Record extreme weather in the U.S., Brazil, China and elsewhere is impacting food production this year, with the future expected to be far worse. Agriculture requires “transformational change” to meet the climate crisis, say experts.
New agri-technologies and traditional farming practices done right could combine to offer significant benefits and hope for the global environment and health.
Nearly half of Brazil’s savanna biome has already been lost to agriculture. Scientists say further deforestation may bring biodiversity collapse and disastrous drought, putting Brazil’s water supply and agricultural economy at grave risk.
In late June, Portland, Oregon, experienced its hottest day on record, reaching 42° Celsius (108° Fahrenheit). The last time it had been this hot was in 1981, when temperatures soared…
Researchers are seeking to pinpoint climate change “tipping points,” but defining what that means exactly, when it will come, and what makes it happen, is unimaginably difficult when faced with the chaotic complexities of a vast Earth biome.
When the first tile in a line of dominoes tips forward, it affects everything in front of it. One after another, lined-up dominoes knock into each other and topple. This…
SCOTLAND - “To restore the landscape we need cathedral thinking,” says Thomas Macdonell gazing up at a stand of ancient pines within Glen Feshie, Scotland, where he has worked as…
To stay within planetary boundary safe limits, we must protect soils by conserving global habitat and revamping industrial agribusiness — and do it fast.
A new study has found that sea levels are rising faster than expected, which would put 40% of the world’s population living in coastal regions at elevated risk. Published Feb.…
Upon reaching 2 degrees Celsius of warming, the West Antarctic Ice Sheet won’t regrow until temperatures are at least 1 degree cooler than they were before the Industrial Revolution, say scientists.
The world watched in horror as the Amazon burned in 2019, windblown smoke darkening the sky over far-off São Paulo, Brazil. The ability to predict where fires are likely to…
Agribusiness entities that deforested vast swaths of the Cerrado biome in Brazil to grow corn are now suffering a drop in production because of climate changes brought about by their own actions.
Investing in forests to fight climate change seems like a sure bet. Trees absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, pump out oxygen, and live for decades. What could go wrong?…
As climate change impact dramatically alters the world we live in, the biodiversity around us is also experiencing rapid and alarming changes. For dragonflies and damselflies (odonates), having an amphibious…
The Brazilian savanna has always been a dry place, but the massive conversion of native vegetation to soy is making it far dryer, as is deepening, climate change-driven, drought.
An intensification in fires, coupled with increasing deforestation and worsening climate change, could rapidly shift the Amazon toward being a carbon source by 2050.
The Amazon worst-case scenario has arrived, say leading researchers, as predicted signs of a shift from rainforest-to-savanna begin to be seen in real time on the ground.
Scientists warn that escalating deforestation due to mining, agribusiness and other human disturbance is reducing the ability of intact tropical forests to sequester carbon.
New report reveals how both the Arctic and Antarctic are heating up and changing dramatically amid ongoing, but largely insufficient, UN climate negotiations.
Climate change could shift the calculus for reining in malaria, according to new research that suggests that infectious parasites can develop in mosquitoes more quickly at lower temperatures than scientists…
Life on this planet, in all its wide diversity, is disappearing more quickly now than it has at any time in human history, and some 1 million species of plants…
Tallying up the toll of our individual roles in fueling climate change is a daunting task. To make decisions simpler, we rely on the sorts of trade-off behaviors and cognitive…
The costs of acting now to adapt to a predicted, dramatic loss of Amazon rainforest would be at least one order of magnitude lower than the economic fallout if we…
Land-based options offer the best solutions to help nations meet their Paris carbon reduction goals and limit warming to 1.5 degrees C, says study in response to new IPCC climate report.
A 2007 study estimated that with 40% Amazon deforestation a tipping point could be reached, converting forest to savannah. New factors put that tipping point at 20-25%. Deforestation is now at 17%.
Forest fires are no longer driven mainly by deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon, with climate change induced drought now taking a major role.
In May 2015, more than 200,000 saiga antelope (Saiga tatarica) suddenly died. Entire herds perished, their bodies littering the steppe grasslands of central Kazakhstan as if dropped from the sky.…
The normally idyllic resort island of Bali in Indonesia has hogged international headlines since last month, following the eruption of Mount Agung that has driven tens of thousands of residents…
With COP23 well underway, scientists warn that President Temer’s policies could doom the Amazon and Brazil’s Paris goals, while destabilizing the global climate.
In Paris, Brazil promised to cut its greenhouse gas emissions by 37 percent by 2025. But the country’s emissions grew by 8.9 percent in 2016, largely due to deforestation.
