Climate Change Investigation Report

Introduction

Climate change has been constant for centuries, ever since the beginning of earth. Over thousands of years the earth has been shaped and re-shaped, due to weather and changing climates. A major factor that causes climate change is rain fall, related to cyclone and anti cyclone patterns in the area. Research into climate change will provide information to predict the change that a certain area may undergo, allowing for humans to adapt accordingly, agriculture and architecture can benefit from this; improving farming methods and crop selection also helping in the sustainability of buildings allowing for the dependence on heating or cooling to be taken into account. The following project is an investigation into how climate change

Over the past 104 years, all the recordings and journals have been compiled into a spreadsheet by the current family members still residing on the farm. This data was collected to help the farmer determine what the previous rainfall was and how it was affecting his crops. The data complied will be used to extract a conclusion to this investigation. The data is arranged into a excel spread sheet, and will be analyzed accordingly by creating graphs and tables with relevant rainfall data and comparing the data to the available aerial photographs.

The data used for the following investigation does not include the years 1916 – 1917 (no data recorded) and 1920 during which only 5 months’ data were recorded. It is said that the person who recorded the data was a WW1 soldier during those years. There are a few years during which no values are available for certain months. However, these are much less than for 1920 and are consequently included in the calculations. All the data used is recorded in the appendix.

Data Analysis

The maximum and minimum monthly rainfall and year recorded are shown in the table below. During April, June, July, August and September no rainfall was recorded for a varying number of years. The total numbers of these occurrences are shown in the figure below.

Maximum and

This could be due to several reasons; during both years 1271.6mm and 1051 mm of rain fell respectively.

Figure 2: Aerial photograph taken of Trafalgar, year 1937.

Figure 3: Aerial photograph taken of Trafalgar, year 1948.

When comparing the two photographs taken 9 years apart, it is apparent that there is more vegetation and a greater density of vegetation in 1937. This could be due to a number of factors such as: Decrease in rainfall average over 9 years. Increase in human population over 9 years, greater population will result in vegetation destruction to make way for buildings and residency.

1950 to 1997

During this phase annual rainfall fluctuated considerably around the long term average. It was also during this phase that the absolute maximum annual rainfall (1791.1 mm) was recorded during 1978. As a simplification one could term this phase the “unsettled