Climate change

They call it “The Blob.” A vast expanse of ocean stretching from Alaska to California periodically warms by up to 4 degrees Celsius (7 degrees F), decimating fish stocks, starving seabirds, creating blooms of toxic algae, preventing salmon returns to rivers, displacing sea lions, and forcing whales into shipping lanes to find food. The Blob first formed in 2013 and spread across an area of the northeast Pacific the size of Canada. It lasted for three years and keeps coming back — most recently last summer. Until now, scientists have been unable to explain this abrupt ocean heating. Climate change, even combined with natural cycles such as El Niño, is not enough. But new analysis suggests an unexpected cause. Xiaotong Zheng, a meteorologist at the Ocean University of China, and international colleagues argue that this extraordinary heating is the result of a dramatic cleanup of Chinese air pollution. The decline in s...

They are supposed to be the climate-savers’ gold standard — the key data on which the world relies in its efforts to lower greenhouse gas emissions and hold global warming in check. But the national inventories of emissions supplied to the United Nations climate convention (UNFCCC) by most countries are anything but reliable, according to a growing body of research. The data supplied to the UNFCCC, and published on its website, are typically out of date, inconsistent, and incomplete. For most countries, “I would not put much value, if any, on the submissions,” says Glen Peters of the Centre for International Climate Research in Norway, a longtime analyst of emissions trends. The data from large emitters is as much open to questions as that from smaller and less industrialised nations. In China, the uncertainties around its carbon dioxide emissions from burning coal are larger than the total emissions of many major industrial coun...

The world experienced an average of 26 more days of extreme heat over the last 12 months that would probably not have occurred without climate change, a report said on Tuesday. Heat is the leading cause of climate-related death and the report further points to the role of global warming in increasing the frequency and intensity of extreme weather around the world. For this study, scientists used the years 1991 to 2020 to determine what temperatures counted as within the top 10 percent for each country over that period. Next, they looked at the 12 months to May 15, 2024, to establish how many days over that period experienced temperatures within — or beyond — the previous range. Then, using peer-reviewed methods, they examined the influence of climate change on each of these excessively hot days. They concluded that “human-caused climate change added — on average, across all places in the world — 26 more days of extreme heat...

Perched on sea-ice off Canada’s northern coast, parka-clad scientists watch saltwater pump out over the frozen ocean. Their goal? To slow global warming. As sea-ice vanishes, the dark ocean surface can absorb more of the Sun’s energy, which accelerates warming. So the researchers want to thicken it to stop it melting away. Welcome to the wackier side of geoengineering – deliberately intervening in the Earth’s climate system to try to counteract the damage we have done to it. Geoengineering includes more established efforts to lock up planet-warming gases, such as planting more trees and burying carbon underground. But more experimental measures aim to go a step further, seeking to reduce the energy absorbed by the Earth. Many scientists are strongly opposed, warning that such attempts distract from the critical step of cutting carbon emissions and risk doing more harm than good. But a small number of advocates claim the...

The UN weather agency is sounding a “red alert” about global warming, citing record-smashing increases last year in greenhouse gases, land and water temperatures and melting of glaciers and sea ice, and is warning that the world’s efforts to reverse the trend have been inadequate. The World Meteorological Organisation said there is a “high probability” that 2024 will be another record-hot year. The Geneva-based agency, in a “State of the Global Climate” report released Tuesday (Wednesday AEDT), ratcheted up concerns that a much-vaunted climate goal is increasingly in jeopardy: that the world can unite to limit planetary warming to no more than 1.5 degrees from pre-industrial levels. “Never have we been so close – albeit on a temporary basis at the moment – to the 1.5 degrees lower limit of the Paris agreement on climate change,” said Celeste Saulo, the agency’s secretary...