Average temperature in Finland has risen by more than two degrees

A press release from the University of Eastern Finland: Over the past 166 years, the average temperature in Finland has risen by more than two degrees. During the observation period, the average increase was 0.14 degrees per decade, which is nearly twice as much as the global average.

According to a recent University of Eastern Finland and Finnish Meteorological Institute study, the rise in the temperature has been especially fast over the past 40 years, with the temperature rising by more than 0.2 degrees per decade.

"The biggest temperature rise has coincided with November, December and January. Temperatures have also risen faster than the annual average in the spring months, i.e., March, April and May. In the summer months, however, the temperature rise has not been as significant," says Professor Ari Laaksonen of the University of Eastern Finland and the Finnish Meteorological Institute.

As a result of the temperature rising, lakes in Finland get their ice cover later than before, and the ice cover also melts away earlier in the spring. Although the temperature rise in the actual growth season has been moderate, observations of Finnish trees beginning to blossom earlier than before have been made....

A view over Ropijärvi lake from the south in 2010 September. Shot by Ximonic, Simo Räsänen, Wikimedia Commons, under the GNU Free Documentation License 1.2

Latest IPCC report: Climate change poses risks to the well-being of nature and people – but there are ways of mitigating these risks

A press release from the Finnish Environment Institute: The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has approved the second part of its Fifth Assessment Report (AR5), titled Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability, at the IPCC meeting in Yokohama, Japan. The key message of the report is that climate change poses serious risks to the well-being of nature and people all over the world. The observed effects of climate change have an impact on people’s health, land and marine ecosystems, water supplies, and people’s livelihoods, from the polar regions to the tropics and from small islands to continents. Poor countries that lack the means to adapt to these changes will suffer the worst.

...Professor Tim Carter from the Finnish Environment Institute (SYKE) is one of the lead writers of the now published report. He hopes that decision-makers will take the information produced by researchers seriously: “If adequate measures to reduce emissions are not taken, the fear is that some of the changes resulting from climate change will push us over an edge after which development can no longer be reversed. This kind of threshold could be, for example, the irreversible melting of Greenland’s glaciers.”

...In Finland, the effects of climate change may weaken the water quality of water systems, as the ground remains unfrozen for longer periods of time in the autumn and winter. Water protection efforts will have to adapt to increased run-off, erosion, and nutrition loads. This will result in new challenges, particularly in agricultural water protection. The warming o
f Finland’s climate is already evident in Finnish fauna; birds, for example, are migrating earlier in the spring and later in the autumn.

...Countries all over the world have begun to develop climate change adaptation plans and strategies. Finland has been a pioneer in this regard, and Finland’s reformed adaptation strategy is currently being widely circulated for comments. In Europe, the EU’s adaptations strategy has led to adaptation planning being incorporated into, for example, the use and management of coastal areas and water systems and the risk management of natural disasters....

Helsinki at night, shot by Petteri Sulonen, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr,  under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license 

Nitrogen deposition poses a threat to the diversity of Europe's forest vegetation

A press release from the Finnish Environment Institute: Unless nitrogen emissions are curbed, the diversity of plant communities in Europe's forests will decrease. Atmospheric nitrogen deposition has already changed the number and richness of forest floor vegetation species in European forests over the last 20–30 years. In particular, the coverage of plant species adapted to nutrient-poor conditions has reduced. However, levels of nitrogen deposition in Finnish forests remain small compared to Southern and Central Europe.

These results will be presented as part of international research published in the journal Global Change Biology. Researchers from the Finnish Environment Institute and the Finnish Forest Research Institute (Metla) participated in this research, which concludes that unless nitrogen emissions are curbed, the diversity of plant communities in Europe's forests will decrease. The work involved the examination of long-term changes in vascular plant communities within a 1 300 monitoring grid covering 28 forested areas in various parts of Europe.

The number and richness of forest floor vegetation species in European forests have changed over the last 20 to 30 years, due to wet and dry deposition of atmospheric nitrogen. In particular, low-nutrient or acidic habitats are sensitive to long-term nitrogen deposition. Among such habitats, coverage of species such as heather and may lily has been reduced in many areas, in which nitrogen deposition has exceeded a certain threshold value i.e. the critical nitrogen load.

The largest changes in vegetation have occur red in Southern and Central European forests. Although deposition has not yet markedly affected species numbers within plant communities, most new species spreading into forests during the monitoring period have been types that favour nitrogen.

...Although nitrogen deposition remains small in Northern Europe, even a slight rise in long-term deposition could change the competitive relationship of vascular plants by promoting the dissemination and growth of nitrogen-favouring species....

Species found in nutrient-poor habitats, such as heather, lingonberry, crowberry and lichens in particular are sensitive to nitrogen deposition. Photo Hannu Nousiainen, Metla.

Finnish town is making preparations against the risk of flooding as sea levels rise

Helsingen Sanomat (Finland): As the weather gradually warms up, minds are turning to the vexed question of where exactly the snow is going to go when it melts - there is so much of it that already people are talking of the risk of flooding on a massive scale, even in locations that are normally spared an inundation each spring.

In the Greater Helsinki area, local authorities are looking still further ahead: precautions are to be taken against potential floods caused by climate change and an impending rise in sea level. In the City of Espoo, the first district to be subject to such measures is Perkkaa, where an office building accommodating 1,000 employees is in the construction stage.

According to plans, as many as 3,000 residences could also be built in the area. In the future, water could flood into the plots both from sea and land. Perkka abuts onto the north end of Laajalahti, a large bay exposed to southerly winds. The Monikonpuro brook streaming through the area also collects rainwater, thus increasing volumes of water.

“As a rule, it is likely that when the sea is raging, it is also raining heavily”, describes project architect Lotta Kari-Pasonen, responsible for town planning in the area. To be on the safe side, it will be taken into account that the surface of the water could rise up to three metres above normal. According to Kari-Pasonen, the channel of Monikonpuro has to be widened and terraced. ”The flood waters will have to be directed away from the green areas in order that they can stay dry”, Kari-Pasonen argues….

Aerial view of Kivenlahti, Espoo, Finland, shot by Ville Mustonen, under the Creative CommonsAttribution 3.0 Unported license