The Earth System is revolutionary in its design because it addresses the issues of global change from a true Earth systems perspective.  Lessons from Earth's past allow students to put such modern global change issues in historical context. The book describes how the Earth system "works" and maintains homeostasis, highlighting those events that provide lessons for the future. It describes the effects of humans on the Earth system, emphasizing the global issues of climate change, ozone depletion, and loss of biodiversity. Finally, it concludes by discussing the prospect for life on planets outside the solar system and on Earth in its long-term future.

Now available in an accessible and up-to date format through Kendall Hunt Publishing, the NEW 4th edition of The Earth System:

• Features updated research!  The new edition features color images and data / figures based on research through the end of 2021 – including the 2022 IPCC report (which was released in draft form in 2021).
• Is practical!  Students can learn first-hand the impact of environmental changes through the coverage of human heat stress, new technologies for reducing CO2 emissions, such as electric vehicles, small modular nuclear reactors, wind and solar power.
• Has been reformatted! Chapters have been added / split to discuss the topics of origin and life amid new research, climate stability on Earth-life planets, exoplanets, and on Earth's long-term future and the search for extraterrestrial life.
• Is student friendly!  To aid the learning process, students are presented with Critical-Thinking Problems to encourage students to synthesize concepts to real-life; Useful Concepts, with in-depth presentations of fundamental concepts from the natural sciences essential to our understanding of the Earth system; and Thinking Quantitatively, which emphasizes how mathematics is used to better understand the workings of the Earth system.
• Is flexible! The new edition includes enough material for two one-semester courses, one of which might focus on the present Earth system and near-term environmental problems; and a second one that might cover longer-term changes in the Earth system and implications for life elsewhere.