2021

Inter Disciplinary Programme

in

Climate Studies (IDPCS)

Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bombay

We strive to foster fundamental understanding and problem

centered research in climate science, solutions and policy across

local, regional and global scales

Contact:

Prof. Subimal Ghosh

Convener, IDP in Climate Studies

IIT Bombay, Powai

Mumbai - 400 076, India

Tel: +91-22 2576 5141

head.climate@iitb.ac.in

http://www.climate.iitb.ac.in

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The Interdisciplinary Programme in Climate Studies (IDPCS) was initiated at the Indian Institute of

Technology Bombay (IIT Bombay), in January 2012, as one of the first doctoral programmes in India

addressing research related to climate change. Over 32 faculty participants are drawn from 11

departments across IIT Bombay, who increasingly apply a depth of expertise in their fields to address

the complexity of climate change. Currently, 65 PhD students and 2 Postdoctoral researchers are

enrolled at IDP in Climate Studies.

Education: To evolve an interdisciplinary doctoral curriculum, special courses for undergraduate and postgraduate students and to serve continuing education needs of professionals.

Research: To undertake high-impact, multi-disciplinary, problem-driven research for end-to-end solutions to climate change. To build long-term scientific capacity and systems for study of regional climate change and climate futures.

Government: To provide critical assessments to support policy and governmental decision-making. To provide strategic knowledge support to public and private sector entities catering clean energy and climate.

Human Resource Development and Industry Interaction: To enable the creation of a pool of multi-disciplinary researchers to serve the growing need for climate change professionals.

MISSION

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The PhD curriculum includes a set of courses on fundamental and applied topics

designed to provide intellectual grounding for critical research, analysis and

application.

CORE COURSES:

CM 803: Introduction to Climate Change

CM 402: Earth’s Climate: Past, Present and Future

SCIENCE TRACK COURSES:

CM 801: Introduction to Risk Analysis

CM 802: Atmosphere and Climate Change

CM 701: Geophysical Fluid Dynamics

CM 604: Remote sensing for Environmental and Climate Change Studies

CM 608: Sustainable Engineering Principles

CE 608: Ecohydroclimatology

CE 605: Applied Statistics

CE 701: Remote Sensing Technology

CE 712: Digital Image Processing of Remotely Sensed Data

CE 764: Hydroinformatics

US 604: Management Techniques for Urban Systems

US 607: Sustainability Assessment of Urban Systems

POLICY TRACK COURSES:

CM 607: Energy & Climate

CM 609: Environmental Planning and Development

CM 610: Policy Responses to Climate Change

CM 606: Energy Resources, Economics and Environment

CM 702: Law, Governance, Rights and Development

CM 605: Public Policy & Governance

ACADEMIC COURSES

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The PhD programme attracts highly accomplished students from diverse backgrounds including

Atmospheric Sciences, Environmental studies, Engineering (Civil, Chemical, Computer Science,

Information Technology), Economics, Planning & Architecture. Assistantships are available from

MHRD funds to the Institute and multi-faculty research initiatives.

Currently, 65 students are enrolled for the PhD programme at IDP Climate Studies. The annual

and cumulative student intake can be seen below:

PhD Students at IDPCS, IIT Bombay

STUDENT INTAKE

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The details of students from IDP in Climate Studies who have been placed with

various industries and academic institutions can be found below. Over 15

students have graduated so far.

ACADEMIA INDUSTRY

Dr. Pankaj Sadavarte

Post-doctoral Fellow, Institute for Advanced Sustainability

Studies e.v., Potsdam, Germany

Dr. Nitin Patil

Weather Modelling Group,

Hewlett-Packard, Bangalore, India

Dr. Hiteshri Shastri

Asst. Professor, Charotar University of Science &

Technology, Gujarat, India

Dr. Prashant Dave

Sr. Quantitative Analyst, CRISIL,

Mumbai, India

Dr. Ankur Pandit

Assistant Professor- R&D, Welingkar Institute of

Management Development and Research, Mumbai

Dr. Tarul U Sharma

Associate, GIST Advisory Pvt. Ltd.

Dr. Aparna Dwivedi

Principal, Dr Baliram Hiray College of Architecture,

Mumbai

Dr. Manisha Jain

Visiting Assistant Professor, IGIDR, Mumbai, India

Dr. Supantha Paul

Asst. Professor, Dept. of Civil Engineering, TIT

Narsingarh, Agartala

RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT

Dr. Pratiman Patel, Postdoctoral Fellow, National University of Singapore, Singapore

Dr. Pankaj Kumar, Postdoctoral fellow, Qatar Environment and Energy Research Institute, Qatar

Dr. Piyali Chowdhury, Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Plymouth, United Kingdom

Dr. Deepika Swami, EMPRI fellow-Climate Change, Environmental Management and Policy

Research Institute, Dept of Forest, Ecology and Environment, Govt of Karnataka, Karnataka

Dr. Swati Singh, Postdoctoral Fellow, IISER Bhopal

Dr. Krishna Malakar, Postdoctoral Researcher, College of Water Conservancy & Hydropower

Engineering, Hohai University, Nanjing, China

Dr Rakesh Sinha, Project Manager, Dept of Civil Engineering, IIT Bombay

Dr. Anjana Devanand, Postdoctoral Researcher, School of Civil, Environmental and Mining

Engineering, University of Adelaide, Australia

Dr. Jaysankar. T, Research Associate, IDP in Climate Studies, IIT Bombay

Placement Details

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Special value is placed on the diversity of knowledge among the faculty who apply their expertise to

interdisciplinary challenges that cross traditional academic boundaries to address climate change

not only through earth and environmental science but also through economics and engineering.

Around 32 faculty participants drawn from 11 departments across IIT Bombay are associated with

IDPCS:

Prof. Subimal Ghosh, Convener, IDPCS Civil Engineering

Prof. Chandra Venkataraman Chemical Engineering

Prof. Subhankar Karmakar Environmental Science and Engineering Department

Prof. Mani Bhushan Chemical Engineering

Prof. Yogendra Shastri Chemical Engineering

Prof. Manasa Ranjan Behera Civil Engineering

Prof. T I Eldho Civil Engineering

Prof. D Parthasarathy Humanities and Social Sciences

Prof. Indu J Civil Engineering

Prof. Arpita Mondal Civil Engineering

Prof. RAAJ Ramsankaran Civil Engineering

Prof. Manne Janga Reddy Civil Engineering

Prof. Arun B Inamdar Centre of Studies in Resources Engineering

Prof. Harish Phuleria Environmental Science and Engineering Department

Prof. N C Narayanan Centre for Technology Alternatives for Rural Areas

Prof. Anand Rao Centre for Technology Alternatives for Rural Areas

Prof. Bakul Rao Centre for Technology Alternatives for Rural Areas

Prof. Rangan Banerjee Department of Energy Science and Engineering

Prof. K Narayanan Humanities and Social Sciences

Prof. Sridhar Balasubramanian Mechanical Engineering

Prof. S Gopalakrishnan Mechanical Engineering

Prof. Trupti Mishra Shailesh J Mehta School of Management

Prof. Pradip Kalbar Centre for Urban Science and Engineering

Prof. Eswar Rajasekaran Civil Engineering

Prof. Abhishek Chakraborty Environmental Science and Engineering Department

Prof. Karthikeyan Lanka Centre of Studies in Resources Engineering

Prof. Basudev Biswal Civil Engineering

Prof. Manoranjan Sahu Environmental Science and Engineering Department

Prof. Vikram Vishal Department of Earth Sciences

FACULTY

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Prof. Swatantra Pratap Singh Environmental Science and Engineering Department

Prof. Anish Modi Department of Energy Science and Engineering

Prof. Riddhi Singh Civil Engineering

The distribution of faculty members from various departments can be seen below:

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2

10

5

2

1

2

1 1

4

1

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

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Cluster and components: Dedicated data-server with computer cluster (Master

Nodes-2, I/O Nodes-2, One Storage/Controller-, Compute Nodes-24, cluster compilers

and software.

Modelling software: Modelling platforms - ECHAM6-HAM2, WRF,

MIKEFLOOD,SMS SWAT, Aqua Modelling System, Urbawind; Assessment tools -

Aspen Plus, Nlogit, NVIVO, TIMES-VEDA ; Data handling/visualization -FERRET,

GrADS, SigmaPlot, CDO, NCO, NCL, Xmgrace, Python; Mathematical/statistical -R,

Matlab; Geospatial modelling - Arc GIS, ERDAS IMAGINE, QGIS, ENVI Sarscape.

FACILITIES

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RESEARCH FOCUS

Many sectors and regions in India are highly vulnerable to climate change impacts. Of

particular importance is the fact that India is highly exposed to the risk of a number of

natural hazards of climatic and hydro-meteorological origin including, for example,

extremes of temperature and rainfall perturbation. Research activities at IDP in Climate

studies offer a firm foundation in many leading-edge areas related to climate change.

Research areas include prediction of climate perturbation and extremes, modelling of

processes in the atmosphere and biosphere, climate change impacts on hydrology, climate

mitigation technologies, technology assessment for competitiveness and sustainability,

strategies for low-carbon development, mitigation and adaptation policies, vulnerability

assessment, climate sensitive sectors and poverty, natural disasters, and human impacts.

A broad framework for the integration of climate science to impacts (on socio-economic

sectors) and responses (adaptation and mitigation through technology response) is laid out

in the figure below.

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s

Department of Science and Technology sponsored Centre of Excellence in

Climate Studies (DST-CoECS), IIT Bombay

For Continuation and Advancement of the Centre of Excellence in Climate

Studies, IITB (Phase – II)

Broad areas and Sub-areas

Climate Change Science: Indian Monsoon, Aerosol Atmosphere Interactions, Land atmosphere interactions, Oceanic and Coastal processes, Land Surface processes Climate Change Adaptation: Sector specific impacts assessment, Resources Management, Vulnerability and risk analysis Climate Mitigation: Carbon sequestration, Climate finance, Carbon cycle and role of vegetation, Carbon emissions, Technology assessment

Project Investigators: Prof. Subhankar Karmakar

Co-Project Investigators:

Prof. Chandra Venkataraman

Prof. Subimal Ghosh

Prof. Trupti Mishra

Total project cost: Rs. 6.71 Cr

Duration: 5 years (2018-2023)

RESEARCH INITIATIVES – DST CoECS, IIT Bombay

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The project management is organized around a three tier structure involving 17

institutions. This includes a Lead institution, 8 Associate institutions and 8 field research

institutions. A multi-pronged approach will be adopted towards building scientific

capacity, as well as creation of infrastructure and systems (for measurements and

modelling) at participating institutions.

National Carbonaceous Aerosols

Programme (NCAP) project on

Carbonaceous Aerosol Emissions, Source

Apportionment and Climate Impacts,

Ministry of Environment, Forests and

Climate Change.

Total cost of Project: Rs. 55.57 Cr

Duration: 5y (April 2017 – March 2022)

PI: Prof. Chandra Venkataraman

Co-PIs: Prof. Mani Bhushan

Prof. Harish Phuleria

Prof. Subimal Ghosh

RESEARCH INITIATIVES – NCAP COALESCE

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It is a multi-institutional, coordinated project, with the following goals:

➢ To understand the sources, fate and impacts of carbonaceous aerosols, on climate

and air quality, in the Indian region, through interdisciplinary research.

➢ To reduce uncertainties in our understanding of the impacts of carbonaceous aerosols

on regional scales over India, through adoption of robust methodologies.

➢ To inform scientific communities, policy makers and the public regarding

carbonaceous aerosol influence on climate change and climate stresses, and their

implications.

➢ To promote training and learning about aspects of aerosol measurement and

modelling through workshops on research methods.

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1.

▪ Understanding recent extreme events in India in the context of climate change |

Funded by DST-UKIERI | Grant amount 30.71 lakhs | Duration: 2017-2019

▪ Meso-scale subsurface mixing dynamics in the Indian Ocean region using Modular

Ocean Model (MOM) | Funded by DST | Grant amount 41.77 lakhs | Duration: 2017-

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▪ Extended Range Hydro-meteorological Forecasts for West Bengal at a District Level |

Funded by Dept. of Environment, Govt. of West Bengal | Grant amount 99 lakhs |

Duration: 2017-2019

▪ Transformation as Praxis: Exploring Socially Just and Transdisciplinary Pathways to

Sustainability in Marginal Environments | Funded by BELMONT Forum, Netherlands |

Grant amount 1 Crore | Duration: 2018-21

▪ Coastal Transformation and Fisher Wellbeing | Funded by EU- India Platform for

Social Sciences and Humanities | Grant amount Rs. 17 lakhs

▪ A systematic large-scale assessment for potential of CO2 enhanced oil and natural

gas recovery in key sedimentary basins in India | Funded by DST | Grant amount Rs.

1.44 Crores

OTHER RESEARCH INITIATIVES

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Industry Linkage

Course on ’Sustainable Finance’ in Jan-2020

in collaboration Climate Bonds Initiative

Workshops on specialized

themes

International workshop on

Green Finance Opportunities

and Challenges, April 25 - 26,

2013.

1st Climate Science and Policy

Workshop, March 6-7, 2014.

Climate Modelling Workshop,

March 20, 2015.

Institutional linkages

MoU with Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, Pune.

Co-advising of PhD students, from among staff

scientists.

Research collaboration to support the ESM evaluation

and development.

International visiting lecturers from U. Maryland, U.

British Columbia, Northeastern U., U. Oklahoma, Purdue

U., Chinese U. of Hong Kong

Collaborative guidance of PhD students with scientists

from CSIR-4PI, IITM, Cardiff U., U. Maryland, Columbia.

U, Purdue. U.,

Linkage with policy makers

Preparation of State Action Plan on Climate

Change (SAPCC) for Rajasthan

Development of a Flood Forecasting

System for Chennai.

Project on climate change in coastal

districts of Maharashtra (GEF UNDP).

Participation in research and

implementation of Maharashtra State Action

Plan on Climate Change.

Research for Maharashtra’s State

Knowledge Management Centre on Climate

Change (SKMCCC) on Agriculture, Disaster

Risk Management, Coastal Management &

Rural Development

IPCC AR6

Training initiatives

CEP (Continuing Education

Programme) courses offered to assist

industry professionals in improving

their skills.

Summer School: To create an

awareness about the climate research

for undergraduate and post graduate

students. 6 summer schools organized

and 101 students participated.

E school on Climate Science and

Policy: virtual summer-school

organised in August 2020 due to

ongoing pandemic, received

overwhelmingly positive response.

NETWORKS AND COLLABORATIONS

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The 7th summer school was organised virtually due to ongoing pandemic from August 17-28, 2021

and 1300+ students from various backgrounds participated. Prof. Pradip Kalbar was the co-ordinator

for this year’s summer school. The summer school aims to draw the attention of outstanding students

towards exciting research areas in Climate Studies. The course content includes lectures and

tutorials on climate science and policy by faculty members from IITB and other renowned institutes.

ACTIVITIES/ EVENTS ORGANIZED

IDPCS SUMMER E-SCHOOL

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The Interdisciplinary Programme in Climate Studies (IDPCS) organizes a number of lectures/talks by

eminent faculty members/researchers from various institutes. The seminar series is envisaged as

weekly lectures on a variety of topics relevant to Climate Studies. The audience is primarily students

and faculty of the Climate Studies programme. However, we transitioned to virtual webinars during

the 2020 pandemic, thus making the series accessible to all interested. Some glimpses below:

In Photo: 6th summer school, July 2019

IDPCS WEBINAR SERIES

China-India Webinar on Climate Policy &

Governance. Speaker: Prof. Yuan Xu, The Chinese

University of Hong Kong

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A Panel Discussion on Scope for Technology Development & Entrepreneurship in

Climate Studies | Funded by DST, GoI

Panel discussion Series | funded by DST, GoI

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EVENTS

Workshop with team SPLICE, DST, GoI |12th March 2020

Official launch of book “Climate Change Signals and Response: A strategic knowledge

compendium for India” | 19 March 2019

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EU Day event on “EU Policies and EU-INDIA Engagement on Sustainability, Environment, Climate Policies” |

27 February 2020 | Chief Guest: Ambassador of the European Union to India and Bhutan,

H. E. Ugo Astuto

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CLIMATE CO-BENEFITS OF AIR QUALITY AND CLEAN ENERGY POLICY IN

INDIA

Sustainable development goals connect policies addressing air quality and energy

efficiency with complementary benefits for climate mitigation. However, a typically

fragmented approach across these domains hinders effectiveness in addressing

short-lived climate forcers (SLCFs)—including methane, carbon monoxide, non-

methane volatile organic compounds and black carbon—to supplement CO2

mitigation. Here, to support policy coordination in India, we assess climate co-

benefits of air quality and clean energy policies, using multiple metrics (global

warming and temperature change potentials). We estimate an emission reduction

potential of −0.1 to −1.8 GtCO2e yr−1 in 2030. The largest benefits accrue from

residential clean energy policy (biomass cooking) and air pollution regulation

(curbing brick production and agricultural residue burning emissions), which cut

black carbon. In the next few decades (using global warming potential—GWP20),

emission reduction potentials of warming SLCFs exceed those of CO2, which is not

evident on longer timescales. Concurrently, policies in the electricity generation

and transport sectors reduce cooling SLCFs (SO2 and NOx), potentially unmasking

0.1–2.4 GtCO2e yr−1. Integrating these interventions into national climate policies

can strengthen both climate action and sustainability. The crucial impact of black

carbon suggests that it should be included in the international climate accord.

CHOICE OF IRRIGATION WATER MANAGEMENT PRACTICE AFFECTS INDIAN

SUMMER MONSOON RAINFALL AND ITS EXTREMES

There is an emerging understanding toward the importance of land-atmosphere

interactions in the monsoon system, but the effects of specific land and water

management practices remain unclear. Here, using regional process-based

experiments, we demonstrate that monsoon precipitation is sensitive to the choice of

irrigation practices in South Asia. Experiments with realistic representation of

unmanaged irrigation and paddy cultivation over north-northwest India exhibit

substantially different spatial patterns in experiments with a well-managed irrigation

system, indicating that increase in unmanaged irrigation might be a factor driving the

observed changes in the intraseasonal monsoon characteristics. Our finding stress

the need for accurate representation of irrigation practices to improve the reliability

of earth system modeling over South Asia.

RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS

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A COMPREHENSIVE INDIA-WIDE SOCIAL VULNERABILITY ANALYSIS:

HIGHLIGHTING ITS INFLUENCE ON HYDRO-CLIMATIC RISK

The impacts of hazard events such as extreme rainfall, heatwaves, and droughts

are substantial and represent an increasing threat over India. Effective adaptations

to these hazards require an in-depth understanding of their physical and

socioeconomic drivers. While hazard characteristic models have been substantially

improved, compelling evidence of the spatio-temporal analysis of social vulnerability

(SoV) throughout India are still lacking. Here, we provide the first analysis of the

SoV to disasters at a national-scale for the past two decades using a robust data

envelopment analysis framework, which eliminates subjectivity associated with

indicator weighting. An interesting result is that SoV has decreased over past

decade, which is primarily due to an increase in literacy rate and conversion rate of

marginalized groups to main working population, and a decrease in child population

due to use of birth control. Contrarily, while analysing hydroclimatic hazards over

India, we notice an increase in probability of their occurrence over significantly large

portions all over India, particularly in Karnataka, Maharashtra, Odisha, North-

Eastern states and Telangana. The spatial pattern of increase is surprisingly similar

for all three considered hazards, viz. extreme precipitation, heatwaves, and drought.

Combining the information from SoV and hazard analysis, we further estimate the

risk to hydro-climatic extremes. A notable observation is the synchronized increase

in hazard and risk in these regions, indicating that hazards are contributing

significantly to the increasing risk and not SoV. Further analyses of mortalities

induced by different hazards indicate that deaths per million on a decadal-scale

have either decreased or remained constant in recent decades, which suggests that

mortality is decreasing despite the increasing risk of hazards over India. This also

indicates an enhanced capacity for adaptation, which can be attributed to the

decadal decrease in SoV observed in the present study.

INCREASING AGRICULTURAL RISK TO HYDRO-CLIMATIC EXTREMES IN INDIA

Indian agriculture is globally well-documented to reflect the impacts of changing

climate significantly. However, climate adaptation efforts are often hindered due to

the inadequate assessment of coupled human-environment interactions. In this

study, we propose a novel unified country-level framework to quantify the decadal

agricultural risks derived from multiple hydro-meteorological exposures and adaptive

consequences. We identify, for the first time, that rice and wheat risks have

increased in the recent decade, with wheat at a twofold higher magnitude than rice.

Increasing crops risk is found to be predominantly driven by the decreasing number

of cultivators; in particular, the wheat risk is also attributed to increasing minimum

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temperatures during the crop growing season. We provide convincing evidence

indicating that the hydro-climatic hazards related to precipitation extremes and

droughts are specifically alarming the crops risk as compared to temperature

extremes. These observation-based results highlight the sensitivity of India's

agriculture and the risk associated with multiple agro-ecological and climatic

components. We recommend these findings to facilitate the informed planning of

adaptive measures and ensure sustainable food security of the nation.

SIMULATION OF PASSIVE MICROWAVE DATA TOWARD EFFICIENT

ASSIMILATION OVER INDIAN SUBCONTINENT

Brightness temperature (Tb) is sensitive to soil moisture (SM) estimates and has the advantage of increasing the spatial coverage of SM measurements. This letter focuses on the simulation of Tb from the land surface variables generated by Noah with multiparameterized (Noah-MP) and a forward observation operator, community microwave emission model (CMEM) over the Indian subcontinent with a spatial

resolution of 0.25◦×0.25◦. Traditionally, soil dielectric constant and vegetation

optical depth are the most important parameters that affect the sensitivity of the top of the atmosphere Tb. Hence, the results of the simulated Tb are presented for a total of 12 configurations and the one with better result (C12) is compared against the microwave polarization difference index (MPDI)- based Tb and observed SM and ocean salinity (SMOS) Tb. The simulated SM from the land surface model (LSM) is also compared with the observed SMOS SM to examine the sensitivity of the simulated Tb with SM. The results reveal that MPDI approach has immense potential in simulating the observed Tb and can be used toward the development of an efficient Tb assimilation system.

ON THE ROLE OF RAINFALL DEFICITS AND CROPPING CHOICES IN LOSS OF

AGRICULTURAL YIELD IN MARATHWADA, INDIA

Crop loss and ensuing social crises can be detrimental for the agriculture-driven economy of India. Though some studies identify country-wide increasing temperatures as the dominant factor for crop loss, the agro-climatic diversity within the country necessitates an understanding of the influence of climate variability on yields at regional scales. We report a complex interplay among rainfall, temperature and cropping choices, with a focus on the drought-prone Marathwada region in Maharashtra. Our analysis based on observations, as well as statistical and rocess-

based modelling experiments, and temperature projections of 1.5◦C and 2◦C

warmer worlds show that for the two major cropping seasons, rainfall deficit is the primary cause of crop failure, as compared to rising temperatures. The gradual shift from drought resilient food crops, such as sorghum and pearl-millet to water-intensive cash crops such as sugarcane in recent years, is seemingly responsible for aggravating this crisis. Our findings warrant strategies promoting drought-resilient food crops, that will be useful, not only for mitigating the immediate agrarian

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crisis, but also for curbing impending threats to food security in the region under future climate change.

ANALYSIS OF TEMPERATURE VARIABILITY AND EXTREMES WITH RESPECT TO

CROP THRESHOLD TEMPERATURE FOR MAHARASHTRA, INDIA Temperature is one of the prime factors affecting crop yield and thereby, in changing

climate, it is imperative to investigate the co-variability of crop yield and temperature

change. Temperature change can manifest itself in multiple factors such as

deviation from long-period average, daily scale variability and frequency/intensity of

extreme temperature events. To add to the complexity, each of these factors can

affect the crop yield differently which necessitates understanding their effect on crop

yield individually as well as collectively. Concerning this, we evaluated their distinct

and combined impact with respect to threshold temperature of three major crops, i.e.

sorghum, sugarcane and millet sown across the Maharashtra State of India. Further,

the temperature parameters were conflated using confirmatory factor analysis to

formulate a temperature variability index (TVI) that helped in identifying the

collective impact of these multiple factors on each crop. Results show that the TVI

and sugarcane yield for Nagpur and Bhandara districts of the Vidarbha region

exhibited negative co-variability (− 0.30/year), implying the negative impact of

temperature change on sugarcane. For sorghum, Wardha and Bhandara of

Vidarbha region, Solapur of Pune region and Ratnagiri of Konkan region exhibited

negative co-variability with TVI (~− 0.2 to − 0.4/year). Contrary to sugarcane and

sorghum, for millets, Akola, Amravati and Chandarpur districts in Vidarbha region;

Hingoli, Parbhani, Nanded and Osmanabad in Marathwada region; Satara and

Sangli in Pune region; Jalgaon in Nashik region and Ratnagiri; and Sindhudurg in

Konkan region exhibited positive co-variability (0.50/year), signifying the favourable

temperature conditions for sowing millet. Overall, due to the high exposure of

districts to temperature change in Vidarbha and Pune regions, farmers in these

districts are advised to refrain from sowing sorghum and sugarcane; instead,

farmers can moderate the adverse effects of climate change by sowing millet due to

the existence of conducive temperature for millet in Maharashtra. Further, analysis

was used to suggest the region and climate-specific cropping pattern for other

districts of Maharashtra that can be used by the policy makers to improve the

situation of agriculture, farmers and economy of India.

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ABSORBING AEROSOL INFLUENCE ON TEMPERATURE MAXIMA: AN

OBSERVATION BASED STUDY OVER INDIA

Increasing trends in summer-time temperature maxima (Tmax) over India, show

consequent increases in the intensity and frequency of heatwave events in recent

years. Heat waves have been largely attributed to large-scale meteorological

blocking, characterized by subsidence, clear skies and low soil moisture, in

observational studies, or greenhouse gas enhancements in model studies. While

radiative effects of absorbing aerosols are acknowledged, the association of

absorbing aerosols with temperature maxima has not been investigated

comprehensively. In the current study, statistical tools (such as correlation and

Granger causality) were applied to long term (1979–2013) satellite and ground

based observations to evaluate influence of absorbing aerosols on Tmax in north-

west India (Tmax-NW). Regional absorbing aerosol index (AAI) in the north-west

(AAI-NW) and central-India (AAI-CI) showed co-variability with Tmax-NW, implying

connections to both local and non-local absorbing aerosols. The effects persisted on

seasonal and heatwave event scales, becoming stronger on heatwave days with

presence of enhanced AAI loadings. Causal effects of AAI-NW and AAI-CI were

identified on Tmax-NW with a lag of 1–11 days, across multiple years, thereby

establishing the influence of absorbing aerosols on heatwave events. The absence

of confounding effects of surface pressure on these links suggests that, even during

heat wave events linked to atmospheric blocking, absorbing aerosols can further

enhance temperature maxima and related heatwave intensity.

SPATIOTEMPORAL ANALYSIS OF WATER BALANCE COMPONENTS AND THEIR

PROJECTED CHANGES IN NEAR-FUTURE UNDER CLIMATE CHANGE OVER SINA

BASIN, INDIA

Quantification of water-budget components is an essential step in the planning and

management of water resources in any river basin. Recently several studies

emphasized that climate change would inevitably affect terrestrial hydrology. This

study applies distributed hydrological modeling using the Variable Infiltration

Capacity (VIC) model to simulate the water balance components in the Sina basin, a

drought-prone region in India. We analyzed the long-term spatiotemporal dynamics

of precipitation, evapotranspiration, surface runoff, and baseflow components, and

their alterations due to impending climate change. The study employed the Mann-

Kendall test and Sen’s slope estimators to analyze the spatiotemporal trends of the

water balance components during the baseline (1980–2010) and for the near future

(2019–2040) periods. For the baseline period, precipitation exhibited an increasing

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trend, particularly during the monsoon season. On the evaluation of the annual

water balance components, it showed that the basin has a low annual rainfall (~ 718

mm) and relatively a very high annual evapotranspiration (~ 572 mm) during 1980–

2010, which might be the main reason for frequent droughts in the study basin.

Further, for analysing the climate change impacts on the water budget in the Sina

basin, the VIC model was forced with outputs from a set of global climate models for

near future (2019–2040) for two emission scenarios RCP4.5 and RCP8.5. Analysis

of the results revealed that the water balance components in the near future would

be negatively affected by climate change despite their increasing pattern in the

baseline period. In comparison to the baseline (1980–2010), the surface runoff

would decrease by as much as 32% for the near future, which stresses for planning

and adaptation of appropriate mitigation measures in the basin.

ABSORBING AEROSOLS AND HIGH‐TEMPERATURE EXTREMES IN INDIA

Heat waves in India during the pre‐monsoon months have significant impacts on

human health, productivity and mortality. While greenhouse gas‐induced global

warming is believed to accentuate high temperature extremes, anthropogenic

aerosols predominantly constituted by radiation‐scattering sulfate are believed to

cause an overall cooling in most world regions. However, the Indian region is

marked by an abundance of absorbing aerosols, such as black carbon (BC) and

dust. The goal of this work was to understand the association between aerosols,

particularly those that are absorbing in nature, and high‐temperature extremes in

north‐central India during the pre‐monsoon season. We use 30‐year simulations

from a chemistry‐coupled atmosphere‐only general circulation model (GCM),

ECHAM6‐HAM2, forced with evolving aerosol emissions in an interactive aerosol

module, along with observed evolving SSTs. A composite of high‐temperature

extremes in the model simulations, compared to climatology, shows large‐scale

conditions conducive to heat waves. Importantly, it reveals concurrent positive

anomalies of BC and dust aerosol optical depths. Changes in near‐surface

properties include a reduction in single scattering albedo (implying greater

absorption) and enhancement in short‐wave heating rate, compared to

climatological conditions. Alterations in surface energy balance include reduced

latent heat flux, but increased sensible heat flux, consistent with enhanced

temperatures. Thus, chemistry‐coupled GCM simulations capture an association of

absorbing aerosols with high‐temperature extremes in north India, arising from

radiative heating in the surface layer.

25

PARTITIONING OF MEMORY AND REAL-TIME CONNECTIONS BETWEEN

VARIABLES IN HIMALAYAN ECOHYDROLOGICAL PROCESS NETWORKS

The Himalayan ecosystem is a global biodiversity hotspot and a vital component of

the global water cycle. However, the studies characterizing the ecohydrological

processes of the Himalayas are still limited. Looking at a system as a network,

having nonlinear couplings, can give us better insights into its dynamics. Here, using

an information-theoretic approach on the variables, Precipitation (P), Temperature

(T), Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI), Latent Heat Flux (LH), Sensible Heat Flux

(SH), Wind Speed (WS), Incoming Shortwave Radiation (SWL), and Relative

Humidity (Q), we represent the ecohydrological processes of the Himalayas in the

form of networks for three seasons: summer (MAM), monsoon (JJASO), and winters

(NDJF). The networks have two types of links between variables: real-time and

memory-driven. We show that the couplings between ecohydrological variables in

the Western Himalaya are more memory dominant that the Eastern Himalaya.

Precipitation interacts with vegetation in the Himalayas using both real-time

associations as well as memory-based connections. The dominance of memory

varies spatially and temporally. The Temperature, on the other hand, influences

vegetation in near real-time, and it also has memory-based links in Central Himalaya

and at the higher elevations of the Eastern Himalaya. We find that the real-time

interactions (zero lagged connections) among ecohydrological variables are high

during the monsoon as opposed to winters, which are dominated by memory-based

associations. These findings provide the foundation for further analysis of the

trajectory of Himalayan ecohydrological systems under natural and human-induced

climate stresses.

26

During 2012-2020, several high-impact publications resulted from the ongoing

research and many citations were received in the peer-reviewed literature with our

research also getting highlighted in the media.

PUBLICATIONS

TIONS Environmental Research Letters

Climate Dynamics

Geophysical Research Letters

Nature Sustainability

Scientific Reports-Nature

Water Resources Research

Hydrology Research

Atmospheric Environment

Journal of Hydrology

Atmospheric Research

Science of the Total environment

27

Over 135 international journal publications (2012-2020), 109 articles appear in

proceedings of International conferences.

22%

10%

50%

18% <2

Between2-3

Between3-5

Research Articles with Impact Factor

28

1. Tripathy, Shrabani S., Udit Bhatia, Mohit

Mohanty, Subhankar Karmakar, and Subimal

Ghosh. "Flood evacuation during pandemic: a

multi-objective framework to handle compound

hazard." Environmental Research Letters 16, no.

3 (2021): 034034.

2. Ghosh, Mousumi, Mohit Prakash Mohanty,

Pushpendra Kishore, and Subhankar Karmakar.

"Performance evaluation of potential inland

flood management options through a three-way

linked hydrodynamic modelling framework for a

coastal urban watershed." Hydrology Research

52, no. 1 (2021): 61-77. (IF: 2.475)

3. Ghosh, Mousumi, Mohit Mohanty, and Subhankar

Karmakar. "Identification of Optimal Hydraulic

Flood Management Scenarios for a Socially

Vulnerable Urban Coastal Catchment: A 3-way

Coupled Hydrodynamic Approach." Earth and

Space Science Open Archive ESSOAr (2021).

4. Ghosh, Mousumi, Jitendra Singh, Sheeba

Sekharan, Subimal Ghosh, P. E. Zope, and

Subhankar Karmakar. "Rationalization of

automatic weather stations network over a

coastal urban catchment: A multivariate

approach." Atmospheric Research (2021): 105511.

5. Swami, Deepika, Prashant Dave, and Devanathan

Parthasarathy. "Analysis of temperature variability

and extremes with respect to crop threshold

temperature for Maharashtra, India." Theoretical

and Applied Climatology (2021): 1-12.

6. Tibrewal K. & Venkataraman C. (2020) “Climate

co-benefits of air quality and clean energy policy

in India” Nature Sustainability

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-020-00666-3

7. M. Singh, R. Krishnan, B. Goswami, A. D.

Choudhury, P. Swapna, R. Vellore, A. G. Prajeesh,

N. Sandeep, C. Venkataraman, R. V. Donner, N.

Marwan, J. Kurths (2020) “Fingerprint of volcanic

forcing on the ENSO–Indian monsoon coupling”

Science Advances, DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aba8164.

8. Swami, Deepika, Prashant Dave, and Devanathan

Parthasarathy. "Understanding farmers’ suicidal

ideation: a structural equation modeling study in

Maharashtra, India." Climatic Change 163, no. 4

(2020): 2175-2200.

9. Mondal, Arpita, Neeraj Sah, Arushi Sharma,

Chandra Venkataraman, and Nitin Patil.

"Absorbing aerosols and high‐temperature

extremes in India: a general circulation modelling

study." International Journal of Climatology 41

(2021): E1498-E1517. (IF: 3.609)

10. Prashant Dave, M Bhushan, and Chandra

Venkataraman. "Absorbing aerosol influence on

temperature maxima: An observation-based

study over India." Atmospheric Environment

(2020)

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosenv.2019.117237

(IF: 4.012)

11. Tripathy, S.S., Vittal, H., Karmakar, S. and Ghosh,

S., (2020) “Flood risk forecasting at weather to

medium range incorporating weather model,

topography, socio-economic information and

land use exposure” Advances in Water Resources

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.advwatres.2020.103785

12. Krishnan, Sooraj, Akhilesh S. Nair, and J. Indu.

"Simulation of Passive Microwave Data Toward

Efficient Assimilation Over Indian Subcontinent."

IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Letters

(2020).

13. S Nandi, and M Janga Reddy. Spatiotemporal

Analysis of Water Balance Components and Their

Projected Changes in Near-future Under Climate

Change Over Sina Basin, India. Water Resources

Management (2020).

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11269-020-02551-2

(IF: 2.98)

14. Aditya Gusain, Subimal Ghosh, and Subhankar

Karmakar. "Added value of CMIP6 over CMIP5

models in simulating Indian summer monsoon

rainfall." Atmospheric Research (2020)

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosres.2019.104680

(IF: 4.114)

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL PUBLICATIONS (2020-21)

29

15. Zachariah, Mariam, Arpita Mondal, Mainak Das,

Krishna Mirle AchutaRao, and Subimal Ghosh.

"On the role of rainfall deficits and cropping

choices in loss of agricultural yield in

Marathwada, India." Environmental Research

Letters 15, no. 9 (2020): 094029.

16. Sahana, V., Parvathi Sreekumar, Arpita Mondal,

and Deepthi Rajsekhar. "On the rarity of the 2015

drought in India: A country-wide drought atlas

using the multivariate standardized drought index

and copula-based severity-duration-frequency

curves." Journal of Hydrology: Regional Studies

31 (2020): 100727. (IF: 1.639)

17. Pratiman Patel, Subhankar Karmakar, Subimal

Ghosh, Dev Niyogi. “Improved simulation of very

heavy rainfall events by incorporating WUDAPT

urban land use/land cover in WRF”, Urban

Climate (2020)

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.uclim.2020.100616

(IF: 4.25)

18. Vittal H, Subhankar Karmakar, Subimal Ghosh,

and Raghu Murtugudde. "A comprehensive India-

wide social vulnerability analysis: highlighting its

influence on hydro-climatic risk." Environmental

Research Letters (2020)

https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ab6499

(IF: 6.192)

19. Tarul Sharma, Vittal H, Subhankar Karmakar, and

Subimal Ghosh. "Increasing agricultural risk to

hydro-climatic extremes in India." Environmental

Research Letters (2020)

https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ab63e1

(IF: 6.192)

20. Aditya Gusain, Mohit Mohanty, Subimal Ghosh, C.

Chatterjee, and Subhankar Karmakar. "Capturing

transformation of flood hazard over a large River

Basin under changing climate using a top-down

approach." Science of The Total Environment

(2020)

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.138600

(IF: 5.589)

21. Jitendra Singh, Subhankar Karmakar,

Paimazumder D, Subimal Ghosh, and Dev Niyogi.

“Urbanization alters rainfall extremes over the

contiguous United States.” Environmental

Research Letters. (2020)

https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ab8980

(IF: 6.192)

22. Dawn Emil Sebastian, Sangram Ganguly, Jagdish

Krishnaswamy, Kate Duffy, Ramakrishna Nemani,

Subimal Ghosh. “Multi-scale Association between

Vegetation Growth and A Wavelet Analysis

Approach.” Remote Sensing (2019)

https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11222703 (IF: 4.74)

23. Anamitra Saha and Subimal Ghosh. "Can the

weakening of Indian Monsoon be attributed to

anthropogenic aerosols?." Environmental

Research Communications (2019)

https://doi.org/10.1088/2515-7620/ab2c65

(IF: new journal from IOP Publishing)

24. Pratiman Patel, Subimal Ghosh, Akshara

Kaginalkar, Sahidul Islam, and Subhankar

Karmakar. "Performance evaluation of WRF for

extreme flood forecasts in a coastal urban

environment." Atmospheric Research (2019)

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosres.2019.03.005

(IF: 4.114)

25. Anjana Devanand, Huang Maoyi, Ashfaq

Moetasim, Beas Barik, and Subimal Ghosh.

"Choice of Irrigation Water Management Practice

Affects Indian Summer Monsoon Rainfall and Its

Extremes." Geophysical Research Letters (2019)

https://doi.org/10.1029/2019GL083875

(IF: 4.58)

26. D. Parthasarathy. “Inequality, uncertainty, and

vulnerability: Rethinking governance from a

disaster justice perspective” Environment and

Planning E: Nature and Space, 1 (3), 2018, 422-

442. https://doi.org/10.1177/2514848618802554

27. Kumar, P., Banerjee, R. and Mishra, T. (2020), “A

framework for analyzing trade-offs in cost and

emissions in power sector”, Energy, 195,

p.116949.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.energy.2020.116949

28. Navinya C., Patidar G. and Phuleria H. C. (2020),

“Examining Effects of the COVID19 National

Lockdown on Ambient Air Quality across Urban

India”, Aerosol Air Quality Research

https://doi.org/10.4209/aaqr.2020.05.0256

30

29. Malakar K., and Mishra T. (2020), “Revisiting

cyclone Phailin: Drivers of recovery in marine

fishing communities,” International Journal of

Disaster Risk Reduction, 48, 101609.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2020.101609

30. Swami D., and Parthasarathy D. (2020), "A

multidimensional perspective to farmers’ decision

making determines the adaptation of the farming

community." Journal of Environmental

Management, 264, 110487.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2020.110487

31. Sinha R. K., Eldho T. I., & Ghosh S (2020)

“Assessing the impacts of land use/land cover

and climate change on surface runoff of a humid

tropical river basin in Western Ghats, India”,

International Journal of River Basin Management

https://doi.org/10.1080/15715124.2020.1809434

32. Chinnasamy P., Honap V.U. & Maske A.B. (2020)

“Impact of 2018 Kerala Floods on Soil Erosion:

Need for Post-Disaster Soil Management” Journal

of the Indian Society of Remote Sensing

https://doi.org/10.1007/s12524-020-01162-z

33. Jayasankar T., Murtugudde R., & Eldho T. I. (2020)

“Inconsistent Atmosphere-Ocean Dynamics and

Multidecadal Zonal SST Gradient Trends across

the Equatorial Pacific Ocean in Reanalysis

Products” Journal of Geophysical Research:

Oceans https://doi.org/10.1029/2020JC016297

34. Sinha R. K., Eldho T. I., & Ghosh S. (2020)

“Assessing the impacts of land cover and climate

on runoff and sediment yield of a river basin”

Hydrological Sciences Journal

https://doi.org/10.1080/02626667.2020.1791336

35. Chinnasamy P., and Sood A. (2020) “Estimation of

sediment load for Himalayan Rivers: Case study of

Kaligandaki in Nepal” Journal of Earth System

Science https://doi.org/10.1007/s12040-020-

01437-6

36. Sinha R. K., Eldho T. I., & Ghosh S. (2020)

“Assessing the impacts of historical and future

land use and climate change on the streamflow

and sediment yield of a tropical mountainous

river basin in South India” Environmental

Monitoring and Assessment

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-020-08623-5

37. Hurford A. P., Harou J. J., Bonzanigo L., Ray P. A.,

Karki P., Bharati L. and Chinnasamy P. (2020)

“Efficient and robust hydropower system design

under uncertainty- A demonstration in Nepal”,

Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2020.109910

38. Chinnasamy P., and Parikh A. (2020) “Remote

sensing-based assessment of Coastal Regulation

Zones in India: a case study of Mumbai, India”,

Environment, Development and Sustainability

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10668-020-00955-z

39. A. R. Ravishankara, Liji M. David, Jeffrey R. Pierce,

and Chandra Venkataraman (2020) “Outdoor air

pollution in India is not only an urban problem”

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA

www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.2007236117.

40. Hiloidhari M., Banerjee R., Rao A.B. (2020) ”Life

cycle assessment of sugar and electricity

production under different sugarcane cultivation

and cogeneration scenarios in India” Journal of

Cleaner Production

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2020.125170.

41. Mohanty, M.P., Nithya, S., Nair, A.S., Indu, J.,

Ghosh, S., Bhatt, C.M., Rao, G.S. and Karmakar, S.,

(2020) “Sensitivity of various topographic data in

flood management: Implications on inundation

mapping over large data-scarce regions” Journal

of Hydrology

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2020.125523

42. Gupta, M., Chauhan, T., Murtugudde, R., and

Ghosh, S. (2021) “Pollutants control the process

networks of urban environmental-meteorology”

Environmental Research Letters

https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/abce28

43. Raghav, P., Borkotoky, S.S., Joseph, J.,

Chattopadhyay, R., Sahai, A.K. and Ghosh, S.,

(2020), “Revamping extended range forecast of

Indian summer monsoon” Climate Dynamics

https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-020-05454-5

44. Chauhan, T. and Ghosh, S (2020) “Partitioning of

Memory and Real-time Connections between

Variables in Himalayan Ecohydrological Process

Networks”, Journal of Hydrology

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2020.125434

31

45. Varekar, V., Yadav, V. and Karmakar, S., (2020)

“Rationalization of water quality monitoring

locations under spatiotemporal heterogeneity of

diffuse pollution using seasonal export

coefficient” Journal of Environmental

Management

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2020.111342

46. Nandi, S. and Reddy M.J. (2020) Comparative

performance evaluation of self-adaptive

differential evolution with GA, SCE and DE

algorithms for the automatic calibration of a

computationally intensive distributed

hydrological model. H2Open Journal (2020) 3 (1):

306–327.https://doi.org/10.2166/h2oj.2020.030.

REACH OUT TO US

Convener, IDP in Climate Studies Phone: +91 22 2576 5141

IIT Bombay, Powai +91 22 2576 5142

Mumbai - 400076 E-mail: office.climate@iitb.ac.in

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For more details about the PhD programme, please visit our official website:

https://www.climate.iitb.ac.in/

Prof. Subimal Ghosh - Convener, IDP in Climate Studies

Associated Faculty, IDPCS, IITB:

Prof. Harish Phuleria | Prof. J Indu | Prof. Pradip Kalbar

PhD Scholars, IDPCS, IITB: Srinath Haran Iyer | Shrabani Tripathy | Sindhuja Kasthala

Archismita Banerjee - Project Manager, IDP in Climate Studies

Sheeba Sekharan - Research Associate, IDP in Climate Studies

GET TO KNOW US

CREDITS

INTERDISCIPLINARY PROGRAMME IN CLIMATE STUDIES, IIT BOMBAY