CDIAC's Bookshelf

CDIAC's Bookshelf

In the course of our work at CDIAC, many books and announcements cross our desks. Many of these are highly specialized and may not get a broad announcement to the worldwide scientific community, so we'd like to share our familiarity with them in this feature of CDIAC Communications. CDIAC does not stock or distribute these publications.

A Better Future for the Planet Earth: Lectures by the Winners of the Blue Planet Prize (Asahi Glass Foundation, Japan, 1997, 282 + xvii pp.)

This book includes profiles, essays, lectures, and lists of publications of recipients of the Blue Planet Prize, the international environmental award of the Asahi Glass Foundation. The Prize was first awarded in 1992. Included among the ten winners, whose works are presented in this book, are Syukuro Manabe (1992: "Model Assessment of Observed Global Warming Trend" and "Future Projection of Global Warming by Climate Models"), Charles Keeling (1993: "A Brief History of Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide Measurements and Their Impact on Thoughts About Environmental Change"), Bert Bolin (1995: "What We Know and What We Don't Know about Human-Induced Climate Change and What Should Be Done?" and "Biogeochemical Cycles and Climate Change"), and Wallace S. Broecker (1996: "Our Burden of Responsibility" and "Will Our Ride into the Greenhouse Future Be a Smooth One?").

Copies of A Better Future for the Planet Earth are available from The Asahi Glass Foundation, 2F, Science Plaza Bldg. 5-3, Yonbancho, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 102, Japan.

Multi-Hazard Identification and Risk Assessment [Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Washington, D.C. 20472, 1997, 369 + xxiii pp. and appendices]

This report summarizes hazards both natural (atmospheric, geologic, hydrologic, seismic, and other) and technological (dam failures, fires, hazardous materials events, and nuclear accidents). The report also introduces FEMA's recently developed risk assessment methodology, Hazards United States (HAZUS), and summarizes the National Mitigation Strategy. Future updates are planned by FEMA for the report, which is intended to be a resource for state and local specialists.

>Copies of Multi-Hazard Identification and Risk Assessment are available from FEMA's Publications Warehouse (+1-800-480-2520)

Bits of Power: Issues in Global Access to Scientific Data (National Research Council (NRC), Washington, D.C., 1997, 235 + xii pp.)

This book reports on a National Research Council study to understand the effects of changing technical, economic, and legal issues on the exchange (especially international) of digital data among scientists and to learn what actions are necessary to ensure the full and open exchange of scientific data worldwide. The Committee on Issues in the Transborder Flow of Scientific Data, U.S. National Committee for the International Council of Science Unions (CODATA), provides specific recommendations on data issues in the natural sciences, issues in information technology, economic aspects of scientific data, and legal developments affecting access to data, under the following overarching principle "The value of data lies in their use. Full and open access to scientific data should be adopted as the international norm for the exchange of scientific data derived from publicly funded research. The public-good interests in the full and open access to and use of scientific data need to be balanced against legitimate concerns for the protection of national security, individual privacy, and intellectual property."

Copies of Bits of Power are available from the National Academy Press, 2101 Constitution Ave., N.W., Box 285, Washington, DC 20055 (+1-800-824-6242, http://www.nap.edu/)

Assessing Climate Change: Results from the Model Evaluation Consortium for Climate Assessment (Gordon and Breach Science Publishers, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 1997, 418 + xxiv pp.)

The Model Evaluation Consortium for Climate Assessment (MECCA) was established in 1991 as an international global climate research consortium of universities, government, and industry, with the goal of providing insight into the uncertainties in model projections of greenhouse climate change. This book, edited by Wendy Howe and Ann Henderson-Sellers, represents the final product of the MECCA Analysis Team. It consists of nineteen chapters that describe the MECCA project (Part 1), climate and the atmosphere (Part 2), oceans and climate (Part 3), sensitivity studies (Part 4), impacts of climate change (Part 5), and lessons learned (Part 6). According to the book's

Foreword, by George M. Hidy, MECCA has been a success, especially with respect to the incorporation of MECCA findings into the 1992 and 1995 reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Copies of Assessing climate change are available from Fine Arts Press, Tower A, 112 Talavera Road, North Ryde, NSW 2113, Australia (+61-2-9878-8222, fax +61-2-9878-8122)

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