French Guiana Climate Change
French Guiana Climate Change

French Guiana Climate Change

French Guiana Climate

The climate in French Guiana is tropical monsoon, with a lot of rain all year. There is a distinct dry season and a lengthy wet season. The temperature in French Guiana is almost always around thirty degrees Celsius (86 degrees Fahrenheit) throughout the year. It is normally slightly warmer in the dry season since the sun shines much more.

After midnight, the temperature decreases to a low of around 23-24 degrees Celsius (71-76 degrees Fahrenheit). It can be slightly cooler on the highlands of the tumuk humak mountains in southern French Guiana. Because to the extreme humidity caused by the significant rains and high temperatures, French Guiana may feel very clammy. Throughout the year, this tropical dampness is felt.

French Guiana Climate Background

The climate in French Guiana, which is located just north of the Equator, is tropical, hot, and humid all year, with a dry, somewhat warmer season from July to November and a rainy season from December to June.

Temperatures

Temperatures in Cayenne are hot all year: lows are consistently above 20 °C (68 °F), while highs range from 29 °C (84 °F) in January and May to 32 °C (90 °F) in September and October, which are the hottest months due to their driest and sunniest conditions. However, the humidity is lower at this time of year, hovering about 65 percent during the hottest hours, compared to 70 percent for the rest of the year. From May through November, however, the temperature can reach 37/40 °C (99/104 °F) on the hottest days.

Precipitation

Precipitation in French Guiana is plentiful, exceeding 2,500 millimeters (100 inches) a year in some areas and even 3,000 mm in others (120 in). Within the rainy season (which, as previously said, runs from December to June), there are three distinct periods: – the short rains period, which occurs in December and January.

Because the intertropical convergence zone (ITCZ) travels through the country from north to south, this is the case. Rains, which can be intense but are usually brief, fall mostly at night and early in the morning around the coast. On the shore, the northeast trade winds are moderately strong, and the sea can be turbulent.

French Guiana Climate Change
French Guiana Climate Change

The brief dry season of March, commonly known as the March short summer, can also occur in February. Because the ITCZ is now in the south of the country, the weather tends to be sunny, although it is unreliable due to its short duration (one or two weeks), and it is more noticeable in the northwest (see St. Laurent du Maroni) than in the south. The wind might also carry dust from the Sahara desert around this time.

The rainy season, which lasts from April to June, peaks in May, when the ITCZ, this time from the south, brings a lot of heat and humidity from the Amazon jungle. The breeze is weaker, and the heat is oppressive due to the humidity. Rain falls mostly at night and early in the morning along the coast. The rains are heavier and more frequent near the central and eastern parts of the coast (see Cayenne, Saint-Georges-de-l’Oyapock), where flooding is more likely.

In St. Laurent du Maroni, more than 300 mm (12 in) of rain falls per month, and in Cayenne and Saint-Georges-de-l’Oyapock, in the east, more than 500 mm (20 in) falls in a single month (May). It rains practically every day throughout this time.

French Guiana Climate Change
French Guiana Climate Change

During the dry season, from July to November, the ITCZ moves to the north, although only slightly, and thunderstorms can form inland and move to the shore in any event. Rainfall amounts to around 40/50 millimeters (1.6/2 inches) per month in Cayenne, a little more in Maripasoula, in the west, where it’s around 70/80 mm (2.7/3.1 in), and even more in St. Laurent du Maroni, in the far north-west, where it’s around 100 mm (4 in) per month, but it’s still lower than the rest of the year.
Hurricanes pass more to the north, over the Caribbean Sea, and French Guyana is outside of their path.

French Guiana Climate  Change

French Guiana’s tropical rainforest ecosystems are among the least affected by landscape fragmentation and degradation, but they are also among the most sensitive to climate change. The current study will investigate the effects of climate change on four ecosystem services in the French Guianan tropical woods. In Northern French Guiana, where 95 percent of the population of this overseas Region lives, there is currently no reference map for these four ecosystem services.

To investigate the impacts of a variety of climate change scenarios on ecosystem services. Then we’ll look at whether the current design of protected areas in northern French Guiana is appropriate for sustaining tropical forest ecosystem diversity. We’ll also look at how climate change affects the long-term viability of wood trees and their ability to store carbon in the forest.

Our project allows for the formal incorporation of biodiversity as a driving factor in the sensitivity of tropical forest ecosystem services to climate change by explicitly including climate indicators in forest dynamic models and explicitly linking the spatial patterns of ecosystem services to the spatial patterns of climate indicators.

French Guiana Climate  Change and Impacts

The impact of climate changes in the Amazon Basin and the Guiana Shield during the last glacial maximum and the Holocene on vegetation changes is still being disputed. Our goal was to see if there were any notable changes in vegetation in northern French Guiana during the Holocene. At eight sites now occupied by woodland or savannah, we measured fluctuations in the d13C of soil organic matter.

The forest locations were chosen to represent two regions that are likely to have been subjected to varying degrees of disturbance during the Pleistocene and Holocene periods. As a result of our findings, tropical rainforests in northern French Guiana were able to withstand drier climatic conditions during the Holocene. Nonetheless, modest changes in vegetation, soil processes, or soil physical qualities were compatible with regional and vertical differences in the 13C of SOM.

 

reference – worlddata

 

recentclimate – French Guiana Climate Change ,French Guiana Climate Change  News,French Guiana Climate Change report

By JC

Consultation on Climate Change & Risk Management