Turetsky

‘Zombie fires’ are occurring more frequently in boreal forests, but their impacts remain uncertain (The Conversation)

Anonymous — Mon, 17 Jul 2023 06:00:00 +0000

‘Zombie fires’ are occurring more frequently in boreal forests, but their impacts remain uncertain (The Conversation) Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 07/17/2023 - 00:00

Jennifer Baltzer , Merritt Turetsky , Sander Veraverbeke

Are zombie fires something to worry about? As a team of scientists who have dedicated our careers to understanding changing boreal fire regimes, we decided to find out for ourselves.

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Recipients of President’s DEI Awards, Grants honored at reception (CU Connections)

Anonymous — Sat, 13 May 2023 00:11:31 +0000

Recipients of President’s DEI Awards, Grants honored at reception (CU Connections) Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 05/12/2023 - 18:11

CU System awards and grants to advance diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) were also honored at an April 20 event. INSTAAR has received a grant to address inclusive open workspaces. Through participatory scenario development, ethnographic walks, and semi-structured interviews, SEEC community members will reflect on inequitable and unwelcoming spaces and conceptualize just future concepts.

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Belching lakes, mystery craters, ‘zombie fires’: How the climate crisis is transforming the Arctic permafrost (CNN)

Anonymous — Tue, 15 Nov 2022 00:30:03 +0000

Belching lakes, mystery craters, ‘zombie fires’: How the climate crisis is transforming the Arctic permafrost (CNN) Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 11/14/2022 - 17:30

Katie Hunt

Thawing permafrost—the frozen layer of soil that has underpinned the Arctic tundra and boreal forests of Alaska, Canada and Russia for millennia—is upending the lives of people living in the Arctic and dramatically transforming the polar landscape. The vast amount of carbon stored in the permafrost is an overlooked and underestimated driver of climate crisis. Permafrost thaw needs to get more attention—fast.

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Climate tipping points and the damage that could follow (NPR)

Anonymous — Fri, 11 Nov 2022 22:12:16 +0000

Climate tipping points and the damage that could follow (NPR) Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 11/11/2022 - 15:12

If Earth heats up beyond 1.5 degrees C, the impacts don't get just slightly worse--scientists warn that abrupt changes could be triggered, with devastating impacts. As the 27th annual climate negotiations are underway in Egypt and the world is set to blow past that 1.5°C warming threshold, NPR asks climate scientists including Merritt Turetsky about three climate tipping points--points of no return that could cause big changes to the Earth's ecosystems.

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U.S. House committee, Colorado congressional delegation visit campus (CU Boulder Today)

Anonymous — Wed, 04 May 2022 06:00:00 +0000

U.S. House committee, Colorado congressional delegation visit campus (CU Boulder Today) Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 05/04/2022 - 00:00

On May 3, members of the U.S. House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology and Colorado congressional delegation joined leaders and scientists from CU Boulder, including INSTAAR Director Merritt Turetsky, to showcase university research and federal partnerships.

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Permafrost peatlands and mental health with Dr. Merritt Turetsky (For Peat's Sake podcast)

Anonymous — Fri, 18 Mar 2022 21:56:37 +0000

Permafrost peatlands and mental health with Dr. Merritt Turetsky (For Peat's Sake podcast) Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 03/18/2022 - 15:56

Merritt Turetsky joins the For Peat's Sake podcast on Spotify to talk about permafrost peatlands. We talk about the unique qualities of permafrost peatlands and the sad reality that many of them are disappearing due to anthropogenic (aka human-caused) climate change. Merritt explains the state of the science and we also chat about mental health, the importance of self-care, and setting boundaries.

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Warming permafrost puts key Arctic pipelines, roads at “high risk,” study says (Washington Post)

Anonymous — Tue, 11 Jan 2022 07:00:00 +0000

Warming permafrost puts key Arctic pipelines, roads at “high risk,” study says (Washington Post) Anonymous (not verified) Tue, 01/11/2022 - 00:00

In coming decades, the shifting terrain that accompanies the warming of the permafrost caused by climate change will put most human-made structures in the Arctic at risk. Nearly 70 percent of the infrastructure in the Northern Hemisphere's permafrost regions—including at least 120,000 buildings and nearly 25,000 miles of roads—are located in areas with high potential for thaw of near-surface permafrost by 2050, according to new research. Quotes Merritt Turetsky: "I am writing a eulogy for the ecosystem that I love. The permafrost has been there for thousands of years in some places, and it will never come back."

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The great Siberian thaw (The New Yorker)

Anonymous — Mon, 10 Jan 2022 07:00:00 +0000

The great Siberian thaw (The New Yorker) Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 01/10/2022 - 00:00

Permafrost contains microbes, mammoths, and twice as much carbon as the atmosphere. What happens when it starts to thaw? Merritt Turetsky weighs in.

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Climate scientists grapple with wildfire disaster in their backyard (Axios)

Anonymous — Mon, 03 Jan 2022 07:00:00 +0000

Climate scientists grapple with wildfire disaster in their backyard (Axios) Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 01/03/2022 - 00:00

The wind-whipped firestorm that tore through parts of Boulder County, Colorado, on Thursday struck at the heart of one of America's top climate science and meteorology research hubs. Merritt Turetsky is among those interviewed.

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Persistent places: A new project pulls together diverse groups to define and map climate change

Anonymous — Fri, 15 Oct 2021 06:00:00 +0000

Persistent places: A new project pulls together diverse groups to define and map climate change Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 10/15/2021 - 00:00

Shelly Sommer

A project that unites land managers, citizens, and scientists to jointly understand how Colorado Front Range ecosystems and public lands are responding to pressures from people and climate change has been funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF)

Image: Residents gather in a community workshop hosted by the Center for Sustainable Landscapes and Communities (CSLC) at CU Boulder. Photo courtesy CSLC.

The goal of the project is to bring together diverse groups with a stake in the Front Range public lands around the concept of climate-change refugia. Refugia, a Latin term meaning refuges, are units of a landscape that can maintain valued characteristics despite pressures such as climate change.

“Many of the things people appreciate and like about public lands and open space are things like shade along trails, or cooler temperatures on hot days,” says Keith Musselman, lead investigator on the project and a Research Associate at INSTAAR. “These attributes are related to the science of ecosystems, soil, water, climate—but scientists often don’t think of these systems in terms of the experiences they give to people.”

“The idea is to understand what people value about our public lands; and what decision makers think about when they manage these lands; and what scientists consider when they look at the ecosystems, landscape, and climate processes in these same places,” says Musselman.

By bringing together such diverse stakeholders, the project will help identify land management needs and challenges. It will also map places that are buffered from climate change—the refugia—as well as places that are at risk, or already indelibly changed. That can give land managers information they can use to decide where to invest resources.

The measurements are neat, because we’ll build a tram system at INSTAAR’s Mountain Research Station with a cart that has all kinds of environmental sensors - Keith Musselman

Funding for the project comes from an NSF program called Growing Convergence Research, which is intended to solve vexing and complex research problems, focusing on social needs, by merging ideas, knowledge, and approaches from different disciplines. The program is one of the NSF’s ten Big Ideas, emerging key areas in scientific research.

The five-year, $3.6 million grant will support undergraduate and graduate students at three universities, community college students, a postdoctoral scholar, and scientists from five institutions, including INSTAAR researchers Eve-Lyn Hinckley, John Knowles, and Merritt Turetsky. The local Front Range research will be collaboratively conducted by researchers with the National Center for Atmospheric Research, University of Colorado Denver, the University of Wyoming, and Cornell University.

The science portion of the project will adapt an advanced computer model of Earth systems, initially developed for tropical regions, to the environment of the Rocky Mountains. “These models are dynamic, and simulate the growth and death of trees, how groundwater connects to surface water, how trees connect to water and when,” says Musselman. A measurement campaign on Niwot Ridge in the Rockies will help scientists develop the model and test its performance.

Landscape around INSTAAR's Mountain Research Station

“The measurements are neat, because we’ll build a tram system at INSTAAR’s Mountain Research Station with a cart that has all kinds of environmental sensors,” says Musselman. “The cart will travel back and forth along a track. Instead of observations being made at a single location, we’ll take measurements through space and time—and that will give us a better picture of how our landscapes are connected.”

At the same time, Amanda Carrico—CU Boulder social scientist and Director of the Center for Sustainable Landscapes and Communities—will lead efforts to measure values and priorities within the Colorado public about how to manage our public lands. “Colorado will face some tough choices in the coming years and decades. We’re experiencing a growing population, increasing use of public lands, as well as the threats of climate change. It is important for the residents of Colorado to have a voice in how we set priorities as we look into the future,” says Carrico.

A coalition of 54 land managers at local, regional, and state levels will also participate in the project to shape both the research questions that are asked, and the conclusions and recommendations that the project generates.

The project will start work in mid-October.

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