https://www.science.org/content/article/venice-s-barrier-against-rising-seas-could-jeopardize-city-s-ecosystem By Erik Stokstad, Science Magazine.  Excerpt: To combat a growing flood risk, Venice, Italy, has spent billions of euros to build three barriers that can temporarily close off the lagoon surrounding the city from the Mediterranean Sea. Now, scientists are reporting that by blocking the stormwater that causes floods, the barriers also prevent salt marshes in the lagoon from receiving vital sediment, which ultimately may hinder their ability to stay above the rising sea level.…

https://www.science.org/content/article/how-one-society-rebounded-worst-year-be-alive By Michael Price, Science Magazine.  Excerpt: It was  the worst time to be alive , according to some scientists. From 536 C.E. to 541 C.E., a series of volcanic eruptions in North and Central America sent tons of ash into the atmosphere, blocking sunlight, chilling the globe, and destroying crops worldwide. Societies everywhere struggled to survive. But for the Ancestral Pueblo people living in what today is the U.S. Southwest, this climate catastrophe planted the seeds for a more cohesive, technologically sophisticated society, a new study suggests. ...Although there’s no way to perfectly reconstruct how the Ancestral Pueblo people’s social systems broke down and reformed, Sinensky thinks it may have happened something like this: As crops continued to fail, the small, disparate groups eventually had to band together to survive. They shared technology and growing techniques and built villages...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/transportation/2021/11/28/roads-climate-change-flooding-infrastructure By  Ian Duncan , The Washington Post.  Excerpt: Responding to increasingly common extreme weather is a vast undertaking that many state transportation departments are only beginning to tackle….

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/26/world/middleeast/iran-protests-water-shortages.html By  Farnaz Fassihi , The New York Times.  Excerpt: ...Weather experts say 97 percent of the country is dealing with water scarcity issues....Experts on Iran’s water scarcity issues say climate change and reduced rainfall have exacerbated the drought caused by mismanagement.…

https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2021/11/rooftop-solar-parking-lot-canopy-smart-energy-policy/ By Richard Conniff, Mother Jones magazine.  Excerpt: It uses pre-cleared land, makes electricity where needed, and keeps parking lots cool. ...By 2050, in one  plausible scenario  from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), supplying solar power for all our electrical needs could require ground-based solar on 0.5 percent of the total land area of the United States. To put that number in perspective, NREL senior research Robert Margolis says it’s “less land than we already dedicate to growing corn ethanol for biofuels.” ...The appeal of parking lots and rooftops... is that they are abundant, close to customers, largely untapped for solar power generation, and on land that’s already been stripped of much of its biological value.…

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/25/climate/smithsonian-museum-flooding.html By  Christopher Flavelle , The New York Times.  Excerpt: Beneath the National Museum of American History, floodwaters are intruding into collection rooms, a consequence of a warming planet. A fix remains years away. ...Smithsonian ...buildings are extremely vulnerable to flooding, and some could eventually be underwater.…

https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2021/11/24/biden-offshore-wind-new-york/ By  Dino Grandoni , The Washington Post.  Excerpt: The approval of 12 turbines east of Long Island moves the Biden administration closer to its clean energy goals. But it still faces strong head winds before achieving them.…