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At least 163 records · Page 9

Large-Scale and Global Hydrology

Powered by the sun, water moves continuously between and through Earths oceanic, atmospheric, and terrestrial reservoirs. It enables life, shapes Earths surface, and responds to and influences climate change. Scientists measure various features of the water cycle using a combination of ground, airborne, and space-based observations, and seek to characterize it at multiple scales with the aid of numerical models. Over time our understanding of the water cycle and ability to quantify it have improved, owing to advances in observational capabilities, the extension of the data record, and increases in computing power and storage. Here we present some of the most recent estimates of global and continental ocean basin scale water cycle stocks and fluxes and provide examples of modern numerical modeling systems and reanalyses.Further, we discuss prospects for predicting water cycle variability at seasonal and longer scales, which is complicated by a changing climate and direct human impacts related to water management and agriculture. Changes to the water cycle will be among the most obvious and important facets of climate change, thus it is crucial that we continue to invest in our ability to monitor it.

land hydrology↗

Windows of Opportunity for Skillful Forecasts Subseasonal to Seasonal and Beyond

There is high demand and a growing expectation for predictions of environmental conditions that go beyond 0–14-day weather forecasts with outlooks extending to one or more seasons and beyond. This is driven by the needs of the energy, water management, and agriculture sectors, to name a few. There is an increasing realization that, unlike weather forecasts, prediction skill on longer time scales can leverage specific climate phenomena or conditions for a predictable signal above the weather noise. Currently, it is understood that these conditions are intermittent in time and have spatially heterogeneous impacts on skill, hence providing strategic windows of opportunity for skillful forecasts. Research points to such windows of opportunity, including El Niño or La Niña events, active periods of the Madden–Julian oscillation, disruptions of the stratospheric polar vortex, when certain large-scale atmospheric regimes are in place, or when persistent anomalies occur in the ocean or land surface. Gains could be obtained by increasingly developing prediction tools and metrics that strategically target these specific windows of opportunity. Across the globe, reevaluating forecasts in this manner could find value in forecasts previously discarded as not skillful. Users’ expectations for prediction skill could be more adequately met, as they are better aware of when and where to expect skill and if the prediction is actionable. Given that there is still untapped potential, in terms of process understanding and prediction methodologies, it is safe to expect that in the future forecast opportunities will expand. Process research and the development of innovative methodologies will aid such progress.

Annarita Mariotti↗

Derivation and Testing of Consumptive Water Use Fraction for Specialty Crops

The Crop Consumptive Use Fraction (CCUF) expresses beneficial water use in the form of seasonal evapotranspiration of applied water (ETAW), relative to total irrigation volume. The metric is an indicator of the efficiency of agricultural water use and is a recommended component for preparation of agricultural water management plans in California. An FAO-56 based web application has been developed to facilitate retrospective evaluation of ETAW, and hence CCUF, at field level. The current application is optimized for prevailing climate in four of the state’s main growing regions: San Joaquin Valley, Sacramento Valley, Central Coast, and North Coast. User inputs include crop type, soil texture, irrigation method, daily irrigation volume, daily rainfall, and seasonal start/stop dates to define the analysis period. Time series of fractional green canopy cover (Fc), based on Landsat and Sentinel-2 Earth-resource satellite observations, are imported from NASA’s Satellite Irrigation Management Support (SIMS) system. Grass reference evapotranspiration (ETo) time series are accessed from Spatial CIMIS (California Irrigation Management Information System). Daily crop height (h) is estimated as a simple function of typical maximum height for the given crop type (from FAO-56) and Fc. A vegetation density coefficient (Kd) is derived from Fc and h. Stomatal control factors during mid-and late-season are applied to tree and vine crops. Typical values for minimum daily relative humidity and mean daily windspeed, derived from historical CIMIS weather data, are used to correct for regional deviations from standard climate (defined as RHmin=45%, windspeed =2m/s). The resulting daily basal crop coefficient (Kcb) represents the ET of a well-watered crop with minimal soil evaporation, relative to ETo. A soil water balance sub-model for the top 0.1 m is used to calculate daily evaporation coefficients (Ke). A second sub-model applies to the root zone to calculate crop water stress coefficients (Ks) and effective precipitation (Pe), which is the fraction of rainfall that is available for crop use. Those coefficients are combined with Kcb and ETo to calculate daily ETc. ETAW is then derived as cumulative ETc less cumulative Pe. For verification purposes, sensor installations were used to measure seasonal ETc in commercial fields for several annual and perennial specialty crops by soil water balance and energy balance methods. Model estimates of seasonal ETc show mean absolute error of <10% compared to the ground measurements.

Derivation↗

Local Scale (3-M) Soil Moisture Mapping Using SMAP and Planet Superdove

A capability for mapping meter-level resolution soil moisture with frequent temporal sampling over large regions is essential for quantifying local-scale environmental heterogeneity and eco-hydrologic behavior. However, available surface soil moisture (SSM) products generally involve much coarser grain sizes ranging from 30 m to several 10s of kilometers. Hence a new method is proposed to estimate 3-m resolution SSM using a combination of multi-sensor fusion, machine- learning (ML) and Cumulative Distribution Function (CDF) matching approaches. This method established favorable SSM correspondence between 3-m pixels and overlying 9-km grid cells from overlapping Planet SuperDove (PSD) observations and NASA Soil Moisture Active-Passive (SMAP) mission products. The resulting 3-m SSM predictions showed improved accuracy by reducing ab- solute bias and RMSE by ~0.01 cm3/cm3 over the original SMAP data in relation to in-situ soil moisture measurements for the Australian Yanco region, while preserving the high sampling frequency (1-3 day global revisit) and sensitivity to surface wetness (R 0.865) from SMAP. Heterogeneous soil moisture distributions varying with vegetation biomass gradients and irrigation regimes were generally captured within a selected study area. Further algorithm refinement and implementation for regional applications will allow for improvement in water resources management, precision agriculture, and disaster forecasts and responses.

soil moisture↗

Satellite-assisted Evaluation of Irrigation Application Efficiency for Lettuce in the Salinas Valley

The Salinas Valley region of California’s Central Coast is a majorU.S. vegetable producer. Lettuce is a leading commodity, grown on about 100,000 acres with annual value near $1.4B (2022 Monterey County Ag Report). Vegetables crops in the area aretypically well watered and fertilized in pursuit of commercial yield and quality standards. Information on irrigation application efficiency, meanwhile, can enhance waterresource sustainability and mitigate impacts of nitrate infiltrationon groundwater quality. The Crop Consumptive Use Fraction (CCUF), previously recommended by the California Department of Water Resources, is a metric that expresses evapotranspiration (ET) of applied water relative to total applied water. More recently under Assembly Bill 1668 addressing water conservation and drought planning, the metric can be used to help quantify application efficiency to support preparation of agricultural water management plans in the state. This study will report CCUF evaluations from several commercial lettuce plantings in the Salinas Valley during the 2022 dry season (late spring-early fall). The evaluations were derived from satellite-based observations of cropET from the OpenETcloud application, and applied water monitored by in-line flowmetersand supplemented by grower reports of irrigation system runtime. The study will also compare observed (satellite-based) ET with modeled ET from the CropManage irrigationand nutrient management decision-support system operated by Cooperative Extension. Additional study in cool-season vegetables is ongoing in 2023.

Satellite-assisted↗

Effectiveness of Residue and Tillage Management on Runoff Pollutant Reduction from Agricultural Areas

Highlights No-till and no-till residue systems were effective in reducing runoff particulate and total nutrients but increased dissolved nutrients. Maintaining >30% residue cover reduced most runoff constituents, irrespective of no-till or tillage. No-till-residue prevented runoff nutrient losses and benefitted farm revenue by avoiding tillage. Abstract. Reduced tillage management conservation practices (No-till and Reduced-till) are widely adopted in agriculture; however, understanding their overall effectiveness for water quality protection is challenging. A meta-analysis was conducted to understand and quantify the effectiveness of residue and tillage management on runoff, sediment, and nutrient losses from agricultural fields. Annual runoff and the associated sediment, and nutrient (nitrogen and phosphorus) loads were compiled from 60 peer reviewed research articles published across the United States and Canada. A total of 1575 site-years of data were categorized into tillage (<30% surface cover), no-tillage (<30% surface cover), tillage with residue (>30% surface cover), no-tillage with residue (>30% surface cover), and pasture management. No-tillage, no-tillage-residue, and tillage-residue managements were evaluated for their effectiveness in reducing runoff, nutrients, and sediment loads compared to tillage. Synthesized and surveyed corn yield data were used to evaluate the economic cost effectiveness of no-tillage-residue management with respect to tillage. Across the site years (1968-2019) studied, median runoff depth for no-tillage and no-tillage-residue were 84% and 70% greater than tillage and tillage-residue management, respectively. No-tillage-residue management had up to 86% less sediment losses than tillage systems, on average, for both >30% and <30% surface cover. No-tillage-residue management was most effective, with a positive performance effectiveness of 65% to 90% in controlling sediments, particulate, and total nutrient losses in runoff compared to tillage. Cost effectiveness analysis revealed the benefits of no-tillage-residue management in reducing nutrient loads and increasing net-farm revenue by avoiding tillage operational costs. Except for dissolved phosphorus, no-tillage-residue management cost effectiveness for sediments and nutrient loads ranged from negative $6 to negative $102 per every Mg or kg of load reduction, indicating it had both economic and environmental benefits compared to tillage management. Overall, these results indicate that over the long-term, no-tillage and tillage, combined with greater than 30% residue cover, can effectively reduce sediment and nutrient losses. This work highlights the importance of crop residues on the soil surface to reduce runoff losses, even in no-tillage systems. Keywords: Conservation tillage, No-tillage, Residue cover, Tillage, Water quality.

Agriculture↗

Science Breakthroughs 2030. Final report

Agriculture is a fundamental societal activity, characterized by many different landscapes, crops, markets, and participants. Food, agricultural, and biofuels products are central to the daily life of all citizens, though most do not recognize the fragility of the environment that brings forth this abundance. As is noted in the 2012 report from the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, Agricultural Preparedness and the United States Agricultural Research Enterprise (PCAST, 2012) the food and agricultural system faces constant challenges in: Managing new pests, pathogens, and invasive plants. Increasing the efficiency of water use. Growing food in a changing climate. Reducing the environmental footprint of agriculture. Managing the production of bioenergy. Producing safe and nutritious food. Assisting with global food security and maintaining abundant yields. Science Breakthroughs 2030 was organized to identify the most compelling research directions in food and agriculture, in particular those empowered by the application of insights and tools from disciplines of science and engineering not typically associated with food and agricultural research. A committee appointed by the Chairman of the National Research Council explored ideas for research directions with input from the scientific community, with the objective of producing a report describing ambitious and achievable scientific pathways to address major problems and create new opportunities in food and agriculture. Following numerous meetings, a jamboree, and town hall, the appointed committee prepared a report that has subsequently become a reference for federal agencies supporting research in the food and agricultural space. It highlights five key areas for research investment with broad application across food and agriculture: integrated systems research; sensor development; data mining and information sciences, genomics; and the microbiome.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗

Management opportunities for soil carbon sequestration following agricultural land abandonment

The widespread historical and ongoing abandonment of agricultural lands worldwide presents important opportunities for promoting climate change mitigation through carbon sequestration. The default management outcome of abandonment is natural regeneration through ecological succession. However, several different management strategies and new land uses for abandoned agricultural lands have been recommended by the scientific community in recent years. This paper reviews the foremost proposed strategies and compares their soil carbon sequestration potentials. Six major categories have been proposed globally. Each proposal has positive and negative outcomes depending on site-specific factors and management objectives. Accordingly, no single strategy is ideal in all scenarios and a combination of strategies addresses multiple rural development goals concurrently. A combination of passive and active management techniques is the most effective approach for maximizing soil carbon sequestration over large geographic scales, while other strategies can be designed to also promote low-carbon land use practices and fossil fuel substitution. The implications of each proposal highlighted here demonstrates the positive role that abandoned agricultural lands can serve in climate change mitigation efforts, supporting policymakers tasked with planning the future of regions undergoing abandonment.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

Integrating Satellite and Surface Sensor Networks for Irrigation Management Applications in California

Satellite mapping of evapotranspiration (ET) from irrigated agricultural lands can provide agricultural producers and water managers with information that can be used to optimize agricultural water use, especially in regions with limited water supplies. The timely delivery of information on agricultural crop water requirements has the potential to make irrigation scheduling more practical, convenient, and accurate. We present a system for irrigation scheduling and management support in California and describe lessons learned from the development and implementation of the system. The Satellite Irrigation Management Support (SIMS) framework integrates satellite data with information from agricultural weather networks to map crop canopy development, basal crop coefficients (Kcb), and basal crop evapotranspiration (ETcb) at the scale of individual fields. Information is distributed to agricultural producers and water managers via a web-based irrigation management decision support system and web data services. SIMS also provides an application programming interface (API) that facilitates integration with other irrigation decision support tools, estimation of total crop evapotranspiration (ETc) and calculation of on-farm water use efficiency metrics. Accuracy assessments conducted in commercial fields for more than a dozen crop types to date have shown that SIMS seasonal ETcb estimates are within 10 mean absolute error (MAE) for well-watered crops and within 15 across all crop types studied, and closely track daily ETc and running totals of ETc measured in each field. Use of a soil water balance model to correct for soil evaporation and crop water stress reduces this error to less than 8 MAE across all crop types studied to date relative to field measurements of ETc. Results from irrigation trials conducted by the project for four vegetable crops have also demonstrated the potential for use of ET-based irrigation management strategies to reduce total applied water by 20-40 relative to grower standard practices while maintaining crop yields and quality.

Nemani, Ramakrishna R.↗

Representing Global Soil Erosion and Sediment Flux in Earth System Models

Abstract Soil erosion produces enormous amounts of sediment, carbon, and nutrient fluxes from land to rivers, thus playing crucial roles in global biogeochemical cycles and food security. To predict soil erosion in the context of climate and land use changes, we explicitly parameterize cropland management actions (i.e., irrigation, conserved agriculture, and crop residue management) and geological factors (i.e., lithology and glacier) in the Energy Exascale Earth System Model (E3SM) soil erosion module. The erosion model is calibrated using a global‐scale regionalized parameter calibration method. The spatial variabilities of the modeled and the Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation (RUSLE) based benchmark soil erosion are consistent across vegetation, climate and soil properties. Compared with independent data, our model shows a bias reduction in 59% of the observations relative to the RUSLE‐based soil erosion, with 53% of the bias reduction exceeding 50%. This improvement is mainly due to a better representation of the topographic effect on soil erosion. Our results indicate that conserved agriculture practices have effectively reduced soil erosion in cropland by over 25% in the United States and Argentina. In contrast, irrigation has increased soil erosion in many Asian countries. For upland sediment flux, our model is consistent with the WBMsed benchmark data in inter‐basin variability but could be more skillful in simulating intra‐basin variability because it couples soil erosion and sediment flux explicitly. The developed model provides useful skills for more realistic predictions of soil erosion and river sediment dynamics under environmental changes.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗

Emerging satellite observations for diurnal cycling of ecosystem processes

Diurnal cycling of plant carbon uptake and water use, and their responses to water and heat stresses, provide direct insight into assessing ecosystem productivity, agricultural production and management practices, carbon and water cycles, and feedbacks to the climate. Temperature, light, atmospheric water demand, soil moisture and leaf water potential vary over the course of the day, leading to diurnal variations in stomatal conductance, photosynthesis and transpiration. Earth observations from polar-orbiting satellites are incapable of studying these diurnal variations. Here, we review the emerging satellite observations that have the potential for studying how plant functioning and ecosystem processes vary over the course of the diurnal cycle. The recently launched ECOsystem Spaceborne Thermal Radiometer Experiment on Space Station (ECOSTRESS) and Orbiting Carbon Observatory-3 (OCO-3) provide land surface temperature, evapotranspiration (ET), gross primary production (GPP) and solar-induced chlorophyll fluorescence data at different times of day. New generation operational geostationary satellites such as Himawari-8 and the GOES-R series can provide continuous, high-frequency data of land surface temperature, solar radiation, GPP and ET. Future satellite missions such as GeoCarb, TEMPO and Sentinel-4 are also planned to have diurnal sampling capability of solar-induced chlorophyll fluorescence. We explore the unprecedented opportunities for characterizing and understanding how GPP, ET and water use efficiency vary over the course of the day in response to temperature and water stresses, and management practices. We also envision that these emerging observations will revolutionize studies of plant functioning and ecosystem processes in the context of climate change and that these observations and findings can inform agricultural and forest management and lead to improvements in Earth system models and climate projections.

Plant functioning↗

Groundwater Depletion in California’s Central Valley Accelerates During Megadrought

Groundwater provides nearly half of irrigation water supply, and it enables resilience during drought, but in many regions of the world, it remains poorly, if at all managed. In heavily agricultural regions like California’s Central Valley, where groundwater management is being slowly implemented over a 27-year period that began in 2015, groundwater provides two-thirds or more of irrigation water during drought, which has led to falling water tables, drying wells, subsiding land, and its long-term disappearance. Here we use nearly two decades of observations from NASA’s GRACE satellite missions and show that the rate of groundwater depletion in the Central Valley has been accelerating since 2003 (1.86 km3 /yr, 1961-2021; 2.41 km3 /yr, 2003- 2021; 8.58 km3 /yr, 2019-2021), a period of megadrought in southwestern North America. Results suggest the need for expedited implementation of groundwater management in the Central Valley to ensure its availability during the increasingly intense droughts of the future.

Hydrology↗

Remote monitoring of agricultural systems using NDVI time series and machine learning methods: a tool for an adaptive agricultural policy

This study aims to provide accurate information about changes in agricultural systems (AS) using phenological metrics derived from the NDVI time series. Use of such information could help land managers optimize land use choices and monitor the status of agricultural lands, under a variety of environmental and socioeconomic conditions. For this purpose, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) NDVI data were used to derive phenological metrics over the Oum Er-Rbia basin (central Morocco). Random forest (RF), support vector machine (SVM), and K-nearest neighbor (KNN) classifiers were explored and compared on their ability to classify AS classes over the study area. Four main AS classes have been considered: (1) irrigated annual crop (IAC), (2) irrigated perennial crop (IPC), (3) rainfed area (RA), and (4) fallow (FA). By comparing the accuracy of the three classifiers, the RF method showed the best performance with an overall accuracy of 0.97 and kappa coefficient of 0.96.The RF method was then chosen to examine time variations in AS over a 16-year period (2000–2016). The AS main variations were detected and evaluated for the four AS classes. These variations have been found to be linked well with other indicators of local agricultural land management, as well as the historical agricultural drought changes over the study area. Overall, the results present a tool for decision makers to improve agricultural management and provide a different perspective in understanding the spatiotemporal dynamics of agricultural systems.

Youssef Lebrini↗

Jemez Pueblo Agriculture: Monitoring Rangeland Conditions to Inform Drought and Land Management in New Mexico

The Jemez Pueblo, a community located in the semi-arid high desert region of northcentral New Mexico, faces challenges with drought mitigation and livestock management. NASA DEVELOP partnered with the Pueblo of Jemez Natural Resources Department and The Nature Conservancy to provide recent and historical rangeland conditions to aid present decision-making, which relies on cultural practices, site familiarity, available resources, and physical data. This partnership offers the opportunity to support management practices by leveraging remote sensing and virtual fencing technologies. Our project explored Rangeland Analysis Platform (RAP) products incorporating NASA Earth observation Landsat 5 TM, Landsat 7 ETM+, Landsat 8 OLI, and Landsat 9 OLI-2 remote-sensed imagery as an agricultural land management tool. We performed linear regression analysis to evaluate RAP data to field data and explored RAP annual herbaceous biomass, ground cover trends, and climatic factors at the pasture level. We then computed study area summary statistics, performed pixel-by-pixel trend analysis across the study period, and evaluated ground cover trends near water sources. Based on available data, RAP was poorly correlated to bare ground and herbaceous biomass, generally underestimating the former and overestimating the latter. To improve the evaluation of RAP products, we suggest increasing the spatiotemporal distribution of the field dataset. According to RAP, from 1986 to 2023, the site became hotter and drier, bare ground increased, and annual forbs and grasses increased while perennials decreased. RAP products did not agree with field-collected data; however, the trends over time may be useful for informing rangeland management actions.

cattle grazing management↗

Colorado Eastern Plains Agriculture: Rangeland Monitoring to Inform Grazing Management in Eastern Colorado

Adaptive management on cattle ranches requires rangeland managers to decide the location and duration of the cattle grazing activity across different pastures. Biodiversity, forage availability, and cattle health are all affected by rangeland management. Virtual fencing is a tool that rangeland managers can use to potentially increase biodiversity and improve ranching operations. NASA DEVELOP and Colorado State University (CSU) collaborated with the Nature Conservancy (TNC), and Red Top Ranch to demonstrate the efficacy of virtual fencing. We sought to identify annual and monthly biomass patterns on the ranch through the creation of monthly max biomass productivity maps. We utilized a dataset from the Agricultural Research Service (ARS) to calculate biomass on the ranch. To validate our remotely-sensed results, we compared model-predicted biomass values to field-collected biomass clipping data and an additional biomass dataset from the Rangeland Analysis Platform (RAP). We used satellite imagery from Landsat 5 Thematic Mapper (TM), Landsat 7 Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+), Landsat 8 Operational Land Imager (OLI), Landsat 9 –OLI-2, and Sentinel-2 MultiSpectral Instrument (MSI) for 2021 and 2022. We found that there was heterogeneity in biomass across the ranch, with higher biomass on the western side. The highest peak of biomass was in the summer months, with a smaller peak in mid-September. The ARS biomass dataset had a significant relationship with RAP for 2021. ARS biomass did not have a significant relationship with the biomass field data collected in 2022. The results of our study are aimed to support rotation management, ranch production, biodiversity, and conservation management.

cattle↗

Data from: Soil carbon change in intensive agriculture after 25 years of conservation management

Changes in soil organic carbon (SOC) and nitrogen (SON) are strongly affected by land management, but few long-term comparative studies have surveyed changes throughout the whole soil profile. We quantified 25-year SOC and SON changes to 1 m in 10 replicate ecosystems at an Upper Midwest, USA site. We compared four annual cropping systems in maize ( Zea mays )-soybean ( Glycine max)-winter wheat ( Triticum aestivum ) rotations, each managed differently (Conventional, No-till, Reduced input, and Biologically based); in three managed perennial systems (hybrid Poplar ( Populus × euramericana ), Alfalfa ( Medicago sativa ), and Conifer ( Pinus spp.); and in three successional systems (Early, Mid- and Late succession undergoing a gradual change in species composition and structure over time).

agricultural sciences↗

Idaho & Oregon Agriculture: Monitoring Vegetation Impacts of Livestock Management Practices Used to Reduce Predator Conflicts on Idaho and Oregon Grazing Allotments

The practice of night penning, which involves corralling livestock into a fenced, secure area overnight, aims to safeguard animals from predators. Although this method has proven successful in minimizing interactions between livestock and wildlife, the extent of its impact on vegetation communities is still being explored. This project examines the feasibility of using Net Primary Productivity (NPP) values from the Rangeland Analysis Platform (RAP) to quantify the impacts of night penning on rangeland vegetation communities. RAP provides spatially distributed values of vegetation composition, cover, and productivity, and is derived from imagery from Landsat 5, Landsat 7 & Landsat 8 at a 30m resolution for rangelands across the United States. Our DEVELOP team partnered with Alderspring Ranch, Krebs Livestock, and the U.S Department of Agriculture Animal & Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) to analyze the impacts of night penning on vegetation communities. We identified control sites that captured the topographic characteristics of night pen sites used by our partners. We then quantified and compared changes in annual NPP between night pen and control sites. Our analysis of RAP NPP data, using a control-treatment design did not find impacts of night penning on vegetation. However, this was a preliminary analysis, and does not conclusively quantify the impacts of night penning on rangeland vegetation. Our analysis indicated that RAP may be a feasible tool to study livestock management impacts on rangeland vegetation; however, future studies could further validate these findings through ground observations.

Rangeland Analysis Platform (RAP)↗

Landscape-scale management for biodiversity and ecosystem services

Compelling evidence has accumulated that biodiversity in agricultural landscapes is declining. Reversing this trend requires us to transform how we envision and manage agricultural systems. Here, while most current efforts focus on modifying practices at the field scale, organisms are also affected by ecological patterns and processes that transcend individual fields and farms. Consequently, effective conservation of biodiversity and related ecosystem services will require addressing practices at the landscape scale as well.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗