Browse Articles

Indigenous and Western knowledge ethically combined is uniquely suited to address ongoing climate challenges. To build an environment where Western and Indigenous knowledge systems thrive, funding institutions must value co-production of knowledge and be available to Indigenous experts.

Strong positive wetland methane climate feedbacks from global warming may occur but have not been accounted for in Earth system models. Now, model simulations show a substantial increase in methane emissions due to the stronger impact of warming over tropical wetlands.

Atmospheric methane concentrations are increasing and a process-based model now estimates greater methane emissions from wetlands since 2007 than previous studies. Substantial increases in 2020 and 2021 contributed to record-high growth rates in the atmospheric methane burden.

Warming reduces the greenhouse gas sink of pristine wetlands. Here the authors show that carbon dioxide emissions increase in cryptogam sites at higher latitudes, while methane and nitrous oxide emissions are enhanced in vascular-plant-dominated permafrost wetlands.

Using data on oxygen variability taken from 32 representative reef sites, the authors show that hypoxia is already common. Under future scenarios of ocean warming and deoxygenation, the duration, intensity and severity of hypoxia will increase, with nearly one-third of reefs experiencing severe hypoxia.

The authors investigate relationships between various soil stressors that exceed critical thresholds and the maintenance of ecosystem services. They show that multiple stressors crossing a high-level threshold reduces soil functioning and can be consistently used to predict ecosystem functioning.

Achieving net zero means balancing remaining emissions with carbon removal, and understanding the nature and scope of residual emissions is key to planning decarbonized energy and industrial systems. However, our analysis of long-term climate strategies shows that many governments lack clear projections for residual emissions at net zero.

Climate warming affects permafrost regions, with strong impacts on the environment such as the greening of river plains. Here the authors use satellite data to show that these changes have stabilized large Arctic sinuous rivers by slowing their lateral migration by about 20% over the past half-century.

Carbon dioxide removal will be essential to reaching ambitious climate goals by offsetting hard-to-abate emissions and drawing down legacy CO₂. A diverse portfolio of CO₂ removal strategies, rather than any single approach, could achieve gigatonne-scale removals while limiting risks to the water–energy–land system.

Residual emissions, as a noticeable component of net-zero plans, should be analysed transparently and with specificity. By examining the national long-term strategies, the authors find that currently residual emissions are not clearly defined and are unlikely to be balanced by land-based carbon removal.

The modern food industry is reshaping society and contributing to global warming. Mitigation efforts at different levels are needed to promote environmental and human health.

Although the role of the human diet in climate change has been widely acknowledged, current practices fail to capture its realistic effect on warming. In this Analysis, Ivanovich et al. develop a global food consumption emission inventory and estimate the associated future climate impact using a reduced-complexity climate model.

Acclimation to climate change induces a reduction in the overall energetic cost for ectotherms, but most studies focus on a single species. Now, research shows that species competition can erode the energetic benefits of acclimation by affecting individual behaviour and energetics.

Natural gas has been seen as a bridge in the move from fossil fuels to cleaner energy. This work presents UK longitudinal survey data showing climate change beliefs increasingly diminish public support for natural gas.