Future Climate, Water, and Land Use/Land Cover
John Harrington, Jr., [jharrin@ksu.edu], Geography, K-State
Cultivated Systems cover 25%
of Earth’s terrestrial surface
From Dow Chemical:
“when you add the human element,
the chemistry changes”
Climate Variability = a driver of ecological change in KS
Noise? Or, is there some predictability?
6
4
2
0
-2
-4
PDSI for western Kansas
2002
1997
1992
1987
1982
1977
1972
1967
1962
1957
1952
1947
1942
1937
1932
1927
1922
1917
1912
1907
1902
1897
1892
1887
-6
1930s
drought
1950s
drought
recent
drought
1930s
Drought
+ PDO
+ AMO
1950s &
recent
Drought
- PDO
+ AMO
Predictability of weather and climate
Humans =
a driver of
change
Impacts in agricultural landscapes may be greater
than Eric Sanderson’s work might suggests.
Forecasting Agriculturally Driven Global Environmental Change
“the nonclimatic global environmental impacts of agricultural expansion” (p. 282)
Global changes associated with
agriculture present: “an
environmental challenge that
may rival, and significantly
interact with, climate change”
(p. 283)
From Table 1:
Irrigated Land (106 ha)
2000
280
2020
367
2050
529
“If global population stabilizes at
8.5 to 10 billion people, the next
50 years may be the final episode
of rapid global agricultural
expansion.”
(p. 284)
Biogeochemical and hydrologic
cycles are being altered
A period of rapid and unprecedented global change:
Types, Rates, and Magnitudes of Change
MA thesis by Nate Kettle
Professional Geographer article in 2007
An example of Buffalo Commons ideas
Anthropogenic Biomes
Erle C. Ellis and Navin Ramankutty
Front Ecol Environ 2008, 6, doi: 10.1890/070062
Land Change Science
Observation and monitoring
Understanding the coupled system – causes, impacts,
and consequences
Modeling
Synthesis
Retrospective studies of paleoenvironments and nutrient availability
in Kansas during the past century
Kendra McLauchlan, Assistant Professor, Geography, KSU
Modeling biogeochemical cycles in the central Great Plains
Nate Brunsell, Assistant Professor of Geography, KU
Soil carbon dynamics, land use, and precipitation in the Great Plains
Sharon Billings, Assistant Professor of Ecology and
Evolutionary Biology, KU
Mapping the Land Cover of Kansas and the Kansas River Basin
Steve Egbert, Associate Professor of Geography, KU