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News articles on Climate Change

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Mongabay.com news articles on climate change in blog format. Updated regularly.

Humans impacted climate thousands of years ago
(9/9/2005) New research suggests humans were influencing the world's climate long before the Industrial Revolution. Atmospheric levels of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, climbed steadily during the first millennium due to massive fires set by humans clearing land agriculture.


Vegetation growth in Arctic could add to global warming
(9/8/2005) Warming in the Arctic is stimulating the growth of vegetation and could affect the delicate energy balance there, causing an additional climate warming of several degrees over the next few decades. A new study indicates that as the number of dark-colored shrubs in the otherwise stark Arctic tundra rises, the amount of solar energy absorbed could increase winter heating by up to 70 percent. The research will be published 7 September in the first issue of the Journal of Geophysical Research-Biogeosciences, published by the American Geophysical Union.


Carbon reinjection strategies to be affected by climate change
(9/8/2005) An Earth System model developed by researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign indicates that the best location to store carbon dioxide in the deep ocean will change with climate change.


Glaciers melting at alarming rates, water problems feared
(9/7/2005) Global Warming is melting glaciers in every region of the world, putting millions of people at risk from floods, droughts and lack of drinking water says a report from WWF.


Fires in peat lands cost climate
(9/6/2005) The tropical rainforests of Kalimantan have long been threatened and increasingly endangered by deforestation and other invasive types of human activity. However, a lesser known ecosystem in the region that is literally coming under fire, is the tropical peat lands, particularly in the central area of the province of Indonesian Borneo.


Human evolution linked to climate change says study
(9/6/2005) New evidence suggests human evolution was caused by specific periods of climatic change in Africa according to research presented at the Annual Conference of the Royal Geographical Society. These climatic influences played a crucial part in enhancing human development says Dr Mark Maslin, Senior Lecturer in Geography at University College London.


Gas hydrates in ocean could trigger catastrophic climate change
(9/6/2005) Global warming will cause gasses trapped beneath the ocean floor to release into the atmosphere according to research presented at the Annual Conference of the Royal Geographical Society. The impact could initiate a catastrophic global greenhouse effect.


Global warming may have triggered worst mass extinction
(8/29/2005) A dramatic rise in carbon dioxide 250 million years ago may have caused global temperatures to soar and result in Earth's greatest mass extinction, according to a study published in the September issue of Geology. Global warming, which may have produced temperatures 10 to 30 degrees Celsius higher than today, would have had a significant impact both on oceans, where about 95% of lifeforms became extinct, and on land, where almost 75% of species died out.


Hurricanes getting stronger due to global warming says study
(8/29/2005) Late last month an atmospheric scientist at Massachusetts Institute of Technology released a study in Nature that found hurricanes have grown significantly more powerful and destructive over the past three decades. Kerry Emanuel, the author of the study, warns that since hurricanes depend on warm water to form and build, global climate change might increase the effect of hurricanes still further in coming years.


Bacteria's combined weight exceeds that of all fish in world's oceans
(8/24/2005) Researchers at Oregon State University and Diversa Corporation have discovered that the smallest free-living cell known also has the smallest genome, or genetic structure, of any independent cell - and yet it dominates life in the oceans, thrives where most other cells would die, and plays a huge role in the cycling of carbon on Earth.


Modifying clouds to fight global warming
(8/15/2005) An article in The Sunday Times reports that a scientist is working a cloud manufacturing technique to counter global warming.


Animals behaving strangely; climate change the culprit?
(8/11/2005) For the first time, scientists have found a direct relationship between global warming and the evolution of contemporary wildlife.


Food demand greater threat to wildlife than global warming
(7/28/2005) A redoubling of human food demand over the next 50 years that could imperil vast tracts of wildlife habitat. Recognizing the food demand, however, would shift government research funds from climate models to politically incorrect agricultural research stations-our main hope to double crop and livestock yields.


Amazon not holding expected carbon, carbon-credit trading scheme at risk?
(7/28/2005) The rivers of South America's Amazon basin are "breathing" far harder -- cycling the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide more quickly -- than anyone realized.


California to face water shortage warns new study
(7/27/2005) At current rates, California's demand for water will increase by 40 percent over the next 25 years, warns a new study from the Public Policy Institute of California.


EU to charge passengers carbon tax for vacation flights
(7/26/2005) The European Commission wants to begin tacking carbon emission charges on airlines in its strategy to tackle climate change, according to a document released by the EU executive Commission yesterday. Airlines would likely pass these fees on to passengers, who would see ticket prices rise by up to 9 euros ($10.86) for a return flight.


Global warming shrinks sacred glacier in the Andes
(7/6/2005) The melting of a glacier in the Peruvian Andes due to global climate change is impacting the religious practices of local people, according to an article run last month in The Wall Street Journal.


Climate change could ruin tourism in the Mediterranean
(7/1/2005) According to a new study the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), global climate change will bring hotter, drier summers to the Mediterranean and significantly impact two of the region's largest industries, agriculture and tourism.


Mayors agree on 'green cities' environmental pact
(6/5/2005) Mayors from around the world on Sunday signed an international treaty to make their cities more environmentally conscious that calls for boosting use of public transportation, drastic cuts to the volume of trash sent to landfills and ensured access to potable water.


Borneo's peat lands going up in smoke
(4/21/2005) The tropical rainforests of Kalimantan have long been threatened and increasingly endangered by deforestation and other invasive types of human activity. However, a lesser known ecosystem in the region that is literally coming under fire, is the tropical peat lands, particularly in the central area of the province of Indonesian Borneo


Rainforest Diversity - Short-term Variation, Ice Ages, Ecotones
(3/1/2005) Rainforests and their diversity do not exist in a constant state, but are the product of a series of impacts including fires, tree falls, small-scale human clearing, and even lava flows. These events can increase forest diversity by giving new species a chance to grow in the absence of the towering canopy trees. The growth of new tree species spells new opportunities for their symbiotic species (for example new pollinators or seed dispersers).


Global Impact of Deforestation - Climatic Role of Forests
(3/1/2005) Tropical rainforests play a vital role in the functioning of the planet's natural systems. The forests regulate local and global weather through their absorption and creation of rainfall and their exchange of atmospheric gases. For example, the Amazon alone creates 50-80 percent of its own rainfall through transpiration. Cutting the rainforests changes the reflectivity of the earth's surface, which affects global weather by altering wind and ocean current patterns, and changes rainfall distribution. If the forests continue to be destroyed, global weather patterns may become more unstable and extreme.


Impact of Deforestation - Extinction
(3/1/2005) The greatest loss with the longest-lasting effects from the ongoing destruction of wilderness will be the mass extinction of species that provide Earth with biodiversity. Although great extinctions have occurred in the past, none has occurred as rapidly or has been so much the result of the actions of a single species. The extinction rate of today may be 1,000 to 10,000 times the biological normal, or background, extinction rate of 1-10 species extinctions per year..


Human Threats to Rainforests - Fuelwood, Roads, Climate
(3/1/2005) FAO estimates that 40 percent of the world (2.6 billion people) rely on fuelwood or charcoal as their primary source of energy for cooking and heating. Fuelwood consumption has increased 250 percent since 1960 (the world's population only increased by 90 percent since 1960).


Impact of Deforestation - Atmospheric Role of Forests
(3/1/2005) Rainforests play the important role of locking up atmospheric carbon in their vegetation via photosynthesis. The vegetation and soils of the world's forests contain about 125 percent of the carbon found in the atmosphere. When forests are burned, degraded, or cleared, the opposite effect occurs: large amounts of carbon are released into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide along with other greenhouse gases (nitrous oxide, methane, and other nitrogen oxides). The burning of forests releases about two billion metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere each year, or about 22 percent of anthropogenic emissions of carbon dioxide.



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