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Engineering biology is a dynamic field that uses gene editing, synthesis, assembly, and engineering to design new or modified biological systems. Here the authors discuss the policy considerations and interventions needed to support a role for engineering biology in climate change mitigation.

Efficiency and clean fuels won’t be enough. Governments and industry must experiment with other approaches to bring the climate impact of aviation close to zero.

The success of international climate cooperation relies on whether national commitments are believable under the Paris Agreement. Based on the survey with experienced climate policy professionals, the authors explore the determinants of credibility of national commitments.

Using a multi-sector model of human and natural systems, we find that the nationwide cost from state-varying climate policy in the United States is only one-tenth higher than that of nationally uniform policy. The benefits of state-led action — leadership, experimentation and the practical reality that states implement policy more reliably than the federal government — do not necessarily come with a high economic cost.

The nationwide cost of cutting emissions can be affected by local policies. This study considers the differences across the US states, with integrated assessment model results showing that varying state policies only increases nationwide costs by about 10%.

To predict how society and political systems might actually respond to warming, upgrade integrated assessment models.

Stopping climate change requires revolutionary transformations in industry and agriculture. Ahead of several major climate meetings this year, policymakers struggling to measure progress on climate change should focus less on global emissions, which will be slow to change, and more on technological advances in pioneering niches.

Governments may struggle to impose costly polices on vital industries, resulting in a greater need for negative emissions. Here, the authors model a direct air capture crash deployment program, finding it can remove 2.3 GtCO₂ yr^–1 in 2050, 13–20 GtCO₂ yr^–1 in 2075, and 570–840 GtCO₂ cumulative over 2025–2100.

Analysis of past recoveries shows a low-carbon reboot matters more for climate than does the brief emissions crash.

Three trends will combine to hasten it, warn Yangyang Xu, Veerabhadran Ramanathan and David G. Victor.

The Paris Agreement highlights the need for local climate leadership. The University Of California’s approach to deep decarbonization offers lessons in efficiency, alternative fuels and electrification. Bending the emissions curve globally requires efforts that blend academic insights with practical solutions.

Global cooperation is required to address climate change. In the Arctic region, the abatement of black carbon can be achieved by countries taking self-interested action, whereas methane abatement requires more cooperation due to its diffuse geographical impacts.

The ocean is a key part of the climate system but is often neglected in individual country priorities. Analysis of Nationally Determined Contributions reveals 70% include marine issues. The level of inclusion varies dependent on country factors including vulnerability to rising seas.

All major industrialized countries are failing to meet the pledges they made to cut greenhouse-gas emissions, warn David G. Victor and colleagues.

Deep international cooperation will be needed to tackle climate change. This Perspective looks at how decentralized policy coordination involving partial efforts to build confidence and reduce emissions could foster such cooperation.

Our editors' pick of this year’s most influential expert opinions.

From CRISPR to climate change, corruption to chemical synthesis, David Parkins’s wry illustrations found the heart of every Nature Comment piece they graced.

The real business of decarbonization begins after an agreement is signed at the Paris climate conference, argue David G. Victor and James P. Leape.

After Paris, policymakers will need new goals for protecting the climate. Science can help with a basket of measures because 'climate change' isn't just about temperature.

Cutting levels of soot and other short-lived pollutants delivers tangible benefits and helps governments to build confidence that collective action on climate change is feasible. After the Paris climate meeting this December, actually reducing these pollutants will be essential to the credibility of the diplomatic process.

David G. Victor calls for the IPCC process to be extended to include insights into controversial social and behavioural issues.

Assessments of emissions mitigation patterns have largely ignored differences in investment risk across technologies and regions. With a model accounting for such differences in the electricity generation sector, research now finds that mitigation costs are higher than with no risk variation, and highlights the importance of institutional reforms to lower investment risks.

Average global temperature is not a good indicator of planetary health. Track a range of vital signs instead, urge David G. Victor and Charles F. Kennel.

For the first time since the failed 2009 Copenhagen Climate Change Conference, momentum is building towards a new climate agreement. But expectations must be kept in check, and making expert advice more useful to the process will require engaging the social sciences more fully.

It is argued by many that market-based policies along with cash transfers will make it easier for nations to forge deals to cut carbon emissions. However, emission-intensive manufacturing in China and India could be hit especially hard by this approach.

While there is nearly unanimous agreement that the accord that emerged from last month's UN climate change conference in Copenhagen doesn't go far enough towards addressing the climate problem, it's less certain what the next steps should be. Olive Heffernan asks the experts for their views.

What can be done to slow global warming? Huge new sources of carbon-free power may be needed. But other options also exist, and with so many uncertainties dogging predictions of technology and climate, choosing the best portfolio is hard.

Conventional wisdom holds that the proper next step for an effective climate treaty is to negotiate binding targets and timetables for greenhouse gases. But this is not the best approach.

A General Agreement on Climate Change would accommodate the diverse and changing interests of nations as they seek to slowglobal warming alongside other socioeconomic objectives

The present halcyon state of UN members' minds is an opportunity for administrative reform.

The use of a single number to assess the potential damage done by greenhouse gases is premature.