Even the big oil companies are predicting global demand will decline within decades. With investment in oil exploration projected to decline too, New Zealand should be putting its energy elsewhere.
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Articles on Science + Environment
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Earth’s climate system is connected across hemispheres. When the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation weakens and Europe cools, warming in New Zealand and southern mid-latitudes accelerates.
The major benefit of agrivoltaics is that solar panels shelter crops and animals from the heat, while providing more warmth at night. Soils also retain more moisture and some crops grow better.
New Zealand tends to focus on big infrastructural projects such as tunnels or light rail to change cities. But there are cheaper ways to add public spaces to urban design.
Any decision to authorise offshore drilling and other activities contributing to climate change will now need to be assessed under the law of the sea in addition to international climate agreements.
AI chatbots offer unconditional support, but this could lead users to develop an inflated self image – and impede their chances of positive social interactions with real people.
When landslides or glaciers bring rocks to the surface, cosmic rays bombard them, smashing common atoms into rarer forms and acting as a chronometer of the changing Earth.
The rights-of-nature movement emerged as a response to economic pressures on ecosystems. But the success of projects depends on how well legal liability is defined.
Some 7,000 years ago, West Antarctica’s ice sheet retreated, most likely driven by warmer ocean currents slipping under the ice. This could happen again – unless we cut emissions fast.
Pollution on land inevitably ends up in the sea. Policy makers must stop working in silos and instead consider the indirect consequences human impacts on land have for marine environments.
The common triplefin is helping marine scientists understand the negative effects of ‘skyglow’ on coastal fish, which are already more exposed to microplastics, chemicals and noise pollution.
If a new declaration based on customary concepts of tikanga and mana is recognised by the courts, it could potentially give interest groups the legal standing to sue on behalf of whales.
Quality mental healthcare requires more than training clinicians. They also need to be supported to implement their knowledge in the therapy room.
Ocean warming seems the main driver of Antarctica’s sea-ice loss. But as satellites show, the change is not universal and sea ice persists in East Antarctica and the Weddell Sea.
Geoengineering proposals to cool the ocean would indeed reduce ice loss from West Antarctica’s glaciers, but not enough to stop sea-level rise or allow the ice sheet to regrow.
Marine protection represents our best strategy to reverse declining biodiversity. But protected areas also provide a low-tech and cost-effective way for the fishing industry to safeguard stocks.
Winemakers need to understand the full extent of climate change impacts on the industry, including how changes in temperature and humidity may affect the microbes that ferment grapes.
Monitoring methods based on environmental DNA are faster, more comprehensive and cheaper than traditional ecological surveys. They help fill gaps in New Zealand’s data on river health.
New Zealand’s plants and animals are globally unique and underpin primary production and tourism. The government’s fast-tracking proposal threatens to erode the natural capital the economy relies on.
New research comparing the geology of southern Africa with the deep seafloor near New Zealand challenges conventional views of how the planet behaved when it was very young.
Top contributors
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Senior Lecturer in Physical Geography, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington
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Morgan Foundation Senior Research Fellow in Freshwater Ecology and Environmental Science, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington
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Ice Sheet & Climate Modeller, GNS Science
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Senior Research Fellow, University of Canterbury
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Professor of Glaciology, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington
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Professor in Ocean Physics, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau
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Associate Professor of Applied Geology, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau
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Distinguished Scholar, NCAR; Affiliate Faculty, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau
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Associate Professor of Ecology, Lincoln University, New Zealand
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Professor of Environmental Genomics, Curtin University
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Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington
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Lecturer in Ecology, University of Otago
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Associate Professor in Geophysics, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington
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Senior Lecturer in Child Psychiatry and Paediatrics, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau
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Senior Researcher, Manaaki Whenua - Landcare Research
