Our planet and us -

doi:10.1038/ngeo2366

Humans have altered their environment ever since they first appeared. Updates on three frameworks of thinking about the scale of twenty-first-century human influence on the Earth are invigorating the global change debate.

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Farm and bench -

doi:10.1038/ngeo2163

Climate change could compromise food security over the coming century. Scientists working towards mitigation and adaptation have to win over those who work on the land.

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Nature Climate Change: Ensuring climate information guides long-term development -

Lindsey Jones et al.

doi:10.1038/nclimate2701

Ensuring climate science is produced, communicated and utilized in Sub-Saharan Africa is essential to achieving climate-resilient development.

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To build capacity, build confidence -

Bruce Hewitson

doi:10.1038/ngeo2465

The history of attempts to spread scientific know-how beyond western centres of excellence is littered with failures. Capacity building needs long-term commitment, a critical mass of trainees, and a supportive home environment.

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Wedge approach to water stress -

Yoshihide Wada, Tom Gleeson & Laurent Esnault

doi:10.1038/ngeo2241

Water availability and use are inherently regional concerns. However, a global-scale approach to evaluating strategies to reduce water stress can help maximize mitigation.

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Metals for a low-carbon society -

Olivier Vidal, Bruno Goffé & Nicholas Arndt

doi:10.1038/ngeo1993

Renewable energy requires infrastructures built with metals whose extraction requires more and more energy. More mining is unavoidable, but increased recycling, substitution and careful design of new high-tech devices will help meet the growing demand.

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Nature: Environment: Waste production must peak this century -

Daniel Hoornweg, Perinaz Bhada-Tata & Chris Kennedy

doi:10.1038/502615a

Without drastic action, population growth and urbanization will outpace waste reduction.

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Nature: Environmental science: Scorecard for the seas -

Derek P. Tittensor

doi:10.1038/488594a

An index assessing the health of the oceans gives a global score of 60 out of 100. But the idea that a single number can encompass both environmental status and the benefits that the oceans provide for humans may prove controversial.

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Nature Climate Change: Livelihood resilience in the face of climate change -

Thomas Tanner et al.

doi:10.1038/nclimate2431

The concept of resilience requires greater attention to human livelihoods if it is to address the limits to adaptation strategies and the development needs of the planet's poorest and most vulnerable people.

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Nature Climate Change: Strategies for improving adaptation practice in developing countries -

Declan Conway & Johanna Mustelin

doi:10.1038/nclimate2199

As adaptation moves from theory and international negotiation to implementation, a range of issues have the potential to hamper attempts at effective delivery and to increase the vulnerability of intended beneficiaries of the adaptation agenda.

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Persistent growth of CO₂ emissions and implications for reaching climate targets -

P. Friedlingstein, R. M. Andrew, J. Rogelj, G. P. Peters, J. G. Canadell, R. Knutti, G. Luderer, M. R. Raupach, M. Schaeffer, D. P. van Vuuren, C. Le Quéré

doi:10.1038/ngeo2248

In order to limit climate warming, CO₂ emissions must remain below fixed quota. An evaluation of past emissions suggests that at 2014 emissions rates, the total quota will probably be exhausted within the next 30 years.

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Regional strategies for the accelerating global problem of groundwater depletion -

Werner Aeschbach-Hertig & Tom Gleeson

doi:10.1038/ngeo1617

The world's largest freshwater resource is groundwater. A review of our understanding of groundwater depletion suggests that although the problem is global, solutions must be adapted to specific regional requirements at the aquifer scale.

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Nature: The geographical distribution of fossil fuels unused when limiting global warming to 2 °C -

Christophe McGlade & Paul Ekins

doi:10.1038/nature14016

To limit global warming to a rise of 2 °C compared to pre-industrial levels, we cannot use all of our fossil fuel reserves; here an integrated assessment model shows that this temperature limit implies that we must leave unused a third of our oil reserves, half of our gas reserves and over 80 per cent of our coal reserves during the next 40 years, and indicates where these are geographically located.

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Sand as a stable and sustainable resource for nourishing the Mississippi River delta -

Jeffrey A. Nittrouer & Enrica Viparelli

doi:10.1038/ngeo2142

Dams have starved the lower Mississippi River of sediment over recent decades, suggesting that the drowning of the delta is inevitable. Analysis of the rivers suspended sediment load and morphodynamic modelling suggest that the amount of sand essential for land building has not significantly decreased since dam construction, with sand remaining available for several centuries.

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Nature Climate Change: Economic development and the carbon intensity of human well-being -

Andrew K. Jorgenson

doi:10.1038/nclimate2110

Strategies for effective sustainability efforts require reducing the carbon intensity of human well-being: the level of anthropogenic carbon emissions per unit of human well-being.

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Nature: Signature of ocean warming in global fisheries catch -

William W. L. Cheung, Reg Watson & Daniel Pauly

doi:10.1038/nature12156

The mean temperature of the catch, an index designed to characterize the effect of climate change on global fisheries catch, increased at a rate of 0.19 degrees Celsius per decade between 1970 and 2006, showing that ocean warming has already affected global fisheries.

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