Use-inspired Paleoenvironmental Science and Data: A Deep Whole-Earth Time Dimension
Abstract
The field of paleoenvironmental science has matured dramatically over the last 30 years, and paleo-data are now widely used to inform policy and other decision-making. The IPCC now incorporates paleo-perspectives in a prominent manner - centuries to millennia-long paleo records are key to assessing the full range of possible climate system behavior, how the Earth's climate system responds to large changes in forcing, how climate change may impact ecological, hydrological, oceanographic and many other systems that humans are concerned about. Paleohydroclimatic data increasingly are used by water managers, just as forest managers use paleo-fire data to understand the natural rhythms and processes so critical to healthy ecosystems and the services they provide. Paleo-data are now widely used for model evaluation, and for understanding what models may be missing - in this sense, the millennia-long observational record provided by paleoenvironmental data helps us avoid costly surprises. Success comes with responsibility, however. The more paleo-data and paleo-based understanding informs policy and other decisions, the more critical it is that paleo-data and the results built on them need to be openly shared, easily accessible and reproducible. The value of paleo-data grows with use, and thus data sharing serves to grow value to the society that ultimately pays for the research. The tradition of sharing paleo-data is built on an even longer tradition of sharing samples, and yet innovations are still needed to make sure samples are managed for future use, particularly as natural archives like glaciers, caves and corals are lost to climate change and other human activity. Scientific journals and data centers are constantly innovating; paleoenvironmental scientists must all play their part as well.
- Publication:
-
AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2016
- Bibcode:
- 2016AGUFMIN23F..05O
- Keywords:
-
- 0999 General or miscellaneous;
- EXPLORATION GEOPHYSICSDE: 1699 General or miscellaneous;
- GLOBAL CHANGEDE: 1999 General or miscellaneous;
- INFORMATICSDE: 6699 General or miscellaneous;
- PUBLIC ISSUES