ALBERT

Description: In support of the first Tropospheric Ozone Assessment Report (TOAR) a relational database of global surface ozone observations has been developed and populated with hourly measurement data and enhanced metadata. A comprehensive suite of ozone data products including standard statistics, health and vegetation impact metrics, and trend information, are made available through a common data portal and a web interface. These data form the basis of the TOAR analyses focusing on human health, vegetation, and climate relevant ozone issues, which are part of this special feature.Cooperation among many data centers and individual researchers worldwide made it possible to build the world's largest collection of in-situ hourly surface ozone data covering the period from 1970 to 2015. By combining the data from almost 10,000 measurement sites around the world with global metadata information, new analyses of surface ozone have become possible, such as the first globally consistent characterisations of measurement sites as either urban or rural/remote. Exploitation of these global metadata allows for new insights into the global distribution, and seasonal and long-term changes of tropospheric ozone and they enable TOAR to perform the first, globally consistent analysis of present-day ozone concentrations and recent ozone changes with relevance to health, agriculture, and climate.Considerable effort was made to harmonize and synthesize data formats and metadata information from various networks and individual data submissions. Extensive quality control was applied to identify questionable and erroneous data, including changes in apparent instrument offsets or calibrations. Such data were excluded from TOAR data products. Limitations of a posteriori data quality assurance are discussed. As a result of the work presented here, global coverage of surface ozone data for scientific analysis has been significantly extended. Yet, large gaps remain in the surface observation network both in terms of regions without monitoring, and in terms of regions that have monitoring programs but no public access to the data archive. Therefore future improvements to the database will require not only improved data harmonization, but also expanded data sharing and increased monitoring in data-sparse regions.

Description: Climate change is becoming an existential threat with warming in excess of 2°C within the next three decades and 4°C to 6°C within the next several decades. Warming of such magnitudes will expose as many as 75% of the world’s population to deadly heat stress in addition to disrupting the climate and weather worldwide. Climate change is an urgent problem requiring urgent solutions. This report lays out urgent and practical solutions that are ready for implementation now, will deliver benefits in the next few critical decades, and places the world on a path to achieving the long-term targets of the Paris Agreement and near-term sustainable development goals. The approach consists of four building blocks and 3 levers to implement ten scalable solutions described in this report by a team of climate scientists, policy makers, social and behavioral scientists, political scientists, legal experts, diplomats, and military experts from around the world. These solutions will enable society to decarbonize the global energy system by 2050 through efficiency and renewables, drastically reduce short-lived climate pollutants, and stabilize the climate well below 2°C both in the near term (before 2050) and in the long term (post 2050). It will also reduce premature mortalities by tens of millions by 2050. As an insurance against policy lapses, mitigation delays and faster than projected climate changes, the solutions include an Atmospheric Carbon Extraction lever to remove CO2 from the air. The amount of CO2 that must be removed ranges from negligible, if the emissions of CO2 from the energy system and SLCPs start to decrease by 2020 and carbon neutrality is achieved by 2050, to a staggering one trillion tons if the carbon lever is not pulled and emissions of climate pollutants continue to increase until 2030.

Description: Various emerging technologies challenge existing governance processes to identify, assess, and manage risk. Though the existing risk-based paradigm has been essential for assessment of many chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear technologies, a complementary approach may be warranted for the early-stage assessment and management challenges of high uncertainty technologies ranging from nanotechnology to synthetic biology to artificial intelligence, among many others. This paper argues for a risk governance approach that integrates quantitative experimental information alongside qualitative expert insight to characterize and balance the risks, benefits, costs, and societal implications of emerging technologies. Various articles in scholarly literature have highlighted differing points of how to address technological uncertainty, and this article builds upon such knowledge to explain how an emerging technology risk governance process should be driven by a multi-stakeholder effort, incorporate various disparate sources of information, review various endpoints and outcomes, and comparatively assess emerging technology performance against existing conventional products in a given application area. At least in the early stages of development when quantitative data for risk assessment remain incomplete or limited, such an approach can be valuable for policymakers and decision makers to evaluate the impact that such technologies may have upon human and environmental health.

Description: All stakeholders, and perhaps especially the public, should acknowledge that sustainable management of complex public risk is always going to be a matter of judgement. Such judgements will always face challenges of uncertainty and controversy and, while there are legitimate questions to be asked about who should make the decision and the effectiveness of their chosen approaches, it is central that decision makers receive a clear mandate and appropriate political support and trust. The concepts discussed encourage approaches to risk that permit it to be intelligently understood and managed. They are intended to foster appropriate approaches to risk decision making by those in authority, to ensure that decision making is proportionate, ethical, fair and trusted, and perceived to be so by those on whose behalf the decisions are made. It is useful to distinguish ‘how the public thinks about risk’ and ‘how public risk perception and choices are thought about by authority’, and both deserve critical scrutiny. Public pressure around environmental risk has promoted a more balanced conception that recognizes decisions are not based only on formalised knowledge about likely impacts and that it is necessary to think more broadly about ways to implement sustainable management actions. However, a similar approach is lacking in other areas, such as lifestyle risk. Cross fertilisation of good practice between different areas will be important for future improvement. It is necessary to achieve a balance between placing greater emphasis upon the contextual logic of public risk choices whilst also promoting the insight available from scientific inquiries based on data acquisition, statistical analysis and probability theory. Ten principles have been developed to address a number of important issues that have arisen from a wide-ranging evaluation of contemporary successes and failures in public risk interventions. The first four principles are intended to guide decision makers on ways to utilise insights into risk concepts in making policy decisions. Principles 5-8 relate to improving the quality of risk analysis and numbers 9 and 10 are suggestions for helping the public to make better risk decisions for themselves. Finally, an additional principle, number 11, acknowledges that we live in a dynamic world and reminds policy makers that this includes a need to respond to developments in approaches to the consideration and management of risk.

Description: Eine Faziesrekonstruktion W1d Korrelation obersinischer-unterkambrischer Schichten der Yangtze-Plattform (Südchina) wird vorgestellt. Dabei wird zwischen geschütztem Becken, Schwelle W1d tiefem Becken unterschieden. Die unterkambrische Schwarzschiefer-Transgression, der "Badaowan" Event, wird als diachron gekennzeichnet. Nach Untersuchungen der Lithologie W1d Geochemie der unterkambrischen Sedimente, vorwiegend Schwarzschiefer des Profils Sansha (nahe Dayong. N-Hunan), kann zwischen Sedimenten, die unter teilweise anoxischen Bedingungen oder im stagnierenden Becken abgelagert wurden, unterschieden werden. Schwammnadeln sind im untersten Unterkambrium Zentralchinas weit verbreitet. Neufimde vollständiger hexactinellider Schwämme Sanshadictya microreticulata gen. et sp. 0., Hyalosinica archaica gen. et sp.o., Triticispongia diagonata gen. et sp. n., Solactiniella plumata gen. et sp. 0., Hunanospongia sp. QIAN & DING, 1988, Hexactinellida indet., eines fraglichen vertreters der Demospongiae, Saetaspongia densa gen. et sp. 0. sowie eines Vertreters der Malacostraca Perspicaris sp., W1d einer unbenannten A1genfonn, werden vorgestellt. Schwammnadeln wurden ebenfalls neu in Gesteinen des Shibantan Mb. (Dengying Fm., Ob. Proterozoikum) vom Straßenaufschluß Liantuo (nahe Yichang. S-Hubei) gefunden. Die Fauna vorwiegend hexactinellider Schwämme von Sansha wird im Zusammenhang mit den taphonornisch AhnIichen Spongienfaunen des Red Hil1s Quarry (Mitteldevon, Nevada) und des Arnager Kalkes (Kreide, Bomholm) diskutiert.

Description: A facies reconstruction and correlation ofUpper Sinian - Lower Cambrian strata ofthe Yangtze platform (South China) is presented. Protected basin, uplift and deep basin development may be distinguished. The Lower Cambrian black shale transgression, the "Badaowan" Event, is characterized as diachronous. As a result of these investigations of lithology and geochemistry of the Lower Cambrian sediments (mainly black shales ofthe Sansha section, near Dayong. N. Hunan), sediments deposited under partially anoxic conditions or in a stagnant basin have been recognized. Sponge spicules are widely distributed in the lowennost Lower Cambrian of CentraI China. Recently discovered more or less complete sponges, including Sanshadictya microreticulata gen. et sp. 0., Hyalosinica archaica gen. et sp. 0., Triticispongia diagonata gen. et sp. 0., Solactiniella plumata gen. et sp. 0., Hunanospongia sp. QIAN & DING, 1988, Hexactinellida indet., a questionable demosponge, Saetaspongia densa gen. et sp. 0., and the Malacostraca Perspicaris sp., and an unnamed a1ga are described. Sponge spicules additionally were found in rocks of the Shibantan Mb. (Dengying Fm., Upper Proterozoic) from the road section of Liantuo (near Yichang. S.Hubei province). The fauna ofmainly hexactinellid poriferans from Sansha is discussed with regard to the similar taphonomy ofthe sponge faunas from the Red Hills Quarry (MiddIe Devonian ofNevada) and from the Arnager Iirnestooe (Cretaceous, Bomholm).

Description: Snow in the environment acts as a host to rich chemistry and provides a matrix for physical exchange of contaminants within the ecosystem. The goal of this review is to summarise the current state of knowledge of physical processes and chemical reactivity in surface snow with relevance to polar regions. It focuses on a description of impurities in distinct compartments present in surface snow, such as snow crystals, grain boundaries, crystal surfaces, and liquid parts. It emphasises the microscopic description of the ice surface and its link with the environment. Distinct differences between the disordered air–ice interface, often termed quasi-liquid layer, and a liquid phase are highlighted. The reactivity in these different compartments of surface snow is discussed using many experimental studies, simulations, and selected snow models from the molecular to the macro-scale. Although new experimental techniques have extended our knowledge of the surface properties of ice and their impact on some single reactions and processes, others occurring on, at or within snow grains remain unquantified. The presence of liquid or liquid-like compartments either due to the formation of brine or disorder at surfaces of snow crystals below the freezing point may strongly modify reaction rates. Therefore, future experiments should include a detailed characterisation of the surface properties of the ice matrices. A further point that remains largely unresolved is the distribution of impurities between the different domains of the condensed phase inside the snowpack, i.e. in the bulk solid, in liquid at the surface or trapped in confined pockets within or between grains, or at the surface. While surface-sensitive laboratory techniques may in the future help to resolve this point for equilibrium conditions, additional uncertainty for the environmental snowpack may be caused by the highly dynamic nature of the snowpack due to the fast metamorphism occurring under certain environmental conditions. Due to these gaps in knowledge the first snow chemistry models have attempted to reproduce certain processes like the long-term incorporation of volatile compounds in snow and firn or the release of reactive species from the snowpack. Although so far none of the models offers a coupled approach of physical and chemical processes or a detailed representation of the different compartments, they have successfully been used to reproduce some field experiments. A fully coupled snow chemistry and physics model remains to be developed.

Description: Oil palm plantations have expanded rapidly in recent decades. This large-scale land-use change has had great ecological, economic, and social impacts on both the areas converted to oil palm and their surroundings. However, research on the impacts of oil palm cultivation is scattered and patchy, and no clear overview exists. We address this gap through a systematic and comprehensive literature review of all ecosystem functions in oil palm plantations, including several (genetic, medicinal and ornamental resources, information functions) not included in previous systematic reviews. We compare ecosystem functions in oil palm plantations to those in forests, as the conversion of forest to oil palm is prevalent in the tropics. We find that oil palm plantations generally have reduced ecosystem functioning compared to forests: 11 out of 14 ecosystem functions show a net decrease in level of function. Some functions show decreases with potentially irreversible global impacts (e.g. reductions in gas and climate regulation, habitat and nursery functions, genetic resources, medicinal resources, and information functions). The most serious impacts occur when forest is cleared to establish new plantations, and immediately afterwards, especially on peat soils. To variable degrees, specific plantation management measures can prevent or reduce losses of some ecosystem functions (e.g. avoid illegal land clearing via fire, avoid draining of peat, use of integrated pest management, use of cover crops, mulch, and compost) and we highlight synergistic mitigation measures that can improve multiple ecosystem functions simultaneously. The only ecosystem function which increases in oil palm plantations is, unsurprisingly, the production of marketable goods. Our review highlights numerous research gaps. In particular, there are significant gaps with respect to socio-cultural information functions. Further, there is a need for more empirical data on the importance of spatial and temporal scales, such as differences among plantations in different environments, of different sizes, and of different ages, as our review has identified examples where ecosystem functions vary spatially and temporally. Finally, more research is needed on developing management practices that can offset the losses of ecosystem functions. Our findings should stimulate research to address the identified gaps, and provide a foundation for more systematic research and discussion on ways to minimize the negative impacts and maximize the positive impacts of oil palm cultivation.

Description: The Fennec climate programme aims to improve understanding of the Saharan climate system through a synergy of observations and modelling. We present a description of the Fennec airborne observations during 2011 and 2012 over the remote Sahara (Mauritania and Mali) and the advances in the understanding of mineral dust and boundary layer processes they have provided. Aircraft instrumentation aboard the UK FAAM BAe146 and French SAFIRE (Service des Avions Français Instrumentés pour la Recherche en Environnement) Falcon 20 is described, with specific focus on instrumentation specially developed for and relevant to Saharan meteorology and dust. Flight locations, aims and associated meteorology are described. Examples and applications of aircraft measurements from the Fennec flights are presented, highlighting new scientific results delivered using a synergy of different instruments and aircraft. These include (1) the first airborne measurement of dust particles sizes of up to 300 microns and associated dust fluxes in the Saharan atmospheric boundary layer (SABL), (2) dust uplift from the breakdown of the nocturnal low-level jet before becoming visible in SEVIRI (Spinning Enhanced Visible Infra-Red Imager) satellite imagery, (3) vertical profiles of the unique vertical structure of turbulent fluxes in the SABL, (4) in situ observations of processes in SABL clouds showing dust acting as cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) and ice nuclei (IN) at −15 °C, (5) dual-aircraft observations of the SABL dynamics, thermodynamics and composition in the Saharan heat low region (SHL), (6) airborne observations of a dust storm associated with a cold pool (haboob) issued from deep convection over the Atlas Mountains, (7) the first airborne chemical composition measurements of dust in the SHL region with differing composition, sources (determined using Lagrangian backward trajectory calculations) and absorption properties between 2011 and 2012, (8) coincident ozone and dust surface area measurements suggest coarser particles provide a route for ozone depletion, (9) discrepancies between airborne coarse-mode size distributions and AERONET (AERosol Robotic NETwork) sunphotometer retrievals under light dust loadings. These results provide insights into boundary layer and dust processes in the SHL region – a region of substantial global climatic importance.

Description: Urban air quality and human health are among the key aspects of future urban planning. In order to address pollutants such as ozone and particulate matter, efforts need to be made to quantify and reduce their concentrations. One important aspect in understanding urban air quality is the influence of urban vegetation which may act as both emitter and sink for trace gases and aerosol particles. In this context, the "Berlin Air quality and Ecosystem Research: Local and long-range Impact of anthropogenic and Natural hydrocarbons 2014" (BAERLIN2014) campaign was conducted between 2 June and 29 August in the metropolitan area of Berlin and Brandenburg, Germany. The predominant goals of the campaign were (1) the characterization of urban gaseous and particulate pollution and its attribution to anthropogenic and natural sources in the region of interest, especially considering the connection between biogenic volatile organic compounds and particulates and ozone; (2) the quantification of the impact of urban vegetation on organic trace gas levels and the presence of oxidants such as ozone; and (3) to explain the local heterogeneity of pollutants by defining the distribution of sources and sinks relevant for the interpretation of model simulations. In order to do so, the campaign included stationary measurements at urban background station and mobile observations carried out from bicycle, van and airborne platforms. This paper provides an overview of the mobile measurements (Mobile BAERLIN2014) and general conclusions drawn from the analysis. Bicycle measurements showed micro-scale variations of temperature and particulate matter, displaying a substantial reduction of mean temperatures and particulate levels in the proximity of vegetated areas compared to typical urban residential area (background) measurements. Van measurements extended the area covered by bicycle observations and included continuous measurements of O3, NOx, CO, CO2 and point-wise measurement of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) at representative sites for traffic- and vegetation-affected sites. The quantification displayed notable horizontal heterogeneity of the short-lived gases and particle number concentrations. For example, baseline concentrations of the traffic-related chemical species CO and NO varied on average by up to ±22.2 and ±63.5 %, respectively, on the scale of 100 m around any measurement location. Airborne observations revealed the dominant source of elevated urban particulate number and mass concentrations being local, i.e., not being caused by long-range transport. Surface-based observations related these two parameters predominantly to traffic sources. Vegetated areas lowered the pollutant concentrations substantially with ozone being reduced most by coniferous forests, which is most likely caused by their reactive biogenic VOC emissions. With respect to the overall potential to reduce air pollutant levels, forests were found to result in the largest decrease, followed by parks and facilities for sports and leisure. Surface temperature was generally 0.6–2.1 °C lower in vegetated regions, which in turn will have an impact on tropospheric chemical processes. Based on our findings, effective future mitigation activities to provide a more sustainable and healthier urban environment should focus predominantly on reducing fossil-fuel emissions from traffic as well as on increasing vegetated areas.