Search

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is experiencing a surge in electricity demand, with power generation increasing 4 times in 25 years from 1990 to 2014. Despite the abundant primary renewable energy sources, the country has overlooked them in the past in national energy policies. However, in recent years, renewable energy has become a part of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia's energy conservation policy due to climate changes, technological progress, economies of scale, and increased competitiveness in supply chains. The Saudi government has created the King Abdullah City for Atomic and Renewable Energy (KACARE) to develop national strategies for effectively utilizing renewable and nuclear energy. This paper reviews the current state of the art of the renewable energy technologies available on the market and evaluates the installation of renewable energy plants near Saudi Arabia's East Coast for a new town, focusing on technical rather than economic aspects. The paper provides a wide review of the possible technical solutions to exploit the producibility of different renewable sources, considering the challenging climate conditions typical of desert areas. The analysis of a real case study shows a high availability of wind and solar irradiance that allow a net energy production of 354 and 129 GWh, respectively. In addition, the comparison between a typical ground-mounted photovoltaic (PV) system and an emerging floating PV reveals that for the same installed power, occupied area, and environmental conditions, the latter has a 4% greater performance ratio due to the cooling effect of water. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper assesses the reliability of regional climate downscaling products from the Coordinated Regional Downscaling Experiment-Southeast Asia (CORDEX-SEA) in reproducing the present-day wind at the East Coast of Peninsular Malaysia (ECPM). A total of five CORDEX-SEA products, namely CNRM-CM5(RegCM4), CSIRO-Mk3-6-0(RegCM4), EC-EARTH(RegCM4), HadGEM2-ES(RegCM4) and MPI-ESM-MR(RegCM4), with a resolution of 25 km, were compared to reference data from the European Centre Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) fifth generation atmospheric reanalysis ERA5 spanning 1980–2005. This study focused on the period of the southwest monsoon, specifically the months of June, July and August (JJA), as wind during this season is known to play an important role in generating upwelling at the ECPM. The results obtained show that only three of the CORDEX-SEA products, CSIRO-Mk3-6-0(RegCM4), HadGEM2-ES(RegCM4) and MPI-ESM-MR(RegCM4), were able to reproduce the wind in terms of wind speed, wind stress curl and wind pattern as effectively as ERA5. An ensemble was made from these three CORDEX-SEA products, and it was found that the ensemble was able to reproduce a value of the Upwelling Index (UI) that was similar to the reference data, albeit with some bias. Hence, only the three stated CORDEX-SEA products and their ensemble are suitable to be used for future climate change studies within the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Groundwater–surface water exchange in salt marsh ecosystems mediates nearshore salt, nutrient, and carbon budgets with implications for biological productivity and global climate. Despite their importance, a synthesis of salt marsh groundwater studies is lacking. In this review, we summarize drivers mediating salt marsh hydrogeology, review field and modeling techniques, and discuss patterns of exchange. New data from a Delaware seepage meter study are reported which highlight small-scale spatial variability in exchange rates. A synthesis of the salt marsh hydrogeology literature reveals a positive relationship between tidal range and submarine groundwater discharge but not porewater exchange, highlighting the multidimensional drivers of marsh hydrogeology. Field studies are heavily biased towards microtidal systems of the US East Coast, with little global information available. A preliminary estimate of marsh porewater exchange along the Mid-Atlantic and South Atlantic Bights is 8–30 × 1013 L y−1, equivalent to recirculating the entire volume of seawater overlying the shelf through tidal marsh sediments in ~30–90 years. This review concludes with a discussion of critical questions to address that will decrease uncertainty in global budget estimates and enhance our capacity to predict future responses to global climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We studied the effects of metabolic cold adaptation (MCA) in two populations of a eurythermal species, spotted seatrout (Cynoscion nebulosus) along the U.S. East Coast. Fish were captured from their natural environment and acclimated at control temperatures 15 °C or 20 °C. Their oxygen consumption rates, a proxy for metabolic rates, were measured using intermittent flow respirometry during acute temperature decrease or increase (2.5 °C per hour). Mass-specific standard metabolic rates (SMR) were higher in fish from the northern population across an ecologically relevant temperature gradient (5 °C to 30 °C). SMR were up to 37% higher in the northern population at 25 °C and maximum metabolic rates (MMR) were up to 20% higher at 20 °C. We found evidence of active metabolic compensation in the southern population from 5 °C to 15 °C (Q10 < 2), but not in the northern population. Taken together, our results indicate differences in metabolic plasticity between the northern and southern populations of spotted seatrout and provide a mechanistic basis for predicting population-specific responses to climate change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]