October 17, 2023 | The federal government is under pressure to carve out exemptions to its carbon pricing system, particularly for rural home-heating fuel in Atlantic Canada. Keeping essentials like energy affordable is a serious concern, but carbon-pricing exemptions are the wrong solution.

To fully grasp and plan for climate impacts under any scenario, researchers and policymakers must look well beyond the 2100 benchmark. Unless CO2 emissions drop significantly, global warming by 2500 will make the Amazon barren, the American Midwest tropical, and India too hot to live in, according to a team of international scientists.

In a 6-3 decision, the Supreme Court of Canada has ruled the federal Liberal government's carbon pricing regime is constitutional — a major decision that allows Ottawa to push ahead with its ambitious plan to ensure every province and territory has a price on carbon to curb greenhouse gas emissions. Some provinces — notably Alberta, Ontario and Saskatchewan — have forcefully opposed the carbon tax, arguing natural resources are in the provinces' jurisdiction under the Constitution.

A new study finds volcanic activity played a direct role in triggering extreme climate change at the end of the Triassic period 201 million year ago, wiping out almost half of all existing species. The amount of carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere from these volcanic eruptions is comparable to the amount of CO2 expected to be produced by all human activity in the 21st century.

Much of the influence on climate from air pollution in East Asia is driven by consumption in the developed countries of Western Europe and North America, according to research co-led by McGill University atmospheric scientist Yi Huang.
In a paper published online this week in Nature Geoscience, Huang and colleagues from China, the U.S. and U.K. report that international trade shifts the climate impacts of aerosols -- solid or liquid particles suspended in air -- from net consuming countries to net producing countries.

Gravitational effects, variations in Earth structure could damp rise in global sea levels

