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Representative Changes in Emission Concentration

Concepts
By Elize Labuschagne; The oil refinery in Barrancabermeja, Colombia is run by the State run oil company, Ecopetrol. At nearly 1,000 miles long, the Magdalena River covers 24% of the national territory and is an economic life-force for the more than 30 million Colombians that live throughout the basin. With the help of the Ministry of Environment and the river’s environmental authority, Cormagdalena, the Conservancy is implementing conservation strategies throughout the basin.
By Elize Labuschagne; The oil refinery in Barrancabermeja, Colombia is run by the State run oil company, Ecopetrol. At nearly 1,000 miles long, the Magdalena River covers 24% of the national territory and is an economic life-force for the more than 30 million Colombians that live throughout the basin. With the help of the Ministry of Environment and the river’s environmental authority, Cormagdalena, the Conservancy is implementing conservation strategies throughout the basin.

With climate change, the planet is experiencing phenomena caused by the emission of greenhouse gases[1] and that, if not mitigated, will seriously affect the ecosystems and socioeconomic systems of different regions of the planet, and therefore the possible impacts on natural resources in the event of different climate change scenarios should be known.

To study of these possible phenomena, the intergovernmental panel on climate change that has been in charge of generating scenarios by describing representative changes in the concentration of emissions or RCPs that describe different projections for greenhouse gas and aerosol emissions and concentrations and for land use over the course of the 21st century.

The RCPs include strong emission reduction scenarios (RCP2.6), two intermediate scenarios (RCP4.5 and RCP6.0) and a high emissions scenario (RCP8.5), which identify of increasing temperatures in all scenarios evaluated, leading to warming and long-term changes in all components of the climate system, increasing the likelihood of severe, widespread and irreversible impacts on people and ecosystems.

A RCP scenario basically consists of numbers associated with estimating emissions up to 2100, based on assumptions about economic activity, energy sources, population growth, and other socioeconomic factors. Each RCP contains the same categories of data, but the values ​​vary widely, reflecting different emission trajectories over time, as determined by the underlying socioeconomic assumptions (which are unique to each RCP).

Using all available data for the intervening years, a trajectory can be given for any specific emmisions. Each RCP traces a different emission path (pathway) and cumulative emission concentration in 2100.

The models that were selected to incorporate into WaterProof were:

  • RCP-4.5
    • BCC-CSM2-MR
    • CNRM-ESM2-1
    • MIROC6
  • RCP-8.5
    • BCC-CSM2-MR
    • CNRM-ESM2-1
    • MIROC6

[1] Carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide, which prevent heat emitted from the Earth's surface from dissipating

Bibliography

  1. The Beginner’s Guide to Representative Concentration Pathways G. P. WAYNE 2013

    Document that highlights the importance of climate change scenarios

References

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