News & Views in 2018

Biofuels became controversial for compromising food production. Forest residue conversion to jet fuel is a second-generation biofuel that doesn’t compete with food. However, it has unexpected implications across the Sustainable Development Goals.

Analyses of protein in our future food supply have focused on the need to reduce animal-based foods and increase plant-based foods. A new analysis describes a parallel possibility — producing and consuming less-considered options, including insect larva, algae and cultured meat.

Behind pressing scientific questions of sustainability, unexplored areas of theoretical and mathematical knowledge await discovery. A fresh take on the notion of resilience provides a glimpse of what to expect.

Current understanding is that electricity savings in green commercial buildings are low or even negligible. New research, based on a sophisticated analysis of detailed energy data, proves that they do save energy, decrease environmental damage and reduce peak electricity demand.

Are we making the best use of data in our efforts to protect the natural environment? A new study suggests that we could be doing much better.

A reliable power supply in developing countries can help socio-economic development efforts. Now research shows that it would also avoid significant environmental impacts.

Livestock production can pose challenges for populations of large wild mammals. Conservation failure isn’t a foregone conclusion, however, if integrated management for ranching and for wildlife benefits both.

Geoengineering is unproven and risky. Social science scholars explain why some are still investing in and pursuing geoengineering to address climate change, and the consequences this has for alternatives.

A grand plan to devote half the planet to nature could create conflicts with farming. A global analysis locates the countries and ecoregions where scaling up habitat protection will be most difficult.

Renewable energies are on the rise worldwide, but they have to compete against established fossil energies. Lifting import tariffs on selected inputs for renewables can foster the transition to these energies.

Systems thinking has been promoted as a way to improve human–environmental interactions, but analytical approaches to measure degrees of systems thinking remain elusive. If more complex thinking does improve sustainable decision-making, new methods to validate this prevalent hypothesis must be developed.

At the global scale, indigenous lands are critical for biodiversity conservation and cultural survival. Yet at local, sub-national and national scales both are often threatened.

Too much fertiliser in agriculture affects rivers and oceans at large scale. But it turns out that a surprising variety of non-food products is also to blame for impacts on water bodies worldwide.

Experts have long debated how to help poor, predominantly rural nations meet global development goals. One of the most anticipated, and debated, ventures, the Millennium Villages Project, has just published a retrospective self-evaluation mostly supporting the effectiveness of their multi-sectoral approach.

Many cities rely on not just traditional delivery systems for potable water, but also standard economic models for valuing those systems. Both must be questioned to ensure future water security in drought-challenged urban regions.

Most published geoengineering scenarios are climate modelling studies, which biases the public perception of what is possible and desirable. Scenarios should be used more broadly to engage scientists, policymakers and society in a debate about which future climate and world we want.

The structure of criminal phenomena is often obscure for researchers. A study based on thousands of self-reported cases reveals the paths underpinning illegal adoptions in China, and some leads on how to tackle them.

Large organizations struggle to implement new and promising sustainability practices widely, as documented extensively by social science research. Networks of informal relationships among people can contribute to the diffusion and learning of such innovations.

Choosing how much to take and how much to preserve from our environment is a challenging task, and every small decision counts. A behavioural experiment sheds new light on how time pressure negatively affects sustainability decisions.

Societal activities carry environmental costs, which can be mitigated to restore ecosystem function and services. A meta-analysis demonstrates strong negative effects of coal mining on stream biota and limited recovery after restoration.