A new regional assessment shows that Southeast Asia is a major net source of greenhouse gases, with land-use change and rising fossil fuel use overwhelming natural carbon sinks, reservoirs that store carbon-containing chemical compounds for a long period. 

Aviation’s climate impact extends beyond carbon dioxide emissions. A new study from Chalmers University of Technology and the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, and Imperial College, UK, reveals that contrails can represent a significant portion of aviation’s overall climate cost. The study also shows that climate impact can be reduced by optimising flight routes.

In a new article in Nature Communications, The social costs of aviation CO₂ and contrail cirrus, the researchers demonstrate that both CO₂ emissions and contrail formation contribute materially to aviation’s climate impact – and that the associated societal costs differ substantially depending on weather patterns and routing decisions. They find that, at the global level, contrails account for about 15 percent of aviation’s climate impact when measured in economic terms.

Intense storms that sweep over the Southern Ocean enable the ocean to absorb more heat from the atmosphere. New research from the University of Gothenburg shows that today’s climate models underestimate how storms mix the ocean and thereby give less reliable future projections of our climate.