Future Urbanization and Biodiversity: Identifying locations of potential tension Peter J....
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Future Urbanization and Biodiversity: Identifying locations of potential tension Peter J. Marcotullio and Carson Farmer Hunter College, CUNY
Transcript of Future Urbanization and Biodiversity: Identifying locations of potential tension Peter J....
Future Urbanization and Biodiversity: Identifying locations of potential tension
Peter J. Marcotullio and Carson FarmerHunter College, CUNY
Outline
• Inspiration• Methods• Preliminary finding• Conclusion and next steps
Inspiration for the project
Inspiration for the project
• In 2012, we did a very simple analysis of the geographic distribution of human population over time from 1980 to 2100 and compared this distribution to biodiversity distributions
0 200,000 400,000 600,000 800,000 1,000,000 1,200,000 1,400,000-90
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0 200,000 400,000 600,000 800,000 1,000,000 1,200,000 1,400,000-90
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90Population by Latitude, 2010
0 200,000 400,000 600,000 800,000 1,000,000 1,200,000 1,400,000-90
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Population by Latitude, 2040
0 200,000 400,000 600,000 800,000 1,000,000 1,200,000 1,400,000-90
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Population by Latitude, 2070
0 200,000 400,000 600,000 800,000 1,000,000 1,200,000 1,400,000-90
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Population by Latitude, 2100
0 100000000 200000000 300000000 400000000 500000000 600000000 700000000 800000000-90
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90Biodiversity by Latitude, Avifauna
Source: Turner and Hawkins, 2004
0 200000 400000 600000 800000 1000000 1200000 1400000-90
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Population by Latitude, with Avian Biodiversity Gradient 1980
0 200000 400000 600000 800000 1000000 1200000 1400000-90
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Population by Latitude, with Avian Biodiversity Gradient 2100
• The second spike in population is located between 5° South and 15° North
• The terrestrial area located between 5° South and 15° North includes 1,311 of the 5,286 terrestrial mammalian species ranges identified by the IUCN or almost a quarter of all terrestrial mammals species
• This area also intersects 13 of the 34 hotspots identified in 2011
• Moreover, most future population will be added to the world’s cities, which provides special conservation challenges and opportunities
• This was enough to peak our interests
• The question was how to do this analysis more rigorously
We decided to start with a simple model and then develop the project from there…
Methods
• Components of urbanization– Population size • GRUMP 2000 spatial population distribution • UN population for 1692 large cities to 2030 (2014)• UN population for urban residents to 2050 (2014)
– Urban area • GRUMP 2000 spatial population extents (2014)
Methods
• Adding population– Large cities: Add/subtract population using UN
population figures for specific cities for 2000 – 2030 (large cities)
– Small cities: Add/subtract population using UN population from 2000-2030 minus that from large cities, randomly
– All cities: Add/subtract population using UN population figures randomly 2030 – 2050
– After 2050…?
Methods
• Biodiversity– Geodatabases of global ranges for Taxa• Mammals (5,513) (IUCN Red List, Version 2014.1)• Birds (> 9,000) (BirdLife International and NatureServe
(2012) )• Amphibians (6,410) (IUCN Red List, Version 2014.1)• Reptiles (4,296) (IUCN Red List, Version 2014.1)
– Dissolve ranges for individual species– Rasterize results to a “reasonable” resolution– Add up the species in cells
For this presentation we provide on a sample demonstrating the possibilities
Methods
• Population and biodiversity– Identify the most rapidly growing urban areas– Identify the areas of highest biodiversity– Correlate these as potential “tension” areas
Preliminary findings
Preliminary findings
• Show partial results for one country: Democratic Republic of Congo (ISO-code: COD)
• Projection population distribution to 2050• Use a sample of biodiversity (partial
amphibian distribution)• Overlay sample of biodiversity with 2050
patterns
Democratic Republic of Congo
Projected population growth: Democratic Republic of Congo
19501960
19701980
19902000
20102020
20302040
20500
20 000
40 000
60 000
80 000
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120 000
140 000
160 000
180 000
24 838
93 864
37 354
61 427 62 191
155 291
UrbanRuralTotal
2010
2050
Conclusions
• Summary– We are developing a process by which we project urbanization to
2050 and identify locations of human-biodiversity tension. We have started with a simple model
• Next steps – Refine the technique and use it on a global geography for all
countries to 2050 and possibly 2100• In the future
– We hope that from this “simple” process we can further use object-oriented methods to develop more complicated models of urbanization (including land use change, economic components, etc.) and a larger set of biodiversity data
