Europe has enough solar and wind resources to meet its electricity demand entirely from renewable sources. A new study by researchers at the Institute for Transformative Sustainability Research (IASS) in Potsdam shows that many regions and municipalities could meet their electricity demand using electricity systems based exclusively on renewables. However, their development would exacerbate land...
Grito in Spanish can mean “to cry.” For example, the cries of despair of María del Pilar Hurtado’s son in a video that circulated throughout the Colombian media this summer. In the video, the boy kicks and screams next to his mother’s lifeless body in the town of Tierralta (Córdoba) in Colombia’s northern Caribbean region....
By analysing 138 experiments, researchers have mapped the potential of today’s plants and trees to store extra carbon by the end of the century. The results show trees and plants could remove six years of current emissions by 2100, but only if no further deforestation occurs. The study, led by Stanford University and the Autonomous...
Connected areas of high-quality forest running through oil palm plantations could help support increased levels of biodiversity, new research suggests. There is growing pressure to reduce the consumption of palm oil due to concerns over deforestation. However, the research team, led by the University of York, says promoting more sustainable palm oil is a better...
In India, children that belong to disadvantaged castes face a much higher likelihood of not living past their fifth birthday than their counterparts in non-deprived castes. International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) researchers examined the association between castes and under-five mortality in an effort to help reduce the burden of under-five deaths in the...
Stone tools uncovered in Mongolia by an international team of archaeologists indicate that modern humans traveled across the Eurasian steppe about 45,000 years ago, according to a new University of California, Davis, study. The date is about 10,000 years earlier than archaeologists previously believed. The site also points to a new location for where modern...
Studies of how global change is impacting marine organisms have long focused on physiological effects–for example an oyster’s decreased ability to build or maintain a strong shell in an ocean that is becoming more acidic due to excess levels of carbon dioxide. More recently, researchers have begun to investigate how different facets of global change...
Facebook’s Libra cryptocurrency has taken a lot of criticism from Western government officials and media commentators – but it’s not meant for them. A major target market for the Libra is users in developing countries. From researching cryptocurrency, blockchain and other technologies in the context of developing countries, I can see that digital payment systems...
Understanding how people use and experience important places for living nature is essential for effectively managing and monitoring human activities and conserving biodiversity. In a new article published in the journal Science of the Total Environment, a team of researchers assessed global patterns of visitation rates, attractiveness and pressure to more than 12,000 Important Bird and...
Involuntary staying, a type of housing trap, is a common experience among people living on housing estates, since around one in three residents feel that they are trapped in their current residential arrangements. More than half of them would like to move away from their current neighbourhoods. According to the residents own estimation, the most...
