The cold, hard truth
The Yukon is warming faster than anywhere else in the world. It’s causing irreversible damage to Indigenous communities
Arctic Canada is filling with puddles.
Springtime in the Yukon looks astonishingly similar to June in Ontario. The days are long. Deer bite the heads off flowers deep in the forest. Icy mountains still loom in the distance, but here in the city of Whitehorse, wet mud squishes with every step. People wear shorts and t-shirts. Trucks are parked in nearly every driveway, dried clay caked onto their tires. Spring in Whitehorse is beautiful, if you forget that it comes at the cost of a forever-changed climate.
Continue reading on THIS Magazine.
Mapbiomass, the foundations are laid in the DRC (French)
In its ambition to cover 70% of the world’s tropical forest areas by 2030 by deploying initiatives in 20 tropical countries in Latin America, Africa and Southeast Asia, the Mapbiomass network, with the support of the Central African Forest Satellite Observatory (OSFAC-DRC), has started its activities in the Democratic Republic of Congo, identified as a priority country for the deployment of Mapbiomass in Africa.
This is what justified the holding of the workshop on the “presentation of the Mapbiomass initiative and initiation of the process of building the Mapbiomass-DRC Network”.
Read more on Info Environnment.
A siege on science: How Trump is undoing an American legacy
In its first 100 days, the Trump administration has slashed federal agencies, canceled national reports, and yanked funding from universities. The shockwaves will be felt worldwide.
Across seven decades and a dozen presidencies, America’s scientific prowess was arguably unmatched. At universities and federal agencies alike, researchers in the United States revolutionized weather forecasting, cured deadly diseases, and began monitoring greenhouse gas emissions. As far back as 1990, Congress directed this scientific might toward understanding climate change, after finding that human-induced global warming posed a threat to “human health, and global economic and social well-being.”
Introduction
The impacts of climate change on the frequency and severity of physical hazards are putting many communities at risk. As the threat of climate change grows, so too does the need for accessible information, tools, and expertise to support climate-resilient decision making across multiple scales, from communities to countries. Woodwell Climate Research Center believes there is a need to localize and customize climate risk assessments. This information is critical for local government leaders as they make planning decisions, but it is not available to all communities. Woodwell believes that this science should be freely and widely available. To address this gap, Woodwell works with communities and countries across the world, including Ethiopia, to provide community climate risk assessments, free of charge.
Ethiopia, with its rich cultural heritage and about 126.5 million people (2023¹), faces growing climate challenges that also impact its economic priorities and natural resources. Located on the horn of Africa, Ethiopia boasts a diverse range of climates, from tropical forest in the southwest to desert in the north. Rain-fed agriculture forms the livelihoods of many of Ethiopia’s communities—agriculture accounted for nearly 35% of Ethiopia’s GDP in 2020.² Ethiopia experiences the effects of increased climate variability through extreme hazards including droughts, floods, and landslides across different parts of the country.
Ethiopia has established a strong policy landscape for climate action through several strategic initiatives. The national government has demonstrated their commitment to addressing Ethiopia’s climate future by embracing the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction and incorporating resilience principles into its first Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) to the UNFCCC submitted in 2017 and revised in 2022. In addition, Ethiopia has outlined its commitment to sustainable development through key policy frameworks, including the Ten-Year Development Plan (2021–2030), the Long-Term Low Carbon Emission Development Strategy (LT-LEDS 2020–2050), the Climate Resilient Green Economy Strategy (CRGE), and the National Adaptation Plan (NAP), aimed at mitigating risks associated with climate change and environmental degradation. Woodwell’s quantitative risk assessment of extreme precipitation, flooding, drought, and streamflow patterns builds upon Ethiopia’s deep knowledge systems and aims to complement existing national frameworks. This report intends to provide local data insights to support decision-makers and communities to take evidence-informed approaches for resilience.
The climate of Ethiopia is heavily influenced by its imposing topography. The country can be roughly divided into the highlands that make up most of the western half of Ethiopia and the lowlands which consist of southeast and northeast Ethiopia. These two zones differ significantly in the distribution, intensity, and seasonality of rainfall. This variation affects water availability, agriculture, and climate resilience across the country. The highlands generally see around 1,500 mm of rainfall per year (Figure 1) which falls mostly during the Kirempt season (June–September). The lowlands receive considerably less rainfall, about 300 mm annually, which occurs largely during the Belg rainy season (February–May).
Due to this sharp gradient in annual rainfall, the type of agriculture to support livelihoods differs between the highlands and the lowlands. Crop-based agriculture dominates the highlands (Figure 2), while as one moves southeast and northeast towards the lowlands, pastoral communities become more prevalent. Approximately 94% of Ethiopia’s crop production occurs in the Meher season (September–February) which is largely a product of the Kirempt rainy season.³ A failure of the summer rains would be devastating for the Ethiopian people, especially since more than 85% of the labor force is engaged in the agricultural sector, with only 5% of crop production is irrigated, making the sector highly dependent on rainfall.⁴ Internal climate variability can lead to large swings in annual rainfall from year to year leading to a drought prone environment. Additionally, bursts of extreme precipitation that cause flooding can occur in drought years resulting in concurrent disaster events.
The Frontiers Planet Prize, the world’s largest science competition to enhance planetary health by fast-tracking innovative research, today announced National Champions from 19 different countries who now advance to the International competition, which will award three winners $1M each to scale up their research.
Read more on the Marine Biological Laboratory website.
Why New York and New Jersey are at risk of spring wildfires
The wildfire scorching southern New Jersey ignited despite a series of downpours in recent weeks — and the region is ripe for more blazes.
April’s rains didn’t soak into the ground enough to prevent the fire from erupting at the edge of New Jersey’s pine barrens reserve. The blaze — which was allegedly sparked by an improperly extinguished bonfire — has burned 21 square miles (54 square kilometers) and is expected to grow in the coming days.
Read more on Insurance Journal.
I’m a field research scientist. What does this mean? I enjoy being outside, in forests and wetlands, studying the environment up close and personal. One of my favorite places to work and explore over the course of my career has been Howland Research Forest in central Maine.
Dominated by red spruce, eastern hemlock, and red maple, this mature northern forest feels old. There is a 400 year old yellow birch that was already a mature tree during the American revolution. The ground is soft— spongy with a lot of “holes” where past trees have fallen and roots decomposed. My feet often plunge into these holes, which can sometimes be filled with water.
The Howland Forest Research station was established in 1986 by the University of Maine in partnership with a packaging and paper company, International Paper. My first trip to Howland Forest was in 1998 and at the time the research center was just a collection of trailers housing equipment. I had never seen so much mouse poop in a building.
Howland was one of the first sites ever dedicated to measuring the net exchange of carbon between a forest and the atmosphere. Its support comes from the Ameriflux Network, a grass roots, science driven network of research stations spread across North and South America that monitors the flow of carbon and water across ecosystems. In these early years, Howland forest also served as a training site for testing out NASA’s remote sensing capabilities. At one time, Howland Research Forest was the most photographed site on earth from space. Soon the well used trailers were replaced with multiple buildings to accommodate the ever expanding research. The mice were evicted.
Howland forest was selectively harvested over 100 years ago, evidenced by cut stumps, but the forest has remained intact, growing under natural conditions since then. Most trees range between 100-120 years old. In 2007, International Paper was scheduled to harvest these mature trees. Recognising the value of maintaining a continuous long-term record of observations, scientists from Woodwell Climate Research Center, The University of Maine (UMaine Orono), and the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) partnered with the Northeast Wilderness Trust (NEWT) to purchase the forest. The Howland Research forest, now owned by NEWT, was protected in a forever wild state. This science and conservation partnership saved an invaluable mature natural forest and research site. As scientists continued to collect data over the next decades, we would learn just how important this partnership was to our understanding of mature forests.
Long-term measurements of carbon exchange between the forest and the atmosphere are being taken from the top of a tower, as part of the Department of Energy (DOE) supported Ameriflux Network, and paired with measurements on the ground. It’s the measurements on the ground where I come in. Myself and collaborators at UMaine Orono, USFS and a host of other scientists and students over the decades have measured carbon exchange from soils, tracked changes in temperature and moisture, and taken tree inventories.
Mature forests contain large stores of carbon in their tree stems, foliage, roots, and within the soils, accumulated over decades of growth and decomposition. Allowing mature forests to continue to grow, untouched, is beneficial to maintaining carbon stores along with the natural biodiversity and water cycling, often collectively called “ecosystem services”.
Over the last 25 years, Howland Research Forest has seen the warmest, driest, and wettest years. Observations show an increasing trend in the net uptake of atmospheric carbon (as carbon dioxide) into this mature forest, meaning that Howland forest is continuing to take up and store more carbon each passing year.
If the forest had been harvested in 2007, observations spanning that shorter time frame would have indicated a decreasing trend in net net carbon uptake, meaning that Howland Forest was taking up less carbon each passing year.
Although Howland Forest continues to take up carbon, the overall number of live trees has been declining (17% decline since 2001 in live trees, particularly red spruce and northern white cedar) and the number of dead trees has nearly doubled since 2001. Theoretically, fewer live trees would indicate less carbon uptake, but that is not happening. The mature, large diameter trees continue to grow; although there may be fewer in number, they continue to take up significant amounts of carbon.
Tree species can differ in how they respond to environmental changes as well as how carbon is allocated within the tree and across a mature forest ecosystem. Teasing out these complex, multi-scaled, multispecies responses requires long term studies. However, given the challenges to acquiring and sustaining funding for long-term studies, it’s unusual to have this type of paired dataset like we have at the Howland Research forest. This would not have been possible without the forward-looking vision of scientists and NEWT, and the consistent support from the Ameriflux Network.
Thanks to its preserved, forever-wild status, a new generation of scientists has the opportunity to continue this work, building on our understanding of the mechanisms driving climate resilience in this mature northern forest.
The partnership between science and conservation is a victory for both. Results from the Howland Research Forest demonstrate the need to continue supporting long-term studies to fully understand how natural, mature forests respond to a changing climate. Conservation organizations and land trusts are preserving and restoring critical habitats across the U.S. and the globe. This is an opportunity to build alliances between science and conservation, to inform how natural ecosystems function and the impact of restoration efforts on the ecosystem services that we all benefit from, while preserving natural spaces for future generations.