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South Australia energy minister hints that the 100 pct net renewables target may not be reached by 2027 as planned. At least households are getting on with the transition.

The post South Australia won’t reach its 100 pct net renewables target on schedule, but it won’t be the fault of households appeared first on Renew Economy.

Australia's first major transmission loop is now operating, and will be at full capacity by the end of next year, bringing a major change in the way the grid operates.

The post Australia’s first transmission loop between three states set to “fundamentally change” flow of electricity appeared first on Renew Economy.

Former EDO boss and now Greens MLC Sue Higginson on the huge implications of the High Court ruling on coal and climate impacts. Plus: A big week for wind and roads, and other news.

The post Energy Insiders podcast: The High Court ruling on climate damage appeared first on Renew Economy.

State subsidy scheme extends to one of the most efficient home energy bill slashers, offering discounts of between $1,500 and $2,100 on the cost of installing ceiling insulation.

The post State extends subsidy to ceiling insulation to help more households slash their energy bills appeared first on Renew Economy.

While renewables opponents weaponise fears about who will clean up abandoned wind or solar farms, two ageing fossil fuel projects have become taxpayer problems in just the last three months.

The post Governments foot the bill for oil and coal cleanups, so should they do the same for renewables? appeared first on Renew Economy.

The connection with the ocean is central to the worldview for Indigenous Peoples around the world. For many Indigenous Peoples of the Pacific this profound connection is reflected in creation stories. In those stories, deities, islands, and humans emerged from the depths of the sea. It is the home of ancestors. 

The territory of voyaging Peoples of the Pacific stretches across the whole of the ocean. The territories in the sea are part of a global web of life. And that is being threatened in a race to plunder the ocean floor.

When companies mine on land, most governments require them to study the impact of their mine. It is well-accepted that companies must study and address impacts on human rights, including Indigenous Peoples’ rights, and the environment. The ocean, however, doesn’t have the same safeguards — yet. 

The rules for deep sea mining are still being written

Right now, the International Seabed Authority is writing the rules that most of the globe will follow if it mines the deep ocean. The ISA was formed by a 1994 agreement that put into effect part of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. It governs more than half of the world’s oceans, and 172 countries are members. 

(Side note: The United States is not a member, and the Trump administration has said it will permit companies to mine the deep sea without regard for international law. You can read more on the threat of unilateral mining here.)

Indigenous Peoples’ rights aren’t being respected

There’s a big problem with what’s happening at the ISA now, however: Indigenous Peoples have no formal seat at the table. Their collective rights are not being taken seriously. 

Mining companies want us to think of the ocean as a vast, isolated blank space just because no one lives on the deep ocean floor. But what non-Indigenous people describe as empty, Pacific Peoples revere as the genesis of existence and source of sustenance and livelihoods. The ocean connects and represents the shared heritage and ancestry of all Pacific Peoples.

Indigenous Peoples’ knowledge tells us that a healthy ocean is sacred, integral to all life on the planet, significant, and worth defending. For many Indigenous Peoples, it also represents a key part of how they live and sustain themselves. It is how their ancestors navigated across islands and land masses. It holds sacred and ceremonial sites. And yet, despite this, their voices and rights are being sidelined. 

The ecological data gathered and knowledge systems built over millenia of lived experience of Indigenous Peoples must inform every part of the work of the ISA. This should include any regulations for mining the deep sea, from planning and study to monitoring and economics.

International law and treaties require better

The countries who are members of the ISA must listen to Indigenous Peoples when they write new rules — not just because it’s the right thing to do, and not just because it gives our planet a better chance for a livable future. The requirement is written into treaties and into international law.

Other international bodies already have processes in place to formally recognize and consult with Indigenous Peoples. The United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change both have formal ways for Indigenous Peoples to participate in decision-making. The ISA, if guided by Indigenous Peoples, can use these models to develop its own such structures.

Indigenous Peoples’ cultural heritage is at risk

Over the past few years, the ISA has been addressing the issue of “underwater cultural heritage”. This is an issue that shows how Indigenous Peoples’ rights can deepen conversations that might otherwise be sidelined.

Underwater cultural heritage sites are required to be protected. But right now, the policy defines those sites as only encompassing human-made objects — shipwrecks, for example.

Indigenous Peoples recognize sites in the ocean as especially culturally and spiritually important. These spaces aren’t human-made, but they hold stories, traditions, and significance that cannot be replaced. Advocates from Pacific Indigenous Peoples say these sites deserve protection.

The current definition of “underwater cultural heritage” gives more protection to a 100-year-old shipwreck than it gives to a sacred site that took millions of years to form and has been a place used and respected by people for thousands of years. 

“Stonehenge, Pyramids, and the Great Wall, without their stories, are simply a collection of stones. Their meaning comes from the traditions, histories, beliefs, and relationships that have been carried from one generation to the next. The same is true beneath the ocean. Culture is not found in the artifact — it is found in the story the artifact carries.”
Statement by the Maui Nui Makai Network (Hawaiʻi)

But framing these sacred spaces through a narrow lens of “underwater cultural heritage” sets the bar far too low. Instead of debating ambiguous terms, the ISA could use the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples as a baseline. It’s a framework that would shift the discussions. Instead of limited opportunities for participation, Indigenous Peoples would have their collective rights recognized by the ISA. Those rights strengthen their ability to continue to protect cultural and spiritual relationships with the ocean, for the benefit of all.

Setting the course for our future

The ISA may be writing policies that most people on the planet will never read, but those policies cut right to some of the biggest questions that will determine our future: Whose stories matter? Whose knowledge is respected? Whose history is valued? Whose rights are defended? And how will those answers shape the Earth that future generations inherit?

The post Indigenous Peoples’ Knowledge Is Left Behind in the Rush to Mine the Seafloor appeared first on Earthworks.

In order to solve climate change, you have to do two things — stop burning fossil fuels, and build clean energy to replace them. The last few decades in the United States have witnessed a long back-and-forth over which of the two goals is more important, and over how to achieve either of them. Is it more important to pass a carbon tax, or subsidize electric vehicles? To block a new oil pipeline, or build a lot of solar and wind? 

On this question, the coalition known as the climate movement has fractured into two broad groups. On one side, there are activists, lawyers, and environmentalists, who tend to focus on blocking and reducing fossil fuel use. On the other, there are renewable energy companies and policy wonks, who tend to focus on building more clean energy.

These factions have clashed in the past, but over the past week a kind of civil war has erupted between the different elements of the climate movement. The inciting incident was the release of the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act, or BAAJA, a long-awaited Senate bill that is designed to enable the construction of more power plants, transmission lines, and gas pipelines. The bill does this by weakening some of the nation’s bedrock environmental laws, speeding up the timeline for government agencies to issue permits, and making it harder to cancel projects that have already gotten federal approval. 

For climate-conscious supporters of the bill, it’s better for the planet to build a lot of clean energy even if it means some fossil fuels get built as well, and even if they cause some damage to the environment on the way. Supporters of the effort argue that if the U.S. builds out new clean capacity, it will be easier to wean off fossil fuels, which are the primary cause of global warming and all its myriad consequences. Opponents say that’s a Faustian bargain, one that will jeopardize tribal nations, other marginalized communities, and endangered species.

“It is definitely exposing a potential fault line between the environmental community and clean energy interests,” said Representative Jared Huffman, a Democrat who represents Northern California, in an interview with Grist. 

Representative Jared Huffman, a Democrat from California, is skeptical of the Senate permitting reform bill. Andrew Harnik / Getty Images

BAAJA is the product of months of bipartisan negotiation between four members of the Senate committees focused on energy and the environment. The two Democrats in the talks were Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island and Martin Heinrich of New Mexico, who are both climate hawks and clean energy advocates. The Republicans were Mike Lee of Utah and Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, who are advocates of fossil fuels and critics of environmental regulation. Despite their ideological differences, the four senators managed to reach a compromise on a sprawling 400-page bill with hundreds of individual provisions. 

The so-called “four corners” reached a deal just before Congress left for its fall recess, and the Senate will not return to take up the bill until after the midterm elections. The bill has not even made it through committee yet, and it also faces an uncertain fate in the House of Representatives. The next few weeks will see a scramble of lobbying as supporters and opponents of the bill try to sway senators and representatives for or away from the bill.

So far, at least, the builders seem to have more influence than the blockers, at least within the climate movement. President Donald Trump has spent the last two years repealing most federal climate policy and blocking the development of new clean energy, and many climate advocates seem willing to accept an imperfect deal rather than hold out hope of fixing Trump’s damage after he leaves office.

“It’s a lot easier to prevent things from being built than to build things, and that applies both to fossil fuels and to renewables,” said Zeke Hausfather, a climate expert at the science nonprofit Berkeley Earth, who also directs climate research for the tech company Stripe. “I don’t want us to run roughshod over any community, but we also can’t give everyone a veto for an issue as important as climate change. So ultimately, we need to strike a balance there.”

The case in favor: Build more

A big challenge with building clean energy is that it takes up a lot of space. Solar farms and wind farms can cover thousands of acres of land, and the transmission lines that carry their power to cities can extend for hundreds of miles, covering far more territory than coal and natural gas plants do. This large footprint makes these projects more likely to touch federal lands or waters, which triggers a series of obligations under the National Environmental Policy Act, the foundational environmental protection law also known as NEPA, and other laws that protect endangered species and historical artifacts. Under NEPA, federal agencies must carry out an extensive analysis of a project’s environmental impacts before issuing or denying a permit for it.

That review process often inspires time-consuming litigation. Opponents can bring lawsuits against an agency even years after a review is complete, arguing the review wasn’t comprehensive enough, and they can ask courts to halt the project until the agency redoes the analysis. A 2025 study found that 64 percent of solar projects, 38 percent of wind projects, and 31 percent of transmission line projects face NEPA lawsuits.  

This litigation can come from almost anyone, and can cover almost any conceivable impact from a project. On one end of the spectrum, a coalition of tribes and environmental groups sued the developer of the SunZia transmission line. The line carries much-needed wind power to Arizona and California, but the plaintiffs wanted the developer to reroute the wires away from a holy cultural site, an effort that was ultimately unsuccessful. On the other hand, opponents of a wind project in California delayed development for years by suing on the grounds that a federal agency had failed to consider pseudoscientific theories about wind turbines creating dangerous electromagnetic fields. Both projects were ultimately completed, but years behind schedule.

A group of wind turbines generate electricity at the Block Island Wind Farm off the coast of Rhode Island. The clean energy industry has pushed for provisions that would prevent President Donald Trump from canceling future offshore wind permits.
John Moore / Getty Images

The bill would make it much harder to file this kind of lawsuit. Litigation would need to be brought within 150 days of the end of the NEPA review process, rather than six years, and the plaintiff must have already described the issue of their suit during a public comment period. Even then, a court could only order the agency to redo its analysis while a project moves forward, rather than pausing a project altogether. The agency could then only revoke the permit under limited circumstances, including a violation of law or the risk of immediate or substantial harm to “life, property, national security, or defense.”  

“This is a great bill, and it’s a huge step in the right direction,” said Ray Long, the president of ACORE, a trade group representing the solar and wind industry. “We need to really put this in reality. We need to build a ton of stuff over the next four years, or else we’re gonna have higher [electricity] prices.”

A related set of provisions makes it harder for the government itself to block projects, providing developers with “permitting certainty.” Here, both the Republicans and Democrats believe they have won — Republicans resent President Joe Biden’s decisions to block the Keystone XL oil pipeline and to pause the construction of new liquefied-natural gas terminals on the Gulf Coast, while Democrats have watched the second Trump administration use dubious executive authorities to halt the construction of solar and wind farms on federal lands and waters. One provision in the bill would help developers seek compensation if they can establish that the government has discriminated against a specific project type, like offshore wind, through delayed and canceled permits.

“This president has found ways to skirt the edges of every law that we have, and his attacks will continue,” said Kris Ohleth, executive director of Special Initiative on Offshore Wind, a pro-offshore wind nonprofit research group. “But at least if developers know they can recoup some of their development costs, as this bill might allow, it’s more appealing for them to return to the market.”

What’s arguably the most important thing in the bill doesn’t have to do with permitting per se. It’s about the massive transmission lines that carry electricity from region to region. The United States has built very few of these interstate lines in recent years. This dearth of new wires has made it infeasible for developers to build more solar and wind. 

“Historically, it didn’t matter too much where power plants were located, so we built them close to where the power was needed,” said Chirag Lala, vice president of research and chief economist at the Center for Public Enterprise, a think tank. “But we don’t have that same luxury with clean energy, which can be very location-specific. If you’re going to rely on those resources, you have to ship the power over long distances.”

High-voltage transmission lines run through the Central Valley of California. The bipartisan permitting bill would overhaul federal rules for transmission, requiring utilities to plan for more lines that move clean energy around the country. Jay L. Clendenin / Getty Images

BAAJA would force utilities and regional grid operators to plan for interregional transmission lines, and would let private developers (like the one behind SunZia) come in and build lines themselves if utilities don’t build enough. The bill would also clear away a number of procedural roadblocks that have allowed utilities to block interregional transmission. 

The Democrats who negotiated the bill and the climate experts who support it see these provisions as a sea change for clean energy. If the bill passes, it could unleash solar in Nevada and wind in the Dakotas, and then bring that power to places like Appalachia that have little solar or wind potential of their own.

The case against: Stop the damage

But while the clean energy industry has celebrated the bill’s effort to speed up permitting for new power plants, many environmental groups have condemned it. These groups argue that the changes would allow for a surge of new development near disadvantaged communities, and will leave residents with no legal recourse to stop that development. 

These groups argue, in essence, that the bill sacrifices many communities in places like the Gulf South in order to achieve an overall nationwide increase in the supply of clean energy. 

“That battle between fossil fuels and renewables is not going to necessarily go well for the people of our region, especially if you take those regular protections that we’ve relied on for years away,” said Liz Zepeda, the director of federal policy at the Southern Environmental Law Center, an environmental law group that represents six states in the Southeast. 

The permitting changes have also drawn intense criticism from Indigenous groups, who say that the narrowing of historic preservation law would deprive tribal nations of a voice in development decisions. By the time that tribes learned about a company’s plans for a new transmission line or solar farm, it could be too late for them to protect culturally important sites.

“These changes will reduce opportunities for Tribal Nations to learn that an infrastructure project is occurring or to participate before decisions are made, all but guaranteeing that construction or other activities affecting sacred places can proceed without meaningful Tribal involvement,” said Valerie Grussing, the executive director of the National Association of Tribal Historic Preservation Officers, a group representing tribal officials who advise federal agencies on protecting Indigenous historic sites during project development.

The bill would constrain litigation on behalf of endangered species and would also weaken states’ power to stop development under the Clean Water Act. This latter state power has been used in the past to take down old hydropower dams, like the ones on the Klamath River, and that would now be harder.

BAAJA would also allow mines on public lands to unload excavated rock and waste materials on adjacent land. Mining is essential for clean energy development — solar panels, wind turbines, and EV batteries all need metals and minerals — but some environmental groups worry about the impact on local ecosystems.

Indigenous youth and climate activists hold a protest against pipeline projects in Washington, D.C., in 2021. A new bipartisan permitting reform bill in the Senate would make it easier to build many pipelines.
Bill Clark / CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images

In addition to raising concerns about environmental and social impacts, opponents argue that the bill would lock in future development of fossil fuels, which could negate the climate benefit of building clean energy. Among the biggest concessions to Republicans is a broad environmental exemption for natural gas pipelines, which, along with the Clean Water Act changes, would make it much harder for states on the East Coast to block new pipelines. Hausfather, who is supportive of the bill, allows that more gas reaching the Northeast would likely cause emissions to go up, though he believes that increased clean energy development elsewhere would more than offset those increases.

The bills’ opponents are also extremely skeptical of the “permitting certainty” provisions that the offshore wind industry welcomed. The bill would prohibit the president and federal agencies from discriminating against any specific energy source, but that prohibition would apply to fossil fuels as well as renewables. It would in theory make it almost impossible for a future president to undertake an LNG pause like the one Biden pursued, or to block offshore oil development. 

“If you have a dominant industry right now, which is the fossil fuel industry, you are creating a structure that makes it possible for them to lock in their dominance forever,” said Brett Hartl, the government affairs director at the Center for Biological Diversity, the environmental protection nonprofit that has led the opposition to the bill.

Opponents argue that by trading away their ability to stop new oil and gas production, the bill would hamstring the climate fight, no matter how much solar and wind gets built.

“Do we just ignore the political and economic power of the fossil fuel industry, and just hope and pray we can deploy renewable energy fast enough to reduce emissions?” asked Erich Pica, president of Friends of the Earth, a nonprofit environmental group. “That’s what this bill does.” 

Builders vs. blockers

BAAJA’s fate is far from guaranteed. In addition to the opposition from influential groups like the Center for Biological Diversity, there are a number of House members who have expressed uncertainty about the bill. At least one senior Republican, Brett Guthrie, has said he opposes the effort to force new transmission lines, and major utilities will likely oppose that provision as well. On the Democratic side, Huffman, the representative from California, told Grist that he thinks Democrats can likely get a better deal after the midterms.

“The idea that this is this once-in-a-lifetime great opportunity that will never come again and has to be accepted without any scrutiny or questions is pretty silly,” he told Grist. Huffman said he believes the bill is a “Trojan horse” with “giveaways” for the fossil fuel industry, and said he believes he could negotiate a bill without significant environmental rollbacks should the Democrats take control of the House. 

But even if Democrats retake the House and the Senate, they will need some Republican votes to pass a major transmission reform, so some kind of compromise is inevitable. Many supporters say they doubt that Republicans would negotiate a bill when in the minority, or that Trump would sign a Democrat-led bill.

For now, the bill seems to have split the climate movement down the middle. While hundreds of small environmental groups signed a letter urging Democratic senators not to pass the bill, most major green groups did not sign. The list of absences includes the Sierra Club, the Environmental Defense Fund, the Nature Conservancy, and the Natural Resources Defense Council, arguably the nation’s most influential climate nonprofit, whose leader said in a public statement the bill raises “hard questions” but could be “good for clean energy — really good. ” Others, like Citizen’s Climate Lobby, have offered their unequivocal support. Even the environmental opponents seem somewhat fractured — when a group of opposing nonprofits held a Zoom call to coordinate their strategy, someone leaked the transcript to Punchbowl News.

The fact that the bill has a chance of passing with some support from green groups and climate hawks like Whitehouse reflects a shift in the American climate movement. The movement took off during the fracking boom with protests against pipeline projects like Keystone XL, but efforts to phase out fossil fuels have been stymied by court decisions and administration changes. During that time, solar and wind have both experienced dramatic growth as they’ve gotten cheaper to build, but they are now hitting bottlenecks thanks to transmission constraints and environmental review. 

The fact that Whitehouse and Heinrich came to the table with Republicans, and that so many green groups aren’t fighting their compromise, may be a sign about how climate advocates have come to see fossil fuels: If you can’t beat ’em, build something that can replace ’em.

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline The bipartisan energy bill tearing the climate movement apart on Oct 8, 2026.

As part of the Trump administration’s ongoing push to illegally expand oil and gas drilling into long-protected Arctic public lands in Alaska, the Department of the Interior today announced a categorical exclusion that aims to exempt oil and gas exploration projects from individual review under the National Environmental Policy Act.

Under the categorical exclusion, Interior is relying on old environmental studies from different projects in ecologically distinct areas to claim that new proposed activities would have “no significant impact on the environment.”

Categorical exclusions are typically used by federal agencies only for small projects like routine road or trail maintenance, restoration work, or minor facility upgrades – when no harm is expected to the environment. An exemption for large-scale industrial activities like exploratory drilling and seismic testing across a landscape as vast, varied, and changing as the Western Arctic is a radical departure for how categorical exclusions are typically used.

The 23-million-acre National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska in the Western Arctic is the largest tract of public land in the U.S. Its diverse habitats range from tundra and wetlands to mountain foothills, grassy uplands, riparian areas, and river deltas. Using older studies that analyzed impacts of oil exploration in a specific area of the Western Arctic to forecast impacts for future projects in ecologically different locations is extremely problematic and unsupported. It would also completely cut out the public from future permitting decisions.

“In issuing this categorical exclusion, this administration is seeking to fast track large scale oil drilling and seismic exploration without any further environmental analysis or public input,” said Earthjustice Attorney Janet Bering. “It is cutting the public out of this decision and future decisions. The administration finalized this new approach with zero public input. Combined with a similar proposal that rubber stamps new oil production, this is a one-two punch. It’s bad policy, and it is unlawful.”

Exploration projects, which include seismic surveys, exploratory drilling, and related infrastructure, are known to harm wildlife, including caribou and polar bears. Seismic surveys are conducted with thumper trucks weighing tens of thousands of pounds that repeatedly strike the ground with a large plate to send seismic waves into the earth to detect oil deposits. Transporting industrial equipment and camps for seismic workers across sensitive landscapes also comes with significant risk to the environment.

Last winter, a massive drilling rig nicknamed “the beast” toppled over, caught fire and spilled diesel while it was being transported on an ice road to a new exploration site.

Today’s action follows a similar proposed rule announced by the Trump administration last month to rubber stamp new drilling production projects in the Western Arctic. The public may comment on that proposed rule, but if itis finalized, the public would be cut out of the process. The production rule aims to require Interior to approve new projects as massive as Willow within a 60-day limit of the oil company submitting its application, without any additional environmental study or public process.

Background

The 23-million-acre Reserve in the Western Arctic is one of the most biologically, ecologically, and culturally significant tracts of public land in the United States. The region is home to iconic and imperiled wildlife species like polar bears and seals that depend on sea ice. It provides globally significant habitat for millions of migratory birds and for Alaska’s unique caribou herds.

The Naval Petroleum Reserves Production Act of 1976 recognized the importance of the Western Arctic for wildlife and migratory birds including animals protected under the Endangered Species Act, and for the cultural practices and food security of Indigenous communities. The act requires the BLM to assure adequate mitigation of harm from oil and gas activities, and “maximum protection” of the fragile tundra, birds, wildlife and other unique resources within the Reserve when it allows exploration or drilling in special areas. When Congress authorized leasing and oil extraction in 1980, it again directed the federal government to assure the protection of the Western Arctic’s ecological and cultural resources.

Today, the Trump administration invited fresh controversy when it announced it will abandon environmental reviews under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) to allow oil and gas companies to run roughshod over pristine Arctic ecosystems to search for expensive, far flung oil.

The Bureau of Land Management granted the polluters a new categorical exclusion that will allow activities including seismic surveys, construction of ice roads and airstrips, and exploratory drilling to move forward without the environmental analysis typically required under NEPA. The decision comes as the Trump administration continues its push to expand oil and gas development across Alaska's public lands, threatening sensitive Arctic wildlife and the communities that depend on them.

In response, Mike Scott, National Oil and Gas Campaign Manager, released the following statement:

“The Trump administration is handing Big Oil another free pass to exploit America's public lands, this time by gutting environmental oversight in one of the most fragile ecosystems on the planet. Oil companies have already shown the risks they pose to the Western Arctic, and now this administration wants to make it even easier for them to drill without scrutiny.”

“This isn't about lowering energy costs or helping Alaskans. It's about doing the fossil fuel industry's bidding at the expense of wildlife, Alaska Native communities, and our public lands. The Trump administration is putting corporate profits ahead of people and the planet, and the Western Arctic will pay the price."

Open access notables

Committed Antarctic Ice Sheet mass loss by the end of the twenty-first century, Lin et al., Nature Geoscience

The Antarctic Ice Sheet is the largest source of uncertainty in sea-level rise projections, with uncertainties propagating through emissions scenarios, atmosphere–ocean general circulation models, ice-sheet dynamics and sea-level physics. In ice-sheet model intercomparison exercises, these uncertainties—typically attributed to intermodel differences—stem from modelling choices that may bias ensembles towards commonly adopted approaches regardless of observational consistency. Here we quantify how each individual physical assumption cascades into projection uncertainty using a machine-learning emulation framework, which also enables Bayesian calibration against satellite observations to reduce projection bias. Our results suggest it is very likely (≥0.92 probability) that the Antarctic Ice Sheet is committed to twenty-first-century mass loss, even under aggressive emissions-reduction scenarios. Higher emissions drive greater Antarctic mass loss by 2100 (≥0.89 probability), directly elevating near-term coastal risks. Under very high-emissions scenarios, we identify cascading mechanisms that could produce up to 25.4 cm of sea-level rise by 2100 (95th percentile; median = 15.7 cm) while remaining consistent with satellite observations. Effective management of these risks to densely populated coastal communities requires rapid emissions reductions and improved constraints on climate model selection, sliding laws and ice-shelf melt parameterizations. 

Hysteresis and irreversibility in permafrost physical response to increase and decrease of CO2 emissions, Watanabe et al., Earth System Dynamic

Boreal permafrost over the Northern Hemisphere high latitudes, defined as areas where the ground temperature is below 0 °C for two or more years, stores more than twice as much carbon as the atmosphere. Therefore, thawing of the permafrost, a tipping element, due to global warming may lead to additional carbon emissions and accelerate the warming. To investigate the permafrost response to increase and decrease of CO2 emissions, we conducted a series of numerical experiments using an emission-driven Earth System Model, MIROC-ES2L, and adopting idealized overshooting scenarios in which a prescribed CO2 emission of 10 PgC yr−1 is given until the global warming level reaches different values between 2 and 8 °C followed by the negative emission until the cumulative emission becomes zero.

We found that the response of permafrost area to surface warming and cooling is reversible but has hysteresis for all the emission scenarios. Furthermore, the permafrost property such as the ratio of frozen to liquid water was shown to have irreversibility in the deep soil layer; part of the frozen area in the initial condition was replaced by a mixed water-ice area in the final state despite ground temperature returning almost to the initial condition. Sensitivity experiments reveal that the hysteresis and irreversibility are attributed to the delay of the soil freezing and melting associated with the soil heat conductivity and specific heat of water phase change. This result indicates that once permafrost thaws with warming it will continue for decades after warming diminishes and the delay in the permafrost recovery is larger at global warming levels greater than 2 °C. An offline calculation shows that the additional CO2 emission during the permafrost hysteresis cycle accounts for about 0.6 %–41 % of the cumulative carbon emission released from thawed permafrost in flat10 and NEC experiments.

Trends and Extremes of Near-Surface Dry-Bulb, Wet-Bulb, and Dewpoint Temperature across Southeast Asia and Northern Australia (1980–2021), May et al., Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatolog

Trends in seasonal average dry-bulb temperature T, wet-bulb temperature TWB, and dewpoint temperature TD over the last 42 years (1980–2021) were analyzed over the Southeast (SE) Asian and tropical northern Australian region. All three variables show broad positive trends in most areas, except for relatively weak, nonsignificant trends over northern Australia. Trends in TD and TWB are as high as 0.5°C decade−1 in parts of SE Asia, with generally slightly smaller observed trends in TWB than in T. Trends over the ocean tend to be less variable and slightly weaker on average. We observe an increased occurrence of extreme events in recent years (the 2010s) compared to earlier decades. The T, TWB, and TD extremes occur substantially more frequently during El Niño years, in addition to an underlying increasing trend.

Advancing a Coordinated Strategy for Decision-Relevant Climate Data Products for the United States, Ullrich et al., Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society

Climate adaptation practitioners, planners, and policymakers rely on historical reconstructions and future projections of regional to local climate for adaptation, resilience, and risk management. To serve the many needs of these users, climate data must be relevant for informing the decision-making process (“salient”), consistent with our physical understanding of the global Earth system (“credible”), backed by expert judgment (“authoritative”), and publicly available and ready for use (“accessible”). As more decision-relevant climate data products are being developed to address outstanding needs, important challenges have emerged around the selection, evaluation, use, and standardization of these data products. This article examines opportunities and challenges associated with regional climate data for the United States and describes nascent efforts to build a coordinated strategy among communities of producers and users to maximize the utility of decision-relevant datasets. A community of practice (CoP) is now emerging to benefit both end users and data producers. The CoP will enable enhanced evaluation protocols, improved uncertainty quantification, and eased data distribution and usage, informed by ongoing input on data needs and feedback on quality and usability of data from a wide range of user communities. Broad coordination among interested parties and periodic reviews of the state of the field are vital to the success of this community of practice.

They reduce, we reduce: Perception of other countries’ climate effort predicts support for climate policies, Tam et al., PLOS Climate

As public support influences policy choices, it is crucial to understand how people view climate policies. Based on the premise that individuals tend to be conditional cooperators, we derived the “They Reduce, We Reduce” hypothesis, according to which citizens’ support for climate policies in their own country is higher if they perceive a stronger climate effort by other countries. We tested this hypothesis with a survey study (N = 4,000) in China, India, Japan, and the United States. Findings show that participants who perceived that other countries were likely and willing to take action to reduce climate change, or that the major emitters in the world were currently making substantial efforts, were more supportive of implementing climate policies in their own country. We also observed interindividual variations in this effect, though the patterns differed between countries: The policy attitudes of individuals who felt personally obligated to combat climate change and those who supported their country’s unconditional efforts were less tied to such perceptions. These findings suggest that people respond to other countries’ actions, and policy attitudes should be understood in the context of global climate governance, with reciprocity playing an important role in mobilizing public support.

From this week's government/NGO section:

Economic, Consumer Cost, Pollution Impacts of Federal Energy Policy Changes In 48 U.S. States, Energy Innovation

Federal policy changes since January 2025 will harm the 48 contiguous U.S. states with higher energy prices, lost economic growth and jobs, worse air pollution and healthcare costs, and less grid reliability. Households will pay an additional $920 billion for energy between 2026-2040 – about $6,500 cumulatively per household across that period and $640 per household in 2035. Cutting policies that drive transportation sector innovation and efficiency will inflate gasoline prices 54 cents per gallon in 2035 and 93 cents per gallon in 2040, atop upward pressure from the Iran war. OBBBA and federal cuts to domestic manufacturing and innovation will cost 390,000 jobs per year on average, totaling 6.2 million job-years lost to state economies. Slowing down electrification and domestic energy manufacturing will lower GDP, spilling into other economic sectors, costing state economies $1.3 trillion in cumulative GDP losses. Worsening local air pollution will cause 37,000 additional premature deaths and raise healthcare costs by $72 billion, contributing to rising household costs alongside rising energy prices and goods inflation. All federal energy policy decisions and climate repeals will generate 9.3 billion tons of CO2e emissions, roughly 580 million tons per year.

Offshore Wind Lease Buyouts. Picking Winners and Losers Costs Taxpayers Billions, Taxpayers for Common Sense

As of September 2026, the Department of the Interior (DOI) has agreed to pay energy companies up to $3.9 billion to cancel 12 leases they previously obtained at competitive auctions, on the condition that they make equivalent investments in conventional energy projects instead. These buyouts carry significant implications for American taxpayers and consumers, and there could be more to come. Concerns with offshore wind lease buyouts include the following; Costs Taxpayers $3.9 Billion to Cancel Projects Already Underway: The agreements would return billions in taxpayer revenue already deposited into the federal Treasury to wind developers in exchange for terminating their offshore wind leases; Picks Winners and Losers: The Administration is using billions in refunds to steer investment toward specific energy sectors, manipulating the free market. These cancellations run counter to market trends and private investment decisions. Companies won these leases through competitive auctions; now the Administration is determining which projects and energy sectors qualify for taxpayer-funded refunds; Decreases Planned Domestic Energy Supply: The 12 canceled leases were expected to support projects with a combined nameplate capacity of 19.2 gigawatts (GW), enough to power 6.6 million households. Their cancellation deprives consumers of a future source of domestic energy production; Undermines Energy Security: Robust and diverse energy sources strengthen the domestic energy market. Energy companies paid billions of dollars to secure federal offshore wind leases to diversify their energy portfolios, and now the Administration is undermining their diversification efforts. Although the Administration claims the refunds support new investments, some agreements count investments companies had already made, meaning these taxpayer-funded refunds will not lead to new investment or increase future energy supply.

Climate Fraud 101. Big Oil’s Climate Deception Explained in 101 Documents (1957–2026), Megan Matthews and Kert Davies, The Center for Climate Integrity

For decades, fossil fuel industry leaders were warned that, unless action was taken, communities across the globe would suffer catastrophic harms caused by their products. What they did with that knowledge is the story of the most consequential corporate deception campaign in world history. The authors highlight decades of Big Oil’s climate lies through 101 documents showing that the industry knew and lied about its' central role in the climate crisis. 159 articles in 86 journals by 872 contributing authors

Physical science of climate change, effects

Asymmetry in carbon cycle feedbacks and transient climate response under positive and negative CO2 emissions, Chimuka & Zickfeld, Biogeosciences Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-23-6211-2026

Background trade winds and climate sensitivity control the eastern equatorial Pacific warming pattern, Stuivenvolt-Allen & Fedorov, Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.aec5746

Global climate impact of land-surface change driven by radiative effects, Vrese et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-77834-0

Impacts of increasing CO2 on diurnal migrating tide in the equatorial lower thermosphere, McLandress & Fomichev, Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2005gl025345

Impacts of Mean State Ocean Heat Transport on Climate and Its Response to CO2 Forcing, Gornitz et al., Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 10.1111/nyas.14006

Instantaneous heating rate forcing differentiates tropical high-cloud adjustments across greenhouse gases, Chen et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.aef7462

Modulation of precession-forced Asian–African monsoon and arid climate variability by obliquity, Lei et al., npj Climate and Atmospheric Science Open Access 10.1038/s41612-026-01566-7

Temperature-Modulated Ocean CO2 Uptake in Response to CO2 Increase and Decrease, Xu & Gao, PLANT PHYSIOLOGY 10.1104/pp.112.206961

The 2022 Record-Breaking Northeastward Shift of South Asian High Since 1980: The Role of the Gulf Stream, Zhu et al., International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70623

Why April Stands Out: Monthly Impacts of Internal Variability on Arctic Amplification, Gale et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026jd047413

“Young Get Older, But Old Get Younger”: Warming-Induced Circulation Change Explains Contrasting Pattern of Projected Pacific Deoxygenation, Taylor et al., AGU Advances Open Access 10.1029/2025av002278

 

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Observations of climate change, effects

Climate-change-amplified wind-related economic losses during Cyclone Harry (2026), Faranda et al., Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society Open Access 10.1002/qj.70314

Historical Trend and Future Projection of Summer Temperature Extremes in Nepal, Paudel et al., International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70610

Increased Arctic Winter Rain-on-Snow-Induced Melt Events Detected by Spaceborne Passive Microwave Remote Sensing, Tao et al., Journal of Climate 10.1175/jcli-d-25-0414.1

State of the Climate in Asia 2025, Danielopol et al., Environmental Conservation 10.1017/s0376892903000109

State of Wildfires 2025–2026, Medicine, The Lancet Respiratory Medicine 10.1016/s2213-2600(26)00256-0

Trends and Extremes of Near-Surface Dry-Bulb, Wet-Bulb, and Dewpoint Temperature across Southeast Asia and Northern Australia (1980–2021), May et al., Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology 10.1175/jamc-d-24-0214.1

Tropical belt expansion and its impacts on climate variability in the Mediterranean from 1980 to 2022, Darrag et al., Atmospheric chemistry and physics Open Access 10.5194/acp-26-14031-2026

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Sustained greening of the Antarctic Peninsula observed from satellites, Nature Geoscience, 10.1038/s41561-024-01564-5 46 cites.

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Instrumentation & observational methods of climate change, effects

Advancing a Coordinated Strategy for Decision-Relevant Climate Data Products for the United States, Ullrich et al., Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society pdf 10.1175/bams-d-24-0303.1

Annual growth rates of column-averaged CO2 inferred from Total Carbon Column Observing Network (TCCON), Lindqvist et al., Atmospheric chemistry and physics Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-15-13023-2015

Climate Change Contribution to Seasonal Forecast Anomalies Using Constrained CMIP6 Projections, Ledoux--Xatard et al., Atmospheric Science Letters Open Access 10.1002/asl2.70061

Comparison of Gridded Precipitation Datasets Used in Climate and Drought Monitoring in the Contiguous United States, Schumacher et al., Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology 10.1175/jamc-d-26-0022.1

Defining the Anthropocene using precise geological evidence, Barlow et al., Journal of Applied Ecology Open Access pdf 10.1111/1365-2664.12587

Instrumental Artefacts Can Reverse Apparent Lightning–Climate Trends, Wieser et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl124367

Synchronized Declines in Global Landsat Cloud Occurrence Probability and Area, Yang et al., Journal of Climate 10.1175/jcli-d-26-0038.1

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Energy balance closure at FLUXNET sites revisited, Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, 10.1016/j.agrformet.2024.110235 58 cites.

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Modeling, simulation & projection of climate change, effects

Climate Change Projections for Mexico in the 21st Century, Tejeda-Aguilar et al., International Journal of Climatology Open Access 10.1002/joc.70605

Climate warming amplifies coastal hypoxia response to extreme river discharge, HAO et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-04106-6

Near-Surface Extreme Wind Events and Their Responses to Climate Forcings in a Hierarchy of Global Climate Models, Zhang et al., Journal of Climate 10.1175/jcli-d-26-0148.1

Strong latitudinal contrasts in global wet/dry patterns since the Last Glacial Maximum and under future warming, Zhang et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-04078-7

Temperature-Modulated Ocean CO2 Uptake in Response to CO2 Increase and Decrease, Xu & Gao, PLANT PHYSIOLOGY 10.1104/pp.112.206961

The Response of Tropical Land–Ocean Precipitation Partitioning to SST and CO2 Increase in Global Storm-Resolving Simulations, Schulz & Hohenegger, Journal of Climate 10.1175/jcli-d-26-0041.1

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Fire weakens land carbon sinks before 1.5 °C, Nature Geoscience, 10.1038/s41561-024-01554-7 30 cites.

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Advancement of climate & climate effects modeling, simulation & projection

A Novel Precipitation-Concentration Kriging Ensemble Drought Assessment Framework (PCK-EDAF) for Spatially Consistent and Reliable Drought Projection Under CMIP6 Climate Scenarios, Fatima & Ali, International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70588

Discrepancies in Extreme Daily and Monthly Precipitation Trends Between Observations and Earth System Models, Zarei & Destouni, Frontiers in Environmental Science Open Access pdf 10.3389/fenvs.2026.1764771

Eye-Tracking EzGCM, an Online Climate Modeling Tool, to Evaluate Three Dimensions of Usability, Brown et al., Weather Climate and Society 10.1175/wcas-d-24-0134.1

Net release of CO2 from thawing permafrost soil carbon predicted to occur earlier in this century, Ping, Soil Horizons Open Access pdf 10.2136/sh2013-54-4-gc

The Influence of Historical Sea Surface Temperature Patterns on Regional Precipitation Trends, Dai, Nature Climate Change 10.1038/nclimate1633

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Enhancing Winter Climate Simulations of the Great Lakes: Insights from a New Coupled Lake-Ice-Atmosphere (CLIAv1) Model on the Importance of Integrating 3D Hydrodynamics with a Regional Climate Model, , 10.5194/gmd-2024-146 5 cites.

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Cryosphere & climate change

A Decade of Monthly Frontal Ablation at 147 Tidewater Glaciers in Svalbard, Pyles et al., Earth system science data Open Access 10.5194/essd-18-7319-2026

Committed Antarctic Ice Sheet mass loss by the end of the twenty-first century, Lin et al., Nature Geoscience Open Access 10.1038/s41561-026-02102-1

Decoded Antarctic snow accumulation history reconciles observed and modeled trends in accumulation and large-scale warming patterns, Schneider et al., Earth System Dynamics Open Access 10.5194/esd-17-1395-2026

Four decades of glacier changes in Karzok, Ladakh regulated by climatic and non-climatic drivers (1980–2023), Prajapati et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2025.105275

Hysteresis and irreversibility in permafrost physical response to increase and decrease of CO2 emissions, Watanabe et al., Earth System Dynamics Open Access pdf 10.5194/esd-17-1135-2026

Increased Arctic Winter Rain-on-Snow-Induced Melt Events Detected by Spaceborne Passive Microwave Remote Sensing, Tao et al., Journal of Climate 10.1175/jcli-d-25-0414.1

Modeling the 21st-century response of Greenland’s Zachariæ Isstrøm and Nioghalvfjerdsfjorden Glaciers to atmosphere?ocean forcing and friction laws, Dong et al., Advances in Climate Change Research Open Access 10.1016/j.accre.2025.11.006

Physical mechanism of winter extreme sea ice decline events from a Pan-Arctic viewpoint, Jiang et al., Atmospheric Research 10.1016/j.atmosres.2026.109385

Reduced surface hoar in a warming world, Rudisill et al., cryosphere Open Access 10.5194/tc-20-5585-2026

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Winter snowpack loss increases warm-season compound hot-dry extremes, Communications Earth & Environment, 10.1038/s43247-024-01734-8 15 cites.

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Sea level & climate change

Compound coastal flood exposure in global deltas: an integrated assessment of sea-level rise, subsidence, and socioeconomic dynamics, Wu et al., Climate Risk Management Open Access 10.1016/j.crm.2025.100775

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Shaping the Coast: Accounting for the Human Wildcard in Projections of Future Change, Earth s Future, 10.1029/2024ef004504 3 cites.

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Paleoclimate & paleogeochemistry

Deep waters in the Southwest Pacific do not record a release of excess respired carbon during the early deglacial CO? rise, Hayward, The Journal of Foraminiferal Research 10.2113/32.3.274

Explaining Glacial-Interglacial CO2 Changes Requires Multiple Ocean Processes, Griffiths et al., Journal of Experimental Botany Open Access pdf 10.1093/jxb/erx278

Extreme North American heatwaves in 1941 and 2021 drove widespread but contrasting impacts, Anderson & Chartrand, Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-04055-0

The Glacial-Interglacial CO2-Temperature Relationship, Ganopolski & Roche, Quaternary Science Reviews 10.1016/j.quascirev.2009.09.019

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Global hydroclimate perturbations during the Toarcian oceanic anoxic event, Earth-Science Reviews, 10.1016/j.earscirev.2024.104946 16 cites.

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Biology & climate change, related geochemistry

Aperiodic Clustered and Periodic Hexagonal Vegetation Spot Arrays Explained by Inhomogeneous Environments and Climate Trends in Arid Ecosystems, Pinto-Ramos et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2025gl118462

Climate stress priming of juvenile Southern California giant kelp (Macrocystis pyrifera) to marine heatwaves, Smith et al., Frontiers in Climate Open Access pdf 10.3389/fclim.2026.1938610

Compound food failure on a deteriorated mast system drives Japan’s bear conflict crisis, Xiao et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.aej8134

Coupling of Pacific and Indian Ocean variability disrupted by 19th century volcanism, Wang et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-76705-y

Diatom–lipid–copepod nexus under threat by global change, Jónasdóttir et al., Biology Letters Open Access 10.1098/rsbl.2026.0369

Fine-root responses to warming and elevated CO2 vary among plant functional types, Griffin & Prager, Tree Physiology 10.1093/treephys/tpw133

Habitat-Forming Macroalgae Show Greater Resilience to Marine Heatwaves Than Models Predict, Yet Chronic Ocean Warming Remains Poised to Deliver Considerable Future Declines, Davis et al., Ecology and Evolution Open Access pdf 10.1002/ece3.72604

Impact of climate change on environmental niche dynamics of resident and migratory ducks in the Eastern Himalayan wintering grounds, Mahananda et al., Scientific Reports Open Access 10.1038/s41598-026-74143-w

Increasing atmospheric evaporative demand leads to reducing stability of terrestrial ecosystems to droughts, Zhu et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105743

Investigating Coastal Vegetation Dynamics and Ecosystem Impacts Under Elevated CO2 and Temperature: A Process-Based Approach, ESA, Bulletin of the Ecological Society of America 10.1890/0012-9623-94.4.310

Long-term forest-line dynamics in the French Pyrenees: an accelerating upward shift related to forest context, global warming and pastoral abandonment, Delpouve et al., Biogeosciences Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-22-7725-2025

New climate regime restructures the ecology of Canada’s Northern Great Lakes, Rühland et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Open Access 10.1073/pnas.2603271123

Ocean acidification reshapes phytoplankton phosphorus metabolism under phosphate-limited conditions, wang et al., Nature Geoscience 10.1038/s41561-026-02113-y

Overwintering Strategies Drive Climate Change Impacts on Body Mass in Northern Mammals, Leach et al., Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.71132

Spatial Variability and Long-Term Trends in Winter Phytoplankton of the Warming Eastern Mediterranean Sea, Yuan et al., Global Biogeochemical Cycles Open Access 10.1029/2026gb009273

Spatial variation and predictors of plant species' intrinsic climate sensitivity across the conterminous United States, Qu et al., Ecography Open Access 10.1002/ecog.08894

The short-term effects of ocean acidification on the epiphytic bacterial community of Sargassum thunbergii via high-throughput sequencing, Ji et al., Marine Environmental Research 10.1016/j.marenvres.2025.107531

Vegetation Phenology Shifts Under Climate Change: Cross-Season Mechanisms and Consequences for Ecosystem Productivity, Liu et al., Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.71112

Warmer temperature accelerates senescence by modifying the aging-dependent changes in the mosquito transcriptome, altering immunity, metabolism, and DNA repair, Martin et al., Immunity & Ageing Open Access 10.1186/s12979-025-00551-7

Wet-to-Dry Cascades May Increasingly Drive Wildfire Activity in Non-Forested Ecosystems, and Further Amplify the Risk of Urban Interface Fire Disasters, in a Warming Climate, Swain & Stephens, Global Change Biology Open Access pdf 10.1111/gcb.70681

[Review] Climate change and animal infectious diseases: a systematic review of emerging evidence, Houe et al., Frontiers in Veterinary Science Open Access pdf 10.3389/fvets.2019.00301

“Wildlife and Climate” Scientific Consensus on the Roles of Wild Animals in the Global Carbon Cycle and Natural Climate Solutions, Roberts et al., Global Change Biology Open Access pdf 10.1111/gcb.71115

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Climate change driven effects on transport, fate and biogeochemistry of trace element contaminants in coastal marine ecosystems, Communications Earth & Environment, 10.1038/s43247-024-01679-y 118 cites.

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GHG sources & sinks, flux, related geochemistry

A high-resolution urban CO2 transport model with anthropogenic and biogenic fluxes, Wu et al., Elementa Science of the Anthropocene Open Access 10.1525/elementa.138

ABCFlux v2: Arctic–boreal CO2 and CH4 monthly flux observations and ancillary information across terrestrial and freshwater ecosystems, Virkkala et al., Repository for Publications and Research Data (ETH Zurich) Open Access pmh:oai:www.research-collection.ethz.ch:20.500.11850/806633

Amazon River Plume Control on Carbonate Chemistry in the Western Tropical Atlantic, Batista et al., Global Biogeochemical Cycles Open Access 10.1029/2026gb009389

Climate Change Induced Seasonal Amplification of the Indian Ocean CO2 Sink, ESA, Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment Open Access pdf 10.1890/1540-9295-11.6.284

CO2 and CH4 fluxes from standing dead trees in a northern conifer forest, Hettwer, DigitalCommons (California Polytechnic State University) pmh:oai:digitalcommons.library.umaine.edu:etd-5303

Drought-induced peatland carbon loss exacerbated by elevated CO2 and warming, Quan et al., Repository for Publications and Research Data (ETH Zurich) Open Access pmh:oai:www.research-collection.ethz.ch:20.500.11850/785250

Ecosystem respiration during snowmelt and soil thaw leads to a rare annual CO2 net loss in a boreal fen, Särkelä et al., Työväentutkimus Vuosikirja Open Access pmh:oai:helda.helsinki.fi:10138/638997

Future methane measurement campaigns require basin-specific sampling strategies, Daniels & Hammerling, Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-04089-4

High-Resolution Modeling to Quantify CO2 Emissions From an Industrial Point Source, Zhao et al., Atmospheric chemistry and physics Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-15-12623-2015

Improved estimation of net ecosystem CO2 exchange over North America using LSTM-based flux upscaling (2001–2021), Huang & Wei, Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.20482273

Interhemispheric Asymmetry in Air-Sea CO2 flux Trends Across Eastern Boundary Current Systems Under a High Warming Scenario, Banerjee & Kumar, Global Biogeochemical Cycles 10.1029/2025gb008860

Lake eutrophication increases unprotected organic carbon pools in sediments, Gong et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-04103-9

Modeling Carbon Emissions Driven by Land-Use Change: Uncertainty and Sensitivity Analysis of Dynamic Global Vegetation Models, Dong et al., Global Biogeochemical Cycles Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026gb009219

N2O Emissions From the Eastern Tropical Indian Ocean, Martinez-Rey et al., Biogeosciences Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-12-4133-2015

Net release of CO2 from thawing permafrost soil carbon predicted to occur earlier in this century, Ping, Soil Horizons Open Access pdf 10.2136/sh2013-54-4-gc

Northern typical forested swamp soil CO? efflux dynamics, Geng et al., Frontiers in Forests and Global Change Open Access 10.3389/ffgc.2026.1925894

Overlooked contribution of organic alkalinity in Arctic Ocean margins biases ocean acidification estimates, Song et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-04072-z

Previously Unrecognized Land-Use Control on Deep Soil CO2 Sink, Sultan, New Phytologist Open Access pdf 10.1111/j.1469-8137.2009.02974.x

Saline Permafrost and Cryopegs as Potentially Important Sources of CO2—Assessing Organic Carbon Mineralization Potentials on the Alaskan Coastal Plain, Seemann et al., Publication Database GFZ (GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences) Open Access pdf pmh:oai:gfzpublic.gfz.de:item_5039705

Substantially underestimated winter CO2 sources of the Southern Ocean, Horton et al., Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 10.1111/nyas.12586

Temperature-Modulated Ocean CO2 Uptake in Response to CO2 Increase and Decrease, Xu & Gao, PLANT PHYSIOLOGY 10.1104/pp.112.206961

The Detectability of Extreme CO2 Flux Events Using Atmospheric Observations, He et al., Remote Sensing Open Access pdf 10.3390/rs10060839

The role of the tropical carbon balance in determining the large atmospheric CO2 growth rate in 2023, Sage et al., Annals of Botany Open Access pdf 10.1093/aob/mcad160

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Arctic soil carbon trajectories shaped by plant–microbe interactions, Nature Climate Change, 10.1038/s41558-024-02147-3 32 cites.

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CO2 capture, sequestration science & engineering

A Review of Experimental Approaches to CO2 Injectivity in Geological Storage: Methods, Controlling Factors, and Challenges, Zhou et al., Arabian Journal for Science and Engineering 10.1007/s13369-025-10982-5

A systematic review of carbon sink pathways and deployment strategies, Ma et al., The Science of The Total Environment 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2025.180833

Advances in CO2 Capture Materials: From Strategies to CO2-Based Fertilizers for a Sustainable Future, Novella, Frontiers in Thermal Engineering Open Access pdf 10.3389/fther.2023.1301616

Advances in CO2 Capture Materials: From Strategies to CO2-Based Fertilizers for a Sustainable Future, Novella, Frontiers in Thermal Engineering Open Access pdf 10.3389/fther.2023.1301616

Characterization and Performance Evaluation of Biochar-Modified Wellbore Cement Under Geological CO2 Storage Conditions, Gan et al., Geoenergy Science and Engineering 10.1016/j.geoen.2024.213510

Comprehensive Evaluation of Fault Sealing for CO2 Geological Storage in Low-Permeability Reservoirs, Amer et al., Scientific Reports Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41598-025-03032-5

Ideas and perspectives: Max MACS – constraining the potential global scale of Marine Anoxic Carbon Storage for CO2 removal, Raven et al., Repository for Publications and Research Data (ETH Zurich) Open Access pmh:oai:www.research-collection.ethz.ch:20.500.11850/801836

Measuring large-scale mCDR using a novel Atmospheric CO? Perimeter Flux (ACPF) method, Fiekowsky et al., Frontiers in Climate Open Access pdf 10.3389/fclim.2026.1941538

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: The Impact of Drought on Terrestrial Carbon in the West African Sahel: Implications for Natural Climate Solutions, Journal of Geophysical Research Biogeosciences, 10.1029/2024jg008143 4 cites.

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Decarbonization

Carbon catalysts for CO2 conversion: From carbon emissions to zero-carbon solutions, Rusdan et al., Nanomaterials Open Access pdf 10.3390/nano12213877

Gaps in mind: Political and spatial cleavages in local onshore wind attitudes in Germany, Radtke, Energy Policy Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.enpol.2026.115475

Physics-informed large models for wind and solar forecasting: A carbon-aware framework for decarbonized power systems, Sulaima et al., Energy Sustainable Development/Energy for sustainable development Open Access 10.1016/j.esd.2026.102146

Turning Wind Into Value: Hydrogen Storage and Trade as Variation Management Strategies for Offshore Wind Integration, Marnate & Grönkvist, Wind Energy Open Access 10.1002/we.70155

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Solar cells combined with geothermal or wind power systems reduces climate and environmental impact, Communications Earth & Environment, 10.1038/s43247-024-01739-3 22 cites.

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Geoengineering climate

Reduced Longwave Absorption of Magnesium Sulfate Aerosol as an Alternative to Sulfuric Acid for Stratospheric Aerosol Injection, Odelskii et al., Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.20446772

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Ocean Alkalinity Enhancement in Deep Water Formation Regions Under Low and High Emission Pathways, Earth s Future, 10.1029/2023ef004213 12 cites.

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Aerosols

Anthropogenic aerosol reduction contributes to faster flash drought onset in a changing climate, Wei, Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.22113395

Climate change communications & cognition

Climate anxiety is associated with increasing distress and diminishing returns in pro-environmental behaviours: A cross-sectional study of Australian youth, Lykins et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.jenvp.2026.103234

They reduce, we reduce: Perception of other countries’ climate effort predicts support for climate policies, Tam et al., PLOS Climate Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000755

[Comment] Reframing the climate anxiety focus ahead of COP30: the imperative of addressing the policy-action gap, Ip et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2025.101397

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Truth and democracy in an era of misinformation, Science, 10.1126/science.ads5695 31 cites.

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Agronomy, animal husbundry, food production & climate change

Circularity measures enhance resilience of net zero pathways for agriculture, Henn et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-04052-3

Climate-driven agricultural migration improves livelihoods but risks nationalizing deforestation and climate vulnerability: evidence from Kafinda game management area in Zambia, Chama et al., Climate Risk Management Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.crm.2026.100889

Cover Crops as Nature-Based Climate Solutions in the Midwestern US: Potential Benefits, Knowledge Gaps, and Opportunities for Transdisciplinary Work, Barnes et al., Earth s Future Open Access pdf 10.1029/2024ef005691

Diffusive CH4 Emissions From Agricultural Ditches Overshadow CH4 Sinks by Upland Fields, Wu et al., Aberdeen University Research Archive (Aberdeen University) pmh:oai:aura.abdn.ac.uk:2164/26702

Potential for Expanding Sorghum Production in Europe in the Face of Climate Change, Davoudkhani et al., Earth s Future Open Access pdf 10.1029/2025ef007503

The effects of peat thickness and water table depth on CO2 and N2O emissions from agricultural peatlands – a process-based modelling approach, Kajasilta et al., Biogeosciences Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-23-3567-2026

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Climate change mitigation policies in agriculture: An overview of sociopolitical barriers, Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews Climate Change, 10.1002/wcc.916 19 cites.

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Hydrology, hydrometeorology & climate change

A Multimodel Perspective of Droughts in Future Climate and Implications for Irrigation in Malawi, Likoya et al., Journal of Hydrometeorology Open Access 10.1175/jhm-d-25-0060.1

A potential overestimation of CO2 physiological effects on evapotranspiration, Bonfils et al., Journal of Climate 10.1175/jcli-d-17-0005.1

Comparison of Gridded Precipitation Datasets Used in Climate and Drought Monitoring in the Contiguous United States, Schumacher et al., Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology 10.1175/jamc-d-26-0022.1

[Feature] Groundwater depletion in a drying world, McQuillan, The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2025.101372

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: The contribution of Arabian Sea warming to decreasing summer precipitation in the northern Greater Mekong Subregion, Atmospheric Research, 10.1016/j.atmosres.2024.107714 8 cites.

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Climate change economics

Climate-change-amplified wind-related economic losses during Cyclone Harry (2026), Faranda et al., Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society Open Access 10.1002/qj.70314

Correcting for spatial and temporal dependence in estimating the economic effect of extreme heat, Wyner & Brill, Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.aeg1967

On the Inherent Ambiguity of Extreme Event Costs Attributed to Climate Change, Match et al., AGU Advances Open Access 10.1029/2026av002546

The impact of international clean energy finance and public policies on the low-carbon energy transition: Evidence from Egypt and Brazil, De?irmenci & Ünsal, Energy Policy Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.enpol.2026.115647

Why Japan’s sovereign climate finance took a transition-bond form: bureaucratic mediation in an eco-developmental state, Kobayashi & Lin, Figshare Open Access 10.6084/m9.figshare.33321252

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: A multi-model assessment of inequality and climate change, Nature Climate Change, 10.1038/s41558-024-02151-7 71 cites.

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Climate change mitigation public policy research

Challenges in the decarbonization of the UK electrical power system by 2030: A techno-economic analysis of current and alternative policies, Or et al., Energy Policy Open Access 10.1016/j.enpol.2026.115633

Geopolitical fragmentation and energy transition inequalities: Climate policy uncertainty, sanctions, and the oil and gas sector, Nguyen et al., Energy Policy Open Access 10.1016/j.enpol.2025.115048

Hydrogen in the European power sector – A case study on the impacts of regulatory frameworks for green hydrogen, Asimakopoulou, Yearbook of International Environmental Law Open Access 10.1093/yiel/yvad035

Ownership structures shape climate-policy effectiveness in electricity generation, Grant et al., Energy Policy Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.enpol.2026.115644

Repurposing the past, powering the future - socio-economic impacts of hybrid pumped hydro storage in Greece and Poland's coal regions, Kruczek et al., Energy Research & Social Science 10.1016/j.erss.2025.104386

The unequal flight: Policy design and public support for carbon taxation of air travel, Pizzo et al., Energy Research & Social Science Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.erss.2026.104994

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Scenario analysis of supply- and demand-side solutions for circular economy and climate change mitigation in the global building sector, Journal of Industrial Ecology, 10.1111/jiec.13557 43 cites.

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Climate change adaptation & adaptation public policy research

A framework to quantify managed retreat outcomes for households and communities, Lauer et al., Climate Risk Management Open Access 10.1016/j.crm.2026.100890

Accelerating climate change adaptation in cities: a global analysis of urban strategies, drivers, and co-benefits, Liu et al., Climate Policy 10.1080/14693062.2025.2598520

Assessing power system vulnerability to climate-related stressors and shocks: The case of Indonesia, Aji et al., Energy Sustainable Development/Energy for sustainable development Open Access 10.1016/j.esd.2026.102147

Climate change and the weather-energy Nexus in US energy demand, Akad?r? et al., Scientific Reports Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41598-026-74518-z

Climate Change Increases Water Scarcity Risks and Adaptation Needs in China, Zhang et al., Earth s Future Open Access pdf 10.1029/2025ef007712

Climate change, gendered identities, and adaptation strategies in rural Tanzanian households, Mbunda, Climate and Development 10.1080/17565529.2025.2603542

Editorial: Receiving communities and climate destinations, Tanner & Wilsterman, BioScience Open Access pdf 10.1093/biosci/biaf065

FRAME-PS: a typology-specific method for assessing climate resilience in urban public spaces, Ronael & Oruç, Urban Climate Open Access 10.1016/j.uclim.2026.103173

Greening schools for climate-resilient, inclusive and liveable cities, Ruíz-Mallén et al., Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-025-02519-3

Innovation for Climate Change Adaptation: A Meta-Analysis, Woime & Dilebo, Climate Resilience and Sustainability Open Access pdf 10.1002/cli2.70066

Mainstreaming Equitable Climate Action through Growth Management Planning in Washington State, United States, Chang et al., Weather Climate and Society 10.1175/wcas-d-24-0158.1

Mapping resilience pathway of smallholder farming community to cyclone-led climate disasters in coastal West Bengal, India, Panja et al., Global Environmental Change 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2025.103108

When adaptation is not a policy domain: Institutional embedding of climate change adaptation in Thailand’s human settlements governance, Schipper, One Earth Open Access 10.1016/j.oneear.2020.09.014

Wisdom of the Past, Power for the Future: Centering Local Traditions in Community Organizing to Codevelop Climate Adaptation Practices, Jean et al., Weather Climate and Society 10.1175/wcas-d-24-0133.1

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Landslide Hazard Is Projected to Increase Across High Mountain Asia, Earth s Future, 10.1029/2023ef004325 33 cites.

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Climate change impacts on human health

A Review of Airborne Pollen and Its Interactions With Air Pollutants, Urbanization, and Climate Change: Implications for Human Health and Monitoring Gaps, Dhawan et al., Current Allergy and Asthma Reports 10.1007/s11882-025-01241-6

Forecasted Heat and Vulnerable Populations: Understanding Limitations Associated with New Tools, Hiscox et al., Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 10.1175/bams-d-25-0052.1

How climate change affects mosquito-borne infectious disease: The different trajectories of malaria and dengue, Cumming et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.aei0953

Integrated governance for improved climate and health outcomes in Southern African cities: a review, Matewa et al., Climate and Development 10.1080/17565529.2026.2655964

The impact of climate change on human health and pharmaceuticals, O'Flynn et al., Analytical Methods 10.1039/d0ay02098b

[Articles] Quantifying the health-care burden of temperature in the National Health Service in England: an economic analysis of resource use and costs, Fahr et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2025.101373

[Correspondence] Suicidality in climate change and mental health research, Bayliss et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2025.101399

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Tracking climate adaptation in hospitals: An inventory of structural measures, Climate Risk Management, 10.1016/j.crm.2024.100657 9 cites.

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Climate change impacts on human culture

Sociability Under Anthropogenic Change: From Individual Behaviour to Population-Level Consequences, Kowalczyk & Pietrzak, Ecology and Evolution Open Access 10.1002/ece3.74205

Other

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: A comparative study of strategic petroleum reserve policies of major countries in the world, Energy Policy, 10.1016/j.enpol.2024.114362 23 cites.

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Informed opinion, nudges & major initiatives

[Comment] A call to action: climate leadership at the World Health Assembly, Cavendish & Nogueira, The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2025.101389

[Feature] Groundwater depletion in a drying world, McQuillan, The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2025.101372

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago: Science for transformative change: the IPCC, boundary work and the making of useable knowledge, Frontiers in Climate, 10.3389/fclim.2024.1408513 8 cites.

buffer/IOPN Articles/Reports from Agencies and Non-Governmental Organizations Addressing Aspects of Climate Change

Offshore Wind Lease Buyouts. Picking Winners and Losers Costs Taxpayers Billions, Taxpayers for Common Sense

As of September 2026, the Department of the Interior (DOI) has agreed to pay energy companies up to $3.9 billion to cancel 12 leases they previously obtained at competitive auctions, on the condition that they make equivalent investments in conventional energy projects instead. These buyouts carry significant implications for American taxpayers and consumers, and there could be more to come. Concerns with offshore wind lease buyouts include the following; Costs Taxpayers $3.9 Billion to Cancel Projects Already Underway: The agreements would return billions in taxpayer revenue already deposited into the federal Treasury to wind developers in exchange for terminating their offshore wind leases; Picks Winners and Losers: The Administration is using billions in refunds to steer investment toward specific energy sectors, manipulating the free market. These cancellations run counter to market trends and private investment decisions. Companies won these leases through competitive auctions; now the Administration is determining which projects and energy sectors qualify for taxpayer-funded refunds; Decreases Planned Domestic Energy Supply: The 12 canceled leases were expected to support projects with a combined nameplate capacity of 19.2 gigawatts (GW), enough to power 6.6 million households. Their cancellation deprives consumers of a future source of domestic energy production; Undermines Energy Security: Robust and diverse energy sources strengthen the domestic energy market. Energy companies paid billions of dollars to secure federal offshore wind leases to diversify their energy portfolios, and now the Administration is undermining their diversification efforts. Although the Administration claims the refunds support new investments, some agreements count investments companies had already made, meaning these taxpayer-funded refunds will not lead to new investment or increase future energy supply.

Climate Fraud 101. Big Oil’s Climate Deception Explained in 101 Documents (1957–2026), Megan Matthews and Kert Davies, The Center for Climate Integrity

For decades, fossil fuel industry leaders were warned that, unless action was taken, communities across the globe would suffer catastrophic harms caused by their products. What they did with that knowledge is the story of the most consequential corporate deception campaign in world history. The authors highlight decades of Big Oil’s climate lies through 101 documents showing that the industry knew and lied about its' central role in the climate crisis.

10th edition of the Copernicus Ocean State Report, Grégoire et al., Copernicus Publication

The authors present information on the state, variability, and ongoing changes in the marine environment of the global ocean and the European regional seas over the past decades up to close to real time. Using observation-based (remote sensing, in situ) and ocean reanalysis data, the authors provide a comprehensive 4-dimensional (latitude, longitude, depth, and time) analysis of the Blue, Green, and White Ocean. The OSR is intended to act as a reference, providing a unique ocean monitoring dashboard for the scientific community and for policy makers and others with decision making responsibilities.

Communication to the Aarhus Convention Compliance Committee regarding the European Commission’s sustainability indicators and the current data centre build-out, Emmanouilidou et al., Lighthouse Reports

The European Commission is withholding vital environmental information from the public, undermining citizens’ ability to participate meaningfully in one of the most critical environmental issues of our time: the enormous and accelerating data centre build-out. The long awaited rating scheme, now published, offers the appearance of transparency. While the Commission claims it is “the most comprehensive worldwide” transparency initiative around the environmental impact of data centres, it fails to provide the information that communities are entitled to. Absent are the real figures that the Commission holds on how much strain each data centre imposes on the electrical grid, how much water it uses and how much waste heat it emits. In their place are labels corresponding to “efficiency ratios” that conceal more than they reveal. This leaves the industry able to engage in a phoney war against the ratings scheme, which contains most of the carve outs and evasions they have lobbied for, while depriving the public of its right to know. The authors are challenging the Commission with a communication to the Aarhus Convention Compliance Committee, the body that reviews whether officials are fulfilling their legal obligations regarding environmental democracy.

Global Financing for Coal Flatlines as Banks Move in Opposite Directions, Urgewald et al., Urgewald et al

The authors use a dataset to track loans and underwriting from 744 commercial banks to companies operating across the thermal coal value chain. Between 2022 and 2025, these banks channeled $467 billion to the coal industry. Financial flows to the sector are, however, highly concentrated: Chinese banks account for 62% ($289 billion), US banks for 14% ($67 billion) and Japanese banks for 6% ($28 billion) of total bank support to the coal industry. The four years covered in the dataset directly follow COP 26 in Glasgow, where governments agreed to accelerate the phase-down of coal, and financial institutions made high-profile net-zero commitments. The authors show that global bank financing for coal has remained broadly flat since Glasgow, averaging around $117 billion per year, but this aggregate figure masks a growing rift within the banking industry. While total coal financing of EU banks declined, financial flows from UK banks to the coal industry grew by 17% since the Glasgow COP. This increase was, however, mainly driven by Barclays and to a lesser degree by HSBC.

The Southeast Asia Climate Outlook: 2026 Survey Report, Seah et al., Climate Change in Southeast Asia Programme at ISEAS – Yusof Ishak Institute

The report is the first comprehensive overview of climate change perspectives specific to the Southeast Asian region. Conducted yearly since 2020, the surveys aim to provide a general sense of the prevailing views of Southeast Asian citizens towards climate change issues. The reports contain the results and analysis of views towards questions such as climate adaptation and mitigation, climate change impacts, low-carbon transitions and climate policy, among other topics. The 2026 survey gathered the views of 3,706 respondents from eleven ASEAN member states.

Climate on the Floor: India’s Parliamentary Discourse on Environment since the Paris Agreement, Hajira Puthige, Centre for Financial Accountability

The author examines the evolution of India’s legislative engagement with the climate crisis during the critical decade following the adoption of the Paris Agreement in December 2015. The analysis addresses whether parliamentary scrutiny is keeping pace with the country’s growing climate vulnerabilities and if current parliamentary discussions reflect the level of ambition that the climate crisis demands. The report covers the period from December 2015 to December 2025, focusing on a dataset of 8,702 parliamentary questions raised in both the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha. The analysis is organized into eight key thematic areas: Clean Energy and Decarbonisation; Extreme Weather and Natural Disasters; Forests and Land Use; Climate Change and Global Impacts; Environment; Mitigation, Adaptation and Carbon Management; Climate Finance and Markets; and Global Climate Governance.

Sound Check: Climate Risk and Resilience in Canada's Live Music Sector, Lansley et al., The Canadian Live Music Association

Climate disruption now poses a material economic risk to Canada’s live music sector. Live music contributes C$10.92 billion to Canada’s GDP, supports more than 101,000 FTE jobs, and attracts nearly 20 million visitors annually. Without stronger preparedness, coordination, and financial support, extreme weather could place an estimated C$1.2 billion to C$3.0 billion of Canadian music-event and festival economic value at risk between now and 2040, with a central estimate of approximately C$1.8 billion. Drawing on national disruption data, climate projections, the Canadian Live Music Association’s Climate Contingency survey, interviews, and focus groups, the authors found that climate risk is now a structural issue for live music in Canada. The sector is adapting, but not at the scale or pace required to protect its economic, cultural, tourism, employment, and community value.

Interim heat mortality monitoring report, England in May and June 2026, United Kingdom Health Security Agency, Government of the United Kingdom

During the May and June 2026 heat events there were an estimated total of 2,877 heat-associated deaths, an estimated 753 heat-associated deaths occurred during the May heat episode, an estimated 2,124 heat-associated deaths occurred during the June heat episode, and the mortality burden is already close to the highest annual totals previously recorded by the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA). During summer 2026, England experienced 2 notable heat events, one in May and the other in June, both of which were exceptional for different reasons. The May heat event occurred unusually early in the season, with record-breaking temperatures following a period of unseasonably cool weather. The June event was characterized by its' intensity and formed part of a broader period of sustained hot weather across Europe. Given the public health significance of these events, and the considerable interest from policymakers, partners and the public, UKHSA has produced this interim report to provide an early assessment of heat-associated mortality. Such early assessments will only be undertaken following extraordinary periods of heat and would not normally be produced for routine heat events.

Innovation on Hold: One Year Since DOE’s Mass Award Terminations, Boyd et al., US. Department of Energy Alumni and Network and Lawyers for Good Government

On October 1, 2025, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) took an unprecedented step by terminating 321 awards worth over $8 billion in clean energy grant funding. DOE has since conceded that these awards were canceled "based solely" on the award recipient state’s political identity (targeting "blue states"). When combined with earlier rounds of cuts in clean energy demonstration projects, over $12.5 billion in Congressionally appropriated energy research, development, and deployment funding was terminated last year. The authors track the lasting impacts to the Department’s grant mechanisms and awards management processes. This latest analysis of federal spending data, court filings, and direct awardee feedback shows that despite DOE’s statements that project portfolio reviews are complete, the majority of affected projects—whether terminated, "retained," or "ghosted"—remain functionally frozen.

Missouri's State Energy Plan, Missouri Department of Natural Resources

At the core of this State Energy Plan are four primary goals: Energy independence, nuclear enablement, grid reliability and economic growth (Figure 1). These goals establish a consistent framework to assess current system conditions, evaluate how different resource and investment decisions perform and identify priorities for consideration. No single course of action or set of investments optimizes all objectives at once. Rather, a portfolio of actions is needed to balance affordability, reliability, economic growth and community prosperity under a range of conditions. This portfolio, including new policies and legislation, will drive toward these goals and a brighter future for Missouri.

Thriving Economy Project, Budzinski et al., Sustainable Energy and Environment Coalition

The report is a policy blueprint designed to modernize the economy, charting a path towards growth and prosperity for all Americans. The menu of policy options will strengthen America’s economic competitiveness, ensure a stable and resilient food supply, create good jobs, preserve and strengthen the natural systems that underpin the economy, and deliver affordable, reliable energy to American families and businesses. Rather than repeatedly rebuilding after disaster strikes, the authors believe public policy should reduce risk before it materializes, reward long-term investment, align fragmented programs around shared outcomes, and equip state, local, and Tribal partners with the tools and certainty they need to act. Critical to achieving these goals is the use of forward-looking climate data so the government can ensure that new homes, bridges, and energy systems are built for the climate that people will actually face, rather than one that no longer exists. Upfront investments lead to systems that can not only withstand the climate of the future, but thrive in it.

Flood Insurance: Congressional Action Could Help Increase Coverage for At-Risk Properties, Government Accountability Office

The authors examined (1) the extent to which consumers purchase flood insurance, (2) the effectiveness of the mandatory purchase requirement, (3) factors affecting consumers’ decisions to purchase flood insurance, and (4) potential actions to increase consumers’ purchase of flood insurance. The authors identified four actions that could help increase NFIP and private flood insurance coverage. Each would require statutory authority from Congress; incorporate all sources of flood risk into purchase requirement determinations which could help ensure that more at-risk properties have coverage; make property-level flood risk information publicly available to potentially increase awareness of flood risk; require lenders to provide flood insurance quotes for federally backed mortgages to better signal the need for coverage; and increase National Flood Insurance Program coverage limits to allow property owners to obtain coverage that is better aligned with potential flood losses.

Southern California Fires Incident Analysis Report, Kerber et al., UL Research Institutes' Fire Safety Research Institute

The January 2025 fires in Southern California, including the Palisades and Eaton Fires, occurred under extreme wildfire conditions characterized by powerful Santa Ana winds, critically dry vegetation, and rapid fire spread originating in vegetation and extending into the built environment. These fires became among the most deadly, destructive, and costly wildfire disasters in California history, testing communities, emergency responders, infrastructure systems, and government agencies at every level. The findings demonstrate that outcomes were shaped by the interaction of multiple interlinked systems rather than any single factor or failure. California and local jurisdictions had established numerous prevention, preparedness, and response programs prior to the fires, including defensible space inspection programs, fuels reduction efforts, community preparedness initiatives, evacuation systems, mutual aid agreements, and extensive fire suppression resources. The analysis concludes that future wildfire resilience requires coordinated improvements across landscapes, communities, infrastructure systems, emergency management organizations, and response operations. Priority recommendations include strengthening community-scale risk reduction, enhancing preparedness for large, wind-driven community conflagrations; improving situational awareness and operational intelligence; expanding wildfire-resistant construction and community preparedness programs; strengthening evacuation and interoperability systems; improving infrastructure resilience; and establishing standardized, post-suppression procedures.

Economic, Consumer Cost, Pollution Impacts of Federal Energy Policy Changes In 48 U.S. States, Energy Innovation

Federal policy changes since January 2025 will harm the 48 contiguous U.S. states with higher energy prices, lost economic growth and jobs, worse air pollution and healthcare costs, and less grid reliability. Households will pay an additional $920 billion for energy between 2026-2040 – about $6,500 cumulatively per household across that period and $640 per household in 2035. Cutting policies that drive transportation sector innovation and efficiency will inflate gasoline prices 54 cents per gallon in 2035 and 93 cents per gallon in 2040, atop upward pressure from the Iran war. OBBBA and federal cuts to domestic manufacturing and innovation will cost 390,000 jobs per year on average, totaling 6.2 million job-years lost to state economies. Slowing down electrification and domestic energy manufacturing will lower GDP, spilling into other economic sectors, costing state economies $1.3 trillion in cumulative GDP losses. Worsening local air pollution will cause 37,000 additional premature deaths and raise healthcare costs by $72 billion, contributing to rising household costs alongside rising energy prices and goods inflation. All federal energy policy decisions and climate repeals will generate 9.3 billion tons of CO2e emissions, roughly 580 million tons per year.

Surging Water Costs amid the US Affordability Crisis, Food and Water Watch

Households across the United States are grappling with rising drinking water bills, stretching their ability to make ends meet. The authors compiled and analyzed water billing data for the 500 largest community water systems in 2025, which collectively served 155 million people (45% of the US). They compared typical household water bills in 2025 to those in 2015, using data from a previous investigation. From 2015 to 2025, household drinking water bills increased faster than inflation, grocery prices, and median household income. The average community water system increased household drinking water bills by 62%. Water bills increased at 1.6 times the overall inflation rate and more than 2 times the rate for groceries. Water bills increased 19% faster than the US median household income, forcing households to spend a higher portion of their stretched incomes on water. In Louisiana, Maryland, New Hampshire, and West Virginia, water bills grew about twice as fast as their corresponding statewide median household incomes. Climate change-driven droughts and other severe weather patterns continue to threaten water supplies and infrastructure globally, generating expenses that will be pushed onto ratepayers. Continued expansion of water-intensive industries like factory farming and hyperscale data centers also compound threats on local water supplies.

Bankable by design: Financing ASEAN’s energy system transformation, Alnie Demoral and Dinita Setyawati, Ember

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations' (ASEAN) energy transition financing challenge is shifting beyond utility-scale renewable energy toward making distributed renewable energy, battery storage and transmission infrastructure bankable at scale. The authors examine the factors shaping investment decisions across ASEAN, drawing on project-level evidence, techno-economic modelling and market assessments to identify the barriers that continue to constrain deployment. They found that market design, transaction costs, revenue certainty and value-capture mechanisms are now as important as access to capital in determining project bankability, and outline policy and financing interventions that can help accelerate the region’s clean energy transition. About New Research

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In response to allegations that U.S. Ambassador to Greece Kimberly Guilfoyle abused her diplomatic position to advance private gas interests in the Balkans, Oil Change International’s Allie Rosenbluth said:

“Trump’s push to lock Europe into decades of U.S. gas dependence puts fossil fuel profits ahead of people’s energy bills, health, and safety [1]. Any use of diplomatic power to threaten elected governments or secure private gas deals would be an outrageous abuse of public office and must be investigated.”

Note to the editor:
[1] To read more about Europe’s increasing dependence on U.S. LNG imports: Pay, Baby, Pay: Trump’s AI and energy dominance agenda means costlier LNG for Europe.

Something strange just popped up in the Gulf of Mexico: a hurricane. Well, not so much Hurricane Isaias, which storm-watchers expect to make landfall as a Category 2 somewhere between the coast of Mississippi and the Florida Panhandle late Friday, causing widespread destruction. It’s more the timing of it: This is the first Atlantic hurricane of the season, which began all the way back in June. That smashes the previous record in the satellite era for the latest first hurricane of a season, September 11. 

“This is pretty astounding, really, to break a record by just about a month,” said Brian McNoldy, a senior research associate who studies hurricanes at the University of Miami.

So what’s with the extraordinary delay? El Niño, of all things. 

Even though that band of warm water is on the other side of the Americas in the Pacific, it messes with two of the fundamental ingredients for making hurricanes in the Atlantic: wind and humidity. To spawn a tropical cyclone, you need warm water, which provides energy, as well as high humidity and winds moving in a consistent direction. (Hurricanes have been getting more intense lately because climate change is rapidly warming the oceans, creating high-octane fuel.) While the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico have been plenty warm, providing huge pools of fuel, El Niño has been messing with weather patterns, creating dry, sinking air. It also provides wind shear — air moving at different directions and speeds as you gain altitude — which hurricanes really hate. 

Hence the exceptionally quiet Atlantic hurricane season this year.

So why did Isaias finally break through in October? While it is indeed fighting wind shear in the Gulf, atmospheric conditions aren’t as bad for it as they are farther east. “It’s forming in one of the few places that a storm can occur in the Atlantic right now, because of the very strong El Niño that’s taking shape and imposing very strong vertical shear across the deep tropics,” McNoldy said. “The Gulf has a small window of opportunity for a storm to form, and it did.”

The Gulf is also running several degrees warmer than usual, at least at the surface, where Isaias is drawing its energy. Interestingly enough, though, the “ocean heat content,” a measurement of the thermal energy down through the depths, there is nearing a record low. “So that warmth is really only skin deep,” McNoldy said.

This sets up a weird dynamic for Isaias. Hurricanes are such violent storms that they churn up deeper waters: If that liquid is warm like the surface, that means more fuel. But if it’s cooler, that’s anathema to a hurricane. This effect is so pronounced that scientists can use satellites to trace the paths of hurricanes, just by detecting the trails of cold water they leave behind. 

While the Atlantic hurricane season has been exceptionally quiet, in the eastern Pacific has been very busy as seven have formed, five of them being major. (It’s hosted 18 named storms so far, five more than usual.) Hawai’i has suffered particularly badly this summer, with hurricanes Lala and Nolo bringing torrential rain. Right now, Hurricane Rachel is taking aim at Baja Mexico and Southern California, where it could spawn dangerous surf and winds this weekend. 

Meanwhile, the Gulf Coast is bracing for Isaias — a storm that may have arrived very late, but, with ferocious winds and a potential storm surge of up to 7 feet, is no less a threat for life and property.

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Hurricane Isaias is a typical storm — but it’s also ‘astounding’ on Oct 8, 2026.

Governor Newsom recently vetoed SB 872, the Delta Levees and Canal Subsidence Fund, missing a critical opportunity to protect the state’s water resources and Delta communities..

The Governor’s veto message pointed to more than $170 million allocated for repairing levees, aqueducts, canals and other projects, calling SB 872 “unnecessary”, but the state’s own data emphasizes the gaps in funding urgently needed to protect the Delta estuary.

Morgen Snyder, Director of Policy and Programs at Restore the Delta, told CBS News, “The funding in the budget, while incredible and much needed, is sort of a drop in the bucket compared to what overall repairs are needed.”

In a CalMatters piece, Rachel Becker highlights the estimated $3.3 billion cost needed to repair the 1,100 miles of federal and non-federal levees. According to the Delta Stewardship Council, without these improvements, “$22 billion in assets and over $5 billion in annual economic activity” are at risk of flooding by 2085.

The bill would have also funded necessary land subsidence repairs to the State Water Project. CalMatters cites a state report that found subsidence could cut water deliveries by almost 90% in the next 17 years, while the California Department of Water Resources estimates that fixing the damage to the State Water Project’s infrastructure could cost nearly $4 billion.

Coverage in the Lodi News similarly highlights how the Governor’s veto represents yet another example of prioritizing the Delta Conveyance Project over preventing emergencies and protecting Delta ecosystems and communities. 

SB 872 garnered unanimous support in the Legislature, bringing together Northern and Southern California legislators, environmental groups, and water interests to protect critical water infrastructure. 

As Restore the Delta’s Executive Director Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla said, “Not only did Governor Newsom veto a much needed bill to bring Delta levees to the necessary standards to deal with climate change, he vetoed funding for fixing existing conveyance for the State Water Project.” 

News Roundup:

• Newsom vetoes Delta levees bill as El Niño winter looms. CalMatters.
• Newsom vetoes bill aimed at funding Sacramento-San Joaquin delta levee repairs, water infrastructure. CBS News. 
• Levees, vetoed legislation and what comes next: Newsom rejects funding bill as both sides debate best path forward. The Lodi News.  
• Newsom vetoes bill intended to shore up Delta levees. The Lodi News.
• Newsom rejects long-range water solution for Delta, aqueduct. The Manteca Bulletin.
• Newsom vetoes Delta levees bill as El Niño winter looms. News from the States.
• As El Niño approaches, Newsom vetos bill aimed at protecting California levees from flooding. Planetizen News.
• Gov. Newsom Vetoes Important California Water Bill, Despite Unanimous Passage by Legislature. California Globe.
• Solano-supported Delta levee repair legislation vetoed. The Daily Republic.
• Newsom vetoes historic Delta levees bill as El Niño winter looms. The Stockton Record.

Gov. Maura Healey ordered home energy relief for low- and middle-income households, to be funded by alternative compliance payments — the fees electricity suppliers pay when they fall short of mandated clean energy targets.

Corporations that have benefited from the Trump administration’s cancellation of federal enforcement actions have given $210.5 million in contributions and pledges to MAGA Inc., and other Trump-aligned Super PACs, according to a new investigation by Public Citizen.

The finding comes as Public Citizen’s new analysis documents the Trump administration’s cancellation of 212 federal enforcement actions involving 205 corporations, including 80 investigations, 67 dismissed enforcement lawsuits and 54 canceled accountability measures involving alleged corporate misconduct.

Among the largest contributors, including corporations, executives, and investors are as follows:

• Elon Musk, whose companies Tesla and SpaceX benefited from at least eight canceled enforcement actions, pledged to spend $100 million to help elect Republicans in the 2026 midterms, largely through America PAC which he controls, and gave $5 million to MAGA Inc.. Both Tesla and SpaceX benefited from four canceled actions each.

• Crypto.com, which profited from the Securities and Exchange Commissions’ (SEC) cancellation of an investigation into allegations that the crypto platform traded unregistered securities, gave $35 million to MAGA Inc., and another $2 million to Keep America Great, both Trump-aligned Super PACs.

• Gemini, similarly profited from a dropped SEC investigation into allegations of trading unregistered securities, gave $20 million to MAGA Inc. Its co-founders, Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss, personally gave an additional $10 million each to MAGA Inc.
• Andreessen Horowitz, along with co-founders Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, gave $12 million to MAGA Inc.. Nine corporations that benefit from canceled actions are a part of the firm’s investment portfolio.

“Corporations and ultra-wealthy executives with enormous financial interests before the federal government are pouring extraordinary sums into the president’s political operation,” said Robert Weissman, Public Citizen co-president. “Once the check is cashed, the administration is pulling back enforcement actions meant to punish corporate misconduct. It’s a great deal for the corporate wrongdoers – at the expense of their victims and the American people.”

“The potential is limitless when companies and the wealthy people behind them can give millions of dollars to Trump-aligned political groups,” said Rick Claypool, a research director for Public Citizen and author of the report. “The scale of these contributions raises fundamental questions about what corporations are expecting when they invest heavily in a political operation, especially when it involves the President of the United States.”

Public Citizen’s Corporate Enforcement Tracker is an online resource for watchdogging the Trump administration’s cancellation of federal enforcement actions brought against corporations prior to President Trump’s second term.

In response to the outcome of the pre-COP summit in Fiji, Oxfam Climate Policy Lead Nafkote Dabi said:

“These talks were an underwhelming precursor to the summit in Türkiye next month. The absence of leaders from the richest and most polluting countries sends a dangerous signal that the global commitment to tackling the climate crisis is wavering.

“While rich governments fail to take responsibility for climate action, the world faces an onslaught of climate disasters. Devastating heatwaves in Europe claimed thousands of lives this summer, while a lethal combination of El Niño and existing climate breakdown leaves millions of people facing hunger across the Horn of Africa and Latin America.

Leaders cannot spend another COP sidestepping their climate commitments. At COP31, rich governments must increase their climate finance commitments and hold the richest polluters accountable.”

Oxfam Australia’s Policy and Advocacy Lead Josie Lee said:

“For Australian leaders to leave the pre-COP talks without a single substantial funding pledge, merely repackaging previously committed funding, is irresponsible, and falls short of the bold leadership it promised. Australia spends ten times more on fossil fuels subsidies than it does supporting its neighbors to act on climate change.

“We cannot claim to be a responsible regional partner while continuing to prioritize support for coal oil and gas over adequate climate finance. Oxfam Australia is calling on the Government to demonstrate real solidarity with its Pacific neighbors, by putting money on the table and taking responsibility for our share of the climate crisis.”

Executive Director of Oxfam in the Pacific Eunice Wotene said:

“Our hope for hosting pre-COP in the Pacific was that leaders of historically polluting countries would see for themselves the losses and damages with which we are grappling and take decisive action. We urge leaders to take these observations onward to COP31 to ensure the richest countries, corporations and individuals are held accountable for their disproportionate role in the climate crisis.”

Social Security Works Executive Director Alex Lawson had the following response to the news that Texas Senate candidate Ken Paxton discussed cuts to Social Security in private conversations in Washington, as revealed in leaked audio published by the Texas Tribune:

“It's disgusting that Ken Paxton is laughing while planning to cut Social Security benefits for everyone in this country, including the nearly 5 million Texans who rely on Social Security and the 1.3 million Texans who Social Security keeps out of poverty.

“This is a sick man who thinks it’s a joke to push over a million Texans into poverty by stealing their hard-earned benefits. This is a man who should not be allowed anywhere near the levers of power, since clearly he thinks working people are a joke to be laughed at with the billionaire donors he works for.”

The Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa (AFSA) is inviting proposals from consultants or teams to examine how African seed systems are financed and strengthen the evidence on the economic benefits of farmer managed seed systems and agroecology.

Building on AFSA’s existing research, the study will map public, private and philanthropic funding, identify who benefits, and assess how finance could better support farmers. It will examine yields, production costs, household income and profitability, alongside wider outcomes for climate resilience, nutrition, biodiversity and livelihoods.

The assignment will combine desk research and remote interviews with 8–10 proposed case studies, including at least four newly documented cases developed with AFSA members and other networks. Findings will inform practical recommendations for donors, development finance institutions and philanthropic foundations, with clear recognition of evidence gaps and trade-offs.

The proposed duration is 14 weeks from contract signature. Applicants should demonstrate expertise in African agriculture, seed systems or agroecology, financial analysis and evidence synthesis, alongside strong English writing skills and capacity for French-language engagement.

To apply, submit a technical proposal, itemised budget, CVs, two relevant research or writing samples, and references from comparable assignments.

Deadline: 30 October 2026
Email: afsa@afsafrica.org
Subject line: Proposal for African seed systems and financial flows study

Read the full terms of reference.

Food Systems for the Future (FSF) Institute wants to make grocery retail work for all communities. According to the organization’s Founder and CEO Ambassador Ertharin Cousin, municipally-supported grocery stores may be part of the solution to the food affordability crisis.

Publicly-owned or -supported grocery stores are designed to lower the cost of groceries, helping to make them more affordable for communities. The approach has attracted growing attention following the announcement of New York City’s plan to open a publicly-supported grocery store in each borough. States from Kansas to Illinois have also explored the solution, but success has varied, with some businesses struggling to break even. 

“What happens if the economics don’t work before the store opens?” Cousin asks, arguing that some areas have overlooked or failed to focus on establishing a sustainable framework. “If you insert subsidies, but you don’t insert the operational capacity that is necessary…the stores close.”

In Atlanta, Georgia, however, Cousin sees a model that seems to be working. Azalea Fresh Market is not municipally-owned; rather the store is publicly supported and independently operated. 

The local government provided the capital needed to construct the store along with guarantees for low-interest operating capital to stock the shelves and hire employees. They also identified a strong operator that knows how to run a successful grocery store and has a relationship with the community. “That has potential for longevity,” Cousin tells Food Tank. 

Grocery prices in the United States are up by nearly 33 percent compared to 2019, according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. At the same time, healthcare, transportation, and housing costs are rising while millions of households have lost access to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. 

It’s not just low-income families who are struggling, says Cousin, who sees more people making difficult choices about what to put in their shopping cart. “We also have economically distressed households that are what we often call the working poor and up to middle-income households…who are now beginning to feel the pinch of affordability.” 

Government-supported food retailers may not be a silver bullet to solve this, but they are “part of the answer,” Cousin explains. 

FSF Institute recently held its second Grocery Retail for All Summit to bring together leaders from across sectors to identify practical, scalable solutions already working in communities across the country. Cousin believes that it’s important to build a “platform of information” so that retailers, nonprofits, and governments “are not constantly reinventing the wheel.” Needs may be context-specific, she says, but lessons can be adapted to create retail models that endure. 

Ultimately, Cousin tells Food Tank, “it’s not the opening of the grocery store that should be celebrated. It’s the resilience and longevity of the operation of that grocery store.” 

Listen to the full conversation with Ertharin Cousin on “Food Talk with Dani Nierenberg” to hear more about the growing food crisis, alternative models of food retail, and legislative solutions for food access.

Articles like the one you just read are made possible through the generosity of Food Tank members. Can we please count on you to be part of our growing movement? Become a member today by clicking here.

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

The post Opening a Grocery Store Is Only the Beginning: Making Food Retail Work for Communities appeared first on Food Tank.

This week on Talking Headways we are sharing Part 1 of our conversation with Reece Martin of The Transit Brief in Toronto at the Mpact Transit + Community Conference. We discuss China’s transit expansion, the politics and impacts of fare policy, construction costs around the globe, the US’s existential crisis and the material benefits of progress.

Avid listeners know the drill: Press play on the audio player embedded below, read an AI-generated transcript here, or digest the edited excerpt at the end of this post.

Reece Martin: The US is clearly in a civilizational struggle with China — and it’s like, hey, they’re building all this stuff, and you can’t build even highways? Even if you think that the right thing for the US to do is just build more car infrastructure, you can’t even do that.

The state is geriatric. It’s run by geriatrics. It’s an existential problem. You wanna build defense infrastructure. You wanna build transportation infrastructure, energy infrastructure — and you just can’t because of all of this proceduralism and various other problems, right?

The things that would let you build more subways, would let you build more housing, and would let you do all these other things. And I think it would make the United States a better place, a more dynamic place, right? And it’s good for the economy, right? I’m reading a fantastic book, I recommend everyone goes and reads it. It’s called Order Without Design, by Alain Bertaud.

He’s French. My French pronunciation, despite being Canadian, is horrendous. It’s great. But it’s also quite interesting because urban issues are very progressive-coded, and he’s like a total market fundamentalist, and it’s great. We impose so many constraints on ourselves, and if you actually didn’t, you would probably get better, more dynamic cities.

Cities are what creates great dynamic economies. And you look at a place like New York in the early 20th century — that’s the dream, right? They’re building a ton of infrastructure, building a ton of housing. The city was growing. It was getting denser.

It was getting more dynamic, like what Chinese cities are experiencing now, right? It’s the same thing. It’s a state-led process, whereas in the US and in London as well, this was actually run by private companies initially. And to some extent, New York subway expansion was kinda killed by the city getting involved and then kind of building all of these redundant parallel lines to the private operators.

You need to create that dynamism that lets cities grow. Look at Austin or Atlanta. They would be better cities if they had great transit systems because it would create competition. Even if you’re a driver — it’s like, well, if the roads are too busy, if they’re not improving, then I’ll just get on the train.

But because that doesn’t exist, your whole city just suffers as a result. And so I think that something that is healthy in Ontario and in Canada more broadly is that transit and transportation, while it’s still politically contentious, nobody disagrees that you need to build this stuff.

Jeff Wood: My wife’s Chinese. We’ve been going back every year. I usually spend about a month there, and it’s just eye-opening to go and see what’s happening in Shenzhen or even Hong Kong or even in northern cities.

Her city is the main city in a province, and it’s a small city compared to Beijing and Shanghai, but it has two new subway lines. And just seeing that and how the people are responding to that.

I interviewed Olivia Plotnick, who is an American from Oregon living in China. She’s been living there for the last 10 years. She’s a brand specialist, and she did this trip where she went to 30 cities in three months using high-speed rail. And I asked her: “Well, what do people think about this?” And she said, “I talked to the cab drivers, and they think it’s amazing.”

All the high-speed rail, all the infrastructure, they can see things happening. They can see more customers. And on her side, where she talks about brands and new brands, the second tier of Chinese cities, there’s a competition between these brands that are starting up because of all the infrastructure that’s happening.

And there’s a discussion about not only building the infrastructure, but about how we can make our regions better because of the infrastructure we’ve already built. How can we create better biotech investment? Well, let’s create a cluster of cities outside of Shanghai that you already connected with subways and with high-speed rail that enhance the ability of people to share information and share ideas to get more patents, those types of things.

And I feel like we’re having that discussion a little bit in the private sector. The folks that are investing in technology are doing things, but it’s not kind of the same way as thinking about how you can connect all these places so that new discussions about technology and investment and all those things can happen.

It’s really frustrating to go and see what they’ve done there and what we’re doing here, and what we’re wasting money on in the United States. And I shouldn’t say here because we’re in Canada. But in the United States, we’re still spending so much money on road expansion and the highway system, and it’s already built out.

It’s completely not valuable anymore to spend more money on it because it’s built out. You need to shift over to something else, like high-speed rail, that’s actually going to connect places and create that vitality and that collision of ideas that we really need.

Reece Martin: I think there’s two things that are pretty interesting. I’m actually a tech guy. I did computer science at university, so I’m not super-cynical about tech, even if AI is a little concerning. You have to sometimes reflect that most of the new technology developed in my life, in terms of the value extracted.

There’s a lot of good biotech. It’s great that we can cure a bunch of cancers that we previously couldn’t. So I don’t wanna be too negative. But if you look at consumer technology and software, which is a huge part of the economy, a lot of this stuff is useful, but a lot of it is actually just net-negative on people’s quality of life.

Like Instagram — the world would probably be better without it, right? There’s a lot of things like that. So you just sort of wonder. You look at China, right? They’ve spent all this money and effort building something. If you live in Portland, and you could go to Seattle for the afternoon, that is gonna make your life better in a way that Instagram is not gonna make your life better. It’s gonna let you live in the real world.

Jeff Wood: Yeah, the tourism there has exploded. People can go to different parts of the country and see some of their sights and ancient sites.

Reece Martin: And that’s good. Imagine if it were easier and cheaper to travel from California to Nevada or California to Arizona. Even politically, these things help people not be crazy because they would interact more with people with different views and from different places. And I think there’s been a real focus on this: How do we extract more money out of people for the latest iPhone? And not: How can we materially improve living standards?

I can see some of this as a Canadian because when I grew up in Vancouver, the SkyTrain system was 40 percent as big as it is today. The city looked totally different. It’s covered in high-rises now. There’s this all-new SkyTrain. There’s new highways and bridges.

The same is true in Toronto and Montréal. If you look at the population of Canada when I was born, it was probably in the high 20 millions. We’re now at 40 million. It would as if the US was at 500 million people, if it had experienced that kind of growth.

There’s housing costs, which are really difficult here. I don’t want to frame it as entirely positive. But you just recognize that positive progress is possible. When I was growing up, you couldn’t just take the train to the airport in Vancouver and then take into the city from Toronto’s airport. Now you can.

Next year it’ll be Montréal. This constant sense of progress and more options, more accessibility, more people that you can meet every year. When people don’t have that experience of living in a society that has so much forward progress and momentum, I think they underrate how valuable it is.

Even if you are a cab driver and you’re a bit worried about what you’re gonna do — well, so much is happening. I’m gonna figure it out, right? It’s a positive for all of society.