Volume 5 Issue 9, September 2015

A much-anticipated 'monster' El Niño failed to materialize in 2014, whereas an unforeseen strong El Niño is developing in 2015. El Niño continues to surprise us, despite decades of research into its causes. Natural variations most probably account for recent events, but climate change may also have played a role.

Cutting levels of soot and other short-lived pollutants delivers tangible benefits and helps governments to build confidence that collective action on climate change is feasible. After the Paris climate meeting this December, actually reducing these pollutants will be essential to the credibility of the diplomatic process.

Expansion of the oil sands industry in Canada has caused land destruction and social friction. Canada could become a leader in climate governance by honouring treaty commitments made with indigenous peoples.

Connected and automated vehicles enable new business models, such as self-driving taxis, that could transform transportation. These models have the potential to reduce energy consumption and greenhouse-gas emissions, but only if they are developed with energy use in mind.

The UN's climate negotiation process is no longer the 'only show in town', but there is little agreement among particpants on alternatives to replace it.

Some countries have pledged to become carbon neutral, while others' emissions continue to rise. Differences in their political attributes could explain the discrepancy in ambitions.

A key element of the West African monsoon is changing faster than in the surrounding areas but the reason is unknown. Now research assesses the specific behaviour of the temperature over the Saharan desert.

Many sub-Saharan countries are failing to include climate information in long-term development planning. Ensuring climate-resilient development requires a step change in how medium- to long-term climate information is produced, communicated and utilized in sub-Saharan Africa and elsewhere.

Here it is argued that air pollution over West African cities needs greater consideration. The effects of aerosol pollution on clouds and solar and thermal radiation can be expected to alter regional climate and impact human health and food security.

Projections of African ecological responses to climate change diverge widely. This Perspective unpicks some of the reasons for this uncertainty and reveals the importance of accounting for the influences of disturbancesand climate on vegetation.

Mixed crop and livestock farms are the backbone of African agriculture, yet there is little information on how these systems may be affected by changes in climate. Addressing this knowledge gap could help smallholders adapt to climate change.

Water, energy and food security in southern Africa are interdependent and exposed to the climate. This Review considers the extent to which spatial and sectoral interdependencies can be, and are being, considered.

This Review looks at the state of knowledge on the El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO), a natural climate phenomenon. It discusses recent advances and insights into how climate change will affect this natural climate varibility cycle.

Autonomous vehicles move passengers without human intervention. Modelling suggests that autonomous taxis could reduce transport emissions by 87–94% per mile in 2030 and save approximately 7 billion barrels of oil.

Survey data shows that policymakers are starting to seriously consider alternative climate governance forums to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

Consumers in Germany are much more likely to purchase expensive ‘green’ energy produced from renewable resources if they have to actively opt out if they do not want it. In absence of such a ‘nudge’, behaviour depends more on political allegiance.

An analysis of quantitative sociological data reveals that adaptive capacity has increased in coastal fishing communities in Kenya, but that underprivileged segments of society remain vulnerable to the impacts of climate change.

A combination of retreating sea ice and different rates of warming in the Greenland and Iceland seas is reducing winter air–sea heat fluxes. These fluxes drive ocean convection and are projected to decrease further.

Bioclimatic modelling suggests that as species distributions shift in response to climate change, few currently isolated but closely related species are likely to come into contact, implying that hybridization and competition risks will remain small.

Rapid climate warming has been linked to increasing shrub dominance in the Arctic tundra. Research now shows that climate–shrub growth relationships vary spatially and according to site characteristics such as soil moisture and shrub height.

Shifts in the growth rate of a model green alga cultured in the presence of one or a combination of up to eight environmental drivers can generally be explained by the response to a single dominant driver, such as pH or temperature.

Today Africa faces a multitude of development and sustainability challenges. Climate change is expected to exacerbate these challenges through its direct effects on people and the environment, as well as by imposing the need for measures to keep greenhouse gas emissions low and adapt to climate impacts. However, there remains a dearth of information with which to understand the nature of these risks for Africa and how best to tackle them. In this Insight we highlight some of the key ways that climate change might impact African wildlife and farming systems, and the interacting pressures on water, energy and food resources. The effects of air pollution on African climate are also considered, as is the uptake of available climate information by decision makers.