At the first flagship Emerging Leaders in Environmental and Energy Policy (ELEEP) Network conference, participants dug deep to identify key areas in energy and environment where transatlantic cooperation could be most effective. ELEEP member and former EGU Science Communication Fellow Edvard Glücksman reports back from Washington DC. Finding solutions through cooperation is not necessarily the …[Read More]
climate change
IPCC report ‘unprecedented changes’ in climate, urging policymakers to take action
“Human influence on the climate system is clear” was the key message from the report on the physical science of climate change from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). “We have come a long way since the first IPCC report was published in 1990,” a statement reiterated throughout the press conference for the release …[Read More]
Geosciences column: Playing back the Antarctic ice records
Satellites are keeping tabs on the state of Arctic and Antarctic sea ice, and have observed considerable declines in ice extent in many areas since records began, but what do we know of past sea ice extent? Ice cores keep an excellent record of climate change, but until recently, ice cores have not been used …[Read More]
Geosciences Column: How curbing HFC emissions could reduce warming
Carbon dioxide is without a doubt the most famous of warming culprits. But would reducing emissions of this greenhouse gas be enough to mitigate climate change within this century? A recent paper published in Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics focuses on a less known substance that, if phased out, could avoid as much as 0.5 °C …[Read More]
Geosciences Column: Rainfall and Climate – a Dynamic Problem
“Rain is grace; rain is the sky descending to the earth; without rain, there would be no life.” – John Updike Rain quenches the thirst of soils and vegetation, fuelling ecosystems and much of the world’s agriculture. Whether it ruins a day on the beach or destroys a season’s harvest, it makes humans deeply aware of …[Read More]
Sussing out sea level rise
Ocean thermal expansion, that is, the increase in water volume due to temperature alone, is relatively well understood – as is the retreat of both mountain glaciers and ice caps. While most models simulate these effectively, there is little understanding of how both the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets will respond to climate change. This …[Read More]