Once a year, over the icy desolation of the Antarctic, an ominous hole forms in the ozone layer. However, the 2024 story has taken a rather hopeful turn as the annual ozone hole was smaller compared to previous years.



Scientists at NOAA and NASA project that, if we keep up the momentum, we could see a full recovery of the ozone layer by 2066.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-seventh-smallest-ozone-hole">Seventh-smallest ozone hole</h2>



The 2024 ozone hole, as observed during the peak of the depletion season from September 7 to October 13, held the historic rank of the seventh-smallest. 



The Montreal Protocol, an environmental treaty that phased out <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/decline-in-ozone-depleting-chemicals-is-an-encouraging-trend/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">ozone-destroying chemicals</a>, was ratified in 1992 and has proven to be a significant achievement.



Over the years, the ozone-depleted region has been alarmingly large, with 2024's size averaging nearly three times the size of continental United States.



The worst of the ozone hole was seen on September 28, when it swelled to 8.5 million square miles - only to later shrink.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-recovery-of-the-ozone-hole">Recovery of the ozone hole</h2>



The experts attribute this year's improvement to two key drivers - the continued decline of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) after the Montreal Protocol and a serendipitous surge of ozone carried by air currents from north of the Antarctic.



Paul Newman, leader of NASA's ozone research team and a chief scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, elaborated on the state of the ozone hole. 



"The 2024 <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/antarctic-ozone-hole-exposes-wildlife-to-harmful-uv-radiation/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Antarctic hole</a> is smaller than ozone holes seen in the early 2000s. The gradual improvement we've seen in the past two decades shows that international efforts that curbed ozone-destroying chemicals are working," said Newman.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-our-shield-against-solar-rays">Our shield against solar rays</h2>



Existing way up in Earth's atmosphere, an ozone-rich layer serves as a planetary parasol, safeguarding us from the sun's harmful <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/uv-radiation-played-a-role-in-earths-largest-mass-extinction/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">ultraviolet</a> (UV) rays. 



When the ozone layer thins out, more UV radiation seeps through, leading to an increased risk of skin cancer, cataracts, and damage to aquatic ecosystems, as well as a reduction in agricultural yields.



Back in the 1970s, the scientific community was deeply concerned about CFCs - chemicals that were widely used in refrigerants, aerosols, insulating foams and even in some fire suppression systems. 



These chemicals were gnawing away at the ozone layer. By the mid 1980s, the ozone layer over the Antarctic was drastically depleted. 



It was then that the world came together to sign the <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/1987-ozone-treaty-had-an-unexpected-benefit-for-the-environment/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Montreal Protocol in 1987</a>, pledging to phase out CFCs and replace them with eco-friendly alternatives by 2010. Today, we are witnessing the success of this global commitment.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-the-road-to-ozone-recovery">The road to ozone recovery</h2>



Stephen Montzka, a senior scientist with NOAA's Global Monitoring Laboratory, urges caution.



"For 2024, we can see that the ozone hole's severity is below average compared to other years in the past three decades, but the ozone layer is still far from being fully healed," said Montzka.



<a href="https://www.earth.com/news/cfcs-are-not-the-only-culprit-bushfire-smoke-may-also-destroy-ozone/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">CFCs</a> that are already in our atmosphere will take several decades to disintegrate. As their levels gradually drop, we can expect the ozone layer to bounce back, leading to the slow but certain reduction of ozone holes.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-monitoring-our-progress">Monitoring our progress</h2>



NASA and NOAA scientists monitor the ozone hole yearly, noting that variations in atmospheric conditions, including transport of ozone-rich air from other regions, can influence its size and depth each year.



The scientists rely on a suite of systems to keep a close eye on the ozone layer. These include instruments on NASA's Aura satellite and NOAA's polar orbiting satellites.



<a href="https://www.noaa.gov/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">NOAA</a> also uses weather balloons, released from the South Pole Baseline Atmospheric Observatory, to measure ozone concentrations in Dobson units.



The 2024 concentration hit its lowest measurement at 109 Dobson units on October 5th.



"This is well below the 225 Dobson units that was typical of the ozone cover above the Antarctic in 1979,” said NOAA research chemist Bryan Johnson. "So, there’s still a long way to go before atmospheric ozone is back to the levels before the advent of widespread CFC pollution.”



Nonetheless, it's crucial to remember that every small step toward recovery brings us closer to a healthier planet.



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Antarctic ozone hole may fully recover by 2066

Once a year, over the icy desolation of the Antarctic, an ominous hole forms in the ozone layer. However, the 2024 story has taken a rather hopeful turn as the annual ozone hole was smaller compared to previous years. Scientists at NOAA and NASA project that, if we keep up the momentum, we could see a full recovery of the ozone layer by 2066. Seventh-smallest ozone hole The 2024 ozone hole, as observed during the peak of the depletion season from September 7 to October 13, held...

UN: Saving the environment may require people to work less. Saving the environment may require people to work shorter hours in the future, according to a United Nations report released Wednesday.
The report by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA">U.N.'s</a> International Resource Panel found the amount of raw materials extracted from the Earth has tripled over the last 40 years, fueled by a growing global middle class, and that will require a more efficient use of resources in order to avoid serious environmental consequences.
That increased efficiency will in turn lead to lower costs and higher economic growth which could hamper efforts to reduce overall demand, the report said.
In order to compensate for these gains in efficiency, the report recommends a combination of policy initiatives including shorter working hours and pricing raw materials in way that reflects the social and economic costs of their extraction.
"Rethinking the way we use materials is essential if we are to safeguard humanity's future," the panel's co-chair Alicia Barcena Ibarra said in a statement. "A prosperous and equitable world that overcomes these problems will require transformative changes in how we live our lives and how we consume materials."
According to the report, the amount of raw materials extracted from <a href="http://www.earth.com/news/warming-temperatures-soil-expelling-co2/">Earth</a> rose to 70 billion tons in 2010 up from 22 billion tons in 1970.
Meanwhile, the efficiency of raw material use has been declining since 2000, just as their global use has rapidly accelerated as emerging economies like China embarked on ambitious industrial and urban transformations.
The report found that the world's richest countries consume on average 10 times as much raw materials the poorest nations and about twice the world average.
If the world continues on its current trajectory, by 2050 the planet will need three times more raw materials than are consumed today, intensifying climate change and pollution as well as ultimately leading to the depletion of the Earth's natural resources, the report said.
© 2016 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Learn more about our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.

UN: Saving the environment may require people to work less

UN: Saving the environment may require people to work less....

Grand Canyon National Park hires first female superintendent. Grand Canyon National Park's first female superintendent says she will work with the staff to forge ahead after a sexual harassment scandal that led to the retirement of the park's former chief.
Christine Lehnertz will start her new post next month to oversee the park that draws more than 5 million visitors each year, replacing Dave Uberuaga, who retired earlier this year. The National Park Service announced her assignment on Tuesday.Grand Canyon National Park hires first female superintendent
Lehnertz said she has already been learning about the issues the park faces and plans to continue efforts in place that deal with the claims that some male employees harassed female colleagues during trips the agency led on the<a href="https://www.bing.com/search?q=colorado+river&amp;form=EDGEAR&amp;qs=PF&amp;cvid=5007d08307ce4218bd145cd3544e0dbb&amp;cc=US&amp;setlang=en-US&amp;elv=AY3%21uAY7tbNNZGZ2yiGNjfMa*3koim6WmYuhKqzXqmtQR6rB8NUPst%21pYSs03V9YcG0egPqXUqegWVSjxgCCHmf%21F5VIKYTLhUzAky2EBVtu&amp;plvar=0&amp;PC=HCTS"> Colorado River</a>.
A report by the Interior Department's Office of Inspector General in January found that some male employees who worked in the river district preyed on female colleagues, demanded sex and retaliated against women who refused.
The river district provided limited guided tours and emergency and medical services along the Colorado River and was disbanded as a result of the report. Uberuaga and his deputy, Diane Chalfant, were disciplined, although the actions were not made public. Uberuaga announced he was retiring instead of accepting a transfer. Chalfant remains a deputy superintendent.
Lehnertz said she has been in contact with the staff about other reforms. But she wouldn't elaborate on specifics, citing privacy issues and the fact that she's not in a leadership position at the park yet.
The park has developed a plan for supervisory and employee training on sexual harassment, hostile work environment and culture change, according to a summary of actions provided to The Associated Press.
"There's a lot that's being done in terms of trying to break these pieces down and try to understand them," Lehnertz said. "It's not as easy as just going in and saying we're going to change the culture."
Lehnertz is a trained environmental biologist who has been with the National Park Service for nine years. She has been the first woman to hold each of the four leadership positions she's been in, including her current job as the superintendent of the overseeing Golden Gate National Recreation Area in <a href="http://www.earth.com/image/shasta-lake-northern-california/">California</a>, Lehnertz said.
Her top priorities are employee safety as well as creating an inclusive work environment, Lehnertz said.
"Whether it's sexism or sexual harassment or sexual assault, any of those are clearly behaviors that just can't be a part of an organization that is inclusive and is respectful and is part of a larger community," she said.
She'll also face the issue of an aging water pipeline that breaks several times a year and needs replacement. The Trans-Canyon Pipeline was completed in 1970 and runs 15 miles long.
She's ready for the challenges, Lehnertz said.
"It's an amazing place where we're gonna have to do things like healing and rebuilding while continuing to provide really good resources to the visitors and continuing to protect the resources there that are so special," she said.
© 2016 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Learn more about our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.

Grand Canyon National Park hires first female superintendent

Grand Canyon National Park hires first female superintendent. Grand Canyon...

A new study shows to where and to what extent palm oil plantations could be expanded, while avoiding further deforestation in pristine and carbon-rich tropical forests

Land used for palm oil production could be nearly doubled without expanding into protected or high-biodiversity forests, according to a new study published in the journal Global Environmental Change. The study is the first to map land suitable for palm oil production on a global scale, while taking into account environmental and climate considerations.

"There is room to expand palm oil production and to do it in a sustainable way," says IIASA researcher Johannes Pirker, who led the study.

Palm oil production has expanded massively, from 6 million hectares in 1990 to 16 million in 2010, an area about the size of Uruguay. The oil, which is used for cooking and as a food additive, now accounts for about 30% of all vegetable oil used worldwide. Palm oil is controversial, in particular because much of this expansion came at the expense of biodiversity-rich tropical forests, which were cut to make room for new plantations. But oil palm farming has also contributed to lifting millions of people out of poverty in Indonesia and Malaysia, the top palm oil producing countries. And an important share of palm oil producers are small-holder farmers who rely on the commodity as their primary income.

With palm oil as the number one cooking oil in Asia, where populations are rising, demand for the oil is expected to continue growing, and many developing countries are looking to expand their production. Yet it was not clear how much land is available for expansion. In the new study, researchers started by creating a global map of where the conditions are right for producing palm oil, based on temperature, rainfall, slope, and soil type.

From a purely biophysical perspective, they found that nearly 1.37 billion hectares of land globally are suitable for oil palm cultivation, in Africa, Central and South America, and Asia. From this they then removed any land which is already being used for other purposes, such as farming, residences, or cities. For this, the researchers relied on the hybrid land cover maps developed at IIASA using crowdsourced data.

Finally, the researchers ruled out areas that are protected by law, as well as forests that are particularly valuable from a biodiversity or carbon storage perspective. With all of these areas removed, the resulting map includes an area of 19.3 million hectares of very suitable land which could potentially be available for future production. This is slightly more than the current extent of palm oil production, 18.1 million hectares. However, among this area, about half is more than ten hours drive to the closest city which might not allow for economically profitable oil production. The map, published online, is also available for download.

"This analysis will be a useful tool to identify area for future oil palm investments that meets some basic environmental standards. The maps are available to stakeholders who can combine them with local information to address other dimensions of sustainable development," says IIASA researcher Aline Mosnier, who also worked on the study.

Growing attention to the deforestation caused by palm oil has led many companies to begin aiming for sustainability certification in their sourcing. However, the researchers argue that consumers and companies need to go a step beyond that. Pirker says, "Moves to ban palm oil are misguided. What we need to do instead is look at the origin of the oil, who is growing it how and where. Certification is a first step in the right direction but companies committed to sustainability should look in more detail at their supply chains, and consumers can demand this of them."
###
Reference

Pirker, J., Mosnier, A., Kraxner, F., Havlik, P. and Obersteiner, M. (2016) What are the limits to oil palm expansion? Global Environmental Change, 40, 73-81 doi:10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2016.06.007

Scientists are working to make palm oil sustainable

A new study shows to where and to what extent...

Rocks formed beneath the ocean floor by fast-spreading tectonic plates may be a large and previously overlooked source of free hydrogen gas (H2), a new Duke University study suggests.

The finding could have far-ranging implications since scientists believe H2 might be the fuel source responsible for triggering life on Earth. And, if it were found in large enough quantities, some experts speculate that it could be used as a clean-burning substitute for fossil fuels today because it gives off high amounts of energy when burned but emits only water, not carbon.

Recent discoveries of free hydrogen gas, which was once thought to be very rare, have been made near slow-spreading tectonic plates deep beneath Earth's continents and under the sea.

"Our model, however, predicts that large quantities of H2 may also be forming within faster-spreading tectonic plates -- regions that collectively underlie roughly half of the Mid-Ocean Ridge," said Stacey L. Worman, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Texas at Austin, who led the study while she was a doctoral student at Duke's Nicholas School of the Environment.

Total H2 production occurring beneath the oceans is at least an order of magnitude larger than production occurring under continents, the model suggests.

"A major benefit of this work is that it provides a testable, tectonic-based model for not only identifying where free hydrogen gas may be forming beneath the seafloor, but also at what rate, and what the total scale of this formation may be, which on a global basis is massive," said Lincoln F. Pratson, professor of earth and ocean sciences at Duke, who co-authored the study.

The scientists published their peer-reviewed study in the July 14 online edition of the journalGeophysical Research Letters.

The new model calculates the amount of free hydrogen gas produced and stored beneath the seafloor based on a range of parameters -- including the ratio of a site's tectonic spreading rate to the thickness of serpentinized rocks that might be found there.

Serpentinized rocks -- so called because they often have a scaly, greenish-brown-patterned surface that resembles snakeskin -- are rocks that have been chemically altered by water as they are lifted up by the spreading tectonic plates in Earth's crust.

Molecules of free hydrogen gas are produced as a by-product of the serpentinization process.

"Most scientists previously thought all hydrogen production occurs only at slow-spreading lithosphere, because this is where most serpentinized rocks are found. Although faster-spreading lithosphere contains smaller quantities of this rock, our analysis suggests the amount of H2 produced there might still be large," Worman said.

"Right now, the only way to get H2 -- to use in fuel cells, for example -- is through secondary processes," Worman explained. "You start with water, add energy to split the <a href="http://www.earth.com/news/earth-oxygen-boring-billion/">oxygen</a> and hydrogen molecules apart, and get H2. You can then burn the H2, but you had to use energy to get energy, so it's not very efficient."

Mining free hydrogen gas as a primary fuel source could change that, but first scientists need to understand where the gas goes after it's produced. "Maybe microbes are eating it, or maybe it's accumulating in reservoirs under the seafloor. We still don't know," Worman said. "Of course, such accumulations would have to be quite significant to make hydrogen gas produced by serpentinization a viable fuel source."

If further research confirms the model's accuracy, it could also open new avenues for exploring the origin of life on Earth, and for understanding the role hydrogen gas might play in supporting life in a wide range of extreme environments, from the sunless deep-sea floor to distant planets.
###
Worman and Pratson conducted the study with Jeffrey Karson, professor of earth sciences at Syracuse University, and Emily Klein, professor of earth sciences at Duke.

Worman received her Ph.D. in earth and ocean sciences from Duke in 2015.

CITATION: "Global Rate and Distribution of H2 Gas Produced by Serpentinization within Oceanic Lithosphere," Stacey L. Worman, Lincoln F. Pratson, Jeffrey Karson, Emily Klein.Geophysical Research Letters, July 14, 2016. DOI: 10.1002/2016GL069066

Oceans may be a large source of free hydrogen gas

Rocks formed beneath the ocean floor by fast-spreading tectonic plates...

Lizard genome gives insight into climate change. Using genomic data from three lizard species, City College of New York-led researchers gleaned insights not available before on the impact of climate change on the distribution of animal populations in South American forests. The findings improve ways of modeling the distribution of biodiversity in the past and future.

"We saw that as the forest has changed, lizard populations have also changed. Yet, different lizards species showed either expansions or contractions, suggesting that responses to climate change are not the same for every organism," said Ivan Prates, a PhD student in the Carnaval Lab in City College's Division of Science and the Graduate Center, CUNY. He is the first author of the study.

Lizard genome gives insight into climate change. The team studied the genomes of species widespread in the Amazon and <a href="http://www.earth.com/image/atlantic-coastline-southern-brazil/">Atlantic</a> forests, asking if and how populations expanded or contracted in response to changes in precipitation over the last 200,000 years. It then inferred how widely these lizards have been able to disperse over time.

"By studying genomes, which guard signatures of how population sizes changed over time, we inferred how abundant and widespread these organisms were in the past. This allowed us, for the first time, to outline plausible scenarios of the distribution of genomic diversity for the future," said Prates.
###
The study, "Inferring responses to climate dynamics from historical demography in Neotropical forest lizards," is a collaboration between the Carnaval and Hickerson laboratories in CCNY's Department of Biology. Other co-authors include CCNY's Alexander T. Xue, Ana C. Carnaval and Michael J. Hickerson. It appears in the latest PNAS and was jointly funded by NSF, the Brazilian science agency FAPESP and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA">NASA.</a>

About The City College of New York

Since 1847, The City College of New York has provided low-cost, high-quality education for New Yorkers in a wide variety of disciplines. More than 15,000 students pursue undergraduate and graduate degrees in the College of Liberal Arts and Science; Bernard and Anne Spitzer School of Architecture; School of Education; Grove School of Engineering; Sophie Davis Biomedical Education/CUNY School of Medicine; and the Colin Powell School for Civic and Global Leadership. U.S. News, Princeton Review and Forbes all rank City College among the best colleges and universities in the United States.

Lizard genome gives insight into climate change

Lizard genome gives insight into climate change. Using genomic data...

First study to show that deciduous tree water uptake of snowmelt water represents a large but overlooked aspect of the water cycle in boreal watersheds

Trees play a surprising role in the water cycle. Approximately 25 to 50 percent of a living tree is made up of water, depending on the species and time of year. The water stored in trees has previously been considered just a minor part of the water cycle, but a new study by University of <a href="https://www.bing.com/search?q=alaska+airlines&amp;form=EDGEAR&amp;qs=LS&amp;cvid=b01cd5804ef94428899d1a42beca17e1&amp;cc=US&amp;setlang=en-US&amp;elv=AY3%21uAY7tbNNZGZ2yiGNjfMa*3koim6WmYuhKqzXqmtQJDg%21TXLJQdKc8qulnPuP2HsXJk9wtd%21dGVLdCAsEDkO1klF6fuy1sFFvpS9JSyPj&amp;plvar=0&amp;PC=HCTS">Alaska</a> Fairbanks scientists shows otherwise.

Research published this week in Nature Scientific Reports is the first to show that the uptake of snowmelt water by deciduous trees represents a large and previously overlooked aspect of the water balance in boreal watersheds. The study was led by Jessica Young-Robertson, who worked with other scientists from the National Weather Service and UAF's International <a href="http://www.earth.com/news/antarctic-ice-loss-sea-level/">Arctic</a> Research Center and Geophysical Institute.Trees play a surprising role in the water cycle

The results are critical for understanding boreal forest hydrology and ecology, including soil moisture, the availability of freshwater, tree health and the ways trees influence regional weather, particularly thunderstorms. All of these factors are important for understanding the frequency and severity of wildland fires.

Like a straw, trees draw water up from the soil and eventually release it into the atmosphere through leaves or needles. The scientists measured the water content in both deciduous and evergreen trees in several locations at different times of the year.

They found that deciduous trees took up a surprisingly large amount of water in the period between snowmelt and leaf-out. These trees absorbed 21 to 25 percent of the available snowmelt water -- to the point of being completely saturated. For the boreal forest of Alaska and Western Canada, this equates to about 17-20 billion cubic meters of water per year. That is roughly equivalent to 8 million Olympic-sized swimming pools or 8-10 percent of the Yukon River's annual discharge.

The study also quantified transpiration -- the water that trees release to the atmosphere. The researchers found that deciduous trees transpired 2 to 12 percent of the absorbed snowmelt water immediately after leaf-out. This concentrated period of transpiration has the potential to create more favorable conditions for atmospheric convection and thunderstorms, which start many of the wildfires in the sparsely populated boreal forest region.

Calculating the amount of water stored by deciduous trees is important. The area occupied by deciduous trees in the boreal forest is expected to increase 1 to 15 percent by the end of this century, and the absorption of snowmelt could also then increase.

This is the first study to show that deciduous tree water uptake of snowmelt water represents a large but overlooked aspect of the water balance in boreal watersheds. Tree water dynamics impact many processes. Quantifying tree water storage is important for understanding hydrology, tree response to drought and the related factors of tree water use, soil moisture and climate.
###
The full study, "Deciduous trees are a large and overlooked sink for snowmelt water in the boreal forest," by authors Young-Robertson, W. Robert Bolton, Uma S. Bhatt, Jordi Cristóbal and Richard Thoman is available online at: <a href="http://www.nature.com/articles/srep29504" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">http://www.nature.com/articles/srep29504</a>.

ADDITIONAL CONTACTS: Jessica Young-Robertson at <a href="mailto:jmrobertson3@alaska.edu">jmrobertson3@alaska.edu</a> or 907-474-1553

Young-Roberston was supported by United States Geological Survey Changing Arctic Ecosystem Initiative, Wildlife Program of the USGS Ecosystem Mission Area, National Science Foundation Hydrology grant #1114457, U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Advanced Scientific Computing Research, Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing (SciDAC) program grant #DE-SC0006913. W.R. Bolton and U. Bhatt received financial support from the Alaska Climate Science Center, funded by Cooperative Agreement G10AC00588 from the United States Geological Survey.

Trees play a surprising role in the water cycle

First study to show that deciduous tree water uptake of...

Garden grass may soon be a source of clean energy. Researchers develop novel way of deriving hydrogen from grass using just sunlight and a cheap catalyst

Garden grass could become a source of cheap and clean renewable energy, scientists have claimed.

A team of UK researchers, including experts from Cardiff University's Cardiff Catalysis Institute, have shown that significant amounts of hydrogen can be unlocked from fescue grass with the help of sunlight and a cheap catalyst.

It is the first time that this method has been demonstrated and could potentially lead to a sustainable way of producing hydrogen, which has enormous potential in the renewable energy industry due to its high energy content and the fact that it does not release toxic or greenhouse gases when it is burnt.

Co-author of the study Professor Michael Bowker, from the Cardiff Catalysis Institute, said: "This really is a green source of energy.

"Hydrogen is seen as an important future energy carrier as the world moves from fossil fuels to renewable feedstocks, and our research has shown that even garden grass could be a good way of getting hold of it."

The team, which also includes researchers from Queen's University Belfast, have published their findings in the Royal Society journal Proceedings A.

<a href="http://www.earth.com/video/concentrating-sunlight-to-produce-clean-hydrogen/">Hydrogen</a> is contained in enormous quantities all over in the world in water, hydrocarbons and other organic matter.

Up until now, the challenge for researchers has been devising ways of unlocking hydrogen from these sources in a cheap, efficient and sustainable way.

A promising source of hydrogen is the organic compound cellulose, which is a key component of plants and the most abundant biopolymer on Earth.

In their study, the team investigated the possibility of converting cellulose into hydrogen using sunlight and a simple catalyst -- a substance which speeds up a chemical reaction without getting used up.

This process is called photoreforming or photocatalysis and involves the sunlight activating the catalyst which then gets to work on converting cellulose and water into hydrogen. The researchers studied the effectiveness of three metal-based catalysts -- Palladium, Gold and Nickel.

Nickel was of particular interest to the researchers, from a practical point of view, as it is a much more earth-abundant metal than the precious metals, and is more economical.

In the first round of experiments, the researchers combined the three catalysts with cellulose in a round bottom flask and subjected the mixture to light from a desk lamp. At 30 minutes intervals the researchers collected gas samples from the mixture and analysed it to see how much hydrogen was being produced.

To test the practical applications of this reaction, the researchers repeated the experiment with fescue grass, which was obtained from a domestic garden.

Professor Michael Bowker continued: "Up until recently, the production of hydrogen from cellulose by means of photocatalysis has not been extensively studied.

"Our results show that significant amounts of hydrogen can be produced using this method with the help of a bit of sunlight and a cheap catalyst.

"Furthermore, we've demonstrated the effectiveness of the process using real grass taken from a garden. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time that this kind of raw biomass has been used to produce hydrogen in this way. This is significant as it avoids the need to separate and purify cellulose from a sample, which can be both arduous and costly."
###
1. For further information contact:

Michael Bishop
Communications &amp; Marketing
Cardiff University
Tel: 02920-874499 / 07713-325300
Email: <a href="mailto:BishopM1@cardiff.ac.uk">BishopM1@cardiff.ac.uk</a>

2. Cardiff University is recognised in independent government assessments as one of Britain's leading teaching and research universities and is a member of the Russell Group of the UK's most research intensive universities. The 2014 Research Excellence Framework ranked the University 5th in the UK for research excellence. Among its academic staff are two Nobel Laureates, including the winner of the 2007 Nobel Prize for Medicine, University Chancellor Professor Sir Martin Evans. Founded by Royal Charter in 1883, today the University combines impressive modern facilities and a dynamic approach to teaching and research. The University's breadth of expertise encompasses: the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences; the College of Biomedical and Life Sciences; and the College of Physical Sciences and Engineering, along with a longstanding commitment to lifelong learning. Cardiff's flagship Research Institutes are offering radical new approaches to pressing global problems.<a href="http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">http://www.cardiff.ac.uk</a>

Garden grass may soon be a source of clean energy

Garden grass may soon be a source of clean energy....

Scientists: Humanity is lucky climate change didn't start sooner. There is some consolation in how the fossil fuel-induced climatic changes we increasingly experience through droughts and storm surges are playing out. It could have happened sooner, and therefore already have been much worse.

Luckily, the natural atmosphere already contained carbon dioxide, enough that the human-induced changes were relatively small, for a long time. Had these concentrations been even slightly lower, the effects of the emission of harmful greenhouse gases would have been felt much earlier, at a time when mankind was not yet ready or knowledgeable enough to face up to mitigation efforts. This silver lining approach is taken by David Archer of the University of<a href="http://www.earth.com/news/chicago-named-wild-onion/"> Chicago</a> in the US, in a scenario exercise in Springer's journal Climatic Change.

The concentration of carbon dioxide molecules in the atmosphere is measured as parts per million of dry air, or ppm. In the climatic past and earlier glacial periods, this level fluctuated between 180 ppm and 260 ppm. Measurements taken of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antarctica">Antarctic</a> sheet ice show that the concentration of naturally occurring carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was already 278 ppm in the 1750s before industrialization started in earnest.

"If the initial atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration were half its actual value, we would currently be experiencing the climate expected for the year 2050," says Archer, setting out one possible scenario. "If there were only one-tenth as much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere initially, the climate forcing we are experiencing today would have already happened, in the year 1900."

Archer therefore describes the climatic changes currently being experienced on Earth as "moderate," thanks to the blanketing effect that naturally occurring carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has had. This has given scientists the time to piece together an understanding of Earth's climate system and the effects of fossil fuel emissions.

The first ideas about radiative balance and the greenhouse effect date back to 1827, while predictions about climatic sensitivity due to carbon dioxide were made by 1896. It was, however, only after the advent of the computer that a modern understanding emerged of how fossil fuel use would impact the climate. This understanding was able to mature to the extent of public warnings about it by the 1970s.

"If the natural concentration had been a factor of two or more lower, the climate impacts of fossil fuel carbon dioxide release would have occurred about 50 or more years sooner, making it much more challenging for the developing human society to scientifically understand the phenomenon of manmade climate change in time to prevent it," he says. "To the extent that a thorough scientific understanding is also a requisite for making a decision to abandon fossil fuels, the outlook for humanity would have been considerably darker in this altered world than it has turned out in actuality."
###
Reference: Archer, D. (2016). Near Miss: The importance of the natural atmospheric CO2 concentration to human historical evolution, Climatic Change. DOI 10.1007/s10584-016-1725-y

Scientists: Humanity is lucky climate change didn't start sooner

Scientists: Humanity is lucky climate change didn't start sooner. There...

NASA: Historical records not an accurate prediction of climate change. A new <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA">NASA</a>-led study finds that almost one-fifth of the global warming that has occurred in the past 150 years has been missed by historical records due to quirks in how global temperatures were recorded. The study explains why projections of future climate based solely on historical records estimate lower rates of warming than predictions from climate models.

The study applied the quirks in the historical records to climate model output and then performed the same calculations on both the models and the observations to make the first true apples-to-apples comparison of warming rates. With this modification, the models and observations largely agree on expected near-term global warming. The results were published in the journal Nature Climate Change. Mark Richardson of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, <a href="http://www.earth.com/image/shasta-lake-northern-california/">California,</a> is the lead author.

The Arctic is warming faster than the rest of Earth, but there are fewer historic temperature readings from there than from lower latitudes because it is so inaccessible. A data set with fewer Arctic temperature measurements naturally shows less warming than a climate model that fully represents the Arctic.NASA: Historical records not an accurate prediction of climate change

Because it isn't possible to add more measurements from the past, the researchers instead set up the climate models to mimic the limited coverage in the historical records.

The new study also accounted for two other issues. First, the historical data mix air and water temperatures, whereas model results refer to air temperatures only. This quirk also skews the historical record toward the cool side, because water warms less than air. The final issue is that there was considerably more Arctic sea ice when temperature records began in the 1860s, and early observers recorded air temperatures over nearby land areas for the sea-ice-covered regions. As the ice melted, later observers switched to water temperatures instead. That also pushed down the reported temperature change.

Scientists have known about these quirks for some time, but this is the first study to calculate their impact. "They're quite small on their own, but they add up in the same direction," Richardson said. "We were surprised that they added up to such a big effect."

These quirks hide around 19 percent of global air-temperature warming since the 1860s. That's enough that calculations generated from historical records alone were cooler than about 90 percent of the results from the climate models that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) uses for its authoritative assessment reports. In the apples-to-apples comparison, the historical temperature calculation was close to the middle of the range of calculations from the IPCC's suite of models.

Any research that compares modeled and observed long-term temperature records could suffer from the same problems, Richardson said. "Researchers should be clear about how they use temperature records, to make sure that comparisons are fair. It had seemed like real-world data hinted that future global warming would be a bit less than models said. This mostly disappears in a fair comparison."

NASA uses the vantage point of space to increase our understanding of our home planet, improve lives and safeguard our future. NASA develops new ways to observe and study Earth's interconnected natural systems with long-term data records. The agency freely shares this unique knowledge and works with institutions around the world to gain new insights into how our planet is changing.

For more information about NASA's Earth science activities, visit:

<a href="http://www.nasa.gov/earth">http://www.nasa.gov/earth</a>

NASA: Historical records not an accurate prediction of climate change

NASA: Historical records not an accurate prediction of climate change....

Merciless heat wave covers the US. Call it the United Sweats of<a href="http://www.earth.com/image/deforestation-south-america/"> America</a>. A heat wave spreading across the country is leaving few places to hide. Not even the cool of night.
By Friday afternoon, all but one of the Lower 48 states had hit 90 degrees somewhere, with only Washington around for cooler comfort. For much of the country, it was expected to get even worse over the weekend.
"It's just day after day. Merciless," said Jeff Masters, meteorology director of the private Weather Underground. "We don't often see this much of the country this hot for this length of time."
And while the extra hot weather will ease a bit next week for good chunks of the country, the temperature forecast for the next three months isn't exactly promising, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
For the first time in more than 20 years, the Climate Prediction Center<a href="http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/predictions/long-range/lead01/off01-temp.gif">map</a> is shades of one color: orange for above normal temperatures.
The map usually varies, showing places where there is a greater chance for above or below normal temperatures or equal chances. But the outlook for August, September and October is for above normal everywhere.
Center climate scientist Dan Collins said the center's archives go back to 1995 and they've never seen this for the entire United States - including Alaska and Hawaii. That doesn't mean a three-month heat wave, just on average warmer than normal temperatures through October.
"Unusual indeed," Collins said. "But maybe less so as the years pass."
Scientists haven't calculated if man-made global warming from the burning of fossil fuels is a factor in the current heat wave, but said it has been a factor in most recent ones and a good chance here, too.
What's happening now is a ridge of high pressure has just spread over almost the entire United States. That keeps clouds and cooling away, and just pushes warm air down.
Add to that the humidity, which makes everything feel stickier. It's coming with warmer ocean water, especially from a hotter-than-normal <a href="https://www.bing.com/search?q=gulf+of+mexico&amp;form=EDGEAR&amp;qs=PF&amp;cvid=2c03b5946f1b4c878cc3a06f65c57746&amp;cc=US&amp;setlang=en-US&amp;elv=AY3%21uAY7tbNNZGZ2yiGNjfNhS3t*LItEfHefM2goi1CZbtqxB8iRhXDpyzoxrjsjGc5ydP2RzZzbZRZgKw*U*RpxqfDQQMPHzoMJKWmo%211rY&amp;plvar=0&amp;PC=HCTS">Gulf of Mexico</a>, Masters said.
The high heat and humidity will move from the Corn Belt toward the Southeast over the weekend, according to the National Weather Service.
On Monday, the weather service forecasts that nearly all of the Lower 48 states could hit 95 on the <a href="http://www.wpc.ncep.noaa.gov/heat-index-MAX/bchi-day3.html">heat index</a> , which factors in humidity. And about 30 states are forecast to hit 100.
The high temperature averaged for the Lower 48 states was 92 degrees on both Thursday and Friday, the warmest since June of 2012, said meteorologist Ryan Maue of the private WeatherBell Analytics service.
Not even the cool of night is helping because temperatures aren't dropping as much as they normally do. That's a health issue because the human body relies on the evening coolness for relief, said Greg Carbin, a forecast chief for the weather service's Weather Prediction Center.
Heat waves like this one "are kinda like the home run statistic in steroid-fueled baseball," University of Georgia meteorology professor Marshall Shepherd said in an email. "Sure heat waves always happened naturally (like home runs in baseball) but the statistics are shifting to make them more likely and more frequent within a warmer background climate."
© 2016 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Learn more about our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.

Merciless heat wave covers the US

Merciless heat wave covers the US. Call it the United...

Woody climbing vines, known as lianas, are preventing tropical forests from recovering and are hampering the ability of forests to store carbon, scientists are warning

Woody climbing vines are threatening tropical forests. Instead of taking decades to recover, tropical forests are at risk of taking hundreds of years to re-grow because of lianas, which spread rapidly following extensive tree-felling.

In a new study published in the African Journal of Ecology, scientists advocate the temporary removal of lianas in selected areas to help tropical forests grow back.

The team, from the University of York and Flamingo Land zoo, reveal for the first time outside of commercial forestry or plantation studies, how lianas are preventing the growth of trees in an African forest.

This observation was not a huge surprise based on previous work elsewhere in the tropics and its established use in forestry.

However, the scientists also reviewed previous scattered studies and have revealed that the impact on tree growth rates is approximately equivalent across the tropics, on average nearly halving the rate of growth. Also Woody climbing vines are threatening tropical forests causing a lot more problems that anticipated.

More sparse data even suggests a net 7-fold decrease in the overall rate of biomass accumulation (accounting for tree mortality and the growth of new trees).

"The implications for the global carbon sink are profound," said Dr Andrew Marshall from the University's Environment Department and Director of Conservation Science at Flamingo Land.

"No-one has until now compiled data from all over the world to see what the general trend is. What this study suggests is a trend; that lianas are impacting on the tropics but not just in selected sites."

However, Dr Marshall says the lianas also help to promote <a href="http://www.earth.com/news/biodiversity-offsetting-may-be-limited-by-land-constraints/">biodiversity</a> and help sustain an abundance of plants and animals -- creating "bridges" across the trees, food for monkeys and other animals, and generally adding to the overall function of forests.

In the paper, the scientists highlight one climber, known locally as "the lion's grasp", because of its claw-like spines.

Dr Marshall said the problem had been caused by commercial logging, which allowed the lianas to flourish.

"We don't want to advocate taking all the lianas out of the forest, that would be terrible. But a temporary removal in some places will help forests grow back," Dr Marshall added.

"Lianas are an important part of the ecology. If we temporarily cut them back the trees start growing more, with new trees sprouting and less mortality, resulting in more and more biomass in the forest."

"We don't have enough data yet to know which species respond well to clearing out lianas, that is the next stage in the research."

--

<a href="http://www.york.ac.uk/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">University of York</a>

Woody climbing vines are threatening tropical forests

Woody climbing vines, known as lianas, are preventing tropical forests...

A solar energy project has some environmentalists seeing red.
Solar energy ordinarily wins praise from groups that want to cut greenhouse gases, but a proposed solar project at a defunct Long Island nuclear power plant has stirred outrage because it requires demolishing 350 acres of woodlands. Solar energy project in Long Island is angering environmentalists
"Choosing solar over forests anywhere in the world is just plain stupid," said Dick Amper, of the Long Island Pine Barrens Society. "Solar is very important to fight global warming and beyond, but I'm afraid we're making false choices when you destroy portions of nature and the environment to accomplish that end." Solar energy project in Long Island is angering environmentalists
Similar projects are happening elsewhere.
A court fight is brewing over a plan by<a href="http://www.earth.com/news/new-jersey-wild-animal-traveling-performances/"> New Jersey'</a>s Six Flags Great Adventure amusement park to cut down nearly 15,000 trees to make way for a solar farm. In Connecticut, state officials recently approved a plan to raze 134 acres of trees in the town of Sprague, near Norwich, for a solar energy project.
Alex Hobson, a spokeswoman for a Solar Energy industry group in Washington, D.C., declined to comment on the Long Island proposal, but said the industry "is committed to responsible use of the land on which we operate and we go to great lengths to protect biodiversity and ecologically fragile lands."
Under the proposal, a company called LI Solar Generation, LLC, a joint venture between NextEra Energy Resources and National Grid, would construct the facility on the grounds of the defunct Shoreham nuclear power plant.
The plant was completed in 1984 for $6 billion but never opened because of community opposition over potential safety concerns. The solar project backers are hoping to plug into existing electric energy infrastructure on the Shoreham property, with plans for up to 72 megawatts of solar energy, providing power for more than 13,000 homes.
A part of the plan mentions replanting trees elsewhere to offset the cutting of the forest but a spokesman for the company did not have details.
Walter Thomas, who teaches a course on solar energy at the University of Massachusetts-Lowell, questioned why it was necessary to eliminate any trees at all.
"I would think Long Island would have giant rooftops and parking lots in shopping malls that could be used for large solar projects if that's what's needed," Thomas said. "There's so much acreage available for that stuff."
Sid Bail, president of the Wading River Civic Association, who lives about a half mile from the Shoreham site along the Long Island Sound, isn't buying it. "I favor renewable energy, but in this case it's a very bad trade-off," he said.
The proposal submitted last month still requires extensive regulatory review.
"We are prepared to work closely with all public officials and the local community to come up with the best solution to have renewable solar energy at Shoreham, and preserve as much of the property as possible," Ross Groffman, executive director of NextEra Energy Resources and LI Solar Generation said in a statement.
Neal Lewis, executive director of the Sustainability Institute at Molloy College, an environmental advocacy group on Long Island that supports the Shoreham project, said it is always preferable to build solar projects in open spaces that don't require the elimination of large numbers of trees. But he notes that "of all the potential options, there is nothing less impactful on the environment than putting in a solar farm."
"That's the real world we live in and they have a right to develop it."
---
Associated Press researcher Jennifer Farrar contributed to this report.
---
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Solar energy project in Long Island is angering environmentalists

A solar energy project has some environmentalists seeing red. Solar...

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Today’s Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.igb.illinois.edu/">Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology</a> reveals how scientists can modify common crops like soybean, rice, and wheat to protect them from heat stress.



“We need to double crop production by 2050 to feed a growing global population, and not only are we not on track to do that, but climate change is further complicating things,” said Amanda Cavanagh, a lecturer at the University of Essex. 



The study is part of Realizing Increased Photosynthetic Efficiency (RIPE), an international research project that aims to develop food crops that turn the sun’s energy into food more efficiently.



“Using an engineering approach we designed multiple alternative metabolic pathways to photorespiration. Testing them in the field showed increases in productivity which led Amanda to significantly move the project forward by showing our engineered plants can withstand pretty extreme temperature stress,” said study co-author and RIPE researcher Paul South.&nbsp;



“As the climate changes and temperature stresses increase the pressure on our global food supply, farmers will need every tool available including engineering approaches like the synthetic biology used here to maintain safe and productive harvests.”



The experts tested plants modified to have more efficient photorespiration to see if they were better adapted to warmer temperatures.&nbsp;



The team found that the engineered plants produced 26 percent more biomass than the wild-type plants exposed to the same temperatures, and had 15 percent less yield loss under the higher temperatures.



Video Credit: Amanda Nguyen/University of Illinois



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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Designing crops that can beat the heat

[sendtonews key="QGPzYnXEtN-1712599-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from Carl...

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Today's Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA Goddard</a> describes the first comprehensive estimate of carbon density in the Saharan, Sahel, and Sudanian zones of Africa. In an effort to measure the amount of carbon stored across these drylands, a team of scientists used high-resolution satellite images and artificial intelligence to map nearly 10 billion individual trees. 



"The high spatial resolution (50 cm) combined with AI and field measurements used in this study is key to improving tree inventories in drylands," said Pierre Hiernaux, a French researcher working for NASA. "The ever-increasing availability of very high-resolution satellite imagery will make it possible to assess carbon pools and their dynamics at the individual tree level on a global scale."



"This study is exceptional because it is pioneering a type of approach that will revolutionize the monitoring of trees and forests on a global scale: in the short term, it will be possible to map the world's trees from the centre of the Amazon to our schoolyards," said <a href="https://www.inrae.fr/en">INRAE</a> researcher Jean-Pierre Wigneron.



"Many fields of application will become much more efficient and accurate, such as tracking carbon stocks, biodiversity, monitoring logging and protection against illegal forest degradation, in near real time.”



Video Credit: NASA Goddard&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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Remote sensing will revolutionize the way we monitor trees

[sendtonews key="EjmSP20gQK-2593093-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from NASA...

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Lesotho: Africa's "Kingdom in the Sky" Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features northwest Lesotho in South Africa.



According to ESA, Lesotho is the only nation in the world that lies completely above 1,000 m in elevation. The country is famous for its tall mountains and narrow valleys, and is known as Africa's "Kingdom in the Sky."



Out of a population of around two million people, about 80 percent live in rural areas. More than 75 percent of these people are engaged in <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/climate-change-will-have-a-global-impact-on-agriculture/">agriculture</a>, including rainfed cereal production and animal grazing.&nbsp;



ESA reports that the country’s agricultural system faces a growing number of issues, with climate-related vulnerabilities such as drought, floods and extreme temperatures occurring more frequently. 



Diamonds are amongst the minerals found in the mountains. Indeed, Lesotho can truly be called the Kingdom in the Sky. Beautiful, culturally rich, safe, affordable, and easily accessible from Durban and Johannesburg, mountainous Lesotho is a vastly underrated travel destination. the Kingdom of Lesotho (Sotho: 'Muso oa Lesotho) is an enclaved country in southern Africa. It is just over 30,000 km2 (11,583 sq mi) in size and has a population of around 2 million.



Video Credit: ESA&nbsp;&nbsp;



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Lesotho: Africa's "Kingdom in the Sky"

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Today's Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA Goddard</a> features a visual dataset of.methane emissions from wetlands across the globe. Atmospheric methane levels have reached record highs in recent years, and wetlands are a major source of these emissions.&nbsp;



"Methane is an important greenhouse gas that contributes substantially to global warming. On a molecule by molecule basis, methane is much more efficient at trapping heat than carbon dioxide, the main driver of warming," says NASA.



"Though human activities, including agriculture, oil and natural gas production and use, and waste disposal, collectively contribute the majority of methane to the atmosphere, about a third of total methane emissions comes from wetlands."&nbsp;



According to NASA, understanding methane emissions from wetlands and other natural sources is critically important for scientists and policymakers who are working to combat climate change by reducing emissions from human activities.



Video Credit: NASA Goddard



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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Wetlands are a major source of methane emissions

[sendtonews key="f8fukm28Vz-2491833-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from NASA...

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Today’s Video of the Day from <a href="https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/">NASA Earth Observatory</a> reveals the evolution of the Columbia Glacier in southeastern Alaska. Columbia is among the fastest shrinking glaciers in the world, and the video documents its rapid retreat over the years.&nbsp;



Columbia Glacier is a large, multi-branched calving glacier that flows out of the Chugach Mountains to the Prince William Sound.&nbsp;



According to USGS, Columbia had a long history of stability prior to 1980, with a length 41 miles, and small, short-lived advances or retreats.



In the years since 1980, however, satellite images have captured Columbia’s alarming retreat. By using false-color images, scientists can distinguish between snow and ice, open water, vegetation, and rocky debris on the glacier’s surface.



The series of false-color images featured in today's video were acquired over the span of 35 years. You can see that by 2021, the glacier’s main branch had retreated about 15 miles from its initial position.



The Columbia Glacier has also lost more than 50 percent of its volume, mostly due to calving. <a href="https://www.earth.com/video/nasa-reveals-3d-visual-of-an-atmospheric-river/">NASA</a> reports that while climate change likely started the retreat, mechanical processes kept the disintegration going.



The NASA images are provided by Jesse Allen, Robert Simmon, Joshua Stevens, and Lauren Dauphin using data from Landsat satellites, from the U.S. Geological Survey, and data from MODIS on NASA’s Terra satellite. The structure of Columbia’s moraine played a large role in the stability of the glacier before 1980. 



Like other tidewater glaciers, the Columbia built up a moraine over time, and the mixture of ice and rock functioned like a dam keeping out the sea. It was supported on one end by the shoreline and by the underwater terminal moraine at the other.



Video Credit: NASA Earth Observatory/&nbsp; NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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The rapid retreat of the Columbia Glacier

[sendtonews key="0879czfG3k-1785905-12187" type="single"] Today’s Video of the Day from NASA...

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Today's Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA Goddard</a> describes how record-breaking heat expressed itself around the world in 2022.



Scientists have determined that 2022 was the 5th warmest year since 1880. Furthermore, the last nine consecutive years have been the warmest on record.



From devastating floods and wildfires to natural disasters like Hurricane Ian, 2022 showed us yet again how a warming climate affects people across the globe.&nbsp;



"As we look back at 20:22 and years past, we see that each year we better understand the challenges we face and how important it is to meet them," says NASA.



Video/ Image Credit: NASA Goddard



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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2022 illustrated the consequences of a warming climate

[sendtonews key="3UUsNkFOuS-2487333-12187" type="single"] Today's Video of the Day from NASA...

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Satellites reveal how Earth's systems are interconnected Today’s Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA Goddard</a> describes Earth’s interconnected systems, and how this network is affected by rising temperatures.&nbsp;



During 2020, average global temperatures matched the hottest year on record. The hurricane season was also record-breaking, with many of the storms intensifying at extraordinary speeds. Hot water in the ocean is fuel for hurricanes. The satellite data shows that it's all one interconnected system showing how Satellites reveal how Earth's systems are interconnected.



According to NASA, dust swept up from Northern Africa plays a major role in the formation of hurricanes, and is also a key source of fertilization in the Amazon rainforest. As a result of<a href="https://www.earth.com/news/seagrass-wasting-disease-is-fueled-by-climate-change/"> climate</a> change, dust plumes are expected to decline, which will have an effect on vegetation far away.&nbsp;



Images from Earth-observing satellites show how the world’s plant life is affected by natural disasters, fires, and deforestation. Satellites also reveal how widespread changes in vegetation impact waterways,&nbsp; the climate, air quality. Satellites communicate by using radio waves to send signals to the antennas on the Earth. "Earth From Space" is a groundbreaking two-hour special that reveals a spectacular new space-based vision of our planet. 



Video Credit: NASA Goddard&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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Satellites reveal how Earth's systems are interconnected

[sendtonews key="JbW4VsY53O-1632195-12187" type="single"] Satellites reveal how Earth's systems are interconnected...

Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://welcome.miami.edu/">University of Miami</a> Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science explores how changes in water temperatures have affected tiger shark habitats and movements in the North Atlantic Ocean. The study reveals that rising temperatures have caused the sharks to shift toward the poles over the past 40 years.



“Tiger shark annual migrations have expanded poleward, paralleling rising water temperatures,” explained study lead author Neil Hammerschlag. “These results have consequences for tiger shark conservation, since shifts in their movements outside of marine protected areas may leave them more vulnerable to commercial fishing.”



The researchers analyzed nine years of tracking data from satellite-tagged tiger sharks, combined with four decades of conventional tag and recapture data provided by National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Cooperative Shark Tagging Program.



The experts found that during the last decade of record heat, for every one-degree Celsius increase in water temperatures, tiger sharks migrated further poleward by over 400 kilometers. They also migrated two weeks earlier than usual to waters off the northeastern coast of the United States.



“Given their role as apex predators, these changes to tiger shark movements may alter predator-prey interactions, leading to ecological imbalances, and more frequent encounters with humans,” concluded Professor Hammerschlag.



Video Credit: University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science



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Tiger sharks are shifting poleward as temperatures rise

Today’s Video of the Day from the University of Miami...

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> is focused on the melt ponds that emerge during the spring and summer on the Greenland Ice Sheet, which is the largest ice mass in the northern hemisphere.



"Melt ponds are vast pools of open water that form on both sea ice and ice sheets and are visible as turquoise-blue pools of water in this Copernicus Sentinel-2 image," says ESA.



"When snow and ice melts atop glaciers, water flows in channels and streams and collects in depressions on the surface. These melt ponds can speed up the melting of the surrounding ice since they greatly reduce the ice’s ability to reflect sunlight."



"This can create a positive feedback where an increasing number of melt ponds absorb more heat which causes ice cover to melt even faster."



According to ESA, Greenland has been hit with a late-season heatwave that began in early September. This caused the type of melt event that usually occurs in the middle of summer.



"In a recent paper published in Nature Climate Change, scientists found that major sea-level rise from the melting of the Greenland ice cap is now ‘inevitable’ even if the burning of fossil fuels were to halt overnight," says ESA. "Using satellite observations of Greenland ice loss and ice cap from 2000 to 2019, the team found the losses will lead to a minimum rise of 27 cm regardless of climate change."



Video Credit: ESA&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



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Melt ponds on the Greenland Ice Sheet

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> describes how Earth is unique in our solar system for its ability to sustain liquid water on its surface. But now, the water cycle is shifting as the climate warms, and scientists must find ways to predict how these changes will affect water availability.



Overall, 96 percent of Earth's water is saltwater, and nearly all of freshwater is found in ice and groundwater. These sources of water are linked as it passes through solid, liquid and gas phases.



In a warmer climate, the water cycle will be transformed. It will be easier for water to evaporate and form clouds, and storms will become more frequent and intense. Some regions will get too much water, while others will be left without enough water. In addition, soil moisture will be lost - which threatens food security.



Scientists are using satellite data from over the last 40 years to track changes that are happening in the water cycle. This will ultimately help us prepare for extreme events and better manage our water resources, according to ESA.



Video Credit: ESA



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Tracking changes in Earth's water cycle

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Saturn,-,High,Resolution,3d,Images,Presents,Planets,Of,The

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Today's Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA Goddard Space Flight Center</a> features images of Saturn from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope. The photographs capture the start of the mysterious "spoke season" on Saturn - when unexplained features appear on its rings. 



According to NASA, both the cause of the spokes and their seasonal variability have yet to be fully explained by planetary scientists.



"Like Earth, Saturn is tilted on its axis and therefore has four seasons, though because of Saturn's much larger orbit, each season lasts approximately seven Earth years. Equinox occurs when the rings are tilted edge-on to the Sun," explains NASA.



"The spokes disappear when it is near summer or winter solstice on Saturn. (When the Sun appears to reach either its highest or lowest latitude in the northern or southern hemisphere of a planet.) As the autumnal equinox of Saturn's northern hemisphere on May 6, 2025, draws near, the spokes are expected to become increasingly prominent and observable."



Experts believe that the spokes may be a product of the planet's variable magnetic field. When magnetic fields interact with solar wind, an electrically charged environment is created. This phenomenon is visible on Earth as the northern lights.&nbsp;



"Scientists think that the smallest, dust-sized icy ring particles can become charged as well, which temporarily levitates those particles above the rest of the larger icy particles and boulders in the rings," says NASA.



The spokes were first observed in the early 1980s by NASA's Voyager mission. Depending on the angle of the rings, the spokes can appear dark or light.



"Thanks to Hubble's OPAL program, which is building an archive of data on the outer solar system planets, we will have longer dedicated time to study Saturn’s spokes this season than ever before," said NASA senior planetary scientist Amy Simon, head of the Hubble Outer Planet Atmospheres Legacy (OPAL) program.



"Despite years of excellent observations by the Cassini mission, the precise beginning and duration of the spoke season is still unpredictable, rather like predicting the first storm during hurricane season."



Video Credit: NASA Goddard&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Mysterious "spoke season" captured on Saturn

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Closeup,Of,Fresh,Green,The,Napier,Bush,Grass,As,Animal

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Today’s Video of the Day from <a href="http://www.ntu.edu.sg/">NTU Singapore</a> reveals that some plants can remove toxic heavy metals from soil.&nbsp;



The researchers analyzed samples of various tropical plant species to test for levels of heavy metals and metalloids. The study showed that there are existing plants with high levels of these contaminants, which means that these species are great candidates for drawing pollutants out of the soil.&nbsp;



Among the plants examined in the study, 12 species had accumulated several types of heavy metals and metalloids. These plants are widely available, including species that are native to Singapore.



“In a small nation like Singapore, land may be repurposed to support new development plans, so it is important that we have a green and sustainable way to remediate land that is contaminated," said Professor Lam Yeng Ming.



"We set out to uncover how to better make use of tropical plants to do phytoremediation and through advanced characterization techniques, we showed how some of these tropical plant species can be an environmentally friendly and literally a 'green' way to remove contaminants in soil."&nbsp;



"Phytoremediation also has benefits of cost effectiveness, simplicity of management, aesthetic advantages, and long-term applicability and sustainability. The strategy prevents erosion and metal leaching by stabilizing or accumulating heavy metals, so that helps reduce the risk of contaminant spread.”



Video Credit: NTU Singapore



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Plants help remove heavy metals from contaminated soil

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.acs.org/">American Chemical Society</a> describes why herbicides are not as effective in killing weeds anymore. In the 20th century, chemical companies developed thousands of herbicides. The most commonly used herbicide was glyphosate, which was introduced in 1974.



Over the past few decades, dozens of species of weeds have evolved resistance to glyphosate. Depending on the site of action, the part of the plant that an herbicide interacts with, weeds may even be resistant to herbicides that have not been developed yet.&nbsp;



With increasing resistance to glyphosate and other herbicides, weeds are - once again - becoming a major concern for farmers.&nbsp;



Video Credit: American Chemical Society&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Weeds are becoming increasingly resistant to herbicides

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/">NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory</a> (JPL) describes a dust storm on Mars that was nearly twice the size of the United States. As the storm covered the southern hemisphere of the planet, some of NASA’s explorers had to delay their normal activities.



NASA’s Insight lander put itself in a "safe mode" for 11 days to conserve battery power because solar power was disrupted by the dust. The Ingenuity Mars Helicopter postponed flights until conditions improved.



"A fleet of NASA orbiters monitor Martian dust storms like this one and serve as lifelines to Earth by relaying data from the rovers and lander on the ground back to the team. This includes the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, MAVEN, and Odyssey," reports JPL.



"Dust storms like this recent one start close to the ground and are spread by wind as they rise – warming the cold Martian atmosphere."



The images in the video were captured by NASA’s Curiosity as the dust rolled in. A fleet of orbiters monitored the dust storm from above, relaying data from Mars’ explorers back to scientists on Earth.



Video &amp; Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/MSSS



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

NASA monitors giant dust storms on Mars

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Today's Video of the Day from the <a href="http://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features Qeshm Island in the Strait of Hormuz. This strait provides the only sea passage from the Persian Gulf to the open ocean.



Qeshm is separated from the Iranian coast by the Clarence Strait, also known as Khuran.&nbsp;The Hara Forest Protected Area is a network of shallow waterways and forest located between the island and the mainland. This protected region is home to sea turtles, snakes, and more than 150 species of migrating birds.



Qeshm is famous for its wide range of&nbsp;ecotourist&nbsp;attractions, such as the&nbsp;Hara marine forests. According to environmentalists, about 1.5 percent of the world birds and 25 percent of Iran's native <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/female-hummingbirds-avoid-sexual-harassment-by-looking-like-males/">birds</a> annually migrate to the forests, which are the first national geo park in Iran.



Tourists are also drawn to the island to see an age-old Portuguese&nbsp;fort, historic mosques, the&nbsp;Seyyed Mozaffar&nbsp;and&nbsp;Bibi Maryam&nbsp;shrines, and the "Valley of Stars."



The average temperature on the island is 81 degress and the region is often hot and humid. From June to August, the island is described as being oppressively hot. The ideal time to visit is during the winter season. 



Video Credit: ESA&nbsp;



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Qeshm Island in the Strait of Hormuz

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> features Inhambane Bay in southeast Mozambique.&nbsp;



"Inhambane Bay is a deep inlet into which the small Mutamba River flows," says ESA. "On one side of the bay lies the historical city of Inhambane, capital of the Inhambane Province, while the sister city of Maxixe, the economic capital of Inhambane, sits across from it. The province is the second largest grower of cashews, after Nampula, and it also produces coconut and citrus fruits."



The beaches of Barra and Tofo are popular with tourists. There are also coral reefs along the long coastline of Inhambane, making it an ideal destination for scuba diving and snorkeling.



"Mozambique’s extensive coastline heightens the country’s vulnerability to tropical cyclones that develop in the Indian Ocean as well as storm surge flooding," says ESA.



"More than half of the population lives in low lying coastal areas, putting communities at risk. Inhambane Bay was dangerously close to where Cyclone Idai made landfall in 2019 causing widespread destruction to the country."



Video/ Image Credit: ESA



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Inhambane Bay in southeast Mozambique

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency </a>&nbsp;features the Kangerlussuaq Glacier, one of the largest tidewater outlet glaciers in Greenland. The glacier is located on the east coast of the Greenland ice sheet.



As human-induced climate change continues to drive up temperatures, global ice loss is accelerating at an alarming rate. ESA reports that, over the past decade alone, 3.5 trillion tons of ice have melted from the Greenland ice sheet. This is enough to cover the UK with meltwater 15 meters deep.



Based on satellite imagery, researchers determined that Kangerlussuaq entered a new phase of rapid retreat and acceleration in 2017. In their study, published in <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/feart.2019.00123/full">Frontiers in Earth Science</a>,&nbsp; the experts report that the glacier's ice front is now at its most retreated position since the early 20th century.



"Given Kangerlussuaq’s previous impacts on both the magnitude and pattern of ice sheet wide mass loss, we predict that its new phase of retreat, acceleration and thinning will markedly enhance the south-east region’s contribution to increasing discharge from the ice sheet," wrote the study authors.&nbsp;&nbsp;



"More broadly, accurate forecasting of the ice sheet’s contribution to sea level rise will require a deeper understanding of, and responses to, these non-linear ice dynamic processes."



Video Credit: ESA



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Kangerlussuaq Glacier on the Greenland ice sheet

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> describes the complex relationship between ocean and climate. ESA's Climate Change Initiative will help us understand how oceans influence the climate and how climate change is impacting the oceans.&nbsp;



"Earth’s oceans are huge heat stores, soaking up 93% of the excess heat from human activity over the past 70 years. Ocean currents redistribute heat around the planet, from the Equator to the poles. Where this ocean heat goes influences weather patterns and regional climate," explains ESA.



"As well as absorbing heat, oceans are a natural carbon sink, absorbing a quarter of carbon dioxide emissions from human activity. This has led to the acidification of ocean water, threating marine life."



The amount of heat and carbon dioxide soaked up by the ocean depends on specific variables, including phytoplankton, temperatures, waves, salinity, and ice cover. Satellites can be used to measure these variables from space.



"From their unique vantage point, satellites provide key information for understanding the complexities of our planet and monitoring environmental issues," says ESA.



Video Credit: ESA



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By <a href="mailto:csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Editor



Check us out on <a href="https://www.earth.com/earthsnap/">EarthSnap</a>, a free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.

Ocean heat influences regional climate

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Today’s Video of the Day from the <a href="https://www.esa.int/">European Space Agency</a> describes the importance of monitoring the shape of the sea surface, which is constantly changing. These observations have many applications, such as ship routing, <a href="https://www.earth.com/news/the-modem-ocean-is-a-tough-place-for-whales-to-survive/">ocean</a> current forecasting, and debris tracking.



"A project supported by the Discovery element of ESA’s Basic Activities recently investigated a new technique to measure sea surface topography very precisely," reports ESA.



"The technique involves looking at satellite navigation (GNSS) signals that have been reflected off of the sea surface at very low angles. At these so-called grazing angles, waves and surface roughness have very little impact on the reflection process; the sea surface acts as a very smooth mirror."



Estel Cardellach is the principal investigator at the Institute for Space Studies of Catalonia, who first submitted the idea for the project.



“In a mirror-like reflection the phase of the signal can be tracked – it is continuous," said Cardellach. "Different surface heights result in different phase measurements. It gives a very precise measurement of the surface altitude at a few centimetres’ precision.”



The researchers developed a GNSS receiver and set up an experiment in the Balaeric Islands to collect signals from the receiver that were reflected off the sea surface. Ultimately, these signals will provide improved measurements of the shape of the sea surface.



Image/ Video Credit: ESA



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By <a href="http://csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Monitoring the dynamic shape of the sea surface

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Aerial,Photo,Of,River,In,Amazon,Rainforest,Jungle,In,Peru

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Today’s Video of the Day from <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/goddard">NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center</a> describes how scientists are using autonomous sound sensors to monitor deforestation in the Amazon. By recording soundscapes, the experts can determine which animals are present through their distinct sounds.&nbsp;



Using this method, sounds can be used as scientific measurements to analyze the effects of deforestation. The researchers will gain a better understanding of how the acoustics of a forest can be used to measure its health.&nbsp;



"From space, parts of the Amazon rainforest that have previously been logged or burned may look lush and green, like a place buzzing with activity and full of sounds. But inside the rainforest, the animal life may tell a different story, of a harsh environment and a quieter soundscape," says NASA.



Video Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center&nbsp;



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By <a href="http://csexton@earth.com">Chrissy Sexton</a>, <a href="https://www.earth.com/staff/">Earth.com</a> Staff Writer

Monitoring deforestation in the Amazon through sounds

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