Geography Lecture Series

November 16, 3:00pm - 4:00pm
Mānoa Campus, Saunders 443B Add to Calendar

Vertically Challenged—Climate Change in the Third Dimension

Henry Diaz
Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, University of Colorado at Boulder

A number of recent studies have documented changes in the climate of Hawai‘i that are generally consistent with expectations from climate change projections, such as those found in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fourth Assessment Report. Results from these studies indicate a significant warming trend present over the past 80 years in the Hawaiian Islands, but they also point to an amplification of the warming signal at higher elevations. Indicators of enhanced upper elevation warming include a reduction in the frequency of occurrence of freezing temperatures in the upper slopes of the higher terrain (which exceeds 13,000 ft/4,000 m) in Maui and the Big Island and a concomitant rise in the freezing level surface in the region. These findings are in good agreement with analogous studies done for other mountainous areas of the world.

A comparison of warming rates for other mountainous regions is presented in the context of climate model simulations of vertical warming rates related to enhanced greenhouse warming. A longer-term perspective of recent and possible future climatic changes in the Hawaiian Islands is also given in terms of recent paleoclimate reconstructions for areas known to modulate climatic variations in Hawai‘i. We also consider the question of whether, given the expected vertical amplification of the sea level global warming signal, we have an adequate climate monitoring system in place to detect widespread climate changes and its impacts in mountain regions.


Ticket Information
Free and open to the public

Event Sponsor
Geography, Mānoa Campus

More Information
Stacy Jorgensen, 956-7526, jorgy@hawaii.edu

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