Can we go beyond INDCs： Analysis of a future mitigation possibility in China, Japan, EU and the U.S.

The most important achievement in the Paris Agreement is to set up emission reduction target by commitment submitted by each country/ region with the form INDC. However the emission reduction target inside INDCs could not match with the emission pathway for the global to keep a global temperature rise this century well below 2 ℃ and to drive efforts to limit the temperature increase even further to 1.5 ℃ above pre- industrial levels. It is important for countries to do more than their commitment in INDCs, especially in near term. This paper looks at the near term trend for possibilities for further emission reduction compared with INDCs, and found there do have the possibility. It concludes there is space for the four countries/regions to do more than their INDCs submitted to UNFCCC, and see the light towards to a global 2 ℃ target.

Decadal co-variability of the summer surface air temperature and soil moisture in China under global warming

The self-calibrating Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI) is calculated using newly updated ground observations of monthly surface air temperature (SAT) and precipitation in China. The co-variabilities of PDSI and SAT are examined for summer for the period 1961-2004. The results show that there exist decadal climate co-variabilities and strong nonlinear interactions between SAT and soil moisture in many regions of China. Some of the co-variabilities can be linked to global warming. In summer,sig-nificant decadal co-variabilities from cool-wet to warm-dry conditions are found in the east region of Northwest China,North China,and Northeast China. An important finding is that in the west region of Northwest China and Southeast China,pronounced decadal co-variabilities take place from warm-dry to cool-wet conditions. Because significant warming was observed over most areas of the global land surface during the past 20-30 years,the shift to cool-wet conditions is a unique phenomenon which may deserve much scientific attention. The nonlinear interactions between SAT and soil moisture may partly account for the observed decadal co-variabilities. It is shown that anomalies of SAT will greatly affect the climatic co-variabilities,and changes of SAT may bring notable influence on the PDSI in China. These results provide observational evidence for increasing risks of decadal drought and wet-ness as anthropogenic global warming progresses.

Subtidal variability in the Taiwan Strait induced by combined forcing of winter monsoon and topography

As an important channel connecting the East and South China Seas, circulations in the Taiwan Strait are strongly influenced by the East Asian monsoon and the topography of the strait, especially the Taiwan Bank(TWB), which is a remarkable topographic feature located at the southern entrance to the strait. Based on a series of pressure gauges deployed roughly 40 km offshore along the western Strait, subtidal sea-level variability under the combined impact of winter monsoon and topography was studied. The analyses show significant along-strait coherences of subtidal sea levels and their coherences with the large-scale monsoon wind for periods from 2 to 14 days. It is suggested that these fluctuations are mainly forced waves driven by the large-scale winds. In addition to the normal cross-shore wind setup, a sea-level setup in the along-strait direction is confirmed, which is induced by the combined forcing of the fluctuating winter monsoon and the blocking of the TWB. A southward current surge driven by a northerly wind event will cause a rising sea level over the TWB inducing a southward alongshore slope anomaly to the north of the TWB and a reversed slope anomaly to the south The subtidal current through the channel to the west of the TWB is found to be influenced by the reversed slope anomalies generated via the along-shore setup.