma’ refers to what scientists call a standard deviation.

For example, 2020 brought prolonged heat waves to both Siberia and Australia, contributing to the emergence of devastating wildfires in both regions. Both events led to the declaration of a local state of emergency. Temperatures at life-threatening levels have hit parts of the US and Canada in 2021, reaching almost 50°C. Globally, the record-breaking heat extremes increased most in tropical regions, since these normally have a low variability of monthly temperatures. As temperatures continue to rise, however, record-breaking heat will also become much more common in mid- and high-latitude regions.

1 in 4 rainfall records is attributable to climate change

Daily rainfall records have also increased. Compared to what would have to be expected in a climate without global warming, the number of wet records increased by about 30 percent. This implies that 1 in 4 records is attributable to human-caused climate change. The physics background to this is the Clausius-Clapeyron relation, which states that air can hold 7 percent more moisture per degree Celsius of warming.

Importantly, already-dry regions such as western North America and South Africa have seen a reduction in rainfall records, while wet regions such as central and northern Europe have seen a strong increase. Generally, increasing rainfall extremes do not help to alleviate drought problems.

Small temperature increase, disproportionally big consequences

Comparing the new data with the already quite extreme previous decade of 2000-2010, the data show that the land area affected by heat extremes of the 3-sigma category roughly doubled. Those deviations which are so strong they have previously been essentially absent, the 4-sigma events, newly emerged in the observations. Rainfall records have increased a further 5 percentage points in the last decade. The seemingly small amount of warming in the past ten years, just 0.25°C, has thus pushed up climate extremes substantially.

“These data show that extremes are now far outside the historical experience. Extreme heat and extreme rainfall are increasing disproportionally,” says co-author Stefan Rahmstorf, from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research. “Our analysis confirms once again that for the impacts of global heating on us humans, every tenth of a degree matters.”

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JOURNAL

npj Climate and Atmospheric Science

DOI

10.1038/s41612-021-00202-w 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

Increasing heat and rainfall extremes now far outside the historical climate

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

5-Oct-2021