Matching Items (39)
Filtering by
- All Subjects: Climate Change
- All Subjects: conservation
- Creators: School of Sustainability
- Creators: Huang, Huei-Ping
- Status: Published
Description
This 15-week long course is designed to introduce students, specifically in Arizona, to basic sustainability and conservation principles in the context of local reptile wildlife. Throughout the course, the students work on identifying the problem, creating visions for the desired future, and finally developing a strategy to help with reptile species survival in the valley. Research shows that animals in the classroom have led to improved academic success for students. Thus, through creating this course I was able to combine conservation and sustainability curriculum with real-life animals whose survival is directly being affected in the valley. My hope is that this course will help students identify a newfound passion and call to action to protect native wildlife. The more awareness and actionable knowledge which can be brought to students in Arizona about challenges to species survival the more likely we are to see a change in the future and a stronger sense of urgency for protecting wildlife. In order to accomplish these goals, the curriculum was developed to begin with basic concepts of species needs such as food and shelter and basic principles of sustainability. As the course progresses the students analyze current challenges reptile wildlife faces, like urban sprawl, and explore options to address these challenges. The course concludes with a pilot pitch where students present their solution projects to the school.
ContributorsGoethe, Emma Rae (Author) / Brundiers, Katja (Thesis director) / Bouges, Olivia (Committee member) / School of Sustainability (Contributor, Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2021-05
Description
Ten regional climate models (RCMs) and atmosphere-ocean generalized model parings from the North America Regional Climate Change Assessment Program were used to estimate the shift of extreme precipitation due to climate change using present-day and future-day climate scenarios. RCMs emulate winter storms and one-day duration events at the sub-regional level. Annual maximum series were derived for each model pairing, each modeling period; and for annual and winter seasons. The reliability ensemble average (REA) method was used to qualify each RCM annual maximum series to reproduce historical records and approximate average predictions, because there are no future records. These series determined (a) shifts in extreme precipitation frequencies and magnitudes, and (b) shifts in parameters during modeling periods. The REA method demonstrated that the winter season had lower REA factors than the annual season. For the winter season the RCM pairing of the Hadley regional Model 3 and the Geophysical Fluid-Dynamics Laboratory atmospheric-land generalized model had the lowest REA factors. However, in replicating present-day climate, the pairing of the Abdus Salam International Center for Theoretical Physics' Regional Climate Model Version 3 with the Geophysical Fluid-Dynamics Laboratory atmospheric-land generalized model was superior. Shifts of extreme precipitation in the 24-hour event were measured using precipitation magnitude for each frequency in the annual maximum series, and the difference frequency curve in the generalized extreme-value-function parameters. The average trend of all RCM pairings implied no significant shift in the winter annual maximum series, however the REA-selected models showed an increase in annual-season precipitation extremes: 0.37 inches for the 100-year return period and for the winter season suggested approximately 0.57 inches for the same return period. Shifts of extreme precipitation were estimated using predictions 70 years into the future based on RCMs. Although these models do not provide climate information for the intervening 70 year period, the models provide an assertion on the behavior of future climate. The shift in extreme precipitation may be significant in the frequency distribution function, and will vary depending on each model-pairing condition. The proposed methodology addresses the many uncertainties associated with the current methodologies dealing with extreme precipitation.
ContributorsRiaño, Alejandro (Author) / Mays, Larry W. (Thesis advisor) / Vivoni, Enrique (Committee member) / Huang, Huei-Ping (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
The numerical climate models have provided scientists, policy makers and the general public, crucial information for climate projections since mid-20th century. An international effort to compare and validate the simulations of all major climate models is organized by the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP), which has gone through several phases since 1995 with CMIP5 being the state of the art. In parallel, an organized effort to consolidate all observational data in the past century culminates in the creation of several "reanalysis" datasets that are considered the closest representation of the true observation. This study compared the climate variability and trend in the climate model simulations and observations on the timescales ranging from interannual to centennial. The analysis focused on the dynamic climate quantity of zonal-mean zonal wind and global atmospheric angular momentum (AAM), and incorporated multiple datasets from reanalysis and the most recent CMIP3 and CMIP5 archives. For the observation, the validation of AAM by the length-of-day (LOD) and the intercomparison of AAM revealed a good agreement among reanalyses on the interannual and the decadal-to-interdecadal timescales, respectively. But the most significant discrepancies among them are in the long-term mean and long-term trend. For the simulations, the CMIP5 models produced a significantly smaller bias and a narrower ensemble spread of the climatology and trend in the 20th century for AAM compared to CMIP3, while CMIP3 and CMIP5 simulations consistently produced a positive trend for the 20th and 21st century. Both CMIP3 and CMIP5 models produced a wide range of the magnitudes of decadal and interdecadal variability of wind component of AAM (MR) compared to observation. The ensemble means of CMIP3 and CMIP5 are not statistically distinguishable for either the 20th- or 21st-century runs. The in-house atmospheric general circulation model (AGCM) simulations forced by the sea surface temperature (SST) taken from the CMIP5 simulations as lower boundary conditions were carried out. The zonal wind and MR in the CMIP5 simulations are well simulated in the AGCM simulations. This confirmed SST as an important mediator in regulating the global atmospheric changes due to GHG effect.
ContributorsPaek, Houk (Author) / Huang, Huei-Ping (Thesis advisor) / Adrian, Ronald (Committee member) / Wang, Zhihua (Committee member) / Anderson, James (Committee member) / Herrmann, Marcus (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
The implications of a changing climate have a profound impact on human life, society, and policy making. The need for accurate climate prediction becomes increasingly important as we better understand these implications. Currently, the most widely used climate prediction relies on the synthesis of climate model simulations organized by the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP); these simulations are ensemble-averaged to construct projections for the 21st century climate. However, a significant degree of bias and variability in the model simulations for the 20th century climate is well-known at both global and regional scales. Based on that insight, this study provides an alternative approach for constructing climate projections that incorporates knowledge of model bias. This approach is demonstrated to be a viable alternative which can be easily implemented by water resource managers for potentially more accurate projections. Tests of the new approach are provided on a global scale with an emphasis on semiarid regional studies for their particular vulnerability to water resource changes, using both the former CMIP Phase 3 (CMIP3) and current Phase 5 (CMIP5) model archives. This investigation is accompanied by a detailed analysis of the dynamical processes and water budget to understand the behaviors and sources of model biases. Sensitivity studies of selected CMIP5 models are also performed with an atmospheric component model by testing the relationship between climate change forcings and model simulated response. The information derived from each study is used to determine the progressive quality of coupled climate models in simulating the global water cycle by rigorously investigating sources of model bias related to the moisture budget. As such, the conclusions of this project are highly relevant to model development and potentially may be used to further improve climate projections.
ContributorsBaker, Noel C (Author) / Huang, Huei-Ping (Thesis advisor) / Trimble, Steve (Committee member) / Anderson, James (Committee member) / Clarke, Amanda (Committee member) / Calhoun, Ronald (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
This study performs numerical modeling for the climate of semi-arid regions by running a high-resolution atmospheric model constrained by large-scale climatic boundary conditions, a practice commonly called climate downscaling. These investigations focus especially on precipitation and temperature, quantities that are critical to life in semi-arid regions. Using the Weather Research and Forecast (WRF) model, a non-hydrostatic geophysical fluid dynamical model with a full suite of physical parameterization, a series of numerical sensitivity experiments are conducted to test how the intensity and spatial/temporal distribution of precipitation change with grid resolution, time step size, the resolution of lower boundary topography and surface characteristics. Two regions, Arizona in U.S. and Aral Sea region in Central Asia, are chosen as the test-beds for the numerical experiments: The former for its complex terrain and the latter for the dramatic man-made changes in its lower boundary conditions (the shrinkage of Aral Sea). Sensitivity tests show that the parameterization schemes for rainfall are not resolution-independent, thus a refinement of resolution is no guarantee of a better result. But, simulations (at all resolutions) do capture the inter-annual variability of rainfall over Arizona. Nevertheless, temperature is simulated more accurately with refinement in resolution. Results show that both seasonal mean rainfall and frequency of extreme rainfall events increase with resolution. For Aral Sea, sensitivity tests indicate that while the shrinkage of Aral Sea has a dramatic impact on the precipitation over the confine of (former) Aral Sea itself, its effect on the precipitation over greater Central Asia is not necessarily greater than the inter-annual variability induced by the lateral boundary conditions in the model and large scale warming in the region. The numerical simulations in the study are cross validated with observations to address the realism of the regional climate model. The findings of this sensitivity study are useful for water resource management in semi-arid regions. Such high spatio-temporal resolution gridded-data can be used as an input for hydrological models for regions such as Arizona with complex terrain and sparse observations. Results from simulations of Aral Sea region are expected to contribute to ecosystems management for Central Asia.
ContributorsSharma, Ashish (Author) / Huang, Huei-Ping (Thesis advisor) / Adrian, Ronald (Committee member) / Herrmann, Marcus (Committee member) / Phelan, Patrick E. (Committee member) / Vivoni, Enrique (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
There are three known materials that readily undergo fission, allowing their use as a base for nuclear fuel: uranium-235, a naturally-occurring but uncommon isotope; plutonium, created from irradiated natural uranium; and uranium-233, produced from thorium. Of the three, uranium-235 and plutonium feature heavily in the modern nuclear industry, while uranium-233 and the thorium fuel cycle have failed to have significant presence in the field. Historically, nuclear energy development in the United States, and thorium development in particular, has been tied to the predominant societal outlook on the field, and thorium was only pursued seriously as an option during a period when nuclear energy was heavily favored, and resources seemed scarce. Recently, thorium-based energy has been experiencing a revival in interest in response to pollution concerns regarding fossil fuels. While public opinion is still wary of uranium, thorium-based designs could reduce reliance on fossil fuels while avoiding traditional drawbacks of nuclear energy. The thorium fuel cycle is more protected against proliferation, but is also much more expensive than the uranium-plutonium cycle in a typical reactor setup. Liquid-fueled molten salt reactor designs, however, bypass the prohibitive expense of U-233 refabrication by avoiding the stage entirely, keeping the chain reaction running with nothing but thorium input required. MSRs can use any fissile material as fuel, and are relatively safe to operate, due to passive features inherent to the design.
ContributorsGalbiati, Joseph Nicco (Author) / Martin, Thomas (Thesis director) / Foy, Joseph (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Sustainability (Contributor)
Created2014-05
Description
This thesis examines how the wording of proposed government policies can affect the level of public support that a given policy generates. By surveying 158 Phoenix residents, I tested the differing degrees of support that voters would have for a proposed city ordinance, which would stop Homeowners' Associations from restricting the use of native desert plants in residential landscaping. The ordinance was framed in the survey as a self-governance issue or a water conservation issue. I found that the message frames had little effect on the overall level of support for the ordinance, since most residents had moderate support for the policy. However, participants who were either residents of Homeowners' Associations that did not have native plant restrictions, or native residents of Arizona, demonstrated greater levels of support for the self-determination frame of the proposed ordinance. These findings have implications for policy makers who use targeted messages to establish pro-environmental policies at the local level.
ContributorsSmith, Mary Hannah (Author) / Darnall, Nicole (Thesis director) / Ramirez, Mark (Committee member) / Tetreault, Colin (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Sustainability (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor)
Created2013-05
Description
The goal of this paper is to serve as a case-study of the youth climate movement at the local level, focusing on how young activists and organizers in Arizona perceive their pathways, motivators, and barriers in the climate movement. In order to answer my research question of ‘What are the different experiences of Arizona youth activists’ involvement in climate action?’, I conducted a case-study of 15 interviews with participants between the ages of 18-25 that varied in racial and gender identity, as well as the duration of their involvement. While this paper does not present a comprehensive view of all experiences of youth climate activists and organizers in Arizona, these interviews highlight the upbringing, background, and the degree of involvement of young climate organizers and activists, ultimately revealing their similar yet unique experiences in the climate movement. Even though further research, discussion, and opportunities are needed to better understand the youth climate movement as well as other emerging social movements, these participants represent the heart of the movement here in Arizona. This case-study sheds light on lived-experiences and urges readers to consider young climate activists and organizers’ varying perspectives on how to support, amplify, and implement their requests for a livable, intersectional, diverse, and inclusive future.
ContributorsNguyen, Minh-Tam (Author) / Fischer, Daniel (Thesis director) / Klinsky, Sonja (Committee member) / School of Sustainability (Contributor, Contributor, Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / School of Social Transformation (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2020-12
Description
Environmental activism has played a major role in American politics since the late 1800s, with major victories including the National Park Service Organic Act of 1916 that established the National Park Service to help protect parks and monuments, the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts of the 1960s and 1970s, and the phase-out of ozone depleting chemicals in the 1990s. Yet mainstream activism has stagnated in recent years, facing a variety of problems such as continuing to perpetuate a corporate system in which frontline and minority communities are left behind and only focusing on traditional methods like lobbying and indirect activism that fail to generate mass public support. In contrast, the Sunrise Movement is a new youth-oriented environmental and social organization that has become prevalent in the last five years for their aim to combat both climate change and socioeconomic inequalities through the Green New Deal. With the growing need for climate action that is fair and equitable, this project intended to contextualize the Sunrise Movement within past and current environmental movements as well as the current environmental and political climate in order to then investigate how Sunrise operates and their level of effectiveness in promoting the Green New Deal. I performed a literature review of both past and present news articles as well as journal articles in addition to interviewing experts in the theory and practice of activism to characterize the three waves of environmentalism and lessons learned, the current political sphere and what mainstream activism is working toward, and Sunrise itself. While mainstream and localized radical activism had victories and a certain degree of effectiveness, their lack of inclusivity has failed to encourage the mass mobilization needed for long-term climate legislation. The Sunrise Movement distinguishes itself through disruptive activism and direct engagement: disruptive by challenging the status quo of profit over people, the two party system where both groups are moving toward the right, and the whiteness and liberal locations of the mainstream environmental movement; direct by working with partners across the environmental, social, and labor sphere and working with actionable, hands-on items that encourage participation. Though they have major limitations like ensuring that they are as inclusive as they recognize an environmental movement must be and the risk of being seen as a partisan organization, Sunrise shows that the attitude of the public is moving in favor of the climate and social equity.
ContributorsAlzamora, Madeline Kate (Author) / Fong, Benjamin (Thesis director) / Brian, Jennifer (Committee member) / School of Molecular Sciences (Contributor) / School of Sustainability (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2020-12
Description
Climate change, as it becomes more prevalent, is putting a much harsher strain on the resources of the world, specifically food, energy, and water. With this in mind, now is the time to make a change and begin working towards a more sustainable future for everyone. Arizona is an especially susceptible location that has the opportunity to be the leader of this change. In order to effectively manage this movement through governance, a food-energy-water nexus approach is required. This approach recognizes and accounts for the intricate relationships between these industries in order to promote more resilience and balance throughout the nexus. While the main focus in Arizona tends to be on water, and rightfully so, it is important to understand the intricacies of the food, energy, and water systems together. Right now, the system is fragile and needs a new, more complex approach. Ultimately, legislation that intertwines water rights with agriculture regulation and energy production goals, while also including equity and justice measures, have the capacity to work towards limiting the effects of climate change that Arizona will see. Arizona has the opportunity here to either provide a cautionary tale to other regions of how mismanagement can lead to destruction or can showcase the legislative success that the nexus governance approach can provide.
ContributorsKonopka, Violet (Author) / York, Abigail (Thesis director) / Richter, Jennifer (Committee member) / School of Sustainability (Contributor) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2020-05