What is the environmental footprint of your favorite pair of blue jeans? A new study indicates it might be quite large. The study, published in Environmental Science and Technology Letters Wednesday, found denim microfibers had infiltrated all the way to the Canadian Arctic Ocean. Researchers say it’s a telling example of the extent of human-generated […]
Three years ago, scientists predicted it would happen. Now, new NASA satellite imagery confirms it’s true: two ice caps in Canada’s Nunavut province have disappeared completely, providing more visual evidence of the rapid warming happening near the poles, as CTV News in Canada reported. According to Gizmodo, scientists at the National Snow and Ice Data […]
Biologist Egor Kirillin is on a special mission. Deep in the Siberian wilderness in the Russian Republic of Sakha, he waits on the Olenjok river until reindeer come thundering into the water. The river crosses the huge herd’s migration route south, and provides Kirillin’s one chance to tag them with radio transmitters. It’s not a […]
By Johnny Wood What better place to build a Doomsday Vault than the remote, snow-covered islands of Norway’s Arctic Svalbard? Sitting around 1,000 kilometers from the North Pole, the facility is buried in permafrost to protect the precious seed samples housed there. But a freak heatwave is causing the region’s ice to melt. Following several […]
By Krissy Waite Climate activists are celebrating Deutsche Bank’s new energy policy banning financial support of drilling in the Arctic, a move which comes after years of pressure from advocacy groups. The bank, a multinational investment company headquartered in Germany, announced Monday that it will no longer offer financial services to new projects that involve […]
By Jennie Gosché In late 2019, before the world was completely upended by the COVID-19 pandemic, I was presented a last-minute chance to photograph polar bears outside one of the northernmost villages in the United States — Kaktovik, Alaska. It was an opportunity I couldn’t refuse, and as the COVID-19 pandemic now stretches into summer […]
If world governments don’t act to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, most polar bear populations will not survive the century, a new study has found. Polar bears, who rely on Arctic sea ice to hunt for seals, have long been a symbol of the impacts of the climate crisis. As the ice melts, they lose the […]
The record-breaking heat in the Arctic saw temperatures soar above 100 degrees for the first time in recorded history. Now, a new analysis has put to rest any notion that the heat was caused by natural temperature fluctuations. The study found that the record-breaking heat wave was made 600 times more likely by the man-made […]
By James Shulmeister Climate Explained is a collaboration between The Conversation, Stuff and the New Zealand Science Media Centre to answer your questions about climate change. If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, please send it to climate.change@stuff.co.nz What was the climate and sea level like at times in Earth’s history […]