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EartherClimate ChangeEl Niño Is Causing a Worldwide Sugar Shortage
El Niño is almost over, but the wreckage of things it knocked over in its wake continues—and one of those things is your sugar supply. Eat your desserts while you still can, friends. The Independent got a look at a new report from analytics firm Green Pool warning that a sugar shortage is headed our … Continued
By Ria Misra -
EartherClimate Change
Prominent Climate Scientists Say Boulder-Hurling Megawaves Are Decades Away
Over the summer, pioneering climate scientist James Hansen and his colleagues penned an apocalyptic study predicting that the deadliest consequences of climate change will be felt within decades. That paper precipitated a raucous debate, but now, it’s been accepted for publication, heralding a sea shift in attitudes toward climate studies that make dire and outlandish … Continued
By Maddie Stone -
EartherClimate Change
Carbon Emissions Haven’t Been This High Since Dinosaurs Went Extinct
Carbon hasn’t entered our atmosphere this quickly in at least 66 million years—since an asteroid slammed into our planet and wiped out the dinosaurs, or perhaps even earlier. Our addiction to fossil fuels has pushed the planet into a “no-analog” state that’s “likely to result in widespread future extinctions,” an exceedingly humorless study published today … Continued
By Maddie Stone -
EartherClimate Change
Something Strange and Terrible Is Happening to France’s Wine Grapes
We’d suggest you sit down and pour yourself a drink before you hear this news—but, honestly, that would probably only make it worse. Harvest dates for wine around the world have been progressively shifting earlier and earlier, as the warming climate gives us warmer and warmer cold seasons. In a new paper out today in … Continued
By Ria Misra -
Tech News
El Niño Will Hit Us With a Weird Mix of Floods and Drought on Its Way Out
El Niño is almost ready to give way for the rise of its cold counterpart, La Niña. But before it goes, it has one more tough weather hit to throw at the US: a bizarre combination of flooding and an ever-intensifying drought. NOAA’s spring forecast was just released and, although El Niño will be wrapping … Continued
By Ria Misra -
EartherClimate Change
An Entire American Community Is Being Relocated Because of Sea Level Rise
Climate change is often seen as a problem for generations to come, but as our freakish winter weather has shown, we’re already living the future we created. Need more proof? An entire Native American community is now going to be resettled, before it gets swallowed by the rising seas. The Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw Indians have called the … Continued
By Maddie Stone -
EartherClimate Change
Obama Cracks Down on Offshore Oil Drilling
In a major victory for environmentalists, the Obama administration is expected to reveal a five year drilling plan that’ll significantly curb offshore oil and gas development in Atlantic coastal waters and the Arctic, The Guardian reports. Members of the Obama administration got ahead of the prez by making the announcement on Twitter this morning. The … Continued
By Maddie Stone -
EartherClimate Change
The Surprising Reason Our Planet Isn’t Heating Up Even Faster
In research that adds new truth to the phrase “every cloud has a silver lining,” scientists are reporting that sulfate aerosol emissions have offset roughly a third of global warming over the Earth’s land, by scattering sunlight back into space. What’s more, reductions in European air pollution may be contributing to the rapid Arctic warming … Continued
By Maddie Stone -
EartherClimate Change
Obama Enlists Canadian Prime Minister to Help Fight Climate Change
As tiny-handed man-children command the lion’s share of our nation’s attention, the still-acting leader of the United States—President Obama—is quietly doubling down on climate change. The latest part of Captain Planet’s scheme? Getting Canada on board. After years of taking a backseat on climate change, the US and Canada are trying to position themselves as … Continued
By Maddie Stone -
Tech News
How Cloud-Seeding Boosted California’s Latest El Niño Storms
Don’t be too quick to thank El Niño for the last wave of storms that blessed the West Coast with swamped reservoirs, replenished snowpack, and spectacular flaming palm trees. Turns out that El Niño had a little help—precipitation was increased by an estimated 15 percent thanks to cloud-seeding. According to the Los Angeles Times, LA’s … Continued
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EartherClimate Change
If You Don’t Think a One-Degree Temperature Rise Matters, Read This
It’s just one-degree, right? So, how big a difference can it really make? There’s a place in the world where we can already look at for an answer. A new study in Nature Climate Change looks at Brazil’s Mato Grosso state, a rising agricultural powerhouse in the country and in the world. (Ten percent of … Continued
By Ria Misra -
Tech News
El Niño Might Deliver After All Thanks to ‘Miracle March’ Storms
If there’s one thing we’ve come to expect from El Niño, it’s that we should expect pretty much anything. After a dry, hot February convinced everyone that El Niño had left the building—or ditched California completely—a new set of storms have provided a glimmer of great wet hope. This is coming soon to a West … Continued
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Tech News
The Bizarre Reason Greenland Is Getting Darker Each Year
Greenland is one of the brightest spots on planet Earth, but ominously enough, its gleaming surface darkens with each passing year, thanks to a strange series of physical processes, one of which cannot be seen with the naked eye. According to a fascinating new study led by Columbia’s Earth Institute and published today the journal … Continued
By Maddie Stone -
EartherClimate Change
Here Is What We’ll be Eating in 2050—and What We Won’t
The foods readily available 35 years from now won’t look like the foods available today. Some of what we’re used to eating will be in short supply—and that new diet could cause an extra 500,000 deaths a year. A new study out in the Lancet from Oxford University extrapolates climate and agricultural projections out until … Continued
By Ria Misra -
EartherClimate Change
Why Scientists Think the Planet Is Heating Up So Fast Right Now
Wasn’t it just yesterday that we learned January was the hottest month in recorded history? Not anymore. The official numbers aren’t in for February yet, but meteorologists are already calling it: Last month destroyed January’s global temperature record, adding another 0.2 to 0.3 degrees Celsius to the planetary thermostat. The reason, scientists say, has a … Continued
By Maddie Stone -
EartherClimate Change
Recent Drought in Eastern Mediterranean Was the Worst in 900 Years
A new NASA study found that a drought that ended in 2012 was the worst in nearly a millennium for a huge swath of the planet. That sobering stat comes from a new NASA study that was released yesterday, which focused on the eastern Mediterranean Levant region: Cyprus, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, Syria, and Turkey. … Continued
By Bryan Lufkin -
EartherClimate Change
China’s Wind and Solar Energy Capacity Is Soaring
Smog-filled days may be a part of life in Beijing for now, but China is cutting coal and growing its wind and solar energy capacity fast, according to figures released yesterday by the country’s National Bureau of Statistics. Solar power generation capacity was up 74 percent in China last year compared with 2014 levels, while … Continued
By Maddie Stone -
Tech News
LA’s Methane Gas Leak Was One of the Biggest Environmental Disasters in US History
A week after the ruptured natural gas well near Porter Ranch, California was officially sealed, we have the full damage report. And it reveals that this was easily one of the largest environmental disasters in US history. All told, the leak released 97,100 metric tons of heat-trapping methane over 112 days, equivalent to the annual … Continued
By Maddie Stone -
EartherClimate Change
El Niño Is Killing Earth’s Coral Reefs
As if our binge-drinking Godzilla El Niño hadn’t caused enough trouble, scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration say it’s exacerbating the longest coral bleaching event in history. It began in 2014 and might not end for two more years. Last fall, marine biologists reported that we’re currently in the midst of one of … Continued
By Maddie Stone -
EartherClimate Change
Without Humans, Global Sea Levels Could Actually Be Falling
In the absence of humans, global sea level might have dropped a smidge last century, according to a detailed analysis of our past and future climate published today in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Sciences. Instead, sea level rose about 5.5 inches—faster than it has in at least 27 centuries. “The 20th century … Continued
By Maddie Stone