The Changing Climate

Featured image: Widespread collapse of West Antarctica’s ice sheet is avoidable if we keep global warming below 2℃

Widespread collapse of West Antarctica’s ice sheet is avoidable if we keep global warming below 2℃

Guest Author • Oct 19, 2021

Dan Lowry, GNS Science; Mario Krapp, GNS Science, and Nick Golledge, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington   Rising seas are already making storm damage more costly, adding to the impact on about 700 million people who live in low-lying coastal areas at risk of flooding. Scientists expect sea-level rise will exacerbate the damage from storm … Read More

Featured image: Social media is reducing climate change debates to your views on veganism

Social media is reducing climate change debates to your views on veganism

Guest Author • Oct 04, 2021

Taha Yasseri, University College Dublin and Mary Sanford, University of Oxford   Ten years ago, when we ranked the most controversial articles on Wikipedia, George W. Bush was at the top of the list with global warming at number five. The article on global warming has now been re-titled as climate change, but this remains among the … Read More

Featured image: Marine heatwaves during winter could have dire impacts on New Zealand fisheries and herald more summer storms

Marine heatwaves during winter could have dire impacts on New Zealand fisheries and herald more summer storms

Guest Author • Oct 01, 2021

João Marcos Azevedo Correia de Souza, MetService — Te Ratonga Tirorangi; Amandine Schaeffer, UNSW; Jonathan Gardner, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington, and Robert Smith   The ocean around New Zealand is getting warmer, and extreme warming events have become more frequent over the past years. These marine heatwaves can have devastating impacts on ocean ecosystems. When they … Read More

Featured image: Pinpointing the role of climate change in every storm is impossible – and a luxury most countries can’t afford

Pinpointing the role of climate change in every storm is impossible – and a luxury most countries can’t afford

Guest Author • Sep 23, 2021

Friederike Otto, University of Oxford and Luke Harrington, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington   Tropical Storm Ida recently left a path of devastation across the US, capping a summer beset by wildfires, heatwaves and floods which broke records around the world. The inevitable question after each of these extreme weather events is the same: to what extent … Read More

Featured image: New research reveals animals are changing their body shapes to cope with climate change

New research reveals animals are changing their body shapes to cope with climate change

Guest Author • Sep 08, 2021

Sara Ryding, Deakin University and Matthew Symonds, Deakin University   Global warming is a big challenge for warm-blooded animals, which must maintain a constant internal body temperature. As anyone who’s experienced heatstroke can tell you, our bodies become severely stressed when we overheat. Animals are dealing with global warming in various ways. Some move to cooler areas, such as … Read More

Featured image: Climate change is an infrastructure problem – map of electric vehicle chargers shows one reason why

Climate change is an infrastructure problem – map of electric vehicle chargers shows one reason why

Guest Author • Aug 26, 2021

Paul N. Edwards, Stanford University   Most of America’s 107,000 gas stations can fill several cars every five or 10 minutes at multiple pumps. Not so for electric vehicle chargers – at least not yet. Today the U.S. has around 43,000 public EV charging stations, with about 106,000 outlets. Each outlet can charge only one vehicle at a … Read More

Featured image: To get New Zealanders out of their cars we’ll need to start charging the true cost of driving

To get New Zealanders out of their cars we’ll need to start charging the true cost of driving

Guest Author • Aug 17, 2021

Timothy Welch, University of Auckland   In light of last week’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report confirming human activity is “unequivocally” driving global warming, here’s a striking statistic: in Auckland, road transport modes are responsible for 35% of the city’s climate-altering emissions. Overall, road transport accounts for nearly 43% of New Zealand’s greenhouse gas emissions, an increase … Read More

Featured image: Apocalyptic films have lulled us into a false sense of security about climate change

Apocalyptic films have lulled us into a false sense of security about climate change

Guest Author • Aug 13, 2021

Doug Specht, University of Westminster and Silvia Angeli, University of Westminster   The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)‘s sobering “code red for humanity” report comes on the heels of months of devastating weather events around the world. Our front pages have been dominated by photos that look as if they’ve come from a film – images of … Read More

Featured image: Fossil fuel misinformation may sideline one of the most important climate change reports ever released

Fossil fuel misinformation may sideline one of the most important climate change reports ever released

Guest Author • Aug 12, 2021

Christian Downie, Australian National University   This week’s landmark report on the state of the climate paints a sobering picture. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded that, without deep and immediate cuts to greenhouse gas emissions, the world is very likely headed for climate catastrophe. In November, world leaders will gather in Glasgow for the latest round … Read More

Featured image: Rising seas and melting glaciers: these changes are now irreversible, but we have to act to slow them down

Rising seas and melting glaciers: these changes are now irreversible, but we have to act to slow them down

Guest Author • Aug 10, 2021

Nick Golledge, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington   After three years of writing and two weeks of virtual negotiations to approve the final wording, the Sixth Assessment Report (AR6) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) confirms that changes are happening in Earth’s climate across every continent and every ocean. My contribution was as … Read More