Earth news stories

When Karin Andreassen set out for the Barents Sea, she knew she would find a lot of methane. The cold, shallow body of water just north of where Norway meets Russia is home to oil and gas fields, and methane—the main component of natural gas—naturally seeps out of the seafloor here. Andreassen, a marine geologist at UiT The Arctic University of Norway, also knew from surveys in the 90s that she’d find some underwater craters.

Never mind the Leaning Tower of Pisa – this is the leaning tower of pines.

Cook pines are towering trees that were once restricted to their native home of New Caledonia, an archipelago in the Pacific Ocean. Through cultivation, they have taken root across tropical, subtropical and temperate regions around the world.

Tumbleweeds may be iconic symbols of the American West, but regions around the world have their own versions of the wind-blown plants — even Antarctica.

Antarctica’s “tumbleweeds” look more like snowballs, but like their western namesake, they are created by the wind.

A new Tel Aviv University study has uncovered the earliest known geological indications of manmade impact on geological processes, in particular erosion of the surface, from 11,500 years ago. Within a core sample retrieved from the Dead Sea, researchers discovered basin-wide erosion rates dramatically incompatible with known tectonic and climatic regimes of the period recorded.

A new study combining European ice core data and historical records of the infamous Black Death pandemic of 1349-1353 shows metal mining and smelting have polluted the environment for thousands of years, challenging the widespread belief that environmental pollution began with the Industrial Revolution in the 1700s and 1800s.

It is not just the pollution caused by traffic that is affecting our health, but also the noise according to a new European study, which found that exposure to excessive traffic noise is linked to a higher risk of heart disease.

What do goats and squirrels have in common?

They both climb trees, of course. While squirrels live amongst the branches, goats, or at least those in arid regions, climb them for dinner. And that’s good for the goats, and the trees.

Using Earth-abundant materials, EPFL scientists have built the first low-cost system for splitting CO2 into CO, a reaction necessary for turning renewable energy into fuel.

Contamination of marine and terrestrial ecosystems by microplastics is putting individual organisms at risk.

The effects of plastic pollution in terrestrial environments remain largely unknown. To date, the majority of research has focused on aquatic systems, as 10 million to 20 million tons of plastic litter find their way to the oceans each year.

Imagine being a scuba diver and leaving your air tank behind you on a dive. That’s essentially what humans are doing as we expand our footprint on the planet without paying adequate attention to impacts on other living things, according to researchers. Both ominous and hopeful, a new report paints a picture of the value of biodiversity, the threats it faces and the window of opportunity we have to save species before it’s too late.

Consumers should consider going organic because pesticides on foods are far more dangerous than was thought, causing damage to the human brain, a major study suggests.

Retreating glaciers have left villages in Ladakh with acute water shortages. Local engineer Sonam Wangchuk, noticing one day how ice under a bridge stayed frozen even in summer, came up with a solution as ingenious as it is beautiful

An expanse of ice roughly the size of Delaware is close to breaking off from the warming Antarctic ice shelf to form one of the world’s largest-ever icebergs, scientists said Thursday.

Call it the largest fart in Earth’s history. As the most recent ice age came to a close 12,000 years ago, retreating glaciers in the Barents Sea north of Norway triggered unprecedented blowouts of methane gas from massive dome-like features on the seabed.

To find a month when the global average temperature over the land and oceans was below average, you have to go all the way back to December 1984, according to the latest monthly analysis from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

By swapping solar photovoltaics for coal, the US could prevent 51,999 premature deaths a year, potentially making as much as $2.5 million for each life saved.