https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/04/renewable-power-surges-pandemic-scrambles-global-energy-outlook Source:   By Warren Cornwall, Science Magazine. Excerpt: The pandemic-induced global economic meltdown has triggered a drop in energy demand and related carbon emissions that could transform how the world gets its energy—even after the disease wanes, according to a report released today by the International Energy Agency (IEA). The precipitous drop in energy use is unparalleled back to the Great Depression of the 1930s. But not all energy sources are suffering equally. Efforts to shift toward renewable energy could be hastened as fossil fuels, particularly coal and oil, have borne the brunt of the decline. Use of renewable energy, meanwhile, has risen thanks to new projects coming online and the low cost of turning wind turbines or harvesting sunlight. ...Global energy demand is expected to drop by 6% in 2020, compared with the previous year. That’s a seven times bigger drop than

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/04/starving-grasshoppers-how-rising-carbon-dioxide-levels-may-promote-insect-apocalypse Source:  By Elizabeth Pennisi, Science Magazine. Excerpt: Empty calories may be grasshoppers’ downfall. Many insect populations are declining, and a provocative new hypothesis suggests one problem is that rising levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) are making plants less nutritious. That could spell trouble not just for insects, but for plant eaters of all sizes. ...Ellen Welti, Kaspari’s postdoc, had been analyzing data on 44 species of grasshoppers at the Konza Prairie Biological Station, a 3487-hectare native tallgrass preserve in northeastern Kansas that is the site of a long-term ecological research (LTER) program. She tracked population trends in two surveys of grasshopper abundance, one done in undisturbed habitats from 1996 to 2017 and another done from 2002 to 2017 where bison grazed. Population booms and busts coincided with major climatic e

https://eos.org/research-spotlights/the-climate-and-health-impacts-of-gasoline-and-diesel-emissions Source:   By David Shultz, Eos/AGU. Excerpt: New research tallies the effects of gas- and diesel-burning vehicle emissions on the climate, as well as on human health. Together, the emissions cause more than 200,000 premature deaths each year.... It’s no secret that CO 2 contributes substantially to warming the planet, ....

https://www.sciencemag.org/careers/2020/04/covid-19-forces-conferences-online-scientists-discover-upsides-virtual-format Source:   By Michael Price, Science Magazine. Excerpt: Biochemist Kathleen Prosser wasn’t planning to present her research at a conference this spring. But when COVID-19 caused organizers to cancel a series of local chemistry meetings across Canada—called Inorganic Discussion Weekends—and offer a virtual alternative, she signed up to give a talk. ...by going virtual, she gained an international audience. The day after her talk she heard from a chemist in Australia, asking for more details and hinting at a future collaboration. “The time zone difference would not have allowed them to see it live, but they watched it [afterward],” she says. As the novel coronavirus outbreak shutters businesses ...massive annual conferences and small society meetings alike have moved online. The new format poses numerous technical and organizational challenges, but it also offers op

https://eos.org/articles/eight-lessons-from-covid-19-to-guide-our-climate-response Source:   By Kimberly M. S. Cartier, Eos/AGU. Excerpt: The global response to the ongoing pandemic can teach us how we should, and shouldn’t, respond to the climate crisis. And most important, it shows that we can do something....

https://eos.org/articles/oktoberfests-methane-rise-is-the-wurst Source:   By Katherine Kornei, Eos/AGU. Excerpt: Incomplete combustion and biogenic emissions—exhalations and flatulence—make Oktoberfest a significant, albeit temporary, source of the potent greenhouse gas....

https://eos.org/research-spotlights/predicting-the-future-of-greenlands-melting-ice-sheet Source:   By Sarah Stanley, Eos/AGU. Excerpt: Climate change drives increased melting of glaciers around the world, including about 280 glaciers that drain ice from Greenland’s massive ice sheet through deep fjords into the ocean. Greenland’s ice has the potential to increase global sea level by more than 7 meters, but the exact effects and their timing are difficult to predict....

https://eos.org/articles/how-financial-markets-can-grow-more-climate-savvy ] Source:   By Jenessa Duncombe, Eos/AGU. Excerpt: Energy investors looking to steel themselves against topsy-turvy market transitions could try something new: factoring extreme weather risks into their investments. At present, financial markets may be failing to account for the physical risks of extreme weather from climate change. That’s a problem, according to Paul Griffin, an accounting professor at the University of California, Davis, because overpricing could lead to an extreme correction to the market down the road. “If the market doesn’t do a better job of accounting for climate, we could have a recession—the likes of which we’ve never seen before,” Griffin said in a press release [ https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-02/uoc--ewc021320.php ]. On the other hand, if markets do adjust and societies reduce emissions, “a couple of generations from now, we might have a more stable planet,” Griffin

https://eos.org/articles/mountain-streams-exhale-more-than-their-share-of-co2 Source:   By Kimberly M. S. Cartier. Excerpt: Sample a stream that runs through the Amazon, the Congo basin, or Canada’s Northern Cordillera, and you’re likely to measure a large amount of carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) dissolved in the water. That carbon mostly comes from plants, animals, and microbes that decompose in the water or return their carbon to the surrounding soil. Mountain streams, however, start their journeys at high altitudes, which lack the carbon-rich soil of their lowland cousins. They haven’t been widely studied, and the few measurements that exist suggest that their water is carbon poor. Because of that, it’s been assumed that mountain streams don’t contribute all that much to the combined CO 2 emission from river networks. However, new research recently published in Nature Communications [ https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-12905-z ] suggests that altogether, mountain streams likely

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/16/world/africa/comoros-climate-change-rivers.html Source:   By Tommy Trenchard, The New York Times. Excerpt: A delicate ecosystem was disrupted in the Comoros, off East Africa, when forests were cleared to make way for farmland. The consequences offer lessons for other parts of the developing world. ...The island, part of the nation of the Comoros off the East African coast, receives more annual rainfall than most of Europe. But a combination of deforestation and climate change has caused at least half of its permanent rivers to stop flowing in the dry season. Since the 1950s, the island has been clearing forests to make way for farmland and in the process disrupted a delicate ecosystem....

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/16/business/electric-cars-cities-chargers.html Source:   By Lawrence Ulrich, The New York Times. Excerpt: For city dwellers who would love an E.V., the biggest hurdle might be keeping it juiced up without a garage or other convenient charging stations. There are people across America who would buy an electric car tomorrow — if only they had someplace to plug it in. Forget oft-cited “range anxiety,” many experts say: The real deal-killer, especially for city and apartment dwellers, is a dearth of chargers where they park their cars. ...“The fact is, about 40 percent of Americans don’t live in single-family homes where you could have a personal charger,” Mr. Nelder said. “There’s no doubt the cars are coming, so we should stop waffling and start building some charging infrastructure.” He added, “Unless there’s a charger at work or your apartment, or damn close to it, it’s not practical to buy an E.V.”....

h ttps://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2020/04/16/southwest-megadrought-climate-change/ Source:   By Andrew Freedman and Darryl Fears, Washington Post. Excerpt: A vast region of the western United States, extending from California, Arizona and New Mexico north to Oregon and Idaho, is in the grips of the first climate change-induced megadrought observed in the past 1,200 years, a study shows. The finding means the phenomenon is no longer a threat for millions to worry about in the future, but is already here. The megadrought has emerged while thirsty, expanding cities are on a collision course with the water demands of farmers and with environmental interests, posing nightmare scenarios for water managers in fast-growing states. A megadrought is broadly defined as a severe drought that occurs across a broad region for a long duration, typically multiple decades. Unlike historical megadroughts triggered by natural climate cycles, emissions of heat-trapping gases from human activitie

https://eos.org/articles/urban-heat-islands-are-warming-the-arctic Source:   By Cheryl Katz. Excerpt: Urban heat islands—centers of warmth surrounded by halos of greening fueled by human activities—are an important climate phenomenon. Characterized by raised temperatures and longer growing seasons, these heat islands trigger significantly faster warming in cities than in rural areas. New research using satellite spectral imaging shows that urban heat islands aren’t just a product of metropolises in the planet’s populous temperate zones. They’re also contributing to climate change in the remote Arctic....

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/09/climate/fema-flood-insurance.html Source:   By Christopher Flavelle and John Schwartz, The New York Times. Excerpt: It’s a simple rule, designed to protect both homeowners and taxpayers: If you want publicly subsidized flood insurance, you can’t build a home that’s likely to flood. But local governments around the country, which are responsible for enforcing the rule, have flouted the requirements, accounting for as many as a quarter-million insurance policies in violation, according to data provided to The New York Times by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which runs the flood insurance program. Those structures accounted for more than $1 billion in flood claims during the past decade, the data show. That toll is likely to increase as climate change makes flooding more frequent and intense....

https://eos.org/articles/the-arctic-ocean-may-not-be-a-reliable-carbon-sink Source:   By Hannah Thomasy, Eos/AGU. Excerpt: Historically, scientists have believed that the Arctic Ocean will be an important carbon sink in the coming years—ice melt will increase the surface area that’s exposed to the air, facilitating carbon uptake from the atmosphere, and cold Arctic waters can store more carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) than warmer waters. Or at least that’s what was supposed to happen. But scientists have begun to suspect that this might not be the case, and new research suggests that the Arctic Ocean is, in fact, not as reliable a carbon sink as we thought. Using data from three research cruises (in 1994, 2005, and 2015), scientists were able to chart how the physical properties of the Arctic Ocean (including total alkalinity, temperature, and dissolved inorganic carbon) changed over time. They found that over the course of the past 20 years, although the amount of CO 2 in the atmosphere h

https://eos.org/research-spotlights/organic-matter-in-arctic-river-shows-permafrost-thaw Source:   By David Schultz, Eos/AGU. Excerpt: The Arctic is the fastest-warming region on Earth, and increasing temperatures are thawing permafrost, releasing more carbon into the atmosphere, and accelerating warming. These feedbacks concern scientists because roughly 850 gigatons of carbon—representing 25%–50% of all soil organic carbon on Earth—are believed to be stored in the permafrost at present. Arctic rivers receive carbon both from the seasonally thawing top layer of the soil and from eroding riverbanks.  ...In a new study [ https://doi.org/10.1029/2019JG005511 ], Bröder et al. analyze water from two sites in the Kolyma River watershed in northern Siberia....

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/06/world/australia/great-barrier-reefs-bleaching-dying.html Source:   By Damien Cave, The New York Times. Excerpt: SYDNEY, Australia — When Terry Hughes surveyed the Great Barrier Reef four years ago from a small plane, mapping the bleaching and death of corals [ https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/15/science/great-barrier-reef-coral-climate-change-dieoff.html ] from water warmed by climate change, he hoped such a rare and heartbreaking scene would not be repeated anytime soon. But rising temperatures sent him back to the air in 2017, when the reef bleached again. Then he returned last month, leading to another devastating conclusion: The reef was being ravaged by bleaching yet again, this time across an even wider area. “It’s the first time we’ve seen severely bleached reefs along the whole length of the reef, in particular, the coastal reefs,” said Professor Hughes, the director of the ARC Center of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies at James Cook Unive

https://eos.org/research-spotlights/reforestation-as-a-local-cooling-mechanism Source:   ByAaron Sidder. Excerpt: Reforestation has been shown to cool surface temperatures, and a novel study suggests it may also reduce air temperature up to several stories above the ground. ... Temperate forests have a reputation as crucial global carbon sinks. In fact, research suggests that American forests alone suck up the equivalent to 14% of annual carbon dioxide emissions in the United States. And after decades of net global forest loss, reestablishing forests worldwide is viewed as a viable option for mitigating the effects of climate change. Beyond the carbon sequestration potential of reforestation, in many parts of the world, forests offer the added benefit of reducing surface temperatures by drawing water from the atmosphere and increasing heat transfer away from the surface. At a local level, restoring forests may help alleviate the effects of climate warming....

https://eos.org/research-spotlights/florida-coastlines-respond-to-sea-level-rise Source:   By  Elizabeth Thompson, Eos/AGU. Excerpt: Sea level rise is one of climate change’s hallmarks. Rising seas threaten coastal populations and can damage coastal ecosystems. Some ecosystems, though, appear to be building themselves up as the water rolls in. In coastal mangroves and marshes, dead plant matter like leaves and roots does not decompose as it does in drier environments. Instead, it is “buried” in the wet ground. For some of these coastal wetlands, the burial rates seem to be increasing. ... The scientists surmised that sea level rise may drive the increasing accumulation of soil carbon....