Reviews & Analysis

With the development of carbon emission allowance markets worldwide, concerns that they could attract excessive speculation have also grown. This Perspective discusses the potential scale and impacts of financial trading, as well as approaches to improve carbon market monitoring and oversight.

A meta-analysis reveals greater variation in heat tolerance within marine than terrestrial taxa. This variation corresponds to the spatial patterns in the maximum temperature populations of marine species experience. Although populations at the equatorward range edges of species’ distributions are particularly vulnerable to warming, standing genetic variation within species might promote an adaptive response elsewhere.

In this Perspective, the authors argue that radical, rather than conventional, interventions are necessary to address climate change. They discuss the definitions and interpretations of the term ‘radical’, and present a typology of radical intervention that addresses the root drivers of climate change.

A lack of observed increases in flooding with climate change has been difficult to explain. Now, research shows a decline in snowmelt to be the cause.

Analysis of tweets relating to the Conference of the Parties (COP) climate summits reveals greater polarization during COP26 than during previous summits. This increase in polarization is associated with growing right-wing engagement and emerged following the global climate strikes in 2019. Surprisingly, one topic unites pro-climate and climate-sceptic groups — ‘political hypocrisy’ — accusations of which have increased since 2019.

Investigating the unprecedented 2021 heatwave in the North American Pacific Northwest revealed that a complex interaction between atmospheric dynamics, soil moisture and temperature nonlinearly amplified the event beyond a five-sigma anomaly. These findings may contribute to a better understanding of the physical drivers of future heat extremes.

Under climate change, the mountain snowpack worldwide is being reduced. Now, research warns of a likely transition to low-to-no snowpack in the American Cordillera, with consequences for freshwater availability.

Increasing climate ambition through 2030 will be crucial to limiting global peak temperature changes this century. Countries need to ratchet their 2030 pledges made in Glasgow to reduce temperature overshoot and consequently reduce the risks of irreversible and adverse consequences to natural and human systems.

Corporate funding for academia often causes unease about the independence and integrity of such research. Now, a study shows that academia partnerships with the energy sector are more favourably inclined towards fossil fuels than to renewables.

The 27th Conference of the Parties (COP27) is being held in November 2022 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt. Having a climate summit hosted in an African country makes it timely to highlight climate change research from the continent. We asked a selection of researchers to share their thoughts on current research questions and how they affect African responses to climate change.

In this Review, the authors discuss recent advances in understanding dryland productivity and functions, examining outstanding debates on dryland response to change and the uncertainties associated with predicting climate trajectories.

Temperature projections from global climate models integrated with simple dynamical models suggest that there will be a systematic increase in the extinction risk of insect populations in the twenty-first century. The risks due to warming are amplified when temperature variability is taken into account.

The global redistribution of agricultural snowmelt dependence and risks was characterized by integrating sub-annual irrigation water demand with snowmelt runoff dynamics and an international trade model. This analysis highlights the global implications of the risks related to changes in snowmelt under climate change, indicating the wider importance of climate adaptation strategies.

The response of water transfer from the land to the atmosphere under drought is uncertain. Now, research shows that soils and plants paradoxically lose more water during low supply due to greater atmospheric demand.

Global warming is changing monsoon systems, the Hadley circulation and the activity of extratropical cyclones. Now, a study shows how these changes will affect the Earth’s arid sand deserts, with profound implications for the environmental and technological sectors.

The fate of the massive amount of carbon stored in permafrost peatlands could determine the magnitude of climate change. Observations now show that warming has stimulated Arctic methane emissions in early summer.

Phasing out carbon-intensive energy sources is crucial for meeting climate targets, but the role of natural gas is increasingly uncertain. For natural gas electricity to be on a net-zero trajectory, all countries in the natural gas electricity value chain must make efforts to cut emissions.

Reforms are required to maintain a healthy and robust flood insurance market under future climate conditions for the United States. Therefore, policymakers should implement premiums that reflect flood risk and incentivize household-level risk reduction, complemented with regional flood adaptation investments.

A myriad of aquatic animals migrate daily across strong depth-related temperature and oxygen gradients. Now, research shows that these vertical migrators are particularly sensitive to temperature gradients and that cold waters currently impose an energetic barrier to latitudinal range expansion that may be released under climate change.

Our global oceans are already experiencing the effects of a changing climate, including marine heatwaves, species redistributions and increased human–wildlife conflict. Now, researchers use acoustic surveys to project risk for one of the least understood and most abundant habitats on Earth, the ocean’s mesopelagic zone.