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Accelerated rock weathering on farmland is seen as a promising way to sequester carbon dioxide in the long term. However, researchers at the Thünen Institute and ETH Zurich urge caution: before rock powder can contribute to climate rescue on a large scale, critical questions about availability and ecological risks must be clarified. A perspective paper published in "Nature Reviews Earth & Environment" provides the factual basis for this debate.

Over thousands of years, the swamps and peatlands in the Congo Basin have accumulated and stored huge amounts of carbon. A research team led by ETH Zurich has now shown that large lakes in this ecosystem are releasing long-buried carbon – which could incur a long-term impact on the global climate. 

A new study identifies the key environmental factors that control how the mineral pyrite forms and is buried in ocean sediments, revealing its outsized role in regulating Earth’s oxygen and climate.

Researchers at ETH Zurich have been able to measure - for the first time - how the amount of dissolved organic carbon in the sea has changed over geological time. The results reveal that our explanations of how the ice ages and complex life forms came about are incomplete.