Skeptical Science New Research for Week #34, 2021

Posted on 26 August 2021 by Doug Bostrom

AMS State of the Climate in 2020: Pay Attention

Only a couple of weeks ago the IPCC released its AR6 Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis synthesis report, the latest of a series of comprehensive, deeply sourced periodic updates describing our best understanding of how Earth's climate functions, and how it will malfunction if we misbehave and thereby alter the system, the "how we can change the climate, and what will happen if we do" perspective on anthropogenic climate change. The report focuses on matters relatively abstract with respect to our daily lives. This latest IPCC report tilts more to the perspective of what will happen in the future, and why. 

This week sees the American Meteorlogical Society (AMS) publish what might be called the third leg of our climate change information perch, State of the Climate in 2020 (PDF, 26MB), the "knowing what we do, how are we doing?" assessment from the best of our information at our closest fully recorded moment in time. Similarly to the IPCC's AR6, this is a massive review and synthesis of research literature from a broad span of  domains connected by climate change but (naturally given it's the AMS) with a more meteorological bent. Compared to the AR6, this is a more observationally based effort. Taking into account authors of works cited to describe the present climate situation, as with the AR6 there are thousands of researchers contrbuting to this synopsis.

So, how are we doing? In a nutshell, we're not living up to our potential. A few excerpts from the report's executive summary (PDF, 11MB) paint for us the general picture, not a hypothetical scenario but what is happening now:

• All major greenhouse gases, including CO2, reached new record high concentrations for the year. The annual global average carbon dioxide concentration at Earth’s surface was 412.5 ± 0.1 ppm, 2.5 ± 0.1 ppm more than in 2019, and the highest in at least the past 800,000 years. The year-overyear increase in the global CO2 levels has tripled over the past half century, from an average of 0.8 ± 0.3 ppm yr–1 in the 1960s to 2.4 ± 0.4 ppm yr–1 in the 2010s.

• In the cryosphere, alpine glaciers around the world continued to lose mass for the 33rd consecutive year, while permafrost temperatures were record high at many observing sites in both mountain and polar regions. Record high spring temperatures in central Siberia led to rapid snowmelt that contributed to the fourth-smallest snow cover extent in May for the Eurasian continent and record smallest in June.

• In 2020, the globally averaged ocean heat content was at a record high, and the global sea surface temperature was the third highest on record, surpassed only by 2016 and 2019. The annual global mean sea level set a new record for the ninth consecutive year, rising to 91.3 mm above the 1993 level, the year when satellite measurements of this indicator began.

• The ocean absorbed about 3.0 billion more metric tons of anthropogenic carbon dioxide than it released into the atmosphere in 2020. This is the highest amount since the start of the record in 1982 and almost 30% higher than the average of the past two decades. More carbon dioxide stored in the ocean means less remains in the atmosphere, but also leads to increasing acidification of the waters, which can greatly harm or shift ecosystems.

• The average surface air temperature over Arctic land areas in 2020 was the highest in the 121-year record, with notably high temperatures over north-central Siberia during most of the year. This was the seventh straight year with an annual temperature more than 1°C higher than the 1981–2010 average. On 20 June, a temperature of 38°C was observed at Verkhoyansk, Russia (67.6°N), provisionally the highest temperature ever measured within the Arctic Circle.

• In August, the time of year with the least amount of ice cover in the Arctic, the Laptev and Kara Seas—which border northern Siberia and where extreme warmth prevailed in 2020— had sea surface temperatures as much as 5.5°C above the 1982–2010 average for the month due to exceptionally low summer sea ice extent.

• An atmospheric river—a long, narrow region in the atmosphere that transports water vapor from subtropical and midlatitudes— brought extreme warmth to parts of Antarctica during austral summer. On 6 February, Esperanza Station reached 18.3°C, the highest temperature ever recorded on the continent, surpassing the previous record set in 2015 by 1.1°C. The warmth also led to the largest late-summer surface melt event in the 43-year record, affecting more than 50% of the Antarctic Peninsula and impacting elevations as high as 1,700 m.

And of course there's a lot more; the report is substantially a matter of observational derivation and there's a torrent of events to describe. The AMS SoC by its nature is not leavened by including obvious hints to improvement embedded in parameters, etc. This report is mostly a matter of quantified facts of just-recorded history, obvious warning signals denied to our cost.

What's reported in the AMS 2020 SoC is as we'd expect according to work such as that found in the latest IPCC AR6 scientific synthesis. Consilience will happen, whether or not we're ignorant of what we've done. Fortunately— again per the IPCC AR6— we're not ignorant. People who claim otherwise are laboring with  problems not connected with actual ignorance about how our climate functions, how we can change it,what will happen as we have done and continue to do. Those things we know, mostly leaving as our main mystery that of why human nature leads us to denial and evasion (as it happens, most editions of New Research sport at least a few articles delving into exactly the latter topic).

113 articles by 578 contributing authors

Physical science of climate change, effects

Impacts of Multi-timescale Circulations on Meridional Heat Transport
Liu et al. International Journal of Climatology
10.1002/joc.7357

Observations of climate change, effects

State of the Climate in 2020
Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society
Open Access 10.1163/9789004322714_cclc_2016-0201-003

First Observations of a Transient Polynya in the Last Ice Area North of Ellesmere Island
Moore et al. Geophysical Research Letters
10.1029/2021gl095099

(provisional link) Rapid attribution of heavy rainfall events leading to the severe flooding in Western Europe during July 2021

Effects of climate change on the valley glaciers of the Italian Alps
Serandrei-Barbero et al.
Open Access pdf 10.5194/tc-2021-241

The heat wave of October 2020 in central South America
Marengo et al. International Journal of Climatology
10.1002/joc.7365

Spatio-temporal analysis of land surface temperature for identification of heat wave risk and vulnerability hotspots in Indo-Gangetic Plains of India
Rao et al. Theoretical and Applied Climatology
10.1007/s00704-021-03756-0

(provisional link) Characteristics of climate extremes in China during the recent global warming hiatus based upon machine learning
10.1002/joc.7354

Impacts of climate change-related flood events in the Yangtze River Basin based on multi-source data
Yang et al. Atmospheric Research
10.1016/j.atmosres.2021.105819

On the emergence of human influence on surface air temperature changes over India.
Dileepkumar et al. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres
10.1029/2020jd032911

Instrumentation & observational methods of climate change, effects

Subseasonal-to-Seasonal Extreme Precipitation Events in the Contiguous United States: Generation of a Database and Climatology
Dickinson et al. Journal of Climate
10.1175/jcli-d-20-0580.1

Linking Warm Arctic Winters, Rossby Waves, and Cold Spells: An Idealized Numerical Study
Jolly et al. Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences
10.1175/jas-d-20-0088.1

The Role of a Tropopause Polar Vortex in the Generation of the January 2019 Extreme Arctic Outbreak
Lillo et al. Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences
10.1175/jas-d-20-0285.1

(provisional link) Design of a temperature error correction method used for meteorology and climate research
10.1002/met.1972

Nonstationary weather and water extremes: a review of methods for their detection, attribution, and management
Slater et al. Hydrology and Earth System Sciences
Open Access pdf 10.5194/hess-2020-576

Tracking heatwave extremes from an event perspective
Lo et al. Weather and Climate Extremes
Open Access 10.1016/j.wace.2021.100371

(provisional link) Climate change in a changing world: Socio-economic and technological transitions, regulatory frameworks and trends on global greenhouse gas emissions from EDGAR v.5.0
10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2021.102350

Temperature emergence at decision-relevant scales
Harrington Environmental Research Letters
Open Access 10.1088/1748-9326/ac19dc

Modeling, simulation & projection of climate change, effects

Co-occurrence of California drought and northeast Pacific marine heatwaves under climate change
Shi et al. Geophysical Research Letters
10.1029/2021gl092765

Regional Flood Risk Projections under Climate Change
Sharma et al. Journal of Hydrometeorology Water Resources Research
Open Access pdf 10.1175/jhm-d-20-0238.1

(provisional link) Multi-model ensemble projections of soil moisture drought over North Africa and the Sahel region under 1.5, 2, and 3 °C global warming

Impacts of Tropical Cyclones on the Caribbean under future climate conditions
Kleptsova et al. Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans
10.1029/2020jc016869

Changes in the ENSO-ISMR relationship in the historical and future projection periods based on coupled models
Varikoden et al. International Journal of Climatology
10.1002/joc.7362

The fate of the Caspian Sea under projected climate change and water extraction during the 21st century
Koriche et al. Environmental Research Letters
Open Access 10.1088/1748-9326/ac1af5

South America climate change revealed through climate indices projected by GCMs and Eta-RCM ensembles
Reboita et al. Climate Dynamics
10.1007/s00382-021-05918-2

(provisional link) High-resolution dynamical downscaling for regional climate projection in Central Asia based on bias-corrected multiple GCMs
10.1007/s00382-021-05934-2

Global and regional estimation of carbon uptake using CMIP6 ESM compared with TRENDY ensembles at the centennial scale
Peng et al. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres
10.1029/2021jd035135

(provisional link) Volume and heat transport in the South China Sea and Maritime Continent at present and the end of the 21st century
10.1029/2020JC016901

Projected changes in the season of hot days in the Middle East and North Africa
Varela et al. International Journal of Climatology
10.1002/joc.7360

Index- and model-dependent projections of East Asian summer monsoon in CMIP6 simulations
Tian et al. International Journal of Climatology
10.1002/joc.7361

Changes in mean and extreme temperature and precipitation events from different weighted multi-model ensembles over the northern half of Morocco
Balhane et al. Climate Dynamics
Open Access pdf 10.1007/s00382-021-05910-w

Exposure of the population of southern France to air pollutants in future climate case studies
Cholakian et al. Atmospheric Environment
10.1016/j.atmosenv.2021.118689

Changes in the frequency of global high mountain rain-on-snow events due to climate warming
López-Moreno et al. Environmental Research Letters
Open Access 10.1088/1748-9326/ac0dde

Toward an in-depth evaluation of the ecosystem component of CMIP6 Earth system models
Zai-Chun Advances in Climate Change Research
Open Access 10.1016/j.accre.2021.08.006

Polar amplification in idealized climates: the role of ice, moisture, and seasons
Feldl & Merlis Geophysical Research Letters
10.1029/2021gl094130

Simulation and estimation of future precipitation changes in arid regions: a case study of Xinjiang, Northwest China
Du et al. Climatic Change
Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-021-03192-z

Advances in climate & climate effects modeling, simulation & projection

(provisional link) Performance evaluation of CMIP6 global climate models for selecting models for climate projection over Nigeria
10.21203/rs.3.rs-642786/v1

Evaluation of the Performance of CMIP5 and CMIP6 Models in Simulating the Victoria Mode–El Niño Relationship
Wang et al. Journal of Climate
10.1175/jcli-d-20-0927.1

Evaluating Diurnal Rainfall Signal Performance from CMIP5 to CMIP6
Lee & Wang Journal of Climate
10.1175/jcli-d-20-0812.1

Empirical and Earth system model estimates of boreal nitrogen fixation often differ: A pathway toward reconciliation
Hupperts et al. Global Change Biology
10.1111/gcb.15836

Assessment of Extreme Precipitation Indices over Indochina and South China in CMIP6 Models
Tang et al. Journal of Climate
10.1175/jcli-d-20-0948.1

Changes of South-Central Pacific Large-scale Environment Associated with Hydrometeors-Radiation-Circulation Interactions in a Coupled GCM
J L F et al. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres
10.1029/2021jd034973

Cryosphere & climate change

Effects of climate change on the valley glaciers of the Italian Alps
Serandrei-Barbero et al.
Open Access pdf 10.5194/tc-2021-241

(provisional link) The distribution and evolution of supraglacial lakes on 79° N Glacier (north-eastern Greenland) and interannual climatic controls

First Observations of a Transient Polynya in the Last Ice Area North of Ellesmere Island
Moore et al. Geophysical Research Letters
10.1029/2021gl095099

Paleoclimate

Retreat of the Antarctic Ice Sheet during the Last Interglaciation and implications for future change
Golledge et al. Geophysical Research Letters
10.1002/essoar.10504661.1

Global Oceanic Overturning Circulation Forced by the Competition between Greenhouse Gases and Continental Ice Sheets during the Last Deglaciation
Zhu et al. Journal of Climate
10.1175/jcli-d-21-0125.1

Glacial mode shift of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation by warming over the Southern Ocean
Oka et al. Communications Earth & Environment
Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-021-00226-3

Milankovitch, the father of paleoclimate modeling
Berger Climate of the Past
Open Access pdf 10.5194/cp-17-1727-2021

Biology & climate change

Not all species will migrate poleward as the climate warms: the case of the seven baobab species in Madagascar
Tagliari et al. Global Change Biology
10.1111/gcb.15859

Late to bed, late to rise – warmer autumn temperatures delay spring phenology by delaying dormancy
Beil et al. Global Change Biology
10.1111/gcb.15858

(provisional link) Climate-induced outbreaks in high-elevation pines are driven primarily by immigration of bark beetles from historical hosts
10.1111/gcb.15861

Synergistic effects of warming and eutrophication alert zooplankton predator–prey interactions along the benthic–pelagic interface
Zhang et al. Global Change Biology
10.1111/gcb.15838

Thirty-eight years of CO2 fertilization have outpaced growing aridity to drive greening of Australian woody ecosystems
Rifai et al.
Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-2021-218

(provisional link) Diverging growth performance of co-occurring trees (Picea abies) and shrubs (Pinus mugo) at the treeline ecotone of Central European mountain ranges
10.1016/j.agrformet.2021.108608

Frequent locally absent rings indicate increased threats of extreme droughts to semi-arid Pinus tabuliformis forests in North China
Zhao et al. Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
10.1016/j.agrformet.2021.108601

(provisional link) Vegetation grows more luxuriantly in Arctic permafrost drained lake basins
10.1111/gcb.15853

(provisional link) Growing faster, longer or both? Modelling plastic response of Juniperus communis growth phenology to climate change
10.1111/geb.13377

GHG sources & sinks, flux, related geochemistry

(provisional link) Dynamic global vegetation models underestimate net CO 2 flux mean and inter-annual variability in dryland ecosystems
10.1088/1748-9326/ac1a38

Variability in black carbon mass concentration in surface snow at Svalbard
Bertò et al. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics
Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-2021-39

Historical increases in land-derived nutrient inputs may alleviate effects of a changing physical climate on the oceanic carbon cycle
Lacroix et al. Global Change Biology
Open Access pdf 10.1111/gcb.15822

Global and regional estimation of carbon uptake using CMIP6 ESM compared with TRENDY ensembles at the centennial scale
Peng et al. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres
10.1029/2021jd035135

(provisional link) Assessing the Relative Climate Impact of Carbon Utilization for Concrete, Chemical, and Mineral Production
10.1021/acs.est.1c01109

(provisional link) Integrating Ecosystem Patch Contributions to Stream Corridor Carbon Dioxide and Methane Fluxes

Tropical deoxygenation sites revisited to investigate oxygen and nutrient trends
Stramma & Schmidtko Ocean Science
Open Access pdf 10.5194/os-17-833-2021

Carbon dynamics at the river-estuarine transition: a comparison among tributaries of Chesapeake Bay
Bukaveckas
Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-2021-209

Continental-scale controls on soil organic carbon across sub-Saharan Africa
von Fromm et al. SOIL
Open Access pdf 10.5194/soil-2020-69

Accelerated increase in vegetation carbon sequestration in China after 2010: A turning point resulting from climate and human interaction
Chen et al. Global Change Biology
10.1111/gcb.15854

Carbon and nitrogen dynamics in the coastal Japan Sea inferred from 15 years of measurements of stable isotope ratios of Calanus sinicus
Nakamura et al.
Open Access pdf 10.5194/os-2021-74

(provisional link) Large-scale drivers of relationships between soil microbial properties and organic carbon across Europe
10.1111/geb.13371

The role of oxygen in stimulating methane production in wetlands
Wilmoth et al. Global Change Biology
Open Access pdf 10.1111/gcb.15831

Shipborne measurements of methane and carbon dioxide in the Middle East and Mediterranean areas and the contribution from oil and gas emissions
Paris et al. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics
Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-2021-114

Methane emissions in the United States, Canada, and Mexico: Evaluation of national methane emission inventories and sectoral trends by inverse analysis of in situ (GLOBALVIEWplus CH4 ObsPack) and satellite (GOSAT) atmospheric observations
Lu et al.
Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-2021-671

CO2 removal & mitigation science & engineering

A review of CO2 adsorbents performance for different carbon capture technology processes conditions
Lai et al. Greenhouse Gases: Science and Technology
10.1002/ghg.2112

Decarbonization

(provisional link) Reducing CO 2 emissions by targeting the world’s hyper-polluting power plants

Carbon pricing and supporting policy tools for deep decarbonization; case of electricity generation of Sri Lanka
Herath & Jung Carbon Management
10.1080/17583004.2021.1966514

Conceptualizing and achieving industrial system transition for a dematerialized and decarbonized world
Singh & Chudasama Global Environmental Change
10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2021.102349

Unilateral Phase-Out of Coal to Power in an Emissions Trading Scheme
Eichner & Pethig Environmental and Resource Economics
Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10640-021-00589-3

Grid impacts of highway electric vehicle charging and role for mitigation via energy storage
Mowry & Mallapragada Energy Policy
10.1016/j.enpol.2021.112508

Geoengineering climate

A scenario of solar geoengineering governance: Vulnerable states demand, and act
Schenuit et al. Futures
Open Access 10.1016/j.futures.2021.102809

Black carbon

Variability in black carbon mass concentration in surface snow at Svalbard
Bertò et al. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics
Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-2021-39

Aerosols

Opportunistic Experiments to Constrain Aerosol Effective Radiative Forcing
Christensen et al.
Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-2021-559

Radiative Forcing of Nitrate Aerosols from 1975 to 2010 as Simulated by MOSAIC Module in CESM2-MAM4
Lu et al. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres
10.1029/2021jd034809

Climate change communications & cognition

Climate skeptics’ identity construction and (Dis)trust in science in the United States
Sarathchandra et al. Environmental Sociology
10.1080/23251042.2021.1970436

“Not a Big Climate Change Guy” Semiotic Gradients and Climate Discourse
Adams Environmental Communication
10.1080/17524032.2021.1964998

Understanding the importance of sexism in shaping climate denial and policy opposition
Benegal & Holman Climatic Change
10.1007/s10584-021-03193-y

(provisional link) Effects of consensus messages and political ideology on climate change attitudes: inconsistent findings and the effect of a pretest
10.1007/s10584-021-03200-2

Support for mitigation and adaptation climate change policies: effects of five attitudinal factors
Rubio Juan & Revilla Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change
Open Access pdf 10.1007/s11027-021-09964-3

Agronomy, animal husbundry, food production & climate change

(provisional link) Co-production of knowledge reveals loss of Indigenous hunting opportunities in the face of accelerating Arctic climate change
10.1088/1748-9326/ac1a36

Assessment of the impacts of climate change and variability on water resources and use, food security, and economic welfare in Iran
Kiani Ghalehsard et al. Environment, Development and Sustainability
10.1007/s10668-021-01263-w

Nonlinear shifts in infectious rust disease due to climate change
Dudney et al. Nature Communications
Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-021-25182-6

(provisional link) Vulnerability and impact of climate variability on Peruvian artisanal fisheries
10.1080/17565529.2021.1964423

(provisional link) Diminishing weed control exacerbates maize yield loss to adverse weather
10.1111/gcb.15857

Climate change, power, and vulnerabilities in the Peruvian Highlands
Heikkinen Regional Environmental Change
Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10113-021-01825-8

Improving rangeland climate services for ranchers and pastoralists with social science
Wardropper et al. Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability
10.1016/j.cosust.2021.07.001

(provisional link) Increases in extreme heat stress in domesticated livestock species during the twenty-first century
10.1111/gcb.15825

Climate change shifts forward flowering and reduces crop waterlogging stress
Liu et al. Environmental Research Letters
Open Access 10.1088/1748-9326/ac1b5a

Hydrology & climate change

Effects of climate and irrigation on GRACE-based estimates of water storage changes in major US aquifers
Scanlon et al. Environmental Research Letters
Open Access 10.1088/1748-9326/ac16ff

Regional Flood Risk Projections under Climate Change
Sharma et al. Journal of Hydrometeorology Water Resources Research
Open Access pdf 10.1175/jhm-d-20-0238.1

(provisional link) Multi-model ensemble projections of soil moisture drought over North Africa and the Sahel region under 1.5, 2, and 3 °C global warming

The fate of the Caspian Sea under projected climate change and water extraction during the 21st century
Koriche et al. Environmental Research Letters
Open Access 10.1088/1748-9326/ac1af5

Humans, climate and streamflow
Villarini & Wasko Nature Climate Change
Open Access 10.1038/s41558-021-01137-z

Impacts of climate change-related flood events in the Yangtze River Basin based on multi-source data
Yang et al. Atmospheric Research
10.1016/j.atmosres.2021.105819

(provisional link) Future Changes in the Indian Ocean Walker Circulation and links to Kenyan Rainfall
10.1029/2021JD034585

Climate change economics

Does financial development influence renewable energy consumption to achieve carbon neutrality in the USA?
Lahiani et al. Energy Policy
10.1016/j.enpol.2021.112524

Climate change adaptation as a global public good: implications for financing
Khan & Munira Climatic Change
Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-021-03195-w

Mobilizing private adaptation finance: lessons learned from the Green Climate Fund
Stoll et al. Climatic Change
Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-021-03190-1

(provisional link) Climate effects on US infrastructure: the economics of adaptation for rail, roads, and coastal development

Corporate Emissions-Trading Behaviour During the First Decade of the EU ETS
Abrell et al. Environmental and Resource Economics
10.1007/s10640-021-00593-7

The burden of climate action: How environmental responsibility is impacted by socioeconomic status
Lerner & Rottman Journal of Environmental Psychology
10.1016/j.jenvp.2021.101674

Temperature and Exports: Evidence from the United States
Karlsson Environmental and Resource Economics
Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10640-021-00587-5

Climate change mitigation public policy research

(provisional link) Risk? Crisis? Emergency? Implications of the new climate emergency framing for governance and policy
10.1002/wcc.736

Cost of non-uniform climate policies
Cherp Nature Climate Change
10.1038/s41558-021-01133-3

The surprisingly inexpensive cost of state-driven emission control strategies
Peng et al. Nature Climate Change
10.1038/s41558-021-01128-0

The climate and health benefits from intensive building energy efficiency improvements
Gillingham et al. Science Advances
Open Access pdf 10.1126/sciadv.abg0947

(provisional link) Global scenarios of resource and emission savings from material efficiency in residential buildings and cars
10.1038/s41467-021-25300-4

(provisional link) Revising the EU ETS and CORSIA in times of the COVID-19 pandemic: challenges for reducing global aviation emissions

(provisional link) Phasing out fossil fuel subsidies in the EU? Exploring the role of state aid rules
10.2139/ssrn.3725464

(provisional link) Framing the just transition: How international trade unions engage with UN climate negotiations
10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2021.102347

(provisional link) Climate change in a changing world: Socio-economic and technological transitions, regulatory frameworks and trends on global greenhouse gas emissions from EDGAR v.5.0
10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2021.102350

Support for mitigation and adaptation climate change policies: effects of five attitudinal factors
Rubio Juan & Revilla Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change
Open Access pdf 10.1007/s11027-021-09964-3

Climate change adaptation & adaptation public policy research

Global evidence of constraints and limits to human adaptation
Thomas et al. Regional Environmental Change
Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10113-021-01808-9

Determinants of climate change adaptation strategies in the coastal zone of Bangladesh: implications for adaptation to climate change in developing countries
Kabir et al. Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change
10.1007/s11027-021-09968-z

Urban-Scale Evaluation of Cool Pavement Impacts on the Urban Heat Island Effect and Climate Change
AzariJafari et al. Environmental Science & Technology
Open Access pdf 10.1021/acs.est.1c00664

(provisional link) Interrogating ‘effectiveness’ in climate change adaptation: 11 guiding principles for adaptation research and practice

Climate change adaptation as a global public good: implications for financing
Khan & Munira Climatic Change
Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-021-03195-w

From climate adaptation to climate justice: Critical reflections on the IPCC and Himalayan climate knowledges
Chakraborty & Sherpa Climatic Change
Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-021-03158-1

Collective action problems and governance barriers to sea-level rise adaptation in San Francisco Bay
Lubell et al. Climatic Change
Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-021-03162-5

Mobilizing private adaptation finance: lessons learned from the Green Climate Fund
Stoll et al. Climatic Change
Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-021-03190-1

(provisional link) Climate effects on US infrastructure: the economics of adaptation for rail, roads, and coastal development

Sustainability challenges of adaptation interventions: do the challenges vary with implementing organizations?
Rahman Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change
10.1007/s11027-021-09966-1

(provisional link) A climate resilience research renewal agenda: learning lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic for urban climate resilience

Collective action problems and governance barriers to sea-level rise adaptation in San Francisco Bay
Lubell et al. Climatic Change
Open Access pdf 10.1007/s10584-021-03162-5

Building Urban Climate Change Adaptation Strategies: The Case of Russian Arctic Cities
Bobylev et al. Weather, Climate, and Society
10.1175/wcas-d-21-0004.1

(provisional link) Climate change impacts and urban green space adaptation efforts: Evidence from U.S. municipal parks and recreation departments
10.1016/j.uclim.2021.100962

The climate justice pillars vis-à-vis urban form adaptation to climate change: A review
Mohtat & Khirfan Urban Climate
Open Access 10.1016/j.uclim.2021.100951

Climate change impacts on human health

Spatio-temporal analysis of land surface temperature for identification of heat wave risk and vulnerability hotspots in Indo-Gangetic Plains of India
Rao et al. Theoretical and Applied Climatology
10.1007/s00704-021-03756-0

Climate change and women’s health: A scoping review
Desai & Zhang Zhang GeoHealth
Open Access 10.1002/essoar.10505892.1

Climate change impacts on human culture

(provisional link) Co-production of knowledge reveals loss of Indigenous hunting opportunities in the face of accelerating Arctic climate change
10.1088/1748-9326/ac1a36

Other

Risk Researchers’ Views About the Goal of Trying to Ensure Policymakers Consider Scientific Evidence
Besley & Schweizer Risk Analysis
10.1111/risa.13813

The Making of a Metric: Co-Producing Decision-Relevant Climate Science
Jagannathan et al. Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society
Open Access pdf 10.1175/bams-d-19-0296.1

Using systems thinking and causal loop diagrams to identify cascading climate change impacts on bioenergy supply systems
Groundstroem & Juhola Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change
Open Access pdf 10.1007/s11027-021-09967-0

Informed opinion, nudges & major initiatives

State of the Climate in 2020

Open Access 10.1163/9789004322714_cclc_2016-0201-003

(provisional link) Interrogating ‘effectiveness’ in climate change adaptation: 11 guiding principles for adaptation research and practice
10.1080/17565529.2021.1964937

A brief history of usable climate science
Coen Climatic Change
10.1007/s10584-021-03181-2

Keep climate policy focused on the social cost of carbon
Aldy et al. Science
10.1126/science.abi7813

(provisional link) Risk? Crisis? Emergency? Implications of the new climate emergency framing for governance and policy
10.1002/wcc.736

Dynamics, impacts, and future projections of Arctic rapid change
Xian-yao & Tingjun Advances in Climate Change Research
Open Access 10.1016/j.accre.2021.08.007

Climate services promise better decisions but mainly focus on better data
Findlater et al. Nature Climate Change
10.1038/s41558-021-01125-3

 

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Obtaining articles wihout journal subscriptions

We know it's frustrating that many articles we cite here are not free to read. One-off paid access fees are generally astronomically priced, suitable for such as "On a Heuristic Point of View Concerning the Production and Transformation of Light"  but not as a gamble on unknowns. With a median world income of US$ 9,373, for most of us US$ 42 is significant money to wager on an article's relevance and importance. 

• Here's an excellent collection of tips and techniques for obtaining articles, legally.

• Unpaywall offers a browser extension for Chrome and Firefox that automatically indicates when an article is freely accessible and provides immediate access without further trouble. Unpaywall is also unscammy, works well, is itself offered free to use. The organizers (a legitimate nonprofit) report about a 50% success rate

• The weekly New Research catch is checked against the Unpaywall database with accessible items being flagged. Especially for just-published articles this mechansim may fail. If you're interested in an article title and it is not listed here as "open access," be sure to check the link anyway. 

How is New Research assembled?

Most articles appearing here are found via  RSS feeds from journal publishers, filtered by search terms to produce raw output for assessment of relevance. 

Relevant articles are then queried against the Unpaywall database, to identify open access articles and expose useful metadata for articles appearing in the database. 

The objective of New Research isn't to cast a tinge on scientific results, to color readers' impressions. Hence candidate articles are assessed via two metrics only:

• Was an article deemed of sufficient merit by a team of journal editors and peer reviewers? The fact of journal RSS output assigns a "yes" to this automatically. 
• Is an article relevant to the topic of anthropogenic climate change? Due to filter overlap with other publication topics of inquiry, of a typical week's 550 or so input articles about 1/4 of RSS output makes the cut.

A few journals offer public access to "preprint" versions of articles for which the review process is not yet complete. As it is the journal's decision to do so, we respect that and include such items in New Research. These are flagged as "preprint."

The section "Informed opinion, nudges & major initiatives" includes some items that are not scientific research per se but fall instead into the category of "perspectives," observations of implications of research findings, areas needing attention, etc.

What does "(provisional link)" mean?

When the input list for New Research is processed, some articles do not produce a result from the journal databases we employ. Usually this is because the publisher has not yet supplied information to doi.org for the given article. In these cases and in order to still include timely listing of articles, we employ an alternate search tactic. While this method is usually correct, sometimes the link shown will lead to an incorrect destination (available time does not always permit manual checking of these). We invite readers to submit corrections in comments below.

Each edition of New Research is reprocessed some two weeks after intitial publication to catch stragglers into the DOI ecosystem. Many "provisional links" will end up being corrected as part of this process. 

Suggestions

Please let us know if you're aware of an article you think may be of interest for Skeptical Science research news, or if we've missed something that may be important. Send your input to Skeptical Science via our contact form.

Journals covered

A list of journals we cover may be found here. We welcome pointers to omissions, new journals etc.

Previous edition

The previous edition of Skeptical Science New Research may be found here.