Amazonian lakes sequester carbon dioxide at a rate 39% higher than the rainforest itself. This is according to a 2022 study by researchers from Brazil, Australia, the U.S., France, Portugal,…
Research has found that drought and declining water availability are increasingly impeding the ability of tropical ecosystems to soak up carbon dioxide, making the tropics a less effective carbon sink.…
Sustainable liquid biofuels are needed to reduce the carbon footprint of fossil fuel-powered planes, ships, trucks and cars. Grass feedstock has shown promise in biofuel labs, but commercial scaling up may be an insurmountable hurdle.
JAKARTA — Most peatlands in Indonesia that need protection are currently not protected, a new study has found. It identifies 5.65 million hectares (13.96 million acres) of peatlands — an…
Researchers analyzed never-before-used satellite data to calculate how much carbon is stored in protected areas worldwide.
At the start of the 2000s, the search for a “miracle” biofuel led to a stubby Latin American tree. But jatropha’s boom went bust when high yields and big eco benefits failed to materialize. Now some say it’s set for a return.
Revisions to the long-debated European Union Renewable Energy Directive (RED) have been approved. Those policies still support the burning of wood pellets to make energy, despite evidence of harm to forests and climate, say NGOs.
The dry season of 2015 was a devastating one for Indonesia, with around 100,000 fires engulfing thousands of hectares of tropical rainforests and carbon-rich peatlands on the islands of Sumatra,…
A pioneering global study published March 15 in the journal Nature showed that humid tropical forests recovering from degradation and deforestation have the potential to absorb a vast amount of…
Biofuels have long been held up as a viable high-tech climate solution, but in practice they’ve often not lived up to their promise, causing environmental harm and in some cases being more carbon-intensive than fossil fuels.
As biomass burning to make energy surges, nations are setting standards that fail to count carbon emissions at power plant smokestacks, worsening climate change even as those same countries dub biomass “carbon neutral.”
Warmer temperatures could significantly diminish the ability of tropical forests to siphon carbon from the atmosphere by intensifying dry seasons, according to a recent study. The tropics pack away an…
Imagine showers of little green sand grains drifting through the ocean: collecting on coral reefs, rolling off the backs of whales, sprinkling schools of tuna — and helping to save…
Tropical forests play a key role in our efforts to stabilize the global climate. As a readymade means of ameliorating our continued greenhouse gas emissions, tree-clad tropical landscapes provide us…
A stone causeway connects an islet, the famed Aragonese Castle perched atop it, to the island of Ischia off the coast of Naples in southern Italy. Below water, along the…
In contrast to their reputation, big plant eaters such as elephants that disturb forest and grassland vegetation could help curb climate change.
Wildlife — as big as elephants and as small as spiders — are important players in the carbon cycle, and scientists say that supercharging ecosystems with animals could enhance terrestrial and marine carbon sinks.
Melting sea ice may evoke images of polar bears stranded on shrinking floes or dramatically collapsing ice shelves. But according to a study published recently in the journal Science, ice…
Players in the carbon offset market say they offer a solution to the climate crisis. When an emitter releases carbon in one place, they can support a project elsewhere that…
On Sept. 20, the Emissions Database for Global Atmospheric Research, or EDGAR, a scientific group associated with the European Commission, released its 2022 report detailing the CO2 emissions of every…
Hours after being born, oysters are already working to form their protective, chalk-layered shells. Drawing calcium and carbonate from seawater, they combine the two to form hardened shells. But as…
The death knell of coal has been proclaimed, but policy loopholes in Asia allow for cofired power plants, where coal and wood are combined as fuel. Both fuels produce lots of carbon emissions, but those from wood aren’t counted.
The UK and EU were the primary users of woody biomass for energy. But Japan and South Korea have drastically stepped up their burning of wood pellets — potentially threatening forests, biodiversity, and the climate.
Japan and South Korea are increasingly burning biomass, such as wood pellets, to make energy, with potentially adverse impacts on the global climate, deforestation and biodiversity.
As hot and muggy as most tropical rainforests are, you only need to leave their florid confines and step onto a recently razed plot of land to feel an immediate…
Slice through a tree trunk, and you’ll find a series of rings that tell a story of how that tree grew over the course of its life. These rings are…
In the past, ocean carbon data was sparse, mostly gathered by ships. But the future of monitoring belongs to robot floats that deliver real-time data across vast oceans — even in the remote Antarctic Southern Ocean.
The world still has a fighting chance to keep temperatures below 2° Celsius over pre-industrial levels, if all countries meet their commitments to curb global warming, scientists say. In a…
JAKARTA — Indonesia looks set to continue its heavy reliance on coal in its energy mix under a legislative sleight of hand: it will define fuels derived from coal as…
Organizations in the Malaysian state of Sabah have filed a complaint with the U.N. Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples about a once-secretive deal aimed at locking up…
