Ranchers’ Use Of Drought Contingency Plans In Protective Action Decision Making,
2021
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Ranchers’ Use Of Drought Contingency Plans In Protective Action Decision Making, Tonya Haigh, Michael Hayes, Jolene Smyth, Linda Stalker Prokopy, Charles A. Francis, Mark Burbach
National Drought Mitigation Center: Faculty Publications
Drought contingency planning is an increasingly common tool in the ranchers’ climate adaptation toolboxes, but its effect on drought response has not yet been evaluated. We use cognitive models of protective action decision making and planning to explore the effects of having a drought plan on the use of drought early warning information and drought response (and timing). Results of a cross-sectional, probability-based survey of livestock producers affected by a 2016 flash-drought are used to describe the characteristics of operations with drought plans and provide evidence of whether having a plan predicts drought information use and response. While larger operations …
Assessment Of The Fluoride Concentration In Drinking Water And Tea In The Arusha Region Of Tanzania,
2021
Duquesne University
Assessment Of The Fluoride Concentration In Drinking Water And Tea In The Arusha Region Of Tanzania, Sophia Bakar, David Kahler, Alanna Bachtlin, Kara Okular, Kathleen Glancey, Abbey Whitewood
Environmental Science Datasets
High fluoride concentrations in drinking water affect millions of people around the world; however, fluoride can come from several sources. The World Health Organization recommends a fluoride concentration in drinking water of no more than 1.5 mg/L; fluoride above this concentration can cause long-term problems known as fluorosis, such as mottled teeth and increased risk of dental caries, or skeletal deformities. Rural communities near Arusha, Tanzania have high fluoride concentrations in their water. Adults and children of the Arusha Region rely heavily on tea for daily water consumption, which has the benefit of disinfection by boiling. Researchers investigated water quality, …
Optimisation Of Retrofit Wall Insulation: An Irish Case Study,
2021
Technological University Dublin
Optimisation Of Retrofit Wall Insulation: An Irish Case Study, Rakshit D. Muddu, D M. Gowda, Anthony James Robinson, Aimee Byrne
Articles
Ireland has one of the highest rates of emissions per capita in the world and its residential sector is responsible for approximately 10% of total national CO2 emissions. Therefore, reducing the CO2 emissions in this sector will play a decisive role in achieving EU targets of reducing emissions by 40% by 2030. To better inform decisions regarding retrofit of the existing building stock, this study proposes Optimum Insulation Thicknesses (OIT) for typical walls in 25 regions in Ireland. The calculation of OIT includes annual heat energy expenditure, CO2 emissions, and material payback period. The approach taken is based on Heating …
Whose Ground Truth Is It? Harvesting Lessons From Missouri’S 2018 Bumper Crop Of Drought Observations,
2021
University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Whose Ground Truth Is It? Harvesting Lessons From Missouri’S 2018 Bumper Crop Of Drought Observations, Kelly Helm Smith, Mark E. Burbach, Michael Hayes, Patrick Guinan, Andrew Tyre, Brian Fuchs, Tonya Haigh, Mark Svoboda
National Drought Mitigation Center: Faculty Publications
Drought-related decision-making and policy should go beyond numeric hydrometeorological data to incorporate information on how drought affects people, livelihoods, and ecosystems. The effects of drought are nested within environmental and human systems, and relevant data may not exist in readily accessible form. For example, drought may reduce forage growth, compounded by both late-season freezes and management decisions. An effort to gather crowdsourced drought observations in Missouri in 2018 yielded a much higher number of observations than did previous related efforts. Here we examine 1) the interests, circumstances, history, and recruitment messaging that coincided to produce a high number of reports …
Tweetdrought: A Deep-Learning Drought Impacts
Recognizer Based On Twitter Data,
2021
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Tweetdrought: A Deep-Learning Drought Impacts Recognizer Based On Twitter Data, Beichen Zhang, Frank Schilder, Kelly Helm Smith, Michael Hayes, Sherri Harms, Tsegaye Tadesse
National Drought Mitigation Center: Faculty Publications
Acquiring a better understanding of drought impacts becomes increasingly vital under a warming climate. Traditional drought indices describe mainly biophysical variables and not impacts on social, economic, and environmental systems. We utilized natural language processing and bidirectional encoder representation from Transformers (BERT) based transfer learning to fine-tune the model on the data from the news-based Drought Impact Report (DIR) and then apply it to recognize seven types of drought impacts based on the filtered Twitter data from the United States. Our model achieved a satisfying macro-F1 score of 0.89 on the DIR test set. The model was then applied to …
Developing A Strategy For The National Coordinated Soil Moisture Monitoring Network,
2021
USDA-ARS Hydrology and Remote Sensing Laboratory
Developing A Strategy For The National Coordinated Soil Moisture Monitoring Network, Michael H. Cosh, Todd G. Caldwell, C. Bruce Baker, John D. Bolten, Nathan Edwards, Peter Goble, Heather Hofman, Tyson E. Ochsner, Steven Quiring, Charles Schalk, Marina Skumanich, Mark D. Svoboda, Mary E. Woloszyn
National Drought Mitigation Center: Faculty Publications
Soil moisture is a critical land surface variable, affecting a wide variety of climatological, agricultural, and hydrological processes. Determining the current soil moisture status is possible via a variety of methods, including in situ monitoring, remote sensing, and numerical modeling. Although all of these approaches are rapidly evolving, there is no cohesive strategy or framework to integrate these diverse information sources to develop and disseminate coordinated national soil moisture products that will improve our ability to understand climate variability. The National Coordinated Soil Moisture Monitoring Network initiative has developed a national strategy for network coordination with NOAA’s National Integrated Drought …
Evaluation Of Remotely Sensed Precipitation Estimates From The Nasa Power Project For Drought Detection Over Jordan,
2021
The University of Jordan
Evaluation Of Remotely Sensed Precipitation Estimates From The Nasa Power Project For Drought Detection Over Jordan, Muhammad Rasool Al‑Kilani, Michel Rahbeh, Jawad Al‑Bakri, Tsegaye Tadesse, Cody Knutson
National Drought Mitigation Center: Faculty Publications
Droughts can cause devastating impacts on water and land resources and therefore monitoring these events forms an integral part of planning. The most common approach for detecting drought events and assessing their intensity is use of the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI), which requires abundant precipitation records at good spatial distribution. This may restrict SPI usage in many regions around the world, particularly in areas with limited numbers of ground meteorological stations. Therefore, the use of remotely sensed derived data of precipitation can contribute to drought monitoring. In this study, remotely sensed precipitation estimates from the POWER/Agroclimatology archive of NASA and …
A Novel Strategy To Reconstruct Ndvi Time-Series With High
Temporal Resolution From Modis Multi-Temporal
Composite Products,
2021
Huazhong Agricultural University
A Novel Strategy To Reconstruct Ndvi Time-Series With High Temporal Resolution From Modis Multi-Temporal Composite Products, Linglin Zeng, Brian Wardlow, Shun Hu, Xiang Zhang, Guoqing Zhou, Guozhang Peng, Daxiang Xiang, Rui Wang, Ran Meng, Weixiong Wu
Center for Advanced Land Management Information Technologies: Publications
Vegetation indices (VIs) data derived from satellite imageries play a vital role in land surface vegetation and dynamic monitoring. Due to the excessive noises (e.g., cloud cover, atmospheric contamination) in daily VI data, temporal compositing methods are commonly used to produce composite data to minimize the negative influence of noise over a given compositing time interval. However, VI time series with high temporal resolution were preferred by many applications such as vegetation phenology and land change detections. This study presents a novel strategy named DAVIR-MUTCOP (DAily Vegetation Index Reconstruction based on MUlti-Temporal COmposite Products) method for normalized difference vegetation index …
Temporal Invariance Of Social-Ecological Catchments,
2021
University of North Dakota
Temporal Invariance Of Social-Ecological Catchments, Mark A. Kaemingk, Christine N. Bender, Chris Chizinski, Aaron J. Bunch, Kevin L. Pope
Nebraska Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit: Staff Publications
Natural resources such as waterbodies, public parks, and wildlife refuges attract people from varying distances on the landscape, creating “social-ecological catchments.” Catchments have provided great utility for understanding physical and social relationships within specific disciplines. Yet, catchments are rarely used across disciplines, such as its application to understand complex spatiotemporal dynamics between mobile human users and patchily distributed natural resources. We collected residence ZIP codes from 19,983 angler parties during 2014–2017 to construct seven angler–waterbody catchments in Nebraska, USA. We predicted that sizes of dense (10% utilization distribution) and dispersed (95% utilization distribution) angler–waterbody catchments would change across seasons and …
Roost Use And Movements Of Northern Long-Eared Bats In A
Southeast Nebraska Agricultural Landscape,
2021
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Roost Use And Movements Of Northern Long-Eared Bats In A Southeast Nebraska Agricultural Landscape, Christopher Fill, Craig R. Allen, John F. Benson, Dirac Twidwell
Nebraska Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit: Staff Publications
Bats are important bio-indicators of ecosystem health and provide a number of ecosystem services. White-nose Syndrome and habitat loss have led to the decline of many bat species in eastern North America, including the federally threatened northern long-eared bat, Myotis septentrionalis. White-nose Syndrome was only recently found in Nebraska, which lies on the western extent of this species geographic range. To better understand how this forest-dependent species persists in an agriculturally dominated landscape amid a growing number of pressures, we investigated the roosting habits of this bat at the Homestead National Monument of America, located in southeast Nebraska. We …
Phylogenomics Reveals Ancient And Contemporary Gene Flow Contributing To
The Evolutionary History Of Sea Ducks (Tribe Mergini),
2021
University of Texas at El Paso
Phylogenomics Reveals Ancient And Contemporary Gene Flow Contributing To The Evolutionary History Of Sea Ducks (Tribe Mergini), Philip Lavretsky, Robert E. Wilson, Sandra L. Talbot, Sarah A. Sonsthagen
Nebraska Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit: Staff Publications
Insight into complex evolutionary histories continues to build through broad comparative phylogenomic and population genomic studies. In particular, there is a need to understand the extent and scale that gene flow contributes to standing genomic diversity and the role introgression has played in evolutionary processes such as hybrid speciation. Here, we investigate the evolutionary history of the Mergini tribe (sea ducks) by coupling multi-species comparisons with phylogenomic analyses of thousands of nuclear ddRAD-seq loci, including Z-sex chromosome and autosomal linked loci, and the mitogenome assayed across all extant sea duck species in North America. All sea duck species are strongly …
The Eicda: What Is It, And Why Is It Right For Nebraska?,
2021
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
The Eicda: What Is It, And Why Is It Right For Nebraska?, Samantha Markus
Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies
For decades, humans have been pumping greenhouses gases into the atmosphere, and we are finally starting to see some of the damages. Global temperature has risen 1.76°F when compared to the twentieth century. Within Nebraska, we are seeing an increase in heavy rain events and extreme hot days, both of which negatively impact agriculture. These changes are becoming more devastating as each year passes with no action.
“Developing Nations Should Not Rush To Renewable Energies”,
2021
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
“Developing Nations Should Not Rush To Renewable Energies”, Alisson Ntwali
Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies
The Conference of Parties 26 (COP26)’s purpose was to bring countries together to accelerate action towards the goals of the Paris Agreement and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change to limit the average global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius compared to pre-industrial levels.
Biden’S “Blue” Hydrogen Plan Is Not The Answer,
2021
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Biden’S “Blue” Hydrogen Plan Is Not The Answer, Ryan Martz
Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies
The excitement about hydrogen as a fuel and energy source is similar to buying an electric vehicle (EV) thinking it will reduce your personal CO2 emissions. On the surface, it seems great! No greenhouse gas emissions while driving is certainly better than the greenhouse gasses released from a normal combustion engine car, but when you consider other effects, it’s no longer as great. What if the grid that you plug your EV into is powered primarily by coal? What about the environmental and human rights impacts of mining the materials to make the batteries? What about the lack of …
Loss And Damage: The $100 Billion Promise ‘The Leaders’ Failed To Keep,
2021
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Loss And Damage: The $100 Billion Promise ‘The Leaders’ Failed To Keep, Abbie Williams
Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies
100 billion dollars, the amount develOp-ed nations were supposed to pay less develOp-ed nations by 2020, the promise they failed to keep. The promise that was revisited at COP26 in Glasgow. The climate finance fund is funds from more develOp-ed nations to less develOp-ed nations to help with transitioning to a green economy so there is no need for reliance on fossil fuels. This fund consists of both loans and grants.
Solar Panels: Are Aesthetics More Important Than The Environment?,
2021
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Solar Panels: Are Aesthetics More Important Than The Environment?, Madison Kinkaid
Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies
Imagine you decide to install solar panels on your house. You want to do your part in combating the climate crisis as well as save your family money. You’ve done your research about which panels to get and exactly how to position them on your home. Then you find out that your neighborhood doesn’t allow solar panels because someone decades ago decided they weren’t aesthetically pleasing.
It's About Time Nebraska Ditches Coal,
2021
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
It's About Time Nebraska Ditches Coal, Riley Johnson
Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies
For too long now, Nebraska has relied on coal from our western neighbor, Wyoming. While this proximity to Wyoming’s coal mines has led to cheap coal and cheap energy prices, it has made us reliant on out-of-state coal companies. It's great that energy is kept cheap using coal, but all of our money is getting sent out of state. Why send all of our money out-of-state when we can keep Nebraskan’s hard-earned money in Nebraska. Our beautiful state has an extremely large potential for renewable energy that we fail to utilize.
30 By 30,
2021
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
30 By 30, Laron Core
Op-Eds from ENSC230 Energy and the Environment: Economics and Policies
Biden’s 30 by 30 plan, a regulatory approach to conservation, an imminent response to environmental action, a promise of inclusivity to all stakeholders. Or a broken promise in the making, an environmental policy inadequate to deliver sufficient results to its stakeholders? I am set to believe Biden’s 30 by 30 plan could very well be DOA.
A Model-Based Exploratory Study Of Sulfur Dioxide Dispersions From Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations In The Southeastern United States,
2021
Western Kentucky University
A Model-Based Exploratory Study Of Sulfur Dioxide Dispersions From Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations In The Southeastern United States, Jesse Winchester, Rezaul Mahmood, William Rodgers, Philip J. Silva, Nanh Lovanh, Joshua D. Durkee, John Loughrin
High Plains Regional Climate Center: Staff Publications
In the Southeastern U. S. there are Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) that emit a variety of gases, including SO2. Sulfur is emitted as reduced sulfur compounds and can react in the atmosphere to produce SO2. It is expected that the concentration and spread of SO2 emissions from these sources would differ between wet and dry periods. In this research, SO2 emissions from locations representing CAFOs and its dispersion over the southeastern U.S. were simulated through sensitivity experiments using the Weather Research and Forecasting-Chemistry (WRF- Chem) model. Simulations were performed for dry periods and …
The Quantitative Assessment Of Pond Scum: An Examination Of The Biogeochemistry Of Phosphorus Cycling In The Belgrade Lakes,
2021
Colby College
The Quantitative Assessment Of Pond Scum: An Examination Of The Biogeochemistry Of Phosphorus Cycling In The Belgrade Lakes, Abbey M. Sykes
Honors Theses
The internal recycling phosphorus in freshwater lake bottom sediments represents a significant source of hypolimnetic phosphorus (P) release for many of Maine’s lakes. In summer months, Maine lakes often thermally stratify and the lake hypolimnion develops anoxia, leading to a reduction in redox potential at the sediment-water interface. These reducing conditions facilitate the reductive dissolution of ferric iron, and, since phosphorus is often present in freshwater lake sediments as solid FeOOH-PO4 complexes, results in release of soluble phosphorus into the water column. Our current study presents field and laboratory data from sediment fractionation extractions designed to quantify concentrations of …
