Climate of the Past 20th Anniversary: Impact of Past Climate Changes on Ecosystems and Human Societies
To mark its 20th anniversary, Climate of the Past, an interactive journal of the European Geosciences Union, is launching a special webinar series celebrating two decades of leading paleoclimate science.
Each webinar will emphasize the journal’s scientific diversity and impact, featuring two invited talks of 30 minutes from leading researchers across different areas of paleoclimate science. Talks will be followed by a live 30 minutes Q&A session, allowing for discussion and engagement with the broader community. This webinar will be recorded and uploaded to the EGU YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@egu.
Our archives of past changes in climate also include evidence for how physical drivers (e.g. temperature and hydroclimate) impacted ecosystems on land and in the ocean. At the same time, human activities have shaped ecosystems and responded to climate events and climate change. Past changes in climate state and climate variability offers unique opportunities to understand the adaptation and resilience strategies used by past human societies, as well as identifying areas of vulnerability and resilience within natural and managed.
Talks:
Gustav Strandberg (Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute, Sweden) - Human land use as a climate forcing during the Holocene
The European land cover has been affected by human activities for at least 6 000 years. It is therefore highly probable that these land-cover changes were large enough to impact the climate via biophysical effects. By using a novel combination of regional climate models (RCM), dynamical vegetation model and pollen data we can both estimate the difference between reconstructed and potential vegetation (i.e. anthropogenic land-cover changes), and which effects these changes could have had on the local climate.
The results suggest that the anthropogenic land-cover changes were large enough to impact climate. This tendency is seen already 6 000 years ago, but becomes more visible with time, as the anthropogenic impact gets stronger. Around 2 500 years ago the land use is more extensive, and so is the effect on climate. These effects do, however, vary with season and across Europe. The results are also model dependent. This is the first time a two-model RCM ensemble is used to simulate parts of the Holocene in Europe. It is also the first time a RCM is combined with novel statistical methods to reconstruct vegetation. This model setup gives an unique opportunity to study the sensitivity of Holocene climate in Europe to vegetation changes (and between models). The high resolution also gives more representative comparisons to proxy data.
Bronwen Whitney (Northumbria University, UK) – Complex societal responses to climate and environmental change in the tropical Americas
Environmentally deterministic narratives continue to dominate questions of how past societies responded to climate change. Decline or ‘collapse’ of complex societies have been linked to drought inferred through paleoclimate records. However, correlations between climate and socio-environmental changes do not universally reflect decline or collapse, but instead, may indicate alterations to management strategies as past societies adapted to new environments.
Drawing on examples from the seasonal environments of the Bolivian Amazon and Yucatan peninsula, this talk explores diverse management strategies – from control of seasonal flood waters in savanna wetlands to altered agroforestry strategies and promotion of forest resources – in response to changing environmental conditions. The case studies demonstrate that socio-environmental changes were spatially heterogeneous as responses to regional climate change were dependent on local conditions and environments, with different strategies occurring at sites separated by relatively short distances (< 50 km). Investigations of past climates and society, therefore, require nuanced interpretation as past people and societies have demonstrated diversity of responses to climate change, which includes resilience and adaptability during times of environmental stress.
Conveners:
Erin McClymont & Odile Peyron.
Speakers:
Gustav Strandberg (Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute) - Gustav's field of work considers the evaluation of regional and global climate simulations, and uncertainties in climate scenarios. This includes paleo climatic studies and the role of other forcing than greenhouse gas forcing, and Information to the general public and users of climate scenario data. Their research interest includes Interactions between vegetation and climate, .odel simulations of paleo climate, and the impacts of climate change.
Bronwen Whitney (Northumbria University, UK) - I studied for my PhD at the University of Edinburgh (2005 – 2009) where I examined climate and vegetation change from the last glacial period until present in the world’s largest tropical wetland. From there, I continued my research into human and climatic causes of tropical environmental change and I joined Northumbria University in January 2015.
Register for this online event here.
If you have any questions about ‘Climate of the Past 20th Anniversary: Impact of Past Climate Changes on Ecosystems and Human Societies’, please contact us via webinars@egu.eu.