AMMA-2050 NEC05274
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Leeds
Department Name: School of Earth and Environment
Abstract
Abstracts are not currently available in GtR for all funded research. This is normally because the abstract was not required at the time of proposal submission, but may be because it included sensitive information such as personal details.
Planned Impact
The primary impacts of AMMA-2050 will be: the enhanced uptake of the products of climate science in medium term decision-making in West Africa; and the growth of regional expertise in climate science, its impacts and the science-decision making interface.
The AMMA-2050 project combines novel scientific excellence along with fully integrated participation of stakeholders. We are building on the community of researchers and operational partners established in AMMA since 2003, which already has a strong track record of collaborative, multidisciplinary and impact-focused science. Within AMMA-2050 we aim to use this community to derive practical impact from our research, and to demonstrate specific applications of robust climate projections to planning in the agricultural and urban flood-risk sectors.
In order to deliver impact in the use of reliable climate information in these sectors, it is necessary to address the fundamental weaknesses in current climate science and the information it delivers. This physical science research in Pillar 1 of the project will be conducted in very close cooperation with a programme of applied research (Pillar 2) and practical demonstration projects (Pillar 3). Sustained communication among these groups is essential to the delivery of practical outputs that are relevant to users. For example, key measures of high-impact climatic quantities (drought, flooding etc) will be defined within the whole consortium and coordinated at the top level, so that such measures are both useful to users within the demonstration projects, and scientifically rigorous in the climate models. Furthermore, the credibility of climate information relies on the transparent evaluation of the information in terms of its accuracy and reliability. The legitimacy of the climate information will be ensured by the co-production of knowledge by institutions in Africa and Europe and by stakeholders and scientists working together on the project. Since excellent science is a major driver of the work of AMMA-2050, we aim to publish our results in the top peer-reviewed journals, and present the research at national and international meetings.
Existing partnerships and networks are the foundation upon which our communications are built. Within AMMA-2050, stakeholders have a defined role in ensuring the work is demand-led. Our knowledge exchange activities will draw on the networks our partners have in West Africa as well as involving boundary organisations such as the CCKE-Unit. Ongoing engagement of these organisations will ensure outputs of AMMA-2050 are communicated beyond our original list of stakeholders to a wider audience of interest groups. In this, we will work with regional and international agencies such as the Volta Basin Authority (VBA), the Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) programme, the African Centre of Meteorological Application for Development (ACMAD), the Economic Community Of West African States (ECOWAS), and government departments such as the Direction de la Gestion et de la Planification des Ressources en Eau (DGPRE) in Dakar.
The capacity building activities of AMMA-2050 will involve a balance of staff time visiting African and European research centres and policy placements totalling more than 60 months. Alongside attendance at international conferences and annual consortium meetings, plus significant leadership roles, the project will help to develop a skilled workforce and a new generation of leaders in African research. The ultimate beneficiaries of AMMA-2050 will be the populations of West Africa, who will benefit from more effective use of climate information in planning for an uncertain future. This is particularly so in the key areas of food security, via informed adaptive cropping and agricultural policies, and cities which are resilient to future flood risk.
The AMMA-2050 project combines novel scientific excellence along with fully integrated participation of stakeholders. We are building on the community of researchers and operational partners established in AMMA since 2003, which already has a strong track record of collaborative, multidisciplinary and impact-focused science. Within AMMA-2050 we aim to use this community to derive practical impact from our research, and to demonstrate specific applications of robust climate projections to planning in the agricultural and urban flood-risk sectors.
In order to deliver impact in the use of reliable climate information in these sectors, it is necessary to address the fundamental weaknesses in current climate science and the information it delivers. This physical science research in Pillar 1 of the project will be conducted in very close cooperation with a programme of applied research (Pillar 2) and practical demonstration projects (Pillar 3). Sustained communication among these groups is essential to the delivery of practical outputs that are relevant to users. For example, key measures of high-impact climatic quantities (drought, flooding etc) will be defined within the whole consortium and coordinated at the top level, so that such measures are both useful to users within the demonstration projects, and scientifically rigorous in the climate models. Furthermore, the credibility of climate information relies on the transparent evaluation of the information in terms of its accuracy and reliability. The legitimacy of the climate information will be ensured by the co-production of knowledge by institutions in Africa and Europe and by stakeholders and scientists working together on the project. Since excellent science is a major driver of the work of AMMA-2050, we aim to publish our results in the top peer-reviewed journals, and present the research at national and international meetings.
Existing partnerships and networks are the foundation upon which our communications are built. Within AMMA-2050, stakeholders have a defined role in ensuring the work is demand-led. Our knowledge exchange activities will draw on the networks our partners have in West Africa as well as involving boundary organisations such as the CCKE-Unit. Ongoing engagement of these organisations will ensure outputs of AMMA-2050 are communicated beyond our original list of stakeholders to a wider audience of interest groups. In this, we will work with regional and international agencies such as the Volta Basin Authority (VBA), the Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) programme, the African Centre of Meteorological Application for Development (ACMAD), the Economic Community Of West African States (ECOWAS), and government departments such as the Direction de la Gestion et de la Planification des Ressources en Eau (DGPRE) in Dakar.
The capacity building activities of AMMA-2050 will involve a balance of staff time visiting African and European research centres and policy placements totalling more than 60 months. Alongside attendance at international conferences and annual consortium meetings, plus significant leadership roles, the project will help to develop a skilled workforce and a new generation of leaders in African research. The ultimate beneficiaries of AMMA-2050 will be the populations of West Africa, who will benefit from more effective use of climate information in planning for an uncertain future. This is particularly so in the key areas of food security, via informed adaptive cropping and agricultural policies, and cities which are resilient to future flood risk.
Publications
Fitzpatrick R
(2016)
On What Scale Can We Predict the Agronomic Onset of the West African Monsoon?
in Monthly Weather Review
Challinor A
(2016)
Current warming will reduce yields unless maize breeding and seed systems adapt immediately
in Nature Climate Change
Pope RJ
(2016)
Identifying errors in dust models from data assimilation.
in Geophysical research letters
Sultan B
(2016)
Agriculture in West Africa in the Twenty-First Century: Climate Change and Impacts Scenarios, and Potential for Adaptation.
in Frontiers in plant science
Taylor CM
(2017)
Frequency of extreme Sahelian storms tripled since 1982 in satellite observations.
in Nature
Lafore J
(2017)
Meteorology of Tropical West Africa - The Forecasters' Handbook
Cornforth R
(2017)
Meteorology of Tropical West Africa - The Forecasters' Handbook
Parker D
(2017)
Meteorology of Tropical West Africa - The Forecasters' Handbook
Lafore J
(2017)
Meteorology of Tropical West Africa - The Forecasters' Handbook
Bhowmick M
(2018)
Analytical solution to a thermodynamic model for the sensitivity of afternoon deep convective initiation to the surface Bowen ratio
in Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society
| Title | The sound of Africa's changing climate |
| Description | We used climate data from the CP4 model to create music in the style of West African music. The music was driven by the data so that uncomfortable future temperatures and humidities sound discordant. From the web page: "Data sonification is a legitimate way to represent data, explains Prof Douglas Parker, who gives the example of a heart rate monitor as a demonstration of sonic data. "The idea behind this experiment is not just to produce a scientific exercise, though, says Parker, but to merge the climate data with the aesthetics of music in a way that can elicit an emotional response in the listener. "An exercise like this can have different purposes, he says. It can sell an educational story and can also activate people in the way that protest music like that of Bob Dylan and others did in the United States during the Vietnam War. It can also be an artistic activity that people can listen to and enjoy. "Prof Benjamin Lamptey's time as the Acting Director-General of the African Centre of Meteorological Applications for Development (ACMAD) in Niamey, Niger, contributed to initiating the team's first experimental track. "With this one, the team took four climatic variables for Niamey from the year 1997 - temperature, relative humidity, wind speed, and rainfall levels - and used the sonification process to rework this data as music. "Where the Ghana track has more of a West African musical style, the Niamey track is in the electronic dance music genre. In this composition, two keyboard instrumentals represent the temperature and humidity information for the Niger capital, while the percussion represents the rainfall and the bass delivers the wind data. The first half of the track is the musical rendition of the 1997 weather data, while the second half slips across to reflect the kind of shifts to these weather parameters that the city may experience a hundred years from then, and where the music becomes clashing and discordant. "The track also has a recording of Lamptey, this time reflecting on the importance of collaboration and research in order to boost climate resilience." |
| Type Of Art | Performance (Music, Dance, Drama, etc) |
| Year Produced | 2021 |
| Impact | The music has been featured in an editorial in the journal Nature. |
| URL | https://futureclimateafrica.org/news/this-is-the-sound-of-west-africas-changing-climate/ |
| Description | We have developed a method for determining the onset of the annual rains in West Africa, on a regional rather than local scale. The rains are very variable, both in terms of space and time. Some places a few kilometres apart may experience big differences in the timing of the first sustained rains of the wet season. For this reason, it has been difficult to evaluate weather and climate predictions of the onset of the rains, and to communicate any changes to stakeholders such as farmers. We have devised an analysis of "Local Onset Regions" which aggregate local onsets up to the largest possible regional scale. These are potentially useful because (a) they define areas where the onset of rain is coherent (and areas where it is not), and (b) they can be related to large-scale climatic drivers of the onset. We have shown that extreme storms in West Africa have increased threefold since the 1980s. The cause of the change seems to be changes in the windshear, leading to stronger storms able to extract more water from the atmosphere, rather than a moistening of the atmosphere. We have analysed the ability of climate models to capture the response of the rainfall to these drivers. We find that the models struggle to show a sufficiently strong response to the windshear. We have analysed climate model projections for a typical West African day in 2100, according to the RCP8.5 scenario. We found that for rainfall and temperature over most of the region the typical future day would be a very extreme day in the current climate. |
| Exploitation Route | Weather forecasters and agricultural planners in Africa should be able to use the Local Onset Region (LOR) method to understand the skills and limitations of the forecasts they are using. For instance, they may expect forecasts to be consistent within known LORs, but not beyond these scales. They may also have local information regarding climatic "drivers" of particular LORs (we see that in some LORs, for instance, it is the change in wind direction some 6 weeks earlier that precedes rainfall onset). Other researchers are using the LOR methods to analyse monsoon onsets in Africa and SE Asia, and their relationships to climatic drivers. Our results showing intensification of storms in recent years, and projection to the future, are being used to influence planning for response to extreme events in West Africa. |
| Sectors | Agriculture, Food and Drink,Energy,Environment |
| URL | http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/MWR-D-15-0274.1 |
| Description | The knowledge developed on intensification of extreme rains, in the past decades and in future projection, is being used in planning for future flooding in Ouagadougou as part of the AMMA-2050 Pillar 3 work. |
| First Year Of Impact | 2019 |
| Sector | Environment |
| Impact Types | Policy & public services |
| Description | CEH-Leeds |
| Organisation | UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Sector | Public |
| PI Contribution | My team in Leeds conduct atmospheric studies using observations, models and theoretical ideas. I have also led a number of projects and field experiements in which we have collaborated with CEH. |
| Collaborator Contribution | Expertise in land-surface processes. Expertise in land-atmosphere interactions. Expertise in land-atmosphere climate dynamics. Data analysis, especially remote sensing of rainfall and land surface state. Leadership of projects. Co-supervision of PhD students. |
| Impact | This is a multidisciplinary partnership in the area of land-atmosphere interaction. It has resulted in a large number of high-impact papers, successful jointly-supervised PhD studentships, and successful impacts, especially in Africa. |
| Description | Met Office |
| Organisation | Meteorological Office UK |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Sector | Academic/University |
| PI Contribution | Our research group analyses atmospheric processes in order to better represent them in the Met Office's forecast models. We also use those forecast models in our research, and evaluate their performance in order to identify the best strategies to improve the models. |
| Collaborator Contribution | The Met Office brings its models and its datasets to the partnership, in addition to the considerable expertise of its staff. The Met Office also represent a conduit to the impact of our research for society, through its provision of operational weather and climate forecasts. |
| Impact | Our research has influenced the Met Office strategy for model development, especially in regard to high-resolution models, and the convective parametrisation scheme. We have jointly influenced international strategy for atmospheric research and measurements. |
| Description | Collaboration with PAS/PNA and Climate Analytics |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
| Results and Impact | Collaboration with the PAS/PNA workshop coordinated by partners Climate Analytics, to share current scientific understanding regarding future climate for Senegal and potential impacts across sectors. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| URL | https://climateanalytics.org/media/re_rapport_final_pas_pna_150319.pdf |
| Description | Consultation with decision makers in Senegal |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
| Results and Impact | Sharing of emerging learning about future climate in West Africa, with consultation on potential impacts in Senegal and how it can support national and sub-national planning, particularly for the agricultural sector |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2015,2018 |
| URL | https://www.amma2050.org/sites/default/files/May-2018-Dakar-WorkshopReport.pdf |
| Description | Meeting with Mayors in Ouagadougou |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Local |
| Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
| Results and Impact | Meeting with city and national decision makers in Burkina Faso as part of AMMA-2050's pilot to strengthen flood-resilient urban planning in Ouagadougou. Project partners shared a range of tools, including - Intensity-Duration-Frequency (IDF) curves, flood risk maps, emerging scientific understanding about the future climate in West Africa - and sought decision makers' feedback on the use and further development of these products to support decision-making |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | https://www.amma2050.org/sites/default/files/RapportMayoralmeeting24May2018-shortend.pdf |
| Description | joint WASCAL-AMMA2050 workshop |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
| Results and Impact | The joint WASCAL-AMMA 2050 workshop aimed to support and inform WASCAL's approach to co-producing climate services. Together with invited policymakers working at city, national and regional levels, researchers from AMMA-2050 and WASCAL shared and discussed a range of approaches for developing climate services tailored to support specific decision-making processes. The workshop employed a participatory impact pathways approach, with methodologies presented including: Theatre Forum, participatory modelling and the Plateau Game, as employed within the AMMA-2050 pilot projects. WASCAL welcomed the workshop, with colleagues embracing the proposed approaches. The institution also recognised the need to ensure dedicated science-policy resource to strengthen institutional engagement with decision makers. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | https://wascal.org/wascal-amma-2050-set-roadmap-to-activate-science-policy-links-in-west-africa/ |