September closes out (for now?) extraordinary 2023 winter rainfall season

Posted by & filed under CSAG Blog, CSAG student blog, Frontpage.

In early April, we posted a preliminary assessment of the remarkable series of rainfall events that affected the south-western Cape region from mid-February to late March. That turned out to be just the start of an extraordinarily long and intense rainfall season for the Winter Rainfall Zone. Arguably the most severe storm of the season… Read more »

March 2023 rewrites Table Mountain rainfall record books

Skeleton Gorge Waterfall in Kirstenbosch after heavy rains on Table Mountain in March 2023.

Posted by & filed under CSAG Blog, CSAG student blog, Frontpage, Uncategorized.

Summary An initial look at preliminary March 2023 rainfall data for Table Mountain suggests it was the wettest March in the instrumental record of the “Mountain in the Sea”, going back as far as 1893! This appears to have been mostly the result of four cut-off low systems forming along the west coast during the… Read more »

CSAG Short Course on Navigating Climate Risk.

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The Climate System Analysis Group (CSAG), based at the University of Cape Town, will be running its annual course on Navigating Climate Risk (formerly Winter School) This in-person, one-week (5 to 9 September 2022) intensive course has been developed specifically for participants from developing countries and aims to take participants through the full spectrum of climate… Read more »

Adaptation strategies – a shift in focus

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  The term adaptation has become progressively common in the climate change literature as a result of the continuing effects of a changing climate. Similarly, mitigation definitions and strategies have been well documented over the last decade as the need to address the issue of climate change becomes more and more important. And indeed, mitigating… Read more »

Dealing with Climate Change – The Market as a Mechanism

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Politicians the world over are coming to realise that climate change is an imminent problem facing humanity. These challenges bring together concerns for the relationship of humans to nature, the responsibility of the richer nations to the poorer, the effect of local activities on global conditions and the responsibility of current generations to future ones…. Read more »

Warming of Global Climate is admitted with no doubt, equivocation occurs in the interpretation of the cause of climate change. Debate will never ends how can we save the society?

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Earth’s climate is well known to be dynamic by scientists since centuries ago. Historically the earth’s climate has been rising and falling irregularly between warm periods (glacial state) and cold periods (interglacial state). The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) global climate change models projections shows that from late 1970s the time series of global… Read more »

Was the HAIL this morning a sign of Climate Change – Cape Town (3 Jun 2013)? Have we used the latter as a platform to transfer our climate science research knowledge???

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Some parts of the City (e.g. Sea Point) experienced hails earlier this morning. For obvious reasons or simply because we can hardly experience hails, the condition took attention of many citizens – i.e. children were skating on the pavements partially cover with hail, numerous pictures were taken at different areas at different views, media founds… Read more »

Climate change mitigation – one roof at a time.

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As a former conservation student, I have always enjoyed exploring ideas about improved sustainable options. At the beginning of the year, while I was in search of a thesis topic, I was very much interested in rooftop gardens and the possibility of contributing to sustainable living, specifically focussing Cape Town. This idea included combining modern… Read more »