Earth and Environmental Sciences

Accurately assessing ecosystem service value (ESV) is crucial for implementing ecological compensation and formulating sustainable management policy. However, long-term spatial-temporal patterns of ESV remain limited, particularly in permafrost regions. Here, based on different spatial regions across the entire Qinghai-Tibet Plateau (QTP), encompassing both permafrost and non-permafrost regions, we assess ESV variations throughout the 21st century by combining multi-source data with six models. We find that ESV increased notably at a rate of 7.86 × 10 9 CNY per decade from 2001 to 2020, but is projected to decline significantly from 2021 to 2100 in the QTP. Notably, ESV declines significantly in permafrost regions over the 21st century, primarily due to the severe degradation of transitional and unstable permafrost regions. In contrast, ESV increases markedly in non-permafrost regions, mainly caused by the transition of permafrost into non-permafrost. Regulating service value contributes the most to ESV across different spatial scales. Moreover, fractional vegetation cover is the dominant factor influencing ESV. Our findings provide scientific support for the formulation of ecological management strategies in alpine regions.

Climate-related migration is a growing phenomenon. Extensive research exists concerning the hazard contexts and decision-making factors that shape these migration dynamics. However, the experiences of migrants in climate “destination cities” are understudied. Planning efforts to reduce vulnerability and increase conditions of liveability for migrants in these cities could benefit from concerted efforts to engage with them directly. Recently, two approaches for understanding the liveability of destination cities have emerged: the “Climate-Resilient Migrant-Friendly Town” (CRMFT) framework and the Vulnerable City/Recipient City/Climate Destination typology. Engaging with both, this study investigates the mid-sized port city of Mongla, Bangladesh as a potential climate destination, analyzing how migrants narrate liveability using standards associated with these frameworks. Based on semi-structured interviews with 21 migrants who have relocated to Mongla, we find labour opportunities, and local services and infrastructure are key dimensions of urban liveability. Both the availability of remunerative livelihood opportunities and the challenges around accessing basic services, such as water, must be critical considerations for planners intent on reducing vulnerabilities. Narratives reveal that neither major framework, alone, is sufficient for informing liveable climate destination cities. These results advance conceptualizations for planning climate destinations by centreing migrants’ lived experiences.

The decent living standards (DLS) framework defines a minimum set of material requirements that are essential for achieving human well-being. Over the past decade, it has served as a normative reference to link the environmental impacts of socioeconomic futures to progress in human development. Studies have applied the DLS framework at national, regional, and global scales to quantify multidimensional poverty, infrastructure, and service requirements in order to eradicate poverty and, in turn, to quantify the energy and materials required to meet these needs. A few studies examine the greenhouse gas (GHG) implications of providing DLS to all in climate futures. Overall, the literature suggests that the energy and GHG emissions implied in closing gaps and sustaining DLS are, and will remain, smaller than the impacts associated with affluence beyond DLS. There are substantial regional variations in resource impacts as a result of differences in climate, population density, and existing provisioning systems. Transport needs are relatively poorly understood, and its quantifications vary the most. The literature reveals the importance of inequality reduction in simultaneously eradicating poverty and achieving climate stabilization goals.

The emergence of concepts such as eco-anxiety, climate anxiety, and solastalgia in the literature highlights the need to systematize evidence on the different dimensions of psychological distress associated with environmental degradation and how they are experienced by populations in the Global South. Although research on these phenomena is expanding, much of the evidence has focused on countries in the Global North. This scoping review aims to map evidence for the impacts of extreme climate events on populations in the Global South. This review provides a critical and comprehensive analysis of the literature regarding the diverse impacts of extreme climate events, inadequate infrastructure, and eco-anxiety on the populations of the Global South. It also addresses several key issues, including equity and climate justice as well as social vulnerabilities such as poverty, hunger, food insecurity, and health challenges related to experiences of climate emergencies. The manifestation of these psychosocial phenomena linked to the occurrence of climate emergencies requires immediate responses from governments, health systems, civil society, activists, and all sectors of society.

The burial state of anthropogenic objects on the seafloor provides insight into localized sedimentation dynamics and is also critical for assessing ecological risks, potential pollutant transport, and the viability of recovery or mitigation strategies for hazardous materials such as munitions. Accurate burial depth estimation from remote imagery remains difficult due to partial occlusion, poor visibility, and object degradation. This work introduces a computer vision pipeline, called PoseIDON, which combines deep foundation model features with multiview photogrammetry to estimate six degrees of freedom object pose and the orientation of the surrounding seafloor from ROV video. Burial depth is inferred by aligning CAD models of the objects with observed imagery and fitting a local planar approximation of the seafloor. The method is validated using footage of 54 objects, including barrels and munitions, recorded at a historic ocean dumpsite in the San Pedro Basin. The model achieves a mean burial depth error of approximately 10 cm and resolves spatial burial patterns that reflect underlying sediment transport processes. This approach enables scalable, non-invasive mapping of seafloor burial and supports environmental assessment at contaminated sites.