Articles in 2014

The linkage of bottom-up climate policies is now widely favoured over the top-down approach exemplified by the Kyoto Protocol. This Perspective critiques this new received wisdom, and argues for a balance of top-down and bottom-up approaches.

Climate-smart agriculture (CSA) is an approach to the development of agricultural systems intended to help support food security under climate change. This Perspective outlines a set of CSA actions needed from public, private and civil society stakeholders: building evidence; increasing local institutional effectiveness; fostering coherence between climate and agricultural policies; and linking climate and agricultural financing.

Climate change research is necessarily interdisciplinary in nature. This Perspective takes stock of research done at the cutting edge of economics and ecology with the aim of stimulating future collaborative work through the sharing of research methods and insights.

The release of carbon from decomposing Arctic soils, following permafrost thaw, is a potentially important climate feedback. Research now shows how shrub cover protects permafrost carbon reservoirs. Manipulative experiments show that the loss of shrub cover leads to a transition of the tundra to waterlogged methane-emitting conditions.

The evidence that climatic conditions influence beliefs about anthropogenic climate change is mixed. Now research analyses the extent to which US state-level winter temperature anomalies influence the likelihood of perceiving warmer-than-usual temperatures, and the attribution of such temperatures to global warming. Results show that temperature anomalies have a strong influence on perception, whereas attribution is mainly driven by perceived scientific consensus and political orientation.

It is commonly assumed that pro-environmental behaviour can be triggered by offering an extrinsic reward. Now research shows that acting pro-environmentally elicits positive feelings and leads people to feel warmer. In experiments, people who learn they act in an environmentally friendly way feel good about themselves and perceive a higher room temperature than people who learn their behaviour is environmentally unfriendly.

A significant challenge for policies aiming to reduce carbon emissions from deforestation is the avoidance of international carbon leakage. Research now shows, however, that even globally implemented forest conservation schemes could allow another type of carbon leakage through cropland expansion into non-forested areas.

Parameterization of the temperature sensitivity of decomposition and efficiency of microbial carbon use represent large sources of uncertainty in soil carbon–climate responses. Now research shows that interactions between temperature, microbial biogeochemistry and mineral surface sorptive reactions could result in variable but weaker soil carbon–climate feedbacks compared with conventional substrate characterization with static temperature sensitivity.

Mass bleaching of coral caused by extreme thermal events is likely to intensify unless greenhouse-gas emissions are reduced. Modelling suggests that Pacific coral reefs will benefit from emissions reductions sooner than Caribbean reefs.

Much uncertainty in the response of soil organic carbon (SOC) to climate change relates to the relative effects of microbial priming and mineral protection. Now research indicates that although protected C provides an important constraint on microbial priming, it is not sufficient to prevent reduced SOC storage in most terrestrial areas.

Millions of people in China lack ready access to clean water and sanitation. Projected impacts of climate change may delay China’s progress towards reducing the burden of water-, sanitation- and hygiene-attributable infectious disease.

Policymakers are creating mechanisms to help developing countries cope with loss and damage from climate change, but the negotiations are largely neglecting scientific questions about what the impacts of climate change actually are.