Environment

Palm oil plantations, for one, are increasingly struggling with the sector's declining attractiveness, which has hardly changed since the colonial era.... Read more

Across Europe, many banks alongside motorways are planted with grass to stabilize soil and keep roadside landscapes tidy.... Read more

When you reach for a "palm-oil-free" label at the supermarket, you likely feel you're doing your part to save orangutans and protect biodiversity. However, the reality behind that label is more complex than it appears.... Read more

For over three decades, satellites orbiting Earth have measured the height of the ocean surface with remarkable precision. These measurements are crucial because changes in ocean height are one of the clearest indicators of how our planet is responding to climate change. Rising ocean surfaces signal warming temperatures, melting ice,... Read more

Kitchen sponges are considered a potential, yet largely understudied, source of microplastics in households. A study in Environmental Advances investigated how many microplastic particles are released from kitchen sponges during use and what environmental impacts result. The paper is titled "From sink to sea: Microplastic release from kitchen sponges and... Read more

Alaska's glaciers respond to climate change by melting for three additional weeks with every 1 degree Celsius increase in the average summer temperature, data from satellite-mounted radars show.... Read more

A burst of unusual March heat is hitting the United States this week and into next, busting previous monthly heat records by wide margins. While heat is most acutely felt by people exposed to it, graphics and charts convey the scale of this extreme event. Temperatures in the West remain... Read more

Most of Europe's original natural forests have been transformed for agriculture and managed forests producing energy, paper, and timber. The few remaining "old-growth" natural forests are relics of the past that illustrate how forests would have looked in the absence of human management. They can, therefore, tell us how people... Read more

Two University of Victoria (UVic) geologists have integrated field geology with statistical modeling to give scientists a new view of the chemical reactions happening on ocean floors billions of years ago. The revised picture shows that big changes in the carbon cycle were happening earlier than expected, and at the... Read more

For half the world's population, the water in their drinking glasses comes from below them. Groundwater also supplies 40% of global irrigation projects. Alarmingly, more than a third of the planet's aquifers, or groundwater basins, are dropping. Declining water tables leave entire regions vulnerable to drought, land subsidence or seawater... Read more

While parts of New York and New Jersey were "building back better" after Superstorm Sandy, residents of flood-prone public housing in Rockaway, Queens, were left without heat or running water for years.... Read more

Tiny pieces of plastic, called microplastics, are showing up everywhere, even in the water in clouds, rain, and snow—and they may be affecting our weather and temperatures. A study published in Environmental Science & Technology and led by Hosein Foroutan, associate professor of civil and environmental engineering, found that microbes... Read more

Every time we do a load of laundry, tiny fibers of polyester escape from our clothes and slip down the drain. These microfibers, so small they can be invisible to the naked eye, are among the most common forms of microplastic in the ocean. Yet, new research published in Journal... Read more

A record early heat wave striking the west of the United States on Friday is a one-in-500-years type event and all but certainly the result of human-caused climate change, experts say.... Read more

Researchers at the University of Seville have demonstrated the effectiveness of active vertical garden systems in improving indoor air quality in buildings. To do so, they worked inside a closed glass chamber installed at the Higher Technical School of Agricultural Engineering, where they found that after 24 hours, 96% to... Read more