A paper with a sort of scary title: Adaptive Mitigation of Warming-Induced Food Crisis and Nitrogen Pollution

[NNadir]

It's here: Adaptive Mitigation of Warming-Induced Food Crisis and Nitrogen Pollution Jinglan Cui, Yujing Gao, Hans van Grinsven, Miao Zheng, Xiuming Zhang, Chenchen Ren, Tinghui Ma, Jianming Xu, and Baojing Gu Environmental Science & Technology 2025 59 (7), 3527-3536.

I won't have any time to discuss the paper fully, but I'll share the introduction:

Feeding the world’s growing population while reducing pollution is one of the most pressing challenges of the 21st century, especially in the context of global warming. (1−3) The Earth’s surface temperature has risen by 1.1 °C above the preindustrial level from 2011–2020, (4) and exceeding the Paris Agreement target of 1.5 to less than2 °C global warming would have tremendous impacts on ecosystems. (5) Cropland ecosystems, which contribute to the largest nitrogen (N) fluxes on Earth, are particularly vulnerable to future climate change. (6,7) To meet the growing demand for food, N inputs to global croplands have increased almost five-fold over the past 50 years, leading to an almost proportional increase in N surplus (a proxy for N pollution, i.e., N not taken up by crops but lost to the environment) and associated environmental pollution risks, such as eutrophication and biodiversity loss. (8,9)

Global warming poses a dual threat to food production and environmental sustainability. (10−12) Rising temperatures can affect the physicochemical properties of soils and biota, with profound effects on carbon (C) and N pools and dynamics. (13) Global warming has been suggested to worsen atmospheric N pollution in Australia. (14) Despite extensive research on the effects of warming on the carbon cycle─such as crop yield (15) and soil organic carbon, (16) there remains a deficiency in understanding the response and adaptation of cropland N cycles to warming on a global scale. (17,18) Previous meta-analyses have demonstrated warming effects on a few N parameters, without fully considering the interrelated components of the N cycle in the broader context of the food system. (13,19,20) A comprehensive understanding of N cycling feedback under climate change is essential for the development of Earth System Models and climate policies. (17,21) Given the growing urgency to address climate change, immediate and coordinated adaptation and mitigation strategies are essential worldwide to safeguard food security and promote environmental health. (15,22)

As warming tends to occur alongside other drivers of climate change, such as elevated CO2 levels and altered precipitation regimes, it is challenging to investigate the mechanisms of the response of the N cycle to warming alone. Warming manipulation experiments, such as infrared heaters, heating cables, and open-top chambers, provide valuable empirical data to quantify the effects of warming on biogeochemical cycle variables. (23,24) In this study, we identify the response patterns of cropland N cycles based on a global synthesis of warming experiments and then project the global cropland N budgets at a spatial resolution of 0.5 °C X 0.5 °C under future warming scenarios using the biogeochemical model. Finally, we evaluate the efficiency and cost-benefit of potential adaptive mitigation measures to mitigate the effects of warming from an agricultural perspective...

I am unlikely to be on the planet myself all that much longer, but I feel for those we leave behind. They're screwed.

It would seem our expensive reactionary approaches to issues in energy, often driven by dreamy baby boomer fantasies, are going to leave a shit mess, which will only get worse under fascism, much worse.

Don't worry. Be happy. The paper is about approaches to mitigation. Given that nitrogen production has high energy intensity, owing to the need to destroy exergy to make hydrogen from fossil fuels for ammonia production, and given that our approach to energy is exceedingly stupid, this doesn't bode well.