REPORTS & PAPERS 2018 | Climate Change Resources

REPORTS AND PAPERS

In 1988 NASA scientist James Hansen warned lawmakers in the US Senate of the looming dangers presented by global warming, which humans were accelerating. In the same year the United Nations (UN) and the World Meteorological Organization (WHO) formed the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to report to world leaders on the science of climate change.

In 1990, the First IPCC Assessment Report (FAR) was published, underlining the importance of climate change as a challenge with global consequences and requiring international cooperation. It was followed by the 2nd (1995), 3rd (2001), 4th (2007) and 5th (2013-2014) with the 6th due in 2022.

On December 12, 2015 in Paris at the United Nations Climate Change Conference, COP 21, the now-infamous Paris Agreement was written with an objective to combat climate change and to accelerate and intensify the actions and investments needed for a sustainable low carbon future. It entered into force on November 4, 2016 by which time it had been ratified by 55 countries (accounting for 55% of global emissions). Within the following two years 197 countries — every nation on earth — signed on, including the U.S.

Unfortunately in the summer of 2017 President Trump announced that the U.S. would withdraw from the Paris Agreement. That takes effect on November 4, 2020.

In 2018, U.S. carbon emissions surged even as coal plants closed, rising by 3.4 percent just in that year alone, the biggest increase in eight years.

Also in 2018, came the Fourth National Climate Assessment Report, a U.S. report written for the president every four years. This report focused heavily on climate change’s impact on the American economy.

A stunning timeline, following our extraordinary lack of progress since 1988, was written by Paul Bledsoe and published in the New York Times on December 29, 2018. Many of the reports and papers referenced in this article appear in this CCR section.

That piece was almost immediately followed by Carbon Brief publishing a list of 2018 climate-change related papers most featured in the media. The infographic below shows which ones made it into the Top 10.

2018 REPORTS & PAPERS

IOP 12/5/18

IOP SCIENCE

Global energy growth is outpacing decarbonization

12/05/18

Recent reports have highlighted the challenge of keeping global average temperatures below 2 °C and—even more so—1.5 °C (IPCC 2018). Fossil-fuel burning and cement production release ~90% of all CO2 emissions from human activities. After a three-year hiatus with stable global emissions (Jackson et al 2016; Le Quéré C et…

Dec 07 2018

Mother Nature Network

Global CO2 emissions hit record high in 2018, as Greenland ice melt goes into ‘overdrive’

By Russell McLendon Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images

Global carbon dioxide emissions in 2018 are soaring to the highest level on record, according to a new report from the Global Carbon Project, published this week in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Research Letters. As time runs out for preventing the worst effects of climate change, this suggests humanity is…

Dec 05 2018

CNN

Carbon emissions to hit all-time high, says report

By Mark Tutton Photo by Global Carbon Report 2018

A new report projects that annual global carbon emissions will reach an all-time high this year. Carbon emissions from human activity are driving climate change and curbing them is a central aim of the Paris Agreement, which aims to keep the global temperature rise well below 2 degrees Celsius, and if…

YALE 12/2/18

Yale Climate Communications

United Nations COP24

02/25/19

The 2018 United Nations Climate Change Conference was the 24th Conference of the Parties( COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, also known as the Katowice Climate Change Conference. It was held between 2 and 15 December 2018 in Katowice, Poland.

Dec 29 2018

350.org

COP24 Reflections

By Kristy

After a disappointing conclusion of COP 24 this year from weak policies/ guidelines established in the Paris Rulebook to neglecting critical conversations around carbon markets, hope continues to be a scarce commodity found in the negotiation rooms of COP.

Dec 16 2018

BBC News

Climate change: Five things we’ve learnt from COP24

By Matt McGrath Photo by Kiara Worth/IISD/ENB

Delegates to the UN climate conference in Poland have reached agreement on how to implement the 2015 Paris Climate Accord, which comes into force in 2020. What are the key points to come out of the meeting?

Dec 16 2018

The Guardian

What was agreed at COP24 in Poland and why did it take so long?

By Fiona Harvey Photo by Kacper Pempel/Reuters

Fractious UN climate change talks ended with a deal on putting the Paris agreement into practice – but much else left unresolved.

Dec 10 2018

CNN

US teamed up with Russia, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait to weaken language supporting landmark climate report

By Kate Sullivan

The United States sided with Russia, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait over the weekend at a global climate summit to contest language supporting a landmark climate report on limiting global warming.

Dec 02 2018

UN News

Special Coverage of COP24, the UN Climate Change Conference

As world leaders and change-makers gather this December in Katowice, Poland, for the 24th Conference of the Parties of the Climate Change Convention, or COP24, UN News will provide you with a front row seat to all the action.

YALE 12/1/18

Yale Climate Communications

Climate Change in the American Mind: December 2018

02/25/19

“Things like depression, anxiety, post traumatic stress disorder, substance abuse, domestic abuse, all these things tend to go up in the aftermath of a natural disasters,” says psychologist Susan Clayton of the College of Wooster, co-author of an extensive report on climate change and mental health.

Jan 23 2019

Washington Post

The Energy 202: ‘Year from hell’ means more Americans are taking climate change personally, new polling shows

By Dino Grandoni Photo by Ringo H.W. Chiu/AP Photo

A pair of polls published Tuesday found broad recognition among Americans that the world is getting warmer after they endured a year of intense wildfires and devastating hurricanes.

Jan 22 2019

Rolling Stone

More Americans Than Ever Believe in Climate Change, No Matter What Trump Says

By Andy Kroll Photo by David Goldman/AP/REX/Shutterstock

New rates of melting ice underscore the results of an encouraging survey about environmental attitudes

YALE 12/1/18

Yale Climate Communication

Politics & Global Warming

12/01/18

Drawing on a nationally representative survey (N = 1,114; including 966 registered voters), this report describes how American registered voters — Republicans, Democrats, and Independents — view global warming, personal and collective action, and climate policies.

Aug 08 2017

Yale Program on Climate Communication

Public Opinion: Is there an economy-environment tradeoff?

By Matto Mildenberger and Anthony Leiserowitz Photo by David Goldman/AP/REX/Shutterstock

Between 2008 and 2012, multiple surveys found that US public beliefs and attitudes about global warming declined by over 10 percentage points. For example, our surveys found that public belief that global warming is happening fell from 71% in 2008 to a low of 57% in 2010 before beginning to…

MU 11/29/18

Monmouth University Polling Institute

Climate Concerns Increase; Most Republicans Now Acknowledge Change

11/29/18

An increasing number of Americans believe climate change is occurring, including a majority who now see this issue as a very serious problem, according to the latest Monmouth University Poll. Most Americans are optimistic that there is still time to prevent the worst effects of climate change and support taking…

Nov 30 2018

CNN Politics

More Americans and most Republicans now believe in climate change

By Veronica Stracqualursi Photo by Philippe Wojazer/Reuters

A growing number of Americans, including most Republicans, believe that climate change is happening, a shift in public opinion from three years ago.

LANCET 11/28/18

THE LANCET

The Lancet Countdown: Tracking Progress on Health and Climate Change

11/28/18

The Lancet Countdown: tracking progress on health and climate change was established to provide an independent, global monitoring system dedicated to tracking the health dimensions of the impacts of, and the response to, climate change. The Lancet Countdown tracks 41 indicators across five domains: climate change impacts, exposures, and vulnerability; adaptation,…

Jan 28 2019

FOOD POLITICS

New Lancet report: The Global Syndemic: Uniting Actions to Address Obesity, Undernutrition, and Climate Change

By Marion Nestle

The Lancet has been busy. Last week, it published a blockbuster report on the need for worldwide dietary changes to improve human health and that of the environment. And here is another post about this EAT-Forum report on Friday.

Jan 25 2019

FOOD POLITICS

Weekend reading: The Lancet / EAT Forum report on healthy and sustainable diets

By Marion Nestle

I’ve saved this for Weekend Reading because it will take a weekend to get through it. The report is a blockbuster: 37 authors, 47 pages, 357 references.

Jan 16 2019

National Geographic

Eating meat has “dire” consequences for the planet, says report

By Sarah Gibbens Photo by Robin Hammond, Nat Geo Image Collection

To feed a growing global population and curtail climate change, scientists say we need to radically change our food systems.

Dec 15 2018

DeSmog

Major Health Study Shows Benefits of Combating Climate Change

By David Suzuki

The Lancet Countdown: Tracking Progress on Health and Climate Change, by 150 experts from 27 academic institutions and intergovernmental organizations, including the World Health Organization and the World Bank, is blunt: “A rapidly changing climate has dire implications for every aspect of human life, exposing vulnerable populations to extremes of…

Nov 30 2018

Business Insider

8 ways the climate apocalypse could affect your health

By Peter Kotecki Photo by Mohammed/AP

Public health journal The Lancet released a report Wednesday warning that climate change is causing a long list of health risks.

Nov 28 2018

The New York Times

Study Warns of Cascading Health Risks From the Changing Climate

By Somini Sengupta and Kendra Pierre-Louis Photo by Saumya Khandelwal for NYT

Crop yields are declining. Tropical diseases like dengue fever are showing up in unfamiliar places, including in the United States. Tens of millions of people are exposed to extreme heat.

NCA 11/23/18

NCA: NATIONAL CLIMATE ASSESSMENT

2018 Fourth National Climate Assessment Report

12/07/18

The Global Change Research Act of 1990 mandates that the U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) deliver a report to Congress and the President no less than every four years that “1) integrates, evaluates, and interprets the findings of the Program…; 2) analyzes the effects of global change on the…

Feb 08 2019

ELECTRIC LITERATURE

Melville House Published the Climate Report Because Trump Didn’t Want To

By Carrie V Mullins Photo by Colin

On November 23, 2018, the U.S. government released the Fourth National Climate Assessment, a federally mandated study compiled by thirteen agencies and over 300 scientists to examine the effects of climate change. Two months later, Melville House, a Brooklyn based publisher released it as a paperback for $17.95.

May 29 2019

The New York Times

The White House Plan to Change Climate Science

By Michael Barbaro Photo: Brandon Thibodeaux for The New York Times

After two years spent unraveling the policies of his predecessors, President Trump and his appointees are going after influential government reports.

Mar 26 2019

Ceres

Investors Sound Alarm Bells on Climate. Are You Listening?

By Mindy Lubber and Veena Ramani

Let’s add the World Economic Forum to the list of organizations sounding a clarion call on climate change. Their recent risks report identifies climate change as one of the most severe risks that the world faces, and warns, “it is in relation to the environment that the world is most clearly sleepwalking…

Dec 07 2018

The New York Times

How to Understand the U.S. Climate Report

By Lisa Friedman, Julia Rosen and Brad Plumer

As my colleague Coral Davenport reported, the timing of the release was no accident. The Trump administration hoped to bury the assessment’s grim findings in the Thanksgiving weekend news cycle leftovers and avoid having to respond to its major conclusion: that unchecked rising temperatures will cost the American economy hundreds…

Dec 05 2018

The New York Times

Greenhouse Gas Emissions Accelerate Like a ‘Speeding Freight Train’ in 2018

By Kendra Pierre-Louis Wu Hong/EPA, via Shutterstock

Greenhouse gas emissions worldwide are growing at an accelerating pace this year, researchers said Wednesday, putting the world on track to face some of the most severe consequences of global warming sooner than expected.

Nov 30 2018

Science Friday

Where Will Climate Change Impact The US? Everywhere.

By Ira Flatow Photo credit National Park Service

Find out what the Fourth National Climate Assessment Report says about your region’s climate future.

Nov 29 2018

GRIST

We broke down what climate change will do, region by region

By Grist staff Grist / Smith Collection / Gado / Getty Images

A brilliant breakdown on what this report, mandated by Congress to occur in the US every 4 years, says.

Nov 28 2018

Food Politics

Climate change report: bad news for agriculture

By Marion Nestle Photo by Borgen Magazine

The US Global Change Research Program released its 4th report on climate change: U.S. agriculture and the communities it supports are threatened by increases in temperatures, drought, heavy precipitation events, and wildfire on rangelands.

Nov 28 2018

The New York Times

How to Understand the U.S. Climate Report

By Lisa Friedman, Julia Rosen and Brad Plumer Photo by Janie Osborne, The New York Times

Nov 27 2018

EARTHER

The White House Talking Points About the National Climate Assessment Are Demonstrably False

By Brian Kahn Photo by AP

The White House tried to hide the National Climate Assessment by releasing it on Black Friday. That plan failed. Stories continue to surface and reporters continue to ask questions about the report’s stark findings.

Nov 27 2018

The New York Times

President Trump Overlooks an Investment Opportunity in Climate Change

By Antony Currie Photo by Tom Brenner, The New York Times

Fighting climate change could be America’s new New Deal. The effects of global warming on virtually all aspects of American society could be devastating, according to a government report released on Friday. Rather than seize on its findings as a way to boost American innovation, economic output and jobs, President…

Nov 26 2018

Nation of Change

3 charts: What Trump doesn’t want you to know about the climate emergency

By Juan Cole Photo by Garry Knight, Flickr

Trump and his cronies are deeply invested in or beholden to ExxonMobil and other Big Carbon firms who stand to lose billions if the public realizes the harm they are inflicting on us.

Nov 26 2018

Smithsonian

Climate Change Will Cost Taxpayers Billions In Near Future, Federal Report Shows

By Meilan Solly Photo by Wikimedia Commons

By 2100, the country’s GDP could shrink by 10 percent, triggering an economic crisis twice as damaging as the Great Recession.

Nov 23 2018

The New York Times

U.S. Climate Report Warns of Damaged Environment and Shrinking Economy

By Coral Davenport and Kendra Pierre-Louis By Justin Sullivan, Getty Images

A major scientific report issued by 13 federal agencies on Friday presents the starkest warnings to date of the consequences of climate change for the United States, predicting that if significant steps are not taken to rein in global warming, the damage will knock as much as 10 percent off…

PNAS 10/30/18

PNAS

Climate-driven declines in arthropod abundance restructure a rainforest food web

By Bradford C. Lister and Andres Garcia 10/30/18

Arthropods, invertebrates including insects that have external skeletons, are declining at an alarming rate. While the tropics harbor the majority of arthropod species, little is known about trends in their abundance. We compared arthropod biomass in Puerto Rico’s Luquillo rainforest with data taken during the 1970s and found that biomass…

Nov 05 2019

Nation of Change

Our vanishing world: Insects

By Robert J. Burrowes

Just one critical and largely ignored variable in this rush to extinction is our decimation of the world insect population denying us an ever-expanding range of ecological services.

NATURE 10/15/18

Nature Plants

Decreases in global beer supply due to extreme drought and heat

10/15/18

Beer is the most popular alcoholic beverage in the world by volume consumed, and yields of its main ingredient, barley, decline sharply in periods of extreme drought and heat. Although the frequency and severity of drought and heat extremes increase substantially in range of future climate scenarios by five Earth…

Oct 15 2018

The New York Times

Heat and Drought Could Threaten World Beer Supply

By James Gorman Photo by Agence France-Presse

If horrific hurricanes and a new, scarier-than-ever United Nations report don’t change attitudes on climate change, perhaps a new report on barley will. A small international team of scientists considered what the effect of climate change would be for this crop in the next 80 years, and they are raising…

IPCC 10/8/18

IPCC

2018 IPCC: The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Report

12/07/18

An IPCC special report on the impacts of global warming of 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels and related global greenhouse gas emission pathways, in the context of strengthening the global response to the threat of climate change, sustainable development, and efforts to eradicate poverty. SUMMARY for POLICYMAKERS REPORT HERE and…

Feb 08 2021

Bloomberg Green

The World Is Moving Toward Net Zero Because of a Single Sentence

By Eric Roston

The District of Columbia city council held a public hearing on Oct. 9, 2018, to discuss legislation that would halve the U.S. capital's greenhouse-gas pollution by 2032. The bill had gathered momentum over the summer and fall, but received a turbo boost of support just one day prior, when the…

Nov 21 2018

NRDC

The IPCC Climate Change Report: Why It Matters to Everyone on the Planet

By Courtney Lindwall

The U.N. report warns that dire impacts from climate change will arrive sooner than many expected. Here’s why we need to follow the report’s advice, and why every ton of emissions reductions can make a difference.

Oct 09 2018

Rolling Stone

Can Civilization Survive What’s Coming?

By Jeff Goodell

The new IPCC report on climate change will fill you with existential dread — rightfully so.

Oct 09 2018

The Takeaway

New UN Report Predicts Climate Crisis by 2040. Now What?

By Tanzina Vega Photo: AP Photo

A new UN climate report says it will take unprecedented efforts to avert massive and deadly increases in drought, food shortages, wildfires, and more by the year 2040. That's sooner than what many scientists had warned of, up until now.

Dec 11 2019

VICE

‘We Fear for Our Children:’ Alaska Natives Speak out in Climate Change Report

By Maddie Stone Photo: Mark Ralston/afp Via Getty Images

For the first time, NOAA's annual report on the devastating effects of climate change in the Arctic is highlighting the unsettling changes to the lives of the people who live there.

Jan 18 2019

Rolling Stone

Saving the Paris Agreement

By Jeff Goodell Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images

Response at COP23 after release of IPCC: How a team of U.S. diplomats helped salvage the global pact on climate change in the face of Trump’s denialism.

Jan 09 2019

CLIMATE COMMUNICATION

IPCC Frequently Asked Questions PDF

In 2007, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change included these FAQs in an effort to make the basics of climate science more accessible to non-scientists. Susan Hassol worked with the authors to edit this piece.

Dec 17 2018

The Huffington Post

6 Things Children Born This Year Will Experience In Their 20s

By Chris D’Angelo and Alexander C. Kaufman Photo by Akhtar Soomro, Reuters

The latest U.N. climate report includes some dire forecasts.

Dec 12 2018

BBC NEWS

The IPCC says we need to buy less meat, milk, cheese and butter

By BBC News US

For example, beef cattle raised on deforested land produces 12 times more greenhouse gas emissions than those reared on natural pastures. Scroll down for a great graphic.

Nov 27 2018

Pacific Standard

The Latest U.N. Gap Report Shows Which Countries Are Falling Behind on Climate

By Kate Wheeling Photo by Ho/AFP/Getty Images

Major countries are still whiffing on their Paris Agreement pledges.

Nov 19 2018

The New York Times

Will We Survive Climate Change?

By John Schwartz Photo by Jens Mortensen, The New York Times

Reports of the threats from a warming planet have been coming fast and furiously. The latest: a startling analysis from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicting terrible food shortages, wildfires and a massive die-off of coral reefs as soon as 2040, unless governments take strong action.

Oct 22 2018

The New Yorker

What Is Donald Trump’s Response to the U.N.’s Dire Climate Report?

By Elizabeth Kolbert Illustration by João Fazenda

The U.N.’s scientific advisory board sounds a piercing alarm on climate change, but the President doesn’t seem to hear it.

CLEVER 10/1/18

CLEVER

How Climate Change Will Impact Major Cities Across the U.S.

10/01/18

To understand how climate change will impact major cities across the United States, we gathered and analyzed available public data from Notre Dame Global Adaptation Initiative (ND-GAIN).

Sep 06 2019

CELEVER

How Climate Change Will Impact Major Cities Across the U.S.

By Eylul Tekin

Homeownership is a long-term investment, with the typical mortgage lasting between 15 and 30 years; however, most home buyers don’t consider the potential impact of climate change on their most important investment. The reality is climate change could have a serious impact on how the real estate industry approaches property values…

Aug 19 2019

CITYLAB.COM

What U.S. Cities Facing Climate Disaster Risks Are Least Prepared?

By BRENTIN MOCK

New studies find cities most vulnerable to climate change disasters—heat waves, flooding, rising seas, drought—are the least prepared. This month the cities of Austin and Seattle passed ordinances to tackle the already-here disaster of climate change. In Seattle, the city council passed a resolution to endorse adopting its own local…

UN 9/11/18

PARIS AGREEMENT

Emissions Gap Report 2018

Prof. Kevin Reed and Ph.D. Alyssa Stansfield 11/27/18

The goal of the Paris Agreement on climate change, as agreed at the Conference of the Parties in 2015, is to keep global temperature rise this century to well below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. It also calls for efforts to limit the temperature increase even further to 1.5…

Feb 07 2019

Climate Change News

China pledges to strengthen climate plan

By Chloé Farand Photo: Elysee

In a joint statement with France, the world’s biggest emitter declared an intention to upgrade its contribution to the Paris Agreement

Nov 04 2019

The Washington Post

Trump makes it official: U.S. will withdraw from the Paris climate accord

By Brady Dennis

The Trump administration notified the international community Monday that it plans to officially withdraw from the Paris climate accord next fall, a move that will leave the world’s second-largest emitter of greenhouse gases as the only nation to abandon the global effort to combat climate change.

Feb 20 2019

The Washington Post

Countries vowed to cut carbon emissions. They aren’t even close to their goals, U.N. report finds

By Chris Mooney Photo by Philippe Wojazer/Reuters

A new ‘emissions gap’ report says we’re even further from where we need to be than we thought.

Jun 05 2017

The Hill

US governors, mayors, businesses, commit to Paris climate pact goals

By Timothy Cama © Getty Images

More than 1,000 governors, mayors, businesses and others are committing to uphold the goals of the Paris climate change agreement.

SBU 9/11/18

CLIMATE COMMUNICATION

The Human Influence on Hurricane Florence

Prof. Kevin Reed and Ph.D. Alyssa Stansfield 09/11/18

Prof. Kevin Reed and Ph.D. Alyssa Stansfield, along with colleagues at LBNL and NCAR, have for the first time used a climate model (CAM5) to produce near real-time experimental forecasts of Hurricane Florence to assess how much human induced climate change has altered the anticipated rainfall, intensity and size of…

Feb 11 2019

InsideClimate News

Hurricane Florence’s Unusual Extremes Worsened by Climate Change

By Bob Berwyn Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images

Researchers estimate the storm’s rainfall forecast is 50 percent higher because of warmer oceans and more moisture in the atmosphere brought by global warming.

SCIENCE 9/7/18

Science

Climate model shows large-scale wind and solar farms in the Sahara increase rain and vegetation

09/07/18

Energy generation by wind and solar farms could reduce carbon emissions and thus mitigate anthropogenic climate change. But is this its only benefit? Li et al. conducted experiments using a climate model to show that the installation of large-scale wind and solar power generation facilities in the Sahara could cause…

Jan 08 2019

Yale School Of Environment

Green energy combats climate change and brings life to the desert

By Zhinan Chen

On a global scale, wind and solar powers are helping us reduce carbon emissions and combat climate change. At a regional level, the effects of installing large-scale wind and solar farms can change landscapes and harm ecosystems in ways not yet fully understood. However, recent research focusing on the impact…

NOAA 9/1/18

NCDC

Global Climate Report

09/01/18

Temperature anomalies and percentiles are shown on the gridded maps below. The anomaly map on the left is a product of a merged land surface temperature (Global Historical Climatology Network, GHCN) and sea surface temperature (ERSST.v4) anomaly analysis as described in Huang et al. (2016). Temperature anomalies for land and…

Feb 28 2022

BBC

Climate change: IPCC report warns of ‘irreversible’ impacts of global warming

By Matt McGrath

Many of the impacts of global warming are now simply "irreversible" according to the UN's latest assessment. But the authors of a new report say that there is still a brief window of time to avoid the very worst.

Oct 17 2018

The Washington Post

Assessing the Global Climate in September 2018

Photo courtesy Pixabay.com

The global land and ocean temperature departure from average for September 2018 tied with 2017 as the fourth highest for the month of September in the NOAA global temperature dataset record, which dates back to 1880. The year-to-date was also fourth warmest on record.

SCIENCEDIRECT 9/1/18

ScienceDirect

Worldwide decline of the entomofauna: A review of its drivers

By Francisco Sánchez-Bayo and Kris A.G.Wyckhuys 02/26/19

Biodiversity of insects is threatened worldwide. Here, we present a comprehensive review of 73 historical reports of insect declines from across the globe, and systematically assess the underlying drivers. Our work reveals dramatic rates of decline that may lead to the extinction of 40% of the world's insect species over…

Feb 01 2019

By Center for Biological Diversity

New Analysis: Curbing Pesticides Key to Reversing Insect Apocalypse
More Than 40 Percent of World’s Insect Species on Fast-track to Extinction

Planting Healthy Air report quantifies health benefits of trees for 245 cities globally.

NHTSA 8/24/18

NHTSA

Draft Environmental Impact Statement for The Safer Affordable Fuel-Efficient (SAFE) Vehicles Rule for Model Year 2021–2026 Passenger Cars and Light Trucks

07/01/18

This Draft Environmental Impact Statement (Draft EIS) analyzes the environmental impacts of fuel economy standards and reasonable alternative standards for model years 2021 to 2026 for passenger cars and light trucks. NHTSA has proposed these new or amended Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards under the Energy Policy and Conservation…

Sep 28 2018

Live Science

7-Degree Global Temperature Rise Is Inevitable, Trump Administration Presumes (and Shrugs It Off)

By Mindy Weisberger Photo by Sean Rayford/Getty

A recently issued environmental report suggests that leaders in the Trump administration have already shrugged off the possibility of putting the brakes on climate change, a stance that embraces a catastrophic future for the planet.

RSC 8/15/18

ROYAL SOCIETY OF CHEMISTRY

Macroscopic heat release in a molecular solar thermal energy storage system

08/20/18

The development of solar energy can potentially meet the growing requirements for a global energy system beyond fossil fuels, but necessitates new scalable technologies for solar energy storage. One approach is the development of energy storage systems based on molecular photoswitches, so-called molecular solar thermal energy storage (MOST).

Jan 25 2019

Science Alert

Scientists Create Liquid Fuel That Can Store The Sun’s Energy For Up to 18 Years

By Carly Cassella Photo by Nantonov/iStock

No matter how abundant or renewable, solar power has a thorn in its side. There is still no cheap and efficient long-term storage for the energy that it generates. The solar industry has been snagged on this branch for a while, but in the past year alone, a series of…

Nov 06 2018

Forbes

Scientists Reveal Strange Molecule That Can Store Sun’s Energy For 18 Years

By Trevor Nace

A Swedish research team believes it found the breakthrough renewables was looking for, a solar thermal fuel that can store the sun's energy for up to 18 years.

Jan 05 2018

Clean Technica

Turning Solar Energy Into Liquid Fuel

By Nicolas Zart

Of all the strange things we do as a race on this planet, refining and over-complicating things are some of them. We’re never satisfied with letting things be and often time favor extravagant conspiracy theories over reality. After all, how would the opposing piston engine and the convoluted internal combustion…

YALE 8/7/18

Yale Program for Climate Change Communication

Yale Climate Opinion Maps 2018

By Jennifer Marlon, Peter Howe 03/19/20

These maps show how Americans’ climate change beliefs, risk perceptions, and policy support vary at the state, congressional district, metro area, and county levels.

Jan 24 2019

Resilience

Red Tides of a Different Sort— Although Just as Polluting

By Joel Stronberg Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images

A second university poll conducted by climate communications programs at Yale and George Mason found the same pattern occurring and for much the same reasons. A key takeaway was a 15 percent rise in the number of respondents who said they were personally experiencing the impacts of Earth’s warming.

Oct 09 2018

InsideClimate News

Yale Program on Climate Change Communication

By Matthew Ballew, Jennifer Marlon, Edward Maibach, Abel Gustafson, Matthew Goldberg and Anthony Leiserowitz Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images

With weather becoming more extreme—including powerful hurricanes, stronger droughts and heatwaves, and increased flooding due to sea-level rise—more Americans are personally experiencing the effects of climate change. It is, therefore, no surprise that this increase in danger is accompanied by an increase in worry about global warming. In our recent…

PLOS 7/31/18

PLOS MEDICINE

Quantifying excess deaths related to heatwaves under climate change scenarios: A multicountry time series modelling study

By Yuming Guo , Antonio Gasparrini, Shanshan Li , Francesco Sera, Ana Maria Vicedo-Cabrera, Micheline de Sousa Zanotti Stagliorio Coelho, Paulo Hilario Nascimento Saldiva, Eric Lavigne, Benjawan Tawatsupa, Kornwipa Punnasiri, Ala Overcenco, Patricia Matus Correa, Nicolas Valdes Ortega, Haidong Kan, Samuel Osorio, Jouni J. K. Jaakkola, Niilo R. I. Ryti, Patrick G. Goodman, Ariana Zeka, Paola Michelozzi, Matteo Scortichini, Masahiro Hashizume, Yasushi Honda, Xerxes Seposo, Ho Kim, Aurelio Tobias, Carmen Íñiguez, Bertil Forsberg, Daniel Oudin Åström, Yue Leon Guo, Bing-Yu Chen, Antonella Zanobetti, Joel Schwartz, Tran Ngoc Dang, Dung Do Van, Michelle L. Bell, Ben Armstrong, Kristie L. Ebi, Shilu Tong
07/01/18

The number of people dying from heat waves is likely to rise sharply in some regions by 2080 if policymakers fail to take mitigating steps in climate and health policies, according to the results of a study on Tuesday.

Jul 31 2018

Reuters

Study sees dramatic rise in heatwave deaths by 2080

by Kate Kelland Photo by REUTERS/Wolfgang Rattay

The number of people dying from heatwaves is likely to rise sharply in some regions by 2080 if policymakers fail to take mitigating steps in climate and health policies, according to the results of a study on Tuesday.

GRAIN/IATP 7/18/18

GRAIN & IATP

How big meat and dairy companies are heating up the planet

GRAIN and the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP) 07/18/18

A new report shows how the world’s 35 largest meat and dairy companies are pursuing growth strategies that will increase their emissions and derail global efforts to prevent dangerous climate change.

Jul 18 2018

The Independent

Meat and dairy companies to surpass oil industry as world’s biggest polluters, report finds

By Josh Gabbatiss Photo by Sara Brown

There’s no other choice. Meat and dairy production in the countries where the top 35 companies dominate must be significantly reduced.

NOAA 7/1/18

NOAA Arctic Program

Arctic Report Card: Update for 2018

Continued warming of the Arctic atmosphere and ocean are driving broad change in the environmental system in predicted and, also, unexpected ways. New emerging threats are taking form and highlighting the level of uncertainty in the breadth of environmental change that is to come. Previous Arctic Report Cards here

Mar 27 2019

Washington Post

The Doomsday Vault’s home is already altered by climate change. A report says it could get worse.

By Kayla Epstein Photo by David Keyton/AP

Few places have served as a locus for the public’s anxiety about climate change as much as the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. The seed ark, popularly known as the “Doomsday Vault,” is embedded deep in the permafrost of a northerly Norwegian island and stores nearly a million samples from around…

NATURE 6/13/18

Nature

Mass balance of the Antarctic Ice Sheet from 1992 to 2017

06/13/18

The Antarctic Ice Sheet is an important indicator of climate change and driver of sea-level rise. Here we combine satellite observations of its changing volume, flow and gravitational attraction with modelling of its surface mass balance to show that it lost 2,720 ± 1,390 billion tonnes of ice between 1992 and 2017,…

Jun 13 2018

Carbonbrief

Sea level rise due to Antarctic ice melt has ‘tripled over past five years’

By Daisy Dunne

The rate of sea level rise resulting from the melting of the Antarctic ice sheet has tripled over the past five years, according to new research from a global team of scientists.

REPORT 7/6/18

Proceedings of the National Academy of Science

Trajectories of the Earth System in the Anthropocene

07/01/18

In July, 2018, group of scientists published “Trajectories of the Earth System in the Anthropocene,” exploring the risk that climate feedbacks could lead to runaway heating and a “Hothouse Earth.” Will Steffen, Johan Rockström, and Katherine Richardson — from the Universities of Stockholm, Australia, and Copenhagen, with colleagues from Stanford,…

Sep 14 2018

Greenpeace

Hothouse Earth

By Rex Weyler Photo by Maria Vasilieva / Greenpeace

In July of this year, during record-smashing heat waves and forest fires, a group of scientists published “Trajectories of the Earth System in the Anthropocene,” exploring the risk that climate feedbacks could lead to runaway heating and a “Hothouse Earth.”

Aug 25 2018

PBS NewsHour

Humanity has only a handful of decades to avoid a devastating ‘Hothouse Earth’

A study published in the Proceeding of the National Academy of Sciences tells a tale of two Earths. In one, humans are able to rein in global warming, and in the other, temperatures would be irreversibly warmer than pre-industrial levels, by 4 to 5 degrees Celsius. How societies act in…

Aug 09 2018

The Guardian

World is finally waking up to climate change, says ‘hothouse Earth’ author

By Rex Weyler Photo by Ullstein Bild via Getty Images

Report predicting spiralling global temperatures has been downloaded 270,000 times in just a few days

Aug 07 2018

The Guardian

Domino-effect of climate events could move Earth into a ‘hothouse’ state

By Jonathan Watts Photo by Paul Goldstein/Cover Images

A domino-like cascade of melting ice, warming seas, shifting currents and dying forests could tilt the Earth into a “hothouse” state beyond which human efforts to reduce emissions will be increasingly futile, a group of leading climate scientists has warned.

Aug 06 2018

BBC News

Climate change: ‘Hothouse Earth’ risks even if CO2 emissions slashed

By Matt McGrath Photo by Getty Images

It may sound like the title of a low budget sci-fi movie, but for planetary scientists, "Hothouse Earth" is a deadly serious concept.

Aug 06 2018

Greenpeace

Global warming may become unstoppable even if we stick to Paris target

By Michael Le Page Photo by Radius Images / Alamy

We could be on the verge of triggering a series of cascading tipping points that result in the planet warming 4 or 5°C hotter than the pre-industrial benchmark.

REPORT 6/1/18

SCIENCE

Reducing food’s environmental impacts through producers and consumers

By J. Poore & T. Nemecek 06/01/18

Food is produced and processed by millions of farmers and intermediaries globally, with substantial associated environmental costs. Given the heterogeneity of producers, what is the best way to reduce food's environmental impacts? Poore and Nemecek consolidated data on the multiple environmental impacts of ∼38,000 farms producing 40 different agricultural goods…

Jun 06 2018

Science News

A big analysis of environmental data strengthens the case for plant-based diets

By Susan Milius Photo by Adam Melnyk, Shutterstock

The same foods grown in various ways can also have less impact on the planet, scientists say.

UBC 6/1/18

The University of British Columbia

Global Food Security: How much of the world’s food do smallholders produce?

06/01/18

The widely reported claim that smallholders produce 70–80% of the world’s food has been a linchpin of agricultural development policy despite limited empirical evidence. Recent empirical attempts to reinvestigate this number have lacked raw data on how much food smallholders produce, and have relied on model assumptions with unknown biases…

Jun 21 2019

Medium

Small farms grow a large portion of the world’s food

By Vinny Ricciardi

It’s quite amazing. Small farms are still growing a large portion of the world’s food. In our recent study, we collected data from 55 countries and found that farms under 2 ha (5 acres) — the size of two American style football fields — are growing between 30–35% of all food produced.

Jun 01 2018

The University of British Columbia

How much of the world’s food do smallholders produce?

By V Ricciardi, N Ramankutty, Z Mehrabi, L Jarvis, B Chookolingo

Explore our new dataset on how much food is produced by differently sized farms. For each of the 55 countries, we found nationally representative surveys and censuses that asked farmers how much of each crop they produced. Using this information, we calculated how much total crop production (in kilocalories) each…

NCC 5/7/18

Nature Climate Change

The carbon footprint of global tourism

05/07/18

Tourism contributes significantly to global gross domestic product, and is forecast to grow at an annual 4%, thus outpacing many other economic sectors. However, global carbon emissions related to tourism are currently not well quantified. Here, we quantify tourism-related global carbon flows between 160 countries, and their carbon footprints under…

May 08 2018

Scientific American

Global Tourism Has a Bigger Share of Carbon Emissions Than Thought

By Chelsea Harvey Photo by Daniel Piraino

International tourism accounts for 8 percent of all carbon emissions worldwide—about three times more than previously thought, according to a study released yesterday.

FP 5/2018

Founders Pledge

Climate Change Cause Area Report

03/19/20

Climate change is an unprecedented problem requiring unprecedented global cooperation. However, global efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions have failed thus far. This report discusses the science, politics, and economics of climate change, and what philanthropists can do to help improve progress on tackling climate change.

Aug 14 2016

The New York Times

Effective Altruism: Where Charity and Rationality Meet

By Tyler Cowen Photo by Ria Novosti/Science Photo Library

You are lucky enough to have some money to give away: It could be $100 or $1 million. Whether you are prepared to make a small donation or a big one, you would like to accomplish something good with it.

REPORT 4/18/18

NATURE

Global warming transforms coral reef assemblages

04/19/18

The paper warns that corals on the Great Barrier Reef began to die immediately in the aftermath of the record-breaking marine heat-wave in 2016.

May 06 2022

The New York Times

The ocean’s biggest garbage pile is full of floating life

By Annie Roth Photo: Ben Lecomte

Researchers found that small sea creatures exist in equal number with pieces of plastic in parts of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, which could have implications for cleaning up ocean pollution.

Mar 01 2019

The Atlantic

Since 2016, Half of All Coral in the Great Barrier Reef Has Died

By Robinson Meyer Photo by David Gray / Reuters

A new study warns it has become a “highly altered, degraded system.”

Apr 19 2018

Forbes

Half Of The Great Barrier Reef Has Died Since 2016

By Trevor Nace Photo by Arterra/UIG via Getty Images

The world's largest coral reef system, visible even from outer space, has lost half of its coral in the past two years. The Great Barrier Reef, once a colorful and visible display of biodiversity and a symbiotic ecosystem, now resembles a ghost town where life once flourished.

Apr 19 2018

NEW YORK TIMES

Damage to Great Barrier Reef From Global Warming Is Irreversible, Scientists Say

By Jacqueline Williams Photo by XL Catlin Seaview Survey, via Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

An underwater heat wave that damaged huge sections of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef two years ago spurred a die-off of coral so severe that scientists say the natural wonder will never look the same again.

REPORT 2/1/18

World Health Organization

Climate change and health

02/26/19

Over the last 50 years, human activities – particularly the burning of fossil fuels – have released sufficient quantities of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases to trap additional heat in the lower atmosphere and affect the global climate. In the last 130 years, the world has warmed by approximately…

Feb 26 2019

The New England Journal of Medicine

The Imperative for Climate Action to Protect Health

By Andy Haines, M.D., and Kristie Ebi, M.P.H., Ph.D.

The WHO predicts that 250,000 deaths yearly from 2030 to 2050 will be attributable to climate change. Reductions in greenhouse-gas emissions would be expected to have substantial health benefits — for example, reduced air pollution could lead to a lower risk of noncommunicable disease.

SCIENCE 1/5/18

Science

Spatial and temporal patterns of mass bleaching of corals in the Anthropocene

01/05/18

Coral bleaching occurs when stressful conditions result in the expulsion of the algal partner from the coral. Before anthropogenic climate warming, such events were relatively rare, allowing for recovery of the reef between events. Hughes et al. looked at 100 reefs globally and found that the average interval between bleaching…

Jan 04 2018

The Guardian

Coral reef bleaching ‘the new normal’ and a fatal threat to ecosystems

By Helen Davidson Photo by Greg Torda

Study of 100 tropical reef locations finds time between bleaching events has shrunk and is too short for full recovery.

PC 1/5/18

CITIZEN.ORG

Carbon Omission: How the U.S. Media Underreported Climate Change in 2017

01/05/18

The proportion of pieces that mentioned climate change in climate-relevant contexts was decidedly low. There was no topic that media connected to climate change in more than 33 percent of pieces. Perhaps unsurprisingly, that high-water mark comes from articles discussing record heat.1 From there, the numbers drop off steeply. Some…

Jan 05 2018

Common Dreams

Corporate Media ‘Failed’ to Connect 2017’s Extreme Weather to Climate Crisis: Study

By Jake Johnson

Despite the fact that 2017 saw a flurry of devastating and "record-shattering" hurricanes, enormously destructive wildfires, and extreme droughts, a new report by Public Citizen published on Friday concludes that major American media outlets "largely failed" to connect these weather events to the broader global climate crisis.

FOE 1/1/18

Friends of the Earth

The Dangers of Industrial Ocean Fish Farming

01/01/18

The seafood business is booming. It comprises over 16% of the protein we eat worldwide, the majority of which is farmed. In the last 30 years, global fish farm production increased from 5 million to 63 million tons. Aquaculture recently surpassed global beef production, and by 2030, it is projected…

Jul 09 2018

fao.org

Is the planet approaching “peak fish”? Not so fast, study says

Global fish production will continue to expand over the next decade even though the amount of fish being captured in the wild has levelled off and aquaculture's previously explosive growth is now slowing, says a new report by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).

Jun 25 2018

The Regeneration Weekly

The rise of aquaculture and the threat of floating feedlots

By Parker Hughes Photo: Marcovdz

Since the 1960s, the average annual increase in global fish consumption (3.2 percent) has outpaced population growth (1.6 percent) and exceeded the combined consumption of meat from all terrestrial animals (2.8 percent). In per capita terms, global fish consumption has more than doubled from 9.0 kg (19.84 lbs) in 1961…

Jan 01 2018

The World Bank

Life below water

Almost 90 percent of global marine fish stocks are now fully exploited or overfished, and wild capture fisheries struggle without sound regulatory frameworks and strong enforcement. The status of marine biodiversity is closely connected with ocean pollution and acidification. About two-thirds of the world’s oceans showed signs of increased human…

Jan 01 2018

fao.org

The State of the World Fisheries and Aquaculture

The State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture 2018 presents FAO’s official world fishery and aquaculture statistics. Global fish production* peaked at about 171 million tonnes in 2016, with aquaculture representing 47 percent of the total and 53 percent, if non-food uses (including reduction to fishmeal and fish oil) are excluded.

Oct 03 2013

State of the Planet

Sustainability Certification in Aquaculture: Put Your Money Where Your Mouth Is?

By Amy Mcdermott

Over the last century, habitat destruction and unchecked harvest have caused a precipitous decline in many wild fish populations. Popular choices like cod and tuna have been pushed to the brink of global collapse. With the growth of the human population, demand has increased while wild stocks have dwindled. In…

AMS 1/1/18

Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society

State of the Climate in 2018

01/01/18

An international, peer-reviewed publication released each summer, the State of the Climate is the authoritative annual summary of the global climate published as a supplement to the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society.

Aug 12 2019

CNN

Greenhouse gases reach record levels, report finds

By Brandon Miller and Wayne Drash

The dominant greenhouse gases released into the Earth's atmosphere reached record levels in 2018, and their global warming power is now 43% stronger than in 1990, according to a new report by the American Meteorological Society released Monday. The State of the Climate in 2018 study also reported other key…

FAO 1/1/13

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

Tackling Climate Change through Livestock

10/01/14

An important emitter of greenhouse gases (GHG), the livestock sector also has a large potential to reduce its emissions. This is the main conclusion drawn by the report “Tackling climate change through livestock”. This newly released report provides the most comprehensive global assessment made to-date of the livestock sector’s GHG…

Feb 25 2019

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

Key facts and findings

Greenhouse gas emissions by the livestock sector could be cut by as much as 30 percent through the wider use of existing best practices and technologies, according to a new study released today by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

Feb 25 2019

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

2018 REPORTS AND PAPERS

REPORTS AND PAPERS

2018 REPORTS & PAPERS