A Biomass Future for the North American Great Plains

Toward Sustainable Land Use and Mitigation of Greenhouse Warming

Norman J. Rosenberg (Autor)

Buch | Softcover

200 Seiten

2010 | Softcover reprint of hardcover 1st ed. 2007
Springer (Verlag)
978-90-481-7405-8 (ISBN)

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WHY THIS BOOK? This book is an exploration of the possibility that a significant portion of the North American Great Plains (NAGP), now primarily in rangeland, corn, soybean, and small-grain production, can be converted to the production of biomass-energy crops. Biomass can be used as a substitute for some of the fossil fuels the use of which is now increasing the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide (CO ) 2 and contributing to global warming and climatic change. Such a land use change to biomass could lead not only to a global good but also to specific economic and environmental benefits for the NAGP region. This analysis is prompted by the following facts and trends: The emission of CO from fossil fuel combustion and tropical deforesta- 2 tion and the rising concentrations of other greenhouse gases make global warming a virtual certainty in this century; indeed the evidence is strong that a warming is already discernible. Global warming will lead to climatic change and, while the geographic d- tribution of this change is not yet known, most general circulation models (GCMs) suggest that midcontinental regions in the northern hemisphere (such as the NAGP) are likely to become drier as well as warmer. NAGP, one of the world’s major breadbaskets, is subject to periodic droughts and other climatic stresses that may worsen with global wa- ing.

The author is Regent's Professor Emeritus of Agricultural Meteorology at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and Laboratory Fellow Emeritus at the Joint Global Change Research Institute, a collaboration of the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and the University of Maryland-College Park.

The Physical Environment.- People and the Economy.- Agriculture and Sustainability.- The Wildcard of Climate Change.- A Role for the Plains in Combating Climate Change.- Outlook.

Erscheint lt. Verlag	25.11.2010
Reihe/Serie	Advances in Global Change Research ; 27
Zusatzinfo	XVIII, 200 p.
Verlagsort	Dordrecht
Sprache	englisch
Maße	160 x 240 mm
Themenwelt	Naturwissenschaften ► Biologie ► Ökologie / Naturschutz
	Naturwissenschaften ► Geowissenschaften ► Geografie / Kartografie
	Sozialwissenschaften ► Politik / Verwaltung
	Technik ► Elektrotechnik / Energietechnik
	Technik ► Umwelttechnik / Biotechnologie
	Weitere Fachgebiete ► Land- / Forstwirtschaft / Fischerei
ISBN-10	90-481-7405-8 / 9048174058
ISBN-13	978-90-481-7405-8 / 9789048174058
Zustand	Neuware