A coordinated observing campaign uncovered the causes of an unexpected methane plume spotted by satellite.
Methane is a potent greenhouse gas emitted by both...
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Highlights
Since 1989, the U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) has submitted annual reports to Congress called Our Changing Planet. The reports describe the status of USGCRP research activities, provide progress updates, and document recent accomplishments
In particular, Our Changing Planet highlights progress and accomplishments in interagency activities. These highlights represent the broad spectrum of USGCRP activities that extend from Earth system observations, modeling, and fundamental research through synthesis and assessment, decision support, education, and public engagement. Highlights describe the state of science at the time of publication of each yearly report, and may not reflect more recent advances in understanding. The date of publication of the source report is noted on each highlight page.
As of 2010, urban areas are home to more than half of the world's population, produce at least 70% of carbon-dioxide emissions from fossil fuels, and emit a significant amount of anthropogenic methane, but represent a small fraction of the Earth’s land surface. Currently, greenhouse gas emissions estimates for many cities are either unavailable or are generated using self-reported data from particular sectors, and contain significant uncertainties. Although methods for comprehensive measurement of urban emissions have been tested in smaller cities with stable emissions, these techniques...
In 2015, drought impacts in the Western United States cost an estimated $4.5 billion. Impacts included the fallowing of hundreds of thousands of acres of farmland, excess groundwater pumping, and the exacerbation of wildfire conditions, which contributed to fires that caused the highest annual total of U.S. acreage burned since record-keeping began in 1960. As these impacts become more prevalent under a changing climate, preparedness, including an early-warning system for drought conditions, is increasingly important in many parts of the United States. The...
Much of the precipitation along the U.S. West Coast is delivered by phenomena known as “atmospheric rivers”—narrow bands of moist air that may extend for thousands of miles across regions outside of the tropics, and play a critical role in regional water supply and storm activity. Atmospheric-river events play a beneficial role in building up Western water supply and snowpack but are also the source of a large majority of floods in the region. Many uncertainties about key processes that affect storm development...
On February 11, 2016, workers in California ended the largest reported natural gas leak in U.S. history. The Aliso Canyon leak released methane and other gases into the atmosphere from an underground-storage facility for over three months, causing the evacuation of more than 5,000 households. Researchers from NOAA, NASA, Scientific Aviation, the University of California, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the California Air Resources Board, and South Coast Air Quality Management District mobilized rapidly to assess the environmental impacts of the leak,...
Extreme events such as heavy rains, severe storms, drought, and heat waves can have devastating effects on infrastructure, the economy, and vulnerable segments of the population. A growing field of climate science seeks to understand the drivers behind extreme events and how they connect to broader climate trends. Building on efforts to monitor the global climate (see Highlight 1), a recent report published in BAMS integrates findings from 20 different research