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As glacial cliffs break off and destabilize frozen landscapes, glaciologist Richard Alley focuses on the fractures. The work could improve predictions about future sea-level rise.
As wind power grows around the world, so does the threat the turbines pose to wildlife. From simple fixes to high-tech solutions, new approaches can help.
Evidence that the approach helps to save trees, preserve ecosystems and reduce carbon emissions is often hard to come by. But it can succeed if it’s done right, says an economist.
OPINION: The notion of planting miles of trees to hold back encroaching deserts is misguided and damaging; we should promote programs that secure livelihoods and respect dryland ecologies instead
OPINION: Zero-deforestation supply-chain commitments aren’t protecting tropical forests as much as hoped. But they might, if the same standards were applied to domestic and export markets.
The wet landmasses, though inherently impermanent, have been essential to both people and wildlife for thousands of years. But recent shifts have brought on some rapid losses that worry scientists.
OPINION: Ocean warming, acidification and deoxygenation due to climate change — as well as pollution and development — threaten our global waters, but disaster is far from inevitable
PODCAST: A report to the US president sounded an alarm — humankind was ‘conducting a vast geophysical experiment’ by burning fossil fuels and filling the atmosphere with an ‘invisible pollutant.’ But a slick campaign by Big Oil led to confusion, politicization and dire consequences for the planet. (Season 3, Episode 1)
Lawsuits against emissions-spewing governments and fossil fuel companies have established themselves as a key tool in the battle against climate change, but they aren’t always successful
Ecologist Sandy Milner has traveled to Alaska for decades to study the development of streams flowing from melting glaciers. He’s seen insects move in, alders and willows spring up, and spawning fish arrive in thousands.
How do animal populations respond to climate change? After studying the same butterfly and its habitats for decades, two biologists explain that it’s complicated — but endlessly intriguing.
VIDEO: Economic issues were front and center at the most recent global climate summit. Join Tobias Adrian of the International Monetary Fund and Shuang Liu of the World Resources Institute to take stock of the investments needed to prevent future climate disasters.
VIDEO: Cities have recently experienced extreme heat waves, causing preventable illness and death. How can we protect people from dangerous heat while also reducing carbon emissions?
Replacing gasoline with ethanol has changed landscapes across the globe as grasslands and forests give way to cornfields. Researchers are deeply divided over what this means for the planet. Here’s the science behind the conflict.
VIDEO: Is the disaster insurance industry hurtling toward a climate crisis? Learn how we can shore up programs that buffer the financial devastation that follows floods, fires and hurricanes — and help individuals and communities strengthen their climate resilience.
Scientists find that a small amount of animal products could have a place in our diets without wreaking environmental havoc. But it’s far less than what we consume today, and only if farmed in just the right way.
Warming, wildfires and unpredictable weather threaten to disrupt the delicate processes that underlie treasured wines. Researchers and producers are innovating to keep ahead.
Researcher Arun Agrawal has lived three decades on either side of a watershed: the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, signed 30 years ago this June. His 60 years are a window into how far we have come, and how far there is to go.
PODCAST: Digging — quite literally — into our planet’s past to study its paleoclimate has shed light on bygone ice ages and hints at trouble ahead for our now-warming world (Season 2/Episode 4)
VIDEO: In August 2020, the Dome Fire burned more than 40,000 acres of the iconic species’ range in the Mojave Desert, leaving a graveyard of blackened trees. A massive replanting effort now underway hopes to return life to the fragile ecosystem by boosting numbers of the climate-threatened plant.
The complex interplay of ticks, their habitats and hosts — along with changes in land use and climate — may be enabling the spread of the pathogens they carry
Worry over the planet’s future is taking a toll on emotional well-being, researchers say. Here’s how to cope so we don’t lose hope for our planet and for ourselves.
Covid-19 has been a stress test for the world’s food supply chains — and a preview of looming threats. That’s making efforts to improve the journey from farm to fork more urgent than ever.
VIDEO: Watch our conversation about the pandemic’s effect on global food supplies and distribution, and how we might prevent future crises arising from climate change
PODCAST: Once fringe and futuristic, this renewable energy shines brightly today as a cheap and efficient source of energy. Still, it remains controversial — for much different reasons. (Season 1/Episode 3)
VIDEO: Diverting recoverable materials helps keep trash from overwhelming landfills, but the industry still faces many challenges. Consumer education, innovative technologies and turning wastes to energy can help manage the rubbish problem.
Where other species succumbed, the killifish survived contaminated habitats. It’s a finding that could help researchers understand environmental risk factors for humans.
To slow or stop global warming, the world agrees it must cut carbon dioxide emissions. But monitoring each nation’s output of greenhouse gases is not always straightforward.
To understand what might be lost, ecologist Janet K. Jansson taps molecular methods to explore Earth’s underground microbes, from the permafrost to the grasslands
The only way for humanity to solve its environmental problems may be to abandon our quest for continual economic expansion. It’s time to study what a future of degrowth might look like, some researchers say.
COMIC: In the US, where political parties have increasingly staked claims on one side of the issue or the other, beliefs may be more about belonging than facts
Worsened by global warming, drought and other environmental stressors play a role in fanning the flames of civil conflicts
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