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RUNNING HEAD: THE WABASH RIVER WATERSHED AND ITS DATA ABOUT GLOBAL WARMING

The Wabash River Watershed and Its Data about Global Warming Joseph Nelson [University]

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Introduction Global warming happens when the temperature of the earth rises. It occurs when greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, water vapor, nitrous oxide, and methane trap the heat and light in the atmosphere of the planet, which increases the temperature. Global warming has tremendous effects to the planet and the living things that reside in it (Global Warming). When the issue of global warming is discussed, the first things that come to mind are the human activities that greatly contribute to the process of global warming. In addition to this, people also see the harsh effect of it to the life on the planet. However sometimes, the changes are not blatant that people do not notice the change at all until its too late. Unless of course,

there are certain studies conducted to monitor the changes that ordinary humans do not take notice of on a smaller scale. One example of this is the changes that occurred over the course of the decades in the Wabash River Watershed in the United States. The Wabash River Watershed covers an area of greater than 33,000 square miles in extreme west-central Ohio, the central 4/5 of Indiana, excluding the extreme northern areas that drain into the Great Lakes and the extreme southern strip that drains directly into the Ohio River and the southeastern of Illinois. The major cities that fall within this watershed include Indianapolis, Champaign, Urbana, Terre Haute, Lafayette and Vincennes. There have been constant monthly data calculations of the atmospheric and surface water for this region, which are re-charted on an annual basis. The gathered data includes maximum, minimum, and average temperatures, and the average temperature range. Precipitation data is also recorded, including days of light, moderate, heavy and the total number of days of

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precipitation. Water balance data are also taken into consideration and this includes actual evapotranspiration, deficit, and surplus and estimated water runoff, which is often a proxy for stream flow data. These data were taken in between the years 1961 through 1990, during the time when there was little direct evidence of a warming climate and the beginning period of significant warming. The data were graphed and based on the graphic representation of the data; people can learn if there are indeed evidences of warming in the Earths atmosphere. Is there evidence of Global Warming? According to the data presented by the graph of the temperatures in the Wabash River Watershed area from 1961 to 1990, the overall trend in the annual maximum temperature is in a decreasing manner until approximately in 1982, when the temperature value increased significantly though the end of the decade. The data also indicated that the maximum temperature at the end of the period was nearly as high as it was at the beginning, with the increase occurring over a much shorter time period. Additionally, the data further indicated that in the late l970s, the temperature was at its lowest, but it spiked up towards the end of the decade which reached high levels in a 30-year period. The researchers explained that the increase of temperature during this period is an indication that the end of the decade of the 1970s saw the first indications of human-induced global warming. The decade that spanned the 1970s was the coldest in U.S. history and according to some studies, this coldness in temperature can be likened to another Little Ice Age.

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In another recorded data, there was a point during this 30-year period that there was a low value in the early 1980s. There were peaks in the early 1970s as well as in the late 1980s. The general trend of the 10-year running mean is upward. According to global warming theories, the increased temperature in the global and local setting increases the rate of evaporation. An increased rate in evaporation leads to the increased formation of clouds, fog or haze. This in turn increases the heat that is trapped in the lower atmosphere, leading to higher minimum temperatures. The data also indicated that in the 10-year period, the annual temperature in the Wabash Valley was roughly stable in the first decade, while there was a decline in the average temperatures during the second decade, and rapidly increasing in the 3rd decade. The increase in the annual temperature indicated an increase by 1 degree over the time period from the second decade going into the 3rd decade. The data from the 1980s indicated a rapidly increasing average temperature, which seems to support the idea that planet was already entering a period of rapid global warming (University of Wisconsin, 1999). Aside from the observations done in the Wabash Valley, there were also other observations done by other scientists on a global perspective. Scientists have observed that ocean temperatures, from the surface to 1000m integrated over depth, have increased by .05C since the middle of the 20th century (Cangialosi). Across the globe, there were significant number of sea ice and land ice that have been breaking apart and glaciers are also retreating, except for the glaciers in the Antarctic and New Zealand regions. Snow has also decreased globally and the surface height of the sea has increased 4-8 inches across the globe (Cangialosi).

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In addition, extreme weather patterns have also began to exist since the middle of the 1970s, which was also recorded in the Wabash Valley during this time. Since the 1900, there has been an increase in cloud cover by 2% in the Northern Hemisphere. What this indicates is that the changes in the temperature and weather patterns in the Wabash Valley is only a fragment of the overall changes on a global scale brought about by global warming. Theorists are also looking at the possibility of more droughts and less surplus water conditions for inland or continental locations. According to the data presented by the observations in the Wabash Valley, there was a rapid increase in the annual precipitation in the first decade and in the following decades, the increase continued on. There were also data recorded on the increase of water vapor to be available for precipitation since the levels of precipitation have increased significantly, from 39 inches at the beginning of the period to 42 inches at the end. As the temperature increases, the rate of evaporation also increases. The last year of the 30-year data showed a far in excess of precipitation than any other year. The data however, does not support the idea that continental land mass areas would receive less precipitation in a globally warmed environment. One of the beliefs is that global warming affects high latitudes more than tropical ones. Therefore, there is less of a temperature difference north to south in the northern hemisphere. This temperature gradient is one of the things that helps drive and create strong storm systems. A weak temperature gradient would mean that continental storm systems or low pressure areas would be weaker and less able to transport moisture inland from the Gulf of Mexico, resulting in lower precipitation amounts. The data does not support this. Additionally, it should be remembered that it is both precipitation

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(low amounts) and evaporation (high amounts) that work to provide drought conditions, not just the lack of rainfall. The data also indicated that a general increase in evapotranspiration, or the transport of water into the atmosphere from the surfaces of the earth, with a peak in the late 1970s. Global warming theories have indicated that there should be similar or lower amounts of precipitation, as well as increased levels of evapotranspiration due to the higher temperatures. The data further added that the actual evapotranspiration during the 1980s was mostly stable, slightly declining, which have indicated that global warming, as how it is currently understand was not acting the way it was expected to be. Data have also indicated that the overall trend in terms of moisture deficit in the Wabash region indicated that a downward movement was seen in the presented data. This indicated that in the course of ten years, there was a decrease in the moisture in the atmosphere in the region, which would lead to global-warming induced droughts. The data also revealed that there was an increase in runoff, or the flow of water, from rain, snowmelt, or other sources, over land. In fact, the data have revealed that amount of runoff from the beginning to the end of the period increased from 13.2 to 15.5 inches. The 5-year running mean data indicated that the runoff seemed to run in 2-3 year cycles of maximums and minimums, but the peaks of the cycles grew to higher and higher levels. This data, by itself, would not appear to agree with the consequences of global warming, as people have understood them to this point.

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What Global Warming has done lately? In the past, prior to the impact of human activities in the warming of the Earths temperature, the Earth has experienced climate change without help from humanity. What is most bothering in this period is that the changes are more rapid than it was before. Although the natural causes of climate change have been in play until today, they have little impact on the changes in temperature that the planet is experiencing today because their impact can either be too small or too slow to provide an explanation on the rapid warming of the Earths temperature in the past decades (Riebeek, 2010). Scientists have predicted that as the world consumes more fossil fuel, greenhouse gas concentrations will continue to increase and the average surface temperature of the Earth will rise along with it. Based on the scenarios created by scientists, the average surface temperatures may rise between 2C and 6C by the end of the 21st century. Even if the emission of greenhouse gases will be reduced, this warming will still occur because the Earth system has not yet fully adjusted to environmental changes that human activities have induced (Riebeek, 2010). The increase in temperature in the atmosphere is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the impact of global warming. The impact is far greater and some of the changes are already felt today. The changes in the temperature modifies rainfall patterns, amplifies coastal erosion, lengthens the growing season in some regions, melts ice caps and glaciers, and alters the ranges of some infectious diseases (Riebeek, 2010). What can be done? There have been actions done in order to stop global warming and the harsh effects of it to the environment. Small acts such as carpooling are a great contribution to the decrease in the

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amount of greenhouse gases that are emitted to the air. However, this may not entirely stop global warming from happening since even if the emission of greenhouse gases will be stopped today, the warming of the temperature would still continue on. Nonetheless, it would help in the lessening the ones already existing in the atmosphere. Limiting the use of appliances that requires too much energy is a great help in the reduction of burning of fossil fuels, thus fewer greenhouse gases are emitted to the atmosphere (Global Warming: Early Warning Signs). On the part of the government, there have been several acts enacted to put a stop to global warming such as The Clean Air Act. The Clean Air Act requires many companies to change their products to decrease the problems associated with global warming. The Clean Air Act has also made car companies change some of the components that make up the insides of their cars. Conclusion There is only one known planet that can support human life. If these things continue to happen in the next few years, our planet will see even more changes that will affect the way we live and the way the future generations will live. Many of the effects of global warming are already felt today and the data taken from the Wabash Valley is only a fraction of the overall changes that is occurring in the planet due to global warming. Today, many regions of the planet are experiencing irregular weather patterns brought by the changes in the atmosphere. Ice caps are melting, which has caused water levels to rise in some areas that has caused flooding that killed many people. Extreme heat wave has caused many people to die and forests to burn. These are only some of the changes and there are bound to be more, more extreme changes that we can no longer adapt to them. It is never too late, if we

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act right now; we can still reverse the effects of global warming and still provide a better future for the next generation.

Reference: Cangialosi, J. (n.d.). Global Warming True or Myth. Retrieved May 11, 2011, from http://orca.rsmas.miami.edu: http://orca.rsmas.miami.edu/~johnc/Warming.html Global Warming. (n.d.). Retrieved May 9, 2011, from //library.thinkquest.org: http://library.thinkquest.org/CR0215471/global_warming.htm Global Warming: Early Warning Signs. (n.d.). Retrieved May 11, 2011, from http://www.climatehotmap.org/: http://www.climatehotmap.org/ Riebeek, H. (2010, June 3). Global Warming. Retrieved May 11, 2011, from http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov: http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/GlobalWarming/ University of Wisconsin. (1999). Sizzling year. Torrid decade. Blistering future? Retrieved May 11, 2011, from http://whyfiles.org: http://whyfiles.org/080global_warm/