Climate change is heavily related to the increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. During photosynthesis, plants absorb some of the industrial CO2 emissions from the atmosphere, making them contribute significantly to climate protection. “The CO2 increase in the atmosphere is currently lower than to be expected from anthropogenic emissions,” says Professor Almut Arneth from the Institute of Meteorology and Climate Research – Atmospheric Environmental Research (IMK-IFU) at KIT Campus Alpin in Garmisch-Partenkirchen. 20 to 25 percent of the CO2 released by humans into the atmosphere is currently being absorbed by plants. “This effect curbs climate change; without it global warming would have progressed further by now,” the scientist says. “The question is whether it will stay this way in the next few decades.”

Data sent from penguins to space and back to UBC could help researchers determine why the species’ breeding population fluctuates so dramatically.

The hurricane record from the Atlantic Ocean shows phases of high and low activity that can last several decades at a time.

A team of international researchers has found a link between seasonal fluctuations in sea level to a long-time phenomenon — Rossby Waves. And this connection may lead to a new tool to help coastal communities, such as Miami, better anticipate and mitigate “nuisance flooding” impacts.

The Pacific island of Guam continued to experience the effects of Typhoon Maria on July 5 as NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite showed a large band of storms over the island.

Tropical Depression 10W strengthened since July 4 and by July 5 had attained typhoon strength. 

The remnants of Post-Tropical Cyclone Prapiroon were spotted by NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite as they were moving over Japan's Hokkiado Prefecture in northern Japan. 

New research suggests there’s a large untapped resource for many of the increasingly water-limited regions of the U.S. and around the world: brackish groundwater, which, in theory at least, would require much less energy to desalinate than seawater.

With current climate policies and efforts to increase clean power generation, the remaining use of fossil fuels in industry, transport and heating in buildings will cause enough CO2 emissions to push climate targets out of reach, according to a study co-authored and co-designed by the JRC.

The Baltic Sea is home to some of the world’s largest dead zones, areas of oxygen-starved waters where most marine animals can’t survive. But while parts of this sea have long suffered from low oxygen levels, a new study by a team in Finland and Germany shows that oxygen loss in coastal areas over the past century is unprecedented in the last 1500 years. The research is published today in the European Geosciences Union journal Biogeosciences.

Tropical forests are important to all of us on the planet. As well as being home for rare and fascinating biodiversity (like the lemurs of Madagascar), tropical forests lock up enormous amounts of carbon helping to stabilise our climate.  However tropical forests are also home to many hundreds of thousands of people whose lives can be affected by international conservation policies.