Pub Date : 2025-01-06DOI: 10.1038/s41893-024-01496-3
Sam Coggins, Andrew J. McDonald, João Vasco Silva, Anton Urfels, Hari Sankar Nayak, Sonam Rinchen Sherpa, Mangi Lal Jat, Hanuman Sahay Jat, Tim Krupnik, Virender Kumar, Ram. K. Malik, Tek B. Sapkota, Amaresh Kumar Nayak, Peter Craufurd
Increasing nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) in agricultural production mitigates climate change, limits water pollution and reduces fertilizer subsidy costs. Nevertheless, strategies for increasing NUE without jeopardizing food security are uncertain in globally important cropping systems. Here we analyse a novel dataset of more than 31,000 farmer fields spanning the Terai of Nepal, Bangladesh’s floodplains and four major rice-producing regions of India. Results indicate that 55% of rice farmers overuse nitrogen fertilizer, and hence the region could save 18 kg of nitrogen per hectare without compromising rice yield. Disincentivizing this excess nitrogen application presents the most impactful pathway for increasing NUE. Addressing yield constraints unrelated to crop nutrition can also improve NUE, most promisingly through earlier transplanting and improving water management, and this secondary pathway was overlooked in the IPCC’s 2022 report on climate change mitigation. Combining nitrogen input reduction with changes to agronomic management could increase rice production in South Asia by 8% while reducing environmental pollution from nitrogen fertilizer, measured as nitrogen surplus, by 36%. Even so, opportunities to improve NUE vary within South Asia, which necessitates sub-regional strategies for sustainable nitrogen management. Overuse of nitrogen fertilizer in crop cultivation can lead to environmental pollution necessitating strategies to optimize nitrogen use efficiency (NUE). This study examines data from more than 31,000 farmer fields across South Asia to identify opportunities for improving NUE in rice cropping systems.
{"title":"Data-driven strategies to improve nitrogen use efficiency of rice farming in South Asia","authors":"Sam Coggins, Andrew J. McDonald, João Vasco Silva, Anton Urfels, Hari Sankar Nayak, Sonam Rinchen Sherpa, Mangi Lal Jat, Hanuman Sahay Jat, Tim Krupnik, Virender Kumar, Ram. K. Malik, Tek B. Sapkota, Amaresh Kumar Nayak, Peter Craufurd","doi":"10.1038/s41893-024-01496-3","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41893-024-01496-3","url":null,"abstract":"Increasing nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) in agricultural production mitigates climate change, limits water pollution and reduces fertilizer subsidy costs. Nevertheless, strategies for increasing NUE without jeopardizing food security are uncertain in globally important cropping systems. Here we analyse a novel dataset of more than 31,000 farmer fields spanning the Terai of Nepal, Bangladesh’s floodplains and four major rice-producing regions of India. Results indicate that 55% of rice farmers overuse nitrogen fertilizer, and hence the region could save 18 kg of nitrogen per hectare without compromising rice yield. Disincentivizing this excess nitrogen application presents the most impactful pathway for increasing NUE. Addressing yield constraints unrelated to crop nutrition can also improve NUE, most promisingly through earlier transplanting and improving water management, and this secondary pathway was overlooked in the IPCC’s 2022 report on climate change mitigation. Combining nitrogen input reduction with changes to agronomic management could increase rice production in South Asia by 8% while reducing environmental pollution from nitrogen fertilizer, measured as nitrogen surplus, by 36%. Even so, opportunities to improve NUE vary within South Asia, which necessitates sub-regional strategies for sustainable nitrogen management. Overuse of nitrogen fertilizer in crop cultivation can lead to environmental pollution necessitating strategies to optimize nitrogen use efficiency (NUE). This study examines data from more than 31,000 farmer fields across South Asia to identify opportunities for improving NUE in rice cropping systems.","PeriodicalId":19056,"journal":{"name":"Nature Sustainability","volume":"8 1","pages":"22-33"},"PeriodicalIF":25.7,"publicationDate":"2025-01-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-024-01496-3.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143121554","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-12-19DOI: 10.1038/s41893-024-01499-0
Raúl R. Cordero, Sarah Feron, Alessandro Damiani
{"title":"Global South researchers need to focus on losses and damages","authors":"Raúl R. Cordero, Sarah Feron, Alessandro Damiani","doi":"10.1038/s41893-024-01499-0","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41893-024-01499-0","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":19056,"journal":{"name":"Nature Sustainability","volume":"8 1","pages":"1-2"},"PeriodicalIF":25.7,"publicationDate":"2024-12-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143121601","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-12-16DOI: 10.1038/s41893-024-01481-w
Kevin M. Wyss, James M. Tour
In the popular nineteenth century fairy tale and perhaps among the first tales of upcycling, Rumpelstiltskin spun waste straw into gold. Now, researchers convert straw and other cellulosic waste biomass into reduced graphene oxide, a valuable and prized nanomaterial, through a simple reaction.
{"title":"Turning straw into reduced graphene oxide","authors":"Kevin M. Wyss, James M. Tour","doi":"10.1038/s41893-024-01481-w","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41893-024-01481-w","url":null,"abstract":"In the popular nineteenth century fairy tale and perhaps among the first tales of upcycling, Rumpelstiltskin spun waste straw into gold. Now, researchers convert straw and other cellulosic waste biomass into reduced graphene oxide, a valuable and prized nanomaterial, through a simple reaction.","PeriodicalId":19056,"journal":{"name":"Nature Sustainability","volume":"7 12","pages":"1558-1559"},"PeriodicalIF":25.7,"publicationDate":"2024-12-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142845134","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Although graphene and graphene-related two-dimensional materials (GR2Ms) hold much potential for various applications, the current methods for their large-scale production rely heavily on graphite minerals and energy-intensive techniques. Here we report a one-step dehydration–condensation method for the economical and green preparation of GR2Ms on a gram scale from biomass at room temperature under atmospheric pressure using only concentrated sulfuric acid. This protocol has been applied successfully to various types of biomass and carbohydrates, delivering a 33% mass yield of GR2M product. The properties of the product are consistent with those of classical reduced graphene oxide (RGO), with the twist that it does not need to be produced from graphite minerals. The mild reaction conditions substantially reduce the energy input, while providing a facile platform for monitoring the kinetics of RGO nucleation and growth. Compared with conventional methods, a 98% reduction in energy consumption is achieved. Overall, the results of this research pave a new avenue to scalable and sustainable GR2M production. Reduced graphene oxide materials are of great interest in many fields, but current production methods are neither sustainable nor scalable. Here the authors report a method that enables the facile production of reduced graphene oxide from biomass at ambient temperature.
{"title":"One-step conversion of biomass to reduced graphene oxide at room temperature","authors":"Duan-Chao Wang, Jin-Ze Lv, Shenjie Zhong, Yuhang Wu, Yang Liu, Sheng-Nan Lei, Hou-Yong Yu, Liangti Qu, J. Fraser Stoddart, Qing-Hui Guo","doi":"10.1038/s41893-024-01480-x","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41893-024-01480-x","url":null,"abstract":"Although graphene and graphene-related two-dimensional materials (GR2Ms) hold much potential for various applications, the current methods for their large-scale production rely heavily on graphite minerals and energy-intensive techniques. Here we report a one-step dehydration–condensation method for the economical and green preparation of GR2Ms on a gram scale from biomass at room temperature under atmospheric pressure using only concentrated sulfuric acid. This protocol has been applied successfully to various types of biomass and carbohydrates, delivering a 33% mass yield of GR2M product. The properties of the product are consistent with those of classical reduced graphene oxide (RGO), with the twist that it does not need to be produced from graphite minerals. The mild reaction conditions substantially reduce the energy input, while providing a facile platform for monitoring the kinetics of RGO nucleation and growth. Compared with conventional methods, a 98% reduction in energy consumption is achieved. Overall, the results of this research pave a new avenue to scalable and sustainable GR2M production. Reduced graphene oxide materials are of great interest in many fields, but current production methods are neither sustainable nor scalable. Here the authors report a method that enables the facile production of reduced graphene oxide from biomass at ambient temperature.","PeriodicalId":19056,"journal":{"name":"Nature Sustainability","volume":"7 12","pages":"1699-1708"},"PeriodicalIF":25.7,"publicationDate":"2024-12-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142845178","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-12-09DOI: 10.1038/s41893-024-01470-z
R. Quentin Grafton, Safa Fanaian, James Horne, Pamela Katic, Nhat-Mai Nguyen, Claudia Ringler, Libby Robin, Julia Talbot-Jones, Sarah Ann Wheeler, Paul Robert Wyrwoll, Fabiola Avarado, Asit K. Biswas, Edoardo Borgomeo, Roy Brouwer, Peter Coombes, Robert Costanza, Robert Hope, Tom Kompas, Ida Kubiszewski, Ana Manero, Rita Martins, Rachael McDonnell, William Nikolakis, Russell Rollason, Nadeem Samnakay, Bridget R. Scanlon, Jesper Svensson, Djiby Thiam, Cecilia Tortajada, Yahua Wang, John Williams
The world faces multiple water crises, including overextraction, flooding, ecosystem degradation and inequitable safe water access. Insufficient funding and ineffective implementation impede progress in water access, while, in part, a misdiagnosis of the causes has prioritized some responses over others (for example, hard over soft infrastructure). We reframe the responses to mitigating the world’s water crises using a ‘beyond growth’ framing and compare it to mainstream thinking. Beyond growth is systems thinking that prioritizes the most disadvantaged. It seeks to decouple economic growth from environmental degradation by overcoming policy capture and inertia and by fostering place-based and justice-principled institutional changes. Efforts to address the water challenges that societies face are hindered by a lack of funding and ineffective implementation, as well as poor understanding of the causes. Adopting a beyond growth framing, this Perspective reflects on the responses needed to mitigate water crises around the world.
{"title":"Rethinking responses to the world’s water crises","authors":"R. Quentin Grafton, Safa Fanaian, James Horne, Pamela Katic, Nhat-Mai Nguyen, Claudia Ringler, Libby Robin, Julia Talbot-Jones, Sarah Ann Wheeler, Paul Robert Wyrwoll, Fabiola Avarado, Asit K. Biswas, Edoardo Borgomeo, Roy Brouwer, Peter Coombes, Robert Costanza, Robert Hope, Tom Kompas, Ida Kubiszewski, Ana Manero, Rita Martins, Rachael McDonnell, William Nikolakis, Russell Rollason, Nadeem Samnakay, Bridget R. Scanlon, Jesper Svensson, Djiby Thiam, Cecilia Tortajada, Yahua Wang, John Williams","doi":"10.1038/s41893-024-01470-z","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41893-024-01470-z","url":null,"abstract":"The world faces multiple water crises, including overextraction, flooding, ecosystem degradation and inequitable safe water access. Insufficient funding and ineffective implementation impede progress in water access, while, in part, a misdiagnosis of the causes has prioritized some responses over others (for example, hard over soft infrastructure). We reframe the responses to mitigating the world’s water crises using a ‘beyond growth’ framing and compare it to mainstream thinking. Beyond growth is systems thinking that prioritizes the most disadvantaged. It seeks to decouple economic growth from environmental degradation by overcoming policy capture and inertia and by fostering place-based and justice-principled institutional changes. Efforts to address the water challenges that societies face are hindered by a lack of funding and ineffective implementation, as well as poor understanding of the causes. Adopting a beyond growth framing, this Perspective reflects on the responses needed to mitigate water crises around the world.","PeriodicalId":19056,"journal":{"name":"Nature Sustainability","volume":"8 1","pages":"11-21"},"PeriodicalIF":25.7,"publicationDate":"2024-12-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143121624","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-12-06DOI: 10.1038/s41893-024-01475-8
Argemiro Teixeira Leite-Filho, Britaldo Silveira Soares-Filho, Ubirajara Oliveira, Michael Coe
Deforestation not only contributes to global warming but also induces changes in the regional climates that impact agriculture. Here, we analyse the effects of deforestation-induced climate change on the soy–maize double cropping of the Cerrado biome. Since the 1980s, there has been an average delay of 36 days in the start of the agricultural rainy season, a 36.7% reduction in total rainfall over the period and a 1.5 °C rise in the temperature in the biome. Of the 8.1 million ha of soy–maize double cropping, 99% experienced delays in the agricultural rainy season and 61% faced reduced rainfall. Those changes have contributed to more frequent and severe soybean and maize crop shortfalls. Delays in the onset of the agricultural rainy season, reductions in rainfall and increases in maximum air temperatures occur more frequently in areas with extensive native vegetation loss. To sustain agricultural productivity in the Cerrado, it is crucial to conserve and restore its native vegetation. Deforestation has the potential to alter regional precipitation cycles. In the Cerrado biome, clearing of native vegetation has led to shortfalls of staple crops due to a delayed agricultural rainy season.
{"title":"Intensification of climate change impacts on agriculture in the Cerrado due to deforestation","authors":"Argemiro Teixeira Leite-Filho, Britaldo Silveira Soares-Filho, Ubirajara Oliveira, Michael Coe","doi":"10.1038/s41893-024-01475-8","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41893-024-01475-8","url":null,"abstract":"Deforestation not only contributes to global warming but also induces changes in the regional climates that impact agriculture. Here, we analyse the effects of deforestation-induced climate change on the soy–maize double cropping of the Cerrado biome. Since the 1980s, there has been an average delay of 36 days in the start of the agricultural rainy season, a 36.7% reduction in total rainfall over the period and a 1.5 °C rise in the temperature in the biome. Of the 8.1 million ha of soy–maize double cropping, 99% experienced delays in the agricultural rainy season and 61% faced reduced rainfall. Those changes have contributed to more frequent and severe soybean and maize crop shortfalls. Delays in the onset of the agricultural rainy season, reductions in rainfall and increases in maximum air temperatures occur more frequently in areas with extensive native vegetation loss. To sustain agricultural productivity in the Cerrado, it is crucial to conserve and restore its native vegetation. Deforestation has the potential to alter regional precipitation cycles. In the Cerrado biome, clearing of native vegetation has led to shortfalls of staple crops due to a delayed agricultural rainy season.","PeriodicalId":19056,"journal":{"name":"Nature Sustainability","volume":"8 1","pages":"34-43"},"PeriodicalIF":25.7,"publicationDate":"2024-12-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143121538","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-12-06DOI: 10.1038/s41893-024-01488-3
Two major scientific fields that are researching sustainability in agriculture, namely agroecology and sustainable intensification, have produced extensive research bases. However, they rarely acknowledge the limitations of their approach or engage with each other. This lack of dialogue might hamper potential progress in sustainable agriculture research.
{"title":"Lack of scientific humility and dialogue hampers progress towards sustainable agriculture","authors":"","doi":"10.1038/s41893-024-01488-3","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41893-024-01488-3","url":null,"abstract":"Two major scientific fields that are researching sustainability in agriculture, namely agroecology and sustainable intensification, have produced extensive research bases. However, they rarely acknowledge the limitations of their approach or engage with each other. This lack of dialogue might hamper potential progress in sustainable agriculture research.","PeriodicalId":19056,"journal":{"name":"Nature Sustainability","volume":"8 1","pages":"9-10"},"PeriodicalIF":25.7,"publicationDate":"2024-12-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143121639","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-12-06DOI: 10.1038/s41893-024-01477-6
Chetan Sharma, Hakan Başağaoğlu, Icen Yoosefdoost, Adrienne Wootten, Debarati Chakraborty-Reddy, F. Paul Bertetti, Ali Mirchi, Debaditya Chakraborty
Groundwater systems play a pivotal role in ensuring food and water security while maintaining vital ecosystem functions. The depletion of numerous global aquifers, however, raises concerns regarding the sustainability of groundwater withdrawals and environmental flows. Despite efforts to mitigate this decline, there remains a striking gap in proving the effectiveness of these measures. Our research focuses on the karstic Edwards Aquifer system in Texas to assess how effectively current mitigation strategies are protecting groundwater levels and spring flows, which are essential for biodiversity and water security. Using counterfactual artificial intelligence, we address the critical question: ‘What would have happened and may happen in the absence of the mitigation measures?’. This approach offers deep insights into both historical impacts and future projections under intermediate- and high-emission climate scenarios. By simulating what might have happened and could happen in the future without these mitigation measures, our approach provides a robust analysis of the real-world benefits of groundwater management strategies, highlighting their role in enhancing climate resilience and ensuring the sustainability of aquifers. Mitigation policy is critical for counteracting aquifer depletion, but measuring its success can be difficult. A counterfactual approach employing artificial intelligence can provide novel insights into the efficacy of mitigation policies.
{"title":"Efficacy of mitigation strategies for aquifer sustainability under climate change","authors":"Chetan Sharma, Hakan Başağaoğlu, Icen Yoosefdoost, Adrienne Wootten, Debarati Chakraborty-Reddy, F. Paul Bertetti, Ali Mirchi, Debaditya Chakraborty","doi":"10.1038/s41893-024-01477-6","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41893-024-01477-6","url":null,"abstract":"Groundwater systems play a pivotal role in ensuring food and water security while maintaining vital ecosystem functions. The depletion of numerous global aquifers, however, raises concerns regarding the sustainability of groundwater withdrawals and environmental flows. Despite efforts to mitigate this decline, there remains a striking gap in proving the effectiveness of these measures. Our research focuses on the karstic Edwards Aquifer system in Texas to assess how effectively current mitigation strategies are protecting groundwater levels and spring flows, which are essential for biodiversity and water security. Using counterfactual artificial intelligence, we address the critical question: ‘What would have happened and may happen in the absence of the mitigation measures?’. This approach offers deep insights into both historical impacts and future projections under intermediate- and high-emission climate scenarios. By simulating what might have happened and could happen in the future without these mitigation measures, our approach provides a robust analysis of the real-world benefits of groundwater management strategies, highlighting their role in enhancing climate resilience and ensuring the sustainability of aquifers. Mitigation policy is critical for counteracting aquifer depletion, but measuring its success can be difficult. A counterfactual approach employing artificial intelligence can provide novel insights into the efficacy of mitigation policies.","PeriodicalId":19056,"journal":{"name":"Nature Sustainability","volume":"8 1","pages":"44-53"},"PeriodicalIF":25.7,"publicationDate":"2024-12-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-024-01477-6.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143121574","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-12-04DOI: 10.1038/s41893-024-01473-w
Şiir Kılkış, Anders Bjørn, Xuemei Bai, Jianguo Liu, Gail Whiteman, Beatrice Crona, Lauren Seaby Andersen, Syezlin Hasan, Varsha Vijay, Oscar Sabag
Cities and companies have great potential to reduce pressures on Earth system boundaries. Science-based target setting has emerged as a powerful tool to help achieve the potential, but its uptake has been limited. Moreover, cities and companies usually develop their targets separately, even though many are co-located. Focusing on the top 200 cities and 500 companies by greenhouse gas emissions, we analyse the current state and potential of adopting science-based targets for climate. Of these key actors, 110 cities with existing net-zero targets and 22 companies with existing science-based targets could together eliminate up to 3.41 GtCO2e of annual emissions. We argue that this reduction potential could increase by as much as 67% (to 5.70 GtCO2e) if the cities and companies that already have targets bring their co-located counterparts on board to keep abreast of their ambitions. Using freshwater as another example, we discuss entry points for addressing interrelated Earth system boundaries through city–company collaborations. Our findings elucidate previously untapped potentials that could accelerate transformations for operating within Earth system boundaries. Many of the world’s largest cities and leading companies have separately adopted targets for emissions and water-use reductions. This study examines how co-location and collaboration could enhance efforts to stay within Earth system boundaries.
{"title":"City–company collaboration towards aligned science-based target setting","authors":"Şiir Kılkış, Anders Bjørn, Xuemei Bai, Jianguo Liu, Gail Whiteman, Beatrice Crona, Lauren Seaby Andersen, Syezlin Hasan, Varsha Vijay, Oscar Sabag","doi":"10.1038/s41893-024-01473-w","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41893-024-01473-w","url":null,"abstract":"Cities and companies have great potential to reduce pressures on Earth system boundaries. Science-based target setting has emerged as a powerful tool to help achieve the potential, but its uptake has been limited. Moreover, cities and companies usually develop their targets separately, even though many are co-located. Focusing on the top 200 cities and 500 companies by greenhouse gas emissions, we analyse the current state and potential of adopting science-based targets for climate. Of these key actors, 110 cities with existing net-zero targets and 22 companies with existing science-based targets could together eliminate up to 3.41 GtCO2e of annual emissions. We argue that this reduction potential could increase by as much as 67% (to 5.70 GtCO2e) if the cities and companies that already have targets bring their co-located counterparts on board to keep abreast of their ambitions. Using freshwater as another example, we discuss entry points for addressing interrelated Earth system boundaries through city–company collaborations. Our findings elucidate previously untapped potentials that could accelerate transformations for operating within Earth system boundaries. Many of the world’s largest cities and leading companies have separately adopted targets for emissions and water-use reductions. This study examines how co-location and collaboration could enhance efforts to stay within Earth system boundaries.","PeriodicalId":19056,"journal":{"name":"Nature Sustainability","volume":"8 1","pages":"54-65"},"PeriodicalIF":25.7,"publicationDate":"2024-12-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-024-01473-w.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143121633","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-12-02DOI: 10.1038/s41893-024-01474-9
Klara Fischer, Giulia Vico, Helena Röcklinsberg, Hans Liljenström, Riccardo Bommarco
There is no consensus in society on how to achieve sustainability. Scientists’ limited experience in reflecting on their guiding assumptions, combined with a tendency to inflate their own research findings, hinders interdisciplinary dialogue and limits the usefulness of science. Through bibliometrics and discourse analysis, we analysed highly cited articles on agroecology and sustainable intensification. In broad terms, agroecology prioritizes diversity while sidelining productivity and adheres to relational epistemology, while sustainable intensification emphasizes boosting crop production while reducing environmental impact within a reductionist epistemology. Both discourses claim to have the solution to agricultural sustainability but are largely inexplicit about their guiding assumptions and their own limitations, and rarely engage with research in the other discourse. Interdisciplinary dialogue based on transparent and self-critical reflection on the assumptions and limitations of research could increase the relevance of science in societal dialogues about alternative pathways towards sustainable agriculture. Two major discourses for agricultural sustainability, agroecology and sustainable intensification, have produced extensive research bases, but do not engage or overlap with each other. This analysis examines how these ‘silos’ may hamper further research.
{"title":"Progress towards sustainable agriculture hampered by siloed scientific discourses","authors":"Klara Fischer, Giulia Vico, Helena Röcklinsberg, Hans Liljenström, Riccardo Bommarco","doi":"10.1038/s41893-024-01474-9","DOIUrl":"10.1038/s41893-024-01474-9","url":null,"abstract":"There is no consensus in society on how to achieve sustainability. Scientists’ limited experience in reflecting on their guiding assumptions, combined with a tendency to inflate their own research findings, hinders interdisciplinary dialogue and limits the usefulness of science. Through bibliometrics and discourse analysis, we analysed highly cited articles on agroecology and sustainable intensification. In broad terms, agroecology prioritizes diversity while sidelining productivity and adheres to relational epistemology, while sustainable intensification emphasizes boosting crop production while reducing environmental impact within a reductionist epistemology. Both discourses claim to have the solution to agricultural sustainability but are largely inexplicit about their guiding assumptions and their own limitations, and rarely engage with research in the other discourse. Interdisciplinary dialogue based on transparent and self-critical reflection on the assumptions and limitations of research could increase the relevance of science in societal dialogues about alternative pathways towards sustainable agriculture. Two major discourses for agricultural sustainability, agroecology and sustainable intensification, have produced extensive research bases, but do not engage or overlap with each other. This analysis examines how these ‘silos’ may hamper further research.","PeriodicalId":19056,"journal":{"name":"Nature Sustainability","volume":"8 1","pages":"66-74"},"PeriodicalIF":25.7,"publicationDate":"2024-12-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-024-01474-9.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143121568","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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