olga wilhelmi
Olga in Utrecht, the Netherlands last October while attending the ADAGUC workshop at the KNMI. In FY2007 Dr. Wilhelmi continued leading and managing the NCAR's Geographic Information Systems (GIS) strategic initiative (http://www.gis.ucar.edu). The initiative integrates the Earth system, environmental and social sciences through spatial analysis and interoperability of georeferenced information. Among current activities of the initiative are investigating of OGC-standards based web services (in particular, for accessing WRF model runs), developing techniques for accurate transformation of coordinate systems between sphere-based atmospheric models and ellipsoid-based GIS environment, and evolving community atmospheric data model for GIS. The initiative continues to update and support the GIS Climate Change Scenarios Portal (http://www.gisclimatechange.org) and is currently developing a downscaled product of the CCSM IPCC projections for the contiguous United States .
Research in FY07:
Exploring spatial patterns of societal vulnerability to extreme heat.
This study is focused on a spatial analysis of vulnerability and risk to excessive heat in two urban areas in the U.S. : Phoenix and Philadelphia. Two cities were analyzed in terms of their climatology, environmental and societal characteristics, previous cases of excessive heat impacts, and existing strategies for heat-wave mitigation. GIS and spatial statistics were used to identify spatial patterns of biophysical and social factors contributing to the heat-related morbidity and mortality.
Collaborators: C. Uejio (U. Wisconsin ), O. Wilhelmi (NCAR), J. Samenow (EPA), J. Golden (U. Arizona ), D. Mills (Stratus Consulting).
Atmospheric Data Access for the Geospatial User Community (ADAGUC)
Led by the KNMI colleagues, the ADGUC project aims at reducing the need for GIS users to invent their own converter and mapping tools, in particular when working with space-borne atmospheric datasets. The ADAGUC project expected results will be: Open Source conversion tools for conversion of selected atmospheric datasets into an Open Standard GIS format, publish atmospheric datasets in GIS format, and a web service to demonstrate the usability of the above to the geospatial and atmospheric community.
Collaborators: John van de Vegte (KNMI), Wim-Jan Som de Cerff (KNMI), Frans van der Wel (KNMI), Ben Domenico (Unidata), Stefano Nativi (U. Florence), Olga Wilhelmi (NCAR)
Spatial patterns of risk and vulnerability in extreme precipitation events: 1997 Fort Collins case study.
Based on the SOARS project of 2005 (B. Edwards – SOARS protégé), this study focuses on a spatial assessment of societal risk to extreme precipitation events and runoff. The 1997 extreme precipitation event, that caused a flood disaster in Fort Collins , Colorado , was used as a model event to assess societal risk and vulnerability to extreme precipitation events and flash flooding. In FY07 we completed development of the methodology and used a data set of 911 calls from the flood to verify results. In FY08 we plan to submit a manuscript to a peer reviewed journal describing the methodology and presenting results from the analysis to the research and practitioner community.
Collaborators: O. Wilhelmi (ISSE), R. Morss ( MMM /ISSE) and B. Edwards (Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality)
Research in FY08:
In FY08 Olga will be collaborating with her colleagues are University of Oslo on the Norwegian Research Council-funded project, “ The Potentials of and Limits to Adaptation in Norway ” ( PLAN ). This four-year project will provide an empirical and theoretical understanding of adaptation as a social process, with an emphasis on its potential to reduce negative impacts and realize the potential benefits of climate change. It will also contribute to a relatively new discourse on the societal limits to adaptation as an effective response to climate change. One of the sub-projects is focused on development of an Integrated Geographic Information System for Assessing Climate Change Impacts and Adaptive Capacity in Norway .
Collaborators: Anne Lucas ( University of Bergen ), Karen O'Brien ( University of Oslo ), Inger Hanssen-Bauer (Norwegian Meteorological Institute), Lynn Rosentrater (U. Oslo ), O. Wilhelmi (GCM).
O. Wilhelmi and P. Romero Lankao will be working on am IAI-funded project ADaptation to the health impacts of Air Pollution and climaTe Extremes in Latin American cities (ADAPTE). This project seeks to investigate a crucial and not yet fully explored problem: the independent and combined effects of exposure to weather related stresses and air pollution and human vulnerability to urban health in four Latin American cities ( Buenos Aires , Bogotá , Mexico City, and Santiago Chile ). The project will explore how patterns in human mortality/morbidity and vulnerability vary spatially, and the human and natural factors accounting for this differential distribution within the cities.
Collaborators: Paty Romero Lankao (ISSE), Mary Hayden (ISSE), Mauricio Osses and Alejandro Leon (U. de Chile), Eduardo Behrenz (U de los Andes , Colombia ), Laura Dawidowski (CNEA Argentina), Graciela di Marco ( Universidad Nacional de San Martín Argentina ).
Recent papers:
Wilhelmi, O., M. Hayes and D. Thomas. 2007. Managing drought in mountain resort communities: Colorado experience. Disaster Management and Prevention (in press).
Wilhite, D.A., D. M. Diodato, K. Jacobs, R. Palmer, B. Raucher, K. Redmond, D. Sada, K. Helm Smith, J. Warwick, O. Wilhelmi. 2007. " Managing Drought: A Roadmap for Change in the United States ". GSA Conference Report. On-line at http://geosociety.org/meetings/06drought/roadmap.pdf
J. van de Vegte, W.-J. S. de Cerff, G. H. J. van den Oord, R. S, I. A. van der Neut, M. Plieger, R. M. van Hees, R.A.M. de Jeu, M. E. Schaepman, M. R. Hoogerwerf, N. G. Groot, B. Domenico, S. Nativi, O.V. Wilhelmi. 2007. Atmospheric Data Access to the Geospatial User Community. Paper presented at SPIE Europe Remote Sensing Conference , 17–20 September 2007, Florence , Italy
Fransen, T. and O. Wilhelmi. 2007. Increasing societal resilience to winter weather. Proceedings of 87th AMS Annual Meeting , 14-18 January 2007, San Antonio , TX , USA (extended abstract).
Selected Presentations:
Wilhelmi, O. GIS in Weather and Society. WAS*IS Workshop. June 16, 2007, NCAR, Boulde , CO.
Wilhelmi, O., J. Boehnert, B. Domenico, S. Kopp and K. Stellman. Weather and Climate Data Model. Technical workshop, ESRI International User Conference. June 19, 2007. San Diego, CA.
Wilhelmi, O. Integration of quantitative and qualitative information. Potentials of and Limitations to Adaptation in Norway ( PLAN ) Workshop, April 12-13, 2007, Oslo, Norway.
Wilhelmi, O. Use of remote sensing and GIS in natural hazard mitigation. Guest lecture to the University of Oslo GIS Club. April 11, 2007, Oslo, Norway.
Wilhelmi , O., C. K. Uejio and J. P. Samenow. Exploring spatial patterns of societal vulnerability to extreme heat. 87th AMS Annual Meeting, 14-18 January 2007, San Antonio, TX, USA
Wilhelmi, O. 2006. Putting Climate on a Map: Increasing Usability of Atmospheric Science through GIS . Eos Trans. AGU , 87(52), Fall Meeting Suppl., Abstract PA24A-07
Wilhelmi, O. Scope of Meteo/ GIS in the International Context . ADAGUC Workshop, De Bilt, The Netherlands , October 3-4, 2006.