Climate Data Information

We provide a comprehensive overview of the causes, magnitude and impacts of climate change. A lot of the relevant climate data are available on the internet but they are not presented in a way which makes them easy to understand. Where climate data are available in a digestible form they are often presented in a biased way. On this site you will find graphs, explanation and data related to essential aspects of climate change. Everything can be downloaded for free and the data files can be input directly to spreadsheets on Windows, Macintosh and UNIX operating systems. The climate information and data are available in the following subject areas:

• Temperature - observed and climate model simulations of Global, European and American temperature.
• Precipitation - observed and climate model simulations of Global, European and American precipitation.
• Proxy Data: (i) Ice Cores - Antarctic, Arctic and glaciers with temperature and other data for 100s of thousands of years. (ii) Tree Rings - data from northern and southern hemisphere countries with temperature estimates for 100s of years.
• Forcing – Natural albedo (reflectivity) of earth; Orbital variations (Milankovitch cycles) ; Sun-spots; Oscillations (El Niňo and other oscillations); Radio-sonde temperature profiles. Gases: Variation of CO2 and methane over time and a break-down of CO2 by source and geographical origin, including the influence of greenhouse gases on climate; Volcanoes.
• Climate Impacts - Global sea level; Snow cover, Arctic and Antarctic sea ice; Tropical cyclones; Polar bears; Water stress; Airborne dust and temperature.

We provide a model, called HYSIM-CC, to quantify the effects of climate change.

The need to assess the impacts of climate change in a range of development projects is becoming more and more a donor specified requirement. Whilst in many circumstances the projections of temperature and precipitation disseminated by the IPCC will in themselves be enough, in other areas, such as water resources and agriculture, additional analysis and modelling is needed. This is not just a question of assessing the overall change in water stress. The way in which the temperatures and precipitation are distributed over the year will also be important. Higher temperatures in the growing season might not be balanced by extra precipitation at other times. Changes in the seasonal pattern of snowfall and snowmelt may mean that spring flushes, important for wetlands and fish spawning, no longer occur.

HYSIM-CC was designed to provide the tools to enable hydrologists, water resources planners, irrigation engineers and agronomists to assess rapidly and accurately the local impact of climate change on water stress anywhere in the world. The tools we provide are built on our worldwide experience of working with stakeholders in projects related to water resources and the environment. With the model you can:

• Work with IPCC SRES climate scenarios
• Import climate and other data
• Analyse changes to river flow, runoff, soil moisture, groundwater recharge, snow melt, frost days and irrigation demand
• Simulate the impacts anywhere in the world
• Output the results in a range of graphic formats or as CSV files

Examples of the use of HYSIM-CC are provided.

Mr. Ronald Manley
Ron is a founding member of the Water Resource Associates who first got involved with climate change in 1981 during a study of Libyan agriculture. In 1998 he carried out the first major analysis of climate change impact for Severn-Tent Water Authority, one of the UK's largest. Since then he have analysed impact in Asia, the Middle East, Europe, Pacific Ocean and Africa. Countries of Recent Experience:

• Vanuatu, flood estimation for rural roads
• Mekong, flood and drought sequences.
• Cambodia, rural flooding and droughts.
• Tagus (Spain/Portugal), water resources
• Malaysia, potential impact on hydropower
• Turkey, impact on winter runoff.
• Zambia, changed seasonal temperature and rain patterns
• Kagera basin, water resources availability
• Malombe, flooding and sediment transport

Dr. Patrick Reynolds
During the last decade, Pat has pursued a career as an international bi-lateral and multi-lateral team leader in the field of fresh and marine transboundary water management. Pat designed and maintains the website under the name of Boray Designs.