From 16 to 19 September, the ICM will host in Barcelona an ICREA workshop on climate during the Pliocene and implications for the future, jointly organized by the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology (ICTA) of the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB) and the ICM.
From 16 to 19 September, the ICM will host in Barcelona an ICREA workshop on climate during the Pliocene and implications for the future, jointly organized by the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology (ICTA) of the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB) and the ICM.
The Pliocene (geologic period that extends from 5.33 million years ago to 2.59 million years ago), has often been proposed as an analogue for future climate conditions, since it is the most recent period when global temperatures were sustained at values that may be reached at the end of the century. Interestingly, despite relatively small differences in climate control factors, including atmospheric CO2 concentrations (which were only slightly higher than today), the Pliocene climate was markedly different from modern. These characteristics have made the Pliocene a relevant period to validate climate models, which requires, however, robust paleoreconstructions of different key parameters for this period.
As Carles Pelejero, ICREA researcher at the ICM, and the co-coordinator of the workshop Antoni Rosell (UAB), explain : "The aim of this workshop is to convey a joint effort of the community studying this period in order to reconstruct the main climatic parameters (temperature, CO2, ice, sea level, vegetation) at selected time intervals in the Pliocene. This is intended to provide a comprehensive representation of the climate period to allow comparison of data obtained using different models".
Among the Pliocene experts who will attended the meeting are renowned scientists like Alan Haywood (University of Leeds, UK), Lydie Dupont (University of Bremen, Germany) and Harry Dowsett (United States Geological Survey), who will present the state of play from different perspectives during the morning of September 17.
This workshop is funded by ICREA (Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats), PAGES (Past Global Changes), EGU (European Geosciences Union) y SCAR-PAIS (Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research, Past Antarctic Ice Sheet Dynamics.
More information about this ICREA workshop in its web site: http://jornades.uab.cat/plioclim/