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Many are familiar with <keyword id="163030" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="new-mexico" source="Orion">New Mexico</keyword> as the infamous home of a fictional blue meth manufacturer from TV, but it also holds a significant place in the hearts of archaeologists due to its <keyword id="12162896" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="white-sands-national-park" source="Orion">White Sands National Park</keyword>. This park, with its extensive history, has come to become a piece of the complex puzzle of <keyword id="135635" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="human-evolution" source="Orion">human evolution</keyword>. Back in 2009, archaeologists made an astounding discovery within the park's layers – 61 footprints of varying sizes. These footprints narrated tales of <keyword id="3582955" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="ancient-human" source="Orion">ancient human</keyword> traditions and life in a region that was significantly different during the last ice ages, far from the arid terrain we see today. What's remarkable is that these ancient humans found their home in the region, thriving during a time when one might not expect them to. Human history is woven with tales of migrations driven by climate, food, and environmental factors. Unravelling when these migrations occurred is an ongoing endeavour. Until recently, experts believed that early humans arrived in <keyword id="6378080" type="General" weightage="50" keywordseo="north-america" source="Orion">North America</keyword> around 13,500 to 16,000 years ago. However, these 61 footprints tell a different story, dating back approximately 23,000 years. This revelation has posed a challenging mystery, leaving archaeologists with a 7,000 year gap to fill. This new estimate was established by dating Ruppia cirrhosa seeds found within the <keyword id="6425567" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="footprint" source="Orion">footprint</keyword> fossils through radiocarbon dating. This process measures the deterioration of specific carbon isotopes within the material to determine its age. Yet, this new dating method faced scrutiny last year. Sceptics questioned whether R. cirrhosa, an aquatic plant, might have absorbed carbon from the surrounding water, potentially dating back thousands of years before the plant itself existed. To solidify their findings, the research team pursued additional dating methods. They isolated tens of thousands of conifer pollen grains from the same soil layer as the pollen. This confirmed that the plant and the cirrhosa seeds coexisted. And because this was a terrestrial plant, its carbon had to come from the surrounding air. Radiocarbon dating, the same method that dated the seeds, also confirmed the age of the pollen. Furthermore, the pollen samples originated from plants associated with colder glacial conditions, a stark contrast to the present desert vegetation's pollen found in the region, as explained by David Wahl, a co-author of the study. The researchers utilised optically stimulated luminescence, a different dating method, to determine the age of quartz grains based on their last exposure to sunlight. This method confirmed that quartz samples from the layers with footprints were at least 21,500 years old, supporting the other two conclusions. With three robust lines of evidence, the research team has effectively demonstrated that humans arrived in the region around 7,000 years earlier than previously estimated. This discovery adds another intriguing chapter to the story of humanity's past. Now, the next step is to delve deeper into the lives of these ancient ancestors. The findings of this research have been published in Science and can be accessed <a href="https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adh5007" data-type="tilCustomLink">here</a>.

Discovery of 23,000-year-old footprint fossils reshape the history of early human migration into North America

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Biochar is a soil additive that can help store carbon dioxide for centuries. </li><li>Cities in Minnesota and Nebraska plan to build biochar plants similar to those in Nordic countries.</li></ul>A decade ago, Jim Doten was on a tour in Afghanistan with the Army National Guard searching for ways to help farmers improve soils depleted of nutrients and carbon.The geohydrologist came across some studies on biochar, a material not unlike the burnt remains of a campfire.Doten's biochar program in Afghanistan was short-lived, but the idea stuck. He's since convinced Minneapolis, Minnesota officials of biochar's value as governments search for ways to not only reduce greenhouse gas emissions but also remove them from the atmosphere. "It took a few years to build credibility because people didn't understand why this was a carbon-negative technology," said Doten, the carbon-sequestration program manager for Minneapolis. <div type="image" title="Jim Doten" height="427" width="426" msid="92582934" hostid="261" sizebytes="26466"></div>The rationale for biochar being carbon-negative goes like this: Through photosynthesis, trees absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, and it's released when they decay or are burned. Gathering forest or yard waste, converting it into biochar using a process known as pyrolysis, and returning it to the soil can trap carbon for centuries and retain water while helping plants absorb nutrients.Doten first worked with the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community, a tribe in Minneapolis that owns a compost facility and develops urban gardens to promote food security. The city paid for biochar trucked in from Missouri to be mixed with compost."That's a great way to demonstrate the work, but from a climate aspect, trucking biochar across the country negates its climate benefits," Doten said. "So we need local supply."Minneapolis is among seven cities <a href="https://www.bloomberg.org/press/bloomberg-philanthropies-announces-mayors-challenge-winning-project-to-combat-climate-change-will-spread-to-seven-global-cities/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener sponsored">that received a $400,000 grant from Bloomberg Philanthropies</a> this week to invest in biochar. The city is matching the grant to fund the construction of a production plant that will convert wood from nearby ash trees — which are getting decimated by an invasive pest — into biochar, Doten said. The plant will be <a href="https://www.startribune.com/zero-carbon-electricity-now-provides-the-most-power-in-minnesota/600047121/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener sponsored">powered by a low-carbon electric grid</a>."Instead of burning the wood for energy, which is also bad for the climate, we're turning it into a soil amendment," Doten said.The $50 billion global industry that combusts wood for power <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/03/26/biomass-carbon-climate-politics-477620" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener sponsored">has been panned by scientists and environmentalists</a>, even as governments in the US, the European Union, and elsewhere categorize it as renewable. While some biochar on the market is a byproduct of that industry, Doten said most production was from plants like the one coming to Minneapolis, which will use the nearly zero-emissions pyrolysis process. That's the case in Stockholm, <a href="https://bloombergcities.jhu.edu/news/solution-spotlight-turning-garden-waste-carbon-sink-stockholm" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener sponsored">the original recipient of a Bloomberg Philanthropies grant</a>, where yard waste is being converted into biochar and <a href="https://biochar-us.org/sites/default/files/presentations/2.3.1%20Stockholm%20Biochar%20Project%20Mattias%20Gustafsson%20-.pdf" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener sponsored">enough energy to heat 80 apartments</a>.Bloomberg Philanthropies said all the projects combined would yield enough biochar suppliers to sequester nearly 10,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide each year. It's a help though it's only a tiny amount relative to the scale of what's needed to keep global warming below catastrophic levels. Scientists <a href="https://www.wri.org/initiatives/carbon-removal" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener sponsored">predict that 10 billion metric tons of carbon</a> will need to be removed from the atmosphere annually by 2050. "Work like this, no matter the size, is important because it engages everyday people in finding solutions," Jim Anderson, the government-innovation lead at Bloomberg Philanthropies, said.For now, Doten said government agencies with big public-works projects would be the main customers for biochar. A pilot project in Minneapolis demonstrated that biochar along highways helped sponge up stormwater, a climate-resiliency strategy as the risk of flooding increases. Eventually, Minneapolis' plant could sell carbon-offset credits to companies that want to meet net-zero targets, Doten added. In 2019, biochar was listed for the first time on a voluntary carbon marketplace in Finland, followed by another listing in 2020, <a href="https://biochar-international.org/protocol/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener sponsored">according to the International Biochar Initiative</a>.Insider is seeking nominations for its first Climate Action 30 list, which identifies the top 30 global leaders working toward climate solutions.Tell us about someone who you believe is doing some of the most impactful or promising work to tackle the global climate crisis:

How a soil additive called biochar can help fight the climate crisis by locking away carbon for centuries

The vast boreal <keyword id="55528" type="General" weightage="50" keywordseo="forests" source="Orion">forests</keyword> of the Northern Hemisphere stretch from Scandinavia through Siberia, Alaska and Canada. They cover a tenth of the world's land but hold one-third of the land's <keyword id="66463" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="Carbon" source="Orion">carbon</keyword>, stored mainly in organic-rich soils and in trees. Now, a new study in the journal Science provides further evidence that emissions from <keyword id="394841" type="General" weightage="100" keywordseo="wildfires" source="Orion">wildfires</keyword> in high northern latitudes are already increasing at an alarming rate. In these forests, the cold climate and often waterlogged ground means fallen tree bark, needles and other dead organic matter takes a long time to decompose. This has allowed the soils to accumulate carbon over thousands of years after the ice sheets retreated at the end of the last ice age. Since then, these ecosystems have mainly been shaped by wildfires ignited by lightning. These fires release some of the carbon stored in trees and in the upper layer of soil back into the atmosphere. The release of soil carbon is hugely significant. It means a boreal forest fire will release 10 to 20 times more carbon compared to a similarly sized fire in other ecosystems where fires consume mainly vegetation and where the soil itself does not contain enough carbon to burn. However, these boreal forests might burn only once a century, sometimes even less often than that. This is much longer than in most other fire-prone ecosystems, and the extra carbon stored in soils and trees in the long period between fires normally exceeds the losses from fires. For the past 6,000 or so years this delicate relationship between carbon uptake and release was quite stable and boreal forests served as a globally important carbon sink. But global heating, which is particularly pronounced in the Northern Hemisphere's high latitudes, is threatening the balance. Soaring temperatures have lengthened the fire season and increased the frequency and severity of wildfires and there is growing evidence that as the interval between fires shortens, more carbon is being released from organic soils in boreal forests than the ecosystems can reabsorb. Satellites can spot gas emitted by wildfires That's where the latest study in Science comes in. The researchers, mostly based in China, used satellite observations of <keyword id="41285" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="wildfire" source="Orion">wildfire</keyword> smoke plumes to look for carbon monoxide, which is invisible to the naked eye but shows up at certain infrared wavelengths. Carbon monoxide isn't itself a greenhouse gas, but if you know how much of it there is, you can infer the amount of carbon dioxide in wildfire smoke as well. This contrasts with the more conventional methods employed by current wildfire emission models. These also use satellites, but record active fires or burned areas simply by comparing before and after images. They then factor in a range of assumptions on how much vegetation would typically have been consumed and how much carbon is emitted per area of different types of vegetation and soil burned. While this new carbon monoxide method has its own uncertainties, it provides independent and more direct estimates of wildfire emissions. It also has potential to give us a more detailed understanding of the differences in wildfire <keyword id="6375918" type="General" weightage="80" keywordseo="carbon-emissions" source="Orion">carbon emissions</keyword> between different ecosystems. A dramatic increase The new study showed a significant increase in emissions from boreal fires over the past two decades. Things were particularly dramatic in 2021, when they comprised a record 23% of global vegetation wildfire emissions, more than twice their contribution in a more typical year. If this trend continues, the boreal forest may very soon become the dominant source of global emissions from biomass burning, overtaking the notorious tropical peatland fires (such as those in Indonesia in 2015) in terms of global significance and adding further to the "fire–carbon-climate warming" feedback. The 2021 fire season was made particularly extreme by simultaneously hot and dry conditions both in North America and northern Europe and Asia. If such weather patterns do become more frequent, leading to more fires in the boreal region, these forests may reach a "wildfire tipping point". A study examining the extreme fires of 2014 in boreal north-west Canada demonstrated that some areas were already turning from carbon sinks into net emitters. This new study covering the entire boreal biome suggests this ecosystem as a whole – from Siberia to Canada – is rapidly approaching this tipping point.

World's largest forest ecosystem turns net-emitter from carbon sink due to extreme wildfires

<a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/one-planet"></a><div type="image" title="seagrass" height="695" width="926" msid="102615693" hostid="261" sizebytes="81806"></div><ul class="summary-list"><li>Blue carbon stored in marine ecosystems could be crucial in the fight against the climate crisis.</li><li>Breakthroughs in satellite technology have helped commercialize blue-carbon credits.</li><li>But remote monitoring of seagrass, salt marshes, kelp forests, and mangroves remains flawed.</li></ul>The Bahamas made history last year when it announced it was to become one of the first nations to sell credits linked to the capture and storage of carbon in its waters.The Caribbean nation sized up its mangroves and seagrass meadows, both of which naturally trap CO2, and estimated it had about $300 million worth of assets it could sell to a voluntary carbon market littered with <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/fund-carbon-removal-corporates-avoid-bad-credits-2023-2?r=US&amp;IR=T">corporations struggling to find high-quality credits</a>.At the time, the country's prime minister, Philip Davis, compared the sale of blue-carbon credits <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-28/the-bahamas-plans-to-sell-blue-carbon-credits-in-2022-pm-says?in_source=embedded-checkout-banner" target="_blank" rel="noopener">to that of a waste-collection service</a>, with the Bahamas dealing with the world's greenhouse-gas emissions — or "garbage."One credit represents a ton of carbon sequestered or prevented from entering the atmosphere. Over $50 billion worth of carbon credits have been predicted to be traded annually in the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/everything-carbon-markets-as-the-sector-heats-up-2022-3?r=US&amp;IR=T">voluntary</a> market, <a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/capabilities/sustainability/our-insights/sustainability-blog/cop27-accelerating-decarbonization" target="_blank" rel="noopener">according to McKinsey</a>.Blue carbon, which is stored in coastal and marine ecosystems, has become an increasingly important asset in the fight against the climate crisis. It could represent one-fifth of the emissions reductions needed to keep within 1.5 degrees of warming, <a href="https://www.wri.org/insights/turning-tide-ocean-based-solutions-could-close-emission-gap-21" target="_blank" rel="noopener">a 2019 report from the World Resources Institute found</a>.Coastal and marine ecosystems such as seagrass, salt marshes, kelp forests, and mangroves also help mitigate the effects of climate change, namely coastal erosion, sea-level rises, and floods, while providing a habitat for marine life. Green carbon, by comparison, is stored on land, usually in woodland projects.One thing the Bahamian effort is missing is "data and scalability," Dimos Traganos, a scientist with the Global Seagrass Watch, told Insider. His organization is building a seagrass- and seascape-monitoring service, which he said would plug that gap.It uses cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and satellites to monitor and verify the health and carbon storage of marine ecosystems, the latter being the basis of blue credits.The blue-carbon ecosystem is leaning heavily into these technologies in an attempt to avoid the accuracy and verification issues that have plagued terrestrial projects.<h2>Tech advances like 'going from dial-up internet to 3G'</h2>Satellites have hit a "tipping point" and have unlocked blue carbon, according to Guy Wolf, the founder and director of the Oxford University spinout OxCarbon."It's a bit like going from dial-up internet to 3G," he said.His nonprofit aims to bring transparency to carbon projects, including a mangrove project where satellite images are linked to visible forest characteristics and soil-sample data to establish quantities of blue carbon stored.Satellite monitoring is <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamiehailstone/2021/12/01/can-satellite-technology-make-the-carbon-credit-market-more-transparent/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">already established on land</a>, where it's used to determine tree types and the size and maturity of a forest without having to manually collect data, which makes it more scalable. This is all fed into a machine-learning model, along with other data, to estimate how much carbon is stored and how much could be stored.But it was difficult to differentiate degraded forest from mature forest over large sample areas, Wolf said. This affected the accuracy of carbon estimations. Older technology provides 30-meter resolutions, meaning every pixel on a picture is 30 square meters, so the area that can be looked at in depth is limited. Older satellites also don't show microchanges year by year, so by the time an issue occurs, it's likely too late, he added.<div type="image" title="Aerial of mangrove in seagrass bed, Islamorada, Florida." height="2242" width="2989" msid="102615694" hostid="261" sizebytes="1367372"></div>OxCarbon uses 50-centimeter resolution, which, together with advancements in computing power, means that the level of accuracy is now an "order of magnitude greater" across larger areas, he said."That's obviously a very scalable solution because even if the area is 10 times the size, you don't need extra manpower," Wolf said."It would cost a bit more, as you would need a bit more satellite imagery, a bit more computer processing, but that is a scalable solution that can expand 100,000 hectares," he added. "It is fast because once you've got the images, you process them."Carbon credits can then be verified and issued faster. "It's speed, accuracy, and scalability, all in one go," he said.With an <a href="https://www.unoosa.org/oosa/en/informationfor/media/2022-unis-os-574.html#:~:text=Since%20the%20beginning%20of%20the,launched%20over%20the%20next%20decade." target="_blank" rel="noopener">abundance of satellites in orbit</a>, photos can be snapped "every month, week, or whenever the satellite flies over," Thomas Merriman, a cofounder and the chief product officer of the carbon-credit-insurance provider Kita Earth, said. His company is betting on the quality of carbon projects, ensuring buyers receive the credits they buy even if something goes wrong. But the work is easily disrupted by cloud cover, which blocks the ability to take photos. <h2>Combating the clouds </h2>Mapping technology that can break through clouds is often attached to satellites. For example, light-detection and -ranging technology can even <a href="https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/lidar.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">penetrate water to map the seafloor</a> or coastline, measure the marine environment's features, and survey its vulnerability."The challenge with anything that's under the water is the turbidity of the water. It's great if you've got really clear crystal waters. It is very bad in the UK," said Donna Lyndsay, the sustainability lead at the UK's mapping agency Ordnance Survey, which has worked with mangroves in the Middle East. Satellite data has to be paired with sonar, divers collecting information, or other field data, she added.Indeed, the Global Seagrass Watch combines its remote-monitoring data with field data. "There are 70 seagrass species. You cannot monitor all of them from space because some of those would be very, very sparse, very coarse, be sitting in turbid waters 20 to 30 meters deep," Traganos said. It's always important to ground-truth findings, he added. <h2>Carbon as a 'blunt tool'</h2>The end goal for many of these projects is to find and highlight hot spots of blue carbon and biodiversity to influence protection, conservation, and climate agendas. Traganos sees the Global Seagrass Watch slotting into an ecosystem of other projects that collectively help to monitor and protect the marine environment. Carbon is sometimes "a bit of a blunt tool," Kita's Merriman said. There's a wealth of data to unlock outside it; Merriman wants property developers to value the flood-defense services of mangroves, for example. "That's the next frontier, really," he added.Merriman also predicted the emergence of biodiversity credits, which would help to restore natural habitats.<div type="image" title="Pivotal's Zoe Balmforth" height="4160" width="5546" msid="102615696" hostid="261" sizebytes="495042"></div>"If you do right by nature, by biodiversity, there will be carbon benefit, either by storage or sequestration," Zoë Balmforth, an ecologist turned founder, said. Her company, Pivotal, conducts biodiversity surveys, including in coastal areas. "But the reverse is not always true. It can be true, but it's not always," she added.Cameron Frayling, Balmforth's cofounder, added: "Technology is the enabler that makes measurement scalable, but you still have to go on-site to deploy it. It's the same thing as on land. We can't do all of this by flying above something and taking pictures, whether it's lidar or satellite."

High-powered satellites have made blue-carbon credits a reality. But they still face accuracy and scalability issues.

<a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/one-planet"></a><div type="image" title="Loam Bio cofounders Tegan Nock, CPO; Mick Wettenhall; Guy Webb, global head of agronomy; and Guy Hudson, CEO." height="4476" width="6706" msid="101144246" hostid="261" sizebytes="1853746"></div><ul class="summary-list"><li>Soil is a huge carbon sink, but intensive agriculture has degraded its ability to store emissions.</li><li>The startup Loam Bio wants to use fungi to boost soil health and help keep carbon in the ground.</li><li>The fungi could help fight the climate crisis, but scientists have questioned its scalability.</li></ul>There is too much carbon in the atmosphere and not enough beneath our feet.Soil forms the basis of food security, holding water and playing host to vast amounts of biodiversity. It also stores an enormous amount of carbon dioxide — a crucial element of healthy land that helps hold the nutrients and water needed for plant growth.But soil carbon is in a sorry state, in <a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1706103114" target="_blank" rel="noopener">part due to current agricultural practices</a>. Soil degradation poses a major risk to food-supply lines, threatening to undermine crop and plant quality.Loam Bio, a biotech startup, has set out to slow down the rapid advance of climate change while dramatically improving soil health at the same time. The Australian company, founded in 2019, has created a microbial fungi-seed coating to enhance agricultural crops' ability to store carbon in soil."It kind of blows my mind that there's so much we don't know about this incredible group of organisms," Guy Hudson, the CEO and a cofounder of Loam Bio, told Insider.Hudson's startup has wowed investors, raising A$155 million, or around $100 million, to date to scale its product from investors including the US heavyweight investor Chris Sacca's climate-tech fund Lowercarbon Capital. The <a href="https://lowercarboncapital.com/company/soilcarbonco/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">lure</a> for Lowercarbon Capital was the lack of additional land, energy, equipment, or dramatic behavior changes needed for microbial-carbon removal to thrive.Loam Bio is part of a bevy of young companies trying to enhance natural processes as a form of carbon removal. Scientists have predicted that, if we are to achieve our goals for climate and economic growth, <a href="https://nap.nationalacademies.org/read/25259/chapter/2#9" target="_blank" rel="noopener">10 gigatons</a> of carbon dioxide must be drawn down from the atmosphere annually. Sustainable agriculture and carbon sequestration, including from soil-carbon management, could reduce up to or the equivalent of <a href="https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg3/downloads/report/IPCC_AR6_WGIII_SPM.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">4.1 gigatons of carbon dioxide</a> annually. While getting carbon into the soil is relatively easy, keeping it there is a more complex challenge, according to one expert. Just how commercially scalable seed coatings can be is also a sticking point for scientists. <h2>Hacking a natural process</h2>Typically, plants absorb CO2 and convert it into sugars through photosynthesis. The plants then exude some of this through the roots and into the soil.There are <a href="https://affiliate.insider.com?h=8def10940a48de6ab964ca36ec384da5ad0cfea3d7a706f17317c9582daa7383&amp;postID=647eeb64c3a3c70df450a6c5&amp;site=bi&amp;u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nature.com%2Fscitable%2Fknowledge%2Flibrary%2Fsoil-carbon-storage-84223790%2F" target="_blank" rel="noopener">different types of soil carbon</a>; some decompose easily while others can take thousands of years to break down. When a soil microbiome, which is a medley of bacteria, viruses, and fungi, degrades a carbon compound, carbon is released back into the atmosphere.Some carbon compounds can become fixed to minerals in the soil, which makes them more resistant to soil microbes breaking them down. When this happens, the carbon is stored for hundreds to thousands of years.Loam Bio treats seeds with a coating so that fungi grow with their roots. The fungi live symbiotically with the plant and help it convert easily broken-down carbon compounds into more resilient <a href="https://www.soilquality.org.au/factsheets/organic-carbon-pools" target="_blank" rel="noopener">forms</a>. It's a win-win for farmers and the environment as increased carbon improves soil health, which ultimately benefits local biodiversity and helps crops grow.The company, which has been working with farmers for three years, launched its first commercial products in Australia this year. It reported an average yield increase of 5.1% for canola and an increase of 2.9% for barley and has research papers in the peer-review stage, which will be released later this year, Hudson said. <div type="image" title="Loam Bio microbes in a petri dish" height="2671" width="3555" msid="101144248" hostid="261" sizebytes="289382"></div><h2>Verifying carbon capture in soil</h2>A solution that improves both soil carbon and crop productivity is an attractive one, Britt Koskella, an associate professor of ecology and evolution at UC Berkeley, said. She added that they are often tackled separately.But there are always tradeoffs in nature; even if scientists find "unicorn bacteria" with the desired characteristics, they may come at the expense of the plant's native microbiome, Koskella said. A functioning, good microbiome — one which helps fight disease — is generally one that is diverse, she added."If we do things that reduce microbiome diversity, tipping it towards a particular function, there's a worry that decreased diversity itself has a cost," Koskella said.Increased carbon is generally beneficial to soil, but if it locks up other minerals — ones longer-lasting compounds could become fixed to — then there is a risk of depleting other nutrients that plants need, Andy Bailey, a plant pathologist at the University of Bristol, said. Otherwise, Bailey sees the solution as beneficial.The soil microbiome could also change to start breaking down the carbon that gets fixed in soil, Bailey added."So it might not be a permanent way of capturing things; it's not been known or studied enough to be able to say with confidence that this will fix carbon for 20 years, 50 years, 100 years," he said."It's that longevity of fixation which is the bit that's really needed if you're talking about this for carbon capture."The challenge hasn't gone unnoticed. "The most important thing is that we're really accurately measuring the carbon that we store in the soil," Hudson said. That involves taking an "incredible high density" of soil cores from its fields. In 2022, Loam Bio took around 14,000 soil cores from 86 different field locations and tested a "whole ton" of carbon-measurement technologies.The company has shown "statistically significant increases" in longer-lasting carbon pools, Hudson added. The startup continues to study its carbon storage capabilities in a variety of soil types.<div type="image" title="Loam Bio's agronomy team Chris Shafto and Dr Brooke Bruning taking soil samples." height="2772" width="3697" msid="101144250" hostid="261" sizebytes="1173070"></div><h2>A reckoning for agriculture </h2>Koskella said that sustainable alternatives to chemical fertilizers, such as microbial treatments, are "not going to have the same widespread efficacy.""They are more time-consuming, they're probably more bespoke, and that can be a real challenge for commercialization," she said.Australian cereal growers don't use many fungicides, Bailey said. In European farming systems, it's much more common to use fungicides, so a fungi-based solution could be less effective in certain regions.Indeed, Loam Bio has products in development in Australia, US, and Brazil that are tailored to each agricultural context, Hudson said."These things aren't a magic bullet in themselves; you've got to look at it much more holistically in the whole of your farming system," Bailey said. That includes looking at the rest of the field, getting crop residue or debris back into the soil, and pivoting to a no-till system, he said. Still, Koskella said that there is no doubt that seed coatings "have to be part of our future."

Why investors pumped $100 million into a startup using microbial fungi to turn soil into a crucial tool in the fight against climate change

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Two dozen companies plans to buy $53 million worth of carbon-removal credits from Charm Industrial.</li><li>The startup converts corn stalks and other plant waste into bio-oil, then pumps it underground.</li><li>Climate scientists say carbon removal is essential to keep global warming below catastrophic levels.</li></ul>Not all oil is bad for the planet. Two dozen companies announced plans Thursday to buy $53 million worth of carbon-removal credits from Charm Industrial, which converts corn stalks, leaves, and other waste leftover from agricultural harvests into bio-oil. Charm then pumps that carbon-rich oil underground to be permanently stored. It's a way to prevent organic matter from breaking down and further warming the atmosphere. The company says the oil hardens within days and it estimates the carbon dioxide is locked away for 1 million years.The agreement, one of the largest to date involving the carbon-removal industry, would prevent 112,000 tons of carbon dioxide from entering the atmosphere between 2024 and 2030. That's far more than the <a href="https://newsletter.businessinsider.com/click/31520770.12795/aHR0cHM6Ly9jaGFybWluZHVzdHJpYWwuY29tL3JlZ2lzdHJ5P3V0bV9tZWRpdW09bmV3c2xldHRlcg/628bdf90094963f5ad0eef3eB34a22263" target="_blank" rel="noopener">6,055 tons that Charm Industrial has removed to date</a> under pilot programs. "This purchase is super helpful for fundraising and going out and building up capacity," Peter Reinhardt, the company's cofounder and CEO, told Insider. "It's hard to build capacity for something that doesn't have demand, so a signed contract is really impactful."The deal <a href="https://frontierclimate.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">was facilitated by Frontier</a>, which was launched last year by Stripe, Alphabet, Shopify, Meta, and McKinsey Sustainability aimed at jump-starting the carbon-removal market with a $1 billion commitment. Frontier had spent only <a href="https://frontierclimate.com/portfolio" target="_blank" rel="noopener">$5.6 million on carbon removal</a> before Thursday's deal with Charm Industrial. Climate scientists say that carbon removal is essential to stave off catastrophe. Even if countries reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, it likely won't be fast enough to keep global temperatures from rising above 1.5 degrees Celsius compared with preindustrial levels. Meeting that global climate goal <a href="https://www.wri.org/initiatives/carbon-removal" target="_blank" rel="noopener">will likely require billions of metric tons</a> of carbon dioxide to be removed from the atmosphere by 2050.There are various carbon-removal technologies. Startups like Climeworks <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/carbon-dioxide-removal-air-sky-machine-climate-change-climeworks-2023-1">are using fans to suck carbon dioxide out of the sky</a>, while others are using enhanced weathering that speeds up the natural ability of minerals to store carbon dioxide.For its part, Charm Industrial buys agricultural waste from farmers and heats it to high temperatures in a contraption called a pyrolyzer. The process creates both bio-oil and biochar. The bio-oil is pumped <a href="https://charmindustrial.com/faq?question=is-it-safe-to-inject-bio-oil-underground_7d367946" target="_blank" rel="noopener">into wells and salt caverns</a> that store industrial waste or were left behind by oil and gas companies — and that the Environmental Protection Agency regulates."This is an opportunity to clean up these end-of-life oil and gas assets," Reinhardt said. "We can take these abandoned assets that may be leaking oil or methane, refill the empty formation and then plug it or properly seal it off."Farmers can add the biochar to their fields, which <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/cities-will-make-soil-additive-biochar-to-help-climate-2022-6">can improve soil health and sequester more carbon</a>. But Charm Industrial doesn't account for that in its measurement of how much carbon the company is removing. The <a href="https://charmindustrial.com/Bio-oil_Sequestration__Protocol_for_Measurement_Reporting_and_Verification.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">life-cycle analysis</a> includes the total carbon stored, minus emissions from transportation, pyrolysis, and the injection underground. Today, Charm Industrial charges $600 per ton of carbon removed, but Reinhardt said that could drop to less than $100 by 2040 as the company scales. Growing the company will require access to more agricultural waste, known as biomass. It's also used in renewable diesel and sustainable aviation fuels. Yet Reinhardt isn't worried about a biomass shortage."I would say this is a theoretical concern we encounter in academic circles, but in practice is very far from reality," he said. "Maybe at a really massive scale there starts to be some questions about how we are going to compete for biomass. Right now, we have biomass coming out of our ears."

Charm Industrial is getting $53 million to turn agricultural waste into oil that can lock away carbon dioxide for 1 million years

<a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/one-planet"></a><div type="image" title="Two women work in a Trace Genomics lab" height="2397" width="3196" msid="100190909" hostid="261" sizebytes="260700"></div><ul class="summary-list"><li><a href="https://www.fao.org/3/cb1928en/cb1928en.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">More than one-quarter</a> of all species lives in soil.</li><li>Soil biodiversity enables farming, purifies water, sequesters carbon, and more.</li><li>The women-led biotech startup Trace Genomics is working to reverse human-caused soil erosion.</li></ul>If you've ever held a gram of soil, odds are you had more than <a href="https://aeon.co/ideas/there-are-more-microbial-species-on-earth-than-stars-in-the-sky" target="_blank" rel="noopener">10,000 species</a> at your fingertips.You might flinch at the thought of billions of bacteria, fungi, and critters at work under our feet, but dirt is home to a living network that can protect crops and humans from disease, purify and conserve water, break down pollutants, and remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Whether directly or indirectly, <a href="https://www.fao.org/3/i4405e/i4405e.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">we rely on healthy soils for 95% of our food</a>. More than <a href="https://www.fao.org/3/cb1928en/cb1928en.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">one-quarter of all species lives in soil</a>, and this underground apparatus has a trickle-up effect: Life above ground begins with the microscopic biome beneath it.But we can't see it, we don't know a lot about it — and we're destroying it. Human activities like farming, deforestation, overgrazing, and construction all lead to soil erosion. If this were a Marvel movie, we're the supervillain deactivating the force field around the realm. Even farmland protected by no-till techniques still <a href="https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/2019/08/4.-SPM_Approved_Microsite_FINAL.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">erodes 10 to 20 times as fast as new soil can form</a>.The UN estimates that restoring land and preventing both biodiversity loss and greenhouse-gas emissions from soil could mean <a href="https://www.unccd.int/news-stories/press-releases/chronic-land-degradation-un-offers-stark-warnings-and-practical" target="_blank" rel="noopener">an economic return of more than $125 trillion every year</a>.Soil-data companies such as the Iowa startup <a href="https://tracegenomics.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Trace Genomics</a> are trying to help farmers reverse that trend. Trace's executives told Insider they'd raised $56 million since 2015 to provide farmers with data and diagnostics about the biodiversity in their fields.<h2>Building a soil-DNA database</h2>While humans have identified more than <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2022/03/30/mammals-not-discovered-study/7207604001/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">80% of mammals</a>, by one estimate, we may have identified only <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/24/science/one-trillion-microbes-on-earth.html#:~:text=According%20to%20a%20new%20estimate,have%20yet%20to%20be%20discovered." target="_blank" rel="noopener">0.001% of microbial species</a>. Put another way, there are likely more species of microbes on Earth than <a href="https://aeon.co/ideas/there-are-more-microbial-species-on-earth-than-stars-in-the-sky" target="_blank" rel="noopener">stars in the galaxy</a>.In response to this challenge, Trace specializes in metagenomics, which uses similar technology as a doctor might use to test a patient's stomach microbiome. But instead of sampling the microbes managing our gut health, it aims to sequence the DNA of all the microbes in a soil sample.Trace Genomics' president, Poornima Parameswaran, has been working with DNA sequencing for nearly two decades. She realized she could use it to fill an information gap in soil health and sustainable agriculture."Unless and until you know what's in the soil, how do you know what opportunities exist and how to create products that really foster biodiversity and other soil functions?" Parameswaran said. <div type="image" title="A woman wearing a Trace Genomics t-shirt stands in a field." height="1833" width="2444" msid="100190911" hostid="261" sizebytes="497256"></div>Trace has one of the largest agricultural-soil databases in the world. One feature allows Trace to give farmers a score based on the presence of biodiversity, water, nutrients, and carbon in the soil. Based on that score, investors can better judge the soil sustainability of the product grown there.Trace also uses its data to provide analytics that farmers can use directly. For example, Trace can analyze soil functions like nutrient cycling — even if it doesn't know the name of the microorganisms doing the job.And it's not just our crops that would benefit from us learning more: Breakthroughs in human medicine such as <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2018/02/13/a-potentially-powerful-new-antibiotic-is-discovered-in-dirt/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">streptomycin and other antibiotics</a> came from soil fungi and bacteria.The opportunity to help fight crop diseases led Parameswaran and Diane Wu, her cofounder, to start Trace Genomics in 2015. Both researchers at Stanford at the time, they began walking fields with local berry and lettuce growers. They learned that as bans on chemicals came rolling in, the farmers struggled to find alternatives to effectively treat their fields.The two researchers first built a lab to diagnose diseases in berries and lettuce. Seven years later, Trace's system can give disease reports for more than 70 different crops. <h2>Providing farmers with data to better manage their fields</h2>Mike Toelle grows soybeans, corn, and alfalfa on his family-owned farm on the border of Minnesota and South Dakota. For the past five years, he's been helping Trace gather data as part of its pilot program.In that time, Trace's challenge has been to zero in on meaningful diagnostics for farmers. "Initially, it was almost overwhelming because there's so much information," Toelle said. Trace's clients, including Toelle, transfer about three samples of the soil from each of their fields into small coffee bags, mark them with a GPS location, and mail them to Trace's lab in Ames, Iowa. From there, Trace's scientists extract the DNA from the soil and run it through a sequencing machine — a nearly 200-pound device that looks like a tabletop office printer.After the sequencer runs for 25 to 30 hours, they've generated up to five gigabytes of data that they analyze, upload to their digital platform, and share with the farmer in various forms, such as color-coded maps.<div type="image" title="A screenshot of a Trace Genomics' TraceView platform with the selection &quot;Phosphorus Saturation Level.&quot; It shows an aerial map of a farmer's fields highlighted in green, yellow, and red." height="727" width="1160" msid="100190913" hostid="261" sizebytes="78708"></div>Farmers have historically had access to chemical tests for their soils, which can give information such as the presence of nutrients or a field's acidity. Some companies offer DNA sequencing to test fields for specific diseases. But Trace is one of few companies to analyze the entirety of a field's biology: the billions of microscopic citizens that live in every tablespoon of soil.Trace's data about the living residents in soil allows it to tell farmers new information about their soil health, such as how well their fields can hold on to crucial nutrients including nitrogen and phosphorus.Toelle told Insider that Trace's nutrient and disease data had helped him decide how much fertilizer to spread and which crop varieties to plant, as well as where to put them on his fields."Every soil is different," Toelle said. "Even within a field, your soils are different, so we really need to understand and get very precise about what we're doing even within a field boundary." Jason Stegink, an agronomist who serves as a consultant for farmers in western Michigan, is working toward having more than half of his clients use Trace's service.On one field, a test from Trace confirmed an insight that took him two years to notice without it.While a traditional chemical test had told him there were plenty of nutrients on the field, he realized his crop was growing unevenly. He needed to add more fertilizer because low microbiological health was preventing the nutrients from being shared throughout the soil."The Trace data told us that in one shot," Stegink said.But Trace's precision comes at a tenfold price. Where a chemical test might run him $20, Trace's test could run him $200.Still, the cost of DNA sequencing has plunged since the turn of the century. While sequencing a human genome cost more than <a href="https://www.genome.gov/about-genomics/fact-sheets/DNA-Sequencing-Costs-Data" target="_blank" rel="noopener">$100,000 in 2000, current prices are typically less than $1,000</a>.<h2>Helping farmers and developers define sustainability</h2>As farmers try to both increase production and decrease waste, soil insights like those from Trace could help them decide which crops, fertilizers, and chemicals to spread and where.For example, farmers can combine data from Trace, or similar soil-data companies including <a href="https://www.pattern.ag/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Pattern Ag</a> and <a href="https://biomemakers.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Biome Makers</a>, with precision agriculture technologies such as autonomous tractors that run on GPS systems.<div type="image" title="Aerial view of a grid including dozens of farm fields that are various shades of green and yellow." height="3024" width="4032" msid="100190915" hostid="261" sizebytes="451960"></div>And to move away from fertilizers, which are finite resources and require massive mining and transportation chains, the agriculture industry can use information from Trace to test eco-friendly alternatives like biologicals. These organic products include microorganisms, insects, and plant extracts that could replace the need for generic fertilizers by regenerating the living network in soil.With the market for agricultural biologicals projected to <a href="https://www.marketwatch.com/press-release/agricultural-biologicals-market-size-trends-comprehensive-research-study-development-status-opportunities-and-growth-by-forecast-2029-2023-04-28?tesla=y" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reach almost $30 billion</a> by 2029, it's certain that many more eyes will be on the industry than before."Trace is one of the pieces that might be able to help not only verify some of those products in their efficacy but also target our integration of some of those products," Stegink said. Toelle and Stegink agreed that Trace's price and precision would improve over time.Just as technologies such as microbiome sequencing and probiotics are innovating the way patients are experiencing doctor visits, companies like Trace are working to bring the same tech to soil treatment."If we can prescriptively treat things going forward, everything is better," Stegink said. "Our performance is better in the field. Our cost is better. Our environmental impact is better."

More than 25% of biodiversity is under our feet — but we're destroying it. A biotech startup that's raised $56 million has a plan to help save our soil.

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Researchers grew plants in soil from the <keyword id="11900364" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="moon" source="Orion">moon</keyword> for the first time.</li><li>Though the seedlings experienced stress and stunted growth, they still sprouted.</li></ul>For the first time, scientists have grown plants in soil from the moon. Their insights could one day help future space farmers grow earthly plants on other worlds.In a new study, published Thursday in the journal <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s42003-022-03334-8">Communications Biology</a>, researchers at the University of Florida planted seeds in samples of soil from the moon, more properly called lunar regolith, which was brought to Earth a half-century ago by the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/every-nasa-apollo-mission-in-history-explained-2018-12">Apollo astronauts</a>.The experiment consisted of using 12 grams — just a few teaspoons — of lunar soil collected during the Apollo 11, 12, and 17 missions, along with a control group of volcanic soil from Earth, which has a similar composition to lunar dirt. Researchers planted seeds of fast-growing thale cress, a weedy plant, which is often used in <keyword id="11896083" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="science" source="Orion">science</keyword> due to its fully mapped genetic code. The seeds sprouted within three days."We were filled with wonder as we handled these samples, collected by Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, Pete Conrad, Alan Bean, Gene Cernan, Harrison Schmidt, and the other moonwalkers of the 1960s and 1970s," the research team wrote in an opinion piece for <a href="https://thehill.com/opinion/technology/3485990-plants-can-grow-in-moon-dirt-heres-why-knowing-that-is-so-important/">The Hill</a>. "Seeing the seeds sprout was awe-inspiring, knowing that our research may one day help astronauts grow plants as a source of food and oxygen during deep space missions and long stays on the moon."<h1>Houston, we have a plant </h1>Reliably cultivating crops in space will be necessary for <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/jane-poynter-space-perspective-founder-space-travel-crucial-protect-earth-2022-3">would-be space travelers</a> to survive longer missions, according to Rob Ferl, one of the study authors and a professor of horticultural sciences at the University of Florida. "For future, longer space missions, we may use the moon as a hub or launching pad. It makes sense that we would want to use the soil that's already there to grow plants," Ferl said in a <a href="https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/952289">statement</a>. "So, what happens when you grow plants in lunar soil, something that is totally outside of a plant's evolutionary experience? What would plants do in a lunar greenhouse? Could we have lunar farmers?"Perhaps unsurprisingly, researchers found that the plants grew better in the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/philippine-taal-volcano-eruption-steam-ash-plume-thousands-evacuate-2022-3">earthly volcanic ash</a> than they did lunar soil. But they could grow."We found that plants do indeed grow in lunar regolith. However, they respond as if they're growing in a stressful situation," Anna-Lisa Paul, a research professor of horticultural sciences at University of Florida and co-author of the study, told reporters at a press conference ahead of the announcement.The plants grown in lunar dirt were smaller and grew more slowly than their counterparts grown in soil from Earth. Many of their leaves had black-and-red discoloration, indicative of stress and overall ill-health. A genetic analysis of the plants revealed those grown in lunar soil expressed genes related to salt and oxidative stress.<div type="image" title="This 2021 photo shows the differences between thale cress plants grown in volcanic ash from Earth, which had a similar particle size and mineral composition to lunar soil, left, compared with those grown in the lunar soil, right, after 16 days." height="2666" width="3554" msid="91568895" hostid="261"></div>Lunar soil is vastly different from the soil that plants typically grow in on Earth: "The moon is very, very poor in water, carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus. So naturally lunar soils don't have a lot of nutrients that are needed to support plant growth," Stephen Elardo, assistant professor of geology at University of Florida and co-author of the study, said at the press conference. "It's not something you would want to breathe in. It would damage your lungs. You wouldn't want to put it in your garden to grow your tomatoes," he added.Though the seedlings grown in lunar soil were stressed and stunted compared with plants grown in Earth soil, they still sprouted and grew. The milestone could supply researchers with <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-astronauts-share-successful-harvest-of-fresh-vegetables-2021-4">lessons on how agriculture</a> could support human outposts in other worlds.Still, we are a long ways off from space farmers tilling lunar soil and living off the land. The moon's atmosphere lacks the constant access to oxygen and water needed for plants to thrive. Further research on lunar gardening might help would-be space travelers to grow food source during long-term missions."We need to work out how to make the plants grow even better in this regolith substrate," Sharmila Bhattacharya, chief scientist for astrobionics at NASA, who was not a part of the study, told <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2022/05/12/world/plants-lunar-soil-scn/index.html">CNN</a>. "For example, do we need to add other components to help the plants along, and if so, what are they? Are there other plants that can adapt better to these regolith substrates, and if so, what traits make them more robust to these environments?"Bhattacharya added: "That's what's so exciting about science; each new finding leads to more unique and transformative results down the road, which we can then use to help improve sustainability for our future space exploration missions!"

Researchers successfully grew plants in Apollo-era lunar soil. Their work could inform future space farmers.

<ul class="summary-list"><li>More than 1 billion children are at extreme risk for weather disasters, a <a href="https://www.unicef.org/media/105376/file/UNICEF-climate-crisis-child-rights-crisis.pdf">UNICEF report</a> found.</li><li>The majority of these kids live in countries that contribute the least to <keyword id="11949068" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="carbon-emissions" source="Orion">carbon emissions</keyword>. </li></ul>Tahsin Uddin, a 23-year-old climate activist who lives in the southern city of Barisal in Bangladesh, has already lost one family home to coastal flooding and rising sea levels. Within the next few years, he expects his current home to be submerged under water as well.Uddin is just one of the millions of Bangladeshis and others across the globe facing the brutal consequences of the <keyword id="11896310" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="climate-crisis" source="Orion">climate crisis</keyword>.By 2050, more than 20 million Bangladeshis will be displaced and nearly 20% of the country's land will be underwater because of rising sea levels, a direct impact of the changing climate, according to the<a href="https://www.nrdc.org/onearth/bangladesh-country-underwater-culture-move"> Natural Resources Defense Council,</a> a nonprofit climate advocacy group.Uddin told Insider the impact of those rising sea levels can be seen throughout the country: "I go to different coastal areas. I saw how much people are suffering. They are trying to survive by drinking salty water. Saline water is very dangerous for their health."While the consequences of <keyword id="11896311" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="climate-change" source="Orion">climate change</keyword> are pummeling Bangladesh, it contributes very little to carbon emissions.<div type="image" title="Villagers wade through waist-deep waters to reach their homes in Pratap Nagar that lies in the Shyamnagar region, in Satkhira, Bangladesh on Oct. 5, 2021" height="1333" width="1777" msid="87688716" hostid="261"></div>In 2020, more than <a href="https://www.statista.com/statistics/264699/worldwide-co2-emissions/">34 billion metric tons of carbon (CO2) were emitted</a> worldwide, but the countries that contributed the least to that total are already facing some of the most significant impacts of the climate crisis.A <a href="https://www.unicef.org/media/105376/file/UNICEF-climate-crisis-child-rights-crisis.pdf">UNICEF report</a> published in August found more than 1 billion children, nearly half the world's kids, lived in places with a high risk of <keyword id="12019615" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="extreme-weather" source="Orion">extreme weather</keyword> events. The 33 countries where the climate crisis poses the most risk to children contributed only 9% of global CO2 emissions, while 70% of emissions were attributed to just 10 countries.A <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/srep20281">2016 study</a> found 20 of the 36 highest-emitting countries were among the least vulnerable to the effects of a warming climate, while 11 of the 17 countries with low or moderate emissions were significantly vulnerable.Some of the countries with low emissions per capita that are at a high risk include Bangladesh, India, Philippines, and multiple countries in sub-Saharan Africa, the Caribbean, and South America.They are facing heat waves, water scarcity, coastal flooding, and water-borne disease, among other hazards, which in turn can lead to poor sanitation, lack of food, scarce income, and deteriorating living conditions. Meanwhile, many of the places currently experiencing these effects lack the infrastructure or resources to mitigate them.Experts and climate activists have said that while countries contributing the most need to reduce emissions, poorer countries are in need of immediate funding to address current challenges.<h2>Heat waves have killed thousands in India in recent years</h2>In the summer of 2019, large swaths of India were <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/13/world/asia/india-heat-wave-deaths.html">scorched by temperatures</a> greater than 113 degrees Fahrenheit for nearly three weeks. In some regions, officials closed local schools. Medical authorities <a href="https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/heat-wave-conditions-in-rajasthan-leaves-of-churu-doctors-cancelled-2049388">canceled time off for doctors</a> to ensure hospitals could handle the influx of patients.Four passengers <a href="https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/kerala-express-passengers-dead-heatwave-uttar-pradesh-jhansi-1546733-2019-06-11">fell ill on board an express train</a> that lacked air conditioning, and died by the time the train reached a station in Jhansi, south of New Delhi."Shortly after we left Agra, the heat became unbearable and some people started complaining of breathing problems and uneasiness. Before we could get some help, they collapsed," a passenger told <a href="https://www.indiatoday.in/india/story/kerala-express-passengers-dead-heatwave-uttar-pradesh-jhansi-1546733-2019-06-11">India Today</a>.By the end of that summer heat wave, <a href="https://www.indiaspend.com/65-indians-exposed-to-heatwaves-in-may-june-2019-july-2019-was-indias-hottest-ever/">more than 200 people had died</a>. The heat wave of 2015 was far worse, with extreme heat causing the deaths of more than 2,000 people. In the past decade, more than 6,000 people in India have died as a result of excessive heat, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/13/world/asia/india-heat-wave-deaths.html">according to government data</a>.<div type="image" title="In this Thursday, May 30, 2019, file photo, children returning from school walk through a dried pond on a hot summer day on the outskirts of Jammu, India. Many parts of India are experiencing extreme heat conditions." height="3723" width="4964" msid="87688718" hostid="261"></div>"Climate change is leading to more frequent, more intense, and longer heat waves around the world," said Olga Wilhelmi, a scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, adding that the link has been well-documented.An estimated 820 million children, more than a third of kids worldwide, are highly exposed to heat waves, according to the UNICEF report."Extreme heat is probably one of the least appreciated weather hazards, but it's actually one of the more deadly weather hazards in the US and worldwide," Wilhelmi said. "Studies show that in the US, somewhere on average between 600 and 1,800 people die from extreme heat every year, but we don't usually read about that in the news."Health complications of extreme heat can vary from dehydration to heatstroke. Heat waves can also exacerbate cardiovascular and respiratory diseases. Groups at a higher risk include older people, children, people with pre-existing conditions, and those who are lower-income and do not have access to air conditioning.Heat waves can also shut down electric grids when they don't have the capacity to handle the increased demand for air conditioning.<h2>Lack of water leads to poverty and hunger </h2>Water scarcity, the lack of adequate access to clean water, is another way people are feeling the climate crisis.While scarcity can be due to institutional failures to deliver water, in many instances it's due to dwindling water sources or growing populations that need more water. More than a third of kids worldwide, 920 million are currently highly exposed to water scarcity. This issue affects kids in various parts of the world including parts of India, South America, Australia, and the Middle East. For example, while parts of India are at extreme risk of scarcity, the country only contributed to 3.14% of overall emissions in 2019. <div type="image" title="Tonchuiwon Tinphei, 34, right, and her sister-in-law Chirmi carry water in baskets and walk home on the eve of World Water Day in Shangshak village, in the northeastern Indian state of Manipur, Saturday, March 21, 2020." height="1333" width="1778" msid="87688720" hostid="261"></div>Greg Pierce, the co-director of the Water Resources Group: Institute of the Environment and Sustainability at UCLA, told Insider the biggest effect could be felt in rural areas. Pierce said rural areas tend to be poorer and have one water source. Residents are usually already walking long distances to get to that water which may not always be clean. Water isn't just needed for drinking, but for producing and selling agriculture. Water is very much tied to livelihoods. "The scarcity issue makes it harder to do agriculture, which is what most rural populations rely on for livelihoods. So, there's a hunger, inability to grow food and inability to earn any money," Pierce told Insider. "That lack of water leads directly to people starving and that is going to become a lot more common, unfortunately again, in many parts of the world."When those resources dry up, residents would be forced to travel even further or move, further straining resources. While many parts of India are dealing with water scarcity, other regions are also experiencing flooding, Pierce said. However, the flooding comes with other complications and doesn't counter the consequences of water scarcity. <h2>Coastal flooding, which destroys property and resources, is already taking a heavy toll in Bangladesh</h2>In Uddin's home of Bangladesh, rising seas and extreme precipitation have inundated communities with flooding in recent years.The village of Bonnotola, once home to more than 2,000 people, has less than 500 residents left, as the flooding and salt water-tainted soil destroyed many people's homes and livelihoods, the <a href="https://apnews.com/article/climate-science-europe-environment-and-nature-bangladesh-0f2a0a0f463523a162901f1beda23c7e">Associated Press</a> reported.One woman from the village of Gabura told AP everyone used to grow food in their backyards, but that salt water flooding has disrupted the once-fertile lands and freshwater that many relied on."We have water everywhere, but we don't have a drop anymore to drink from ponds or wells," she said.Almost every ocean on Earth is experiencing a sea-level rise, according to William Sweet, an oceanographer at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.One in 10 children, or 240 million, are currently exposed to coastal flooding, according to the UNICEF report. Sea-level rise is exacerbated by extreme rainfall events, which are also a consequence of warming."The same heating that's causing oceans to rise, ice caps and ice sheets to melt, and oceans to expand, is also enabling more moisture to be held within the atmosphere," Sweet said, adding that the result is frequent heavy rains. "The combined effect of course is flooding with nowhere for that water to go."While the threat of entire cities being underwater is the most commonly talked about result of rising sea levels, there are many significant issues that arise well before a city or property is actually underwater."It's not when you're underwater, it's when the system fails," Sweet said, adding that flooding can overwhelm infrastructure and destroy roadways, stormwater and wastewater systems, and people's personal property.He said by the time areas are actually underwater, people are already gone by then, driven out by the flooding.<div type="image" title="Bangladeshi flood victim man carrying their houses by boat during flood in Kurigram, Bangladesh on July 27, 2019." height="1333" width="1777" msid="87688722" hostid="261"></div>Coastal flooding creates more problems where water infrastructure is lacking, Pierce told Insider."Flooding doesn't typically increase water supply. It can have a direct impact on water-borne illness, especially because there's poor sanitation in a lot of places and when there's flooding, it gets into wherever the waste is being contained or into the open sewers and spreads," he said. <h2>Diseases are becoming more prevalent in sub-Saharan Africa and South America because of the climate crisis</h2>As temperatures rise, cities flood and water becomes scarce, there's also a rise of waterborne illnesses with an estimated 600 million children currently exposed to diseases like malaria and dengue fever, according to the UNICEF report. The impact can be most immediately felt in countries in sub-Saharan Africa and South America. Martin Muchangi, AMREF water and sanitation specialist based in Kenya, told Insider he studies waterborne illnesses across much of sub-Saharan Africa, and that a vast majority of people are dealing with water scarcity which in turn is driving up waterborne diseases.Muchangi said the issue is twofold: changing temperatures pushing things like mosquitoes into more places and increasing pathogens that cause diarrhea illnesses like cholera and typhoid and the lack of water leading to poor hygiene and diseases like scabies or glaucoma. He told Insider the problem is leading to harming both people and the economy. "So now at the end of the day, if you combine the sum total, you realize that there's major economic loss, there's serious effects to the health, there's serious effects to the thriving of children," he said. <h2>Many countries facing the worst of the climate crisis also have the least resources to address it </h2>While nowhere on earth will escape the effects of the climate crisis, some countries have infrastructure and resources that make them more prepared to respond.Pierce told Insider many of the impacts can be mitigated with robust public health initiatives and proper infrastructure. Water filtration systems, for example, can mitigate the risks of water-borne disease.Muchangi and Uddin told Insider the countries they live and work in, however, don't have the funds they need to address the issues they're facing. In Bangladesh, Uddin said funding is needed to direct towards researching ways to remove salt from saltwater and towards building infrastructure that can withstand flooding, including fortifying schools, hospitals, homes, and other essential buildings. Muchangi said that while finding ways to mitigate the immediate impacts of the changing climate is necessary, limiting CO2 emissions would greatly reduce the burden."If we are able to alleviate climate change itself, then the effects of climate change are going to become lesser and we are going to be able to thrive in a better way," he said.

Countries contributing the least to the climate crisis are feeling the worst of its effects

<ul class="summary-list"><li>The United Nations <keyword id="11901561" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="environment" source="Orion">Environment</keyword> Programme says the era of leaded petrol is officially over.</li><li>The milestone will prevent over 1.2 million premature deaths a year.</li><li>Leaded petrol causes heart disease, strokes, cancer, and stunts brain development, UNEP says.</li></ul>The era of leaded petrol is officially over in a milestone victory for human and planetary health, the United Nations Environment Programme <a href="https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories/press-release/era-leaded-petrol-over-eliminating-major-threat-human-and-planetary">said on Monday</a>. UNEP estimates that banning the use of leaded petrol will prevent more than 1.2 million premature deaths and save the global economy $2.45 trillion each year, as well as decrease crime rates.Monday's milestone announcement comes after nearly two decades of campaigning by UNEP to eliminate the use of lead in petrol, which has contaminated air, soil, dust, drinking water and food crops. The global end of petrol use officially started in July after it was no longer provided by service stations in Algeria. The organization said leaded petrol causes heart disease, strokes and cancer, while also stunting brain development."The successful enforcement of the ban on leaded petrol is a huge milestone for global health and our environment," said Inger Andersen, Executive Director of UNEP. "Overcoming a century of deaths and illnesses that affected hundreds of millions and degraded the environment worldwide, we are invigorated to change humanity's trajectory for the better through an accelerated transition to clean vehicles and electric mobility." Most high-income countries prohibited the use of leaded petrol by the 1980s, UNEP said. Yet, in 2002, when the organization started its campaign, nearly all low- and middle-income countries were still using leaded petrol. The organization said fast-growing global vehicle production still threatens air, water, and soil with pollution, and that the transportation sector is responsible for "nearly a quarter of energy-related global <keyword id="11984592" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="greenhouse-gas" source="Orion">greenhouse gas</keyword> emissions."The automotive industry is well underway with efforts to slow <keyword id="11949068" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="carbon-emissions" source="Orion">carbon emissions</keyword>, in part by ramping up the development and production of electrified vehicles. Several countries including Norway, the Netherlands, France, and Britain have already set forth plans to ban the sale of gasoline-powered vehicles in the next 10 to 15 years.UNEP said the end of leaded petrol will help to satisfy many of the <a href="https://sdgs.un.org/goals">United Nations'</a> sustainable development goals, like clean water and energy, good health and well-being, and sustainable cities.

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