Climate Change group: Michael Sperazza: paleo‐climatologist climate based ecologist –statistical analysis – lacustrine sediment records – methods transferred from marine setting without testing –testing uncertainty‐ geophysical chemistry – grain size – ultrafine particles – Also looking at respiratory disease at different locations Also work on climate reconstruction _Kenya & Montana reconstruction –using lake records +sediment pits on campus sample moraines on Long Island –separated grain size with Laser refraction – want to do collaboration. Sustainability audits on campus –bio‐digester from pig farm. Susan Letcher _terrestrial ecologically reconstructing forest assemblies in Costa Rico plus other international collaborators and China, Reforestation planting using seedings and how affects community assembly. Tropical forestry 33 years of measurements –link tree growth increments relationship with climate. Respiration keeps going up –growth increments –
relationship with CO2 –threatened by higher temperatures‐CO2 does not help. Relationship tress and vines –vines more positive response to CO2 or fast growing trees – landscape scale shift in carbon storage in landscapes. Looking at seasonal rain forests. Litter fall records and precipitation and repeated diameter measurements. No relationship to rainfall. Last 8 years more pronounced drought periods. Other projects watering the rain forest (Not Susan). Rain forest react more. Phylogenetic structure of communities’ relationships not yet linked to climate change but tolerances would be good to work with. Chris Walceck ‐ SUNY Albany meteorology – clouds and affect on air pollution –link between energy demand and GHG‐ how does their models treat clouds‐ how rain forms in clouds‐how things change with modified climate –uncertainty with climate change. Work with local NYS climate records plus tree ring records‐ any cave research. Work with statistical analysis of data. Indentify weaknesses in records‐ correlation with temperature change is not that good‐better relationship is with precipitation. Work with Pine bush reserve in alluvial fan –had archive of data. 5000 years ago Great lakes dried up – Antarctic to goby desert to hot humid climate. DOE grant + Air Force grant. David Gower of Intertech _seeing what others are doing NYSERDA Clarkson test solar technologies funding for testing equipment –know what is going on in various universities. Images for analysis for sunlight access etc. looking at trends –
connecting different researchers and product developers. Global company based in London electrical testing laboratory. Test inverters on solar energy facilities. Ned to test on limited grid. Background in economics and interest in renewable energy. Susan nobody is selling renewable energy –Chris economic issues –costs –
externality issues. Issue of incentives for renewable energy programs. Rick Smardon: need data for climate change adaptation & mitigation at regional scale. Need information that is accessible and friendlier. Problem with data conflicting with each other‐ maybe too much data. Decrease in monitoring stations –
reduction of research money for monitoring. Need generated by economic activity. Possible collaboration with data companies’ example NEON –national system. Proposed research topics Climate change in NYS a. Historical records: gather, compile, analyze and make accessible b. Projection & prediction of future climate change a. water security b. food security c. economic risk calculation c. Visualization & communication a. interaction with behavior and policy Climate change in NYS Historical climate data: data is usually compared with non‐local sources, which is called homogenization. Need to use local knowledge to reconstruct NYS climate data. Will involve interviews to uncover metadata in local archives. Next need to find discontinuities and quality control issues & then reconstruct. Output is more accurate historical database from which to make climate change predictions or scenarios. Future projections –look at NYAS scenarios‐link to impacts and economic risk‐
look at population and land use shifts –refine climate models downscale‐develop base line for hydrologic budget + consumption plus local agricultural productivity & food sheds plus forest cover changes. Visualization & communication: develop interactive graphic interface of local usage with GIS, Google maps, accessible databases. Example is Columbia population density grid. Get user reaction as interface is developed via mediated modeling sessions. Explore NSF education grants for outreach to teachers and for scientific literacy.