Water availability, evaporative demand and climate change. Water availability is the balance between supply (i.e., rainfall) and evaporative demand. Rainfall is well studied but evaporative demand is not. The scientifically useful measure of evaporative demand is the rate of evaporation of water from a metal pan - called pan evaporation. Worldwide measurements show decreasing pan evaporation rate over the last 30-50 years. This project will for the first time make a detailed study of that phenom ....Water availability, evaporative demand and climate change. Water availability is the balance between supply (i.e., rainfall) and evaporative demand. Rainfall is well studied but evaporative demand is not. The scientifically useful measure of evaporative demand is the rate of evaporation of water from a metal pan - called pan evaporation. Worldwide measurements show decreasing pan evaporation rate over the last 30-50 years. This project will for the first time make a detailed study of that phenomenon using a new purpose-built evaporation pan. This will result in better information and policy advice about changes in water availability with climate change.Read moreRead less
Daily hydrological and erosion modelling utilising sub-daily rainfall intensity distributions. Australian catchments face major environmental problems. Computer modelling for predicting outcomes of management decisions, in the priority setting process and for assisting with setting local targets is central to environmental management today. This research will develop a new approach for modelling runoff and erosion that is consistent with key process time and space scales. The research is based o ....Daily hydrological and erosion modelling utilising sub-daily rainfall intensity distributions. Australian catchments face major environmental problems. Computer modelling for predicting outcomes of management decisions, in the priority setting process and for assisting with setting local targets is central to environmental management today. This research will develop a new approach for modelling runoff and erosion that is consistent with key process time and space scales. The research is based on improved process understanding and will utilize the large Australian database of hydroclimate and spatial data. This research will lead to improved estimation of runoff and erosion in gauged and ungauged catchments, allowing decisions on land and water resources and environmental management to be made with more reliable information.Read moreRead less
Improving understanding of climate change and its impacts in Australia through detection and attribution of climate change. This research will quantify the contribution to Australian regional climate change due to greenhouse gases, which will assist policymakers in reaching decisions about policies on emission reductions or adaptation to greenhouse climate change. Improved estimates of uncertainties in future regional climate changes due to increasing greenhouse gases will allow better quantifi ....Improving understanding of climate change and its impacts in Australia through detection and attribution of climate change. This research will quantify the contribution to Australian regional climate change due to greenhouse gases, which will assist policymakers in reaching decisions about policies on emission reductions or adaptation to greenhouse climate change. Improved estimates of uncertainties in future regional climate changes due to increasing greenhouse gases will allow better quantification of their likely impacts, estimation of the costs or maximising any benefits from regional climate changes. Through collaboration with the Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO, this research enhances Australia's capabilities in diagnostic analysis of climate variability and change, and aids the development and evaluation of new Australian climate models. Read moreRead less
Radar Studies of Rainfall with Applications to Forecasting. Weather watch radars are used to predict severe weather events, with echo strengths depending on the number of rain drops in the beam. With suitable calibration the echo intensities can be used to predict rainfall rates. In 2005 the Bureau of Meteorology will establish a new weather radar near Adelaide. We will compare rainfall estimates made with the new radar with results from a VHF profiler that accurately measures rain drop distribu ....Radar Studies of Rainfall with Applications to Forecasting. Weather watch radars are used to predict severe weather events, with echo strengths depending on the number of rain drops in the beam. With suitable calibration the echo intensities can be used to predict rainfall rates. In 2005 the Bureau of Meteorology will establish a new weather radar near Adelaide. We will compare rainfall estimates made with the new radar with results from a VHF profiler that accurately measures rain drop distributions and rainfall. The aim is to test the weather radar estimates of rainfall rates and their uncertainties. Outcomes will have applications in flood forecasting and hydrology.Read moreRead less