Canada’s 2023 wildfires produced more emissions than fossil fuels in most countries

August 28, 2024
This article is from The Spark, MIT Technology Review’s weekly climate newsletter. To receive it in your inbox every Wednesday, sign up here. Last year’s Canadian wildfires smashed records, burning about seven times more land in Canada’s forests than the annual average over the previous four decades. Eight firefighters were killed and 180,000 people displaced. …

The Download: introducing: the 125th Anniversary issue

August 28, 2024
This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. Introducing: the 125th Anniversary issue With this issue, we wanted to celebrate our milestone as a publication without dwelling too much on our own past. Victory laps are for race cars, not magazines.…

From the publisher

August 28, 2024
The magazine you now hold in your hands is 125 years old. Not this actual issue, of course, but the publication itself, which launched in 1899. Few other titles can claim this kind of heritage—the Atlantic, Harper’s, Audubon (which is also turning 125 this year), National Geographic, and Popular Science among them. MIT Technology Review…

African farmers are using private satellite data to improve crop yields

August 28, 2024
Last year, as the harvest season drew closer, Olabokunde Tope came across an unpleasant surprise.  While certain spots on his 70-hectare cassava farm in Ibadan, Nigeria, were thriving, a sizable parcel was pale and parched—the result of an early and unexpected halt in the rains. The cassava stems, starved of water, had withered to straw. …

The year is 2149 and …

August 28, 2024
The year is 2149 and people mostly live their lives “on rails.” That’s what they call it, “on rails,” which is to live according to the meticulous instructions of software. Software knows most things about you—what causes you anxiety, what raises your endorphin levels, everything you’ve ever searched for, everywhere you’ve been. Software sends messages…

Job title of the future: Weather maker

August 28, 2024
Much of the western United States relies on winter snowpack to supply its rivers and reservoirs through the summer months. But with warming temperatures, less and less snow is falling—a recent study showed a 23% decline in annual snowpack since 1955. By some estimates, runoff from snowmelt in the western US could decrease by a…