Conclusion of experiment:

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It would be completely arrogant not to consider the changes are the earth’s climate changes. To look at a small example of climate changes is that super storms keep on damaging cities all over the globe and the civil engineering community must take these conditions in to account. We have to start looking at things like evaporation, temperatures, wind and everything that goes hand in hand with whether paters so that we can design accordingly to prevent the loss of lives.

To look at the Western Cape alone there has been huge changes to the climate since the pre-industrial era. The 1990’s was the warmest decade in the instrumental record since 1861. There is a lot of compelling evidence that proves that the warming observed over the last 50 years are directly linked to human activities. Unfortunately these changes will keep on increasing and this will result in temperatures and resulting changes to precipitation patters.

It is argued by many that the recent increases in extreme events across the globe are as a result of climate change. It can however be said with a fair amount of certainty that the Western Cape will face some degree of changes in the 2030 to 2050 period. The Western Cape has a Mediterranean climate characterised by dry summers and wet winters. This is due to the position of the subcontinent relative to the low-pressure systems between 40° and 50° south. This means that the low-pressure systems bring winter rainfall to the south-western parts of the country with the help of cold fronts as soon as the waves shift northward.

(The Western Cape Climate. 2010)

In conclusion with the experiment that was conducted with the home made evaporation pan it was found that a total of 98mm of water was evaporated in to the atmosphere in the 20 day period that the experiment was conducted. To calculate the amount of water that was evaporated in the area the following calculation has to done.

Calculation:

Information:

·         The experiment was located in Paarl and we can say that the area of the watershed     = 32.2 km²

Convert area to m² = 32.2 x 1000 000   m²

Convert evaporation to m = 98 ÷ 1000 = 0.098

Volume of water m³ = 32.2 x 1000 000 x 0.098

                                 = 3 155 600 m³

                                = 3 155.6 Ml (Amount of water evaporated in the time period of the experiment)

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