News & Comment

After years of working towards a climate accord, the Paris Agreement of 2015 marked the shift from negotiating to reach consensus on climate action to implementation of such action. The challenge now is to ensure transparency in the processes and identify the details of what is required.

Debate over effective climate change communication must be grounded in rigorous affective science. Rather than treating emotions as simple levers to be pulled to promote desired outcomes, emotions should be viewed as one integral component of a cognitive feedback system guiding responses to challenging decision-making problems.

The Paris Agreement has increased the incentive to verify reported anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions with independent Earth system observations. Reliable verification requires a step change in our understanding of carbon cycle variability.

The 2017 wildfire season has seen unusually high fire levels in many parts of the world, with extensive and severe fires occurring in Chile, the Mediterranean, Russia, the US, Canada and even Greenland. Is this a sign of things to come?

Recent scientific advances make it possible to assign extreme events to human-induced climate change and historical emissions. These developments allow losses and damage associated with such events to be assigned country-level responsibility.

Understanding of anthropogenic climate change has evolved since the IPCC's First Assessment Report. Further progress relies on continued collaboration between observationalists and modellers.

As the climate changes, extreme storm and flood events are increasing in intensity and frequency, exposing more people to their impacts. Resilience planning needs to start now to limit these impacts.