“We are on the deathbed. Humanity cannot survive – the way it has been behaving with nature – for more than fifty years, sixty years, or, at the most, one hundred years, which is nothing. If the Third World War does not happen, then we will be committing a slow suicide. Within a hundred years, we will be gone. Not even a trace will be left.”¹ Osho

See also: Osho, “Religion: The Crimes Against Nature and the Environment”

And: Priests & Politicians: The Mafia of the Soul

It is becoming increasingly clear that humanity just doesn’t have the consciousness to prevent the inexorable destruction of the only home it has.

Perhaps more fundamentally, this humanity – which is trashing out the land, the oceans, the atmosphere, and the space beyond the atmosphere – is simply being really trashy. We endlessly look outwards for solutions and almost no one is making it clear that unless we fix our trashiness, nothing can fundamentally change. Without this fundamental change in our trashy approach to the world around us, every “solution” we come up with will be deeply compromised by our trashiness!

While waiting for this obvious point to sink in, followed by a clear understanding of how to undo our trashiness, the OSHO Times can only chronicle the inevitable resultant degeneration of Planet Earth, “and all who sail in her!”

Carbon Dioxide Levels in the Atmosphere

Levels of the greenhouse gas have not been as high as today for 3-5m years, when the global temperature was 2-3C warmer and the sea level was 10-20 metres higher: The Guardian

The C02 clock is ticking here: Bloomberg Green Carbon Clock

Human Population

The population clock is ticking here: Worldometre

The Emissions Gap Report 2020

A simple graphical expression of the gap between where we are going and where we need to go to avoid the coming catastrophe. The UN Report: “Emissions Gap Report 2019: 1.5ºC goal at brink of impossible.” – UN Environment

The Unfolding Story – 2021 – Updated Regularly: 

Read 2020 Edition –  HERE

December 18, 2021
Scientists watch giant ‘doomsday’ glacier in Antarctica with concern
“Cracks and fissures stoke fears of breakup that could lead to half-metre rise in global sea levels – or more…. Years of research by teams of British and American researchers showed that great cracks and fissures had opened up both on top of and underneath the Thwaites glacier, one of the biggest in the world, and it was feared that parts of it, too, may fracture and collapse possibly within five years or less…. Thwaites underlines that global heating and glaciers do not wait for politicians, and every year action to reduce climate emissions is delayed only accelerates global disaster.” – The Guardian

December 16, 2021
Concurrent heatwaves seven times more frequent than in 1980s
“Using climate data from 1979 to 2019, the researchers found that the number of heatwaves occurring simultaneously in the mid- to high-latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere was seven times greater in the 2010s than in the 1980s…. The concurrent heat events also grew hotter and larger: their intensity rose by 17% and their geographic extent increased 46%.” – ScienceDaily

December 16, 2021
How we drained California dry
“A story of remaking the land and taking the water until there was nothing left.” – MIT Technology Review

December 14, 2021
‘15 minutes to save the world’: a terrifying VR journey into the nuclear bunker
“I asked my aides if a cyber attack was possible and was told it was impossible to know for sure…. Shockingly, the researchers found no evidence that any US president except Jimmy Carter, had taken part in realistic drills to practise potentially world-ending decisions. Other presidents occasionally participated in table-top exercises with aides to discuss options but more often sent surrogates in their place.” – The Guardian

December 13, 2021
Postcards From a World on Fire
“Politicians have argued. The summits have come and gone. But the truth is that climate change is already upon us. This is Times Opinion’s tour of how climate change has begun reshaping reality in the 193 member states of the United Nations, in ways big and small. In this project, you will see extreme weather and disappearing species.” – The New York Times

December 11, 2021
Why you should turn vegan to end factory farming’s daily carnage – author’s manifesto for change
“Death toll: 150 million a day. And that’s a conservative estimate. As youanticipate gorging on your Christmas turkey, consider that the above is the figure author and anthropologist Roanne van Voorst puts on the number of “fish, chickens, pigs, cows, goats, sheep” our species slaughters for food. It does not include any of the millions of animals killed in laboratories every year in tests on the latest cosmetics or cleaning agents, or those slaughtered for fur coats or other attire. Or male calves and chicks, designated “waste products” by a food industry that has no use for them and kills them immediately after birth, or animals used in bullfights, dog or horse races, aquariums or ‘waterworld attractions.’ ‘Every week,’ continues van Voorst, ‘more animals are killed for human consumption than humans who have died in all wars in human history combined.’ This carnage is made possible, she says, because although most of us might consider ourselves humane in outlook, we are not prepared to face the horrors inflicted on sentient beings by, primarily, the business of factory farming.” – South China Morning Post

December 10, 2021
The Man Who Predicted Climate Change
“In the nineteen-sixties, Syukuro Manabe drew a graph that foretold our world today—and what’s to come.” – The New Yorker

December 2, 2021
‘It became crystal clear they were lying’: the man who made Germans admit complicity in the Holocaust
“With Final Account, the late director Luke Holland set out to obtain testimonies from those who participated in the Nazi atrocities – before their voices were lost. The result is a powerful mix of shame, denial and ghastly pride.” – The Guardian

December 2, 2021
Californian firm touts ‘mushroom leather’ as sustainability gamechanger 
“Vegan alternatives to leather could save more than just animals. The scientists behind fashion’s new latest must-have – the “mushroom leather” handbag – believe that mycelium, a material grown from fungi which can be engineered to look and feel like calfskin or sheepskin, could help save the planet…. Fine Mycelium, a patented material which can be grown from fungi in trays in a matter of weeks, replicates the appearance and feel of leather while outperforming it in strength and durability. The material recently made its high fashion debut as an exclusive Hermès handbag.” – The Guardian

November 30, 2021
Reshaping the plastic lifecycle into a circle
“In 1950, 2 million metric tonnes of new plastic was produced globally. In 2018, the world produced 360 million metric tonnes of plastics. Because of their low cost, durability and versatility, plastics are everywhere-including in the environment-and only 9 percent of the plastic ever generated has been recycled. The vast majority ends up in landfills, where its slow degradation allows it to accumulate, while pervasive microplastics have been found everywhere, from inside living bodies to the bottom of the ocean.” – ScienceDaily

November 29, 2021
These Australian Coal Mines Are Methane Super-Emitters
“New estimates based on satellite data show Glencore’s Hail Creek mine spewed 230,000 tons of the powerful greenhouse gas a year in 2018 and 2019. Just inland of Australia’s east coast, roughly 200 miles from the Great Barrier Reef, a single coal mine run by Glencore Plc emitted so much super-warming methane in a year that it had the same climate warming impact as the annual pollution from more than 4 million U.S. cars…. Because methane traps over 80 times more heat than carbon dioxide in its first two decades in the atmosphere, the mine had the same short-term warming impact as roughly 19 million tons of CO₂ a year.” – Bloomberg

November 29, 2021
Nurdles: the worst toxic waste you’ve probably never heard of
Billions of these tiny plastic pellets are floating in the ocean, causing as much damage as oil spills, yet they are still not classified as hazardous…. They are the second-largest source of micropollutants in the ocean, by weight, after tyre dust. An astounding 230,000 tonnes of nurdles end up in oceans every year. Like crude oil, nurdles are highly persistent pollutants, and will continue to circulate in ocean currents and wash ashore for decades. They are also ‘toxic sponges’, which attract chemical toxins and other pollutants on to their surfaces…. ‘Pollutants can be a million times more concentrated on the surface of pellets than in the water,’ he says. ‘And we know from lab studies that when a fish eats a pellet, some of those pollutants come loose.’ says Tom Gammage, at the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA), an international campaign group.” – The Guardian

November 26, 2021
UK has given oil and gas industry £13.6bn in subsidies since Paris Agreement, say campaigners
“Activists bringing High Court case will claim government support for fossil fuel extraction is inconsistent with UK’s legal duty to achieve net zero emissions by 2050,” – Independent

November 23, 2021
Humans Have Broken a Fundamental Law of the Ocean
Life in the ocean, they discovered, followed a simple mathematical rule: The abundance of an organism is closely linked to its body size. To put it another way, the smaller the organism, the more of them you find in the ocean. Krill are a billion times smaller than tuna, for example, but they are also a billion times more abundant…. When Sheldon and his colleagues organized their plankton samples by orders of magnitude, they found that each size bracket contained exactly the same mass of creatures…. But now humans seem to have broken this fundamental law of the ocean. In a November paper for the journal Science Advances, Galbraith and his colleagues show that the Sheldon spectrum no longer holds true for larger marine creatures…. The very largest size classes appear to have experienced a reduction in biomass of nearly 90 percent since 1800. Many of the big fish and mammals that used to populate the ocean simply aren’t there anymore. – Wired

November 22, 2021
Hurricanes expected to linger over Northeast cities, causing greater damage
“More storms like Hurricane Sandy could be in the East Coast’s future, potentially costing billions of dollars in damage and economic losses.By the late 21st century, northeastern U.S. cities will see worsening hurricane outcomes, with storms arriving more quickly but slowing down once they’ve made landfall. As storms linger longer over the East Coast, they will cause greater damage along the heavily populated corridor, according to a new study.” – ScienceDaily

November 22, 2021
Men’s meat-heavy diets cause 40% more climate emissions than women’s, study finds
“A second study found in western countries, vegan and vegetarian diets were about a third cheaper to buy than regular diets…. Food production causes 30% of greenhouse gas emissions, and previous studies have shown that meat-eating in rich countries must be sharply reduced in order to tackle the climate crisis, largely caused by the methane and deforestation associated with cattle. It found animal products were responsible for almost half of the average diet’s greenhouse gas emissions: 31% from meat and 14% from dairy. Drink caused 15% of emissions and 8% came from cakes, biscuits and confectionery. The research also showed that non-vegetarian diets created 59% more emissions than vegetarian diets. Men’s diets had 41% more emissions, largely due to eating more meat but also due to more drinks.” – The Guardian

November 19, 2021
Deforestation in Brazil’s Amazon at highest level since 2006
“Deforestation in Brazil‘s Amazon rainforest soared 22% in the past year to the highest level since 2006, the government’s annual report has shown, undercutting president Jair Bolsonaro’s assurances that the country is curbing illegal logging. Brazil‘s space research agency, INPE, recorded 13,235sq km (5,110 square miles) of deforestation in the world’s largest rainforest in satellite data, the report showed on Thursday, an area nearly 17 times the size of New York City.” – The Guardian

November 18, 2021
Rivers play key role in destructive coastal flooding, new research shows
“Rising waters affect coastal communities as well as those who live farther upstream. Rising oceans get more attention in climate change discussions, but rivers are rising, too, according to new research by a University of South Carolina postdoctoral fellow. The research shows that rivers need more attention in policy management and disaster preparation, both at the coast and farther inland.” – ScienceDaily

November 18, 2021
Resilience of vertebrate animals in rapid decline due to humanmade threats
“Global change is eroding life on earth at an unprecedented rate and scale. Species extinctions have accelerated over the last decades, with the concomitant loss of the functions and services they provide to human societies.” – ScienceDaily

November 18, 2021
Antarctic ice-sheet destabilized within a decade
“A new Study provides critical insights into ice mass loss in Antarctica: After the natural warming that followed the last Ice Age, there were repeated periods when masses of icebergs broke off from Antarctica into the Southern Ocean. A new data-model study now shows that it took only a decade to initiate this tipping point in the climate system, and that ice mass loss then continued for many centuries.” – ScienceDaily

November 18, 2021
An Empty Pledge to Protect Rainforests
“But while the political elite at the U.N. conference in Glasgow, Scotland, known as COP26, were making grand gestures to protect precious ecosystems, European, Chinese, and U.S. companies were still busy exploiting the Central African rainforest. The COP26 deforestation pledge is yet another example of Western disingenuousness: The West is once again taking on the role of ‘white savior’ while ignoring its own complicity in the environmental destruction taking place on African soil.” – Foreign Policy

November 18, 2021
New Delhi’s Air Turns Toxic, and the Finger-Pointing Begins
“A thick blanket of noxious haze has settled over the Indian capital of New Delhi, burning eyes and lungs, forcing schools to close and prompting ardent calls from residents for action. India’s leaders have responded with what has become an annual tradition: by pointing fingers at one another. The airborne murk and the towers stand as symbols of India’s deep political dysfunction. The choking pollution has become an annual phenomenon, and the country’s scientists can accurately predict the worst days. But deep partisanship and official intransigence have hindered steps that could help clear the air.” – The New York Times

November 17, 2021
Protesters disrupt the world’s largest coal port: ‘This is us responding to the climate crisis’
“Two young women scaled a huge coal handling machine shortly before dawn on Wednesday, disrupting operations at the world’s largest coal port for several hours to protest what they say is Australia’s lack of action on climate change. ‘My name is Hannah, and I am here abseiled off the world’s largest coal port,’ 21-year-old Hannah Doole declared on a live-streamed video as she hovered high over massive piles of coal bound for export. ‘I’m here with my friend Zianna, and we’re stopping this coal terminal from loading all coal into ships and stopping all coal trains.’” – The Wasthington Post

November 17, 2021
Pacific north-west storm wreaks havoc, with one dead and Vancouver cut off
“Fears death toll will rise after record rainfall destroys highways and leaves tens of thousands in the US and Canada without power.” – The Guardian

November 16, 2021
Climate changed abruptly at tipping points in past
“Climate scientists identify abrupt transitions in climate records that may have been caused by the climate system crossing a tipping point…. Abrupt changes in ice core samples and other records indicate dramatic changes in climate occurred at certain points in the past…. The climate may jump abruptly from one to the other when crossing a tipping point. ‘Our methodology is very effective in correctly detecting abrupt transitions in climate records,” said Bagniewski. “Its wider application may help reconstruct the chronology of Earth’s climatic events.'” – ScienceDaily

November 16, 2021
The age of extinction – Water – Farmers are digging their own graves’: true cost of growing food in Spain’s arid south
Intensive agriculture’s insatiable thirst for water is turning wetland to wasteland, draining rivers and polluting groundwater…. Las Tablas de Daimiel is a unique wetland in the vast, almost treeless plains of Castilla-La Mancha in central Spain. But the park has had the life sucked out of it to slake intensive agriculture’s insatiable thirst. – The Guardian

November 15, 2021
Cop26: Pacific delegates condemn ‘monumental failure’ that leaves islands in peril
“Pacific representatives and negotiators have condemned the outcome of the Cop26 meeting as ‘watered down’ and a ‘monumental failure’ that puts Pacific nations in severe existential danger, with one saying that Australia’s refusal to support funding for loss and damage suffered by Pacific countries was ‘a deep betrayal’ of the region.” – The Guardian

November 14, 2021
After the failure of Cop26, there’s only one last hope for our survival
“Now it’s a straight fight for survival. The Glasgow Climate Pact, for all its restrained and diplomatic language, looks like a suicide pact…. Powerful governments sought a compromise between our prospects of survival and the interests of the fossil fuel industry…. Our survival depends on raising the scale of civil disobedience until we build the greatest mass movement in history, mobilising the 25% who can flip the system. We do not consent to the destruction of life on Earth.” – The Guardian

November 12, 2021
China’s Wildlife Is a Pandemic ‘Waiting to Happen,’ Study Finds
“A study of more than a dozen species of game animals traded, sold and commonly consumed as exotic food in China identified 71 mammalian viruses, including 18 deemed “potentially high-risk” to people and domestic animals.” – Bloomberg

November 12, 2021
Trade officials ‘taking a chainsaw’ to EU forest protection plans
“Sini Eräjää, of Greenpeace, one of the signatory organisations: ‘While trade commissioner Dombrovskis promises climate action and forest protection at Cop26 in Glasgow, his team in Brussels is taking a chainsaw to the new EU rules supposed to tackle deforestation.'” – The Guardian

November 11, 2021
Global temperatures over last 24,000 years show today’s warming ‘unprecedented’
“The study, published this week in Nature, had three main findings: – It verified that the main drivers of climate change since the last ice age are rising greenhouse gas concentrations and the retreat of the ice sheets, – It suggests a general warming trend over the last 10,000 years, settling a decade-long debate about whether this period trended warmer or cooler in the paleoclimatology community, – The magnitude and rate warming over the last 150 years far surpasses the magnitude and rate of changes over the last 24,000 years.” – Science Daily

November 11, 2021
Meet the ‘inactivists’, tangling up the climate crisis in culture wars
“As climate science has gone mainstream, outright denialism has been pushed to the fringes. Now a new tactic of dismissing green policies as elitist is on the rise.” – The Guardian

November 11, 2021
Why has it been so hard to get fossil fuels mentioned in U.N. climate deals?
“’It’s what me and some colleagues like to jokingly call the “f-word,”‘ Ploy Pattanun Achakulwisut, a scientist at the Stockholm Environment Institute, told The Washington Post. Given the outsize role fossil fuels play in greenhouse emissions, she said, the omission of ‘coal,’ ‘oil’ and ‘gas’ from the Paris agreement was ‘mind-boggling.’… Fossil fuel producers retain enormous influence. The industry as a whole sent more representatives to the ongoing COP26 summit than any one country, according to advocacy group Global Witness. ‘It’s like allowing tobacco lobbyists to take part in negotiations to limit the use of smoking,’ Achakulwisut said.” – The Washington Post

November 11, 2021
Toxic foam coats sacred river in India as Hindu devotees bathe in its waters
“A layer of toxic foam coated parts of a sacred river near India’s capital on Wednesday as Hindus gathered on its banks to celebrate a religious festival and some devotees bathed in the waters. The white froth, a mixture of sewage and industrial waste, formed over the last week in sections of the Yamuna River — a tributary of the holy Ganges River. The pungent foam contains high levels of ammonia and phosphates, which can result in respiratory and skin problems, according to experts. Its arrival coincided with Chhath Puja, a festival dedicated to the sun god Lord Surya. Earlier this week, some Hindus were seen wading through the toxic foam to bathe and pray in the river.” – CNN

November 10, 2021
Cop26 is doomed, and the hollow promise of ‘net zero’ is to blame
“Net zero is popular among polluters for good reason – it’s toothless compared to emissions restrictions and a carbon tax…. Instead, we have a decision-making process culminating in the colossal fiasco currently unfolding in Glasgow.” – The Guardian

November 10, 2021
COP architects furious at lack of climate justice at pivotal summit
“Researchers who helped to draft parts of the first United Nations environmental agreements nearly 30 years ago say that that low income countries are being massively let down in the current COP26 climate talks. The 1992 UN Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, was attended by scientists and policymakers from rich and poor countries. “I was so hopeful,” says ecologist Zakri Abdul Hamid, who was the scientific adviser to Malaysia’s delegation.” – Nature

November 10, 2021
India Wants $1 Trillion Before It Raises Targets to Cut Emissions
“The world’s third-biggest emitter also opposes a push at the COP26 climate talks to phase out coal and end subsidies for oil and gas…. The demand comes after India’s surprise announcement at the opening of COP26 negotiations in Glasgow, Scotland, that it would set an ambitious new goal to reach net-zero emissions by 2070. In his speech, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that rich countries should provide as much as $1 trillion in climate finance. On Wednesday, Indian officials clarified their demands. They want $1 trillion in funds just for India by 2030.” – Bloomberg

November 9, 2021
COP26: how the world’s militaries hide their huge carbon emissions
For example, the US Department of Defense is the largest institutional consumer of fossil fuels in the world – and the largest institutional emitter…. The US military is a more consequential climate actor than many of the industrialised countries gathered at the COP26 summit in Glasgow. Despite the outsized role of militaries, we know surprisingly little about their emissions. This is remarkable given their reach and fossil fuel dependency. Some scientists estimate that, together, militaries and their supporting industries might account for up to 5% of global emissions: more than civilian aviation and shipping combined. – The Conversation

November 9, 2021
The number of people who have died from covid-19 is likely to be close to 17m
The official tally of 5m is a huge undercount”.– The Economist

November 7, 2021
Few willing to change lifestyle to save the planet, climate survey finds
“The survey found that 62% of people surveyed saw the climate crisis as the main environmental challenge the world was now facing, ahead of air pollution (39%), the impact of waste (38%) and new diseases (36%)…. Respondents were also lukewarm about doing more themselves, citing a wide range of reasons. Most (76%) of those surveyed across the 10 countries said they would accept stricter environmental rules and regulations, but almost half (46%) felt that there was no real need for them to change their personal habits.”  – The Guardian

November 7, 2021
Countries’ climate pledges built on flawed data, Post investigation finds
“An examination of 196 country reports reveals a giant gap between what nations declare their emissions to be versus the greenhouse gases they are sending into the atmosphere. The gap ranges from at least 8.5 billion to as high as 13.5 billion tons a year of underreported emissions — big enough to move the needle on how much the Earth will warm. Over the next 100 years, 13.3 billion metric tons of greenhouse gases would have the same warming impact as the annual carbon dioxide emissions from 2.89 billion cars. There were 251 million passenger vehicles registered in the U.S. in 2018.” – The Washington Post

November 7, 2021
Running Out of Time at the U.N. Climate Conference
To really appreciate America’s fecklessness, you have to go back to the meeting that preceded all the bad COPs—the so-called Earth Summit, in 1992.” – The New Yorker 

N0vember 5, 2021
‘Luxury carbon consumption’ of top 1% threatens 1.5C global heating limit
“The richest 1% – which is a population smaller than Germany – are on track to be releasing 70 tonnes of CO₂ per person a year if current consumption continues, according to the study. In total they will account for 16% of total emissions by 2030, up from 13% of emissions in 1990. Meanwhile, the poorest 50% will be releasing an average of one tonne of CO₂ annually.” – The Guardian

November 5, 2021
Marx’s Ecology: Materialism and Nature
“Marx, it is often assumed, cared only about industrial growth and the development of economic forces. John Bellamy Foster examines Marx’s neglected writings on capitalist agriculture and soil ecology, philosophical naturalism, and evolutionary theory. He shows that Marx, known as a powerful critic of capitalist society, was also deeply concerned with the changing human relationship to nature.” – Monthly Review

November 5, 2021
More than 750,000 people have died from coronavirus in the U.S.
“More than 46,207,000 cases have been reported.” – WashingtonPost

November 4, 2021
Covid study finds some 28 million extra years of life lost in 2020, with U.S. male life expectancy badly hit
“The international study, published in the BMJ journal, examined changes to life expectancy in 37 upper-middle to high-income countries where researchers said reliable data was available…. ‘More than 222 million years of life were lost in 2020, which is 28.1 million … years of life lost more than expected.’ The highest fall in life expectancy occurred in Russia, where men lost 2.33 extra years at birth, and women 2.14 years. The United States was second, with men losing 2.27 extra years, and women 1.61. Bulgaria, Lithuania, Chile, and Spain followed. In six places — New Zealand, Taiwan, Iceland, South Korea, Norway and Denmark — where the public health response to the pandemic was largely seen as effective, life expectancy either increased or marked no change.” – WashingtonPost

November 4, 2021
Carbon Levels Are Rising Again After Brief Covid Drop
“Global carbon dioxide pollution returned to a pre-pandemic level this year, according to an early estimate by the research group Global Carbon Project prepared for the COP26 talks occurring in Glasgow. The new numbers vividly illustrate the global challenge posed by decades of delayed climate policy and investment. To meet the 2050 goal of the Paris Agreement, which calls for limits to warming temperatures, nations would now have to cut emissions every year by an amount greater than the combined carbon output of Germany and Saudi Arabia.” – Bloomberg Green

November 3, 2021
Secretive court system poses threat to Paris climate deal, says whistleblower
“A secretive investor court system poses a real threat to the Paris climate agreement, activists have said, as governments taking action to phase out fossil fuels face a slew of multimillion-dollar lawsuits for lost profits. New data seen by the Guardian shows a surge in cases under the energy charter treaty (ECT), an obscure international agreement that allows energy corporations to sue governments over policies that could hurt their profits.” – The Guardian

November 2, 2021
Greta Thunberg joins Glasgow crowd to sing ‘You can shove your climate crisis up your arse’
“Greta Thunberg appeared to be enjoying her visit to Glasgow for Cop26 on Monday as she joined a crowd of protesters in singing ‘You can shove your climate crisis up your arse.’… Addressing the crowd, across the river from the Cop26 venue, she said: ‘Inside COP they are just politicians and people in power pretending to take our future seriously. We say no more blah blah blah, no more exploitation of people and nature and the planet.’” – Independent

November 1, 2021
CLIMATE CHANGE AND THE LIMITS OF ECONOMIC GROWTH
“If economic growth ushered in this era of climate change, how can economic growth also be part of the solution?” – Foreign Policy in Focus

November 1, 2021
Top climate scientists are sceptical that nations will rein in global warming
“A Nature survey reveals that many authors of the latest IPCC climate-science report are anxious about the future and expect to see catastrophic changes in their lifetimes…. Six in ten of the respondents said that they expect the world to warm by at least 3 °C by the end of the century, compared with what conditions were like before the Industrial Revolution. That is far beyond the Paris agreement’s goal to limit warming to 1.5–2 °C.” – Nature

October 31, 2021
U.K.’s Johnson Says G-20 Climate Pledges Are Drop in the Ocean
“Johnson says only 12 G-20 nations pledge net zero by 2050…. Environment pledges by the Group of 20 countries are ‘drops in a rapidly warming ocean’ and warned that COP26 climate talks risk failing if urgent action isn’t taken.” – Bloomberg

October 31, 2021
Shell and BP paid zero tax on North Sea gas and oil for three years
“Shell and BP, which together produce more than 1.7bn tonnes of greenhouse gases a year, have not paid any corporation tax on oil and gas production in the North Sea for the last three years, company filings reveal. The oil giants, which have an annual global footprint of greenhouse gases more than five times bigger than Britain’s, are benefiting from billions of pounds of tax breaks and reliefs for oil and gas production… A petroleum revenue tax of 35% was effectively scrapped by the then chancellor, George Osborne, in 2016 and oil giants can claim billions of pounds in taxpayer handouts for decommissioning rigs.”  – The Guardian

October 28, 2021
World is failing to make changes needed to avoid climate breakdown, report finds
“Pace of emissions reductions must be increased significantly to keep global heating to 1.5C. Every corner of society is failing to take the “transformational change” needed to avert the most disastrous consequences of the climate crisis, with trends either too slow or in some cases even regressing, according to a major new global analysis. Across 40 different areas spanning the power sector, heavy industry, agriculture, transportation, finance and technology, not one is changing quickly enough to avoid 1.5C in global heating beyond pre-industrial times, a critical target of the Paris climate agreement, according to the new Systems Change Lab report.”  – The Guardian

October 27, 2021
Greta Thunberg Has Given Up on Politicians
“All political and economic systems have failed, but humanity has not yet failed.” The New York Times

October 27, 2021
Why Financial Firms Can’t Be Climate Change Cops
You can’t force an industry that’s designed to pursue profit to be the arbiter of how we cool the world. In the past six years, banks have provided almost $4 trillion of finance for the fossil-fuel industry.… For every $1 raised on the capital markets by companies involved in renewable energy or other planet-friendly businesses, a further $10 is made available to ‘the companies that are causing the problems in the first place.’ as a report published this week by U.K. think-tank New Financial puts it. And “problems” is putting it mildly.– Bloomberg

October 27, 2021
The dirty dozen: meet America’s top climate villains
“The nation’s worst polluters managed to evade accountability and scrutiny for decades as they helped the fossil fuel industry destroy our planet. The actions of these climate supervillains have affected millions of people, disproportionately hurting the vulnerable who have done the least to contribute to global emissions.  Working- and middle-class people must stop blaming themselves for the climate crisis. Instead, it’s time to band together to seek justice and hold these profiteers accountable. Only in calling out their power and culpability is it possible to reclaim the world that belongs to all of us, together.” – The Guardian

October 26, 2021
World faces disastrous 2.7C temperature rise on current climate plans, UN warns
“Tuesday’s publication warns that countries’ current pledges would reduce carbon by only about 7.5% by 2030, far less than the 45% cut scientists say is needed to limit global temperature rises to 1.5C, the aim of the Cop26 summit that opens in Glasgow this Sunday.” – The Guardian

October 25, 2021
Yes, There Has Been Progress on Climate. No, It’s Not Nearly Enough.
“Today, thanks to rapid growth in clean energy, humanity has started to bend the emissions curve. Current policies put us on pace for roughly 3 degrees Celsius of warming by 2100 — a better result, but still devastating. Many countries have vowed to slash emissions even faster. So far those promises exist mostly on paper, but if nations follow through, the world could potentially limit total warming to around 2 to 2.4 degrees Celsius by 2100. Yet scientists and world leaders increasingly say even that much warming is too risky. To hold global temperature rise to a safer limit of 1.5 degrees Celsius, far more drastic action is needed.” – The New York Times

October 25, 2021
Climate crisis: greenhouse gas levels hit new record despite lockdowns, UN reports
“Levels of climate-heating gases in the atmosphere hit record levels in 2020, despite coronavirus-related lockdowns, the UN’s World Meteorological Organization has announced…. All key greenhouse gases (GHG) rose faster in 2020 than the average for the previous decade and this trend has continued in 2021, the WMO report found.”

October 24, 2021
The Chinese Companies Polluting the World More Than Entire Nations
“The world’s top five polluters were responsible for 60% of global emissions in 2019. China alone generated about the same amount of CO₂ as the next four countries combined. And its carbon output is still rising every year.” – Bloomberg

October 23, 2021
Supersized Methane Leaks Detected in U.K. Ahead of Climate Summit
“The nation hosting crucial COP26 talks to tackle global warming is also home to some of the worst methane emissions in Europe. One of the most significant outcomes of next week’s COP26 climate summit may be a pledge by dozens of countries to cut emissions of methane, the superpotent greenhouse gas. That will require the U.K. hosts to do some major cleaning up at home.” – Bloomberg

October 22, 2021
Historical analysis finds no precedent for the rate of coal and gas power decline needed to limit climate change to 1.5°C – ScienceDaily

October 22, 2021
Xi Says China Must Secure Energy Supply in ‘Its Own Hands’
“President Xi Jinping told oil workers that China must secure its own energy supply, signaling a continued role for fossil fuels in the nation’s efforts to meet power demands.” – Bloomberg

October 22, 2021 (Updated)
The U.S.’s Best Hope For Real Climate Policy Is Fizzling. What Happens Now?
“After months of negotiations, Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), whose home state and personal fortune depend on the continued burning of heavily polluting coal, appears to have effectively blocked inclusion of the president’s Clean Electricity Performance Program.” – HuffPost

October 22, 2021
The Production Gap: Governments’ planned fossil fuel production remains dangerously out of sync with Paris Agreement limits
“The damages are widespread, rapid, and intensifying. The report also serves as a clarion call that while there is still time to limit long-term warming to 1.5°C, that window of opportunity is rapidly closing. – 2021 Report 

October 21, 2021
Climate Change Poses a Widening Threat to National Security
“Intelligence and defense agencies issued reports warning that the warming planet will increase strife between countries and spur migration. Worsening conflict within and between nations. Increased dislocation and migration as people flee climate-fueled instability. Heightened military tension and uncertainty. Financial hazards.” – The New York Times

October 21, 2021
In Australia, It’s ‘Long Live King Coal’
“The country has fallen behind other developed nations in its commitment to slashing carbon emissions. Neither fires nor international pressure has pushed it away from coal and other fossil fuels. At a time when climate change and those who fight it demand that coal be treated like tobacco, as a danger everywhere it is burned, Australia is increasingly seen as the guy at the end of the bar selling cheap cigarettes and promising to bring more tomorrow.” – The New York Times

October 21, 2021
COP26: Document leak reveals nations lobbying to change key climate report
“A huge leak of documents seen by BBC News shows how countries are trying to change a crucial scientific report on how to tackle climate change. The leak reveals Saudi Arabia, Japan and Australia are among countries asking the UN to play down the need to move rapidly away from fossil fuels. It also shows some wealthy nations are questioning paying more to poorer states to move to greener technologies.” – BBC

October 21, 2021
Plastics Will Create More Climate Pollution Than Coal In U.S. By 2030, New Study Finds
It’s widely understood that plastics litter the oceans and kill animals. But its huge and growing impact on global warming has evaded public scrutiny. Plastics are everywhere. From the stomachs of deep-sea fish to human feces, Arctic snow to gusts of wind in the remote wilderness, the oil and gas byproduct has, barely a century after it was first synthesized in a laboratory, become a ubiquitous feature of virtually every ecosystem on Earth and every aspect of modern life…. Plastics already produce 3.8% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions throughout their lifecycle, roughly double the planet-heating pollution spewed by airplanes. By the end of this decade, the plastics industry in the United States alone is on pace to eclipse the carbon footprint of the country’s remaining coal-fired power plants.” – HuffPost

October 21, 2021
Scientists part of team that points to strong connection between climate change, plastics pollution
“At the root of global climate change and the worldwide plastics problem are two related carbon-based fuels — oil and natural gas. Not only are the two among the key drivers of climate change, they are instrumental in the manufacturing of plastics. As storms intensify and become more frequent, the movement of trash from land to our oceans and, and vice versa, is only going to get worse.” – ScienceDaily

October 21, 2021
Northern lakes warming six times faster in the past 25 years
“‘We found that lakes are losing on average 17 days of ice cover per century. Alarmingly, what we found is that warming in the past 25 years, from 1992 to 2016, was six times faster than any other period in the last 100 years….'” – ScienceDaily

October 21, 2021
U.S. Warns Climate Poses ‘Emerging Threat’ to Financial System
“Climate change is an “emerging threat” to the stability of the U.S. financial system, top federal regulators warned in a report on Thursday, setting the stage for the Biden administration to take more aggressive regulatory action to prevent climate change from upending global markets and the economy.” – The New York Times

October 21, 2021
Climate Change Poses a Widening Threat to National Security
“Worsening conflict within and between nations. Increased dislocation and migration as people flee climate-fueled instability. Heightened military tension and uncertainty. Financial hazards. The Biden administration released several reports Thursday about climate change and national security, laying out in stark terms the ways in which the warming world is beginning to significantly challenge stability worldwide. – The New York Times

October 20, 2021
COP Aims to End Coal, But the World Is Still Addicted
“The burning of coal represents the biggest single obstacle to meeting the Paris Agreement goal of limiting warming to 1.5C…. But the dramatic rally in prices in recent weeks shows ever more clearly that it’s nowhere near enough. Humanity remains deeply dependent on coal.” – Bloomberg

October 20, 2021
Fossil Fuel Drilling Plans Undermine Climate Pledges, U.N. Report Warns
“Even as world leaders vow to take stronger action on climate change, many countries are still planning to dramatically increase their production of oil, gas and coal in the decades ahead, potentially undermining those lofty pledges, according to a United Nations-backed report released Tuesday. The report looked at future mining and drilling plans in 15 major fossil fuel producing countries, including the United States, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Canada, China, India and Norway. Taken together, those countries are currently planning to produce more than twice as much oil, gas and coal through 2030 as would be needed if governments want to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above preindustrial levels.” – The New York Times

October 20, 2021
Climate plan urging plant-based diet shift deleted
“A government research paper recommending people “shift dietary habits” towards plant-based foods has been hastily deleted.” – BBC

October 20, 2021
If the US could get on a war footing in 1941, we can tackle the climate emergency
“Drastic action is required to stop the Earth’s systems flipping into new states. Now should be our Pearl Harbor moment.” – The Guardian

October 20, 2021
Changing ocean currents are driving extreme winter weather
“Throughout Earth’s oceans runs a conveyor belt of water. Its churning is powered by differences in the water’s temperature and saltiness, and weather patterns around the world are regulated by its activity. A pair of researchers studied the Atlantic portion of this worldwide conveyor belt called the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, or AMOC, and found that winter weather in the United States critically depends on this conveyor belt-like system. As the AMOC slows because of climate change, the U.S. will experience more extreme cold winter weather.” – ScienceDaily

October 20, 2021
How to Stop 30 Years of Failing to Cut Emissions
“In the three decades since 1990, as countries such as China and India followed the same development path as the U.S. and Europe, human civilization burned ever-increasing amounts of fossil fuels. Rich countries, in particular, had any number of opportunities to take stock and reverse course. Most refused. Now it’s a race against those emissions.” – Bloomberg Green

October 20, 2021
It’s time for philanthropy to step up the fight against climate change
“In 2020, US-based grant makers disbursed almost $64 billion. Of that, about $320 million went directly toward climate change (0.5%).” – McKinsey

October 20, 2021
Climate change: Fossil fuel production set to soar over next decade
“Plans by governments to extract fossil fuels up to 2030 are incompatible with keeping global temperatures to safe levels, says the UN.The UNEP production gap report says countries will drill or mine more than double the levels needed to keep the 1.5C threshold alive.” – BBC

Lakes are changing worldwide: Human activities to blame
“Worldwide, lake temperatures are rising and seasonal ice cover is shorter and thiner. This effects lake ecosystems, drinking water supply and fishing. International research now shows that these global changes in lake temperature and ice cover are not due to natural climate variability. They can only be explained by massive greenhouse gas emissions since the Industrial Revolution.” – ScienceDaily

October 15, 2021
The five biggest threats to our natural world … and how we can stop them
“From destructive land use to invasive species, scientists have identified the main drivers of biodiversity loss – so that countries can collectively act to tackle them…. The world’s wildlife populations have plummeted by more than two-thirds since 1970 – and there are no signs that this downward trend is slowing.” – The Guardian

October 14, 2021
The Southern Ocean’s role in driving global carbon cycle stronger than expected
“The Southern Ocean’s role in driving the global carbon cycle may be stronger than expected as the biological carbon pump is not “switched off” in winter as previously thought.” – ScienceDaily

October 14, 2021
Expansion of wind and solar power too slow to stop climate change
“The production of renewable energy is increasing every year. But after analyzing the growth rates of wind and solar power in 60 countries, researchers conclude that virtually no country is moving sufficiently fast to avoid global warming of 1.5°C or even 2°C.” – ScienceDaily

October 14, 2021 
The climate disaster is here
“Earth is already becoming unlivable. Will governments act to stop this disaster from getting worse?… ‘We have built a civilization based on a world that doesn’t exist anymore,” as Katherine Hayhoe, a climate scientist at Texas Tech University, puts it.’… Cranking up the temperature of the entire globe this much within little more than a century is, in fact, extraordinary, with the oceans alone absorbing the heat equivalent of five Hiroshima atomic bombs dropping into the water every second.” – The Guardian

October 14, 2021
By 2500 Earth could be alien to humans
“To fully grasp and plan for climate impacts under any scenario, researchers and policymakers must look well beyond the 2100 benchmark. Unless CO2 emissions drop significantly, global warming by 2500 will make the Amazon barren, the American Midwest tropical, and India too hot to live in, according to a team of international scientists.” – ScienceDaily

October 14, 2021
Scientists discover large rift in the Arctic’s last bastion of thick sea ice
“The 3,000-square-kilometer gap in the ice may signal that the Last Ice Area is not as resilient as previously thought.” – ScienceDaily

October 10, 2021
Biodiversity loss risks ‘ecological meltdown’ – scientists
“The UK is one of the world’s most nature-depleted countries – in the bottom 10% globally and last among the G7 group of nations, new data shows. It has an average of about half its biodiversity left, far below the global average of 75%, a study has found. A figure of 90% is considered the “safe limit” to prevent the world from tipping into an ‘ecological meltdown.’ according to researchers.” – BBC

October 9, 2021
‘Spillover’ diseases are emerging faster than ever before—thanks to humans
“The growing human population, increasing globalisation, and environmental damage are all accelerating the process, says William Karesh, an executive vice president at EcoHealth Alliance, a New York-based nonprofit that studies zoonoses, or diseases that spread between animals and humans. ‘The laws of biology haven’t changed, but the playing field has changed dramatically,’ he says. The result: Dangerous new human diseases are emerging at unprecedented rates, including Marburg virus, avian flu, AIDS, severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), Nipah virus, swine flu, Ebola, Lyme disease, chikungunya, Zika, dengue, Lassa fever, yellow fever, and now COVID-19. Some 2.5 billion people are infected with zoonotic diseases each year, and because many of these ailments have no cure, they kill about 2.7 million annually, according to the U.S. Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.” – National Geographic

October 7, 2021
Unprecedented rise of heat and rainfall extremes in observational data
“A 90-fold increase in the frequency of monthly heat extremes in the past ten years compared to 1951-1980 has been found by scientists in observation data…. Record daily rainfall events also increased in a non-linear way — on average, 1 in 4 rainfall records in the last decade can be attributed to climate change. Already today, extreme events linked to human-caused climate change are at unprecedented levels, the scientists say, and they must be expected to increase further.” – ScienceDaily

October 6, 2021
Fossil fuel industry gets subsidies of $11m a minute, IMF finds
“Trillions of dollars a year are ‘adding fuel to the fire’ of the climate crisis, experts say…. The IMF found the production and burning of coal, oil and gas was subsidised by $5.9tn in 2020, with not a single country pricing all its fuels sufficiently to reflect their full supply and environmental costs.” – The Guardian

October 6, 2021
U.N. weather agency says world ill-prepared for ‘looming water crisis’
“Most countries are ill-equipped to handle what the United Nations said Tuesday is a “looming” global water crisis caused by climate change and population growth…. Currently, more than 2 billion people live in ‘water-stressed countries’ where they lack access to safe drinking water and sanitation, according to the report ‘The State of Climate Services 2021: Water.'” – The Washington Post

October 5, 2021
Climate Change Is Devastating Coral Reefs Worldwide, Major Report Says
“The world lost 14 percent of its coral in just a decade, researchers found.” – The New York Times

October 5, 2021
China Orders Banks to Ramp Up Funding to Boost Coal Output
“Another step in its efforts to ease a power crunch and ensure supplies this winter.” – Bloomberg

October 5, 2021
India Houses Half of All People Vulnerable to Life-Threatening Heat
“Global heating is disproportionally affecting city dwellers in the world’s second-most populous nation….The researchers found that more than half the people on Earth who face life-threatening heat stress caused by climate change live in India. Urban dwellers in world’s second-most populous nation have borne the brunt of global warming over the last three decades, and the risks to their health are poised to rise…. India has 17 of the 50 cities most affected by heat stress. New Delhi ranked second, while Bangladesh’s capital Dhaka topped the list…. ‘Almost one in five people on Earth experienced increases in exposure to urban heat over the past 30 years.'” – Bloomberg

October 4, 2021
Almost one-in-three people globally will still be mainly using polluting cooking fuels in 2030, research shows
“A major source of disease and environmental destruction and devastation — in 2030, new research warned. This rises to more than four-in-five in Sub-Saharan Africa, where the number of people mainly using polluting fuels is growing at an alarming rate.” – ScienceDaily

October 4, 2021
Exposure to deadly urban heat worldwide has tripled in recent decades, says study
A fifth of world population is affected; many U.S. cities on list. – ScienceDaily

October 4, 2021
Could Fossil Fuel Companies Ever Be Tried for Crimes Against Humanity?
“The list of damages is long from turning parts of the Amazon into a toxic sacrifice zone to lying about climate change for decades and locking up the political means to deal with it, putting humanity in grave danger. For this week’s Giz Asks, we reached out to a number of experts to find out.” – Gozmodo

October 3, 2021
Energy Crisis Adds New Hurdle to COP26 Goal of Ending Coal
“The energy supply crisis is showing how difficult ending the dependence on fossil fuels would be. China is driving demand for coal as it tries to secure the fuel to keep the lights on and factories running. Europe, which remains reliant on gas supplies from Russia, is seeing its companies seeking more coal for electricity generation ahead of winter with gas prices at record highs and supply hard to come by.” – Bloomgerg

October 1,2021
Firefighters are trying to keep sequoias around throughs their 3000th birthdays. Here’s How
With some standing taller than the Statue of Liberty, sequoias are not only some of the largest trees in the world but also some of the most ancient. Their impressive height make them a natural wonder at the slopes of the Sierra Nevada – the only place in the world where they grow.” – The Washington Post

October 1, 2021
How fossil fuel companies use propaganda and disinformation to derail efforts to tackle climate change
“Oil companies use cunning tactics to stop action on climate change, a professor said…. Mr Supran, speaking to the Harvard Gazette, said companies like ExxonMobil have gone to tremendous effort to promote doubt about climate change…. He also spoke about another ExxonMobil manager, who described the effort by former company chairman and chief executive Rex Tillerson in the mid-2000s as an effort to ‘carefully reset’ the company’s profile on climate change so that it would be ‘more sustainable and less exposed.’ Tillerson later served as former President Trump’s secretary of state. ‘They did so by drawing straight from the tobacco industry’s playbook of threading a very fine rhetorical needle, using language about climate change just strong enough to be able to deny that they haven’t warned the public, but weak enough to exculpate them from charges of having marketed a deadly product,’ Mr Supran added.” – Independent

Ivory-billed woodpecker officially declared extinct, along with 22 other species
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s move underscores what scientists say is an accelerating rate of extinction worldwide, given climate change and habitat loss…. Even the scientist who wrote the obit cried. ‘This is not an easy thing,’ said Amy Trahan, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologist who reviewed the evidence and wrote the report concluding the ivory bill ‘no longer exists.’ ‘Nobody wants to be a part of that,’ she added, choking up in a Zoom interview. ‘Just having to write those words was quite difficult. It took me awhile.’ – The Washington Post

September 29, 2021
‘Green growth’ doesn’t exist – less of everything is the only way to avert catastrophe
“It is simply not possible to carry on at the current level of economic activity without destroying the environment…. Everywhere, governments seek to ramp up the economic load, talking of ‘unleashing our potential’ and ‘supercharging our economy.’ Boris Johnson insists that ‘a global recovery from the pandemic must be rooted in green growth.’ But there is no such thing as green growth. Growth is wiping the green from the Earth.” – The Guardian

September 28, 2021
‘Build back better, blah blah blah’: Greta Thunberg mocks Joe Biden and Boris Johnson in climate speech
“At the climate gathering, Greta said: ‘Build back better. Blah, blah, blah. Green economy. Blah blah blah. Net-zero by 2050. Blah, blah, blah.’ Many politicians, notably PM Boris Johnson and US President Joe Biden, have regularly used these slogans and terms in speeches.” – Independent

September 27, 2021
Cop26 climate talks will not fulfil aims of Paris agreement, key players warn
“The UN, the UK hosts and other major figures involved in the talks have privately admitted that the original aim of the Cop26 summit will be missed, as the pledges on greenhouse gas emissions cuts from major economies will fall short of the halving of global emissions this decade needed to limit global heating to 1.5C.” – The Guardian

September 24, 2021
Takeaways from AP and Univision China Fishing Investigation
“Of the 30 vessels the AP observed up close, 24 have been accused of labor abuses or showed signs of possibly violating maritime law. Specifically, 16 ships either sailed with their mandatory safety transponders turned off, broadcast multiple electronic IDs or transmitted information that didn’t match its listed name or location — discrepancies that are often associated with illegal fishing….” – AP

September 22, 2021
Over 120 scientific experts’ global ocean report shows unprecedented climate change impact, as Arctic registers record low ice levels
“Arctic ice levels logged in the last two years have reached record lows, whilst per decade have — on average since 1979 to 2020 — dropped by nearly 13%, a new vast report on the ocean worldwide shows.” – ScienceDaily

September 14, 2021
World Faces Growing Risk of Food Shortages Due to Climate Change
“Food supplies will struggle to keep pace with the world’s growing population as climate change sends temperatures soaring and droughts intensify, according to a report from Chatham House. Yields of staple crops could decline by almost a third by 2050 unless emissions are drastically reduced in the next decade, while farmers will need to grow nearly 50% more food to meet global demand, the think tank said…. Food prices are already near a decade high, fueled by supply chain disruptions during the pandemic and extreme weather. Wheat prices surged over the summer due to crop losses in some of the biggest exporters.” – Bloomberg

September 14, 2021
Climate change: Young people very worried – survey
“Over half (56%) say they think humanity is doomed…. The survey across 10 countries was led by Bath University in collaboration with five universities. It’s funded by the campaign and research group Avaaz. It claims to be the biggest of its kind, with responses from 10,000 people aged between 16 and 25. Many of those questioned perceive that they have no future, that humanity is doomed, and that governments are failing to respond adequately. Many feel betrayed, ignored and abandoned by politicians and adults.” – BBC

September 14, 2021
90% of global farm subsidies damage people and planet, says UN
“Almost half a trillion dollars of support a year harms people’s health, the climate and drives inequality…. This agricultural support damages people’s health, fuels the climate crisis, destroys nature and drives inequality by excluding smallholder farmers, many of whom are women, according to the UN agencies. The biggest sources of greenhouse gas emissions, such as beef and milk, received the biggest subsidies, the report said. These are often produced by large industrialised groups that are best placed to gain access to subsidies.” – The Guardian 

September 13, 2021
Rain fell on Greenland’s ice sheet for the first time ever known. Alarms should ring
“Climate scientists believe that if Greenland continues to rapidly melt, tens of millions of people around the world could face yearly flooding and displacement by 2030.” – The Guardian

September 13, 2021
Meat accounts for nearly 60% of all greenhouse gases from food production, study finds
Production of meat worldwide emits 28 times as much as growing plants, and most crops are raised to feed animals bound for slaughter. The global production of food is responsible for a third of all planet-heating gases emitted by human activity, with the use of animals for meat causing twice the pollution of producing plant-based foods, a major new study has found. – The Guardian

September 10, 2021
Climate change risks triggering catastrophic tsunamis, scientist warns
“The world is underestimating the geological penalties of world warming, which might set off catastrophic earthquakes and tsunamis because the melting of ice sheets reduces the burden on the crust beneath and unleashes intense seismic exercise, a number one earth scientist has warned. “Because the Greenland ice cap melts, the uplift within the crust goes to set off earthquakes,” stated McGuire. …there may very well be a tsunami proper throughout the north Atlantic. Its impression is likely to be akin to the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami that killed greater than 200,000 individuals across the Indian Ocean, he stated.” – Ewns News

September 7, 2021
20 meat and dairy firms emit more greenhouse gas than Germany, Britain or France
Twenty livestock companies are responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions than either Germany, Britain or France – and are receiving billions of dollars in financial backing to do so, according to a new report by environmental campaigners. Raising livestock contributes significantly to carbon emissions, with animal agriculture accounting for 14.5% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions. – The Guardian

September 7, 2021
Wildlife ‘Red List’ a grim tally of extinction threat “The world will get an update Saturday of the Red List of Threatened Species, the authoritative catalogue of how many of the planet’s animal and plant species are teetering on the brink of extinction due to human activity. Experts for the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) have assessed nearly 135,000 species over the last half-century, and almost 28 percent are currently at risk of vanishing forever. Habitat loss, overexploitation and illegal trade have hammered global wildlife populations, but scientists say they are increasingly worried about the looming threats of climate change.” – Phys.org

September 6, 2021
Over 200 health journals call on world leaders to address ‘catastrophic harm to health’ from climate change
“Calling on world leaders to take emergency action to limit global temperature increases, halt the destruction of nature, and protect health. While recent targets to reduce emissions and conserve biodiversity are welcome, they are not enough and are yet to be matched with credible short and longer term plans, it warns.” – ScienceDaily

September 1, 2021
Warming Atlantic drives right whales towards extinction
“Warming oceans have driven the critically endangered North Atlantic right whale population from its traditional and protected habitat, exposing the animals to more lethal ship strikes, disastrous commercial fishing entanglements and greatly reduced calving rates. Without improving its management, the right whale populations will decline and potentially become extinct in the coming decades, according to a recent report.” – ScienceDaily

September 1, 2021
Air pollution is slashing years off the lives of billions, report finds
Dirty air is a far greater killer than smoking, car crashes or HIV/Aids, with coal burning the leading cause…. Coal burning is the principal culprit, the researchers said, and India is worst affected, with the average citizen dying six years early…. ‘Air pollution is the greatest external threat to human health on the planet, and that is not widely recognised, or not recognised with the force and vigour that one might expect,’ said Prof Michael Greenstone at the University of Chicago…. ‘The average global citizen loses 2.2 years of life with today’s levels of air pollution and, if nothing changes, that adds up to 17bn lost years,’ Greenstone said. “What else on the planet is causing people to lose 17bn years of life?'” – The Guardian

August 31, 2021
Up to half of world’s wild tree species could be at risk of extinction
“Between a third and half of the world’s wild tree species are threatened with extinction, posing a risk of wider ecosystem collapse, the most comprehensive global stocktake to date warns. Forest clearance for farming is by far the biggest cause of the die-off, according to the State of the World’s Trees report, which was released on Wednesday along with a call for urgent action to reverse the decline.” – The Guardian

August 31, 2021
Extreme sea levels to become much more common worldwide as Earth warms
“Critical coastal events, happening once a century in recent times, to occur every year on average.” – ScienceDaily

August 30, 2021
Witness in US climate-change law suit tells all
“BOOK REVIEW: “They Knew: The US Federal Government’s Fifty-Year Role in Causing the Climate Crisis” James Gustave Speth MIT Press (2021)…. In their introduction to the book, Julia Olson and Philip Gregory, counsel for the plaintiffs, explain that they had to demonstrate that the government had both allowed and knowingly created the alleged harms. This required them to prove that the conduct of the federal government was a primary cause of the US addiction to fossil fuels, the point Speth’s report was commissioned to demonstrate.” – Nature

August 26, 2021
The Real Existential Threat Is Our Overheating Planet
“‘China has invested heavily in new technologies, with a stated intent to complete the modernization of its forces by 2035 and to field a ‘world-class military” by 2049,’ Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin testified in June…. By 2049, the Chinese military (or what’s left of it) will be so busy coping with a burning, flooding, churning world of climate change—threatening the country’s very survival—that it will possess scant capacity, no less the will, to launch a war with the United States or any of its allies.” – The Nation

August 25, 2021
Pollution From Power Generators Now Exceeds Pre-Pandemic Levels
“Emissions from the power sector rebounded in the first half of the year and are now 5% higher than in the same period in 2019, prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, according to a report by London-based researcher Ember. That’s because utilities are using more coal to meet electricity demand that also rose by 5%.” – Bloomberg

August 22, 2021
The Middle East is running out of water, and parts of it are becoming uninhabitable
The region has witnessed persistent drought and temperatures so high that they are barely fit for human life. Add climate change to water mismanagement and overuse, and projections for the future of water here are grim…. The consequences of water becoming even scarcer are dire: Areas could become uninhabitable; tensions over how to share and manage water resources like rivers and lakes could worsen; more political violence could erupt. – CNN

August 20, 2021
Deforestation in Brazilian Amazon hits highest annual level in a decade
“Between August 2020 and July 2021, the rainforest lost 10.476 square kilometers – an area nearly seven times bigger than greater London and 13 times the size of New York City…. “Deforestation is still out of control,” Carlos Souza, a researcher at Imazon a Brazilian research institute that has been tracking the Amazon deforestation since 2008. The figure is 57% higher than in the previous year and is the worst since 2012.” – The Guardian

August 20, 2021
First ever recorded rainfall in Greenland’s ice sheet summit causes ‘widespread’ melting
“Nearly seven billion tons of rain lashed the Greenland ice sheet over a three-day period, say researchers.” – Independent

August 20, 2021
A billion children at ‘extreme risk’ from climate impacts – Unicef
“Report launched with youth activists including Greta Thunberg paints ‘unimaginably dire’ picture. Almost half the world’s 2.2 billion children are already at “extremely high risk” from the impacts of the climate crisis and pollution, according to a report from Unicef…. Nearly every child around the world was at risk from at least one of these impacts today, including heatwaves, floods, cyclones, disease, drought, and air pollution, the report said. But 1 billion children live in 33 countries facing three or four impacts simultaneously.” – The Guardian

August 19, 2021
This Is the World Being Left to Us by Adults
“Last week, some of the world’s leading climate change scientists confirmed that humans are making irreversible changes to our planet and extreme weather will only become more severe. This news is a ‘code red for humanity,’ said the United Nations secretary general. It is — but young people like us have been sounding this alarm for years. You just haven’t listened.” – The New York Times

August 17, 2021
Global water crisis will intensify with climate breakdown, says report
“Flooding, droughts and wildfires will worsen as global heating disrupts the planet’s water cycle…. Extreme rainfall intensifies by 7% for each additional 1C of global heating, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.” – The Guardian

August 12, 2021
Greenhouse gas emissions must peak within 4 years, says leaked UN report
“Group of scientists release draft IPCC report as they fear it will be watered down by governments. Global greenhouse gas emissions must peak in the next four years, coal and gas-fired power plants must close in the next decade and lifestyle and behavioural changes will be needed to avoid climate breakdown, according to the leaked draft of a report from the world’s leading authority on climate science. Rich people in every country are overwhelmingly more responsible for global heating than the poor, with SUVs and meat-eating singled out for blame, and the high-carbon basis for future economic growth is also questioned.” – The Guardian

August 11, 2021
Global warming begets more warming, new paleoclimate study finds
“Researchers observe a ‘warming bias’ over the past 66 million years that may return if ice sheets disappear…. ‘Humans are forcing the system in a new way. And this study is showing that, when we increase temperature, we’re likely going to interact with these natural, amplifying effects.'” – ScienceDaily

August 9, 2021
In-depth Q&A: The IPCC’s sixth assessment report on climate science
“The authors conclude that it is ‘unequivocal’ that humans have warmed the planet, causing ‘widespread and rapid’ changes to Earth’s oceans, ice and land surface…. Many of these changes – particularly to the oceans, ice sheets and global sea levels – are ‘irreversible,’ the authors say. Abrupt changes and ‘tipping points’ – such as rapid Antarctic ice sheet melt and forest dieback – ‘cannot be ruled out.'” –  CarbonBrief

August 9, 2021
Five Key Takeaways From the Latest IPCC Report on Climate Change 1. The last decade was hotter than any period in 125,000 years. 2. Scientists can now link specific weather events to human-made climate change. 3. Scientists have narrowed the estimated range for how temperatures respond to greenhouse-gas emissions. 4. The Earth rewards good behavior. 5. The IPCC’s volunteer scientists build consensus with all UN governments before releasing this report. “The new report begins with a definitive statement: “It is unequivocal that human influence has warmed the atmosphere, ocean and land.” Tom Evans, climate diplomacy researcher at the think tank E3G, put the implication succinctly: “No government has any excuse to duck their responsibility to act.” – Bloomberg Green

August 9, 2021
Global ocean warming started later in the 20th century than previously estimated
Summary:In estimations of ocean heat content — important when assessing and predicting the effects of climate change – calculations have often presented the rate of warming as a gradual rise from the mid-20th century to today. However, new research could overturn that assumption, suggesting the ocean maintained a relatively steady temperature throughout most of the 20th century, before embarking on a steep rise…. After 1990….” – ScienceDaily

August 8, 2021
Heatwave turns Kazakhstan steppe into mass grave for horses – Independent

August 6, 2021
Present at the Creation of a Climate Alliance—or Climate Conflict
“The United States and Europe are on the brink of decisions that could save the planet—or tear apart the West.” – Foreign Policy

August 5, 2021
Climate crisis: Scientists spot warning signs of Gulf Stream collapse
“Climate scientists have detected warning signs of the collapse of the Gulf Stream, one of the planet’s main potential tipping points. The research found “an almost complete loss of stability over the last century” of the currents that researchers call the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC). The currents are already at their slowest point in at least 1,600 years, but the new analysis shows they may be nearing a shutdown.” – The Guardian

August 2, 2021
Climate crisis: Siberian heatwave led to new methane emissions, study says
“If the climate crisis worsens and temperatures continue to rise, large methane releases remain possibility in the long term and must be better understood, the scientists said. Methane is 84 times more powerful in trapping heat than carbon dioxide over a 20-year period and has caused about 30% of global heating to date. Its concentration in the atmosphere is now at two and a half times pre-industrial levels and continuing to rise, but most of this has come from fossil fuel exploitation, cattle, rice paddies and waste dumps…. The study concluded with the suggestion that ‘permafrost thaw does not only release microbial methane from formerly frozen soils, but also, and potentially in much higher amounts, [fossil] methane from reservoirs below. As a result, the permafrost–methane feedback may be much more dangerous than suggested by studies accounting for microbial methane alone.’” – The Guardian

August 2, 2021
Climate crisis has cost Colorado billions – now it wants oil firms to pick up the bill
“ExxonMobil and Suncor face lawsuits in the western state but big oil’s apologists say the US consumer is to blame for emissions…. ‘It is far more difficult to change it now than it would have been if the companies had been honest about what they knew 30 or 50 years ago,’ said Marco Simons, general counsel for Earth Rights International, which is handling the lawsuit for the county. ‘That is probably the biggest tragedy here. Communities in this country and around the world were essentially robbed of their options.'” – The Guardian

July 30, 2021
Global Warming Will Kill 83 Million People in the Next 80 Years

“A population equivalent to that of Germany — 83 million people — could be killed by 2100 because of rising temperatures caused by greenhouse-gas emissions, according to a new study that might influence how markets price carbon pollution.” – Bloomberg Green 

July 29, 2021
A Carbon Calculation: How Many Deaths Do Emissions Cause?
“A new study looks at “the mortality cost of carbon”: lives lost or gained as emissions change over time…. R. Daniel Bressler, a Ph.D. candidate at Columbia University, calculated that adding about a quarter of the output of a coal-fired power plant, or roughly a million metric tons of carbon dioxide, to the atmosphere on top of 2020 levels for just one year will cause 226 deaths globally. By comparison, the lifetime emissions beyond 2020 levels of a handful of Americans (3.5, to be precise) will result in one additional heat-related death in this century.” – New York Times

July 29, 2021
The Amazon Is Fast Approaching a Point of No Return
“Brazil’s rainforest is being stolen and cleared at an accelerating pace, and the Bolsonaro government is fanning the flames.” – Bloomberg

July 28, 2021
Earth’s vital signs worsen amid business-as-usual mindset on climate change
“‘There is growing evidence we are getting close to or have already gone beyond tipping points associated with important parts of the Earth system, including warm-water coral reefs, the Amazon rainforest and the West Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets,’ said Ripple, distinguished professor of ecology in the OSU College of Forestry.” – ScienceDaily

July 27, 2021
Thousands of scientists warn climate tipping points ‘imminent’ 
“Researchers say ‘overexploitation of the Earth’ has seen many of its ‘vital signs’ deteriorate to record levels. For the study, scientists relied on “vital signs” to measure the health of the planet, including deforestation, greenhouse gas emissions, glacier thickness and sea-ice extent and deforestation. Out of 31 signs, they found that 18 hit record highs or lows. For example, despite a dip in pollution linked to the COVID-19 pandemic, levels of atmospheric CO2 and methane hit all-time highs in 2021. Greenland and Antarctica recently showed all-time low levels of ice mass and glaciers are melting 31-percent faster than they did just 15 years ago, the authors said…” – Aljazeera

July 26, 2021
The Heat, Floods and Fire We Don’t Hear Enough About
“From India to Turkey, it’s not just ‘crazy weather.’ It’s the world at 1.2 degrees of global warming, explain climate scientists.” – Bloomberg

“July 25, 2021
Yep, it’s bleak, says expert who tested 1970s end-of-the-world prediction
A controversial MIT study from 1972 forecast the collapse of civilization – and Gaya Herrington is here to deliver the bad news…. Herrington, a Dutch sustainability researcher and adviser to the Club of Rome, a Swiss thinktank, has made headlines in recent days after she authored a report that appeared to show a controversial 1970s study predicting the collapse of civilization was – apparently – right on time. Coming amid a cascade of alarming environmental events, from western US and Siberian wildfires to German floods and a report that suggests the Amazon rainforest may no longer be able to perform as a carbon sink, Herrington’s work predicted the collapse could come around 2040 if current trends held.” – The Guardian

July 25, 2021
The insect apocalypse: ‘Our world will grind to a halt without them’
“Insects have declined by 75% in the past 50 years – and the consequences may soon be catastrophic…. The loss of insect life from the food chain would not just be catastrophic for wildlife. It would also have direct consequences for the human food supply…. In Paul Ehrlich’s ‘rivets on a plane’ analogy, we may be close to the point where the wing falls off.” – The Guardian  

July 19, 2021
How a powerful US lobby group helps big oil to block climate action
“The American Petroleum Institute receives millions from oil companies – and works behinds the scenes to stall or weaken legislation…. When Royal Dutch Shell…. Most other oil conglomerates are also major funders, including ExxonMobil, Chevron and BP, although they have not made their contributions public. The deep financial ties underscore API’s power and influence across the oil and gas industry, and what politicians describe as the trade group’s defining role in setting major obstacles to new climate policies and legislation.” – The Guardian

July 17. 2021
As Frozen Land Burns, Siberia Fears: ‘If We Don’t Have the Forest, We Don’t Have Life
“Last year, wildfires scorched more than 60,000 square miles of forest and tundra, an area the size of Florida. That is more than four times the area that burned in the United States during its devastating 2020 fire season…. Last year, the record-setting fires in the remote Siberian region of Yakutia released roughly as much carbon dioxide as did all the fuel consumption in Mexico in 2018, according to Mark Parrington, a senior scientist at the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service in Reading, England….” – The New York Times

July 17, 2021
Scientists Fear For Birds As Utah’s Great Salt Lake Nears Record Low Levels
“The vibrant ecosystem of North America’s largest saltwater lake is under serious threat from water diversion and climate change-fueled drought. Utah’s shrinking Great Salt Lake could spell disaster for millions of birds that depend on the briny body of water for food.” – HuffPost

July 16, 2021
Flooding in Europe, in Pictures
“The heavy rain and flooding that began on Wednesday in Europe has continued, with 106 lives lost in Germany by Friday, and at least 20 in Belgium. Hundreds of people are still missing, and the grim expectation is that many of them have not survived…. Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Germany’s president, was among the many who linked the devastation to the need to deal with climate change. ‘Only when we take action against climate change can we keep the events that we are now experiencing within limits,’ he said.” – The New York Times

July 14, 2021
MIT Predicted in 1972 That Society Will Collapse This Century. New Research Shows We’re on Schedule.
“A remarkable new study by a director at one of the largest accounting firms in the world has found that a famous, decades-old warning from MIT about the risk of industrial civilization collapsing appears to be accurate based on new empirical data. The controversial MIT analysis generated heated debate, and was widely derided at the time by pundits who misrepresented its findings and methods. But the analysis has now received stunning vindication from a study written by a senior director at professional services giant KPMG, one of the ‘Big Four’ accounting firms as measured by global revenue. – Vice

July 14, 2021
Amazon rainforest now emitting more CO2 than it absorbs
“The Amazon rainforest is emitting a billion tonnes of carbon dioxide a year, according to a study. The giant forest had been absorbing the emissions driving the climate crisis but is now causing its acceleration, researchers said. Most of the emissions are caused by fires, many deliberately set to clear land for beef and soy production. But even without fires, hotter temperatures and droughts mean the south-eastern Amazon has become a source of CO2, rather than a sink.” – The Guardian

July 13, 2021
Severe drought threatens Hoover dam reservoir – and water for US west
“Only 1.8% of the west is not in some level of drought, with California, Arizona and New Mexico all experiencing their lowest rainfalls on record over the previous 12 months. ‘The amount of water now available across the US west is well below that of any time in modern civilization,’ said Park Williams, a hydroclimatologist at Columbia University. Research by Williams and colleagues last year analyzed tree rings to discover the current dry period is rivaled only by a spell in the late 1500s in a history of drought that reaches back to around 800, with the climate crisis doubling the severity of the modern-day drought.” – The Guardian

July 13, 2021
Plastic pollution is nearing irreversible tipping point, experts warn
“Biodiversity loss, rising temperatures and increased toxicity for oceans and wider society if emissions continue…. In an article published in Science, scientists from Sweden, Norway and Germany wrote that there were “enormous” consequences for continuing to throw away plastics, which continue to be “poorly” recycled. Figures for plastic waste entering the environment by 2025 are in the region of 9 and 23 metric tonnes per year, with warnings that by 2050, the world’s oceans and seas will be filled with more plastic than fish.” – Independent

July 9, 2021
1 Billion Sea Creatures Cooked To Death In Canada In Record Pacific Northwest Heat Wave
“’If we don’t like it, then we need to work harder to reduce emissions,’ warned the University of British Columbia scientist who calculated the massive toll.” – HuffPost

July 8, 2021
Climate crisis ‘may put 8bn at risk of malaria and dengue’
“More than 8 billion people could be at risk of malaria and dengue fever by 2080 if greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise unabated, a new study says.” – The Guardian

July 7, 2021
A Tug of War Between Lake and Sky
“A Clash between elemental forces — sun, rain, heat and ice — is what is threatening to upend centuries of relative stability along the Great Lakes’ 10,000 miles of shoreline, including the 22 miles that define Chicago’s eastern edge. And the best explanation is climate change, said Drew Gronewold, a hydrologist at the University of Michigan who has been studying lake levels for more than a decade. In fact, the speed and uncertainty of the changes underscore how Chicago, in some crucial ways, is perhaps more immediately exposed to the dangers of global warming than cities on the ocean.” – The New York Times

July 5, 2021
Questions to ask on the eve of World Population Day: How many Indians are too many Indians? Are our numbers a boon or a bane?
“The thought that we are about to outnumber the Chinese ought to occupy us. How many Indians are too many Indians? Are our numbers a boon or a bane? What will the demographic changes do to our society? Instead, our politicians are exploiting the myths about population explosion to further their divisive agenda. …It took millions of years for the world’s population to reach one billion in 1800 AD. But it doubled within just 100 years and tripled in the next century, hitting the six-billion mark in 1999. By 2011, it had reached seven billion. In 2030, it’s expected to grow to around 8.5l billion, by 2050 it will be 9.7 billion and in 2100, it will be 10.9 billion.” – Free Press Journal

July 5, 2021
Berta Cáceres assassination: ex-head of dam company found guilty
“Roberto David Castillo, former Honduran army intelligence officer, found to be co-collaborator in ordering murder. A US-trained former Honduran army intelligence officer who was the president of an internationally-financed hydroelectric company has been found guilty over the assassination of the indigenous environmentalist Berta Cáceres. Caceres, winner of the Goldman prize for environmental defenders, was shot dead two days before her 45th birthday by hired hitmen on 2 March 2016 after years of threats linked to her opposition of the $50m Agua Zarca dam.” – The Guardian

July 5, 2021
Sixty years of climate change warnings: the signs that were missed (and ignored)
“In August 1974, the CIA produced a study on ‘climatological research as it pertains to intelligence problems.’ The diagnosis was dramatic. It warned of the emergence of a new era of weird weather, leading to political unrest and mass migration (which, in turn, would cause more unrest)….  ‘The climate change began in 1960,’ the report’s first page informs us…. But, the report argued, the world ignored this warning, as the global population continued to grow and states made massive investments in energy, technology and medicine.” – The Guardian

July 3, 2021 July 3 is International Plastic Bag Free Day. It’s for us to make the choice – planet or plastic “A whopping 25,940 tonnes per day of plastic waste is generated in India, Union Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change Prakash Javadekar disclosed in the Lok Sabha in November 2019, quoting a study by the Central Pollution Control Board. Since then, the pandemic has only led to a surge in pollution from disposable products such as plastic face masks, hand sanitiser bottles and syringes.” – The Free Press Journal

July 2, 2021
The scientists hired by big oil who predicted the climate crisis long ago
“As early as 1958, the oil industry was hiring scientists and engineers to research the role that burning fossil fuels plays in global warming…. What those scientists discovered – and what the oil companies did with that information – is at the heart of two dozen lawsuits attempting to hold the fossil fuel industry responsible for their role in climate change.” – The Guardian