No Arabic abstract
We used the quantitative theory of solubility of karst rocks of Shopov et. al, (1989, 1991a) in dependence of the temperature and other thermodynamic parameters to make reconstructions of past carbonate denudation rates. This theory produced equations assessing the carbonate denudation rates in dependence on the temperature or on the precipitation. We estimated the averaged denudation rate in the region to 14 mm/kyr or 38 t/km2 per year. We used this estimate as starting point and substituted our proxy records of the annual temperature and the annual precipitation in the equations of dependence of karst denudation rate on precipitation and temperature. This way we reconstructed variations of the annual karst denudation rate for the last 280 years in dependence on the annual precipitation and for the last 1250 years in dependence on the temperature. Both reconstructions produce quite reasonable estimate of the variations of carbonate denudation, which is within observed variation of 8- 20 mm/kyr (86% variation). Precipitation dependence of carbonate denudation produces 79 % variation in the denudation rate in result of the reconstructed variation of 300 mm/yr from the driest to the wettest year during the last 280 years. Temperature dependence of carbonate denudation due to temperature dependence of solubility of the carbonate dioxide produce only 9.3% variation in the denudation rate in result of the reconstructed variation of 4.7 deg. C during the last 1250 years, so it is negligible in respect of the precipitation dependence.
Daily rainfall extremes and annual totals have increased in large parts of the global land area over the last decades. These observations are consistent with theoretical considerations of a warming climate. However, until recently these global tendencies have not been shown to consistently affect land regions with limited moisture availability. A recent study, published by Donat et al. (2016, Nature Climate Change, doi:10.1038/nclimate2941), now identified rapid increases in globally aggregated dry region daily extreme rainfall and annual rainfall totals. Here, we reassess the respective analysis and find that a) statistical artifacts introduced by the choice of the reference period prior to data standardization lead to an overestimation of the reported trends by up to 40%, and also that b) the definition of `dry regions of the globe affect the reported globally aggregated trends in extreme rainfall. Using the same observational dataset, but accounting for the statistical artifacts and using alternative, well-established dryness definitions, we find no significant increases in heavy precipitation in the worlds dry regions. Adequate data pre-processing approaches and accounting for uncertainties regarding the definition of dryness are crucial to the quantification of spatially aggregated trends in the worlds dry regions. In view of the high relevance of the question to many potentially affected stakeholders, we call for a cautionary consideration of specific data processing methods, including issues related to the definition of dry areas, to guarantee robustness of communicated climate change relevant findings.
The Arctic sea ice represents an important energy reservoir for the climate of the northern hemisphere. The shrinking of the polar ice in the past decades decreases the stored energy and raises serious concerns about future climate changes.[1-4] Model calculations of the present authors [5,6] suggest that half of the global warming during the past fifty years is directly related to the retreat of the sea ice, while the cause is not well understood, e.g. the role of surface pollution [7-10]. We have analysed the reported annual melting and freezing data of the northern sea ice in the years 1979 to 2018 [11] to gain some insight. Two features can be deduced from our simple model: (i) recent results [12,13] are confirmed that approximately 60 % of the loss of sea ice stems from energy transport to the arctic region. (ii) We find evidence that the remaining part of the ice retreat originates from an increasing surface absorption of solar radiation, obviously due to the rising surface pollution of the sea ice. While the phenomenon was previously considered by several authors in a qualitative way, our analysis contributes semi-quantitative information on the situation. We estimate that the relevant fall-out of light absorbing aerosols onto the sea ice increased by 17 +/- 5 % during the past fifty years. A deposition of additional 3 +/- 1 % of solar radiation in the melting region results that accounts for the ice retreat. Recalling the important role of the ice loss for the terrestrial climate,[3,5,9] the precipitation of air pollution in the Arctic seems to be an important factor for the global warming.
The growing concentrations of the greenhouse gases CO2, CH4 and N2O (GHG) in the atmosphere are often considered as the dominant cause for the global warming during the past decades. The reported temperature data however do not display a simple correlation with the concentration changes since 1880 so that other reasons are to be considered to contribute notably. An important feature in this context is the shrinking of the polar ice caps observed in recent years. We have studied the direct effect of the loss of global sea ice since 1955 on the mean global temperature estimating the corresponding decrease of the terrestrial albedo. Using a simple 1-dimensional model the global warming of the surface is computed that is generated by the increase of GHG and the albedo change. A modest effect by the GHG of 0.08 K is calculated for the period 1880 to 1955 with a further increase by 0.18K for 1955 to 2015. A larger contribution of 0.55 +/-0.05 K is estimated for the melting of polar sea ice (MSI) in the latter period, i.e. it notably exceeds that of the GHG and may be compared with the observed global temperature rise of 1.0 +/- 0.1 K during the past 60 years. Our data also suggest a delayed response of the mean global temperature to the loss of sea ice with a time constant of approximately 20 years. The validity of the theoretical model and the interrelation between GHG-warming and MSI-effect are discussed.
The importance of snow cover and ice extent in the Northern Hemisphere was recognized by various authors leading to a positive feedback of surface reflectivity on climate. In fact, the retreat of Arctic sea ice is accompanied by enhanced solar input in the Arctic region, i.e. a decrease of the terrestrial albedo. We have studied this effect for the past six decades and estimate the corresponding global warming in the northern hemisphere. A simple 1-dimensional model is used that includes the simultaneous increase of the greenhouse gases. Our results indicate that the latter directly cause a temperature rise of only 0.2 K in 1955 to 2015, while a notably larger effect 0.7 +/- 0.2 K is found for the loss of Arctic sea ice in the same time. These numbers comprise most of the reported mean temperature rise of 1.2 +/- 0.2 K of the northern hemisphere. The origin of the sea-ice retreat is discussed, e.g. internal variability or feedback by the CO2 concentration increase. Our data also suggest a delayed response of the global surface temperature rise to the loss of sea ice with a time constant of approximately 10 to 20 years.
We report an empirical determination of the probability density functions $P_{text{data}}(r)$ of the number $r$ of earthquakes in finite space-time windows for the California catalog. We find a stable power law tail $P_{text{data}}(r) sim 1/r^{1+mu}$ with exponent $mu approx 1.6$ for all space ($5 times 5$ to $20 times 20$ km$^2$) and time intervals (0.1 to 1000 days). These observations, as well as the non-universal dependence on space-time windows for all different space-time windows simultaneously, are explained by solving one of the most used reference model in seismology (ETAS), which assumes that each earthquake can trigger other earthquakes. The data imposes that active seismic regions are Cauchy-like fractals, whose exponent $delta =0.1 pm 0.1$ is well-constrained by the seismic rate data.