Bridging critical gaps in relative humidity data to enhance climate science and services in Ethiopia: The case of Awash River Basin
Principal Investigator
Dr. Mekonnen Adnew Degefu
Department of Geography & Environmental Studies
Debre Marks
P. O. Box: 269
Email:mekonnenadnew@yahoo.com
Tel. +251911349728
Executive Summary
Currently there is a growing demand for representative and accurate climate services among policy makers, practitioners and end users across the world, due to the widespread effects of climate risks. The demand is extremely high in the data poor sub-Saharan African countries as this region has not only has low adaptive capacity, but also does not have representative and quality scientific information to prepare for and to formulate sound climate risk management policies and climate services. The objective of the proposed research project is to enhance climate services by filling critical gap in relative humidity data for NMA. The plan is to produce representative high quality gridded relative humidity data by merging better quality satellite and reanalysis RH data from global open sources with quality control in-situ records. We plan to first evaluate the quality of global data products, then produce new one by merging the relatively better RH data with quality control in-situ records. We proposed an excellent research into-use plan by applying and testing the new data product for early drought detection ability and for human and livestock comfortability indices. Results generated from these activities including two MA/MSc Theses will be deliverable outputs from this project. We also plan to train two female students in MA/MSc. We established excellent multidiscipline expert networks (climate scientist, data expert, and expert for artificial intelligence) and partnership with National Meteorological Agency of Ethiopia for effective implementation.
Objectives
The overall objective of this research project is to enhance the availability and utilization relative humidity (RH) data by exploring from global open data sources and producing new one by merging data from global sources and in-situ records through data merging state-of-the-art method for Awash River Basin in Ethiopia. The specific objectives of the proposed research project are to:
- Exploring and evaluating daily time scale global RH data (satellite, in-situ-interpolated, and model reanalysis) from open multiple global sources,
- Producing high quality gridded RH data by merging one or more selected global RH data with quality controlled in-situ records from relatively dense stations for Awash River Basin,
- Converting research results into use. This include: 1) applying and testing the new data for its performance in capturing early onset of drought episodes for the study area, and 2) applying and testing the new data for its performance in representative human and livestock comfortability indices,
- Facilitating data archiving, result dissemination and implementing capacity building prgramme through formal MA/MSc training (2 females) and
- Exploring the gender implications of climate services in the study area and will be conduced by the two MA/MSc students.
The proposed research project intends to explore and test global RH data products, and produce demand driven, original and high quality RH data by merging in-situ observation with multisource products using data merging state-of-the-art method for data poor country, Ethiopia. This research project intends to benefit from the current hydro-climate data innovations (satellite proxies and model reanalysis) to bridge critical data gaps in the developing countries. And results generated from this study will largely assist the development of science informed climate mitigation and adaptation strategies in Ethiopia. Results generated from the proposed study will have multifaceted benefits both for science and practice. In addition to this, evaluation on the performance of RH can provide valuable feedbacks global data producers to advance data production algorisms and methods. The proposed research project intends to significantly enhance the climate research capacity of young academicians. The results generated from this research project can be an excellent lesson for the remaining data poor sub-Saharan African countries.
Key Research Questions
The proposed research project seeks to answer the following research questions:
- Which global precipitation data product has better performance in representing the spatiotemporal variability of RH characteristics including extreme events for Awash River Basin?
- Does the AI data merging state-of-the-art method can enhance the spatiotemporal representation and quality of RH data for Awash River Basin?
- How the newly produced RH data useful for research and operational activities in Ethiopia?
- What aspects of and how the human capacity should be improved to enhance climate science and climate services in Ethiopia?
- What are the gender implication of climate services in the study area?