New funding for Deep South National Science Challenge
New funding for Deep South National Science Challenge
The Deep South National Science Challenge today announced new funding for seven new scientific research projects to help New Zealanders better understand their future climate.
The new projects, worth $1.5 million, range from investigating Antarctic sea ice using drones, to improving predictions and understanding of the drivers of New Zealand’s climate, to exploring the cascading impacts and implications of climate change for Aotearoa New Zealand.
This follows an
announcement of $9 million last November for six projects to
begin the process of developing New Zealand’s first
world-class numerical Earth System Model. This will simulate
current climate and possible future climates under different
scenarios of future global greenhouse gas
emissions.
The New Zealand Earth Systems Model will
help advance understanding of Southern Hemisphere influences
on the global climate and ultimately give New Zealanders a
greater level of certainty in their planning and
decision-making in the face of a changing climate.
The
new projects allocated by the challenge-wide funding
are:
• Improving the simulation of stratospheric
chemistry in the New Zealand Earth System Model, led by
NIWA, Wellington
• Seasonality of Southern Ocean
Dynamics from Antarctic radiocarbon observations, led by GNS
Science
• Climate model evaluation using satellite
simulators: A like for like methodology, led by University
of Canterbury
• Te Tai Uka a Pia - Iwi relationships
with Antarctic and the Southern Oceans to enhance adaptation
to Climate Change, led by University of
Waikato
• Cascading impacts and implications for
Aotearoa New Zealand, led by Victoria University of
Wellington
• Versatile 4D drones for observations of
Deep-South key Earth system processes, led by University of
Canterbury
• Developing capacity in process assessment
and improvement in NZESM through the use of the single
column version of the model, led by Bodeker
Scientific
Challenge director Prof Dave Frame said: “These are bold and exciting projects and we’re looking forward to seeing them get underway. The physical science projects will help us improve climate models, which is important since climate models are the only tools that allow us to develop a coherent understanding of climate drivers and how they interact. It’s also good to be able to fund proposals which link Deep South research to society in constructive and useful ways.”
This funding is the latest allocation of money for the Challenge, which is one of 11 Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment-funded initiatives aimed at taking a more strategic and collaborative approach to science investment.
More details about each project can be found at the Deep South website
ENDS