Climate
Analysis of Greenland ice cores may provide glimpse into climate’s future
January 25, 2013 11:10 am | News | CommentsA new study that provides surprising details on changes in Earth's climate from more than 100,000 years ago indicates that the last interglacial—the period between "ice ages"—was warmer than previously thought and may be a good analog for future climate, as greenhouse gases increase in the atmosphere and global temperatures rise.
In perceiving climate change, feeling the heat counts
January 23, 2013 11:24 am | News | CommentsHuman beings around the world are observing and accurately detecting changes in their local climates, according to a new study led by Yale University researchers. The finding provides the first global evidence for the phenomenon and could have meaningful implications for attempts to combat climate change, they say.
Obama pledges to deal with climate change
January 21, 2013 2:53 pm | by MATTHEW DALY - Associated Press - Associated Press | News | CommentsEnvironmental groups hailed President Barack Obama's warning about climate change in his second inauguration speech, but said the president's words will soon be tested as he decides whether to approve the Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada. Obama pledged Monday to respond to what he called "the threat of climate change," saying the failure to do so would be a betrayal of the nation's children and future generations.
Study: Warmer soils release additional carbon dioxide into atmosphere
January 21, 2013 8:41 am | by Beth Potier, University of New Hampshire | News | CommentsWarmer temperatures due to climate change could cause soils to release additional carbon into the atmosphere, thereby enhancing climate change—but that effect diminishes over the long term. The new study sheds new light on how soil microorganisms respond to temperature and could improve predictions of how climate warming will affect the carbon dioxide flux from soils.
Study reveals gas that triggers ozone destruction
January 14, 2013 9:28 am | News | CommentsScientists at the Universities of York and Leeds have made a significant discovery about the cause of the destruction of ozone over oceans. They have established that the majority of ozone-depleting iodine oxide observed over the remote ocean comes from a previously unknown marine source.
Study: Major cuts to surging carbon dioxide emissions needed now
January 7, 2013 9:43 am | News | CommentsHalting climate change will require "a fundamental and disruptive overhaul of the global energy system" to eradicate harmful carbon dioxide emissions, not just stabilize them, according to new findings by University of California, Irvine (UC Irvine) and other scientists.
Fluctuating environment may have driven human evolution
January 2, 2013 8:05 am | News | CommentsA series of rapid environmental changes in East Africa roughly 2 million years ago may be responsible for driving human evolution, according to researchers at Penn State University and Rutgers University.
Climate poll: Science doubters say world is warming
December 16, 2012 11:28 pm | by Seth Borenstein, AP Science Writer | News | CommentsResults from a new Associated Press-GfK poll is showing that a growing majority of Americans think global warming is occurring. The poll found 4 out of every 5 Americans said climate change will be a serious problem for the United States if nothing is done about it. That's up from 73% when the same question was asked in 2009.
Top officials meet at ONR in response to Arctic changes
December 14, 2012 10:28 am | by David Smalley, Office of Naval Research | News | CommentsThe rapid retreat of sea ice in the Arctic has attracted the attention of top naval officials who have recently held an Arctic Summit at the Office of Naval Research to discuss their reponse to what will likely be a increased volume of human activity in the region. Although the meeting did not discuss policy, it did highlight the many potential areas of impact, from oil drilling to tourism.
Cloud forest trees drink water through their leaves
December 13, 2012 9:59 am | by Robert Sanders, UC Berkeley | News | CommentsUsing an electronic “leaf” that is able to detect when leaves receive moisture, a team of researchers working in Costa Rica’s cloud forests have discovered that tropical montane cloud forest can augment their water intake by drinking directly from the clouds. In dry but otherwise foggy areas, this ability to drink water through leaves is an essential survival strategy.
U.N. climate talks go into overtime in Qatar
December 7, 2012 11:18 am | by KARL RITTER - Associated Press - Associated Press | News | CommentsNearly 200 countries haggling over how to stop climate change—and how to pay for it—failed to reach a deal on schedule Friday, setting the stage for the wrangling to continue late into the night. The two-week U.N. conference in Doha was never meant to yield a global climate pact to curb emissions of greenhouse gases—that has been put off until 2015.
Ancient microbes survive beneath icy surface of Antarctic lake
December 3, 2012 10:48 am | News | CommentsResearchers funded by the National Science Foundation describe in a new publication a viable community of bacteria that ekes out a living in a dark, salty, and subfreezing environment beneath nearly 20 m of ice in one of Antarctica's most isolated lakes. The finding could have implications for the discovery of life in other extreme environments, including elsewhere in the solar system.
A human-caused climate change signal emerges from the noise
November 30, 2012 7:40 am | News | CommentsBy comparing simulations from 20 different computer models to satellite observations, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory climate scientists and colleagues from 16 other organizations have found that tropospheric and stratospheric temperature changes are clearly related to human activities.
Scientists develop new approach to support future climate projections
November 29, 2012 2:03 pm | News | CommentsScientists have developed a new approach for evaluating past climate sensitivity data to help improve comparison with estimates of long-term climate projections developed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The sensitivity of global temperature to changes in the Earth’s radiation balance (climate sensitivity) is a key factor for understanding past natural climate changes as well as potential future climate change.
After long-ago mass extinction, global warming hindered species' recovery
November 5, 2012 9:53 am | News | CommentsResearchers have discovered why plants and animals had a hard time recovering from the largest mass extinction in Earth’s history 250 million years ago. The reason: global warming. Because of environmental consequences of rising temperatures, those species that survived the extinction didn’t fully recover for 5 million years.
Scientists look at climate change, the superstorm
October 31, 2012 9:43 pm | by Seth Borenstein, AP Science Writer | News | CommentsFor more than a dozen years, climate scientists have been warning about the risk for big storms and serious flooding in New York. A 2000 federal report about global warming's effect on the United States warned specifically of that possibility. Still, they say it's unfair to blame climate change for Sandy and the destruction it left behind. We cannot yet conclusively link a single storm to global warming, and any connection is not as clear and simple as environmental activists might contend.
Small marine organisms' big changes could affect world climate
October 30, 2012 1:08 pm | News | CommentsIn the future, warmer waters could significantly change ocean distribution of populations of phytoplankton, tiny organisms that could have a major effect on climate change. Researchers have recently shown that by the end of the 21st century, warmer oceans will cause populations of these marine microorganisms to thrive near the poles and shrink in equatorial waters.
Opposite behaviors? Arctic sea ice shrinks while Antarctic ice grows
October 24, 2012 8:15 am | by Maria-José Viñas, NASA | News | CommentsA new NASA study shows that from 1978 to 2010 the total extent of sea ice surrounding Antarctica in the Southern Ocean grew by roughly 6,600 square miles every year, an area larger than the state of Connecticut. However, this growth rate is not nearly as large as the decrease in the Arctic, which has scientists questioning the reasons for the growth. Atmospheric circulation may be one cause.
Targeting solar geoengineering to minimize risk, inequality
October 22, 2012 9:30 am | News | CommentsBy tailoring geoengineering efforts by region and by need, a new model promises to maximize the effectiveness of solar radiation management while mitigating its potential side effects and risks. The study explores the feasibility of using solar geoengineering to counter the loss of Arctic sea ice.
Ice sheet retreat controlled by the landscape
October 17, 2012 12:56 pm | News | CommentsA U.K. research team has recently determined that the geometry of channels beneath the ice can be a strong control on ice behaviour, temporarily hiding the signals of retreat. The findings, which provide the first simulation of past ice-sheet retreat and collapse over a ten thousand year period in Antarctica, shed new light on what makes ice stable or unstable and will help refine predictions of future ice extent and global sea-level rise, the researchers say.
Earth’s brief polarity reversal linked to other extreme events
October 16, 2012 12:45 pm | News | CommentsFor the first time, three separately found extreme Earth events have been compared by researchers who now believe they may be linked. About 41,000 years ago, a complete and rapid reversal of the geomagnetic field occurred, lasting for just a few hundred years. Around the same time, a super volcano erupted and major climate changes occurred.
Experts: Global warming means more Antarctic ice
October 10, 2012 5:59 pm | by Seth Borenstein, AP Science Writer | News | CommentsWhile the North Pole has been losing sea ice over the years, the water nearest the South Pole has been gaining it. Antarctic sea ice hit a record 7.51 million square miles in September, just days after reports of the biggest loss of Arctic sea ice on record. Climate change skeptics have seized on this example, but scientists say the skeptics are misinterpreting what's happening and why.
Restricting nuclear power has little effect on the cost of climate policies
October 2, 2012 9:03 am | News | CommentsApplying a global energy-economy computer simulation that fully captures the competition between alternative power supply technologies, a team of scientists from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and the University of Dayton, Ohio, analyzed trade-offs between nuclear and climate policies. They found that incremental costs due to policy options restricting the use of nuclear power do not significantly increase the cost of even stringent greenhouse-gas emissions reductions.
Sea-level study shows signs of things to come
October 2, 2012 3:34 am | News | CommentsOur greenhouse gas emissions up to now have triggered an irreversible warming of the Earth that will cause sea levels to rise for thousands of years to come, new research has show. The results come from a study which sought to model sea-level changes over millennial timescales, taking into account all of the Earth's land ice and the warming of the oceans.
Yearlong climate study launches
October 1, 2012 9:50 am | News | CommentsA Horizon Lines container ship outfitted with meteorological and atmospheric instruments installed by scientists from Argonne National Laboratory and Brookhaven National Laboratory will begin taking data for a yearlong mission aimed at improving the representation of clouds in climate models.
