News & Views in 2014

Agriculture-focused integrated assessment models may be overstating the ability of poor countries to adapt to climate change. Empirical research can elucidate limits of adaptation in agricultural systems and help models better represent them.

Global demand for wheat is projected to increase significantly with continuing population growth. Currently, Europe reliably produces about 29% of global wheat supply. However, this might be under threat from climate change if adaptive measures are not taken now.

Arctic warming has reduced cold-season temperature variability in the northern mid- to high-latitudes. Thus, the coldest autumn and winter days have warmed more than the warmest days, contrary to recent speculations.

Atmospheric CO₂ fertilization may go some way to compensating the negative impact of climatic changes on crop yields, but it comes at the expense of a deterioration of the current nutritional value of food.

Cost–benefit analysis and risk assessment approaches inform global climate change mitigation policy-making processes. Now, a development in the former shows that optimal carbon tax levels have previously been underestimated by a factor of two.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has issued guidelines for communicating probabilities with words, but readers all over the world think the words mean something different.

Identification of long-term changes in periods of extreme heavy and weak rainfall during the Indian monsoon season has been elusive. Now, an observational study provides the firmest evidence so far.

Most studies assume that temperature trends are linear. Now, research demonstrates that warming trends are nonlinear, that warming accelerated over most of the twentieth century and is much stronger since 1980 than calculated by linear methods.

Analysis of data from 92 forested sites across the globe indicates that nutrient availability is the dominant driver of carbon retention in forests.

Over short periods of time, it can be difficult to isolate sea-level increase in observations as it is hidden by natural shifts in rainfall quantities over ocean and land, which cause temporary drops in the global sea-level curve. Now research shows how to detect the signal, even in short records, by estimating these variations.

Management practices applied to existing types of land cover can influence the local climate as much as a conversion to a different type of plant cover.

Temperature reconstructions of the past millennium rely heavily on Northern Hemisphere data. Now a Southern Hemisphere temperature reconstruction is available and sheds light on the complexity of the interhemispheric temperature relationship.

Accounting for time-dependent mechanisms in greenhouse gas radiative forcing and evaluating the performance of mitigation technologies in the context of climate stabilization targets can better inform technology choices today and in the future.

An up-to-date synthesis of climate change impacts on crop yields shows that the bounds of uncertainty are increasing. So why do estimates of the effect of climate change on crop productivity differ so much?

From 1974 to 1976, an unexpected large hole appeared in the Weddell Sea winter sea-ice cover, a consequence of ocean heat carried to the sea surface by convection. This may have been a window to the past, as model analysis suggests anthropogenic climate change will diminish the chances of a repeat performance.

Relative to the scale of the problem, climate policies worldwide have failed. Now research explains why policy innovations are often inadequate, routinely reflecting the aversion of policymakers to the risk of failure.

The various supply chains that deliver the services society needs are often managed in silos. Research now shows the advantages of integrated management.

Studies often assume that climate is equally sensitive to emissions of warming greenhouse gases and cooling sulphate aerosols. Now, research illustrates that this is not true in models and that without this assumption recent assessments would have produced higher estimates of future temperatures.

Climate change poses new challenges to the conservation of species, which at present requires data-hungry models to meaningfully anticipate future threats. Now a study suggests that species traits may offer a simpler way to help predict future extinction risks.

Surface global warming has stalled since around 2000 despite increasing atmospheric CO₂. A study finds that recent strengthening of Pacific trade winds has enhanced heat transport from the surface to ocean depths, explaining most of the slowed surface warming.