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Rainfall variability in Eastern Africa is associated with considerable social and environmental impacts, including threats to water, energy and food security. This Review outlines the drivers of this rainfall variability, their corresponding impacts, and potential future changes with anthropogenic warming.
Flexible decision-making tools are needed to support action plans for plastics and other pollutants. Reproducible Analytical Pipelines (RAPs) and technological readiness levels (TRLs) will enable systematic validation and global harmonization of plastic pollution monitoring methods.
Constructed wetlands are used to remove organics and nutrients from wastewater while providing ecosystem services. This Review discusses the application, principles and operational strategies of CWs, and provides guidance on their design and maintenance.
Global CO2 emissions for 2022 increased by 1.5% relative to 2021 (+7.9% and +2.0% relative to 2020 and 2019, respectively), reaching 36.1 GtCO2. These 2022 emissions consumed 13%–36% of the remaining carbon budget to limit warming to 1.5 °C, suggesting permissible emissions could be depleted within 2–7 years (67% likelihood).
Continental rift zones are regions of crustal extension that manifest through seismic and magmatic activity. This Review explores the variety and development of rifts by assessing their geodynamic drivers, resisting factors and weakening processes.
Lithium is an essential resource for the energy transition, owing to its widespread use in rechargeable batteries. This Review describes the fresh water and chemical inputs, wastes and environmental impacts of direct lithium extraction technologies and how to manage them.
An article in Environmental Research Letters models the impact of climate change on future trends in hazardous driving conditions along two important transport systems within the Arctic–Boreal region.
The advent of advanced plate tectonic reconstruction software has instigated an explosive growth in their generation and use by the wider Earth science community. This Technical Review provides a best-practice guide for quantitative plate reconstructions and their applications.
The textile industry has tried to combat the criticism of fast fashion through overly simplistic solutions at the product and operational level. Fast fashion cannot be fixed — the industry needs to be reconstructed to emphasize long material and product lifetimes.
An article in Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems uncovers the source, distribution, and concentration of rare earth elements, yttrium and scandium in sea-floor sediments within the South Pacific Gyre.
Microorganisms and minerals both contribute to organic carbon preservation and accumulation in soil. The soil microbial carbon pump describes the microbial processes, but a separate soil mineral carbon pump needs to be acknowledged and investigated.
Continental margins record the last stages of rifting before a new ocean basin is formed, with their variety reflecting interactions between tectonic, magmatic, sedimentary and hydrothermal processes. This Review provides a process-based understanding of rifted margin formation, gaining insights into their resource potential for the energy transition.
An article in Global Environmental Change documents the time of, and spatial variability in, transgression of the nitrogen and phosphorus planetary boundaries.