Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)
Permanent URI for this community
The Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC) is a regional climate service centre at the University of Victoria that conducts applied research and provides practical information on the physical impacts of climate variability and change in the Pacific and Yukon Region of Canada. We collaborate with climate researchers and regional stakeholders to produce data-based products and online tools in support of long-term planning.
Browse
Browsing Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC) by Date Added
Now showing 1 - 20 of 279
Results Per Page
Sort Options
Item Potential near-future carbon uptake overcomes losses from a large insect outbreak in British Columbia, Canada(Geophysical Research Letters, 2016) Arora, Vivek K.; Peng, Yiran; Kurz, Werner A.; John C., Fyfe; Hawkins, Barbara J.; Schoeneberg (Werner), Arelia T.The current capacity of northern high‐latitude forests to sequester carbon has been suggested to be undermined by the potential increase in fire and insect outbreaks. Here we investigate the response of the terrestrial ecosystems in the province of British Columbia (BC), Canada, to the recent large mountain pine beetle (MPB) outbreak that started in 1999 as well as changing climate and continually increasing atmospheric CO2 concentration up to 2050, in a combined framework, using a process‐based model. Model simulations suggest that the recent MPB outbreak results in BC's forests accumulating 328 Tg less carbon over the 1999–2020 period. Over this same period changing climate and increasing atmospheric CO2 concentration, however, yield enhanced carbon uptake equal to a cumulative sink of around 900–1060 Tg C, depending on the future climate change scenario, indicating that the reduced carbon uptake by land due to the MPB disturbance may already be surpassed by 2020.Item Projected local rain events due to climate change and the impacts on waterborne diseases in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada(Environmental Health, 2019) Chhetri, Bimal K.; Galanis, Eleni; Sobie, Stephen R.; Brubacher, Jordan; Balshaw, Robert; Otterstatter, Michael; Mak, Sunny; Lem, Marcus; Lysyshyn, Mark; Murdock, Trevor Q.; Fleury, Manon; Zickfeld, Kirsten; Zubel, Mark; Clarkson, Len; Takaro, Tim K.Background Climate change is increasing the number and intensity of extreme weather events in many parts of the world. Precipitation extremes have been linked to both outbreaks and sporadic cases of waterborne illness. We have previously shown a link between heavy rain and turbidity to population-level risk of sporadic cryptosporidiosis and giardiasis in a major Canadian urban population. The risk increased with 30 or more dry days in the 60 days preceding the week of extreme rain. The goal of this study was to investigate the change in cryptosporidiosis and giardiasis risk due to climate change, primarily change in extreme precipitation. Methods Cases of cryptosporidiosis and giardiasis were extracted from a reportable disease system (1997–2009). We used distributed lag non-linear Poisson regression models and projections of the exposure-outcome relationship to estimate future illness (2020–2099). The climate projections are derived from twelve statistically downscaled regional climate models. Relative Concentration Pathway 8.5 was used to project precipitation derived from daily gridded weather observation data (~ 6 × 10 km resolution) covering the central of three adjacent watersheds serving metropolitan Vancouver for the 2020s, 2040s, 2060s and 2080s. Results Precipitation is predicted to steadily increase in these watersheds during the wet season (Oct. -Mar.) and decrease in other parts of the year up through the 2080s. More weeks with extreme rain (>90th percentile) are expected. These weeks are predicted to increase the annual rates of cryptosporidiosis and giardiasis by approximately 16% by the 2080s corresponding to an increase of 55–136 additional cases per year depending upon the climate model used. The predicted increase in the number of waterborne illness cases are during the wet months. The range in future projections compared to historical monthly case counts typically differed by 10–20% across climate models but the direction of change was consistent for all models. Discussion If new water filtration measures had not been implemented in our study area in 2010–2015, the risk of cryptosporidiosis and giardiasis would have been expected to increase with climate change, particularly precipitation changes. In addition to the predicted increase in the frequency and intensity of extreme precipitation events, the frequency and length of wet and dry spells could also affect the risk of waterborne diseases as we observed in the historical period. These findings add to the growing evidence regarding the need to prepare water systems to manage and become resilient to climate change-related health risks.Item Investigation of the mechanisms leading to the 2017 Montreal flood(Climate Dynamics, 2019) Teufel, Bernardo; Sushama, L.; Huziy, O.; Diro, G. T.; Jeong, Dae Il; Winger, K.; Garnaud, C.; de Elia, R.; Zwiers, Francis W.; Matthews, H. D.; Nguyen, V.‑T.‑V.Significant flood damage occurred near Montreal in May 2017, as flow from the upstream Ottawa River basin (ORB) reached its highest levels in over 50 years. Analysis of observations and experiments performed with the fifth generation Canadian Regional Climate Model (CRCM5) show that much above average April precipitation over the ORB, a large fraction of which fell as rain on an existing snowpack, increased streamflow to near record-high levels. Subsequently, two heavy rainfall events affected the ORB in the first week of May, ultimately resulting in flooding. This heavy precipitation during April and May was linked to large-scale atmospheric features. Results from sensitivity experiments with CRCM5 suggest that the mass and distribution of the snowpack have a major influence on spring streamflow in the ORB. Furthermore, the importance of using an appropriate frozen soil parameterization when modelling spring streamflows in cold regions was confirmed. Event attribution using CRCM5 showed that events such as the heavy April 2017 precipitation accumulation over the ORB are between two and three times as likely to occur in the present-day climate as in the pre-industrial climate. This increase in the risk of heavy precipitation is linked to increased atmospheric moisture due to warmer temperatures in the present-day climate, a direct consequence of anthropogenic emissions, rather than changes in rain-generating mechanisms or circulation patterns. Warmer temperatures in the present-day climate also reduce early-spring snowpack in the ORB, offsetting the increase in rainfall and resulting in no discernible change to the likelihood of extreme surface runoff.Item Temporal and spatial structure of nocturnal warming events in a midlatitude coastal city(Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology, 2022) Lao, Isabelle; Abraham, Carsten; Wiebe, Ed; Monahan, Adam H.Nocturnal warming events (NWEs) are abrupt interruptions in the typical cooling of surface temperatures at night. Using temperature time series from the high-resolution Vancouver Island School-Based Weather Station Network (VWSN) in British Columbia, Canada, we investigate temporal and spatial characteristics of NWEs. In this coastal region, NWEs are more frequently detected in winter than in summer, with a seasonal shift from slowly warming NWEs dominating the winter months to rapidly warming NWEs dominating the summer months. Slow-warming NWEs are of relatively small amplitude and exhibit slow cooling rates after the temperature peaks. In contrast, fast-warming NWEs have a temperature increase of several kelvins with shorter-duration temperature peaks. The median behavior of these distinct NWE classes at individual stations is similar across the entire set of stations. The spatial synchronicity of NWEs across the VWSN (determined by requiring NWEs at station pairs to occur within given time windows) decreases with distance, including substantial variability at nearby stations that reflects local influences. Fast-warming NWEs are observed to occur either simultaneously across a number of stations or in isolation at one station. Spatial synchronicity values are used to construct undirected networks to investigate spatial connectivity structures of NWEs. We find that, independent of individual seasons or NWE classes, the networks are largely unstructured, with no clear spatial connectivity structures related to local topography or direction.Item PCIC update: August 2021(Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC), 2021-08) Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)This issue of the PCIC Update containts the following stories: PCIC Responds to the Extreme Heat Wave, New IPCC Assessment Report Released, Evaluating the Latest Climate Model Results, Collaborating with Forest Ecolobists to Improve BC Climate Mapping, New PCIC Science Brief: Should the RCP 8.5 Emissions Scenario Represent "Business as Usual"? The staff profile is on Dr. Qiaohong Sun.Item Climate Summary: South Coast region(Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC), 2013-11-01) Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)The Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC) climate summary for the South Coast Region, part of a series on the resource regions of British Columbia.Item Climate extremes in the Georgia Basin: Summary report(Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC), 2017-07) Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)To plan for and adapt to the potential impacts of climate change, there is a need among communities in British Columbia for projections of future climate and climate extremes at a suitable, locally-relevant scale. This report summarizes work completed in 2012 by the Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC) to this end. Commissioned by a group of municipalities and regional districts in the Georgia Basin (Figure 1), PCIC developed and analyzed a set of projections of future climate and climate extremes for the area. The full report, Georgia Basin, Projected Climate Change, Extremes and Historical Analysis, is available from PCIC's online publications library.Item How much has China warmed?(Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC), 2016-04) Zwiers, Francis W.China's observing system records temperatures that are broadly influenced by urban warming Thus the warming of the Chinese land-mass is likely overestimated. Comparison between urban and rural stations appears to lead to an underestimate of the strength of the urbanization influence. A detection and attribution formalism allows decomposition of China's temperature record into externally forced, urbanization induced and internal variability induced components of change Results suggest about 1/3rd of the recorded warming is due to urbanization Anthropogenic and natural external forcing combined are estimated to have caused 0.93°C [0.61-1.24], consistent with the observed global land mean warming 1.09°C [0.86-1.31Item PCIC Primer: Understanding Future Climate Scenarios(Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC), 2022-02) Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)This PCIC Primer, on Understanding Future Climate Scenarios, provides context for, and an explanation of, two sets of emissions scenarios, the Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs), used for the fifth phase of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP5) and the Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs), used in CMIP6.Item Climate change and forests(Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC), 2019-06) Murdock, Trevor Q.Presentation for the Private Forest Landowners Association Annual Conference.Item PCIC science brief: Human-induced greening of the northern extratropical land surface(Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC), 2017-01) Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)This Science Brief covers recent research by Mao et al. (2016) published in Nature Climate Change. The authors find that the observed greening of the land surface between 30-75° north over the 1982-2011 period is largely due to anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions.Item PCIC update: October 2018(Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC), 2018-10) Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)This newsletter discusses the IPCC's Special Report on a global warming of 1.5ºC, the summer of 2018 in BC, supporting agriculture in the Fraser Valley, PCIC's new Seasonal Maps Portal, Columbia Basin Trust workshops and Dr. Jana Sillmann's visit. The newsletter also has a staff spotlight on Matthew Benstead, covers talks delivered by Drs. Jana Sillmann and Whitney Huang, the most recent PCIC Science Brief on Paris Accord emissions and temperature limits, as well as PCIC publications and staff changes.Item PCIC science brief: Tropical Pacific impacts on cooling North American winters(Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC), 2016-07) Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)This PCIC Science Brief covers a recent paper by Sigmond and Fyfe (2016) that was published in Nature Climate Change. The authors investigate the causes of cooler winters over the early 2000s in North America and find that they vary by region. In the northwest, these cooler winters were largely due to a pattern of western cooling and central warming in the tropical Pacific Ocean. In central North America, the cooler winters were primarily due to changes in the northerly winds driven by increased sea level pressure on the west coast of North America.Item 2019 in BC, in climatological context(Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC), 2020-08) Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)This report places the conditions in British Columbia (BC) over 2019 into climatological context. It finds that: a moderate El Niño likely contributed to a slightly warmer than normal 2019 in BC; anomalous warmth peaked in spring, forcing rapid melt of a near-normal winter snowpack; precipitation in summer and fall was above-to-much-above normal across the province; trends in temperature are positive for the period 1950-2019 with minimum temperatures (Tmin) increasing faster than maximum temperatures (Tmax), and that precipitation shows no significant trend over the same period.Item PCIC science brief: On cloud-circulation coupling and climate sensitivity(Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC), 2023-06) Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)One of the key uncertainties in climate model simulations has to do with the response of low-lying marine clouds to increasing temperatures. A recent paper in the journal Nature uses a mix of radar, lidar and data from atmospheric probes to test one of the mechanisms by which cloud cover is projected to be reduced under climate change. Their findings show that this mechanism is not evident in the trade wind regions, which suggests that might not occur in nature. This further suggests that the most extreme estimates of the climate's response to greenhouse gas emissions are less likely than earlier research suggests. Here we discuss what these results tell us about changes to the Earth's sensitivity to greenhouse gas emissions and what this may mean for our province.Item PCIC update: October 2024(Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC), 2024-10) Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)This edition of the PCIC Update contains the following stories: 2023 and the Transition to 2024: A Record-Breaking Year Globally and for BC, Salmon Climate Impacts Portal Released, Development of High-resolution Climate Change Freshwater Hazard Data for BC, Updates to Plan2Adapt and PCIC Climate Explorer and The Pacific Climate Data Set Surpasses One Billion Observations, along with updates on staff changes and the Pacific Climate Seminar Series. The staff issue in this profile is on Quintin Sparks.Item City of Vancouver climate impacts summary(Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC), 2016-04-15) Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)The City of Vancouver is warming. Global climate models project annual average temperature to increase by 1.7°C to 4.0°C, and indicate an average increase of 2.9°C between the 1971-2000 baseline and the 2050s. This fact sheet provides specific information intended to facilitate adaptation as the climate changes. All values in the summary are for the 2050s relative to the 1971-2000 baseline. Additional variables, seasons, projections for the 2080s, and maps were also produced and provided to the City of Vancouver.Item The role of forest genetic resources in responding to biotic and abiotic factors in the context of anthropogenic climate change(Forest Ecology and Management, 2014) Alfaro, René I.; Fady, Bruno; Vendramin, Giovanni Giuseppe; Dawson, Ian K.; Fleming, Richard A.; Sáenz-Romero, Cuauhtémoc; Lindig-Cisneros, Roberto A.; Murdock, Trevor Q.; Vinceti, Barbara; Navarro, Carlos Manuel; Skrøppa, Tore; Baldinelli, Giulia; El-Kassaby, Yousry A.The current distribution of forest genetic resources on Earth is the result of a combination of natural processes and human actions. Over time, tree populations have become adapted to their habitats including the local ecological disturbances they face. As the planet enters a phase of human-induced climate change of unprecedented speed and magnitude, however, previously locally-adapted populations are rendered less suitable for new conditions, and ‘natural’ biotic and abiotic disturbances are taken outside their historic distribution, frequency and intensity ranges. Tree populations rely on phenotypic plasticity to survive in extant locations, on genetic adaptation to modify their local phenotypic optimum or on migration to new suitable environmental conditions. The rate of required change, however, may outpace the ability to respond, and tree species and populations may become locally extinct after specific, but as yet unknown and unquantified, tipping points are reached. Here, we review the importance of forest genetic resources as a source of evolutionary potential for adaptation to changes in climate and other ecological factors. We particularly consider climate-related responses in the context of linkages to disturbances such as pests, diseases and fire, and associated feedback loops. The importance of management strategies to conserve evolutionary potential is emphasised and recommendations for policy-makers are provided.Item Climate summary: Northeast region(Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC), 2013-11) Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)The Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC) climate summary for the Northeast region, part of a series on the resource regions of British Columbia.Item Climate summary: Cariboo region(Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC), 2013-11) Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)The Pacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC) climate summary for the Cariboo region, part of a series on the resource regions of British Columbia.