Costing conservation: an expert appraisal of the pollinator habitat benefits of England’s entry level stewardship

Pollination services provided by insects play a key role in English crop production and wider ecology. Despite growing evidence of the negative effects of habitat loss on pollinator populations, limited policy support is available to reverse this pressure. One measure that may provide beneficial habitat to pollinators is England’s entry level stewardship agri-environment scheme. This study uses a novel expert survey to develop weights for a range of models which adjust the balance of Entry Level Stewardship options within the current area of spending. The annual costs of establishing and maintaining these option compositions were estimated at £59.3–£12.4 M above current expenditure. Although this produced substantial reduction in private cost:benefit ratios, the benefits of the scheme to pollinator habitat rose by 7–140 %; significantly increasing the public cost:benefit ratio. This study demonstrates that the scheme has significant untapped potential to provide good quality habitat for pollinators across England, even within existing expenditure. The findings should open debate on the costs and benefits of specific entry level stewardship management options and how these can be enhanced to benefit both participants and biodiversity more equitably.

The impact of monsoon intraseasonal variability on renewable power generation in India

India is increasingly investing in renewable technology to meet rising energy demands, with hydropower and other renewables comprising one-third of current installed capacity. Installed wind-power is projected to increase 5-fold by 2035 (to nearly 100GW) under the International Energy Agency’s New Policies scenario. However, renewable electricity generation is dependent upon the prevailing meteorology, which is strongly influenced by monsoon variability. Prosperity and widespread electrification are increasing the demand for air conditioning, especially during the warm summer. This study uses multi-decadal observations and meteorological reanalysis data to assess the impact of intraseasonal monsoon variability on the balance of electricity supply from wind-power and temperature-related demand in India. Active monsoon phases are characterised by vigorous convection and heavy rainfall over central India. This results in lower temperatures giving lower cooling energy demand, while strong westerly winds yield high wind-power output. In contrast, monsoon breaks are characterised by suppressed precipitation, with higher temperatures and hence greater demand for cooling, and lower wind-power output across much of India. The opposing relationship between wind-power supply and cooling demand during active phases (low demand, high supply) and breaks (high demand, low supply) suggests that monsoon variability will tend to exacerbate fluctuations in the so-called demand-net-wind (i.e., electrical demand that must be supplied from non-wind sources). This study may have important implications for the design of power systems and for investment decisions in conventional schedulable generation facilities (such as coal and gas) that are used to maintain the supply/demand balance. In particular, if it is assumed (as is common) that the generated wind-power operates as a price-taker (i.e., wind farm operators always wish to sell their power, irrespective of price) then investors in conventional facilities will face additional weather-volatility through the monsoonal impact on the length and frequency of production periods (i.e. their load-duration curves).

A traceable physical calibration of the vertical advection-diffusion equation for modelling ocean heat uptake

The classic vertical advection-diffusion (VAD) balance is a central concept in studying the ocean heat budget, in particular in simple climate models (SCMs). Here we present a new framework to calibrate the parameters of the VAD equation to the vertical ocean heat balance of two fully-coupled climate models that is traceable to the models’ circulation as well as to vertical mixing and diffusion processes. Based on temperature diagnostics, we derive an effective vertical velocity w∗ and turbulent diffusivity k∗ for each individual physical process. In steady-state, we find that the residual vertical velocity and diffusivity change sign in mid-depth, highlighting the different regional contributions of isopycnal and diapycnal diffusion in balancing the models’ residual advection and vertical mixing. We quantify the impacts of the time-evolution of the effective quantities under a transient 1%CO2 simulation and make the link to the parameters of currently employed SCMs.

Full effects of land use change in the representative concentration pathways

Future land use change (LUC) is an important component of the IPCC representative concentration pathways (RCPs), but in these scenarios' radiative forcing targets the climate impact of LUC only includes greenhouse gases. However, climate effects due to physical changes of the land surface can be as large. Here we show the critical importance of including non-carbon impacts of LUC when considering the RCPs. Using an ensemble of climate model simulations with and without LUC, we show that the net climate effect is very different from the carbon-only effect. Despite opposite signs of LUC, all the RCPs assessed here have a small net warming from LUC because of varying biogeophysical effects, and in RCP4.5 the warming is outside of the expected variability. The afforestation in RCP4.5 decreases surface albedo, making the net global temperature anomaly over land around five times larger than RCPs 2.6 and 8.5, for around twice the amount of LUC. Consequent changes to circulation in RCP4.5 in turn reduce Arctic sea ice cover. The small net positive temperature effect from LUC could make RCP4.5's universal carbon tax, which incentivizes retaining and growing forest, counter productive with respect to climate. However, there are spatial differences in the balance of impacts, and potential climate gains would need to be assessed against other environmental aims.

Thermal aspects of satellite downscaling

The strong trend toward nanosatellites creates new challenges in terms of thermal balance control. The thermal balance of a satellite is determined by the heat dissipation in its subsystems and by the thermal connections between them. As satellites become smaller, heat dissipation in their subsystems tends to decrease and thermal connectivity scales down with dimension. However, these two terms do not necessarily scale in the same way, and so the thermal balance may alter and the temperature of subsystems may reach undesired levels. This paper focuses on low-Earth-orbit satellites. We constructed a generalized lumped thermal model that combines a generalized low-Earth-orbit satellite configuration with scaling trends in subsystem heat dissipation and thermal connectivity. Using satellite mass as a scaling parameter, we show that subsystems do not become thermally critical by scaling mass alone.

Short communication: estimation of the financial benefit of using Jersey milk at different inclusion rates for Cheddar cheese production using partial budgeting

Partial budgeting was used to estimate the net benefit of blending Jersey milk in Holstein-Friesian milk for Cheddar cheese production. Jersey milk increases Cheddar cheese yield. However, the cost of Jersey milk is also higher; thus, determining the balance of profitability is necessary, including consideration of seasonal effects. Input variables were based on a pilot plant experiment run from 2012 to 2013 and industry milk and cheese prices during this period. When Jersey milk was used at an increasing rate with Holstein-Friesian milk (25, 50, 75, and 100% Jersey milk), it resulted in an increase of average net profit of 3.41, 6.44, 8.57, and 11.18 pence per kilogram of milk, respectively, and this additional profit was constant throughout the year. Sensitivity analysis showed that the most influential input on additional profit was cheese yield, whereas cheese price and milk price had a small effect. The minimum increase in yield, which was necessary for the use of Jersey milk to be profitable, was 2.63, 7.28, 9.95, and 12.37% at 25, 50, 75, and 100% Jersey milk, respectively. Including Jersey milk did not affect the quantity of whey butter and powder produced. Althoug further research is needed to ascertain the amount of additional profit that would be found on a commercial scale, the results indicate that using Jersey milk for Cheddar cheese making would lead to an improvement in profit for the cheese makers, especially at higher inclusion rates.

Variation on the effects of the 2003 CAP reform and regional differences in the Italian olive oil sector

This paper analyses the impacts of the 2003 CAP reform on the production of Italian olive oil controlling for the regional differences in olive oil production as well as for the differences between years. Italian olive oil production time series data from the Farm Accountancy Data Network for the 2000-2010 period at regional level is used to examine the effect of the 2003 Fischler reform on the production of olive oil. Production costs and payments received by farmers to support their income are considered. The data were collected at micro level based on a sample of farms representative of the production systems in the country. In order to consider the differences in production among the regions, eight representative regions in terms of surveyed farms are considered: Liguria, Toscana, Umbria, Lazio, Campania, Calabria, Puglia and Sicilia. We found that the most important factors affecting the production of olive oil are the area under olive groves and labour productivity. Results also show no evidence that the level of payments have an impact to the level of production, however, the type of payments has. Future work should explore the impact of the 2003 reform into the technical and production efficiency of the Italian olive oil farmers. It would be interesting to link the measures introduced by the cross compliance and the management practices of the different farms to have a more complete picture of the various parameters influencing the production of olive oil.

Study on the application of cool paintings for the passive cooling of existing buildings in Mediterranean climates

Building roofs play a very important role in the energy balance of buildings, especially in summer, when they are hit by a rather high solar irradiance. Depending on the type of finishing layer, roofs can absorb a great amount of heat and reach quite high temperatures on their outermost surface, which determines significant room overheating. However, the use of highly reflective cool materials can help to maintain low outer surface temperatures; this practice may improve indoor thermal comfort and reduce the cooling energy need during the hot season.This technology is currently well known and widely used in the USA, while receiving increasing attention in Europe. In order to investigate the effectiveness of cool roofs as a passive strategy for passive cooling in moderately hot climates, this paper presents the numerical results of a case study based on the dynamic thermal analysis of an existing office building in Catania (southern Italy, Mediterranean area). The results show how the application of a cool paint on the roof can enhance the thermal comfort of the occupants by reducing the operative temperatures of the rooms and to reduce the overall energy needs of the building for space heating and cooling.