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What made the rain in Hurricane Harvey so extreme? credits :  The rainfall from Harvey has now exceeded the amount from the previous record-bearer, Tropical Storm Amelia in 1978. AP Photo/Charlie Riedel Russ Schumacher , Colorado State University Fifty inches of rain. Nine trillion gallons of water . The Gulf Coast of Texas, and especially the Houston metropolitan area, has been inundated by rain produced by Hurricane Harvey. And as of this writing, the rain continues along a broad swath of the Gulf Coast, with a flood threat extending all the way east through New Orleans to the Florida Panhandle. Even for one of the wettest and most flood-prone parts of the United States, the rainfall totals and flooding are breaking records. So, what has made Harvey such a prodigious rain producer? Left panel: Rainfall accumulation for four days ending Tuesday, Aug. 29, 2017 at 9 a.m. CDT. Right pan...

Mumbai floods: what happens when cities sacrifice ecology for development Credits : Harini Nagendra , Azim Premji University As the storm that was hurricane Harvey deluged the areas around Houston, Texas, large parts of northern India, Nepal and Bangladesh also experienced heavy rains. And the city of Mumbai was hit by another major flooding espisode . Several people have died in the city, many in the collapse of a four-storey building that is believed to have been weakened by the rains. Overcrowded cities Such loss of life in urban areas is often blamed on India’s overcrowding. Cities are growing at unprecedented rates. From a population of 2.86 million in 1950 , Mumbai is now home to more than 21 million people, and is expected to have almost 28 million by 2030 . Built along the coastline on a series of islands, the city is surrounded by water: in mudflats, lakes, creeks, rivers, and the ever-present coastline. Given the astronomical land prices in many...

It only takes a few countries to kickstart a decarbonisation revolution Solar energy is now powering much of the world. kenlund/flickr , CC BY-SA Credits : Markus Hagemann , Utrecht University and Andrzej Ancygier , New York University In 2016, more renewable energy was added to the global grid than ever before, and at a lower cost. A global energy revolution is clearly underway. What catalysed this transformation? In our latest study, Faster and Cleaner 2: Kick-Starting Decarbonization , we looked at the trends driving decarbonisation in three key sectors of the global energy system – power, transportation and buildings. By following the emission commitments and actions of countries, we examined what forces can drive rapid transition through our Climate Action Tracker analysis . It turns out that, in these fields, it has taken only a few players to set in motion the kind of transformations that will be necessary to meet the...

Global series: Emerging Cities Sun Brockie/flickr , CC BY-SA credits :  Catesby Holmes , The Conversation ; Clea Chakraverty , The Conversation ; Fabrice Rousselot , The Conversation , and Stephan Schmidt, The Conversation Cities have been in the spotlight recently, as hundreds of American mayors responded to the US withdrawal from the Paris climate deal by signing onto the international agreement themselves . There’s virtually no precedent for such local engagement with global affairs. But cities have always been labs of innovation, as well as hotbeds of crime and inequality, architectural stunners, decaying ruins and everything in between. Our series Emerging Cities examines how urban areas around the globe, from Paraguay to Iran, are changing and making change. People power: how communities can save the environment From citizens who sit on the boards of energy companies to neighbourhoods that help fund local wind fa...

Global series: Humans in our Habitat Families at a tree planting day at Te Muri, New Zealand in June 2017. Greenfleet Australia/flickr , CC BY-SA Catesby Holmes , The Conversation ; Clea Chakraverty , The Conversation ; Fabrice Rousselot , The Conversation , and Stephan Schmidt, The Conversation Credits   On the whole, humanity has been devastating for planet Earth . But our fates are linked, and people, on our good days, can also be nature’s greatest defenders. The Conversation Global’s series “ Humans in our Habitat ” tells the tales of conservation-minded communities, from rural Tibetans who’ve always understood the meaning of biodiversity to Bronx residents relearning how to respect their river. The small hands of Moroccan recycling A wastepicker working in the streets of Casablanca. (Photo Pascal Garret, July 2013) www.bab-el-louk.org, CC BY-NC-ND , CC BY-NC...

Antarctic ice reveals that fossil fuel extraction leaks more methane than thought The analysis of large amounts of ice from Antarctica’s Taylor Valley has helped scientists to tease apart the natural and human-made sources of the potent greenhouse gas methane. Hinrich Schaefer , CC BY-ND Hinrich Schaefer , National Institute of Water and Atmospheric credits :  The fossil fuel industry is a larger contributor to atmospheric methane levels than previously thought, according to our research which shows that natural seepage of this potent greenhouse gas from oil and gas reservoirs is more modest than had been assumed. In our research, published in Nature today , our international team studied Antarctic ice dating back to the last time the planet warmed rapidly, roughly 11,000 years ago. Katja Riedel and Hinrich Schaefer discuss NIWA’s ice coring work at Taylor Glacier in Antarctica. We ...