• Experts Warn of Risk of Civil Unrest in U.K. Due to Food Shortages

    Food shortages—especially a shortage of popular carbohydrates such as wheat, bread, pasta, and cereal — caused by extreme weather could lead to civil unrest in the U.K., according to a new study, which has surveyed some of the country’s leading food experts.

  • Are We Running Out of Water? Water Security Threatened by Droughts and Heatwaves Worldwide

    Increased demand for water due to global population growth, coupled with the increasing frequency of extreme weather events, endangers our water security. Nonetheless, little is known about the relationship of water use by sectors and the occurrence of drought-heatwave events, particularly at the large scale.

  • Climate Intervention Technologies May Create Winners and Losers in World Food Supply

    A technology being studied to curb climate change – one that could be put in place in one or two decades if work on the technology began now – would affect food productivity in parts of planet Earth in dramatically different ways, benefiting some areas, and adversely affecting others.

  • What’s Causing the Panama Canal Logjam

    Low water levels have, the result of prolonged drought conditions, led to a traffic jam at one of the world’s busiest maritime passages. The Panama Canal Authority has capped the number of ships that cross the canal each day, and has restricted their maximum weight and draft, or how deep below the waterline a ship sits. The bottleneck demonstrates how accelerating climate change is threatening global supply chains.

  • What Fuels Wildfires in Sierra Nevada Mountains

    Wildfires in California, exacerbated by human-driven climate change, are getting more severe. To better manage them, there’s a growing need to know exactly what fuels the blazes after they ignite. One of the chief fuels of wildfires in California’s Sierra Nevada mountains is the decades-old remains of large trees.

  • How Do We Dismantle Offshore Oil Structures Without Making the Public Pay?

    More than 12,000 offshore oil and gas installations straddle the globe, and industry analysts anticipate annual offshore oil and gas investments to reach $173 billion by 2024. A number of oil companies are expected to significantly expand their offshore drilling activities in the coming years. At the same time, many jurisdictions face a growing need to dismantle offshore infrastructure, whether because it is aging, the resources are depleted, or mandated net-zero strategies require some installations to be decommissioned earlier than expected.

  • ‘A Silent Killer’: How Saltwater Intrusion is Overtaking Coastal Farmland in the U.S.

    As hurricanes get stronger, storm surges are bringing saltwater to farmland—and leaving salt there once waters evaporate. And as sea level increases due to climate change, the difference between ocean water levels and soil elevation is decreasing, making post-storm water runoff more difficult. With enough flooding, the soil on farms could become so salinized that crops can no longer be grown on that land. The salt eventually makes contact with freshwater aquifers, thus salinizing them.

  • Large Lithium Deposits Discovered in a Caldera on the Nevada-Oregon Border

    Geologists estimate that about 20 to 40 million tons of lithium metal – among the world’s largest deposits – are available in the McDermitt Caldera on the Nevada-Oregon border. “If you believe their back-of-the-envelope estimation, this is a very, very significant deposit of lithium,” says one expert. “It could change the dynamics of lithium globally, in terms of price, security of supply and geopolitics.”

  • 2023: Record Billion-Dollar Weather and Climate Disasters

    2023 still has three-and-a-half months to go, but it has already broken the record for $1-billion climate-driven disasters, that is, disasters which have caused damage of at least $1 billion. So far this year, the United States has experienced 23 such disasters. The previous record – 22 $1-billion climate disasters – was in 2020. The 1980–2022 annual average is 8.1 $1-billion events; the annual average for the most recent 5 years (2018–2022) is 18.0 $1-billion events.

  • The U.S. Is Spending Billions to Reduce Forest Fire Risks – We Mapped the Hot Spots Where Treatment Offers the Biggest Payoff for People and Climate

    In a new study, my colleagues and I mapped out where forest treatments can do the most to simultaneously protect communities – by preventing wildfires from turning into disasters – and also protect the forests and the climate we rely on, by keeping carbon out of the atmosphere and stored in healthy soils and trees.

  • How ERCOT Is Narrowly Getting Through an Extreme Summer — and How Experts Say It Could Do Better

    Record-high power demand and faltering electricity sources have tested the grid in the past month, forcing the Electric Reliability Council of Texas to dig deep into its toolbox to keep power flowing.

  • North America’s Summer of Wildfire Smoke: 2023 Was Only the Beginning

    Canada’s seemingly endless wildfires in 2023 introduced millions of people across North America to the health hazards of wildfire smoke. While Western states have contended with smoky fire seasons for years, the air quality alerts across the U.S. Midwest and Northeast this summer reached levels never seen there before. The pressing question on many people’s minds: “Is this the new normal?” From our perspective as air quality scientists, we think the answer is likely “yes.”

  • A Tropical Storm in California? Warmer Waters and El Niño Made It Possible.

    Tropical Storm Hilary made landfall in Mexico and crossed into California last weekend, knocking out power and drenching wide swaths of southern California. Los Angeles received 2.48 inches of rain on Sunday, breaking a single-day record from 1906 of 0.03 inches. Storm Hilary adds to the lengthy list of climate-fueled disasters this summer.

  • Scientists Are Helping Cities Adapt to Extreme Heat

    Extreme heat is dangerous and is one of the leading causes of weather-related deaths, and in a warming world, extreme heat is becoming the norm, not the exception. Scientists are working to mitigate the effects of extreme heat by developing strategies to build heat resilience which would allow communities to adapt to and thrive in a warming climate.

  • Wildfires Are Much Worse Than a Sign of Climate Change

    Summer headlines have screamed of climate extremes: Record temperatures, an ocean heat wave, and rampant wildfires. The fires present a dual problem: Not only are they a symptom of climate change — becoming bigger, hotter, and more common in regions where they can affect large population centers — but they also make the crisis worse. By burning vast layers of partially decomposed vegetable matter called peat, fires like those in Canada release even more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.