The planet

Terra

A planet of connected systems.

Explore climate, water, land, and life — and the planetary conditions we depend on and change.

Explore Earth systemsSee how the platforms connect

Explore planetary boundaries

Select a boundary to inspect it. The controls illustrate possible relationships between environmental pressures; adjusted values are teaching scenarios, not measured outcomes or forecasts.

PLANETSAFE OPERATING LIMIT
Safe Zone Breached Boundary
Decarbonization Rate0%

Illustrates how clean-energy assumptions affect selected climate, ocean, and ecological pressures in this model.

Deforestation Control0%

Simulates rewilding and zero deforestation. Contracts land-system, biosphere, and water boundaries.

Reference view

BREACHED

Climate change

Control Variable
Atmospheric CO₂ concentration & Radiative forcing
Safe limit
350 ppm / 1.0 W/m²
Reference state
430 ppm / 2.91 W/m²

Elevated carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases trap excess heat in the Earth system, warming the planet and disrupting global meteorological equilibria.

Consequences: Accelerates glacier and ice sheet melt, raises sea levels, intensifies droughts, wildfires, and floods, and triggers climate tipping points.

This boundary is outside the safe operating limit in the reference view.

Planetary Boundaries Inventory

Breached

430 ppm / 2.91 W/m²

Breached

> 100 E/MSY / < 84% BII

Breached

~60% global / ~50% tropical

Breached

> 18.2% global deviation

Breached

150 Tg N / 22 Tg P

Breached

Hundreds of millions of tonnes of plastics/PFAS annually

Breached

2.80 Ω (breached in 2025)

Safe Zone

Global average safe; regional breaches (South Asia)

Safe Zone

~2% global reduction (steady recovery)

Planetary Signals

A small set of measured indicators sketches the direction of the coupled system: a warming atmosphere, a rising and acidifying ocean, thinning forests and wildlife, and an energy base still dominated by fossil fuels.

1.55 °C

WMO

above pre-industrial

2024 was the warmest year on record and the first calendar year to average more than 1.5 °C above the 1850–1900 baseline.

430 ppm

NOAA / Scripps

atmospheric CO₂

Monthly CO₂ at Mauna Loa first passed 430 ppm in May 2025; the 3.75 ppm annual jump in 2024 was the largest on record.

4.5 mm/yr

NASA

sea-level rise

The rate of global mean sea-level rise roughly doubled from 2.1 mm/yr in 1993 to 4.5 mm/yr in 2024, and continues to accelerate.

6.7M ha

Global Forest Watch / WRI

tropical primary forest lost

Tropical primary forest loss hit a record in 2024 — nearly double 2023 — with fire the leading driver for the first time.

73%

WWF / ZSL

wildlife population decline

The average size of monitored vertebrate populations fell 73% between 1970 and 2020; freshwater systems fell 85%.

86%

Energy Institute

primary energy from fossil fuels

Fossil fuels still supplied roughly 86% of global primary energy in 2024, even as wind and solar grew about 16%.

The Earth's Vital Signs

A patient is read through their vital signs; so is a planet. Terra's dashboard brings together population, climate, ocean, land, and waste indicators. Explore dated reference series, illustrative projections, and available source updates, with links back to their providers.

Open the planetary vital signs dashboard

Cross-platform couplings

This platform participates in shared feedback loops with the others. Explore the detailed analysis on the systems map.

On the ladder of scale

Terra spans multiple rungs — from the smallest relevant structures to the largest systems it interprets.

What Terra studies

Terra studies the natural and human-shaped systems that together set the environmental conditions of civilization.

Earth systemsClimateEcologyEnergyPlanetary boundariesHuman geographyBiosphere dynamicsFood, water, and land systemsHumans as a planetary force