New Horizons in Science

Kevin Gurney and his colleagues have produced a high-resolution emissions map of carbon dioxide emissions in the United States (the Vulcan project), and he is working on expanding that map to cover the entire globe. He is also exploring interactions between the carbon cycle, climate change, and human beings. And the news is not good. The biosphere and the oceans are reacting in an unexpected way. The good news is that the oceans and biosphere have been ameliorating a lot of humans' carbon emissions. The bad news it that it appears, from almost every line of research, that that is going to stop. Emissions are going to look worse in the future, because we won't be getting as much help from the biosphere and the oceans.