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. 2008 Jul;9 Suppl 1(Suppl 1):S28-33.
doi: 10.1038/embor.2008.42.

Exporting the ecological effects of climate change. Developed and developing countries will suffer the consequences of climate change, but differ in both their responsibility and how badly it will affect their ecosystems

Chris D Thomas  1 , Ralf Ohlemüller, Barbara Anderson, Thomas Hickler, Paul A Miller, Martin T Sykes, John W Williams
Affiliations

Exporting the ecological effects of climate change. Developed and developing countries will suffer the consequences of climate change, but differ in both their responsibility and how badly it will affect their ecosystems

Chris D Thomas et al. EMBO Rep. 2008 Jul.
No abstract available

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Projected 1945–2045 risks to ecosystems and biodiversity under observed and projected climate change. (A) Locations where vegetation changes from one biome to another are projected using the LPJ-DGVM (version described by Sitch et al (2003); water uptake updated by Gerten et al (2004); using parameter changes listed in Appendix S2 of Hickler et al (2006)). (B) Changes in projected leaf area index (cover) of woody plants using the LPJ-DGVM (m2 leaves per m2 of ground; declines are shown in brown, increases are shown in green). (C) Index of local climate change, measured as standardized Euclidean distance between 2045 and 1945 climates (dark areas indicate large differences). (D) Distributions of shrinking (brown; red denotes complete loss) and expanding (blue) climates measured as percentage change in area (within 1,000 km) between 1945 and 2045. Two grid cells were considered climatically analogous if all climate variables were within ± 2 °C for the two temperature variables and ± 0.2 mm/day for the two precipitation variables. Narrower and wider tolerance ranges produced only minor directional changes of shrinkage and expansion of analogous climate space per country. The values in (B–D) indicate the upper bounds of categories. LPJ-DGVM, Lund–Potsdam–Jena dynamic global vegetation model.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Global distribution of the export and import of projected changes to natural biological systems through fossil fuel-based CO2 emissions. Positive values indicate that a country exports global change to ecosystems through emissions above any change within the country, and negative values indicate that a country would be a net recipient of ecosystem/biodiversity change. Each bar represents one of 163 countries (excluding Antarctica and Greenland, most small island nations and some others that occupied less than 50% of any 0.5° global grid cell, and a few others for which full data were not available).
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References

    1. Cramer W et al. (2001) Global response of terrestrial ecosystem structure and function to CO2 and climate change: results from six dynamic global vegetation models. Glob Chang Biol 7: 357–373
    1. Franco AMA, Hill JK, Kitschke C, Collingham YC, Roy DB, Fox R, Huntley B, Thomas CD (2006) Impacts of climate warming and habitat loss on extinctions at species' low-latitude range boundaries. Glob Chang Biol 12: 1545–1553
    1. Gerten D, Schaphoff S, Haberlandt U, Lucht W, Sitch S (2004) Terrestrial vegetation and water balance: hydrological evaluation of a dynamic global vegetation model. J Hydrol 286: 249–270
    1. Hickler T, Prentice IC, Smith B, Sykes MT, Zaehle S (2006) Implementing plant hydraulic architecture within the LPJ dynamic global vegetation model. Glob Ecol Biogeogr 15: 567–577
    1. Hickling R, Roy DB, Hill JK, Fox R, Thomas CD (2006) The distributions of a wide range of taxonomic groups are expanding polewards. Glob Chang Biol 12: 450–455

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