Understanding Plant Adaptation: New Research Could Improve Crop Resilience to Climate Change

A team of scientists at the University of Calgary is making strides in understanding how plants adapt to environmental stressors, offering promising insights that could help make agricultural crops more resilient to heat, drought, and climate change. Dr. Sam Yeaman, an associate professor in the Department of Biological Sciences, and his team have published groundbreaking research in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), shedding light on how distantly related plant species—from sunflowers to poplars—adapt to similar stresses.

The study, led by Dr. Gabriele Nocchi, marks a significant step in understanding whether different plant species, despite their genetic differences, use similar genetic tools to respond to environmental challenges. The answer, according to Yeaman, is nuanced. “Yes, and no,” he explains. “While there is overlap in the genes used, plants also exhibit unique adaptive strategies. You could say that while each species has its own adaptation story, many share common genetic themes.”

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MIT Breakthrough Catalyst Converts Methane into Valuable Polymers, Offering a Dual Solution to Climate Change

In a groundbreaking development that could significantly impact the fight against climate change, chemical engineers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have created a new catalyst capable of converting methane gas into valuable polymers. Methane, while less abundant than carbon dioxide, is far more potent in trapping heat in the atmosphere, contributing to about 15% of global temperature rise. This makes methane a critical target for greenhouse gas reduction efforts.

Michael Strano, senior author of the study, emphasized the dual challenge of dealing with methane: “It’s a source of carbon, and we want to keep it out of the atmosphere but also turn it into something useful.” Given methane’s potency as a greenhouse gas, developing a method to capture and convert it is essential to mitigating climate change. The new catalyst developed by the MIT team operates at room temperature and atmospheric pressure, making it feasible for deployment in areas with high methane emissions, such as power plants, landfills, and cattle farms.

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Denmark’s Bold Plan: Restoring Nature and Reducing Agricultural Emissions

Denmark is undertaking a groundbreaking initiative to combat agricultural emissions while restoring nature. In a transformative plan, the government will pay farmers to convert some farmland, used for crops like hay for animal feed, into forests. Other areas will revert to peatlands. In total, around 10% of the country’s land will be restored to its natural state.

This is part of Denmark’s strategy to sharply cut emissions from farming, a sector responsible for a significant portion of the global carbon footprint. Alongside this effort, a new tax on cows will reduce meat and dairy production, and farm subsidies will be redirected to encourage the use of less nitrogen fertilizer.

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The Great Green Wall: Africa’s Bold Initiative to Combat Desertification and Climate Change

In the heart of Africa, an ambitious and visionary project is underway to tackle the pressing challenges of desertification, climate change, and biodiversity loss. This initiative, known as the Great Green Wall, aims to plant an 8,000-kilometer-long and 15-kilometer-wide wall of trees across the continent, stretching from Senegal in the west to Djibouti in the east. Beyond reforestation, the Great Green Wall is a symbol of hope and resilience for Africa, with a mission to restore degraded land, sequester carbon, and create green jobs.

Conceived in 2007 by the African Union, the project addresses the threat of the expanding Sahara Desert, which has swallowed fertile land and displaced communities across the Sahel region. The initiative aims to restore 100 million hectares of degraded land, capture 250 million tons of carbon, and create 10 million jobs by 2030. Through planting trees, shrubs, and grasses, the project seeks to reverse land degradation and desertification in one of the poorest and most vulnerable regions of the world.

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Climate Change Threatens Global Primate Populations: New Study Reveals Extinction Risks

A comprehensive study conducted by an international team of biologists, planetary scientists, and conservationists has highlighted the growing threat of extinction faced by non-human primate populations due to climate change. Published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, the study outlines how changing environmental conditions are likely to impact primates across the globe, potentially pushing many species toward extinction.

The researchers collected extensive data from 22,705 locations across four major primate habitats: Madagascar, Asia, Africa, and the Americas (including South and Central America and the Caribbean). By combining this data with specific primate characteristics, such as body size, activity patterns, habitat range, and evolutionary uniqueness, they developed a model to calculate the extinction risks primates face as their environments undergo rapid change.

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Innovating Cooling Technologies: A Solution to Escalating Climate Costs

July marked the hottest month ever recorded in human history, with heatwaves shattering temperature records across the globe. While the discomfort of excessive heat is undeniable, the consequences extend far beyond discomfort. Severe heat is the deadliest weather event, surpassing floods, tornadoes, and hurricanes combined in terms of annual fatalities in the U.S. As climate change intensifies, access to cooled spaces is evolving into a vital health necessity and a fundamental human rights issue.

However, conventional air-conditioning systems have ensnared society in a detrimental feedback loop: as temperatures rise, the demand for air conditioning increases, leading to higher energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. “We’re trapped in a vicious and accelerating cycle,” remarks Nicole Miranda, an engineer specializing in sustainable cooling at the University of Oxford. Cooling has become the fastest-growing contributor to energy consumption in buildings, with projections indicating that global demand for cooling will triple by 2050 if the current trajectory continues. This surge equates to an additional 4,000 terawatt-hours of energy consumption, equivalent to the entire annual energy usage of the United States.

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Lessons from India’s Forest Restoration: Beyond Tree Cover

As the world seeks strategies to combat climate change and biodiversity loss, forest restoration has emerged as a key approach. However, a closer look at global efforts reveals a significant reliance on fast-growing tree plantations. The allure of quick results often guides such choices, but the history of forest restoration in India offers vital insights into the potential pitfalls of this approach. While tree planting can yield immediate outcomes, the long-term consequences for ecosystems and communities require thoughtful consideration.

India’s experience with tree plantations stretches back over 200 years, providing valuable lessons for today’s foresters. During British colonial rule, forests became crucial resources for timber, driven by the demand for railway sleepers and ships. The Indian Forest Act of 1865 placed high-yield timber trees under state control, limiting local access to resources and sparking tensions. Planting initiatives introduced species like teak, eucalyptus, and pine, transforming landscapes into monocultures and endangering native ecosystems.

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Advancing Carbon Removal: Over $1 Billion Federal Grants for Scaling Up Direct Air Capture Technology

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has unveiled a significant boost to carbon removal efforts by awarding federal grants totaling over $1 billion to projects in Texas and Louisiana. These initiatives, designed to remove more than 2 million metric tons of carbon emissions annually, mark a crucial milestone in scaling up direct air capture (DAC) technology.

The chosen projects include Project Cypress in Louisiana, led by Battelle in partnership with Climeworks Corporation and Heirloom Carbon Technologies. Additionally, the South Texas DAC Hub in Kleberg County, Texas, proposed by Occidental Petroleum’s subsidiary 1PointFive, along with Carbon Engineering Ltd and Worley, has been selected. To facilitate broader adoption of DAC, the DOE has introduced various initiatives aimed at reducing technology costs to under $100 per net metric ton of CO2-equivalent within the next decade.

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Robotic Innovations Empower Solar Industry to Meet Climate Goals

As the United States accelerates its transition from fossil fuel-based energy to renewables, the solar industry faces a pressing challenge in meeting the demand for skilled workers. The Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) predicts a need for 800,000 new solar workers by 2030 to achieve the nation’s decarbonization objectives. However, 44% of solar industry employers report difficulty finding qualified applicants, raising concerns about staying on track to meet climate goals.

In response to this workforce gap, solar developers are increasingly turning to autonomous robotic solutions to revolutionize solar installation, particularly at utility-scale projects. Terabase Energy and Sarcos Robotics Corp are at the forefront of this emerging trend.

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Supercharged soil could pull carbon right out of the air

A simple seed treatment could drastically increase the amount of atmospheric carbon captured by crops, and store it underground for longer

By DELLE CHAN

Fundamentally, two of the world’s most pressing challenges, climate change and soil degradation, boil down to a simple imbalance: there is too much carbon in the air, and not enough in the ground. And for Guy Hudson and Tegan Nock, the solution is patently obvious.

The duo are the co-founders of Soil Carbon Co, an Australian agritech startup specialising in what it terms “microbe-mediated carbon sequestration” ­– a method of removing carbon from the atmosphere via microbial fungi and bacteria. The technology in question? A biological treatment applied to seeds that converts atmospheric carbon into a more stable compound which can then be stored deep in the ground – potentially for centuries.

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In a world-first, Australian University builds its own solar farm to offset 100% of its electricity use

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LIMITING GLOBAL WARMING to well below 2℃ this century requires carbon emissions to reach net-zero by around 2050. Australian households have done much to support the transition via rooftop solar investments. Now it’s time for organizations to take a more serious role.

The University of Queensland’s efforts to reduce its electricity emissions provides one blueprint. Last week UQ opened a 64-megawatt solar farm at Warwick in the state’s southeast. It’s the first major university in the world to offset 100% of its electricity use with renewable power produced from its own assets. In fact, UQ will generate more renewable electricity than it uses.

The Warwick Solar farm shows businesses and other organizations that the renewables transition is doable, and makes economic sense.

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The future of energy is being shaped in Asia

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China now accounts for almost three-quarters of global solar panel production.

A Frenchman is credited with being the first to discover the photovoltaic effect that produces electricity from sunlight. The first solar panel was built in the US. But when Abu Dhabi decided to build the world’s largest individual solar power project, they looked east for help.

The country partnered with Chinese and Japanese companies to construct a facility, which opened this year, with a peak capacity of 1.18 gigawatts generated by 3.2 million solar panels. That’s because Asia, more than any other region on the planet, and China, more than any other nation, currently represent the future of solar energy, and are at the heart of the ensuing industrywide transformation from fossil fuels to renewable and nuclear energy.

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