The growing world population, coupled with increasing urbanisation, has led to increased use of artificial lighting inside buildings, but also outdoors at night-time. Light pollution occurs when the presence of artificial light produced by human activities adversely affects the natural environme...
This Future Brief presents the current science on nanoplastics: their detection, assessment and monitoring; their impacts in the environment, ecotoxicity, and environmental fate; and their potential impacts on human health. In 2022, nanoplastics research is a very fast-moving area. New technique...
Like many ecosystems today, forests are under threat from disturbances, economic factors and competing pressures. In recent years, the pressing need to address the inter-related crises of biodiversity loss and climate change has resulted in greater emphasis on protecting, restoring and creating ...
The science is clear: the biodiversity crisis, the climate crisis and the health crisis are interdependent. Political leaders from across the world, representing 80+ countries and the European Union, have also recognised this connection in the Leaders’ Pledge for Nature. Climate change accelerat...
Land take: increasing infrastructural and urban development means that ecosystem services of key importance to human life are being lost. Of high concern is the amount of land being covered with impervious materials, which halts natural soil processes. What measures can avoid, reduce or compensa...
The Natura 2000 network encompasses nearly a fifth of EU territory and provides protection for over two hundred habitat types and more than a thousand rare and threatened species. The benefits to people provided by the network are estimated to be worth €223-314 billion per year. In this Future B...
Impact investing refers to investments that intend to generate measurable social and/or environmental impacts, as well as a financial return. It is often described as ‘doing good while doing well’ and is part of a wider strategy to shift finance towards more sustainable projects. This Future Bri...
From sleepless nights caused by traffic noise to death, quantifying the toll of environmental pollution on human health has been the subject of much research. Hospital visits and incidences of illness can be counted and linked to certain types of pollution through statistical analysis; and altho...
