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| Frontier Research Center for Global Change sets a goal
as "Towards the Prediction of Global Change." In order to
achieve the goal, we are developing "Integrated Earth System
Model", which has so far been studied separately, such as the
atmosphere, the ocean, the land and ecosystems. In this edition, we
would like to explain the progress of our model development, and introduce
projections of atmospheric CO2 concentration in the future and an
analytical result of CO2 dissolving in the ocean using our said model. |
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It has been
recently recognized in the field of earth science
that the earth's surface environment around us is a
system
formed through interactions between its components such
as
atmosphere, ocean, land, and biota. So far, these components
have been subjects of separate disciplines.
Recently, however, it is becoming more and more important
to recognize processes forming the global environment
with a well-balanced set of necessary perceptions obtained
in different disciplines. 10th session of the Conference
of the Parties (COP10), which took place in December
2004 in Buenos Aires, Argentina, provides a good example.
The high government officials from all over the world
discussed implementation of the Kyoto Protocol that
imposes a duty on advanced countries to reduce CO2 emission.
Here, the effect of the implementation will remain unknown
unless we synthesize various kinds of knowledge from
many different fields to answer questions such as: to
what extent can forests and oceans uptake anthropogenic
CO2? (Ecology, Oceanography); given a certain amount
of
increase in CO2 concentration, what would be the corresponding
temperature rise? (Meteorology); and, will green houses
gasses other than CO2 increase in the future? (Atmospheric
chemistry). Furthermore, the issue of feedback processes
is needed to be
examined, as the one between temperature rise and the
carbon
cycle in both terrestrial and marine ecosystems, may
complicate the projection of CO2 concentration. In order
to comprehensively simulate the earth system, numerical
models used for global
environment projection have to be extended. They have
to
include various processes related to the above questions
as
realistically as possible. |
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Realizing such circumstances, FRCGC
launched a project to
develop an integrated earth system model as category
2 of
Research Project for Sustainable Coexistence of
Human,
Nature, and the Earth funded by Ministry of Education,
Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT)
(shortly called Kyousei Project after its Japanese
name). FRCGC has six research programs that cover
most fields relevant to global
environmental changes, and the programs have been
developing models dedicated to their own disciplines.
FRCGC is thus well-equipped for constructing an
"integrated earth
system model" by combining those component
models of
global change (Fig.1).
As of January 2005, all the component models except
for
vegetation dynamics have been coupled on the code,
although
further fine tuning is necessary in order to perform
realistic
simulations. We have recently obtained some preliminary
results regarding carbon cycle modeling. Following
are the
outputs of our recent experiments. |
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