My Climate Change News

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has warned that global warming, caused by greenhouse gas emissions, is leading to more extreme weather events and African nations are among those that will face heightened food and water insecurity. At least 16 million people are already at risk across Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia, according to the United Nations, and the threat of famine is clearly evident.  

While Kenya typically gets most of its rainfall between March and June and some showers between October and December, weather patterns have begun to change. Many areas haven’t had sufficient water since late 2020, and there is no indication when the drought will break. 

Cereal production across northern Kenya and southern Somalia halved last year, and many cattle, goat and camel herds were decimated. Russia’s war on Ukraine has made a terrible situation even worse, pushing up grain and fuel prices, and raising aid costs for governments whose ...

That’s a problem because lands need decades or centuries of idleness to reach their potential for absorbing atmospheric CO₂ and allowing endangered animals and plants to repopulate previously developed areas. “To produce substantial environmental benefits, abandoned lands must stay abandoned long enough” to grow, the authors write.

“This is a very important paper,” said J. Leighton Reid, an assistant professor of ecological restoration at Virginia Tech who was familiar with the study but not involved in it. “Political leaders leaders should take note here because many of them are narrowly focused on how many trees they can plant in the next few years. That number matters way less than the length of the time that those trees will persist as a forest.”

The sites under study stored an estimated 403 million tons of CO₂ — or 35% less than they might have taken up without ...

Yale Climate Connections

Climate change is a global problem, so many people feel powerless to do anything about it. But research shows individual actions add up.

“We estimate between 25 and 30% of the total potential emissions reductions needed to avoid dangerous climate change … can be addressed at global scale over the next 30 years by individuals and households,” says Chad Frischmann of Drawdown Solutions, a research division of the nonprofit Project Drawdown.

His group evaluates the potential impact of various climate solutions. And he says there are many that individuals and households can take action on, like eating more plant-rich meals, reducing the gas and electricity they use, or installing solar.

Frischmann says making these changes can inspire others to do the same. And it signals to companies that consumers want climate-friendly options.

But consumers’ choices are often limited by what’s available and affordable to them. And the ...

Yale Climate Connections

Climate change is a global problem, so many people feel powerless to do anything about it. But research shows individual actions add up.

“We estimate between 25 and 30% of the total potential emissions reductions needed to avoid dangerous climate change … can be addressed at global scale over the next 30 years by individuals and households,” says Chad Frischmann of Drawdown Solutions, a research division of the nonprofit Project Drawdown.

His group evaluates the potential impact of various climate solutions. And he says there are many that individuals and households can take action on, like eating more plant-rich meals, reducing the gas and electricity they use, or installing solar.

Frischmann says making these changes can inspire others to do the same. And it signals to companies that consumers want climate-friendly options.

But consumers’ choices are often limited by what’s available and affordable to them. And the ...

Read: Kerry Lines Up Pledges to Scrub Emissions From Carbon-Heavy Industries

The $300 million sum comes on top of $2 billion in funding announcements made last month for carbon-removal technologies. In a statement today, the FMC also noted Alphabet Inc.’s $200 million in funding toward carbon removal, which was announced last month.

While the world must reduce emissions to zero, reaching global climate goals is going to require pulling down existing greenhouse gases from the atmosphere. Such an injection of cash could give a nascent industry great momentum.

That’s what the FMC hopes to achieve in other sectors, including aluminum, cement and chemicals. Reducing the carbon footprint of these sectors, which are responsible for a third of global emissions, has so far been pushed away as too expensive a problem to solve. The world has mostly focused on technologies like solar and wind power or lithium-ion batteries that have ...

Britain has bet big on renewable power to curb carbon emissions, with Prime Minister Boris Johnson describing the UK as the Saudi Arabia of wind. But that has also left the country at the mercy of weather, and made it harder for grids to cope without the ability to store large amounts of electricity in batteries or use it to produce green hydrogen.

Wind power peaked at 19,835 megawatts on Wednesday, enough to cover more than half of Britain’s electricity needs. Production surpassed a peak set in late January and follows record renewables output seen recently in other parts of Europe, highlighting the potential for green energy to replace expensive fossil fuels.

As the UK continues to ramp up wind-farm capacity to cut its reliance on dirty fuels like coal and gas, records will start to become an increasingly common occurrence. More green output is also good news as European countries look to wean themselves off Russian energy.

Wind power peaked at ...

Yale Climate Connections

A small red bird called the 'i’iwi is a symbol of the Hawaiian islands. It used to be common, but now this distinctive little bird is in danger of extinction.

Eben Paxton of the USGS Pacific Island Ecosystems Research Center explains that the i’iwi evolved in isolation. So these native Hawaiian birds never developed immunity to many diseases that were common elsewhere.

“And so they’re very vulnerable,” he says.

Avian malaria, which was brought to Hawaii in the 1800s, poses an especially grave threat. The disease kills almost all the 'i’iwi that it infects.

It’s spread by mosquitoes, which are most prevalent in low-lying areas. So 'i’iwis now live only at higher elevations, where it’s historically been too cool for mosquitoes.

“But … with global warming and climate change, the temperatures are increasing at those higher elevations,” Paxton says. “And that provides more opportunity for these mosquitoes to breed at ...

Yale Climate Connections

A small red bird called the 'i’iwi is a symbol of the Hawaiian islands. It used to be common, but now this distinctive little bird is in danger of extinction.

Eben Paxton of the USGS Pacific Island Ecosystems Research Center explains that the i’iwi evolved in isolation. So these native Hawaiian birds never developed immunity to many diseases that were common elsewhere.

“And so they’re very vulnerable,” he says.

Avian malaria, which was brought to Hawaii in the 1800s, poses an especially grave threat. The disease kills almost all the 'i’iwi that it infects.

It’s spread by mosquitoes, which are most prevalent in low-lying areas. So 'i’iwis now live only at higher elevations, where it’s historically been too cool for mosquitoes.

“But … with global warming and climate change, the temperatures are increasing at those higher elevations,” Paxton says. “And that provides more opportunity for these mosquitoes to breed at ...

Yale Climate Connections

A small red bird called the 'i’iwi is a symbol of the Hawaiian islands. It used to be common, but now this distinctive little bird is in danger of extinction.

Eben Paxton of the USGS Pacific Island Ecosystems Research Center explains that the i’iwi evolved in isolation. So these native Hawaiian birds never developed immunity to many diseases that were common elsewhere.

“And so they’re very vulnerable,” he says.

Avian malaria, which was brought to Hawaii in the 1800s, poses an especially grave threat. The disease kills almost all the 'i’iwi that it infects.

It’s spread by mosquitoes, which are most prevalent in low-lying areas. So 'i’iwis now live only at higher elevations, where it’s historically been too cool for mosquitoes.

“But … with global warming and climate change, the temperatures are increasing at those higher elevations,” Paxton says. “And that provides more opportunity for these mosquitoes to breed at ...

Yale Climate Connections

A small red bird called the 'i’iwi is a symbol of the Hawaiian islands. It used to be common, but now this distinctive little bird is in danger of extinction.

Eben Paxton of the USGS Pacific Island Ecosystems Research Center explains that the i’iwi evolved in isolation. So these native Hawaiian birds never developed immunity to many diseases that were common elsewhere.

“And so they’re very vulnerable,” he says.

Avian malaria, which was brought to Hawaii in the 1800s, poses an especially grave threat. The disease kills almost all the 'i’iwi that it infects.

It’s spread by mosquitoes, which are most prevalent in low-lying areas. So 'i’iwis now live only at higher elevations, where it’s historically been too cool for mosquitoes.

“But … with global warming and climate change, the temperatures are increasing at those higher elevations,” Paxton says. “And that provides more opportunity for these mosquitoes to breed at ...

Nevertheless, plastics could be net-zero by 2050, according to a new report from BloombergNEF, the clean energy research arm of Bloomberg LP. It will take investing an extra $759 billion to support actions such as the electrification of so-called “cracker” plants — plants that break down natural gas into small molecules needed to make plastics — and building out carbon capture and storage facilities. In addition, the report suggests money needs to be spent on research and development and the switching of feedstocks to include more biofuels.

The authors of the report say such investments must begin immediately. “Large-scale capex spending must start before the end of the decade if the petrochemical industry has any hope of reaching net-zero,” said Ilhan Savut, an analyst with BNEF’s sustainable materials team and lead author of the report. “Investments today will be key to managing ...

Companies are cutting back on purchasing grains from deforested areas like the Cerrado and Amazon to reduce their carbon footprint. The Cerrado is known as one of the high-risk areas of deforestation in Brazil and responsible for over half of the country’s output of soybeans and corn. 

“We are seeing more and more demand for a clean carbon footprint, not only offsetting,” said Rob Coviello, Bunge’s chief sustainability officer.

Bunge is tracking indirect purchases by giving resellers access to digital monitoring tools, including satellite imagery that can identify deforestation from farms they buy from.

Company can monitor 64% of indirect volumes, up from 30%

To contact the author of this story:Tarso Veloso Ribeiro in Chicago at tveloso3@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story:David Marino at dmarino4@bloomberg.netLydia Mulvany

A worker performs a quality control check on ...

Beijing has said it’s shutting smaller, less efficient mines and replacing them with more efficient operations and that it will begin phasing down its coal production after 2025. 

New and proposed coal mine expansions in China threaten to derail the country's climate ambitions.

But China is expanding mines faster than it’s closing them and if that doesn't change it will be much harder for the country to meet climate goals like curbing methane emissions from coal operations and reaching peak carbon emissions by 2030, according to the GEM analysis. The estimated 559 million tons of annual new capacity in development could emit an additional 6 million tons of methane a year unless there is “relentless” adoption of mitigation practices, the non-profit said.

“Short-term decisions being made now are going to be very tricky to undo,” said Ryan Driskell Tate, a research analyst ...

Beijing has said it’s shutting smaller, less efficient mines and replacing them with more efficient operations and that it will begin phasing down its coal production after 2025. 

New and proposed coal mine expansions in China threaten to derail the country's climate ambitions.

But China is expanding mines faster than it’s closing them and if that doesn't change it will be much harder for the country to meet climate goals like curbing methane emissions from coal operations and reaching peak carbon emissions by 2030, according to the GEM analysis. The estimated 559 million tons of annual new capacity in development could emit an additional 6 million tons of methane a year unless there is “relentless” adoption of mitigation practices, the non-profit said.

“Short-term decisions being made now are going to be very tricky to undo,” said Ryan Driskell Tate, a research analyst ...

The WWA results are inherently conservative because the temperature record under study began only in 1979. Incorporating older Indian data beginning in 1951 and output from 20 climate models into their methodology, researchers found the heat wave to be a once-a-century event at the current level of global warming, about 1.2° Celsius above the pre-industrial average. The relatively short data sets made it challenging to narrow the probability window onto what happens next. Similar heat waves might accelerate between anywhere from two to 20 times, meaning that a once-a-century event could be expected as rarely as twice a century or as frequently as every five years after 2°C of global warming. 

A recent UN climate assessment emphasized the growing importance of adaptation to heat and other climate-related disasters, and the critical role international finance plays in achieving it. 

South Asia is both particularly at risk and beginning to ...

Yale Climate Connections

Under the kitchen sink, tucked between trash bags and cleaning products, some people keep a bin of worms. The worms eat fruit and vegetable scraps and leave behind nutrient-rich compost that can be used to nourish houseplants.

Jennifer Roberts of the University of California Cooperative Extension says this method of composting is called vermicomposting, and it can work well for people with limited space.

“An average family of four … can compost all their food scraps with one worm bin that’s about one-and-a-half feet by one-and-a-half feet,” Roberts says.

The stars of the show are red wiggler worms, which can be bought online or at garden centers. And a pound of worms can produce about a cup of compost each month.

“What they create on the other end is actually even richer than normal compost that we would do in our backyard or even from a commercial facility,” Roberts says.

She says composting helps the climate by ...

Yale Climate Connections

Under the kitchen sink, tucked between trash bags and cleaning products, some people keep a bin of worms. The worms eat fruit and vegetable scraps and leave behind nutrient-rich compost that can be used to nourish houseplants.

Jennifer Roberts of the University of California Cooperative Extension says this method of composting is called vermicomposting, and it can work well for people with limited space.

“An average family of four … can compost all their food scraps with one worm bin that’s about one-and-a-half feet by one-and-a-half feet,” Roberts says.

The stars of the show are red wiggler worms, which can be bought online or at garden centers. And a pound of worms can produce about a cup of compost each month.

“What they create on the other end is actually even richer than normal compost that we would do in our backyard or even from a commercial facility,” Roberts says.

She says composting helps the climate by ...

Yale Climate Connections

Under the kitchen sink, tucked between trash bags and cleaning products, some people keep a bin of worms. The worms eat fruit and vegetable scraps and leave behind nutrient-rich compost that can be used to nourish houseplants.

Jennifer Roberts of the University of California Cooperative Extension says this method of composting is called vermicomposting, and it can work well for people with limited space.

“An average family of four … can compost all their food scraps with one worm bin that’s about one-and-a-half feet by one-and-a-half feet,” Roberts says.

The stars of the show are red wiggler worms, which can be bought online or at garden centers. And a pound of worms can produce about a cup of compost each month.

“What they create on the other end is actually even richer than normal compost that we would do in our backyard or even from a commercial facility,” Roberts says.

She says composting helps the climate by ...

Yale Climate Connections

Under the kitchen sink, tucked between trash bags and cleaning products, some people keep a bin of worms. The worms eat fruit and vegetable scraps and leave behind nutrient-rich compost that can be used to nourish houseplants.

Jennifer Roberts of the University of California Cooperative Extension says this method of composting is called vermicomposting, and it can work well for people with limited space.

“An average family of four … can compost all their food scraps with one worm bin that’s about one-and-a-half feet by one-and-a-half feet,” Roberts says.

The stars of the show are red wiggler worms, which can be bought online or at garden centers. And a pound of worms can produce about a cup of compost each month.

“What they create on the other end is actually even richer than normal compost that we would do in our backyard or even from a commercial facility,” Roberts says.

She says composting helps the climate by ...

That’s the challenge confronting Western leaders who want to wean their economies off Russian fossil fuels. Building more offshore wind is one of the more efficient ways for some countries to replace that dirty energy. Turbines built at sea benefit from stronger and more consistent wind speeds. They also avoid one of the biggest hurdles to constructing a wind farm: neighbors who don’t want windmills ruining their view.

The UK in particular has supported the industry by allocating vast tracts of seabed to developers and doling out generous subsidies, helping improve the technology and lower costs. Since the first British project was completed in 2000, turbines have become more than five times as powerful and the price of wind-generated electricity has fallen below power from fossil fuel or nuclear plants. By the end of the decade, Prime Minister Boris Johnson aims to boost the UK’s offshore wind capacity to 50 gigawatts, more than triple the ...