In: Swiss Medical Weekly, 2002, vol. 25-26, p. 329
This paper addresses a number of problems relating climatic change and human health. Following an introduction that outlines the over-arching issues, a short summary is given on climatic change and its anthropogenic causes. The rest of the paper then focuses on the direct and indirect impacts of global climatic change on health. Direct effects comprise changes in the hygrothermal stress response...
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In: Theoretical and Applied Climatology, 2002, vol. 73(3-4), p. 133-150
A study has been conducted to assess the reasons for a significant decrease in the astronomic observing period since the Very Large Telescope of ESO (the European Southern Observatory) went into operation in 1998. Following a multi-year monitoring of meteorological parameters at the site of the ESO telescope in Paranal (northern Chile), the optimal climatic conditions observed there prior to the...
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In: Theoretical and Applied Climatology, 2003, vol. 74, no. 1-2, p. 19-31
In many instances, snow cover and duration are a major controlling factor on a range of environmental systems in mountain regions. When assessing the impacts of climatic change on mountain ecosystems and river basins whose origin lie in the Alps, one of the key controls on such systems will reside in changes in snow amount and duration. At present, regional climate models or statistical...
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In: Theoretical and Applied Climatology, 2003, vol. 76, p. 125
Snow is a key feature of mountain environments in terms of the controls it exerts on hydrology, vegetation, and in terms of its economic significance (e.g., for the ski industry). Its quantification in a changing climate is thus important for various environmental and economic impact assessments. Based on observational analysis, surface energy balance modeling, and the latest data from...
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In: Climatic Change, 2003, vol. 59, no. 1, p. 5-31
This paper addresses a number of issues related to current and future climatic change and its impacts on mountain environments and economies, focusing on the `Mountain Regions' Chapter 13 of Agenda 21, a basis document presented at the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro, and the International Year of the Mountains (IYM) 2002. The awareness...
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In: Journal of Geophysical Research, 2003, vol. 108, no. 13, p. 1-16
The implementation of a physically based parameterization scheme for computation of wind gusts in a numerical regional climate model (RCM) is described in this paper. The method is based on an innovative approach proposed by Brasseur [2001] that assumes that gusts occurring at the surface result from the deflection of air parcels flowing higher in the boundary layer. Our parameterization scheme...
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In: Climatic Change, 2004, vol. 65, p. 11
The Earth's climate system is highly nonlinear: inputs and outputs are not proportional, change is often episodic and abrupt, rather than slow and gradual, and multiple equilibria are the norm. While this is widely accepted, there is a relatively poor understanding of the different types of nonlinearities, how they manifest under various conditions, and whether they reflect a climate system...
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In: Geophysical Research Letters, 2004, vol. 31, p. L02202
The 2003 heat wave that affected much of Europe from June to September bears a close resemblance to what many regional climate models are projecting for summers in the latter part of the 21st century. Model results suggest that under enhanced atmospheric greenhouse-gas concentrations, summer temperatures are likely to increase by over 4°C on average, with a corresponding increase in the...
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In: Global and Planetary Change, 2004, vol. 44, p. 73-81
The heat wave that affected many parts of Europe during the course of summer 2003 may be a harbinger of summers that could occur more regularly in a future climate, under enhanced greenhouse gas concentrations. Switzerland was not exempt from the 2003 heat wave and, indeed, the previous absolute maximum temperature record dating back to the middle of the 20th century was exceeded by over 2 °C....
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In: Global and Planetary Change, 2004, vol. 44, p. 1-9
This short introductory paper illustrates some key issues concerning extremes by focusing on daily temperature extremes defined using quantiles and threshold exceedances. The examples include both a low- and a high-elevation site in the Swiss Alps where long records of homogenous daily data are readily available. The analysis of extremes highlights several features, some of them taken from...
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