-Down to Earth  Before the end of the century, there will be at least one large volcanic eruption, the scientists predict Amid the grim predictions emerging from the latest report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, there is a ray of hope: A major volcanic eruption can counteract anthropogenic global warming to a small extent.  All statements about global warming breaching the 1.5 degree Celsius rise over pre-industrial levels assume that no...

-Down to Earth Daniel Swain, a climate scientist from the University of California, Los Angeles, talks about the new science of extreme events attribution The planet is warming as predicted and its impacts are unfolding as laid out. Climate change is real; there is no dispute over it. But can we directly attribute these rising disasters to human-induced climate change? That is the raging scientific question. To answer this, a new stream of...

-Down to Earth Never seen a drought of this magnitude, claim farmers; paddy crop affected Climate change is real. Droughts in the rainy state of Assam are not unheard of anymore. Warmer temperatures have affected the state’s tea gardens for a decade. Now, places recently experiencing unexpected and longer dry spells are catching the eye.  “Never before have I seen drought in this region,” said Dipantor Soh, a 28-year-old farmer from Mirigaon, a...

-Newsclick.in In a recent paper published in the Bioscience journal, the scientists highlighted that the world will face grave dangers if immediate global actions are not taken to stop climate change. Let us no more turn a deaf ear to the disastrous possibilities of the unabated climate change due to human activities, let us immediately tackle climate change, let us script policy change, if the human race is to avoid the ‘untold...

-Down to Earth The need of the hour is to put halt large hydel-power projects in the Himalayas. Can small hydropower plants offer a sustainable solution? Hydropower is a renewable and non-polluting source of energy. India has an economically exploitable and viable hydropower potential, which is estimated to be about 84,000 megawatt at 60 per cent load factor. It has an installed capacity of 148,701 MW, according to the National Hydroelectric Power...