https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/10/world/asia/sundarbans-mangroves-india-bangladesh.html By Suhasini Raj , The New York Times.  Excerpt: As sea levels rise, eroding embankments and pushing water closer to their doorsteps, the residents of the hundreds of villages in the Sundarbans — an immense network of rivers, tidal flats, small islands and vast mangrove forests straddling India and Bangladesh — have found their lives and livelihoods at risk. In the absence of much government support, women like Aparna Dhara, with help from a nonprofit environmental conservation organization, have devised their own solution: planting hundreds of thousands of additional mangrove trees to bolster their role as protective barriers. ...Mangroves, found only in tropical and subtropical climates, are distinctive for their ability to survive in brackish water.  Research has shown mangrove forests to be  an excellent way to mitigate the effects of climate change , especially the storm surge ac...

https://eos.org/articles/u-s-fires-quadrupled-in-size-tripled-in-frequency-in-20-years By Kimberly M. S. Cartier , Eos/AGU.  Excerpt: Changes including intensifying drought, expansion into burnable land, and an increase in human-caused ignitions have led to a shift in fire patterns. ... Extreme fires  increased primarily in the western and Great Plains regions, while moderate and small fires worsened across the entire country. These fire pattern changes, which threaten human and ecosystem health, are attributed to a combination of climate change impacts and human expansion into new and burnable land.…

https://eos.org/articles/a-climate-mystery-warns-us-to-heed-the-unknown By Jenessa Duncombe , Eos/AGU.  Excerpt: A basic fact about climate change is curiously absent from public consciousness. ... Methane , a potent greenhouse gas, has been rising in the atmosphere at an accelerating rate since 2007. But the cause of the acceleration remains unknown. Today, NOAA  announced  more sobering news. In 2021, methane rose more than other any other year on record, according to a preliminary analysis of weekly measurements taken at 40 sites globally. 2020 also broke records. ...It’s rare to feel like climate change is a mystery anymore. When the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) formed, controversy besieged even basic facts: Is the planet warming? Are sea levels rising? Those squabbles have long since ebbed, ...With so much at stake, there’s a heightening sense that the science is settled. Science historian Naomi Oreskes  called  for the end of the IPCC’...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2022/04/07/methane-emissions-jumped-by-record-2021-noaa-says/ By Steven Mufson , The Washington Post.  Excerpt: Global methane emissions soared by a record amount in 2021, eclipsing the record set the year before, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, demonstrating the huge challenge facing policymakers who have pledged to limit greenhouse gas emissions. Methane, the second biggest contributor to human-caused global warming after carbon dioxide, is emitted in part by oil and natural gas production,   particularly shale gas drilling. But it’s also emitted by livestock farming and landfills, as well as wetlands whose waterlogged soils, rich in microbes, are ideal for naturally producing methane.Since last year,  about 100 countries  have signed on to a Global Methane Pledge, which aims to cut emissions 30 percent by the end of the decade. Some major emitters, such as Russia and China, still ...

https://www.science.org/content/article/tiny-labmade-motors-could-one-day-suck-pollutants-air-and-harvest-precious-metals By Robert F. Service, Science Magazine.  Excerpt: Tiny molecular machines make life possible. Spinning rotary motors generate the chemical fuel our cells need, miniature walkers carry nutrients, and minute construction crews build proteins. Now, chemists are getting in on the act by making even smaller and simpler versions of these biological machines. In three studies, scientists report designing their own molecular pumps and rotary motors. The puny devices are not quite ready to make their real-world debut, but future versions could suck carbon dioxide from the air and harvest valuable metals from seawater. The new studies show it’s possible to get teams of motors all working in the same direction and concentrate target chemicals in a confined space, a feat biology uses to sustain work.…

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/04/climate/ipcc-report-explained.html By Raymond Zhong , The New York Times.  Excerpt: Current pledges to cut emissions, even if nations follow through on them, won’t stop temperatures from rising to risky new levels.… See also NY Times article, Stopping Climate Change Is Doable, but Time Is Short, U.N. Panel Warns ; and IPCC Synthesis Report .

https://eos.org/articles/australian-wildfires-linked-to-ozone-layer-depletion By Krystal Vasquez , Eos/AGU.  Excerpt: The Australian “Black Summer” bushfires produced nearly  1 million tons of smoke  in 2019 and 2020,  wreaking havoc on local air quality . But new research has shown that this is far from the only impact that the smoke had on the atmosphere. According to the study , published in the  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America , thunderstorms generated by the intense wildfires thrust smoke particles well into the stratosphere, where they contributed to a 1% loss of the ozone layer. That’s the amount that should have been recovered over the past decade due to the adoption of the Montreal Protocol, said  Susan Solomon , a professor of environmental studies and chemistry at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and lead author on the paper. “This fire offset that in one blow.”.…