# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
UNHCR: One year after the Russian invasion, insecurity clouds return intentions of displaced Ukrainians | UNHCR

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Twelve months since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, more than 13 million people remain uprooted from their homes, including nearly 8 million refugees across Europe and more than 5 million internally displaced people within Ukraine. Their prospects for return in the near future, however, ar…

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
© Rawpixel.com/Shutterstock.com

According to the latest population projections issued by Eurostat, the EU's population will decrease by 6% between 1 January 2022 and 1 January 2100, equivalent to 27.3 million fewer people.

After a decrease in 2020 and 2021 due to the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, the population of the EU started recovering during the course of 2022.

As a consequence of the mass influx of refugees from Ukraine into the EU as a result of Russia's aggression against Ukraine, the population is estimated to have reached 451 million persons on 1 January 2023. Furthermore, the EU's population is projected to peak at 453 million people in 2026, before decreasing to a projected level of 420 million in 2100.

This information comes from the population projections published by Eurostat today. The results are based on assumptions of partial convergence of EU countries' fertility, mortality and migration patterns.

Source datasets: demo_pjan (observed datamigr_pop1ctz) and proj_23np (projected data)

The proportion of children and young people (aged 0 to 19 years) in the total population is projected to decrease from 20% at the beginning of 2022 to 18% by 2100. Similarly, the share of working-age people (aged 20-64 years) in the EU's total population is projected to decrease from 59% in 2022 to 50% in 2100.

In contrast, the share of older age groups (65 years or more) in the EU's total population is projected to increase. The share of those aged between 65-79 is expected to rise by 2 percentage points (pp) from 15% at the beginning of 2022 to 17% in 2100, while the share of those aged 80 years or more is foreseen to more than double, from 6% to 15%.

In 2022, the EU's population pyramid already shows the shape associated with long life expectancies, low death rates and low birth rates: the highest shares of the population are made up of working-age people above 50, while the shares of young people below 20 are noticeably smaller.

Source dataset: proj_23np

The 2100 pyramid clearly shows development towards a shrinking and ageing society: decreases in the shares of children and young people below 20 and those at working age are only partially offset by increases in the shares of those aged 65 or more. Contrary to 2022, the pyramid does not start contracting after the age of 55, but remains relatively stable until around 85 years.

At the top of the projected pyramid for the year 2100, the age group 100 years or more becomes wider, with women aged 100 or more being projected to represent 0.3% of the total population in 2100 against 0.02% in 2022.

Methodological note:

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
EU's population projected to drop by 6% by 2100

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
According to the latest population projections issued by Eurostat, the EU's population will decrease by 6% between 1 January 2022 and 1 January 2100, equivalent to 27.3 million fewer people. After a decrease in 2020 and 2021 due to the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, the population of the EU started recovering during the course of 2022.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
China's population probably began to shrink for the first time in decades in 2022 and this could impact the country's economy, said experts.

Official data, which will be released next week, could show the total number of births in 2022 at a record low of 10 million, according to independent demographer He Yafu.

This would be less than the 10.6 million babies born in 2021, reported Bloomberg, citing the demographer.

It was reported in July last year that China's population slowed significantly and was expected to start to shrink ahead of 2025.

The state-owned Global Times had reported last year, citing a senior health official, that birth data released on 24 July 2022 showed the number of new births two years ago was the lowest in decades in several provinces.

The number of births in central Hunan province fell below 500,000 for the first time in nearly 60 years, the news outlet had reported, citing provincial data.

Only China's southern Guangdong province has had more than a million new births, it said.

Mr He said China likely recorded more deaths in 2022 than the 10.1 million people who died in 2021, partly due to Covid.

Experts said the shrinking has come faster than earlier expected, something that this could mean serious repercussions for the economy as it could curb growth and reduce demand for housing coupled with an already shrinking labour force.

The government could also grapple with funding its national pension system, according to the Bloomberg report.

Christopher Beddor, deputy China research director at Gavekal Dragonomics, told the business portal that "the measures taken to boost birth rates have been far too little and too late, and were completely overwhelmed by the impact of Covid-Zero on birth rates ".

"The core issue is that there's only so much policy can accomplish in this realm because declining birth rates are driven by deep structural factors," Mr Beddor said, adding that economic challenges posed by China's ageing and shrinking population have been discussed for years.

"The leadership seems to have belatedly realised that those issues are very real and arriving very quickly."

Meanwhile, India is expected to surpass China as the world's most populous country this year, according to a UN report released last year.

"This year's (2022) World Population Day (11 July) falls during a milestone year when we anticipate the birth of the Earth's eight billionth inhabitant," UN Secretary-General António Guterres had said.

China's population likely shrank in 2022 for first time in decades

China's population likely shrank in 2022 for first time in decades

Students wearing face masks are accompanied by their relatives as they head to a primary school in Beijing in September 2022

AP

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
China's population likely shrank in 2022 for first time in decades, expert says

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Official data to show total number of births in 2022 at a record low of 10 million

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Heat waves in US and Europe would have been 'virtually impossible' without climate change, new report finds | CNN

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Extreme heat waves across three continents this month were made significantly more likely by the human-caused climate crisis, according to a new analysis released Tuesday as temperatures are still blazing in parts of the Northern Hemisphere.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.provider_name
Climate Change: Vital Signs of the Planet

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Our lives literally revolve around cycles: series of events that are repeated regularly in the same order. There are hundreds of different types of cycles in our world and in the universe. Some are natural, such as the change of the seasons, annual animal migrations or the circadian rhythms that govern our sleep patterns. Others are human-produced, like growing and harvesting crops, musical rhythms or economic cycles.

Cycles also play key roles in Earth's short-term weather and long-term climate. A century ago, Serbian scientist Milutin Milankovitch hypothesized the long-term, collective effects of changes in Earth's position relative to the Sun are a strong driver of Earth's long-term climate, and are responsible for triggering the beginning and end of glaciation periods (Ice Ages).

Specifically, he examined how variations in three types of Earth orbital movements affect how much solar radiation (known as insolation) reaches the top of Earth's atmosphere as well as where the insolation reaches. These cyclical orbital movements, which became known as the Milankovitch cycles, cause variations of up to 25 percent in the amount of incoming insolation at Earth's mid-latitudes (the areas of our planet located between about 30 and 60 degrees north and south of the equator).

The Milankovitch cycles include:

1. The shape of Earth's orbit, known as eccentricity;

2. The angle Earth's axis is tilted with respect to Earth's orbital plane, known as obliquity; and

3. The direction Earth's axis of rotation is pointed, known as precession.

Let's take a look at each (further reading on why Milankovitch cycles can't explain Earth's current warming here).

Eccentricity - Earth's annual pilgrimage around the Sun isn't perfectly circular, but it's pretty close. Over time, the pull of gravity from our solar system's two largest gas giant planets, Jupiter and Saturn, causes the shape of Earth's orbit to vary from nearly circular to slightly elliptical. Eccentricity measures how much the shape of Earth's orbit departs from a perfect circle. These variations affect the distance between Earth and the Sun.

Eccentricity is the reason why our seasons are slightly different lengths, with summers in the Northern Hemisphere currently about 4.5 days longer than winters, and springs about three days longer than autumns. As eccentricity decreases, the length of our seasons gradually evens out.

The difference in the distance between Earth's closest approach to the Sun (known as perihelion), which occurs on or about January 3 each year, and its farthest departure from the Sun (known as aphelion) on or about July 4, is currently about 5.1 million kilometers (about 3.2 million miles), a variation of 3.4 percent. That means each January, about 6.8 percent more incoming solar radiation reaches Earth than it does each July.

When Earth's orbit is at its most elliptic, about 23 percent more incoming solar radiation reaches Earth at our planet's closest approach to the Sun each year than does at its farthest departure from the Sun. Currently, Earth's eccentricity is near its least elliptic (most circular) and is very slowly decreasing, in a cycle that spans about 100,000 years.

The total change in global annual insolation due to the eccentricity cycle is very small. Because variations in Earth's eccentricity are fairly small, they're a relatively minor factor in annual seasonal climate variations.

Obliquity - The angle Earth's axis of rotation is tilted as it travels around the Sun is known as obliquity. Obliquity is why Earth has seasons. Over the last million years, it has varied between 22.1 and 24.5 degrees with respect to Earth's orbital plane. The greater Earth's axial tilt angle, the more extreme our seasons are, as each hemisphere receives more solar radiation during its summer, when the hemisphere is tilted toward the Sun, and less during winter, when it is tilted away. Larger tilt angles favor periods of deglaciation (the melting and retreat of glaciers and ice sheets). These effects aren't uniform globally -- higher latitudes receive a larger change in total solar radiation than areas closer to the equator.

Earth's axis is currently tilted 23.4 degrees, or about half way between its extremes, and this angle is very slowly decreasing in a cycle that spans about 41,000 years. It was last at its maximum tilt about 10,700 years ago and will reach its minimum tilt about 9,800 years from now. As obliquity decreases, it gradually helps make our seasons milder, resulting in increasingly warmer winters, and cooler summers that gradually, over time, allow snow and ice at high latitudes to build up into large ice sheets. As ice cover increases, it reflects more of the Sun's energy back into space, promoting even further cooling.

Precession - As Earth rotates, it wobbles slightly upon its axis, like a slightly off-center spinning toy top. This wobble is due to tidal forces caused by the gravitational influences of the Sun and Moon that cause Earth to bulge at the equator, affecting its rotation. The trend in the direction of this wobble relative to the fixed positions of stars is known as axial precession. The cycle of axial precession spans about 25,771.5 years.

Axial precession makes seasonal contrasts more extreme in one hemisphere and less extreme in the other. Currently perihelion occurs during winter in the Northern Hemisphere and in summer in the Southern Hemisphere. This makes Southern Hemisphere summers hotter and moderates Northern Hemisphere seasonal variations. But in about 13,000 years, axial precession will cause these conditions to flip, with the Northern Hemisphere seeing more extremes in solar radiation and the Southern Hemisphere experiencing more moderate seasonal variations.

Precession does affect seasonal timing relative to Earth's closest/farthest points around the Sun. However, the modern calendar system ties itself to the seasons, and so, for example, the Northern Hemisphere winter will never occur in July. Today Earth's North Stars are Polaris and Polaris Australis, but a couple of thousand years ago, they were Kochab and Pherkad.

There's also apsidal precession. Not only does Earth's axis wobble, but Earth's entire orbital ellipse also wobbles irregularly, primarily due to its interactions with Jupiter and Saturn. The cycle of apsidal precession spans about 112,000 years. Apsidal precession changes the orientation of Earth's orbit relative to the elliptical plane.

The combined effects of axial and apsidal precession result in an overall precession cycle spanning about 23,000 years on average.
A Climate Time Machine
The small changes set in motion by Milankovitch cycles operate separately and together to influence Earth's climate over very long timespans, leading to larger changes in our climate over tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of years. Milankovitch combined the cycles to create a comprehensive mathematical model for calculating differences in solar radiation at various Earth latitudes along with corresponding surface temperatures. The model is sort of like a climate time machine: it can be run backward and forward to examine past and future climate conditions.

Milankovitch assumed changes in radiation at some latitudes and in some seasons are more important than others to the growth and retreat of ice sheets. In addition, it was his belief that obliquity was the most important of the three cycles for climate, because it affects the amount of insolation in Earth's northern high-latitude regions during summer (the relative role of precession versus obliquity is still a matter of scientific study).

He calculated that Ice Ages occur approximately every 41,000 years. Subsequent research confirms that they did occur at 41,000-year intervals between one and three million years ago. But about 800,000 years ago, the cycle of Ice Ages lengthened to 100,000 years, matching Earth's eccentricity cycle. While various theories have been proposed to explain this transition, scientists do not yet have a clear answer.

Milankovitch's work was supported by other researchers of his time, and he authored numerous publications on his hypothesis. But it wasn't until about 10 years after his death in 1958 that the global science community began to take serious notice of his theory. In 1976, a study in the journal Science by Hays et al. using deep-sea sediment cores found that Milankovitch cycles correspond with periods of major climate change over the past 450,000 years, with Ice Ages occurring when Earth was undergoing different stages of orbital variation.

Several other projects and studies have also upheld the validity of Milankovitch's work, including research using data from ice cores in Greenland and Antarctica that has provided strong evidence of Milankovitch cycles going back many hundreds of thousands of years. In addition, his work has been embraced by the National Research Council of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences.

Scientific research to better understand the mechanisms that cause changes in Earth's rotation and how specifically Milankovitch cycles combine to affect climate is ongoing. But the theory that they drive the timing of glacial-interglacial cycles is well accepted.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.keywords[]
national aeronautics and space administration

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.authors[].name
By Alan Buis,
NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Milankovitch (Orbital) Cycles and Their Role in Earth's Climate - Climate Change: Vital Signs of the Planet

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Our lives literally revolve around cycles: series of events that are repeated regularly in the same order. There are hundreds of different types of cycles in our world and in the universe. Some are natural, such as the change of the seasons, annual animal migrations or the circadian rhythms that govern our sleep patterns.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
A series of climate records on temperature, ocean heat, and Antarctic sea ice have alarmed some scientists who say their speed and timing is unprecedented.

Dangerous heatwaves in Europe could break further records, the UN says.

It is hard to immediately link these events to climate change because weather - and oceans - are so complex.

Studies are under way, but scientists already fear some worst-case scenarios are unfolding.

"I'm not aware of a similar period when all parts of the climate system were in record-breaking or abnormal territory," Thomas Smith, an environmental geographer at London School of Economics, says.

"The Earth is in uncharted territory" now due to global warming from burning fossil fuels, as well as heat from the first El Niño - a warming natural weather system - since 2018, says Imperial College London climate science lecturer Dr Paulo Ceppi.

Here are four climate records broken so far this summer - the hottest day on record, the hottest June on record globally, extreme marine heatwaves, record-low Antarctic sea-ice - and what they tell us.

The world experienced its hottest day ever recorded in July, breaking the global average temperature record set in 2016.

Average global temperature topped 17C for the first time, reaching 17.08C on 6 July, according to EU climate monitoring service Copernicus.

Ongoing emissions from burning fossil fuels like oil, coal, and gas are behind the planet's warming trend.

This is exactly what was forecast to happen in a world warmed by more greenhouse gases, says climate scientist Dr Friederike Otto, from Imperial College London.

"Humans are 100% behind the upward trend," she says.

"If I'm surprised by anything, it's that we're seeing the records broken in June, so earlier in the year. El Niño normally doesn't really have a global impact until five or six months into the phase," Dr Smith says.

El Niño is the world's most powerful naturally occurring climate fluctuation. It brings warmer water to the surface in the tropical Pacific, pushing warmer air into the atmosphere. It normally increases global air temperatures.

The average global temperature in June this year was 1.47C above the typical June in the pre-industrial period. Humans started pumping greenhouse gases into the atmosphere when the Industrial Revolution started around 1800.

Asked if summer 2023 is what he would have forecasted a decade ago, Dr Smith says that climate models are good at predicting long-term trends but less good at forecasting the next 10 years.

"Models from the 1990s pretty much put us where we are today. But to have an idea about what the next 10 years would look like exactly would be very difficult," he says.

"Things aren't going to cool down," he adds.

Extreme marine heatwaves

The average global ocean temperature has smashed records for May, June and July. It is approaching the highest sea surface temperature ever recorded, which was in 2016.

But it is extreme heat in the North Atlantic ocean that is particularly alarming scientists.

"We've never ever had a marine heatwave in this part of Atlantic. I had not expected this," says Daniela Schmidt, Prof of Earth Sciences at the University of Bristol.

In June temperatures off the west coast of Ireland were between 4C and 5C above average, which the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration classified as a category 5 heatwave, or "beyond extreme".

Directly attributing this heatwave to climate change is complex, but that work is ongoing, Prof Schmidt says.

What is clear is that the world has warmed and the oceans have absorbed most of that heat from the atmosphere, she explains.

"Our models have natural variability in them, and there are still things appearing that we had not envisaged, or at least not yet," she adds.

She emphasises the impact of this heat on marine ecosystems, which produce 50% of the world's oxygen.

"People tend to think about trees and grasses dying when we talk about heatwaves. The Atlantic is 5C warmer than it should be - that means organisms need 50% more food just to function as normal," she says.

Record low Antarctic sea-ice

The area covered by sea-ice in the Antarctic is at record lows for July. There is an area around 10 times the size of the UK missing, compared with the 1981-2010 average.

Alarm bells are ringing for scientists as they try to unpick the exact link to climate change.

A warming world could reduce levels of Antarctic sea-ice, but the current dramatic reduction could also be due to local weather conditions or ocean currents, explains Dr Caroline Holmes at the British Antarctic Survey.

She emphasises it is not just a record being broken - it is being smashed by a long way.

"This is nothing like anything we've seen before in July. It's 10% lower than the previous low, which is huge."

She calls it "another sign that we don't really understand the pace of change".

Scientists believed that global warming would affect Antarctic sea-ice at some point, but until 2015 it bucked the global trend for other oceans, Dr Holmes says.

"You can say that we've fallen off a cliff, but we don't know what's at the bottom of the cliff here," she says.

"I think this has taken us by surprise in terms of the speed of which has happened. It's definitely not the best case scenario that we were looking at - it's closer to the worst case," she says.

We can certainly expect more and more of these records to break as the year goes on and we enter 2024, scientists say.

But it would be wrong to call what is happening a "climate collapse" or "runaway warming", cautions Dr Otto.

We are in a new era, but "we still have time to secure a liveable future for many", she explains.

Additional reporting by Mark Poynting and Becky Dale

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Climate records tumble, leaving Earth in uncharted territory - scientists

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
A series of records on temperature, ocean heat, and Antarctic sea ice are "unprecedented", some scientists say.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
How Aging Populations Will Shape Labour Markets By 2031

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
It is predicted that by 2031, workers aged 55 and older will constitute over 25% of the workforce in the Group of Seven countries, according to a Bain & Company report. This is a nearly 10-percentage-point increase from the numbers recorded in 2011.

# data[].attributes.headline
Geography in the news - Heatwaves in US and Europe

# data[].attributes.subject
Geography in the news - Heatwaves in US and Europe