Research summary
As the effects of climate change accelerate, scientists are looking for better ways to understand and anticipate weather events that could affect communities and landscapes, including farms. Dr. Yanping Li, Canada Research Chair in Climate Change Risk and Resilience, is trying to establish a more integrated understanding of what controls convection (the vertical transport of heat and moisture in the atmosphere), climate change risk, and resilience.
In the short term, she and her research team are determining the mechanisms that influence summertime precipitation over the plains east of the Rockies and how convection over the tropical western Pacific affects precipitation over the Canadian Prairies. They also aim to better predict extreme precipitation risks in Canada overall due to climate change and to understand the impact of climate change on prairie croplands and wetlands. This information will help them to evaluate the effectiveness of different adaptation strategies.