I. Climate Science

This is a re-post from The Climate Brink

Twenty years ago, wind, solar and other non-hydro renewables were close to a rounding error. In 2005 they supplied a mere 2.0% of the world’s electricity generation. By 2015 that had risen to 6.8%, and by 2025 it was up to 19.8%. According to the IEA Electricity 2026 outlook, non-hydro renewables will supply around 21.8% of global electricity in 2026, edging past natural gas (21.6%) to become the second-largest source of power after coal.1

That is a remarkable pace of growth from an industry that barely existed two decades ago. But not everyone is impressed; many commenters on social media have responded to these figures by pointing out that despite the growth of renewables, fossil fuel generation continues to grow as well. They aren’t wrong; global coal generation set a record in 2024. Gas generation reached a new high in 2025.

Their point is that clean energy isn’t replacing fossil fuels at all. It’s simply being piled on top of them to feed an ever-growing appetite for electricity, making this an “energy addition” rather than an energy transition. Global fossil electricity generation around 50% higher today than it was in 2005. Coal generation rose by 3,300 TWh and gas by 3,200 TWh. The world burns more coal for power now than it did when wind and solar started taking off.

This argument has been made in the past both by skeptics of growth and by energy systems modelers. The historian Jean-Baptiste Fressoz argues in More and More and More (2024) that “far from the industrial era passing through a series of transformations, each new phase has in practice remained almost wholly entangled with the previous one.” Coal mining created a huge new demand for timber for pit props, while the oil age ran on steel made with coal. Vaclav Smil has made the same point about today’s clean energy boom more bluntly: ”We use more fossil fuels today than at any time in history… Renewables are not replacing fossil fuels; are joining them.”

The question of counterfactuals

The problem with the “addition” argument is that it compares the world today with the world in 2005, rather than with the world as it would have been without clean energy. Electricity demand has not grown because wind turbines and solar panels were built. It has grown because of what the IEA describes as “rising consumption from industry, electric vehicles, air conditioning and data centers”. Demand growth is located overwhelmingly in emerging and developing economies, which accounted for about 80% of global demand growth in 2025 and an average of 95% over the past decade.

Global electricity demand rose by 75% (13,600 TWh) between 2005 and 2025. That demand had to be met by something. Wind and solar supplied 5,400 TWh of new demand, hydro 1,500 TWh, bioenergy and other renewables 530 TWh, nuclear 85 TWh, and fossil fuels the remaining 6,100 TWh. But over the past decade the balance has shifted sharply toward clean energy. Since 2015, wind and solar supplied 57% of demand growth, compared with 29% for fossil fuels. And in 2025, according to Ember’s Global Electricity Review 2026, “wind and solar grew by 841 TWh, meeting 99% of global electricity demand growth”.

A 2024 study by Brantley Liddle found that “intermittent renewables (solar and wind) have unitary displacement effect.” In other words, each unit of wind and solar power displaced about one unit of coal and oil generation. Fossil generation has kept rising in many years because demand has grown faster than clean energy could be added. That is very different from clean energy failing to displace anything.

And electricity demand will continue to rapidly grow, particularly if we succeed in reducing global emissions by electrifying sectors of the economy that currently burn fossil fuels. Most scenarios where we reach net zero emissions involve a doubling or tripling of electricity generation.

So if we want to assess the real world emissions impact of wind and solar buildout over the past 20 years, the right question to ask is not “did fossil use go down?” but rather “how much higher would it have been?”

A world without wind and solar

To answer this, I built a counterfactual for the global power sector in which wind and solar (and geothermal, which is less than 2% of the total) stopped growing in 2005. In every separate country, their generation is held at 2005 levels, while electricity demand, nuclear, hydro and bioenergy follow their real-world paths.2 The missing clean generation has to come from somewhere, and in this counterfactual it comes from fossil fuels.

The key choice is which fossil fuels are used to fill in the gap. A wind farm in China or India displaces coal, while one in Texas or the UK mostly displaces gas. So rather than assuming a single global fossil mix, the analysis fills each country’s gap with that country’s own coal, gas and oil mix in each year, using data for about 200 countries from Ember. This keeps real-world coal-to-gas switching like what occurred during the US shale gas boom in place, rather than crediting it to renewables.3

Without wind and solar growth since 2005, global power-sector CO2 emissions in 2025 would have been 28% higher, at 16.9 billion tonnes rather than 13.2 billion. This adds up to 3.7 billion tonnes avoided in 2025, which is about three-quarters of the total CO2 US emissions that year (or roughly 1.5x EU emissions).

Between 2006 and 2025, wind and solar avoided about 23 billion tonnes of CO2. The biggest assumption I’ve made is what fossil fuel fills in the gap: if every missing kilowatt-hour had come from gas, avoided emissions would be 15 billion tonnes, while if it was all coal it would have been 30 billion.

This lines up almost exactly with Ember’s own estimate. Using a simpler method (and a 2000 baseline rather than 2005 baseline), Ember’s Global Electricity Review 2026 found that “had wind and solar not grown since 2000, fossil generation would have been 30% higher in 2025, and emissions 28% higher.”

While its true that global electricity emissions have yet to clearly peak, it may well be imminent; emissions went down in 2025 and may be on track to decline in 2026 as well, though rapid increases in demand from vehicle electrification and data centers have made this a bit more challenging.4 But there are many countries in which electricity emissions have already peaked and declined substantially, and where clean energy has played a key role in those declines.

Already replacing fossil fuels in some countries

Globally, clean energy has not yet led to fossil fuel use peaking in the electricity sector. In 2025, fossil generation was essentially flat (down ~0.3%). But that global total hides a lot of country-level variability. In many wealthier economies, where demand has grown more slowly, clean energy has driven real emissions reductions (even when accounting for the outsourcing of some industrial production).

Between 2005 and 2025, power-sector CO2 emissions fell by 75% in the UK, 55% in the European Union and 37% in the United States.

The reasons why differ from place to place:

• In the EU, wind and solar account for about 85% of the decline (512 of 601 million tonnes), even though falling nuclear output pushed emissions up by about 100 million tonnes.

• In the UK, the decline had three main drivers: wind and solar (56 million tonnes), lower domestic generation (58 million tonnes, partly because the UK now imports more power), and the near-elimination of coal, which went from 45% of UK fossil generation to effectively zero (36 million tonnes).

• In the US, switching from coal to cheaper natural gas cut emissions by 682 million tonnes, slightly more than wind and solar (606 million tonnes), while a 12% rise in electricity use added 352 million tonnes. Coal’s share of US fossil generation fell from 69% to 29%.

Without wind and solar growth, EU power emissions would have fallen by only about 16% since 2005 rather than 55%, US emissions by about 17% rather than 37%, and UK emissions by about 53% rather than 75%. In these regions clean energy has not just met new demand, its actually pushed fossil generation down.

What about temperatures?

Avoided emissions translate into avoided warming, but the story here has an important twist. Coal plants don’t just emit CO2. They also emit sulfur dioxide, which forms aerosols that reflect sunlight and cool the planet. A world with more coal would also have had more of this aerosol pollution and the cooling it causes, though exactly how much depends on the use of scrubbers, the sulfur content of the coal, and a number of other factors.

To capture the complex dynamics here, I ran the counterfactual emissions (CO2, sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, black and organic carbon, and methane leaked from coal mines and gas supply chains) through the FaIR climate model, using a 841 parameter ensemble constrained to match the climate sensitivity and carbon cycle feedback values assessed in the IPCC AR6 as well as observed warming.

The CO2 avoided by solar and wind growth between 2005 and 2025 has prevented about 0.01C of warming. Adding the methane that would have leaked from the extra coal mining and gas production, the gross effect is larger still. But the extra sulfur that would have been emitted by fossil fuels in that counterfactual world would have masked most of that for now. Taking everything together, the net avoided warming in 2025 is only about 0.002C (−0.008 to +0.009C).

However, this comparison is a bit apples and oranges. Aerosols wash out of the atmosphere within days to weeks, while CO2 persists for centuries (and the warming from CO2 for millennia). Once the extra aerosols clear, the avoided warming from wind and solar deployment to date settles at about 0.01C by 2035. Cooling from sulfur pollution depends on how much is being emitted in a given year, while the warming from CO2 depends on how much has built up over time. So while a new coal plant (in our counterfactual world) would lead to an immediate spike of cooling sulphate aerosols, that effect would be overtaken by warming from CO2 – which will persist long after the coal plant is closed and the cooling from sulfur emissions is gone. Trading a small, temporary cooling from air pollution for permanent warming is a bad bargain, and it comes with catastrophic public health costs of breathing that pollution.

These warming numbers are modest, but they reflect only 20 years of deployment. Much of it is also very recent: 60% of all the emissions wind and solar avoided came in the last five years. The world has emitted roughly 2,600 billion tonnes of CO2 since 1850, so 23 billion tonnes is just under 1% of that total.

More importantly, the 0.01C is only the effect to-date of what has been built so far, assuming the counterfactual world’s extra emissions stopped at the end of 2025. In reality, the wind and solar fleet will keep running and keep growing. At today’s rate, each additional year of operation avoids roughly 3.7 billion tonnes of CO2, and that rate is rising quickly as deployment accelerates.

Addition and displacement at the same time

Clean energy has been an addition to the global power system, but not in the sense the critique implies. It has been added alongside rapidly growing demand that would have existed anyway, and it has displaced fossil generation that would otherwise have been built and burned. Both things are true at once, which is why fossil use can rise while clean energy is still cutting emissions.

Without the wind and solar built since 2005, the world’s power plants would be emitting 28% more CO2 today. Over the long term, the world would be warmer. The warming avoided so far is small (and partly hidden by the side effects of cleaner air), but it grows with every year that clean energy continue producing power. Many countries have already seen their power sector emissions decline, the world as a whole appears to now be on the cusp of absolute declines in electricity sector emissions.

Methods, code and data for this analysis are available over at my GitHub.

1 The 2026 breakdown here is: 10.3% of global generation from solar, 9.1% from wind, 2.2% from bioenergy, and 0.3% from geothermal. Note that the analysis later in the piece looking at what would have happened without clean energy growth excludes bioenergy from its analysis, given the complexity of emissions accounting there.

2 There is a mechanism by which clean energy could in principle add to demand: if cheap wind and solar lower electricity prices, people and firms may use more power. That rebound effect is real, but it would need to be enormous to account for demand growth on the scale seen, and lower cost power can also enable emissions reductions through increased electrification (heat pumps, EVs, etc.). Accounting for a rebound would at most modestly reduce the avoided emissions we estimate.

3 Additional methodological details: Europe is treated as a single interconnected grid, so that Scandinavian wind displaces German and Polish coal and gas rather than fossil plants Sweden doesn’t have. Plants can’t run above realistic capacity factors; where existing plants would be maxed out, the model builds new ones in the fuel each country has been adding. Emissions are calculated from combustion emission factors that vary by country and year, drawn from CEDS, the US EIA and Chinese official statistics, and are net of the emissions from manufacturing the wind turbines and solar panels themselves.

4 Not all electricity demand increases are a bad thing from an emissions standpoint. Vehicle electrification is driving more demand growth than data centers globally, and that demand is coming at the direct expense of oil consumption (and associated emissions).

Recent months have reinforced the case for accelerating action on the energy transition and climate, particularly from a European perspective.

Let’s list the reasons why:

• this summer has been like no other in Europe, with five major heatwaves across the continent and provisional data from the UK Met Office showing temperatures in London approximately 4°C above the long-term baseline average (1991-2020);
• internationally, 2026 has been marked by a series of extreme weather events, from the tragic landslide in Nepal caused by a melting glacier to a deadly winter storm bringing widespread fatalities across North America;
• all this against the backdrop of a super El Niño likely to generate even more extreme weather across the globe in the coming months;
• growing recognition, reflected in UK Energy Security and Net Zero Secretary of State Miatta Fahnbulleh’s warning that the war in Iran and closure of the Strait of Hormuz have shown how exposure to global fossil fuel markets raises energy costs;
• the war has also led to an explosion in electric vehicle sales, particularly in Asia. Across the first half of 2026, electric car sales in Europe grew around 35-40% compared with the same period in 2025; in the UK it’s up about 25% over the same period;
• according to WindEurope, Europe installed 8.8GW in the first half of 2026, a 30% increase on H1 2025. Renewables provided 53.1% of electricity generated by the UK’s Major Power Producers between March and May, with renewable generation up 22% year on year.;
• a breakthrough on the costs of energy storage, with global benchmark costs for four-hour battery storage projects falling by 27% year-on-year in 2025.

On the face of it, the case for accelerating the transition has never been stronger. But despite this, the state of multilateral action on climate change can probably be summed up by the collective shrug in response to the Climate Summit convened by the outgoing UN Secretary-General in New York on 23 September. In his final UNGA week, Antonio Guterres again argued that fossil fuel expansion “defies science, economics and common sense”. In language reflecting an increasing sense of alarm and urgency, he talked about this being the last generation “who can avert climate catastrophe”.

The weakened state of climate multilateralism is often attributed to a geopolitical environment in which political consensus has fractured and climate science is more openly challenged. This is evident not only in North America but in several European countries. But are there still opportunities this autumn for the pendulum to swing back towards concerted policy action that reflects the favourable platform that science, technology and economics are providing?

All roads on climate tend to lead to the COP, which this year will meet in Antalya, Turkey, from 9-20 November. COP31 will feature an unusual co-hosting arrangement between Turkey and Australia, alongside a pre-COP meeting hosted by Fiji and Tuvalu from 5-8 October. Crucially, the Pacific gathering will give small island states a platform to highlight the existential threat posed by climate change.

As for COP31 itself, the co-hosts face the challenge of providing a central focus for a COP where no single major negotiated decision is expected and which is being described as an “implementation COP”. But two key themes are emerging:

• a “35 by 35” global electrification target, designed to accelerate the transition by increasing the share of global final energy demand met by electricity to 35% by 2035, up from the present 20%;
• ecosystem resilience, and the impact of severe climate shocks on food and water systems.

Serious discussion of both issues will be welcome. Yet many increasingly view the COP process, and the wider UN system, as unable to move beyond being a talking shop. Which is why, perhaps even more than is usual at a COP, some of the more consequential action in Antalya may take place in the margins outside the formal negotiations.

This would be consistent with the most significant outcomes from COP30 in Belém, with the emergence of two separate “coalitions of the willing” to work on international roadmaps: to transition away from fossil fuels (TAFF); and to halt and reverse global deforestation.

This TAFF initiative in particular will be put to the test of COP politics, even if it’s not on the formal agenda. Twelve months on from its birth in Belém, and seven months since the coalition of nearly 60 countries met in Santa Marta, Colombia, to kickstart work on a global TAFF process, there will be pressure to start turning high-level ambitions into concrete plans. This will mean attention on the Netherlands, which co-hosted Santa Marta with a Colombian government that has since been replaced by a new administration not committed to the initiative, and Ireland and Tuvalu, which will host a “Santa Marta 2.0” in the Pacific next July. These governments will want to show whether their initiative can work alongside the COP process and even restore some faith in the value of international cooperation to tackle global challenges. Other members of the coalition may also face questions about whether their domestic policies match their claims to international leadership: from the UK Government, which will also take on the G20 presidency in 2027, to Canadian and Australia governments, where fossil fuel production policy is moving in a different direction.

Looking beyond COP31, there are still grounds for optimism, whether through existing institutions or coalitions such as TAFF. The possibility, if recent reports are to be believed, that China could host COP33 in 2029 could be a game-changer, another Paris moment for the UNFCCC and multilateralism to demonstrate that it can deliver more than rhetoric. But back in the present, the science is making clear that delaying meaningful action, even now, will only do further harm. As the Belém Declaration on a TAFF spelled out nearly 12 months ago, action needs to be accelerated.

As progressives gather in Antalya, they may therefore do well to keep two overarching priorities at top of mind.

First, revisit the Belém Declaration as a constant reminder that limiting global temperature rises requires a “shared determination to work collectively towards a just, orderly and equitable transition away from fossil fuels”. This work will require, as the Declaration detailed, a focus on economic diversification, reducing structural dependence on fossil fuel revenues and phasing out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies. Progressive policymakers will also need to consider how to support a step-change in finance for the Global South, given the vulnerability of many emerging and developing economies to both the transition and the physical impacts of climate change. The work that has begun since the Santa Marta conference – both in the Santa Marta workplan and the separate but closely linked Brazilian COP Presidency TAFF exercise – will give policymakers the tools to start implementing TAFF in practice. That collective effort can begin in the discussions in and around COP31, even if not yet in the formal negotiations.

Second, one of the most positive developments this year has been the reframing of climate around energy security, risk and resilience. The statement by the UK Prime Minister at the same UNGA week where the UN Secretary-General’s Climate Summit yielded little tangible progress, that “the climate crisis is now a national security threat for countries around the world”, is a sign of an evolving narrative. As is this line from the recent Green Central Banking newsletter: “maybe resilience, for lack of a better word, is a new, pragmatic way to ensure climate action and collaboration still take place in an ever more geopolitically fragmented world.”

COP delegates will also be mindful that they are convening just after the US mid-terms on 3 November.

Many of the underlying conditions (economic, technological and scientific) are in place for governments to make this autumn one of significant progress on climate ambition. The case for framing the transition around economic opportunity and 21st-century energy security is clear. Policymakers may remain cautious in the current geopolitical environment; but this is time to seize the moment.

The post Can a Sweltering Summer Create an Autumn of Opportunity for the Transition? appeared first on Carbon Tracker Initiative.

This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections

A crisis is brewing for the U.S. electricity grid – one that could make your electric bill skyrocket and thwart efforts to address climate change.

To understand the problem, think of transmission lines – the poles and wires that transport electricity from power plants to homes and businesses – as an interstate highway system for electrons. Like too many cars on the road, too many electrons traveling across power lines can cause traffic jams.

These sorts of jams haven’t been a problem until just recently, as power-hungry data centers proliferate and demand from electric vehicles, heat pumps, and air conditioning grows.

As a result, Americans’ electricity rates, which already spiked by more than one-third over the past five years, are poised to keep rising.

Read: Home electricity bills are skyrocketing. For data centers, not so much.

What’s more, when rising demand meets inadequate grid capacity, that slows efforts to address climate pollution. When new clean power sources are stymied by too much traffic on power lines, existing fossil fuel power plants are forced to remain in service and burn gas and coal more often. And when data centers are unable to connect to the grid, they often build dirty on-site natural gas power generation instead.

Adding more transmission lines to the grid would ease congestion, but on average, permitting and building a new transmission line in the U.S. takes a decade. Some big multistate transmission lines have taken over three decades to complete. And the Trump administration recently axed Congress’ attempts to accelerate the process.

A bipartisan group of senators just released a bill that would reform permitting for transmission lines and other large projects, speeding up the process for constructing new lines. But time is running short in this session of Congress, and the stakes of inaction are high.

"Failing to pass permitting reforms would have real consequences for all of us,” said Zach Zimmerman, director of research and policy for Grid Strategies, a power sector consulting firm, in an email. “Every year that major transmission projects are delayed means higher system costs and less ability to move power where it is needed during extreme weather. Without reform, we will continue to pay more for the grid.”

The U.S. has struggled to modernize its grid

The demand for electrons on the U.S. power grid remained relatively flat for decades, increasing by a mere 5% between 2005 and 2023.

Now that’s changed: Analysts at the consulting firm ICF forecast that U.S. residential electricity rates could rise another 15% to 40% over the next five years and double by 2050, with power grid traffic jams being a root problem.

U.S. electricity demand from 2000 to 2025 (blue) in terawatt-hours (TWh) and the range of forecasts (green) by various groups. (Image credit: created by Dana Nuccitelli with data from Ember, Princeton REPEAT, American Clean Power, Bank of America Institute, Enverus Intelligence Research, and McKinsey & Company)

In 2024, the Department of Energy concluded that the U.S. would need between a doubling and quadrupling of its transmission capacity by 2050 in order to affordably meet growing power demand and maintain grid reliability.

To create that capacity would require a build-out of roughly 5,000 miles per year of high-capacity regional transmission, plus additional miles of interregional transmission, according to Grid Strategies. But it took the U.S. nine years, from 2017 through 2025, to build the last 5,000 miles of transmission lines, Grid Strategies estimated.

The only recent year that came close to the 5,000-mile target was 2013, when Texas built close to 3,000 miles of transmission lines. That was the result of a 2005 Texas state law that encouraged building transmission lines in areas with high potential for wind power, known as “competitive renewable energy zones.”

U.S. transmission build-out has since stagnated, averaging just 600 new miles per year since 2017.

Read: How blue California and red Texas became green powerhouses

Miles of new high-voltage transmission lines built in the U.S. per year between 2010 and 2025, compared to the Grid Strategies estimated need of 5,000 new miles per year. (Image credit: Created by Dana Nuccitelli with data from Grid Strategies and Americans for a Clean Energy Grid)

For comparison, China has been building over 1,000 miles of ultrahigh voltage power lines per year. Ultrahigh voltage transmission lines are like the high-speed rail of transmission. They can carry more electrons more efficiently than America’s high-voltage transmission lines.

Congress has failed to speed up transmission line permitting

Like Texas, Congress passed a law in 2005 in an effort to spur more transmission lines, but with far less success.

One challenge transmission projects face is obtaining permits in every state and local jurisdiction along their proposed path. That can be an onerous and time-consuming process with many potential veto points. In contrast, Congress in the 1938 Natural Gas Act gave the entity now known as the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission the authority to act as a one-stop shop for interstate natural gas pipeline permits.

Lawmakers tried to establish a similar process for interstate transmission lines in the 2005 Energy Policy Act. That law instructed the Department of Energy to establish “National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors.” These are areas where it would be in the nation's interest to build electrical transmission lines relatively quickly, for example, to relieve traffic jams on the grid. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission would then have the authority to permit transmission lines along these corridors in consultation with states.

But for over 15 years, the Department of Energy was unable to designate any such corridors due to a series of court decisions in favor of states, landowners, and environmental groups, ruling that the bill’s language was insufficiently clear. Congress subsequently tried to clarify its intent in the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.

And that effort seemed to succeed. In December 2024, the Department of Energy finally advanced three proposed National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors in the areas identified as having the greatest need for additional transmission capacity.

The Department of Energy’s “rough approximation for illustrative purposes” of its three retained proposed National Interest Electric Transmission Corridors in December 2024. (Image credit: U.S. Department of Energy)

But in August 2026, Trump’s Energy Secretary Chris Wright announced that he was canceling these three proposed corridors. Despite acknowledging the importance of building new transmission lines, Wright characterized these proposals as part of “a climate-alarmist agenda” intended by the Biden administration “to advance their Green New Scam agenda and accelerate decarbonization.”

What’s next?

Zimmerman of Grid Strategies identified several measures that could speed up domestic transmission permitting and development.

For example, Congress could allow important transmission projects to move directly to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission for permitting, rather than waiting for the Department of Energy to first define national interest corridors. That would also depoliticize the process, because the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission operates more independently from the White House than the Department of Energy.

Zimmerman also pointed to a 2024 Federal Energy Regulatory Commission rule called Order 1920. That rule, among other things, requires utilities and regional grid operators to consider the next 20 years of power demand forecasts in their transmission planning rather than simply considering short-term needs.

There’s also “a need for Congress to improve permitting for large-scale transmission and address interregional transmission. And establishing a transmission investment tax credit would be helpful,” Zimmerman said by email.

In order to avoid prolonged fights over who pays for how much of a proposed transmission line, Congress could also establish a formula for fairly allocating its costs among the beneficiaries and define the types of benefits that should be included in that cost allocation.

Congress narrowly failed to pass the Energy Permitting Reform Act in 2024, which would have implemented many of Zimmerman’s recommendations. An analysis by energy systems experts at the nonpartisan think tank RMI estimated that the transmission permitting reform provisions in that bill could have allowed enough clean energy to connect to the U.S. grid to reduce the country’s climate pollution by billions of tons.

This week, a group of senators introduced the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act, which also includes many of Zimmerman’s recommendations. A preliminary analysis of some of the transmission provisions in the bill from the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions estimated that they would cut climate pollution by billions of tons in the next 15 years while reducing Americans’ electricity bills by $19 billion and lessening the risks of widespread power outages.

“This analysis shows that practical reforms to transmission planning and interconnection processes can unlock more clean energy, reduce our reliance on natural gas, lower costs for consumers, and help build a cleaner, more reliable electric grid,” said Nat Keohane, president of the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions. “These benefits are within reach if we move quickly to modernize the systems that power our nation.”

This article first appeared on Yale Climate Connections and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

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A listing of 28 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, September 27, 2026 thru Sat, October 3, 2026. Stories we promoted this week, by category:

Climate Policy and Politics (7 items)

• Midterm Battleground State Poll: Political Priorities & Opinions on the Clean Energy Transition The data relating to “climate hushing” is particularly revealing, showing that — by large margins — battleground state voters (a) want politicians to spend more time talking about climate change (not less), and (b) are more likely to vote for candidates who make transitioning away from fossil fuels a top priority if elected. Environmental Voter Project, EVP staff, Sep 22, 2026.
• Gavin Newsom condemns Democrats` `climate hushing`, predicts Trump`s downfall and expects AOC to run in 2028 Energy modernization means more affordable energy and politicians should not be afraid to say it. The Guardian, Mark Hertsgaard, Sep 24, 2026.
• Fed up with Brazil’s politicians not listening, a climate scientist runs for office Luciana Gatti, who studies carbon uptake in the Amazon, aims to join Brazil’s lower house in this weekend’s elections Science, Daniel Grossman, Sep 28, 2026.
• Alito`s Recusal From Climate Case: Too Little, Too Late? The justice’s participation in the Boulder case already may have been pivotal, and his continued stock holdings—including in fossil fuels—keep an ethics cloud over the Supreme Court. Inside Climate News, Marianne Lavelle, Sep 29, 2026.
• AI Was Supposed to Cut Emissions. Instead, Fossil Fuel Companies Are Using It to Find More Oil and Gas. A new study found AI-driven fossil fuel productivity could increase emissions. Here are examples of companies already using AI to boost production. Desmog, Sarah Hofmann, Sep 30, 2026.
• A Climate Change Rebrand More politicians have stopped talking about the climate, but love of money and risky geopolitics leave the 'green transition' still moving forward. NYT, Katrin Bennhold, Oct 01, 2026.
• Texas can`t hide from climate change by stopping students from learning about it Climate change will shape the future of Texas. Students should be allowed to learn about it. The Climate Brink, Andrew Dessler, Oct 02, 2026.

Climate Science and Research (7 items)

• `Concerning` low sea ice persists as Antarctic hits third-lowest winter peak Antarctic sea ice has recorded its third-smallest winter peak extent since satellite records began 48 years ago, new data reveals. Carbon Brief, Ayesha Tandon, Sep 25, 2026.
• Who is responsible for limiting global warming to 1.5°? Climate mitigation as systems integration: researcher models and quantifies Interlocking systemic changes spanning government, industry and households necessary for adhering to a 1.5°C warming limit. Phys.org, Irene Ketting, Sep 27, 2026.
• Godzilla El Niño is about to hit the Arctic. How bad will it be? Part 1 of a 2-part collaboration between Dave Borlace ("Just have a Think") and Ella Gilbert (Dr Gilbz) about possible connections between the Super El Nino and Artic sea ice in the northern and Antarctica in the southern hemisphere. "Just have a Think" on Youtube, Dave Borlace, Sep 27, 2026.
• “Godzilla” El Niño = crashing Antarctic sea ice? Part 2 of a 2-part collaboration between Dave Borlace ("Just have a Think") and Ella Gilbert (Dr Gilbz) about possible connections between the Super El Nino and Artic sea ice in the northern and Antarctica in the southern hemisphere. Dr Gilbz on Youtube, Ella Gilbert, Sep 27, 2026.
• The impacts of this year`s record-shattering El Niño El Niño will drive severe drought from Indonesia to the Southern Africa and northern South America, with wetter winters from the US Gulf Coast to Southern South America. The Climate Brink, Zeke Hausfather, Sep 28, 2026.
• Planetary Health Check 2026 The 2026 Planetary Health Check identifies 7 of 9 planetary boundaries as exceeded and includes a special focus on carbon sinks. Planetary Health Check, Carlos Nobre et al. , Sep 29, 2026.
• Skeptical Science New Research for Week #40 2026 Skeptical Science's weekly survey of academic, government and NGO climate research. Skeptical Science, Doug Bostrom & Marc Kodack, Oct 01, 2026.

Climate Change Impacts (7 items)

• Explainer: How sea level rise poses an `existential threat` to humans, heritage and nature Here, Carbon Brief unpacks some of the key ways that sea level rise threatens both societies and ecosystems. Carbon Brief, Giuliana Viglione, Sep 22, 2026.
• Sea level rise is reshaping a California beach town and threatening a key rail line “The constant pressure is sea level rise,” said Sean Vitousek, research oceanographer with the U.S. Geological Survey. “It is going to keep rising, and rising, and the beaches will retreat landward.” AP News, Amy Taxin, Sep 27, 2026.
• Antarctica`s ice loss is locked in, and extra snowfall won`t save it - that`s bad news for low-lying coastal areas elsewhere The Conversation, Yucheng Lin, Robert Kopp, Sep 30, 2026.
• Past emissions will continue warming the planet for decades New research shows that past emissions from oil, gas, coal, and cement will continue to affect the environment and increase the odds of extreme weather for decades. Futurity, U. Washington, Sep 30, 2026.
• Swiss glaciers suffer another year of record ice loss Switzerland's glaciers lost more than 5% of their ice in 2026, marking another year of rapid decline. NPR, Imogen Foulkes, Sep 30, 2026.
• Gas from thawing Arctic permafrost is changing world's climate future Two recent studies project that by the end of this century, methane in permafrost liberated by warming due to burning of fossil fuels will add a quarter degree Celsius of warmth to Earth's atmosphere. AP News, Seth Borenstein, Oct 02, 2026.
• Europe`s Extreme Summer Triggered Cascading Climate Shocks A summer of record heat, severe drought and compounding impacts tested Europe's infrastructure and resilience. Inside Climate News, Bob Berwyn, Oct 02, 2026.

Climate Law and Justice (4 items)

• Scrutinizing the Achievement of Climate Targets, Part I: The Widening Reach of Implementation Litigation Columbia University's Sabin Center for Climate Change Law does a deep dive into the role of judiciaries and courts in forcing governments to actually do as they say they will to deal with climate change mitigations. Climate Law Blog, Joe Udell and Filippo Fantozzi, Sep 28, 2026.
• Inside the anti-climate campaign against researchers A POLITICO investigation reveals more than 100 open records requests demanding documents from climate scientists nationwide. Politico, Chelsea Harvey, Lesley Clark and Corbin Hiar, Sep 29, 2026.
• States want to make Big Oil pay for climate harm. Now, courts are weighing in. New York’s "climate superfund” law has suffered two losses in court, while a U.S. Supreme Court case next week could determine the fate of similar efforts nationwide. Grist, Joseph Winters, Sep 30, 2026.
• The surprising allies backing Boulder`s climate case before the Supreme Court Ranchers, conservative legal scholars, and former Republican EPA chiefs are siding against oil companies. Here's why. Grist, Kate Yoder, Oct 01, 2026.

International Climate Conferences and Agreements (1 item)

• `We want action`: Fijian climate activist sends message ahead of UN talks in Pacific Lavenia Naivalu has seen the impact of the climate crisis first-hand and is determined to amplify Pacific voices at this year’s pre-Cop summit in Fiji The Guardian, Sera Sefeti, Oct 02, 2026.

Public Misunderstandings about Climate Solutions (1 item)

• Australia`s climate chief promises harder line on misinformation Senior public servant says bureaucrats will speak up about misinformation that risks policy progress. Politico, Miriam Webber, Oct 01, 2026.

Miscellaneous (1 item)

• 2026 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #39 A listing of 28 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, September 20, 2026 thru Sat, September 26, 2026. Skeptical Science, Bärbel Winkler & Doug Bostrom, Sep 27, 2026.

If you happen upon high quality climate-science and/or climate-myth busting articles from reliable sources while surfing the web, please feel free to submit them via this Google form so that we may share them widely. Thanks!

Open access notables

Centuries of global heating from Carbon Majors: Dependence on future emissions pathways, Frierson & Henrie, PLOS Climate

We perform simulations that attribute the amount of global warming due to corporations, governments and other entities into the future. We utilize the Finite Amplitude Impulse Response (FaIR) model run until 2500, and the Carbon Majors dataset, a database with the emissions history associated with the top 178 oil, gas, coal, and cement producers. We perform counterfactual experiments to calculate the warming attributable to the emissions associated with these entities, using several different future emissions scenarios. The future atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) anomaly attributable to a company’s past emissions is smaller with less ensemble spread in a lower emissions future than it is in a high emissions future. This is due to smaller carbon cycle feedbacks with lower emissions. However, the temperature change from past emissions is larger in a lower emissions future, even with the smaller change in CO2. This is due primarily to the logarithmic sensitivity of CO2 radiative forcing to concentration. Methane concentration post-2080 experiences a negative anomaly, due to a decrease in methane lifetime from elevated temperature, which is a small negative feedback. For any future emissions scenario, the historical emissions from oil, gas, coal, and cement producers affect many aspects of the climate system, including CO2 in the atmosphere and other parts of the carbon cycle, methane, ozone, and stratospheric water vapor. The total radiative forcing induced by these elements stays positive throughout all simulations, which in turn causes positive temperature perturbations. Thus in addition to the damages that have already occurred, we expect the Carbon Majors to be responsible for calculable climate damages for many centuries into the future.

Global Emissions Since the Paris Agreement Have Intensified Europe's Recent Heatwaves, Trok et al., Geophysical Research Letters

Understanding the consequences of continued greenhouse-gas emissions requires determining whether recent emissions can be robustly linked to changes in extreme weather events. However, current approaches have a limited ability to quantify changes in extreme weather caused by small subsets of anthropogenic emissions, particularly for individual events. To address these limitations, we train a generative machine-learning model to predict spatially-explicit changes in daily surface temperature at different levels of cumulative emissions, conditional on the event's observed meteorological conditions. Using this approach, we find strong evidence (>95% probability) that the combined effects of anthropogenic emissions released since the 2015 UN Paris Agreement have increased the intensity of Europe's summer temperature extremes since 2021. Additionally, our results suggest >99% probability that regional-mean temperature during Europe's high-impact June 2025 heatwave would have been lower (median estimate of 0.34°C) if the same large-scale meteorological conditions had occurred under 2015 levels of cumulative emissions.

Permafrost-Thaw Driven Acid-Rock Drainage Threatens Arctic Aquatic Ecosystems, Skierszkan, AGU Advances

A new study in this issue of AGU Advances (Evinger et al., 2026) documents abrupt onset of acid-rock drainage from thawing permafrost in Alaska's Brooks Range. Similar findings emerged from a publication in Science earlier this year (Skierszkan et al., 2026a, https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aea2898). This Viewpoint provides a broader regional context of the phenomenon, highlighting widespread acid-rock drainage within northwestern North America's permafrost zone. Acid-rock drainage is accelerating release of metals and acidity at toxic concentrations in thousands of seepages in regions undergoing permafrost thaw. As such, it may be of the most consequential recently recognized environmental hazards caused by cryosphere loss. This widespread outcome of global warming presents a major risk to water resources and aquatic ecosystems.

Abrupt Onset and Persistent Downstream Effects of Acid Rock Drainage on Rivers Across Northwest Arctic Alaska, Evinger et al., AGU Advances 

Warming in the Arctic is accelerating permafrost thaw, leading to changes in the water quality of streams and rivers that provide important ecosystem services to rural communities. In Arctic Alaska, a growing concern is the increasing number of rivers affected by natural acid rock drainage, a process that occurs when certain minerals are exposed to air and water, releasing acid, sulfate, and a mixture of major and trace metals. Here, we examined the effects of acid rock drainage on river chemistry across six watersheds in Alaska's Brooks Range. Acid rock drainage inputs were extremely acidic, with concentrations of nickel, zinc, and cadmium similar to those observed in mine-impacted rivers outside the region. Acidic, metal-rich inputs to rivers raised metal levels downstream by up to 70 times, with the potential for long range transport (>100 km). We used long-term water quality records to constrain the timing of onset to 2019–2020, which coincided with warm, snowy conditions of the preceding winters. Collectively, our findings document the recent and abrupt onset of acid rock drainage that releases toxic metals to Arctic rivers, with implications for wildlife and humans.

Understanding the Gateway: Unpacking the Mechanisms, Boundaries, and Outcomes of Climate Consensus Messaging, Göbel et al., Journal of Environmental Psycholog

Communicating the scientific consensus on climate change acts as a gateway to increasing climate beliefs, a process described by the Gateway Belief Model (GBM). Although the effectiveness of this approach is well-documented, critical gaps in the literature persist. Few studies have scrutinized the risks of low-consensus messages and their correctability, the potential for consensus messaging to have an impact beyond self-reported measures, or the cognitive mechanisms driving belief updates. This study addresses these three critical areas in a German sample (N = 941). First, we demonstrate the powerful adverse effect of a low-consensus message on the perceived scientific consensus (PSC) and show that this effect can be corrected through subsequent accurate messaging. Second, we introduce learning as a novel cognitive outcome, finding that high-consensus messaging can act as a gateway to knowledge acquisition. Third, we explore initial confidence as a key psychological moderator, revealing that it influences belief updating under certain conditions.

From this week's government/NGO section:

Planetary Health Check 2026, Caesar et al., Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research

The Planetary Health Check (PHC) provides an annual assessment of the state of the Planet. It is structured around the Planetary Boundaries: the nine critical processes that regulate stability, resilience, and the conditions that support life on Earth. For each boundary, one or two indicators, known as control variables, are used to assess its status. These show whether conditions remain within the Safe Operating Space – the range in which the risk of destabilizing the Planet remains low. Beyond a boundary lies the Zone of Increasing Risk, followed by the High-Risk Zone, where the risk of large-scale and potentially irreversible changes becomes high. The 2026 Planetary Health Check finds that seven of the nine Planetary Boundaries are transgressed, and trends for all seven continue to point in the wrong direction, indicating further deterioration in the conditions that support long-term planetary stability.

The Billion Dollar Deal: How the Fossil Fuel Industry Bought the Trump Administration, Cashed In, and Left Americans to Pay the Price, Senate Democrats Anti-Corruption Initiative, Senate Environment & Public Works Committee

The authors trace the massive fossil fuel and polluting industry donations to President Trump and Republican campaigns during the 2024 election cycle and demonstrates how the industries unlocked power over executive branch agencies in the form of personnel and policy decisions. Senate Democratic investigators found over the course of 19 investigations into Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulatory rollbacks, 13 investigations into nine other agencies, and another 13 investigations into 88 separate polluters, backed by original analyses of campaign finance filings, corporate earnings, and investor communications. The near-total refusal of the Trump Administration—and the fossil fuel administration that runs it—to cooperate with legitimate Congressional oversight complicated the investigations, but truth has a way of finding the light, and some corruption casts a shadow too unmistakable to conceal. 134 articles in 64 journals by 882 contributing authors

Physical science of climate change, effects

AMOC Discrepancies across Reanalyses and Models Limit Dynamical Understanding, Raganato et al., Journal of Climate 10.1175/jcli-d-25-0618.1

Contrasting aerosol–cloud feedbacks across a warming Arctic, Chua et al., Nature Geoscience Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41561-026-02114-x

Exploring the Genesis and Climatic Drivers of Marine Heatwaves in the Indonesian Maritime Continent: Insights from South Java and Karimata Strait, Iskandar et al., Dynamics of Atmospheres and Oceans 10.1016/j.dynatmoce.2026.101709

Iceberg Freshwater Transport Alleviates Future Weakening of Antarctic Bottom Water Formation, Shi & Li, Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.20710821

Reassessing the Role of the Antarctic Slope Current in Poleward Ocean Heat Transport, Aguiar et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Oceans Open Access 10.1029/2025jc023934

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
A climate change signal in the tropical Pacific emerges from decadal variability, Nature Communications, 10.1038/s41467-024-52731-6 20 cites.

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Observations of climate change, effects

A country-level storyline attribution of global warming on heat-related extremes in South America, León-FonFay et al., Weather and Climate Extremes Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.wace.2026.100961

Climatic and Hydrological Changes Drive Contemporary Fire Regime Transitions in the World's Largest Wetland, Barros-Rosa et al., Global Change Biology Open Access pdf 10.1111/gcb.71089

Decreasing Translation Speed of Rapid Expansion Tropical Cyclones Over the Western North Pacific, Li & Tang, Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026gl125625

Earlier and faster heatwave onset on land under a warming climate, Xu et al., Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-026-02762-2

Long-term temperature, oxygen and water clarity trends in Swiss lakes, Bärenbold et al., Earth system science data Open Access pdf 10.5194/essd-18-6527-2026

Nighttime warming dominates the thermal evolution of lakes across China, Chen et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-78114-7

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
South America is becoming warmer, drier, and more flammable, Communications Earth & Environment, 10.1038/s43247-024-01654-7 75 cites.

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Instrumentation & observational methods of climate change, effects

A 30-year synthetic climatological normal dataset for Ghana generated using the CDSim framework, Osei et al., Frontiers in Climate Open Access pdf 10.3389/fclim.2026.1798088

Capability of Planet Dove for monitoring the world's coastlines, Cavanaugh et al., Remote Sensing of Environment Open Access 10.1016/j.rse.2026.115630

GloSVeT: a global 0.05° monthly mean surface soil and vegetation component temperature dataset (2003–2023), Liu et al., Earth system science data Open Access 10.5194/essd-18-6885-2026

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Accuracy of daily extreme air temperatures under natural variations in thermometer screen ventilation, Atmospheric Science Letters, 10.1002/asl.1256 7 cites.

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Modeling, simulation & projection of climate change, effects

Assessing Taiwan's Future Climate: High Resolution Projections and Regional Impacts From Statistical Downscaling of CMIP6 Data, Chen et al., International Journal of Climatology Open Access 10.1002/joc.70431

Centuries of global heating from Carbon Majors: Dependence on future emissions pathways, Frierson & Henrie, PLOS Climate Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0001036

Changing Antecedent Land-Surface Conditions Can Amplify Future Heat Extremes Across New Zealand, Debsharma et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026gl124647

Climate change is projected to widen global inequalities in ocean-derived wellbeing, Zhang et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-04070-1

Global Emissions Since the Paris Agreement Have Intensified Europe's Recent Heatwaves, Trok et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl125079

Mediterranean cyclones from pre-industrial to future climate: changes in extreme wind, precipitation and compound precipitation–wind events, Doensen et al., Weather and Climate Dynamics Open Access pdf 10.5194/wcd-7-1899-2026

One History, Many Futures: Exploring Climate-Driven Changes in Estuarine Water Temperature and Salinity (Sado Estuary Case Study), Biguino et al., Earth s Future Open Access 10.1029/2025ef007408

Projected Future Changes of Australian Boundary Currents—Insights From Dynamical Downscaling Simulations, Jin et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Oceans Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026jc024251

Reduced Asian monsoon influence on Mediterranean summers in a warmer climate, Yu et al., Nature Geoscience 10.1038/s41561-026-02091-1

Volcanic Aerosol Forcing Suppresses Tropical African Rainfall: Mechanisms and Modulation by a Warmer Climate, Yu et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres 10.1029/2026jd046721

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Arctic Amplification of marine heatwaves under global warming, Nature Communications, 10.1038/s41467-024-52760-1 25 cites.

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Advancement of climate & climate effects modeling, simulation & projection

Atmospheric nudging in weather and climate modeling: Bias reduction, mechanism isolation, and attribution, Orbe et al., Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society 10.1002/qj.70300

CMIP6 data usage: lessons learned from more than 200 million downloads, Lavoie et al., Geoscientific model development Open Access pdf 10.5194/gmd-19-8977-2026

Fifteen years of regional climate downscaling in CORDEX-Australasia, Evans et al., PLOS Climate Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0001066

Impact of Model Resolution on Antarctic Bottom Water Representation in Coupled Climate Models, Shu et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Oceans Open Access 10.1029/2025jc023640

Simulation of Coastal El Niño Events in CMIP6 Models and Its Relationship to Mean-State and ENSO Biases, Tello & Karamperidou, Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2025gl120974

Systematic Overestimation of Global Peak Runoff Synchronization in CMIP6 Models, Yang et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026gl122766

The NASA-GISS ModelE2.1-CC2 ESM: development and evaluation, Romanou et al., Geoscientific model development Open Access 10.5194/gmd-19-9131-2026

The North American CORDEX-CMIP6 WRF evaluation run: comparing historical simulations from 25 km to convection-permitting scales, Stuivenvolt-Allen et al., Geoscientific model development Open Access 10.5194/gmd-19-8995-2026

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
AI-empowered next-generation multiscale climate modelling for mitigation and adaptation, Nature Geoscience, 10.1038/s41561-024-01527-w 88 cites.

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Cryosphere & climate change

A comprehensive rock glacier inventory for the Peruvian Andes (PRoGI): dataset, characterization and topoclimatic attributes, Medina et al., Earth system science data Open Access 10.5194/essd-18-345-2026

Dynamic thinning and grounding line retreat in Porpoise Bay, Wilkes Land, East Antarctica, Weatherley et al., cryosphere Open Access pdf 10.5194/tc-20-5509-2026

Impact of climate forcing time step in an ice-sheet firn model, Aker et al., cryosphere Open Access pdf 10.5194/tc-20-5475-2026

Listening to Tsunami Waves Induced by Glacier Calving, G?owacki et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026gl125399

Permafrost Detachment Slides: A Distinct High-Magnitude Permafrost Mass Wasting Process, Young et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026gl124103

Permafrost-Thaw Driven Acid-Rock Drainage Threatens Arctic Aquatic Ecosystems, Skierszkan, AGU Advances Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026av002822

Sea level & climate change

North Atlantic sea level budget revisited, Song et al., Ocean science Open Access pdf 10.5194/os-22-2903-2026

Warming and Sea-Level Rise Transform Intertidal Sediment Thermal Dynamics, Liu et al., Earth s Future Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026ef008924

Paleoclimate & paleogeochemistry

Coupled increases in pelagic fish productivity and export productivity during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum, Zhou et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-77863-9

Dead Sea Warming and the Origin of Salt Giants, Guillerm et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl124167

Palaeocene climate warming as a catalyst for wildfire intensification, Theurer et al., Scientific Reports Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41598-026-72676-8

Reconstructing Climate From Coral Skeletal Banding: Statistical Effects of Replicating Cores and Observers, Hedger et al., Paleoceanography and Paleoclimatology Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026pa005546

Biology & climate change, related geochemistry

Abrupt Onset and Persistent Downstream Effects of Acid Rock Drainage on Rivers Across Northwest Arctic Alaska, Evinger et al., AGU Advances Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026av002407

Abrupt pH changes overestimate the responses of Chaetoceros muelleri to ocean acidification, Zhao et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-77753-0

Changes in Potential Suitable Habitats, Species Turnover, and Conservation Gaps of Wild Plants in the Tarim Basin, China, Chen et al., Ecology and Evolution Open Access 10.1002/ece3.74393

Climate Change Impacts on the Distribution Patterns and Habitat Suitability of the Oriental Stork (Ciconia boyciana) in China: Implications for the “30 × 30” Conservation Targets, Chen et al., Ecology and Evolution Open Access pdf 10.1002/ece3.74424

Climate mitigation contributes more to population persistence than evolutionary adaptation in a long-lived seabird, Jenouvrier et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Open Access 10.1073/pnas.2620362123

Climate-Driven Hydraulic Traits Shift in Natural and Planted Forests: Patterns, Drivers, and Future Acclimation, Bai et al., Earth s Future Open Access pdf 10.1029/2025ef006678

Climate-Driven Shifts in Flowering Phenology of Wild Tropical Plants Uncovered by Century-Long Herbarium and Photographic Records, Xue et al., Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.71130

Complete Chloroplast Genomes of Five Ulmus pumila Cultivars: Comparative Analysis, Evolutionary Dynamics, and Germplasm Authentication Implications, Wang et al., Ecology and Evolution Open Access 10.1002/ece3.74352

Economic incentives for conifers may limit broadleaf expansion in climate-adaptive European forests, Djahangard et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-04087-6

Natural disturbances from bark beetle outbreaks and windthrow increasingly affect Europe's most mature and carbon-rich forests, Besnard et al., Biogeosciences Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-23-5983-2026

Ocean dynamics amplify remote warming effects of reforestation, Banville et al., Earth System Dynamics Open Access 10.5194/esd-17-1315-2026

Ocean warming and acidification reveal transcriptional plasticity in the gastropod Hexaplex trunculus, Sarropoulou et al., Marine Environmental Research Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.marenvres.2026.108426

Permafrost-Thaw Driven Acid-Rock Drainage Threatens Arctic Aquatic Ecosystems, Skierszkan, AGU Advances Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026av002822

Projecting Impacts of Marine Heatwaves and Their Effects on Long-Term Changes in Marine Ecosystems Over the 21st Century, Luzinais et al., Global Change Biology Open Access 10.1111/gcb.71123

The Future of Native Bees in Australia Under Environmental and Anthropogenic Change, Howard & Prendergast, Ecology and Evolution Open Access 10.1002/ece3.74363

Unprecedented Warming and Increased Herbivory Drive Collapse of Japan's Kelp Forests, Harvey et al., Global Change Biology Open Access pdf 10.1111/gcb.71106

We Are Dying to Eat You: Cannibalism and Disease Transmission Under Global Climate Change, Rougeau & Elderd, Ecology and Evolution Open Access 10.1002/ece3.74403

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Climate change and deer in boreal and temperate regions: From physiology to population dynamics and species distributions, Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.17505 26 cites.

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GHG sources & sinks, flux, related geochemistry

A 7-Year Eddy Covariance Dataset of the Energy, Water Vapour and Carbon Dioxide Fluxes Observed in a Siberian Dwarf Pine Ecosystem, Iwata et al., Geoscience Data Journal Open Access pdf 10.1002/gdj3.70101

A Global Database of Soil Methane uptake (SMUD), Jiang et al., Earth system science data Open Access pdf 10.5194/essd-18-6783-2026

An assessment of a CO2 transport model simulations using surface, aircraft and satellite data (2015–2021), Das et al., Atmospheric Environment 10.1016/j.atmosenv.2025.121754

Assessment of CO2 storage potential in global marine sediments based on machine learning methods, Zhang et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2025.105210

C-PEAT's Global Peatland Carbon Database (v.2025), Loisel et al., Earth system science data Open Access pdf 10.5194/essd-18-6485-2026

Examining challenges and uncertainties associated with using water table management to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from grassland peat soils, Pierce et al., Environmental Science & Policy Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.envsci.2026.104495

Global carbon dioxide flux into the surface ocean intensified by rain-induced dilution, Witte et al., Nature Geoscience Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41561-026-02112-z

Global dispersal of macroalgae-derived recalcitrant DOC may substantially contribute to deep-ocean carbon storage, Feng et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.aeg3815

Methane emissions from penguin colonies reshape the natural greenhouse gas budget, Román et al., npj Climate and Atmospheric Science Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41612-026-01556-9

Methane oxidation in African lakes increases with phytoplankton and outweighs photosynthesis-driven oxic methane production, Borges et al., Nature Communications Open Access 10.1038/s41467-026-78255-9

Minimal impact of recent decline in C4 vegetation abundance on atmospheric carbon isotopic composition, Lavergne et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-025-03102-6

Natural disturbances from bark beetle outbreaks and windthrow increasingly affect Europe's most mature and carbon-rich forests, Besnard et al., Biogeosciences Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-23-5983-2026

Natural methane emissions feedbacks in MAGICC v. 7.6, Sloughter et al., Geoscientific model development Open Access pdf 10.5194/gmd-19-9063-2026

Optimized wetland rewetting strategies can control methane, carbon dioxide, and oxygen responses to water table fluctuations, Zhao et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-025-03163-7

Pelagic sea cucumbers in the Galapagos: Midwater grazers that short-circuit deep-sea carbon flux, Robison, Ecology Open Access pdf 10.1002/ecy.70536

Responses of Soil Organic Matter and Minerals to Winter and Growing Season Climate Change, Goebel et al., Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.71110

Simulation and analysis of CO2 concentration in China from 2009 to 2021 based on the WRF-Chem model, Liu et al., Atmospheric Research 10.1016/j.atmosres.2025.108732

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Inland water greenhouse gas emissions offset the terrestrial carbon sink in the northern cryosphere, Science Advances, 10.1126/sciadv.adp0024 40 cites.

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CO2 capture, sequestration science & engineering

Assessing Earth system responses in mitigation scenarios with activity-driven simulation of carbon dioxide removal, Schwinger et al., Earth System Dynamics Open Access pdf 10.5194/esd-17-1341-2026

Fast and selective CO2 capture from outdoor air by covalent organic frameworks, Zhou et al., Nature Sustainability 10.1038/s41893-025-01735-1

Land use sequestration potential and uncertainties in India’s net-zero pathway, Rajbanshi et al., Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.21853095

Pathways for biochar carbon removal: A national foresight study, Campion et al., Energy Research & Social Science Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.erss.2026.104988

The Triassic Mercia Mudstone Group: Sealing the UK's net zero future, Mcevoy et al., Earth-Science Reviews Open Access 10.1016/j.earscirev.2026.105678

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Carbon sequestration potential of tree planting in China, Nature Communications, 10.1038/s41467-024-52785-6 101 cites.

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Decarbonization

Regional dynamics of agrivoltaics adoption: Stakeholder perceptions and barriers in Maryland, USA, Morash & Pavao-Zuckerman, Energy Policy Open Access 10.1016/j.enpol.2025.115066

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Solar transpiration–powered lithium extraction and storage, Science, 10.1126/science.adm7034 244 cites.

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Geoengineering climate

Biogeochemical and Carbonate Chemistry Response to Natural and Anthropogenic Mineral-Based Ocean Alkalinity Enhancement, Mehta et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Biogeosciences 10.1029/2026jg009697

Constraints on Ocean Alkalinity Enhancement: Limited Olivine Dissolution and Secondary Precipitation During Periclase Addition to Seawater, Mehta et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Biogeosciences Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026jg009977

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Next steps for assessing ocean iron fertilization for marine carbon dioxide removal, Frontiers in Climate, 10.3389/fclim.2024.1430957 17 cites.

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Black carbon
Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Microplastic and Associated Black Particles From Road-Tire Wear: Implications for Radiative Effects Across the Cryosphere and in the Atmosphere, Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres, 10.1029/2024jd041116 26 cites.

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Aerosols

Climate impact of contrail cirrus from hydrogen combustion aircraft, Pettersson et al., Atmospheric chemistry and physics Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-26-13485-2026

Volcanic Aerosol Forcing Suppresses Tropical African Rainfall: Mechanisms and Modulation by a Warmer Climate, Yu et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres 10.1029/2026jd046721

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
A machine learning paradigm for necessary observations to reduce uncertainties in aerosol climate forcing, Nature Communications, 10.1038/s41467-024-52747-y 27 cites.

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Climate change communications & cognition

Information on public opinion has lasting effects on second-order climate beliefs, but minimal and ephemeral effects on first-order beliefs, Barnfield et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology Open Access 10.1016/j.jenvp.2026.102901

Strategic Frame Differentiation in Environmental Communication: Evidence from China Daily's Bilingual Climate Change Reporting, Yang et al., Environmental Communication 10.1080/17524032.2026.2674274

The Importance of Accounting for Stakeholder Values, Power Relationships and Language in Constructing Relevant and Trustworthy Climate Information, Maraun et al., Earth s Future Open Access pdf 10.1029/2024ef005618

Understanding the Gateway: Unpacking the Mechanisms, Boundaries, and Outcomes of Climate Consensus Messaging, Göbel et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology Open Access 10.1016/j.jenvp.2026.102913

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Understanding ecological grief as a response to climate change-induced loss in Ghana, Climate and Development, 10.1080/17565529.2024.2407342 17 cites.

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Agronomy, animal husbundry, food production & climate change

Agricultural liming is a carbon sink in the Mississippi River Basin, Suhrhoff et al., Nature Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41586-026-11040-2

Association between climate variability adaptation practices and household food security in three agro-ecological zones of northwestern Ethiopia, Nega et al., Discover Sustainability Open Access 10.1007/s43621-026-04827-w

Comparative analysis of methane flux measurement methods under continuous flooding and alternate wetting and drying in Arkansas rice fields, Ranniku et al., Agricultural and Forest Meteorology Open Access 10.1016/j.agrformet.2026.111488

Evaluating farmers' adaptation strategies amid rising heat and climatic extremes in San Diego County, California, Bross et al., Climate Risk Management Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.crm.2026.100880

Manure to insect farming for feed mitigates nitrogen and greenhouse gas emissions, Cheng et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Open Access 10.1073/pnas.2604870123

Modeling the agricultural suitability of key crops under climate change scenarios in british columbia using spatial machine learning, Vakhshoori et al., Agricultural and Forest Meteorology Open Access 10.1016/j.agrformet.2026.111492

Multi-Decadal Analysis on the Impact of Climate Change, Genetic Gain, Cultivar Type, and Harvest Timing on Main and Ratoon Rice Yield and Quality, Wilson et al., Global Change Biology Open Access 10.1111/gcb.70679

Regional dynamics of agrivoltaics adoption: Stakeholder perceptions and barriers in Maryland, USA, Morash & Pavao-Zuckerman, Energy Policy Open Access 10.1016/j.enpol.2025.115066

The carbon footprint of the farming of edible brown alga Sargassum naozhouense, Sun et al., Marine Environmental Research 10.1016/j.marenvres.2025.107738

The impact of climate risk on forestry ecological total factor productivity: evidence from double machine learning, Wang et al., Frontiers in Forests and Global Change Open Access pdf 10.3389/ffgc.2026.1930608

[Personal View] Promoting climate-resilient agriculture and food security through school feeding, Singh et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2025.101414

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Inventory of methane and nitrous oxide emissions from freshwater aquaculture in China, Communications Earth & Environment, 10.1038/s43247-024-01699-8 32 cites.

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Hydrology, hydrometeorology & climate change

Anthropogenic warming is projected to divert atmospheric rivers toward densely populated Asia, Liang et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-04075-w

Characterizing meso-level organizations engaged in climate change adaptation work in Africa: A configurational analysis, Ma et al., Environmental Science & Policy Open Access 10.1016/j.envsci.2026.104503

Climate change integrated intensity-duration-frequency analysis for the coastal cities of Kochi and Kozhikode, India, Drissia & Radhakrishnan, Urban Climate Open Access 10.1016/j.uclim.2026.103163

Decreasing Translation Speed of Rapid Expansion Tropical Cyclones Over the Western North Pacific, Li & Tang, Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026gl125625

Emerging Hydroclimatic Risks in Pakistan: Regional Projections of Precipitation Characteristics Under CMIP6 Scenarios, Khan, International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70577

Evaluation and Projection of Northwest China's Extreme Precipitation Using Statistically Downscaled CMIP6 Models, Zhang et al., International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70237

Observed Decreases in Seasonal Drought across the Northeastern United States, Wargo et al., Journal of Hydrometeorology 10.1175/jhm-d-25-0103.1

Reversed variation of September and October rainfall over West China and its enhanced linkage to Arctic Sea ice in the Pacific sector since the early 1990s, Wang et al., Atmospheric Research Open Access 10.1016/j.atmosres.2026.109364

Tree-ring δ18O reveals a consistent decrease in April precipitation in southeastern China since the 1950s and its linkage to global climate phenomena, Wang et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2025.105249

Volcanic Aerosol Forcing Suppresses Tropical African Rainfall: Mechanisms and Modulation by a Warmer Climate, Yu et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres 10.1029/2026jd046721

Water Storage Capacity Dynamics in Drained Boreal Peatlands: Responses to Rewetting and Climate Change, Salimi et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl124233

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Dynamic assessment of the impact of compound dry-hot conditions on global terrestrial water storage, Remote Sensing of Environment, 10.1016/j.rse.2024.114428 20 cites.

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Climate change economics

Climate- and nature-related transition risks in Brazil: capital stranding and financial vulnerability, Scala et al., Figshare Open Access 10.6084/m9.figshare.33980207.v1

Measuring the compound flood risk from economic growth, sea-level rise and land subsidence on insurance affordability in China's coastal cities, Lin et al., Climate Risk Management Open Access 10.1016/j.crm.2026.100877

New labour and agricultural damages improve climate cost estimates, Moore et al., Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-026-02749-z

The impact of financing cost differences on global energy and industry decarbonization, Waidelich et al., Nature Climate Change Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41558-026-02756-0

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:

Reducing the cost of capital to finance the energy transition in developing countries, Nature Energy, 10.1038/s41560-024-01606-7 116 cites.

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Climate change mitigation public policy research

A critical political economy of climate obstruction: forests, fossils, and foundations of developmentalism in Indonesia, Fünfgeld, Climate and Development Open Access 10.1080/17565529.2025.2609768

Carbon pricing and clean energy markets: Policy effectiveness in an era of trade wars, Jiang, Energy Policy Open Access 10.1016/j.enpol.2026.115624

Institutional betrayal in climate action: Youth experiences and future pathways, Nosek et al., Environmental Science & Policy Open Access 10.1016/j.envsci.2026.104497

Policy, trade, and opinion dynamics in the transition to electric vehicles in Canada, Khajehdehi et al., Environmental Research Infrastructure and Sustainability Open Access pdf 10.1088/2634-4505/aea89b

Resistance as climate change mitigation: Contested emissions from Japan's anti-coal movement, Thiri et al., Energy Research & Social Science Open Access 10.1016/j.erss.2026.104976

Time–frequency and distributional heterogeneity in the drivers of consumption-based carbon emissions across the E7 emerging economies, Fakhrullah et al., Frontiers in Environmental Science Open Access pdf 10.3389/fenvs.2026.1933128

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Green hydrogen transitions deepen socioecological risks and extractivist patterns: evidence from 28 prospective exporting countries in the Global South, Energy Research & Social Science, 10.1016/j.erss.2024.103731 70 cites.

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Climate change adaptation & adaptation public policy research

From awareness to action: Climate change knowledge, perceived impacts, and adaptation responses in coastal Keta, Ghana, Agyemang & Nunekpeku, Environmental Science & Policy Open Access 10.1016/j.envsci.2026.104502

From Policy to Participation: How Trust and Communication Shape Climate Resilience in Longyearbyen, Svalbard, Badu et al., Environmental Communication Open Access 10.1080/17524032.2026.2734419

Heat, water, and hillsides: An integrated diagnosis of compounded climate risks for coastal adaptation in Brazil, Torres et al., Urban Climate Open Access 10.1016/j.uclim.2026.103164

Resolving the fire governance paradox in an increasingly fire-prone world, Devenish et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-04090-x

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Urban water infrastructure: A critical review on climate change impacts and adaptation strategies, Urban Climate, 10.1016/j.uclim.2024.102132 98 cites.

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Climate change impacts on human health

An open-access workflow combining climate model projections with epidemiological frameworks to assess air quality mortality, Wells et al., Frontiers in Climate Open Access pdf 10.3389/fclim.2026.1847091

Our lands, our minds: research and action agenda on Indigenous mental health in a changing climate, Hill et al., Frontiers in Climate Open Access pdf 10.3389/fclim.2026.1724441

[Articles] Projecting and valuing climate change impacts on anxiety and depression in the contiguous USA: a damage function approach, Belova et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2025.101426

[Comment] Framing climate change, migration, and health as a syndemic, Schwerdtle et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2026.101443

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Temperature-Driven Dengue Transmission in a Changing Climate: Patterns, Trends, and Future Projections, GeoHealth, 10.1029/2024gh001059 19 cites.

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Climate change & geopolitics
Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
“We rather not connect trade to politics, let alone geopolitics” – The changing role of Russia as a landscape pressure for zero-carbon energy transitions, Energy Research & Social Science, 10.1016/j.erss.2024.103775 12 cites.

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Climate change impacts on human culture

Impact of climate change on ski tourism and its adaptation research: Progress and prospects, YANG et al., Advances in Climate Change Research Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.accre.2026.09.013

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Hajj pilgrims suffer from climate extremes, Science, 10.1126/science.adr2696 3 cites.

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Other

Artificial Intelligence and Climate Risk Shocks, Chen et al., Risk Analysis Open Access pdf 10.1111/risa.70371

Women, cuckoos, and new generations among darkening peaks: temporalities of climate crisis in the Himalayas and beyond, Diemberger, Apollo (University of Cambridge) Open Access pmh:oai:www.repository.cam.ac.uk:1810/408385

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
The Evolution of the Hunga Hydration in a Moistening Stratosphere, Geophysical Research Letters, 10.1029/2024gl110841 18 cites.

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Informed opinion, nudges & major initiatives

Addressing Epistemic Risk in Actionable Earth System Science, Emard et al., Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society Open Access pdf 10.1175/bams-d-24-0218.1

Carbon removal projects need to get justice right, Fritz et al., Nature Climate Change Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41558-026-02739-1

COP29 at the climate crossroads: achievements, gaps, and implications for a warming world, Khan et al., Frontiers in Climate Open Access pdf 10.3389/fclim.2025.1685999

[Personal View] Leave no one behind: a call to include people with disabilities in climate change and health research, Kim et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2026.101440

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Diversity in IPCC author’s composition does not equate to inclusion, Nature Climate Change, 10.1038/s41558-024-02150-8 9 cites.

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Book reviews

Climate unrest comes to a fictionalized France, Dames, UNC Libraries Open Access 10.17615/z3vg-n281

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

Global Recommendations on Nationality and Statelessness in the Context of Climate Change, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and the Peter McMullin Centre on Statelessness

The authors focus on practical measures that States and other stakeholders can take now to identify and protect stateless persons, and to reduce and prevent statelessness in climate-vulnerable contexts. The recommendations are intended to support practical action to prevent new cases of statelessness, reduce existing statelessness, and protect those whose rights are at risk in the context of climate change. They can be advanced through international, regional, national and local measures, including by integrating safeguards into nationality laws, and by informing efforts to strengthen civil registration and identity systems, human mobility frameworks, disaster risk reduction, emergency preparedness and response, and climate adaptation planning.

Software Developers on Climate Change, AI, and Sustainable Software: A survey of GitHub users, Summer 2026, Vorreuter et al., Yale Program on Climate Change Communication

This report is based on findings from a survey of GitHub users conducted between June 30 – August 9, 2026. 1,039 GitHub users were interviewed (18+) in the 50 U.S. states and Washington, D.C. All questions were administered online in English using the Qualtrics platform. Portions of this survey use validated items from Climate Change in the American Mind (CCAM), a nationally representative U.S. survey. These shared items make it possible to compare GitHub users’ responses to estimates from the U.S. general population, with the sampling caveats described in the Survey Method appendix. The purpose of the survey is to establish a baseline measure of software developers’ climate change beliefs and risk perceptions, their views on AI’s environmental impact, their perceptions of software efficiency as a lever for sustainability, and their expectations for employers, cloud providers, governments, and GitHub in addressing environmental effect. More than eight in ten respondents (86%) say global warming is happening, while 7% say it is not happening, and 6% say they do not know. A majority of respondents (53%) say global warming is caused mostly by human activities, and an additional 31% say it is caused by a combination of human activities and natural changes. About 1 in 10 (9%) say it is caused mostly by natural changes in the environment.

Global Landscape of Climate Finance 2026, Abraham et al., Climate Policy Initiative

Continued growth in turbulent times is led by private finance in domestic markets. Energy security is becoming more affordable per climate dollar. However, the rate of finance growth must increase dramatically to meet needs. Retreating international public flows create opportunity for domestic and catalytic solutions in Emerging Market and Developing Economies. Increased adaptation spending can sustain development gains.

Warming temperatures fueled evaporation, which, combined with low levels of rainfall, led to the agricultural drought this summer (Ireland), Bergin et al., ICARUS Climate Research Centre, Maynooth University, Met Éireann, and Teagasc

A new rapid attribution study shows that increased temperatures and evaporation levels directly linked to climate change will make for drier farming and land conditions. Human-caused warming has already increased the likelihood of extreme July Potential Evapotranspiration (PET) by approximately 8-fold and the intensity by 7% in Ireland. As global temperatures increase, the authors expect the likelihood and intensity of future July PET events to further increase, with a nearly 6% increase in PET on present levels expected at 3°C of warming globally. Really dry Julys in terms of low precipitation levels, like those experienced this summer, are becoming rarer. However, when these exceptionally dry Julys do occur, they are expected to bring even less rainfall. The evidence indicates that it was the PET which exacerbated the effects of the low rainfall conditions and therefore exacerbated the drought conditions experienced across Ireland in July 2026. In general, drying in July is being driven by rising temperatures, which leads to more evaporation, rather than changes in precipitation. Maximum and minimum summer temperatures are following the expected trend and it is becoming not only more likely to have warm summers, as experienced this year, but future summers are also set to become warmer, not just during the day but also at night.

451,000 at Risk, Greenstone et al., Climate Impact Lab

Scientists project that global land temperatures will be 1.2°C/2.1° F above normal in the coming months due in large part to the current “Super El Niño” that began in June and is expected to last through Northern Hemisphere spring. These anomalously warm conditions will resemble the higher temperatures that climate change is projected to deliver 20 years in the future and will lead to 44% more extremely hot days than expected in a normal year. El Niño is effectively pushing the world into the future – exposing people to temperatures that will not be the norm for another two decades – before people have time to adapt and protect ourselves. As a result, a projected 451,000 lives will be lost due to heat the first nine months (June-February) of El Niño, compared to a normal year. This is about 65 times larger than the 6,800 people believed to be dead or missing from the recent Nepal flash flood. In just the next 6 months, this includes 239,000 ± 11,000 deaths across the globe. With current forecasts suggesting El Niño will remain in place through spring 2027, all these numbers may grow even higher, particularly as effects such as higher-than-average temperatures and heat-related deaths will linger into June and July.

Germany’s Roadmap for Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels, German Government

The roadmap lays out the policy framework and the key strategies Germany will be pursuing in the various sectors in order to achieve its goal of climate neutrality and thus transition away from the use of fossil fuels no later than 2045. The scientific reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) indicate that ambitious climate action is urgently needed to mitigate the risks posed by climate change and secure prosperity for future generations. In spite of the progress being made, unceasing efforts are still needed. It is not only in Germany that climate policy faces massive challenges in view of the constantly shifting geopolitical and geoeconomic parameters. International cooperation on climate action and transitioning away from fossil-fuel-generated energy is absolutely critical in this regard.

Supply disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz stress test Southeast Asia's gas buildout, Warda Ajaz, GEM

Southeast Asia’s gas buildout shifts at the edges, but more than 100 GW of power remains in development. The author identified more than 100 GW of gas power capacity in development in May 2024, compared with roughly 106 GW still planned. Over that period, individual projects have moved into and out of development, but the overall scale of planned gas power capacity has remained above 100 GW. The region has planned more liquefied natural gas (LNG) import capacity even as the risks of reliance on LNG have become harder to ignore. LNG import capacity in development has risen from about 47 million tons per annum (mtpa) in 2024 to roughly 70 mtpa today, even as the Hormuz disruption tightened supply and drove up LNG prices in Asian markets. The continued expansion of LNG import infrastructure risks deepening exposure to the same supply disruptions and price volatility the crisis has brought to the fore. Domestic gas may cushion the shock in some countries, but it will not remove the region’s growing exposure to imported LNG. The author identifies at least 20 fields that could add around 62 bcm/y of production capacity by 2035, but new supply takes years to develop and may not even supply domestic power markets. The short-term pursuit of domestic gas offers no quick or assured fallback for countries exposed to tightening global LNG markets.

Americans’ views of data centers have turned more negative, Brian Kennedy, Pew Research Center

Americans have grown more negative toward the possible environmental and economic effects of data centers since the beginning of the year. And a majority say they’d be uncomfortable if a new data center started operating in their area. More than half of Americans (54%) now say data centers are mostly bad for the environment, up from 39% in January. Half say they are mostly bad for home energy costs, up from 38%. And 49% say they are mostly bad for people’s quality of life nearby, up from 30%. The new survey was conducted from July 20 to Aug. 9 among 10,548 U.S. adults. Just 4% of Americans think data centers have a mostly good effect in each of these areas.

Soybean: A Producers Guide to Drought Preparation and Recovery in the Southeastern United States, Plumblee et al., US. Department of Agriculture, Southeast Climate Hub

Drought is a natural part of the Southeastern United States climate and a threat to agricultural productivity and profitability. Whether slow developing or rapid onset, droughts can have negative effects on agricultural crops and livestock, depending on timing, severity, and length. Droughts are expected to become increasingly common in the Southeast due to increasing temperatures, longer dry periods between rain events, and growing water demand across the region.

Planetary Health Check 2026, Caesar et al., Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research

The Planetary Health Check (PHC) provides an annual assessment of the state of the Planet. It is structured around the Planetary Boundaries: the nine critical processes that regulate stability, resilience, and the conditions that support life on Earth. For each boundary, one or two indicators, known as control variables, are used to assess its status. These show whether conditions remain within the Safe Operating Space – the range in which the risk of destabilizing the Planet remains low. Beyond a boundary lies the Zone of Increasing Risk, followed by the High-Risk Zone, where the risk of large-scale and potentially irreversible changes becomes high. The 2026 Planetary Health Check finds that seven of the nine Planetary Boundaries are transgressed, and trends for all seven continue to point in the wrong direction, indicating further deterioration in the conditions that support long-term planetary stability.

U.S. Green Bank 50 Impact Report. Growing the Clean Economy: How U.S. Green Banks Mobilize Capital, Reduce Energy Costs, and Benefit American Communities, Green Bank 50

The U.S. Green Bank 50’s inaugural Impact Report is based on an analysis of a robust survey with responses from 48 Green Banks financing clean energy projects across the country, supplemented by more than 200 case studies, independent market research, and dozens of conversations with Green Bank executive leadership teams. The authors analyze the economic, energy, and environmental effects Green Banks have delivered to date; describes emerging strategic partnerships that pair aligned capital from new allies, such as Community Development Financial Institutions, or CDFIs, with the origination capacity of the Green Banks; discusses strategies to open secondary markets and promote the securitization of quality Green Bank loans; and provides recommendations for how Green Banks can bring community-focused clean energy lending to scale.

The Billion Dollar Deal: How the Fossil Fuel Industry Bought the Trump Administration, Cashed In, and Left Americans to Pay the Price, Senate Democrats Anti-Corruption Initiative, Senate Environment & Public Works Committee

The authors trace the massive fossil fuel and polluting industry donations to President Trump and Republican campaigns during the 2024 election cycle and demonstrates how the industries unlocked power over executive branch agencies in the form of personnel and policy decisions. Senate Democratic investigators found over the course of 19 investigations into Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulatory rollbacks, 13 investigations into nine other agencies, and another 13 investigations into 88 separate polluters, backed by original analyses of campaign finance filings, corporate earnings, and investor communications. The near-total refusal of the Trump Administration—and the fossil fuel administration that runs it—to cooperate with legitimate Congressional oversight complicated the investigations, but truth has a way of finding the light, and some corruption casts a shadow too unmistakable to conceal.

U.S. Hydropower Market Report (2026 edition), Uría-Martínez et al., Oak Ridge National Laboratory

The authors describe the steady growth for one of America’s most affordable and reliable sources of domestic energy. They analyze the latest data from public and commercial sources, as well as findings from other Department of Energy research and development projects, to provide a comprehensive overview of the American hydropower and pumped storage hydropower (PSH) fleet and industry trends. The authors show that from 2010 to 2025, the U.S. hydropower fleet grew to include 2,258 hydropower plants and a total generating capacity of 80.55 gigawatts (GW), adding 2.1 GW to the national energy mix—enough to power 1.6 million American homes. This amounts to 5.6% of total electricity across the country. In addition, the 41-plant PSH fleet grew to a total generating capacity of 22.23 GW and storage capacity of 553 GWh or 82.1% of all utility-scale energy storage capacity, adding 1.7 GW through facility upgrades.

Developing Water Reuse Regulations: A State-Level Guide, Gerringer et al., The WateReuse Association

Each state has different drivers, regulatory landscapes, and rulemaking processes that affect how and why utilities and industry pursue water reuse. The guide provides entry points at the state level for readers to understand their local context and suggestions for how to navigate and engage in the rulemaking process in a way that protects public health and the environment.

State-Level Climate Security: Ohio, Madelyn MacMurray and Caroline Mallory, Council on Strategic Risks

Ohio faces escalating exposure to extreme precipitation, flooding, heat, and drought. In the first six months of 2026, the state accrued between $2 and $5 billion in natural disaster costs, ten times higher than the $250-$500 million in damages usually amassed by June. Aging infrastructure, legacy industrial pollution, and rapidly expanding energy demand from data centers compound these hazards, straining the systems that protect Ohioans from a changing climate.

Security, Integration and Industrial Policy: China’s 15th Energy Five-Year Plan, Michal Meidan and Anders Hove, The Oxford Institute for Energy Studies

China’s 15th Five-Year Plan (FYP; 2026–2030) arrives at a pivotal moment for the country’s energy system. It is the final full planning cycle before China’s 2030 carbon-peaking deadline, but it comes also in the context of a difficult external environment, weaker domestic demand in parts of the traditional economy, and a growing imperative to secure the technologies, materials and infrastructure required for China’s industrial development. The resulting energy agenda seeks to reconcile three objectives: energy security, industrial and technological leadership, and China’s climate commitments.

Carbon without borders: Building Europe’s CO2 market, Alevtyna Prykhodko, The Oxford Institute for Energy Studies

As Europe moves from carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) ambition towards large-scale deployment, the challenge is no longer simply how much infrastructure to build, but how to create a functioning carbon management market. The author examines how the coordination of CO? demand, transport and storage can shape CCS development, and why expanding individual parts of the value chain in isolation may not be enough to unlock deployment. Drawing on scenario, corridor and financial analysis alongside stakeholder interviews, the author explores how infrastructure choices can influence both the scale and geography of Europe’s emerging CCS market. The author highlights the role of industrial clusters and cross-border corridors, the potential of emerging storage regions in Central and Eastern Europe, and the policy choices that could determine which regions participate in, and benefit from, Europe’s future CO? network.

Will There Be an African Energy Revolution? That Depends on Who Funds What, Charles Kenny, Center for Global Development

The reach of electricity in Africa is rapidly extending, not least thanks to an explosion in imports of solar panels. This is good news for the quality of life of people in the region and is the primary route to sustainably extend electricity access, but it imposes some challenges on the utility sector. Most of the panels are being used domestically and at small scale. This worsens what were already considerable financial challenges for utility scale private provision. And it suggests a vital role for publicly funded electricity infrastructure to ensure high-quality, financially sustainable power provision, especially to industry

A Framework on Implementing a Compliance Solution Under the EU Methane Emissions Regulation, Rabbani et al., The Oxford Institute for Energy Studies

The European Commission (EC) has introduced the concept of Compliance Solutions as a mechanism for complying with the Monitoring, Reporting and Veri?cation (MRV) requirements of the European Union Methane Emissions Regulation (EU MER) for imports of LNG/gas/oil from Producers in exporting countries. The goal of this paper is to provide stakeholders a framework to design and evaluate Compliance Solutions that are consistent with the EU MER and the EC Recommendations on Compliance Solutions. The authors introduce key concepts, framework principles, and design requirements to implement Certification and Trace and Claim Compliance Solutions for Producers, intermediaries, and Importers in complex supply chains aligned with the EC’s Recommendations and internationally recognized standards on verification schemes and chain of custody programs where additional prescription is warranted. As a case study, the authors assess the potential for the U.N. Environment Program’s International Methane Emissions Observatory/Oil and Gas Methane Partnership (IMEO/OGMP) to establish an independent entity that could serve as a Compliance Solution Provider against the framework presented.

A Research Strategy for Ocean-based Carbon Dioxide Removal and Sequestration 2026, National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine

The report is part of an ongoing effort to evaluate marine carbon dioxide removal (CDR) approaches and identify research priorities needed to inform future decision making. The authors examine marine CDR approaches using a common framework that considers scientific readiness, carbon removal performance, scalability, environmental and social impacts, governance readiness, and justice considerations.

Accelerating Climate Progress with AI: From Science to Action: Proceedings of a Workshop (2026), National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine

A workshop was held on January 13-14, 2026 to discuss the innovative ways AI can enhance climate science and foster resilience, with a focus on decision making and adaptation measures. The workshop brought together experts from government, nonprofits, the private sector, and academia to explore cross-sectoral engagement, identify critical applications where AI can help support climate decision making at speed and scale, and consider how AI's broader societal impacts affect approaches to addressing climate change. The publication presents a summary of the presentations and discussions from the workshop.

Beyond the blue line: Tackling climate, peace, and security challenges in Abyei, Andrew Yaw Tchie and Katongo Seyuba, Norwegian Institute of International Affairs

Abyei, a disputed area between Sudan and South Sudan, faces interconnected climate, peace and security challenges that affect local communities and the operating environment of the United Nations Interim Security Force for Abyei (UNISFA). Drawing on the experiences of UNISFA, the authors examine existing responses to climate, peace and security challenges and opportunities to strengthen them. They recommend greater integration of climate, peace and security considerations into mission planning, training, early warning and preparedness, alongside support for community-level adaptation and social cohesion.

Considerations for Federal Leasing of Onshore Energy: Oil and Gas and Geothermal Power, McPherron et al., Congressional Research Service

Both oil and gas (O&G) and geothermal power are long-standing energy sectors for the United States. The two sectors have many similar characteristics, including use of subsurface resources, ability to provide baseload electricity production, development timelines, drilling technologies and processes, and types of environmental impacts. The technologies also have significant differences. O&G is a more mature sector, with more investment potential and more potential for competitive leasing, but it depends on finite, carbon-intensive resources. Geothermal power has growth potential due to developing technologies like enhanced geothermal systems and the potential to deliver lower-carbon electricity. Geothermal power also has challenges to greater deployment, including high capital costs, difficult operating conditions, lower profit margins on electricity compared to fossil fuels, and other market challenges. These similarities and differences influence how current onshore federal leasing and permitting laws and regulations impact each sector and can inform what changes might be relevant for the future management and development of federal lands and resources.

U.S. Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program: Overview and Considerations for Congress, Kathryn Kynett, Congressional Research Service

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) established the Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program (GHGRP) in 2009 in response to a congressional directive mandating economy-wide reporting of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. EPA described the program's purpose as gathering comprehensive emissions data to inform the development of future climate change policies. The GHGRP requires reporting from three broad groups of covered entities. Direct-emitting facilities in covered source categories report the GHG emissions released directly from their on-site processes and fuel combustion. Suppliers of fuels and industrial gases report the potential emissions associated with their products if combusted, released, or oxidized. Facilities that inject carbon dioxide (CO2) underground must report the quantities of CO2 injected or sequestered underground. Reporting is generally subject to emissions thresholds for both direct-emitting facilities and suppliers, primarily a threshold of 25,000 metric tons of CO2 equivalent (MTCO2e) per year, although certain source categories are required to report regardless of their emissions levels. There is no threshold for CO2 injection facilities, which must report all quantities of CO2 sequestered or injected underground. Beginning in 2025, EPA initiated a series of actions to reconsider the scope and requirements of the GHGRP. In its 2025 proposed rule, EPA asserts that Section 114 does not authorize continued economy-wide data collection, that the data are not needed to carry out the CAA, and that eliminating most reporting requirements would relieve reporting entities of compliance costs. EPA estimates the proposal would produce significant cost savings for reporting entities. Stakeholder positions on EPA's proposal reflect a range of views.

U.S. Satellite Capabilities for Tracking the Wildfire Life Cycle, Keating-Bitonti et al., Congressional Research Service

Satellite capabilities support virtually every stage of the wildfire life cycle: characterizing the prefire environment (e.g., seasonal climate predictions, vegetation); detecting and monitoring wildfires and smoke; and assessing postfire hazards (e.g., debris flows, flash floods) and ecosystem recovery. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) notes that certain satellites provide "information about the location, duration, size, temperature, and power output of those fires that would otherwise be unavailable" through ground-based sensors, aerial drones, or aircraft. These approaches may provide complementary data to satellites, particularly when satellite data are limited in spatial and/or temporal (i.e., the time between observations of the same area) resolution and given the money and time to develop and deploy new satellites.

Midterm Battleground State Poll: Political Priorities & Opinions on the Clean Energy Transition, Beacon Research, Environmental Voter Project

The authors present key findings from a survey of 5,014 likely midterm voters across eight US Senate battleground states. The survey was conducted via online panel from August 28 – September 11, 2026. With large, balanced samples in each of the eight states surveyed — Alaska (460), Iowa (506), Maine (512), Michigan (708), Georgia (713), North Carolina (707), Ohio (507), and Texas (901) — these are functionally eight state-specific polls that can also be viewed as one larger, multi-state survey. The data relating to “climate hushing” is particularly revealing, showing that — by large margins — battleground state voters (a) want politicians to spend more time talking about climate change (not less), and (b) are more likely to vote for candidates who make transitioning away from fossil fuels a top priority if elected.

How Durable are Used Electric Vehicles?, New AutoMotive, British Vehicle Rental and Leasing Association

High-mileage electric cars are less likely to fail an Ministry of Transport (MOT) than equivalent petrol cars. Analysis of 47.4 million MOT tests found relatively little difference between electric and petrol cars at lower mileages once age and mileage are taken into account. From around 60,000 miles, however, the picture begins to change. Electric Vehicle (EV) MOT failure rates level off at approximately 16%, while those for petrol and diesel cars continue to climb. Among vehicles aged three to eight years with 90,000–120,000 miles on the clock, 16.5% of EVs failed their MOT compared with 22.1% of petrol cars. The authors also found no evidence that the additional weight of EVs results in more suspension problems, although EVs recorded more tire defects. Battery health is not assessed as part of an MOT and is therefore outside the scope of the study.

The Hidden Health Costs of AI Data Centers: More Power, More Pollution, Fewer Federal Protections, Environmental Protection Network

As AI data centers drive enormous new demand for electricity the authors find that federal policy is moving in the wrong direction for health, weakening pollution safeguards, accelerating approvals, reducing public information and participation, and diminishing the science and enforcement capacity needed to understand and control pollution. The authors document at least 30 federal actions since January 2025 that, taken together, increase pollution-related health risks as data centers expand. Those risks extend well beyond the data-center fence line, including pollution from on-site generators and turbines and from power plants supplying enormous new electricity loads many miles away.

Beyond indicators. Unpacking the greening agriculture agenda in the Near East and North Africa region, Tutundjian et al., Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

The authors present a Near East and North Africa (NENA)-specific analysis within the broader global framework for greening agriculture, examining progress, persistent gaps and the particular conditions shaping agricultural transformation across the region. They combine Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) and environmental indicators with an assessment of policy, governance and institutional frameworks to provide a more comprehensive picture of greening agriculture in Near East and North Africa (NENA). The analysis highlights structural challenges related to water scarcity, soil and land degradation, biodiversity, climate change and inefficient resource use, while demonstrating how global and headline indicators may not fully capture country- and region-specific realities. The authors examine the extent to which enabling policy and institutional frameworks are supporting the transition towards more sustainable and resilient agrifood systems.

New Data for Africa’s Changing Climate: Mapping Risks, Readiness and Policy Action, The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, the Global Green Growth Institute, and the World Bank

The African continent is highly vulnerable to climate-related risks. At the same time, Africa contributes only 4% of global energy-related greenhouse gas emissions. Policymakers need foundational data on key climate indicators to point the way towards a low-carbon, climate-resilient path. Yet these data remain limited for most African countries. The authors aim to fill the gap in foundational data. First, they show how African countries and cities are exposed to major climate-related hazards, such as extreme heat, and assesses countries’ adaptation readiness. Second, they describe the climate mitigation policy landscape in African countries along with key policy trends. In doing so, they break new ground by building on novel datasets that use robust methods developed by the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI), the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the OECD Sahel and West Africa Club (SWAC) and the World Bank, covering 28 African countries that jointly account for around 73% of African GHG emissions.

Recharged: Repowering America's Solar Fleet with Storage for a New Era of Demand, Price et al., Crux and Foundry-Logic

America's first generation of solar plants is aging out at the exact moment the grid can least afford to lose the capacity. What owners do with aging solar plants — retire them or reinvest to rebuild them — is an increasingly significant question for the solar market and the nation’s electricity system. The authors attempt to define an emerging market opportunity. They size the technical potential of U.S. solar repowering — the capacity it could unlock and the investment it would represent — using a bottom-up model of the installed fleet by installation year and segment. They also set out the variables including interconnection and permitting, capital sources, and tax credits and equipment rules, that owners and market participants will need to work through as they approach the opportunity.

Second-hand EVs retain their value better than industry claims, Transportation and Environment

Electric cars are retaining their value better than the leasing industry claims. This has major implications for potential buyers and the pricing of leasing deals and puts pressure on leasing companies, carmakers and governments to accelerate the EV shift. The discrepancy stems from how the value loss is calculated. The industry commonly relies on used-car transaction estimates for leasing and financing deals. In the four largest EU markets – Germany, France, Italy, and Spain – 2025 data on used transactions shows a 12.9 percentage point depreciation gap between combustion and electric cars. However, The authors' analysis reveals five key variables are omitted from these calculations. Adjusting for them reduces the gap by 80% to just 2.6 percentage points.

Renewing renewables: The next chapter in the energy transition, Lassen et al., Wood Mackenzie

As the first great wave of turbines and modules reach the end of their design life, owners are having to decide whether to abandon their sites, invest in extending their lifespans or renew them. The authors forecast that more than 2.5 terawatts of wind and solar projects will face this decision in the 2040s. As the transition to a new era of renewal occurs, repowering old sites with new equipment will become as important a driver of installations and output growth as opening new ones. The authors quantify the coming wave of decommissioning and repowering and show why, for many markets, this overlooked issue will be one of the most important factors shaping future growth.

Utilize Coalition white paper: A practical framework for measuring grid utilization, Noah Goldmann and Molly Knoll, Utilize Coalition

As states begin putting grid use into law and regulation, the authors offer a framework to measure how infrastructure is used over time, interpret that information in context, and use it to achieve better outcomes for customers. The authors provide a practical framework for utilities, regulators, policymakers, and stakeholders working to understand and apply grid use. Used alongside existing planning metrics and processes, use can help decision-makers distinguish where existing infrastructure can do more, where targeted solutions can address constraints, and where new investment is needed. About New Research

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Australia is lagging behind traditional allies and failing to take the climate threat seriously, according to a distinguished group of former senior security officials, in an open letter published in metropolitan newspapers today . Signatories to the letter include former Defence Force Chief, Adm. Chris Barrie, and Air Vice-Marshall John Blackburn, former Air Force Deputy Chief.

Australia faces a summer of deadly heat, with an unprecedented “super” El Niño underway forecast to bring record global temperatures over the next year. Climate disruption, extreme heatwaves and drought threaten Australians’ health and livelihoods, our energy and transport systems, water security, crops and livestock, and food prices.

The Australian Government has said little about these threats. A 2022 Office of National Intelligence report on climate and security risks remains hidden. There has been no systemic policy action.

• Open letter: https://www.aslcg.org/open-letter/
• Newspaper full-page statement: https://www.aslcg.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/ASLCG_OpenLetter_AClimateSecurityPlan.pdf
• Webinar: https://events.humanitix.com/climate-security-has-the-penny-finally-dropped

The letter published by the security leaders group says that: “One of Australia’s closest security partners, the United Kingdom, has moved decisively to put climate risk at the heart of its foreign and security policy, and has established a dedicated high-level climate security taskforce. Its planning includes food and water security, supply chains, economic disruption and regional instability. Australia should now urgently take comparable steps.”

The UK has established its first dedicated Climate Security Taskforce, bringing together security, military and academic expertise to identify gaps, assess risks and strengthen national preparedness. The UK Government explicitly linked overseas climate shocks to domestic food prices, supply chains and national security.

Specific actions the Government should take include:

• Tell Australians the risks — Release a public version of the 2022 climate-security assessment.
• Build climate-threat intelligence and early warning capacity — Create dedicated capability to detect emerging risks to food, water, energy, infrastructure and regional stability.
• Prepare for food and price shocks — Stress-test Australia’s food system and plan for shortages, supply disruption and rising prices.
• End the fossil-fuel contradiction — such as the Beetaloo Basin, and accelerate decarbonisation. Since 2022, 37 new, expanded or extended fossil-fuel projects have been approved by the Australian Government
• Establish a Climate Security Taskforce — Bring together defence, intelligence, climate, emergency, food and economic expertise.
• Put climate risk at the centre of national-security planning — Develop an overarching national-security strategy with climate disruption and human security at its core.

Next Wednesday 7 October webinar: Lessons from the UK: https://events.humanitix.com/climate-security-has-the-penny-finally-dropped

This is a re-post from The Climate Brink

The 2026-27 El Niño is on track to be the strongest event in the instrumental record. The latest (September 2026) runs of the 14 seasonal forecast models that I track over at the Climate Dashboard put the event’s peak at around 4.1C in the Niño 3.4 region (with the middle 80% of ensemble members between 3.4C and 4.6C), well above the prior record of 2.75C during the 2015-16 El Niño.1

I’ve previously written about how unprecedenteted this event will be. The question I get asked most often now is a more practical one: what does it actually mean for the weather where I live?

I recently published a piece in Nature on the impacts of El Niño and what countries should do to prepare. But I can only fit so much in a short journal article, and there is vast scientific literature on regional El Niño impacts that has accumulated over the past few decades.

This post walks presents a map of higher-confidence El Niño impacts, with an in-depth discussion of each different region. Some of the canonical El Niño impacts show up in nearly every strong event on record, while others turn out to be closer to a coin flip when looking at the record of past events.

Expected regional impacts of the 2026-27 El Niño. Shading shows confidence from the teleconnection literature and the observed record of strong events. Shapes show where at least 80% of 13 seasonal forecast models agree on the sign of the rainfall or temperature anomaly (NMME and Copernicus C3S, September 2026 initialization). Regional impacts beyond the models’ forecast range (e.g. summer 2027) are drawn by hand. Each label shows how many of the eight strong El Niños since 1957 went the expected way and how many of this year’s models agree.

If you want to dig into a particular region, I’ve put togehter an interactive version of this map over at the Climate Dashboard. Clicking on a region brings up how it fared in each of the eight past strong El Niños, what each of this year’s forecast models shows, and a short summary of the relevant research. You can also replay any past strong event across the whole map, step through the forecast season by season, or click anywhere to see the raw model forecast for that spot. 

Likelihoods but not guarantees

El Niño events shift the odds of different climate outcomes, but not every El Niño has the exact same impacts (Mason and Goddard 2001). As NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center puts it in their current ENSO discussion: “With an event of this magnitude, the chances of experiencing impacts consistent with El Niño are larger, but they are not guaranteed.”

To get at how much the odds shift, I’ve leaned on three separate lines of evidence for each region. The first is the published literature on El Niño teleconnections (the physical pathways by which a warm tropical Pacific changes rainfall and temperature elsewhere). I’ve assessed these with IPCC-style confidence levels like high, medium-high, and medium confidence. You can find links to the individual studies I’ve relied on below, with more details shown over at the Climate Dashboard when clicking on a particular region.

The second is the current generation of dynamical seasonal forecasts: 13 independent modeling systems (six from NOAA’s North American Multi-Model Ensemble and seven from the European Copernicus Climate Change Service), which let us see where the models agree and disagree with the teleconnection literature during this particular event.

The third is the past performance during strong El Niño events. For every region on the map I went back to the eight strong events since 1957 (1957-58, 1965-66, 1972-73, 1982-83, 1997-98, 2009-10, 2015-16 and 2023-24) and checked how often that region was drier or wetter than a typical ENSO-neutral year.2 The figure below shows the results. Each cell is one past event, colored by how dry or wet it was relative to neutral years, with a check mark wherever it landed on the expected side.3

Each cell shows rainfall (or temperature) in one of the eight strong El Niños since 1957 (Nov–Jan Oceanic Niño Index ≥ 1.5 °C), for the season shown on the impacts map, relative to ENSO-neutral years after removing long-term trends. Checks mark events on the expected side of the neutral-year median. Data from GPCC v2025, Berkeley Earth, GHCN-Daily stations (Hawaii and Western Pacific islands) and GPCP (Central Pacific islands, 1979 onward only). Model agreement is from the September 2026 forecasts.

A few things jump out here. Across the 26 regions on the map, 86% of region-events went the expected way (176 of 205). The two biggest east Pacific events, 1982-83 and 1997-98, gave the expected impacts in every single region. The two earliest events delivered in only 68% of regions, which likely reflects both sparser rain gauge networks in the 1950s and 60s and genuine differences between events.

That being said, the teleconnection literature draws in part from these same events, particularly 1982-83 and 1997-98, so these hit rates partly restate the evidence the literature was built on. It’s also worth noting that no past event looks like the one forecast for this winter. All eight of these are “strong” events, and 2026-27 is forecast to be well beyond any of them. In the regions with the most reliable signals that probably means larger impacts. But it also means we are extrapolating well outside the training data here.

Asia, Australia and the Pacific

The western tropical Pacific is where El Niño’s fingerprint is clearest, because it is where the atmosphere’s rising branch of the Walker circulation normally sits. When that rising air shifts east toward the central Pacific, the islands and archipelagos that normally sit under it dry out.

Close-up of the impacts map for Asia, Australia and the Pacific. Each card shows how many of the eight strong El Niños since 1957 went the expected way and how many of this year’s forecast models agree.

Indonesia and the Maritime Continent are the single most reliable El Niño impact on the planet. September through December was drier than the median neutral year in all eight past strong events, and in six of them it was drier than any neutral year in the record. Past strong events resulted in around 73% of normal rainfall, and all 13 models agree on drought this autumn. The main risk for the region is fire. Burning on drained peatlands responds very nonlinearly to drought, and the fires during the 1997 El Niño released an estimated 3 to 9 billion tonnes of CO2, equivalent to 13% to 40% of global fossil fuel emissions that year. The haze from the 2015 fires has been linked to around 100,300 excess deaths across Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore.

The Philippines has an equally consistent record, dry from December through April in all eight strong events (with a median of 58% of normal rainfall). This is driven by an anomalous high pressure system that sets up over the western North Pacific during El Niño winters (Lyon and Camargo 2009). Every one of the 13 models shows it this year.

The western Pacific islands, from Palau and Guam through Micronesia, the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and Fiji, were drier than normal (i.e. than in a typical neutral year) in all eight events. These islands also see sea level drop as the warm water sloshes east, which can expose and kill shallow reef flats (Widlansky et al. 2015).

On the other hand, the central Pacific islands of Kiribati and Tuvalu get deluged. Satellite-era data show September to May rainfall there wetter than in any neutral year in each of the five strong events since 1982, with a median of around double normal.

Southern China tends to be wetter from winter through spring, fed by moisture flowing around the same western Pacific high pressure system. The observed record is weaker than for the Philippines, with 5 of 8 strong events wetter than normal, though the big events were very wet (1982-83 brought around 200% of normal rainfall and 2015-16 164%). The models are in strong agreement (12 of 13) on heavier than normal rainfall this year.

The Yangtze basin is generally expected to experience heavy summer rain in the year after a strong El Niño, when the Indian Ocean warms up and acts as a “capacitor” that sustains the western Pacific high pressure system into summer. That signal was real in 1998, the year of catastrophic Yangtze floods. In June and July, when the East Asian monsoon rain band normally sits over the basin, it was wetter than normal during 6 of 8 past strong events, including all six since 1972. However, next summer is beyond the range of any current seasonal forecast, so no model-based odds are available.

The southern Mekong basin (Cambodia, southern Laos and southern Vietnam) was drier than normal in March to May of the year after the El Niño peak in 7 of 8 strong events, with a median of around 71% of normal rainfall. The teleconnections literature suggests that the ENSO drought signal in mainland Southeast Asia is “most consistent and expressed over the largest areal extents during March-May of the year when the ENSO events decay.” The models show a bit less agreement this year (only 4 of 6 models that extend through May show drying) and the literature notes the relationship varies between events, so it shows up on the map as only medium confidence.

In India, the the textbook example of El Niño is a weaker than normal Indian monsoon. North and central India were drier than normal in all eight years during which strong El Niño events developed, and the 2026 monsoon was running around 12% below normal by mid-August. But that season is already behind us; the monsoon in the year after a strong El Niño was drier than normal in only 1 of 8 cases (1966), with the other seven running between 102% and 115% of normal. Part of this is that strong El Niños often flip into La Niña by the following summer, and part of it is that eastern Pacific events like this one appear less effective at suppressing Indian rainfall in the first place (Kumar et al. 2006). Either way, the data do not support calling for a weak 2027 monsoon.4

Sri Lanka’s northeast monsoon (October to December) was wetter than normal in all eight strong events, with a median of 126% of normal (Zubair and Ropelewski 2006). However, Sri Lanka was also on the wet side in 8 of 12 La Niña years, so the island’s autumn rain is less tied to El Niño specifically than the count might suggests. Southern India shows a similar observed record (7 of 8), but it is not on the map because this year’s models disagree about it (only 5 of 13 show a wet signal).

Southeast Australia (Victoria and Tasmania) was drier than normal between September and November in 7 of 8 strong events, with a median of 81% of normal and a severe 44% in 2015. The El Niño dry signal is concentrated in spring, when it is reinforced by the positive Indian Ocean Dipole that often accompanies El Niño (Cai et al. 2009), and it has a habit of reversing in summer. In 2023-24, national rainfall ran 20% below average in spring before summer came in 19% above average. And for eastern Australia more broadly, this year’s models show little signal at all (only 10 of 13 lean dry, which is not significant). It’s worth noting that the 2019-20 Black Summer fires, often associated with El Niño in the public mind, happened during a record positive Indian Ocean Dipole with only borderline El Niño conditions.

Africa

El Niño’s effects on Africa run through the Indian Ocean. This year a positive Indian Ocean Dipole (warm water off East Africa, cool water off Sumatra) has been developing alongside it. That combination points in opposite directions for the two halves of the continent.

Close-up of the impacts map for Africa. Each card shows how many of the eight strong El Niños since 1957 went the expected way and how many of this year’s forecast models agree.

Southern Africa probably the most potentially disasterious impact on the map, because summer rain there feeds the maize crop that tens of millions of people depend on. December to February was drier than normal in 6 of 8 strong events, consistent with Pomposi et al. (2018), who estimate an around 80% chance of below-normal rain in a strong El Niño. The two clear misses were early in the record (1957-58 and 1965-66). The largest recent failure was 1997-98, when the expected regional drought failed to materialize. That has been attributed to regional circulation features (the Angola Low and Botswana High) that vary independently of ENSO, and it isn’t something we can rule out this year. But the most comparable recent case suggests we will see a bigger impact this year: in 2023-24, with an Indian Ocean Dipole almost as strong as 1997’s, southern Africa had the driest season of all eight events (69% of normal), prompting a $5.5 billion regional humanitarian appeal for more than 61 million people. All 13 models show drought this coming summer.

The Horn of Africa (southern Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia) was wetter than normal between October and December in all eight strong events, with 1997 at 241% of normal and 2023 at 175%. Here the Indian Ocean Dipole matters more than El Niño itself. In model studies the influence of the dipole on the short rains is “overwhelming as compared to that of ENSO,” and World Weather Attribution’s analysis of the catastrophic 2023 floods found “no significant role of ENSO but a significant influence of the IOD.” Because strong eastern Pacific El Niños tend to come with positive dipole events, the hit rate here is really a record of the two acting together. That is also what it looks like will occur this year, as all 13 models show a wet season.

The Sahel is not on the map. Its El Niño signal mostly falls on the summer rainy season of the developing year (which for this event was 2026), and even then it was drier than normal in only 3 of 8 strong events. The literature agrees this is one of the weakest teleconnections, with El Niño explaining only a small share of Sahel rainfall variability (Pomposi et al. 2020).

South America Close-up of the impacts map for South America. Each card shows how many of the eight strong El Niños since 1957 went the expected way and how many of this year’s forecast models agree.

The Amazon was drier than normal between October and May in 7 of 8 strong events, and in each of the last five (from 1982-83 onward) it was drier than any ENSO-neutral year in the record. All 13 models agree for this season. But the Amazon is also strongly impacted by longer-term climate changes. A World Weather Attribution study found that “the severity of the [2023-24] drought… is largely driven by climate change,” with El Niño and warming contributing about equally to the rainfall deficit but the drying trend almost entirely due to warming. Fire risk also depends heavily on land management practices, as the large majority of Amazon fires are set by people.

Northern South America (Colombia, Venezuela and the Guianas) was drier than normal in December to February in all eight strong events, with a median of 71% of normal (Poveda et al. 2011). All 13 models agree this year. Northeast Brazil’s March to May rainy season was drier than normal in 6 of 8 events (Hastenrath 2011). That signal depends on tropical Atlantic temperatures as well as the Pacific, which is why it shown as only medium-high confidence. It also has a dashed outline on the map, because after the last El Niño the 2024 rainy season came in right at normal (100%).

The coast of northern Peru and Ecuador is where El Niño got its name, and where its impacts can be most violent. Normally a desert, the coast floods when the ocean just offshore warms enough to support deep convection. Only 1982-83 and 1997-98 brought truly extreme rains, with the coastal grid cells averaging more than double normal rainfall from December to April. Other strong events ranged from somewhat below to somewhat above normal, and in 2023-24 the expected coastal rains largely failed after Peru had set aside around $1.2 billion for flood preparation. What distinguished 1982-83 and 1997-98 was very warm water right along the coast. This year looks more like those two events than the others; in mid-September the far eastern Pacific (the Niño 1+2 region) was running 4.6C above normal, compared to 3.5C in 1997, 2.1C in 2015 and 2.6C in 2023 at the same point. I’ve rated this high confidence provided that coastal warmth persists as predicted by current models.

Southeastern South America (Uruguay, northeastern Argentina, southern Brazil and Paraguay) was wetter than normal between September and February in 7 of 8 strong events (Grimm and Tedeschi 2009), while the 2023-24 season was close to normal. The devastating Rio Grande do Sul floods of May 2024 came much later – in the autumn after the El Niño’s peak – though one attribution study found the El Niño approximately doubled their likelihood (albeit with a very wide uncertainty range).

The Altiplano, the high plateau shared by southern Peru, western Bolivia and northern Chile, gets most of its rain from December to March, and El Niño tends to suppress it. A warmer tropical atmosphere strengthens the upper-level westerly winds over the Andes, which cuts off the easterly flow that normally carries Amazon moisture up onto the plateau (Garreaud and Aceituno 2001). All 13 models show a dry summer this year, one of the strongest model signals anywhere on the map. The observed record is weaker as only 5 of 8 past strong events were drier than normal. The link is closest over the drier western part of the plateau (Vuille et al. 2000) and weaker toward Lake Titicaca in the north, so I’ve rated the region medium confidence.

In Chile, Montecinos and Aceituno (2003) find that during El Niño “there is a tendency for the occurrence of above-average precipitation between 30° and 35°S in winter [June–July–August (JJA)] and from 35° to 38°S in late spring [October–November (ON)].” October and November were wetter than normal in 7 of 8 strong events (with a median of 170% of normal) and in all six moderate El Niños, and all 13 models agree this year.

Further south, the same literature finds relatively dry summers between about 38°S and 41°S during El Niño, and the observed record agrees (7 of 8 strong events drier than normal from January to March), but this year’s models are split (only 8 of 13 show a drier January and February), so I’ve left it off the map. The Atacama Desert does get rare heavy rains in El Niño years, but historically these have come in the winter of the developing year (Vargas et al. 2000), which for this event has already passed.

North and Central America Close-up of the impacts map for North America, Central America and Hawaii. Each card shows how many of the eight strong El Niños since 1957 went the expected way and how many of this year’s forecast models agree.

The US Gulf Coast and Southeast was wetter than normal between December and February in all eight strong events, with 1982-83 at 151% and 1997-98 at 168% of normal (Ropelewski and Halpert 1986). The strengthened subtropical jet stream also brings wetter winters to Cuba and the Bahamas, which were wetter than normal in all eight strong events, with a median of 163% of normal (Giannini et al. 2000). This year all 13 models agree on wetter than normal conditions in both regions.

Southern California, the US Southwest and northern Mexico were wetter than normal between December and March in 7 of 8 strong events, with 1982-83 and 1997-98 both around double normal. The exception was 2015-16 when coastal southern California ended up at only 60% to 68% of normal despite 9 of 10 seasonal models predicting a wet winter that year. Rerun for 1982-83 and 1997-98, those same models called for wet winters (9 of 9 and 10 of 11), which is what happened. El Niño explains at most around a third of West Coast winter rainfall variability even in strong years, so a lot comes down to where individual storms go.

Northern California is a bit more ambigious. It was wetter than normal between December and March in 6 of 8 strong events, including 2015-16 (120% of normal) when Southern California missed, and 1982-83 and 1997-98 were both well above normal (173% and 156%). All 13 models lean wet this year. The misses were 1965-66 (75%) and 2009-10 (90%). However, the signal is not very specific to El Niño. Northern California was also on the wet side in 7 of 12 La Niña winters, only 2 of 6 moderate El Niños were wet, and the El Niño relationship across all winters since 1950 is weak. Past work has generally found the El Niño rainfall signal is concentrated in Southern California, and I’ve added it to the map as only medium confidence for this year.

Further north, El Niño winters tend to be drier in interior British Columbia and the inland Northwest, with lower snowpack (Shabbar et al. 1997). This was observed in 7 of 8 past events, though the typical dry anomaly is small (~95% of normal), so I’ve assigned it only medium confidence.

Central Canada tends to have mild winters during El Niño, with the strongest warmth just west of Hudson Bay (Shabbar and Khandekar 1996). All eight strong El Niño winters were warmer than the typical neutral winter once long-term warming is removed, and the four since 1997 were strikingly warm (2023-24 was Canada’s warmest winter on record). But La Niña winters were also on the warm side in 7 of 12 cases, and it is sensitive to how the warming trend is removed so I’ve assigned it medium confidence.

Hawaii is usually dry during El Niño winters, particularly in eastern Pacific events like this one (Lu et al. 2020). A composite of long-running Hawaiian rain gauges shows November to March was drier than normal in every strong event since 1972 (six of six, with a median of 69% of normal), though 1957-58 and 1965-66 were both wet. All 13 models show a dry winter this year.

Central America and the southern Caribbean (Costa Rica, Panama and the Caribbean coast of Colombia) tend to be drier during El Niño winters. During the 2023 El Niño, drought restricted traffic through the Panama Canal. But December to February is the dry season across much of this region anyway, and in the places where it normally rains during those months drier conditions only occurred in 5 of 8 past events. The more robust Central American signal is midsummer drought during the developing year (e.g. July and August 2026), which has already passed.

While some of the literature on teleconnections suggests that El Niño drives drier conditions in the Ohio Valley, this year’s models lean wet there (only 3 of 13 show drying), and the observed record is a coin flip as it was only drier in 4 of 8 past strong events.

Europe

Europe is conspicuously absent from the map, which has surprised some people given the summer heat and drought across the continent this year. For most of Europe we simply don’t know what El Niño will do this winter.

Multi-model seasonal forecasts for Europe (top) and the winter North Atlantic Oscillation in each strong El Niño winter since 1950 (bottom).

The textbook late-winter pattern (cold northern Europe, wet south) mostly shows up when a sudden stratospheric warming occurs, which can’t be forecast months in advance (Ineson and Scaife 2009). The link may also have weakened since the 1970s. Past strong El Niño winters split 4 to 4 on the North Atlantic Oscillation, 5 of 8 showed a wet UK and central Europe in autumn, and 5 of 8 had a cold Scandinavian late winter. The models (12 of 13) lean wet for the UK and central Europe from October to December this year, but the shifts are small.

The global picture

Because global temperature lags the tropical Pacific by a few months, 2027 is almost certain to be the warmest year on record. My latest forecast, which combines six global temperature datasets with the 14-model ENSO forecast, gives it a 95% to 96% chance, up from around 85% in April. El Niño-driven drought and fire in the tropics also weaken the land carbon sink, which is why the growth rate of CO2 at Mauna Loa hit a record 3.33 ppm in 2024. A similar spike in 2027 is likely. The fourth global coral bleaching event was driven by the 2023-24 El Niño on top of longer-term warming and affected 84% of the world’s reef area. A stronger event arriving before those reefs have recovered raises the risk of widespread mortality next year.

The most reliable El Niño impacts are clustered around the tropical Pacific and in the Americas. Drought in Indonesia, the Philippines, the western Pacific islands and northern South America, and wet winters from the Gulf Coast to Cuba, have shown up in essentially every strong event since the 1950s, and this year’s models agree. Southern Africa, the Amazon and the Horn of Africa are nearly as consistent. Those are the places where preparation (water storage, food reserves, fire management, flood defenses) is urgently needed now before the rains or droughts arrive.

The impact I’d flag most for policymakers is on food. Of the major climate modes of variability, “only El Niño can force globally synchronous crop failures,” because it simultaneously affects breadbaskets on multiple continents. The map shows drought risk for maize in southern Africa, rice in the Philippines and Southeast Asia and a range of crops in northern South America during the first half of 2027.

Its also worth remembering that this event is forecast to be well beyond anything in the observed record, and the two most similar past events (1982-83 and 1997-98) showed the expected impacts in every region on the map.

I’ll update the map when the October forecasts come in, and I’ve put the code and data to reproduce this analysis on my GitHub here.

1 These numbers are from the September initializations of the 14 models tracked on our Climate Dashboard, with each model weighted equally, and use the same convention as NOAA’s Oceanic Niño Index (each month relative to a centered 30-year climatology). The regional impact forecasts in this post use a slightly different set of 13 models that publish rainfall and temperature fields (NMME and Copernicus C3S). For each region, the model check averages every model over the region’s whole season up to February 2027, the last month all 13 cover; seasons that fall mostly after that use the six NMME models, which run through May.

2 Strong events are those with a November–January Oceanic Niño Index (ONI) of at least 1.5C. For each region I compared its average rainfall (or temperature) in the season on the map to ENSO-neutral years, after removing a long-term trend fitted to the neutral years only. An event counts toward the tally if it lands on the expected side of the median neutral year. Percentages of normal are relative to the 1991–2020 average. The main precipitation data are GPCC’s new Precipitation Analysis Monthly Version 2025. The full methods, including all sensitivity tests, are in the GitHub repository.

3 One note on how to read the numbers here: the counts (like 7 of 8) compare each event with a typical ENSO-neutral year, while the percentages (like 70% of normal) are relative to the 1991–2020 average. These usually tell the same story, but not always, because a few very wet or very dry years can pull the average away from a typical year.

4 This is consistent with the long-standing observation that the ENSO-monsoon relationship has weakened since the 1980s. The strongest El Niño on record at the time, 1997, produced a near-normal monsoon even in the developing year (around 102% of normal in our data for north and central India).

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The UK has avoided the need for gas imports worth £5.9bn since the start of the Hormuz crisis as a result of record electricity generation from wind and solar, reveals Carbon Brief analysis.

While gas prices are surging towards levels not seen since the 2022 energy crisis, the UK has been generating record amounts of power from wind and solar, up 14% year-on-year.

This unprecedented clean-power generation is directly cutting the need for gas-fired electricity, which is down by nearly 10% year-on-year in 2026 to date.

In total, wind and solar have generated a record 41% share of the UK’s electricity needs in 2026 to date, compared with 25% from gas, according to Carbon Brief’s analysis.

The figure below shows that wind and solar generation has avoided the need for UK gas imports worth a total of £5.9bn since the outbreak of war between the US and Iran in February 2026.

The analysis shows that these avoided gas imports would have required the UK to secure the equivalent of more than 100 additional tanker deliveries of liquefied natural gas (LNG).

The £1.3bn import saving in September 2026 to date is the result of record wind and solar output, at nearly 10 terawatt hours (TWh), combined with surging gas prices.

Wholesale gas prices in the UK have remained elevated ever since Russia cut off supplies to Europe in the wake of its invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Gas averaged 90p per therm from 2023 until the start of this year, roughly three times above 2019 prices, before the Covid and Ukraine crises.

Since the outbreak of war in the Middle East in March, gas prices have climbed higher still, averaging 134p per therm or nearly four times the level seen in 2019.

In September 2026 to date, gas prices have averaged 189p per therm, reaching their highest level since the global energy crisis in 2022, as shown in the figure below.

UK gas prices are spiking again because winter is approaching – meaning higher demand for heating – and there is no end in sight for the Hormuz crisis.

At the same time, European gas stocks are low. This means Europe will have to compete with Asia to secure the cargoes of LNG needed to keep warm.

In the UK, high wholesale gas prices are hitting household gas bills under the price cap set by energy regulator Ofgem – but thanks to clean energy, electricity bills have barely increased.

From this Thursday, 1 October, typical household gas bills will be 33% higher than they were in April, some £200 per year, according to thinktank Nesta.

In contrast, household electricity bills will only have risen 4%, according to Nesta’s analysis.

Andrew Sissons, director for sustainable future at Nesta, explained in a social media post that “the link between electricity and gas prices has already begun to break”.

The UK and other fossil-fuel importing nations are being hit not only by high gas prices, but also by high prices for oil, diesel and other refined fuels. The EU has reportedly had to pay an extra €100bn for fossil-fuel imports since the start of the crisis.

For example, UK diesel prices this week hit record levels of nearly £2 per litre. In contrast, recent Carbon Brief analysis shows that electric cars are up to nine times cheaper to drive.

In her speech to the Labour party conference this week, energy secretary Miatta Fahnbulleh said that energy bills were high because the UK is “exposed to global fossil-fuel markets”.

In his own conference speech, prime minister Andy Burnham said the expansion of clean energy was easing the impact of high gas prices on electricity bills. He said:

“We are already taking more control of our electricity prices with a massive expansion of home-grown renewables and nuclear. I have asked Miatta to speed up the breaking of the link between what we pay for power at home and the international gas market, to get bills down.”

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This is a re-post from The Climate Brink by Andrew Dessler

The Trump administration is continuing it’s war on climate science. This time, instead of attacking climate science in general, as they tried (and failed) to do with the DOE Climate Working Group, they are going after the U.S. National Climate Assessment (NCA).

The NCA is required at least every four years under the 1990 Global Change Research Act and it serves as the evidentiary basis for a lot of government climate planning in the U.S. Because of this, it’s frequently attacked by the Merchants of Doubt and weakening it is a clear goal of this administration.

There was some chatter that the administration would try to write an entire new version of the NCA that would deny well-established climate science, but my guess is that they have abandoned this. The NCA is a “Highly Influential Scientific Assessment” and therefore must follow specific rules. These include rules about how to select authors, peer review, etc. Following those rules would make it impossible to produce the biased, climate-denying report that they require. And if they don’t follow the rules, they’d lose the inevitable court challenges.

So they instead, they are proposing to amend the Fifth National Climate Assessment (NCA5) by (basically) removing references to the highest emissions scenarios, RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5, which produces the most warming:

This is justified on two grounds: 1) RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 is not an expected emissions scenario and 2) it is not policy relevant. Point 1 is irrelevant since the NCA5 does not refer to it as business as usual, baseline, etc. And Point 2 is just wrong. My comment below expands on these points.

The USGCRP is presently soliciting comments. You can tell USGCRP understands their arguments are weak since they go out of their way to make it as hard as they can for people to comment on it: They’re limiting the comment window to 15 days and comment length to 3,500 words.

Below is my comment on this. If you see any errors, please leave a comment below or email me.

Public Comment on the Proposed Amendment to the Fifth National Climate Assessment Summary

I write to oppose the proposed amendment. It should be rejected in its entirety.

The amendment rests on two false premises: 1) that NCA5 presents RCP8.5 and SSP5-8.5 results as expected, baseline, or business-as-usual futures, and 2) that RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 scenario runs are not useful for policy deliberations. As described here, neither of these premises is true.

First, NCA5 accurately describes RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 as very high emissions scenarios throughout the report. Second, because of uncertainty in many climate parameters (e.g., climate sensitivity), the temperatures produced under RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 are a reasonable upper bound on what the future climate might be. These scenarios are therefore worth examining not as expected outcomes but as plausible worst cases. Eliminating RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 therefore commits one of the cardinal sins of risk assessment: assuming the worst-case will not occur.

In addition, NCA5 frequently uses these scenarios in global-warming-level analysis, which evaluates impacts at different levels of warming but makes no claim about how likely any level of warming is.

Overall, removing RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 analyses would strip sound science from the assessment and make it harder for U.S. policymakers to evaluate the risks of climate change.

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1. NCA5 does not present results with RCP8.5 or SSP5-8.5 as business-as-usual

The term “RCP8.5” and “SSP5-8.5” appear 113 times in NCA5 — 74 mentions of “RCP8.5” and 39 of “SSP5-8.5”. I have inventoried all of them. They appear in 98 passages. Eighty-four of those describe the pathway as a very high scenario and six as a high scenario; the remaining eight carry no descriptor in the sentence itself. NCA5 never refers to RCP8.5 or SSP5-8.5 as business-as-usual or anything similar. Thus, NCA5 already labels the scenario correctly.

2. RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 emissions may be implausible, but temperatures are not

Much of the RCP8.5 discourse misses a key point: in trying to understand future climate changes, our focus is not primarily on emissions. Rather, it is on temperature, which is what drives most climate impacts. So the key question is: are the temperatures predicted by today’s climate models driven by RCP8.5 implausible?

To quantify this, I ran the FaIR climate emulator (v2.2.4, Leach et al., 2021) between 1750 and 2100 under SSP2-4.5 and SSP5-8.5 emissions from RCMIP v5.1.0. Climate-response uncertainty was represented by the 841-member calibrated and constrained parameter ensemble of fair-calibrate v1.4.1. This analysis shows that the warmest of the SSP2-4.5 runs reach the median SSP5-8.5 run (Figure 1).

Fig. 1. Global surface air temperature (GSAT) for two different scenarios, SSP2-4.5 and SSP5-8.5. The spread within each scenario represents parameter uncertainty in the model. It shows that 0.5% of SSP2-4.5 runs predict warming above the median SSP5-8.5 run.

Let me be precise about what this result means. The spread within each scenario in Figure 1 is not noise. Each of the 841 parameter defines a plausible set of uncertain parameters that determine how the climate system responds to emissions: how sensitive it is to carbon dioxide, how quickly the ocean takes up heat, how strongly aerosols cool, how the carbon cycle responds, etc. Because the ensemble was constrained against observations, every one of these descriptions is consistent with the warming observed to date.

The real climate system, of course, has one true set of these properties. This analysis shows that we cannot rule out that the real climate system driven by a SSP2-4.5 emissions delivers warming at the end of the century equal to what a typical model produces under SSP5-8.5 (around 4°C).

The median temperatures in the RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 ensemble are therefore plausible, even if the emissions that produced them are not. As discussed in the next section, this is important for risk assessment.

One might reasonably wonder why we need SSP5-8.5 to estimate the upper limit of SSP2-4.5 runs. Why can’t we just use SSP2-4.5 runs to evaluate the upper limit? You certainly could specifically analyze high-sensitivity models driven by SSP2-4.5 to determine the worst-case scenario, but the available literature doing that is sparse compared to the literature describing RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 results and doing that would require a wholesale revision of the NCA5 that is not being considered here.

Keeping the RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 runs as a plausible upper limit is particularly important given that recent research has emphasized the possibility that models are underestimating future warming. Gyuleva et al. (2026), for example, use the Earth’s energy imbalance to suggest that models with higher transient climate response more accurately fit the planetary energy balance observations of the last few decades. Armour et al. (2024) show further that the strongest evidence against high-sensitivity models, their poor reproduction of the warming since the 1970s, does not actually rule those models out.

In addition, the SSP2-4.5 scenario contains enormous amounts of carbon removal (Anderson & Peters, 2016). In 2100, for example, total carbon capture & sequestration (CCS) in that scenario is 32 GtCO2[1]. Our willingness and ability to implement CCS at this level (about 75% of today’s total CO2 emissions) is entirely hypothetical (Daigle & Ravikumar, 2026). It is therefore possible that we will not do so, meaning that SSP2-4.5 will be understating emissions. This would push SSP2-4.5 temperatures even further into the range of temperatures simulated by RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5.

Thus, the median global temperature predicted by today’s models driven by RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 is a plausible upper limit of warming this century. To the best of my knowledge, there is no analysis that opposes this conclusion and I do not believe the case can be made on current evidence. The proposed amendment does not attempt it.

3. Risk assessment should not confine itself to the most likely outcome

Reaching RCP8.5-level temperatures with SSP2-4.5 emissions, while plausible, is not likely. But that does not mean we should ignore it. In fact, conventional risk management tells us that, when consequences are severe, low-probability extreme outcomes can determine the response.

Levees are built to withstand the hundred-year flood, not the average year. Nuclear power plants’ safety systems are designed against worst-case scenarios, not average operations. Insurance companies maintain solvency by accounting for the worst-case claims scenario, not typical scenarios. In the national defense arena, Vice President Cheney famously said that, if there is a one percent chance that Pakistani scientists are helping al-Qaeda build a nuclear weapon, “we have to treat it as a certainty in terms of our response.”[2]

It is in this role that RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 is valuable: as a plausible upper bound of the temperature distribution given SSP2-4.5 emissions. This contradicts the claim in the amendment that RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 is not policy relevant. In fact, adopting this amendment would mean that our risk assessment would ignore tail risk. This would go against best practices of risk assessment. I also note that the amendment presents this as a correction of a scientific error, when in reality it’s a value judgement about what role upper limit risks should play in deciding how to respond to climate change.

4. Global warming levels

The amendment also ignores other ways the NCA5 uses RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5. In many places, NCA5 does not use RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 as a possible emissions trajectory but to predict impacts at various global warming levels (GWLs). In other words, the analysis estimates the climate impacts when the planet is 2°C, 3°C, or 4°C warmer than preindustrial.

For example, Figures 2.9, 2.10, and 2.13 map U.S. temperature, precipitation, and sea surface temperature at 1.5°, 2°, 3°, and 4°C of global warming; Figures 2.11 and 2.12 map extreme heat and extreme precipitation at 2°C; Figures 1.14 and 1.15 in the Overview and Figure 30.3 for the Pacific Islands do the same. The report’s findings are read off these figures: e.g., at 2°C of global warming, U.S. average temperature very likely rises 4.4°–5.6°F (p. 2-21), tropical cyclone winds are 5% faster (p. 2-26), and Midwest extreme precipitation intensifies by 10%–15% (p. 24-19).

None of these are predictions that these temperatures will occur. Rather, they answer a different question: what happens when the climate reaches that temperature.

The amendment’s plausibility argument does not address this alternate use and it performs none of the analysis needed to separate warming-level results from genuinely emissions-dependent ones. It simply declares RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 off-limits, which could be used to strike the GWL analysis from the NCA5. It offers no justification for discarding RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 scenarios in GWL analyses, which is of value even if reaching the top of the temperatures range is unlikely.

Recommendation

Reject the proposed amendment in its entirety.

The amendment fails to correct any errors in the NCA5 and is inconsistent with the underlying science. First, NCA5 accurately describes results with RCP8.5. Second, the amendment declares RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 off-limits to federal decision-making but doesn’t address the fact that the median temperatures predicted from these scenarios is plausible. Third, it presents an institutional judgment about risk tolerance (that we should ignore worst-case scenarios) as though it were a scientific correction. Fourth, it proposes to jettison research about impacts at global warming levels. Thus, adopting the amendment would leave the country less prepared for future climate impacts, including lower probability but high severity outcomes.

Anderson, K., & Peters, G. (2016). The trouble with negative emissions. Science, 354(6309), 182-183, doi:10.1126/science.aah4567

Armour, K. C., Proistosescu, C., Dong, Y., Hahn, L. C., Blanchard-Wrigglesworth, E., Pauling, A. G., Jnglin Wills, R. C., Andrews, T., Stuecker, M. F., Po-Chedley, S., Mitevski, I., Forster, P. M., & Gregory, J. M. (2024). Sea-surface temperature pattern effects have slowed global warming and biased warming-based constraints on climate sensitivity. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 121(12), e2312093121, doi:10.1073/pnas.2312093121

Daigle, H., & Ravikumar, A. (2026). Can we sequester carbon fast enough? Growing disconnect between models and reality. Environmental Research: Energy, 3(3), 031001, doi:10.1088/2753-3751/ae987b

Gyuleva, G., Fischer, E., Knutti, R., & Sippel, S. (2026). Recent Temperature and Energy Imbalance Trends Point to Higher Estimates of Future Warming. Earth’s Future, 14(8), e2026EF008356, doi:10.1029/2026EF008356

Leach, N. J., Jenkins, S., Nicholls, Z., Smith, C. J., Lynch, J., Cain, M., Walsh, T., Wu, B., Tsutsui, J., & Allen, M. R. (2021). FaIRv2.0.0: a generalized impulse response model for climate uncertainty and future scenario exploration. Geosci. Model Dev., 14(5), 3007-3036, doi:10.5194/gmd-14-3007-2021

This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Barbara Grady

As the Western United States grapples with severe drought, leading cities to scramble for water and farmers to abandon some crops, a new scientific study has found that 122 major oil, gas, coal, and cement companies and state-owned operations are partially responsible.

The study found that climate change from all climate-warming greenhouse gas emissions over the last 70 years has resulted in a 36% decline in annual average mountain snowpacks, the major source of surface water in Western states – and that about 40% of that decline is linked to the climate pollution caused by just 122 companies.

The annual loss attributable to those 122 companies is equivalent to the amount of water held by Lake Mead, the nation’s largest reservoir, at full capacity. 

The authors of the peer-reviewed paper, “Carbon emissions exacerbating the Western US water crisis,” also found that global warming from greenhouse gas emissions has led to a 13% decline in average annual streamflows from mountains to the lower-lying areas that depend on them, and to a 4.3% increase in the need for agricultural irrigation. The study attributed about half the streamflow declines and roughly half the increased need for irrigation to the warming caused by the 122 companies. In other words, those companies’ products resulted in a 6% fall in streamflows in the region, according to the study. 

Nine scientists from the University of California at Merced and the Union of Concerned Scientists contributed to the study, published August 25 in the Nature magazine affiliate Communications Earth & Environment. 

The West relies on snowpack 

Summers are dry in the Western U.S. 

Precipitation occurs in winter, with much of it stored as snowpack in the mountains. The West’s multibillion-dollar agriculture industry and the reservoirs supplying cities and towns in 11 states depend on melted snow carried by rivers, streams, and water conveyance systems in late spring and summer. If the snowpack is scant or if snow melts early, water shortages can occur in summer when water demand is highest. 

The West’s historic megadrought has persisted for two decades. With less surface water available, farmers have had to pump more groundwater for irrigation, depleting aquifers so much that the ground is sinking in many agricultural areas. Some farmers in the Southwest have had to abandon crops or fallow fields for lack of sufficient water. Corpus Christi, Las Vegas, Los Angeles and Phoenix are just some of the cities facing severe water shortages.

Tying drought to specific companies 

Emily Williams, lead study author and a postdoctoral research scientist at the University of California at Merced, said in an interview that the study allowed scientists to disentangle how much worse water scarcity became over the decade 2014 to 2024 because of climate-change-induced atmospheric warming, as well as how much worse it became specifically because of the warming emissions generated by 122 companies and their products. 

“It lets us get beyond how much more intense climate change is becoming to look at specific impacts like snowpack decline as well as specific sources” of emissions, she said. Her team found impacts on water resources “not just from climate change but because of emissions traceable to specific sources.” 

The 122 companies cited in the study are the world’s biggest producers of climate-warming greenhouse gas emissions cumulatively up to 2024; they are all coal, oil, gas, and cement producers. That list, known in climate science as the carbon majors and compiled by other scientists, is based on publicly reported coal, oil, gas, and cement production data along with scientific formulas for calculating emissions per unit of product produced. Since 2024, the list has grown to include 178 entities.

Chevron, ExxonMobil, BP, and Shell are the fourth-, fifth-, eighth-, and ninth-biggest cumulative emitters of greenhouse gases in the world, according to the most recent version of the list. The world’s three highest emitters are state-owned coal, oil, and gas companies from the former Soviet Union, China, and Saudi Arabia (Saudi Aramco). U.S. coal producers Core Natural Resources and Peabody Energy are also in the top 25 carbon majors. 

The study authors based their calculations on emissions since 1950, rather than earlier, because that was the decade when major oil and gas companies began to suspect that use of their products would cause changes to the Earth’s climate. Engineers at ExxonMobil who studied the issue determined that burning large amounts of fossil fuels would affect planetary climate systems. After its engineers shared their conclusions with management in the 1970s, ExxonMobil at first expanded that research to learn more and then – a decade later – pivoted to hiding the scientific findings and denying the existence of climate change, as reported in the Pulitzer Prize finalist series “The Road Not Taken” by Inside Climate News. Other major oil companies did the same. 

The study authors wrote that “roughly 70% of global industrial carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions since 1854 are traceable to 122 fossil fuel producers and cement manufacturers (“Carbon Majors”), and ~97% of these emissions occurred after 1950.” 

U.S. oil companies remain silent

When asked on August 27 for a comment on the water crisis study, Chevron – the largest U.S. emitter since 1950 – sent an automatic thank-you note but did not respond to the question by publication. 

Chevron’s second quarter earnings report, released August 12, highlighted record-breaking oil production. The report said the company “achieved new U.S. upstream production record of nearly 2.1 million barrels of oil equivalent per day and record U.S. refinery throughput of over 1 million barrels per day” as well as “competitive growth” in operations “around the globe.” Chevron also has embarked on developing oil resources in Venezuela, which has large deposits of heavy crude – a variety of oil that’s highly polluting to process. 

A media relations receptionist for ExxonMobil, the second-largest U.S. emitter, politely pledged to convey the reporter’s question to the media relations team, but the company did not respond. 

The methodology that Williams and her eight colleagues used involved overlaying observational data of recorded temperatures, precipitation, relative humidity, and hydrologic conditions annually over the decade 2014 to 2024 in seven water basins across the Western states with global climate models. Then they introduced emissions data in three variable scenarios to disentangle the effect of emissions from the carbon majors. One scenario included all human-caused emissions since 1950, the second included no anthropogenic emissions, and the third scenario excluded emissions traced to the 122 companies. 

“By comparing these scenarios and using pattern scaling, we calculated how much of the observed changes in snowpack, streamflow, and irrigation demand are attributable to climate change and specifically to emissions from the Carbon Majors,” the authors wrote.

Governments seek damages from polluters 

The study is part of a growing body of what’s called attribution science. As scientific consensus has solidified around climate change resulting from atmospheric warming caused by the burning of fossil fuels, emissions of methane, and destruction of forests, scientists are looking more deeply at the impacts of that warming, how to minimize future warming, and the specific sources of the emissions. 

Similar studies have attributed the size of areas burned in intense wildfires, specific measures of sea level rise, and the increased likelihood and intensity of extreme heat events to emissions from the carbon majors. 

Read: Scientists agree: Climate change is real and caused by people

“We have a choice of how much worse climate change is going to get, and that is a function of how much emissions we allow,” Williams said. She said some changes to the planet’s climate system are already irreversible, but we do have a choice to avoid others and the worsening of some that are already baked in.

Many states and cities around the world are taking the biggest climate polluters to court in hopes of getting financial resources to help them address damages from extreme hurricanes, wildfires and floods whose intensification can be linked to climate change. 

Two states – New York and Vermont – have passed climate superfund laws requiring that the biggest historical emitters help pay for climate damages incurred in their states. Many other states, including California, are considering such legislation. New York’s law was recently struck down in court, but the state also plans to appeal the decision. Meanwhile, several states are suing major fossil fuel companies over the damage they allege was wrought by their emissions.

“As climate impacts become increasingly severe, communities will be asking for more action” to help recover from damage and adapt to climate changes, said Carly Phillips, another author of the water study and senior research scientist at the Union of Concerned Scientists. 

Communities, states and small countries are bearing an unfair share of the costs of the impacts of emissions, Phillips contended, compared with the companies that ignored the looming crisis for decades and even lobbied Congress against taking action sooner.

 “Given the outsized contribution of certain entities to the problem – 122 companies is a very small number – there should be some accountability,” she said.

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• ‘Brazil is back’
• New Jersey-sized forest
• Election significance
• ‘Greenest’ policies 
• Soy moratorium and Brazilian congress

An area of Amazon forest roughly the size of the US state of New Jersey has remained standing due to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s leadership of Brazil, according to Carbon Brief analysis. 

Lula beat Jair Bolsonaro in the 2022 election to become president of the nation that is home to nearly 60% of the Amazon rainforest. 

Forest loss surged during Bolsonaro’s far-right presidency and dropped sharply under the left-wing Lula, with Amazon deforestation likely to hit its lowest level on record this year. 

Now, as another presidential election approaches, Lula is facing off against Bolsonaro’s son, Flávio Bolsonaro, whose “anti-environmental” policies are similar to his father’s.

Carbon Brief’s analysis suggests that at least 20,000 square kilometres (km2) of deforestation has been avoided since Lula took office and prioritised Amazon protection.

The analysis is based on modelling by an international research team of an alternative scenario in which Brazil’s flagship forest code legislation was not enforced – a proxy for Jair Bolsonaro’s leadership. 

Experts tell Carbon Brief that this estimate is likely “conservative” and that actual deforestation under Bolsonaro could have been “much higher”. 

With Lula and Flávio Bolsonaro tied in the polls, the upcoming election is expected to significantly shape the level of environmental action in the world’s fourth-largest emitter, whose emissions are largely driven by deforestation. 

‘Brazil is back’

When Jair Bolsonaro was president of Brazil between 2019 and 2022, he championed the nation’s powerful agribusiness sector and oversaw an unprecedented increase in Amazon deforestation.

Bolsonaro weakened regulations, slashed federal agency budgets and empowered illegal activities in the Amazon, while attacking Indigenous and environmental groups.

This meant that the forest code – Brazil’s flagship legislation that requires landowners to preserve and restore forest on their property – was not properly enforced.

After Lula’s presidential victory in 2022, he promised to target “zero deforestation” by 2030, telling the COP27 UN climate summit that “Brazil is back”.

Lula rolled back Bolsonaro’s wave of deregulation and reinstated a deforestation “action plan”. Led by celebrated environmentalist Marina Silva, the environment ministry scaled up enforcement and policing activities in the Amazon. 

As a result, annual deforestation in the Amazon has more than halved from 11,594km2 per year in 2022 to 5,731km2 in 2025.

Data from August 2025 to July 2026 – the timespan used in government records – is yet to be released, but preliminary satellite alerts put the deforestation figure at 2,874km2.

While the final figure is likely to be higher, experts still think Amazon deforestation in 2026 could hit its lowest level since records began in 1988.

New Jersey-sized forest

Compared to a scenario in which Bolsonaro won in 2022, Carbon Brief analysis suggests that at least 20,000km2 of Amazon forest remains standing today due to Lula’s leadership.

This area – roughly the size of Wales, Belize, Slovenia or the US state of New Jersey – is indicated by the grey area in the chart below.

Each year covers a period from August to July. Deforestation data is from INPE’s PRODES dataset, except for the 2026 figure. This is based on INPE’s DETER real-time satellite alert data, which tends to give lower estimates than PRODES. The “Bolsonaro” projections are based on a scenario with no forest code enforcement, from a 2023 study.

This analysis is based on a 2023 study on the role of nature-based solutions in Brazil’s pathway to net-zero emissions. This was a refined update of a 2018 study that used the same GLOBIOM-Brazil model, from researchers at the University of Oxford, the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis and Brazil’s National Institute for Space Research (INPE).

It is based on a comparison of forest code implementation with a “baseline” scenario in which the code is not enforced, reflecting the kind of weak governance seen under the Bolsonaro administration. (See Carbon Brief’s 2022 article for more details of this modelling.)

Dr Aline Soterroni, a University of Oxford researcher who led the 2023 analysis, tells Carbon Brief that the reversal seen under Lula “shows how quickly deforestation can respond to political will”.

However, she stresses that the modelling of the “no forest code” scenario is “relatively conservative”, with deforestation remaining high but not rising. 

Deforestation in this scenario – used here as a proxy for a Bolsonaro election win – is tempered by slower demand growth for Brazilian beef and soy, says Soterroni. She notes that the scenario also does not capture the potential for illegal forest clearing in response to weak governance.

Indeed, some experts anticipated in 2022 that a Bolsonaro victory would send deforestation rates rising to near-record levels.

Claudio Angelo, international policy coordinator at Brazil’s Climate Observatory, tells Carbon Brief that if Bolsonaro had won in 2022, “we have reason to believe [this would have resulted] in much higher rates than during his first term”.

Angelo says the “political signal” would likely have driven an “explosion of wildcat mining” and illegal deforestation in the Amazon. He also points to efforts – including by Flávio Bolsonaro – to formally dismantle the forest code in the Brazilian congress, during Jair Bolsonaro’s first term.

Soterroni notes that deforestation rates did not immediately drop following Lula’s election, as suggested by modelling of a full “forest code compliance” scenario. She says this reflects the “gradual and imperfect process” of restoring and enforcing the law.

Nevertheless, she tells Carbon Brief:

“The key message from our modelling is the contrast between these trajectories: weak environmental governance keeps deforestation substantially higher than full implementation of the forest code. That message remains relevant today.”

Election significance

With Jair Bolsonaro in prison for plotting a coup after losing the 2022 election, his son Flávio Bolsonaro, a senator for Rio de Janeiro, is standing against Lula in the upcoming contest for president.

There are 13 candidates, but Flávio Bolsonaro and Lula are by far the frontrunners and are currently neck-and-neck in opinion polls. 

If Lula wins, experts say he is likely to continue with the “zero deforestation by 2030” agenda that has already had a pronounced impact on forest loss. 

As the chart below shows, periods when Amazon deforestation fell in recent history all occurred during Lula’s three terms as president. 

In contrast, experts say Flávio Bolsonaro, a climate sceptic who has indicated he will continue his father’s political agenda and favour agribusiness and mining, will likely drive a surge in deforestation. Angelo tells Carbon Brief:

“At the risk of sounding alarmist, I’ve been saying that Lula’s re-election is the only thing standing between us and a wide destruction of the Amazon.”

A Bolsonaro win would be a “tremendous disaster”, says Dr Patricia Pinho, deputy science director at the Amazon Environmental Research Institute, adding: 

“I don’t think we can afford four years of increasing deforestation [and] violence against Indigenous peoples.” 

Dr David Lapola, an ecologist focused on Amazon research at the University of Campinas in Brazil, says he believes deforestation “would certainly rise” and Brazil’s climate and deforestation goals “would be thrown in the trash bin”. He tells Carbon Brief: 

“The Bolsonaro administration in the 2019-2022 period showed that the deconstruction of environmental policies and institutes can be done very, very quickly. 

“In a matter of a few months, they can destroy what has been constructed over decades of environmental policy and activism in Brazil.” 

‘Greenest’ policies 

Lula has the “greenest” policy proposals of Brazil’s six top-polling presidential candidates, according to analysis by the Climate Observatory. 

The analysis identifies 16 “positive and detailed” environmental commitments in Lula’s proposals, including reaffirming his “zero deforestation by 2030” goal. 

Flávio Bolsonaro, on the other hand, has one positive environmental commitment and seven “clearly anti-environmental” proposals. 

The right-wing politician has committed to zero “illegal” deforestation by 2029. However, he has also previously led an attempt to change the forest code, opening up large tracts of previously out-of-bounds forest for legal clearance by extractive industries. 

Given this, Angelo tells Carbon Brief that he is sceptical about the 2029 pledge. 

“The only way you can trust him on this is to think that he is going to revoke the forest code and make all illegal deforestation legal.”

Brazilian presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro with a cardboard cutout of his father, former president Jair Bolsonaro. Credit: ZUMA Press, Inc. / Alamy Stock Photo

Lula is also the only major candidate to list a clear target for cutting national emissions, sticking with Brazil’s existing goal to cut emissions by 59-67% by 2035, compared to 2005 levels. 

Overall, the Climate Observatory notes that climate change and environmental issues “are off the radar for most candidates”, who are instead focusing on the economy and security issues. 

Pinho adds that deforestation and the Amazon have not been at the “forefront” of this election, compared to 2022. 

If Bolsonaro wins, up to 95% of the Amazon would fall under the leadership of right-wing national governments – including those in Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru – reported Mongabay. It noted that presidents in all these nations “explicitly favour agribusiness and mining over environmental conservation”.

If no candidate receives a majority of votes in the first round of Brazil’s election on 4 October, a runoff will take place on 25 October, as has happened at every presidential election since 1998.

Soy moratorium and Brazilian congress

Other factors will also play a role in future deforestation in Brazil, regardless of the next president. 

One is the effective end of the Amazon soy moratorium. This is a voluntary agreement signed by companies committing to not buy soya beans grown on land in the Brazilian Amazon that was deforested after 2008. 

Conservation organisation WWF’s international director general, Kirsten Schuijt, previously described it as the “most impactful voluntary supply chain policy ever implemented”. 

However, major grain traders withdrew from the agreement earlier this year, effectively bringing it to an end. Pinho describes this move as a “huge destruction” of Brazil’s environmental protections. 

Research shows the moratorium prevented around 18,000km2 of deforestation in its first decade of operation from 2005-16. 

In contrast, a 2026 study estimated that the end of the moratorium could result in 14,000km2 of additional deforestation in the Amazon by 2036. 

Alongside choosing a new president on 4 October, Brazilian voters will elect state governors and members of congress, which will also factor into future environmental impacts.

Right-leaning parties, including the far-right Liberal Party linked to the Bolsonaros, currently hold half the seats of the two chambers of congress. 

This has led to conflict between lawmakers and Lula. For example, in 2025, congress bypassed Lula’s veto of several aspects of a controversial piece of legislation dubbed the “devastation bill”. 

Pinho says that the potential for a right-wing congress and president would be “devastating for the environmental and climate agenda”. 

Lapola notes that a Flávio Bolsonaro presidency “would consolidate the view in Brazil that environmental protection is solely a matter of political preference, and not a crucial need of all people”. He adds: 

“Land pillage, destruction of precious biodiversity and scorning of Indigenous peoples simply cannot be a nation’s project in the 21st century. We have got to be smarter than that, for sure.”

related Q&A: What change of power in Colombia could mean for world’s fossil-fuel transition 26.06.2026 International policy Brazil’s biodiversity pledge: Six key takeaways for nature and climate change 16.01.2026 Nature policy COP30: Could Brazil’s ‘Tropical Forest Forever’ fund help tackle climate change? 05.11.2025 COP30 Belém Guest post: How Caribbean states are shaping climate legislation 10.10.2025

The post Analysis: Lula presidency saved at least 20,000km2 of Brazilian Amazon since 2022 appeared first on Carbon Brief.

A listing of 28 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, September 20, 2026 thru Sat, September 26, 2026. Stories we promoted this week, by category:

Climate Policy and Politics (8 items)

• Interview with Senator Sheldon Whitehouse: ''Call Out the Corruption Propelling the US Climate Retreat'' The Rhode Island senator, who could lead the Judiciary Committee if Democrats win in November, urges stronger messaging and a focus on Supreme Court reform. Inside Climate News, Marianne Lavelle, Sep 20, 2026.
• Whitehouse: Call Out the Corruption Propelling the US Climate Retreat The Rhode Island senator, who could lead the Judiciary Committee if Democrats win in November, urges stronger messaging and a focus on Supreme Court reform. Inside Climate News, Marianne Lavelle, Sep 20, 2026.
• Let`s Talk Climate Annual NY Times climate conference opens in difficult times for sensible climate policy. NYT > Climate and Environment, Katrin Bennhold, Sep 20, 2026.
• We Need to Stop Talking Like Climate Change Is Partisan 'People who raise awareness about climate change know that how you communicate your message matters, and there’s much to learn from them.'' TIME, Katharine Hayhoe and Dana R. Fisher, Sep 21, 2026.
• How Saudi oil scientists ended up working on the world`s most important climate reports Guardian investigation reveals fossil fuel links of IPCC authors, with experts declaring the body’s conflict of interest policy ‘not fit for purpose’ The Guardian, Damian Carrington, Eoghan Gilmartin, Silvia Lazzaris, Rita Cruz, Simon Guichard and David Haas, Sep 21, 2026.
• Effort begins to fill the void left by terminated US climate report First paper added to community collection is a roadmap for research. Ars Technica, Scott K. Johnson, Sep 22, 2026.
• The climate scientist Kate Marvel sheds light on why she left NASA this year. One of the most prominent climate scientists to resign from the federal government during the second Trump administration described the “chaotic” conditions inside NASA that led to her departure. NYT, Raymond Zhong, Sep 23, 2026.
• Trump cut their climate jobs. This secretive network found them new ones. Climate Reserve is quietly building a lifeline for America's lost climate workforce, one job at a time. Grist, Kate Yoder, Sep 24, 2026.

Climate Change Impacts (4 items)

• Losing your way of life to climate change matters — and we need a way to measure it Climate losses extend beyond property and income. Policymakers need ways to assess what people value, experience and ultimately stand to lose. Nature, Manasi Kumar, Sep 21, 2026.
• The worst El Niño in recorded history is brewing — here’s how governments must prepare From southern Africa to the Amazon, the risks are mounting and the window for action is rapidly closing. Nature, Zeke Hausfather, Sep 22, 2026.
• Scientists link fossil fuel producers to the West`s worsening water shortages A new study blames 122 companies for contributing to severe drought in the region. Yale Climate Connections, Barbara Grady, Sep 22, 2026.
• An Existential Threat to the Oil Industry Can fossil energy giants be held responsible for extreme weather? The Atlantic, Ross Andersen, Sep 23, 2026.

Climate Education and Communication (3 items)

• Why I turned down funding for my Miami story Behind-the-scenes ethical choices by an accomplished climate communicator. HEATED, Emily Atkin, Sep 21, 2026.
• How to stay smart in the age of AI: the science of critical thinking There is growing concern that AI can blunt memory and reasoning. But science shows ways to keep the brain sharp. Nature, Helen Pearson, Sep 23, 2026.
• Twenty years after An Inconvenient Truth, Al Gore still believes in the climate fight: `We are going to win this` Former US vice-president still has optimism for climate advocacy two decades after groundbreaking documentary The Guardian, Oliver Milman, Sep 23, 2026.

Miscellaneous (3 items)

• 2026 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #38 A listing of 28 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, September 13, 2026 thru Sat, September 19, 2026. Skeptical Science, Bärbel Winkler & Doug Bostrom, Sep 19, 2026.
• Energy Transition is No Longer About Climate Change 'Global Energy analyst Jeff Currie tells Bloomberg the Energy Transition is “TurboCharged” – but it’s not about climate, and maybe never was. By far the biggest growth in energy consumption is going to come from the developing world in Asia and Africa, and those countries are no longer willing to be held hostage to fossil fuels.'' This is Not Cool, greenman3610, Sep 19, 2026.
• Jensen Huang talks about AI and climate change like a supervillain With AI, he says, ‘in order to save you, they’ve got to hurt you first.‘ The Verge, Justine Calma, Sep 24, 2026.

Climate Law and Justice (2 items)

• Suncor Helped Lead Climate Denial Group Spreading ‘Uncertainties’ With a U.S. Supreme Court decision looming on whether the company can be held liable for climate deception, internal documents show a campaign to question science. Desmog, Geoff Dembicki, Sep 21, 2026.
• Judge Dismisses Unusual Climate Suit Claiming Oil Giants Broke Antitrust Law The lawsuit, filed by Michigan, claimed oil companies colluded to obstruct solar power and to misrepresent climate risks, making energy costlier. NYT, Karen Zraick, Sep 22, 2026.

Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation (2 items)

• For Climate-Vulnerable Countries, Debt Costs 25 Times More Than Climate Action As climate disasters intensify, mounting debt is leaving vulnerable countries with less money to prepare, recover and invest in climate action. Inside Climate News, Alissa de Chassey, Sep 19, 2026.
• `Way Too Hot`: Britain`s Hospitals Were Not Built for 96-Degree Summers Patients and workers in one of the country’s largest hospitals sweltered in a heat wave last month. Experts say the whole country must urgently adapt. New York Time, Megan Specia and Andrew Testa, Sep 21, 2026.

Climate Science and Research (2 items)

• Skeptical Science New Research for Week #39 2026 Skeptical Science's latest weekly survey of research on anthropogenic climate change, climate change impacts, and how we're dealing with it all. Skeptical Science, Doug Bostrom & Marc Kodack, Sep 23, 2026.
• `Robust little` vessel begins treacherous 22,000km journey around Antarctica in the name of climate science World news The Guardian, Petra Stock, Sep 25, 2026.

Public Misunderstandings about Climate Science (2 items)

• Trump renames AI in off-the-rails rant against ‘hoax’ concerns Trump Truth Social post likens AI skeptics to global warming and climate change warnings from environmentalists. The Independent, John Bowden, Sep 21, 2026.
• AI`s Meet-Cute With Climate Denial Just in time for Climate Week NYC, President Trump calls concerns over global warming and artificial intelligence a “hoax.” Inside Climate News, By Dan Gearino, Sep 24, 2026.

Public Misunderstandings about Climate Solutions (2 items)

• Fact brief - Does wind power require backup from fossil fuels? Skeptical Science's latest climate solutions denial debunking, created in cooperation with Gigafact and Columbia Univesity's Sabin Center for Climate Change Law. Skeptical Science, Sue Bin Park, Sep 22, 2026.
• Coalition vows to 'take a chainsaw' to climate laws, offshore wind The Coalition would cancel offshore wind zones, scrap climate laws for heavy industry and car makers, and attempt to lift the ban on nuclear if it wins power. ABC News, Jake Evans, Sep 23, 2026.

If you happen upon high quality climate-science and/or climate-myth busting articles from reliable sources while surfing the web, please feel free to submit them via this Google form so that we may share them widely. Thanks!

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Antarctic sea ice has recorded its third-smallest winter peak extent since satellite records began 48 years ago, new data reveals.

Provisional data from the US National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) shows that Antarctic sea ice hit its annual winter peak on 14 September, with an extent of 17.59m square kilometres (km2).

The organisation notes that the data is still preliminary, adding that “large fluctuations in extent are typical of Antarctic sea ice near the seasonal maximum”.

One expert tells Carbon Brief that it is “concerning to see these low values persisting”, but says that scientists need more time to determine whether this represents a “structural shift” in Antarctic sea ice extent.

Meanwhile, at the Earth’s other pole, Arctic sea ice reached its annual minimum on 12 September, ranking as the joint-10th lowest in the satellite record.

The NSIDC notes that the last 20 years have seen the lowest 20 Arctic sea ice extents in the satellite record.

Antarctic peak

Dr Lettie Roach, a polar climate scientist at the Alfred Wegener Institute in Germany, tells Carbon Brief that this year’s Antarctic sea ice maximum was “well below average for the season”. She warns that, “after several decades of stable or increasing winter Antarctic sea ice conditions, it is concerning to see these low values persisting”.

She adds:

“Compared with the Arctic, it’s less clear how recent changes in Antarctic sea ice are attributable to human-caused warming vs natural variability. We need more years of observations to better understand whether this is truly a structural shift.”

Dr Clare Eayrs, a postdoctoral researcher at the Korea Polar Research Institute (KOPRI), tells Carbon Brief that, since recording a “near-average February minimum” extent, Antarctic sea ice has “returned to unusually low winter coverage”.

She notes that Antarctic sea ice extent in July and August this year were the fifth and fourth lowest on record, respectively, adding that “all five of the lowest July extents have occurred since 2022 and all four of the lowest August extents since 2023”.

The chart below shows Antarctic sea ice extent in 2025 (dark blue) and 2026 (red) so far. For comparison, the chart shows decadal averages (dotted lines) as well as 2023 (mid blue), the year of the smallest winter sea-ice maximum on record.

Daily Arctic sea ice extent for 2026 and 2025, with decadal averages for comparison, based on data from the NSIDC. Chart by Carbon Brief.

Eayrs tells Carbon Brief that the regional pattern of Antarctic sea ice cover “changed substantially during the growth season”.

For example, she says that “in April, the Bellingshausen Sea remained almost entirely ice-free, while the neighbouring Amundsen Sea had more ice than usual”.

However, by late August, changes in atmospheric pressure and wind meant that “the Bellingshausen deficit had largely recovered, while ice was unusually scarce in the Amundsen Sea and across much of East Antarctica”. 

Map showing the main regions of the Antarctic. Credit: Carbon Brief
Arctic minimum

Meanwhile, the Arctic recorded its minimum summer sea ice extent on 12 September. At 4.60m km2, this year ties with 2025, 2010 and 2008 as the 10th-lowest sea ice extent on record.

The chart below shows Arctic sea ice extent in 2025 (dark blue) and 2026 (red) so far. For comparison, the chart shows decadal averages (dotted lines) as well as 2012 (mid blue), the year of the smallest summer sea-ice minimum on record.

Daily Antarctic sea ice extent for 2026 and 2025, with decadal averages for comparison, based on data from the NSIDC. Chart by Carbon Brief.

Roach tells Carbon Brief that although this minimum is not “record setting”, it is still “lower than any sea ice minimum before 2007”. She adds:

“Human-caused climate change has reduced Arctic sea ice cover and thickness, so the region is fundamentally different compared to a few decades ago.”

Scientists have been tracking Arctic sea ice thickness using a reanalysis produced called the Pan-Arctic Ice Ocean Modeling and Assimilation System (PIOMAS) since 1979.

In March 2026, the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) terminated a global dataset of air pressure that scientists relied upon to produce PIOMAS, forcing both datasets to stop publishing updates.

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The PIOMAS website says it will take “considerable effort and time” to find alternative data to use in their reanalysis. It adds that “we don’t yet have a good sense if that’s possible with available funds and if so, when we will be able to resume production of a new PIOMAS timeseries”.

Roach also notes that August saw record-breaking heat sweep across much of the world, explaining that high temperatures “extended into Arctic coastal regions, close to regions with substantial sea ice loss – particularly the Barents-Kara and East Siberian seas”.

Dr Zack Labe, a scientist at Climate Central, tells Carbon Brief that the absence of a new record does not mean that ice cover is becoming more “resilient”. He says:

“Local weather patterns across the Arctic play a really important role in year-to-year sea-ice extent, even as the long-term trend is clearly downward.”

Labe tells Carbon Brief that weather in the Arctic this summer was “influenced mainly by lower pressure toward the central Arctic, which brought cloudier and cooler conditions that limited surface melt and delayed the start of the melt season”.

He explains that this “was most obvious across parts of the Beaufort and Chukchi seas, where the melt season didn’t really kick off until after early July, which was more than two weeks later than normal”. 

In contrast, he says, the Atlantic side of the Arctic “had a much more extreme summer”, with sea ice in the Barents Sea recording its “earliest melt-out on record”.

This was partly due to “unusually warm air and ocean temperatures”, Labe says. He notes, for example, that parts of western Siberia saw unusually persistent temperatures more than 5C above the 1981-2010 average for much of the summer, which extended out over the Kara Sea and contributed to substantial ice melt in this area”.

Map showing main regions of the Arctic. Credit: Carbon Brief

Labe tells Carbon Brief that, going forward, scientists need “more data and observations of other sea-ice metrics, like ice thickness, which may give us better insight into the overall condition of the ice pack, especially during years like 2026 when it is very fragmented”.

(In March 2026, Arctic sea ice reached its peak extent for this winter, clocking in as the joint-smallest in a satellite record going back almost half a century.)

Related Guest post: Climate change has caused one-fifth of Pine Island glacier retreat 29.06.2026 Antarctica ‘Very alarming’ winter sees Arctic sea ice hit record-low for second year running 27.03.2026 Ice Q&A: How Trump is threatening climate science in Earth’s polar regions 20.02.2026 Antarctica Limiting warming to 2C is ‘crucial’ to protect pristine Antarctic Peninsula 20.02.2026 Antarctica

The post ‘Concerning’ low sea ice persists as Antarctic hits third-lowest winter peak appeared first on Carbon Brief.

Open access notables

The Increasing Incidence of Boreal and Western U.S. Forest Wildfires and Its Causes: An Overview, Wallace et al., Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society

This overview of the voluminous wildfire literature addresses the following questions: “How seriously is the current spate of wildfires impacting the boreal forests and the forests of the western United States? Is the current rate of burning of these forests unprecedented? Has it been systematically increasing over the past few decades and, if so, is it in response to human-induced global warming?” The article contains diagrams and tables based on a suite of fire-related datasets: satellite measurements of burned area, fire-related carbon emissions, aerosol optical depth, dating back to around the year 2000, and longer ground-based records of area burned by fires in the western United States. The graphics and tables reveal the remarkable extent of the forested area burned. The average area burned per year has increased by roughly a factor of three since the year 2000. The area burned by severe fires with areas > 100 km2 has been increasing more rapidly than the area burned by smaller fires. Wildfire smoke has also increased appreciably over much of North America. Forested burned area and fire-related carbon emissions are highly sensitive to measures of aridity on time scales ranging from days to decades. Aridity has increased, mainly in response to the warming trend, which is comparable in magnitude to that in climate model simulations of the response to rising greenhouse gas concentrations. The evidence presented herein supports the widely held belief that the recent increase in wildfires is mainly due to human-induced global warming.

Net Groundwater Recharge in California Occurs Primarily During Above-Average Snowpack Years, Reager et al., Geophysical Research Letters

In a new application of GRACE and GRACE-FO satellite observations, we estimate basin-scale net groundwater recharge rates for the combined Sacramento, San Joaquin, and Tulare basins encompassing California's Central Valley aquifer. Net recharge is calculated as the temporal derivative of groundwater storage anomalies and compared with precipitation and snow water equivalent over a fixed study area. Net positive recharge is rare, occurring in only six water years since 2004, and is consistently associated with years of above-average Sierra Nevada snowpack. Across the observational record, net positive recharge is observed only in years when snow water equivalent exceeds approximately 21 km3 (17 MAF; ∼121% of the 20-year mean value), with the largest recharge event coinciding with the exceptionally wet winter of water year 2023. These results suggest that above-average snowpack conditions, rather than rainfall alone, are an important enabling condition for basin-scale groundwater recharge under a warming climate.

Concurrent Eurasian Heatwaves Will Intensify Beyond the Mean Warming, Xu et al., Geophysical Research Letters

Heatwaves occurring at the same time over Europe and North China are among the most common simultaneous climate extremes in the Northern Hemisphere. These events are linked by a large-scale atmospheric circulation pattern, the British–Baikal Corridor pattern, which produces high-pressure systems over both regions simultaneously. Using a large ensemble of climate model simulations, we find that these concurrent heatwaves will become much more severe in the future. Importantly, they intensify faster than average temperature increases due to global warming. Even after accounting for background warming, temperatures during these events exceed the regional mean warming by about 0.3°C on average and by more than 0.5°C locally. Surprisingly, the reasons for this additional intensification differ between the two regions. Over North China, the atmospheric circulation pattern strengthens, bringing clearer skies and greater solar heating. Over Europe, however, the circulation pattern weakens, but heatwaves still intensify because drier soils provide less evaporative cooling. These findings challenge the common assumption that the same weather pattern amplifies heat equally wherever it occurs. They also suggest that future heat risks may be underestimated if assessments rely only on average warming, particularly when heatwaves strike multiple regions simultaneously.

Defending the status quo: The role of system justification in public opposition to ambitious climate policy and energy system change, Lloyd et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology

In recent years, environmental psychologists have argued that our field must conduct more solutions-focussed and system-level research if we want to contribute to ambitious and effective climate action. In this paper, we propose that system justification offers a promising pathway towards achieving both of these goals, and investigate its influence on three societally-impactful outcomes: support for climate policy, support for a just energy transition, and endorsement of climate delay discourses. We also test whether experimentally inducing hope could offer a solution to these proposed deleterious effects. We conduct this research in small-to-medium sized communities in Western Canada, many of which are dependent upon fossil-fuels for their continued existence, and thus strongly oppose decarbonization. Using an online survey of these communities (N = 3,400) we find that system justification consistently predicts lower support for climate policies, greater endorsement of climate delay discourses, and lower support for a just energy transition. Additionally, moderation analyses reveal that this relationship is stronger for those with greater proximity to the fossil-fuel industry, and that our hope manipulation had no effect. We explore the policy implications of these findings, arguing that policymakers should (1) aim to narratively detach the status quo from the economic system, and (2) design just transitions policies which act to maintain fossil-fuel communities’ current way of life, rather than trying to improve it. These findings extend system justification theory to three new societally-impactful outcomes; demonstrate its utility for policymaking; and highlight its potential to contribute to transformation-oriented research in environmental psychology.

From this week's government/NGO section:

Findings from a 2026 Survey of Adults Age 18 and Older, Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago and the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research

The authors found that 53% of Americans are extremely or very concerned about the environmental effects of AI, up from 41% who said the same in 2025. Younger adults ages 18-29 have become particularly concerned, increasing from 38% last year to 60% today and moving from levels similar to other age groups to the highest level of concern. Forty-seven percent of Americans think AI will do more to hurt rather than help the environment, up from 33% who said the same in 2025. The authors also explored attitudes toward climate change, energy policy, and electric vehicles (EVs). Most Americans agree that climate change is happening and is caused by human activity, a trend that has remained stable in recent years. There is a large partisan divide in these attitudes, however, with Democrats more likely than Republicans to believe climate change is occurring (92% vs. 55%) and is caused mostly by human activity (68% vs. 34%). About 2 in 3 believe that oil and gas companies, the federal government, and large businesses and corporations have a lot of responsibility to address climate change, while just 4 in 10 say the same about developing countries and individual people.

In Hottest Summer on Record, 2 in 3 Americans Say Climate Change Is Increasing Heat-Related Illnesses, Annenberg Public Policy Center, University of Pennsylvania

Nearly two-thirds of the American public say climate change is increasing the risk of respiratory diseases and heat- and insect-related illnesses. The author's survey, which was conducted Aug. 4-17, 2026, among 1,904 empaneled U.S. adults, found that 76% report that extreme outdoor heat affected their daily activities at least sometimes in the past year and 38% say poor air quality resulting from wildfire smoke did so. Extreme heat is affecting the everyday lives of most Americans. Nearly two-thirds of Americans (65%) say that climate change is increasing the risk of heat-related illnesses, respiratory diseases, and insect-borne diseases. This is unchanged from August 2025 (65%) and July 2024 (67%) but is significantly higher than 58% in November 2023. Americans generally recognize that heat waves are on the rise. Nearly two-thirds (62%) say U.S. heat waves are becoming more frequent and intense than in the past, statistically unchanged from 61% in August 2025, 65% in July 2024, and 58% in November 2023. Of the four extreme weather events measured in the survey, more Americans report that their daily activities were impacted at least sometimes by extreme outdoor heat (76%) and poor air quality resulting from wildfire smoke (38%). As one would expect, fewer say they were impacted at least sometimes by flooding (20%) and tornadoes/hurricanes (11%), since these events are less frequent. 87 articles in 46 journals by 618 contributing authors

Physical science of climate change, effects

Amplified Cloud-Phase Responses Over Global Mountain Regions Under Climate Warming, Zhang et al., AGU Advances Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026av002380

Anthropogenic Warming Weakens Mild Offshore Winds in Southern California but Not the Extreme Fire-Weather Winds, Madakumbura et al., Earth s Future Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026ef008422

Emerging Divergence Between Dry- and Humid-Heat in China Under Weakening Temperature-Humidity Coupling, Zhu et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres 10.1029/2026jd046959

Future Reduction of North Pacific Subtropical Mode Water: Its Impacts on Physical and Biogeochemical Conditions in the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre, Sugimoto, Journal of Geophysical Research Oceans Open Access 10.1029/2026jc024776

On the Timescales of Atmospheric Adjustments to Contrail Cirrus Formation, Quarroz et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026gl125935

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
A holistic platform for accelerating sorbent-based carbon capture, Nature, 10.1038/s41586-024-07683-8 95 cites.

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Observations of climate change, effects

Earthquake-triggered cascading hazards under Arctic amplification, Melo et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Open Access 10.1073/pnas.2617210123

Long-term weakening of extreme cold stress in eastern China, Li et al., Weather and Climate Extremes Open Access 10.1016/j.wace.2026.100960

Observational Evidence for Accelerated Warming and Salinification Propagating Into the Deep Mediterranean, Terzi? & Vilibi?, Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026gl124518

Spatiotemporal variations in snowline altitude across the High Mountain Asia from 1990 to 2024 Based on Landsat Data, Wang et al., Advances in Climate Change Research Open Access 10.1016/j.accre.2026.09.007

The Increasing Incidence of Boreal and Western U.S. Forest Wildfires and Its Causes: An Overview, Wallace et al., Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 10.1175/bams-d-25-0193.1

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Sketching the spatial disparities in heatwave trends by changing atmospheric teleconnections in the Northern Hemisphere, Nature Communications, 10.1038/s41467-024-52254-0 42 cites.

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Instrumentation & observational methods of climate change, effects

A deep learning framework for gridding daily climate variables from a sparse station network, Dumitrescu, Geoscientific model development Open Access 10.5194/gmd-19-8895-2026

Attribution estimates for similar extremes are robust across event definitions, Otto et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-04053-2

Improving global and regional ocean heat content by consistently combining GRACE gravity, satellite altimetry and Argo profile observations in a joint inversion framework, Uebbing et al., Earth system science data Open Access 10.5194/essd-18-6945-2026

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Are Our Climate Data Fit for Your Purpose?, Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, 10.1175/bams-d-23-0295.1 10 cites.

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Modeling, simulation & projection of climate change, effects

Concurrent Eurasian Heatwaves Will Intensify Beyond the Mean Warming, Xu et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl123850

Future Redistribution of North Atlantic Tropical Cyclone Risk in Two Contrasting CMIP6 Scenarios, Lele et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026gl123424

Projected Changes in Reference Evapotranspiration Across Indian Climate Regimes Using Bias-Corrected CMIP6 Simulations, Nayak et al., International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70603

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Abrupt increase in Arctic-Subarctic wildfires caused by future permafrost thaw, Nature Communications, 10.1038/s41467-024-51471-x 42 cites.

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Advancement of climate & climate effects modeling, simulation & projection

A new Earth Observation–based WRF configuration for urban regional climate simulations over Paris, Kyriakidis et al., Geoscientific model development Open Access 10.5194/gmd-19-8709-2026

Downscaling of Temperatures Over the Eastern Mediterranean for the 21st Century, Gelman et al., International Journal of Climatology Open Access pdf 10.1002/joc.70519

New Constraint on Future Ocean Heat Uptake Revealed by Considering Model Spread of Radiative Forcing, Wu & Gregory, Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl123530

The Cloud Feedback Model Intercomparison Project (CFMIP) contribution to CMIP7, Ceppi et al., Geoscientific model development Open Access pdf 10.5194/gmd-19-8693-2026

Using Rapid Temperature Falls to Estimate Future Strong Cold Front Frequency in CMIP6 Climate Projections, Corrales et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026gl124031

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
A Comprehensive Evaluation of Mean and Extreme Climate for the Conformal Cubic Atmospheric Model (CCAM), Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology, 10.1175/jamc-d-24-0004.1 16 cites.

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Cryosphere & climate change

Accelerated mass loss of glaciers across Alaska since the Little Ice Age, Carrivick et al., Scientific Reports Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41598-026-70307-w

Cross-Basin Synergistic Effects Stall Summer Sea Ice Decline in the Chukchi Sea, Dong et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres 10.1029/2026jd047482

Enhanced Erosion Across a Transition From Continuous to Discontinuous Permafrost in Alaska, Özpolat et al., Earth s Future Open Access 10.1029/2025ef007889

Feedbacks and timescales in the modelled transient response of debris-covered glaciers, Hardmeier et al., cryosphere Open Access 10.5194/tc-20-5365-2026

Modelling climate-induced instability of ice-rich permafrost slopes, Aga et al., cryosphere Open Access pdf 10.5194/tc-20-5225-2026

Net Groundwater Recharge in California Occurs Primarily During Above-Average Snowpack Years, Reager et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026gl122396

Parameterizing tidal-water intrusions in long-term Antarctic ice-sheet projections, Juárez-Martínez et al., cryosphere Open Access 10.5194/tc-20-5345-2026

Seasonal Response of the Arctic Sea Ice to Meltwater Runoff from the Greenland Ice Sheet, Liang et al., Journal of Physical Oceanography 10.1175/jpo-d-26-0025.1

Spatiotemporal variations in snowline altitude across the High Mountain Asia from 1990 to 2024 Based on Landsat Data, Wang et al., Advances in Climate Change Research Open Access 10.1016/j.accre.2026.09.007

Temporal evolution of the Petermann Ice Shelf estuary constrained by satellite remote sensing observations, Savignano et al., cryosphere Open Access 10.5194/tc-20-5247-2026

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Lake ice quality in a warming world, Nature Reviews Earth & Environment, 10.1038/s43017-024-00590-6 33 cites.

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Sea level & climate change

Anatomy of Interannual to Decadal Sea Level Changes in the GECCO3 Ocean Synthesis, Stammer et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Oceans Open Access 10.1029/2026jc024340

Paleoclimate & paleogeochemistry
Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
A 485-million-year history of Earth’s surface temperature, Science, 10.1126/science.adk3705 242 cites.

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Biology & climate change, related geochemistry

Climate change affects the distribution of cacti species of the genus Melocactus in the Brazilian Caatinga, Cavalcante et al., Tropical Ecology Open Access 10.1007/s42965-026-00444-w

Detection of emergent multiple predator effects in a warming world, Davidson et al., Biology Letters Open Access 10.1098/rsbl.2026.0257

Escalating Ecological Droughts Driven by Compound Soil and Atmospheric Dryness, Song et al., Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.71102

Global Projections of Coral Reef Sediment Dissolution in the 21st Century, Yan et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026gl125720

GROWTH RESPONSES OF CHIHUAHUA PINE (PINUS LEIOPHYLLA) OVER 128 YEARS OF WARMING AND PRECIPITATION REGIME SHIFTS, Todd et al., Dendrochronologia Open Access 10.1016/j.dendro.2026.126614

Identifying future climate refugia in central European mountain forests, Berre et al., Journal of Ecology Open Access 10.1111/1365-2745.70439

Increasingly synchronous water limitation portends resilience declines for whitebark pine, Friedman & Germain, Dendrochronologia 10.1016/j.dendro.2026.126615

Reforestation Under Climate Change—A Cross-Regional Deadwood Retention Experiment to Develop Multifunctional Forests on Disturbed Norway Spruce Areas, Putzenlechner et al., Ecology and Evolution Open Access pdf 10.1002/ece3.74357

Spatial Variability in Phytoplankton Response to Projected Increases in Iron and Temperature in the Ross Sea, Cristi et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Oceans Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026jc024364

Summer Heat Stress Downregulates Photochemistry in Coast Redwoods, Klinek et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Biogeosciences Open Access 10.1029/2026jg010052

Synthesis of scale-dependent plant biodiversity change in climate warming experiments, Korell et al., Ecology Open Access 10.1002/ecy.70486

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Nonanthropocentric climate ethics, Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews Climate Change, 10.1002/wcc.131 72 cites.

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GHG sources & sinks, flux, related geochemistry

Abundance of Fe/Al Oxides Governs Soil Organic Carbon Stability in Wetlands Under Drying Conditions, Yao et al., Global Change Biology Open Access pdf 10.1111/gcb.71109

Climate and penguin-mediated carbon burial hotspots in coastal lakes of East Antarctica, Zhao et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105730

Forest Carbon Exchange Dynamics and Integrated Carbon Budget of a Subtropical Island Ecosystem, Han et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Biogeosciences 10.1029/2026jg010032

Heterogeneity in Permafrost Organic Matter Molecular Composition With Depth and Ramifications Upon Thaw in the Western Siberian Lowlands, Anderson et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Biogeosciences 10.1029/2026jg010169

Modeling forest soil organic carbon dynamics under seasonal freeze–thaw cycles: implications for carbon sequestration in cold-region forest ecosystems, Gao et al., Frontiers in Forests and Global Change Open Access pdf 10.3389/ffgc.2026.1939588

Natural wetland methane emissions simulated by ICON-XPP, Wilkenskjeld et al., Biogeosciences Open Access 10.5194/bg-23-6583-2026

Net carbon losses in Central African forests revealed by high-resolution biomass change maps, Wan et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-77531-y

Nonlinear thermal responses of soil respiration temperature sensitivity under climate change, Yang et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105727

Seven-year continuous measurement of CO2 and CH4 at Atlas Mohammed V atmospheric research station in Northwest Africa, Ouchen et al., Atmospheric Environment Open Access 10.1016/j.atmosenv.2026.122365

Structural Diversity Amplifies the Effects of Functional Diversity on Forest Carbon Storage Across Stand Development, Wang et al., Global Ecology and Biogeography Open Access pdf 10.1111/geb.70309

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Emerging multiscale insights on microbial carbon use efficiency in the land carbon cycle, Nature Communications, 10.1038/s41467-024-52160-5 119 cites.

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CO2 capture, sequestration science & engineering

Carbon sequestration potential of tree planting under future climate scenarios in the Guangdong–Hong Kong–Macao Greater Bay Area, China, Zhao et al., Urban Climate 10.1016/j.uclim.2026.103128

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Feasible deployment of carbon capture and storage and the requirements of climate targets, Nature Climate Change, 10.1038/s41558-024-02104-0 170 cites.

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Decarbonization

Flash energy droughts in solar and wind resources under climate change, Lin et al., Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-026-02753-3

Hydrogen Storage Technologies: Materials Innovation and System-Level Challenges for a Carbon-Neutral Future, Pranto et al., Advanced Energy and Sustainability Research Open Access 10.1002/aesr.70256

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Diverse decarbonization pathways under near cost-optimal futures, Nature Communications, 10.1038/s41467-024-52433-z 43 cites.

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Geoengineering climate

Mapping justice claims for solar geoengineering, Jinnah et al., PLOS Climate Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0001054

Uneven Responses of Regional Terrestrial Ecosystem Carbon Turnover Time to Stratospheric Aerosol Injection, Park et al., Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.21390921

Black carbon
Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
The politics of knowledge in black carbon mitigation: Policy entrepreneurship of Finnish actors and the Climate and Clean Air Coalition, Environmental Science & Policy, 10.1016/j.envsci.2024.103881 3 cites.

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Aerosols
Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Global aerosol retrieval over land from Landsat imagery integrating Transformer and Google Earth Engine, Remote Sensing of Environment, 10.1016/j.rse.2024.114404 45 cites.

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Climate change communications & cognition

Affective divisions and climate policy polarization, Bäck et al., Environmental Politics Open Access pdf 10.1080/09644016.2026.2731596

Future Before My Eyes: How Psychological Distance and Immersive Presentations Relate to Climate Emotions, Schroeder et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology 10.1016/j.jenvp.2026.103213

Simple logic warnings improve climate argument evaluation across beliefs and partisanship, Bagó & Purcell, Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-026-02754-2

Simple logic warnings improve climate argument evaluation across beliefs and partisanship, Bagó & Purcell, Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-026-02754-2

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Durably reducing conspiracy beliefs through dialogues with AI, Science, 10.1126/science.adq1814 305 cites.

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Agronomy, animal husbundry, food production & climate change

Genetically engineered crops increase climate resilience of US fields, [authors did not process], Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-026-02750-6

Historical dynamics of agricultural carbon emissions in the North China plain over the past 300 years, Ye et al., Frontiers in Environmental Science Open Access pdf 10.3389/fenvs.2026.1831579

Long-Term Sustainability of Direct Straw Return Challenged by Soil Carbon Saturation and Emission Trade-Offs, Liu et al., Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.71120

Stage-Specific Associations Between Extreme Climate Events and Crop Failures Across China, Huang et al., Earth s Future Open Access 10.1029/2026ef008789

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Nexus among climate change, food systems, and human health: An interdisciplinary research framework in the Global South, Environmental Science & Policy, 10.1016/j.envsci.2024.103885 23 cites.

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Hydrology, hydrometeorology & climate change

Future changes and drivers of socioeconomic exposure to extreme precipitation in the Huai River Basin, Jiang et al., Natural Hazards 10.1007/s11069-026-08417-x

Governance barriers to climate change adaptation in regional catchment management, Kennedy et al., Environmental Science & Policy 10.1016/j.envsci.2026.104491

Net Groundwater Recharge in California Occurs Primarily During Above-Average Snowpack Years, Reager et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026gl122396

The 2025–2026 Iberian Atmospheric Rivers Exhibited Moisture Transport Resembling the Early SSP5-8.5 Climate Response, Fernández-Alvarez et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl123799

Variability and response to climate change of precipitation recycling ratio in the water source conservation area of the upper Yellow River, Yang et al., Atmospheric Research 10.1016/j.atmosres.2026.109333

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Spatiotemporal patterns in persistent precipitation extremes of the Chinese mainland (1961–2022) and association with the dynamic factors, Atmospheric Research, 10.1016/j.atmosres.2024.107600 14 cites.

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Climate change economics
Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
The ocean carbon sink enhances countries’ inclusive wealth and reduces the cost of national climate policies, Communications Earth & Environment, 10.1038/s43247-024-01674-3 9 cites.

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Climate change mitigation public policy research

Affective divisions and climate policy polarization, Bäck et al., Environmental Politics Open Access pdf 10.1080/09644016.2026.2731596

Australian Elected Representatives Underestimate Public Support for Climate Action, Wilkinson & Klebl, Journal of Environmental Psychology Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.jenvp.2026.103217

Climate action disclosure among companies: Implications for achieving global efforts to limit average global temperature rise to below 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels, Shimwela et al., PLOS Climate Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000951

Defending the status quo: The role of system justification in public opposition to ambitious climate policy and energy system change, Lloyd et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology Open Access 10.1016/j.jenvp.2026.103214

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Progress from Chicken Genetics to the Chicken Genome, Poultry Science, 10.1093/ps/85.12.2050 55 cites.

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Climate change adaptation & adaptation public policy research

Adapting the emergency management Enterprise to manage the climate emergency: a critical review, Preston et al., Climate Risk Management Open Access 10.1016/j.crm.2026.100885

Cross-sectoral perspectives on strategies to address climate adaptation and health in cyclone-prone Sofala province, Mozambique, Marrufo et al., Frontiers in Climate Open Access pdf 10.3389/fclim.2026.1912968

Governance barriers to climate change adaptation in regional catchment management, Kennedy et al., Environmental Science & Policy 10.1016/j.envsci.2026.104491

Mapping the urban heat island and climate risk in Padua (Italy): Trends in extremes and perspectives for climate justice in adaptation planning, Ceppi et al., Urban Climate Open Access 10.1016/j.uclim.2026.103143

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Elevated urban energy risks due to climate-driven biophysical feedbacks, Nature Climate Change, 10.1038/s41558-024-02108-w 37 cites.

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Climate change impacts on human health

Beyond resolution: An integrated framework for selecting climate data for urban heat-risk assessment, Shin et al., Urban Climate Open Access 10.1016/j.uclim.2026.103150

Climate Informed Dengue Prediction and Future Risk Under a Changing Monsoon Climate in Kerala, India, Yacob & Koll, Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.20096919

Heatstroke in Japan: current status, future risks, and prevention measures under a changing climate, Oka, Climate Risk Management Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.crm.2026.100887

Long-term weakening of extreme cold stress in eastern China, Li et al., Weather and Climate Extremes Open Access 10.1016/j.wace.2026.100960

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Rising cause-specific mortality risk and burden of compound heatwaves amid climate change, Nature Climate Change, 10.1038/s41558-024-02137-5 100 cites.

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Climate change & geopolitics

Mapping and quantifying engagement levels of governments in IPCC approval meetings by topic from text, Bayer et al., PLOS Climate Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0001057

Other

Climate urgency enables political alignment for Latin American power integration, Ramírez et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-77772-x

Dialogue framework for climate justice: bridging social and environmental justice, Thiele, Environmental Sociology 10.1080/23251042.2026.2732173

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

Internal Variability Dominates the Spatial Heterogeneity of Recent Trends in Eurasian Winter Cold Extremes, Liu et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026gl124591

Kinetic study of global-scale O3 pollution under 2060s climate and emission scenarios, Hata et al., Atmospheric Environment Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.atmosenv.2026.122367

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Climatic controls of fire activity in the red pine forests of eastern North America, Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, 10.1016/j.agrformet.2024.110219 7 cites.

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Informed opinion, nudges & major initiatives

A global safety net for climate-risk intelligence is urgently needed, Bashir & Adil, Nature 10.1038/d41586-026-02995-3

Adaptation as a catalyst for social change, Adams et al., PLOS Climate Open Access 10.1371/journal.pclm.0001052

Protecting tropical forests is more cost-effective for biodiversity and climate than restoration, Miranda et al., Science 10.1126/science.adx9928

Research Priorities for Robust Climate Assessments in the United States, Kenney et al., Earth s Future Open Access 10.1029/2025ef007336

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
A just world on a safe planet: a Lancet Planetary Health–Earth Commission report on Earth-system boundaries, translations, and transformations, The Lancet Planetary Health, 10.1016/s2542-5196(24)00042-1 173 cites.

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

Making California’s Electricity Cheaper: An Affordability Agenda for the Golden State, Boyle et al., Grid Lab and Energy Innovation

More than 80% of Californians rank lowering bills as a top or important priority for state leaders, and the state’s elected officials have a duty to address these intertwined problems for their constituents. In response, the authors participated in a workshop of more than 20 California electricity experts to diagnose what is causing rising costs and develop actionable policy solutions that address the scale of the challenge. The authors were informed by but not limited by that workshop; they define a policy roadmap to stabilize and ultimately reduce electricity rates for California’s incoming governor, the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC), the legislature, utilities, and other stakeholders, that will allow California to sustain its clean energy leadership.

Understanding the linkage between transmission deliverability and resource adequacy, Stenclik et al., GridLab and Telos Energy

The authors wanted to bridge the gap between interconnection studies and resource adequacy assessments, two processes that are deeply interrelated, but have historically been treated as separate analytical exercises. Most of the recent attention on generator interconnection has focused on interconnection costs, queue timelines, and transmission cost allocation, while the resource adequacy implications have remained largely unexamined. Despite the central role of deliverability assumptions in resource adequacy assessments, there has been limited research into whether they accurately reflect how resources perform during periods of elevated resource adequacy risk outside of narrowly defined peak-load windows. Inaccurately assumed generator deliverability can have a large affect on resource adequacy outcomes.

Assessing Electricity Resource Adequacy in Pennsylvania and PJM, Knight et al., Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission

The authors developed load projections and evaluated resource adequacy under a set of likely possible futures for PJM's grid and its' Pennsylvania service area. The authors used capacity expansion and resource adequacy scenario modeling to (a) develop projections of future resources through the long term (2040) in light of different load projections and (b) assess system reliability performance through the near term (2030) to better understand the kinds of stresses Pennsylvania’s electric system and the wider PJM grid face. Three scenarios were used. In both the Reference scenario and the High Load And Low Supply scenario, the authors found that from 2027 through 2030, the PJM planning criterion for resource adequacy (loss of load expectation or “LOLE” of 0.1) is not met by PJM. Meanwhile, in the No New Data Centers scenario, LOLE is below this 0.1 threshold.

State of Mind: Mapping Values and Climate Perceptions, Maharashtra Edition, Ek Kutumb Solutions

If technical infrastructure enables the delivery of climate solutions, relational infrastructure enables their acceptance, adoption, and endurance. It comprises the social foundations that shape whether people engage with transitions: the values they hold, the degree of agency they feel, the priorities they seek to protect, the institutions they trust, and the ways in which they make sense of change. To address this missing layer, Ek Kutumb is building the first and largest state-by-state, values-based segmentation of citizens in India. The research seeks to surface the deeply held values and perceptions of climate change, along with experiences of agency, priorities, and trust factors that shape how people respond to climate-related issues and interventions. The first state examined is Maharashtra. Four themes emerge from the Maharashtra findings including the primacy of everyday economic pressures, a deep but locally rooted relationship with nature, broad acceptance of climate change expressed in the language of lived experience rather than scientific terminology, and a trust vacuum in which no institution has yet earned the mandate to lead on climate. The authors segment the population into seven value-based groups, each defined by a distinct configuration of core values. For each segment, they examined their relationship to family and community, as well as their understanding of the environment, climate, and institutions.

State of Global Water Resources 2025, World Meteorological Organization

The authors provide a comprehensive quantitative overview of global water resources, with a focus on hydrological variability and trends. The report's information supports countries, decision makers and stakeholders in understanding the current state of water resources, identifying areas with significant anomalies and supporting effective water management strategies. The authors found that 2025 was one of driest years for river discharge in 35 years. The past seven years have seen abnormal river flows. Water storage on Earth’s land surface has decreased in past 10 years. Widespread glacier loss occurred across all regions for the fourth consecutive year. Asia and Africa are the regions most affected by water-related disasters. Water data availability has improved, but gaps remain in hard hit areas.

State-Led Planning, Development, and Procurement, Spokas et al., Clean Air Task Force

The authors identify how establishing state-led planning and procurement can help state governments in deregulated electricity markets meet their power sector decarbonization goals and lays out the components needed to put that planning in action.

Findings from a 2026 Survey of Adults Age 18 and Older, Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago and the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research

The authors found that 53% of Americans are extremely or very concerned about the environmental effects of AI, up from 41% who said the same in 2025. Younger adults ages 18-29 have become particularly concerned, increasing from 38% last year to 60% today and moving from levels similar to other age groups to the highest level of concern. Forty-seven percent of Americans think AI will do more to hurt rather than help the environment, up from 33% who said the same in 2025. The authors also explored attitudes toward climate change, energy policy, and electric vehicles (EVs). Most Americans agree that climate change is happening and is caused by human activity, a trend that has remained stable in recent years. There is a large partisan divide in these attitudes, however, with Democrats more likely than Republicans to believe climate change is occurring (92% vs. 55%) and is caused mostly by human activity (68% vs. 34%). About 2 in 3 believe that oil and gas companies, the federal government, and large businesses and corporations have a lot of responsibility to address climate change, while just 4 in 10 say the same about developing countries and individual people.

In Hottest Summer on Record, 2 in 3 Americans Say Climate Change Is Increasing Heat-Related Illnesses, Annenberg Public Policy Center, University of Pennsylvania

Nearly two-thirds of the American public say climate change is increasing the risk of respiratory diseases and heat- and insect-related illnesses. The author's survey, which was conducted Aug. 4-17, 2026, among 1,904 empaneled U.S. adults, found that 76% report that extreme outdoor heat affected their daily activities at least sometimes in the past year and 38% say poor air quality resulting from wildfire smoke did so. Extreme heat is affecting the everyday lives of most Americans. Nearly two-thirds of Americans (65%) say that climate change is increasing the risk of heat-related illnesses, respiratory diseases, and insect-borne diseases. This is unchanged from August 2025 (65%) and July 2024 (67%) but is significantly higher than 58% in November 2023. Americans generally recognize that heat waves are on the rise. Nearly two-thirds (62%) say U.S. heat waves are becoming more frequent and intense than in the past, statistically unchanged from 61% in August 2025, 65% in July 2024, and 58% in November 2023. Of the four extreme weather events measured in the survey, more Americans report that their daily activities were impacted at least sometimes by extreme outdoor heat (76%) and poor air quality resulting from wildfire smoke (38%). As one would expect, fewer say they were impacted at least sometimes by flooding (20%) and tornadoes/hurricanes (11%), since these events are less frequent.

Energy Crossroads: Why managing fossil fuel decline is key to Australia’s green export future, Malbrain et al., WWF-Australia

The authors warn that the Australia's bid to be both a renewable energy superpower and a major fossil fuel exporter is putting its economic future at risk. This dual energy strategy is sending mixed signals to investors and trading partners just as countries across the Indo-Pacific accelerate clean energy investments. Australia could lose up to $70 billion in fossil fuel export value by 2035 as global demand shifts. Yet, findings show Australian governments still provide an estimated $20.1 billion a year in support to fossil fuels, compared with just $4.6 billion for renewable energy.

Understanding Oregon’s Data Center Industry, Wirkkala et al., Center for Nonprofit and Philanthropic Insight at ECOnorthwest and the University of Virginia

The authors establishes a common foundation for understanding Oregon’s data center industry. They examine the location, scale, and characteristics of existing and planned facilities; electricity and water implications; workforce and economic contributions; property taxes and incentive programs; land use and host-community characteristics; and Oregon’s position relative to selected peer markets. The analysis draws on facility-level data, confidential employment records, economic modeling, county property tax records, geospatial analysis, public utility and water-resource information, and other state, federal, and industry sources. The authors also identify areas where data are insufficient to understand impacts, and further research or reporting is needed. Electricity demand is one of the industry’s most significant infrastructure considerations. Water use depends heavily on facility technology and local conditions. Data centers have a distinct economic profile; relatively few operational jobs, but substantial economic activity. Land-use effects are small statewide, but can be more significant locally.

From Opportunity To Infrastructure: Scaling Rooftop Solar In Commercial Real Estate (UK), Cush and Wakefield, Real Estate:UK, Forsters, and Push Power

The authors found that the UK’s untapped commercial rooftops could become a major new source of solar energy generation with enough output to match that of 20 Hinkley Point C nuclear power stations. This, if used correctly, could massively increase UK renewable energy production, fast-track the UK’s path to net zero, improve national energy security, reduce the need for solar deployment on agricultural land, and drastically reduce energy costs for occupiers amid ongoing energy price uncertainty. The authors used data and responses from 70 real estate organizations with combined assets under management of over £500bn. The authors found that less than 10% of suitable commercial building roof space has been used for solar generation to date, providing just 3-5GW of solar capacity. While solar technology is widely championed in principle, its deployment remains significantly below its technical potential, particularly across the industrial and logistics real estate sector.

The Dirty Truth. They promised you clean energy, but there's a Dirty Truth behind your rising utility bills, Ver Beek et al., Sierra Club

The authors studied the 50 parent companies that own the most fossil fuel generation, comprised of 76 operating companies, which collectively own half of all remaining coal and gas generation in the U.S. They analyzed their plans to retire coal by 2030, not build new gas plants through 2035, and build clean energy to replace fossil generation and serve new load by 2035. The utilities studied scored 7/100, earning an F, worsening their overall score by 11 points since 2021.

Stored Potential. The impacts of utility-scale battery energy storage systems on communities and the grid, Draklellis et al., RMI

The authors examine large-scale battery energy storage system (BESS) projects across the United States, drawing on available data to assess their reliability contributions, economic impacts, community benefits, and improving safety performance. Batteries help keep the lights on during grid stress. Battery storage can lower electricity costs during high-demand periods. BESS projects can provide meaningful local economic benefits. About New Research

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Almost three-quarters of the 72 five-year plans published by China this year include policies or targets related to climate change and energy, according to Carbon Brief analysis.

Five-year plans are an important part of China’s policymaking process, signalling key priorities and setting targets for the coming years.

The post Interactive: What China’s dozens of ‘five-year plans’ say about climate and energy appeared first on Carbon Brief.

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The latest surge in fossil-fuel prices means it is now up to nine times cheaper in the UK to drive an electric vehicle (EV) than a petrol or diesel car, shows Carbon Brief analysis.

Since February, when the US first attacked Iran, the average price of diesel has increased by 38% to £1.96 a litre, according to Carbon Brief analysis of government figures. 

Following the attack on the Kapotnya oil refinery in Russia on 20 September and with tensions in the Middle East growing, this is expected to pass a record £2 a litre. 

(Russia was the second-largest exporter of diesel in the world, but its refineries have been hit every three days on average in the first six months of 2026.)

Similarly, petrol prices have surged by 31% since February to £1.72, based on government figures, with some locations reaching nearly £2 per litre, according to BBC News.

These increases have been driven by oil prices jumping to more than $100 per barrel as the conflict between Yemen’s Houthis and Saudi Arabia escalates – a roughly 50% increase from June. 

As such, it now costs an estimated 21p per mile to drive a diesel car and 20.1p per mile for petrol, according to Carbon Brief analysis of the latest figures from the Department of Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ).

In contrast, it is currently nine times cheaper to drive an EV charged using an off-peak tariff, at 2.3p per mile, as shown in the chart below. 

Even if charging with electricity bought at the domestic price cap – the maximum amount a supplier can charge for a unit of energy and standing charge, set by the regulator Ofgem every three months – it still only costs around 7p per mile to drive an EV, three times cheaper than the price for petrol or diesel cars. 

The price cap is set to increase in October, but almost all of the increase is for gas, with the unit rate of electricity only expected to rise by less than 1% from 26.1p per unit to 26.3p.

A larger 20% increase in electricity unit rates under the price cap is expected in January 2027, as higher gas costs filter through to an increase in wholesale electricity prices. Nevertheless, EVs would still remain far cheaper to drive than petrol or diesel cars.

UK drivers could save around £80 by charging an EV at home, in comparison with filling up a petrol car at the pump, as shown in the figure below. This is based on comparing the cost of an average full tank of petrol with the cost of enough electricity to drive the same distance.

Despite their much higher running costs, petrol still dominates the UK’s roads, making up 55% of all cars on the road. Only 6% of the roughly 35m cars on the road are fully electric battery EVs, with a further 3% being plug-in hybrids that can run on fuel or electricity.

However, sales of EVs are continuing to increase, with around 30% of new cars sold in August being battery EVs, according to the Society of Motor Manufacturers & Traders (SMMT). This is up from 26.5% in August 2025.

Separate analysis from Carbon Brief in June suggested that the UK’s EV drivers were saving £1,100 a year in fuel costs, compared to petrol car drivers. Following the latest hike in fuel prices, these savings would now be even higher at £1,200 a year.

Compared with average pump prices of £1.72 per litre of petrol or £1.96 per litre of diesel, it would cost as little as 20p – around nine times cheaper than petrol – for an equivalent amount of electricity using off-peak charging.

As shown in the figure below, even charging at the household price cap would only cost the equivalent of 60p per litre, making EVs still significantly cheaper to drive.

Public charging points remain significantly more expensive than domestic rates. However, the UK government estimates that around 90% of electric car charging takes place at home.

In addition, the government plans to introduce a pay-per-mile tax on EVs from April 2028. This would add 3p per mile to the cost of driving an EV. Yet the considerably lower fuel costs mean they will remain far cheaper to drive than petrol or diesel cars.

related Analysis: Global fossil-fuel emissions set to fall in 2026 amid Hormuz crisis 16.09.2026 Emissions CCC: Heathrow expansion could push flights to ‘80% of UK emissions by 2050’ 16.09.2026 Emissions El Niño: Indonesia fire emissions in 2026 ‘on track’ to match record for this century 11.09.2026 El Niño and La Niña UK aviation emissions to be 50% higher than thought by 2050, government admits 10.09.2026 Aviation and shipping

The post Analysis: EVs are now nine times cheaper than petrol or diesel to drive in the UK  appeared first on Carbon Brief.

Skeptical Science is partnering with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline.

Does wind power require backup from fossil fuels?

Most power grids still combine fossil fuels with renewables, but some already run entirely on renewable energy and offer models others could follow.

The majority of 100% renewable grids rely primarily on hydropower, though certain nations have significantly incorporated wind in their portfolios. Costa Rica and Uruguay have achieved 99-100% renewable power with around 17% and 35% coming from wind, respectively.

Several U.S. municipalities meet electricity demands using diverse portfolios of renewables, including wind. Burlington, Vermont’s 2024 supply was 99.9% renewable, mainly via hydropower, biomass, and wind; Seattle, Washington was 95% renewables powered in 2024. In Kansas and South Dakota, wind alone comprises 60% of generation.

Energy storage is also rapidly expanding as a solution to intermittency, with the U.S. ranking second globally and achieving record growth in 2025. Such combinations of renewable resources, storage, and transmission continue to enable more reliable, renewable grids.

Go to full rebuttal on Skeptical Science or to the fact brief on Gigafact

This fact brief is responsive to quotes such as this one.

Sources

Climate Council 11 countries leading the charge on renewable energy

Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark Denmark #1 in share of renewables in net electricity generation for 2024 in the EU

IEA Lithuania

City of Burlington Electric Department Our Energy Portfolio

City of Seattle Power Supply and Delivery

Analysis of EIA data Share of electricity gen by wind, by state, 2025

U.S. Energy Information Administration Electricity Data Browser

U.S. Grid Energy Storage Factsheet University of Michigan

Princeton University Net-Zero America

NREL NREL Report Redefines Wind as a Grid Stabilizer, Not a Liability 

Columbia Law School Sabin Center for Climate Change Law Rebutting 33 False Claims About Solar, Wind, and Electric Vehicles

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Fact briefs are short, credibly sourced summaries that offer "yes/no" answers in response to claims found online. They rely on publicly available, often primary source data and documents. Fact briefs are created by contributors to Gigafact — a nonprofit project looking to expand participation in fact-checking and protect the democratic process. See all of our published fact briefs here.

For millions of people around the world, rising sea levels are already reshaping economies, livelihoods and cultures.

The world’s oceans are currently rising at a faster rate than at any time in at least the past three millennia, with human influence the “dominant cause” of sea level rise since at least 1970.

At the UN general assembly in New York this week, world leaders are set to adopt a high-level declaration on the “existential threats” posed by sea level rise. 

The declaration notes: “Sea level rise is not a distant scenario, but a real and lived experience for many.”

On average, global sea levels rose by 20 centimetres (cm) between 1901 and 2018. 

This is due to both the melting of glaciers and ice sheets and the expansion of seawater as it warms, as well as changes in land-water storage.

The rate of the rise has accelerated in recent years, with ocean levels rising 10.6cm since 1993. 

Sea level rise can vary locally due to seismic and volcanic activity, groundwater extraction and changes to the Earth’s surface resulting from ice melt. 

Under a moderate-emissions scenario, scientists predict that global average sea level will rise an additional 56cm by 2100, relative to a 1995-2014 baseline. 

Here, Carbon Brief unpacks some of the key ways that sea level rise threatens both societies and ecosystems. 

• Cities and coastal communities
• Biodiversity and coastal ecosystems
• Small island developing states
• Coral reefs
• Heritage sites

Article Contents Expand menu

• Cities and coastal communities
• Biodiversity and coastal ecosystems
• Small island developing states
• Coral reefs
• Heritage sites

Cities and coastal communities

Around 770 million people – 10% of the world’s population – are at “acute risk” of negative impacts from sea level rise, according to a report from the UN secretary general released last month. 

(The report defines locations at acute risk as those that are less than five metres above the high-tide line.)

The people at risk include the residents of several of the world’s largest cities, including Mumbai and Kolkata in India and Shenzhen and Guangzhou in China. It also encompasses the entire populations of many island nations. (See: Small island developing states.)

There are two ways to consider sea level rise. 

Global-average sea level rise is the amount the ocean surface has moved upwards, on average, relative to a baseline. 

Relative, or local, sea level rise, is how much the ocean has risen in a given place. This can vary from the global average due to a number of factors, including land motion and ocean circulation, as well as changes to the Earth’s surface, rotation and gravitational pull due to the melting of the ice sheets.

Higher sea levels bring with them myriad dangers for coastal communities: they can increase persistent flooding and inundation, strengthen dangerous storm surges and erode beaches and cliffs. Sea level rise also causes the water table of coastal land to rise, which exacerbates flood risk.

The frequency of 100-year “extreme sea level events” has already increased 12-fold since 1900. These are events where high tides, storm surges and relative sea level rise combine to produce exceptionally high sea levels. Under a moderate-emissions scenario, these events are likely to occur at least annually – and, potentially, even more frequently – in many places by the end of the century.

In addition to damage to homes and other buildings, critical infrastructure – such as water systems and wastewater management projects – is increasingly vulnerable to flooding as a result of sea level rise. Flooding can cut communities off from essential services, such as hospitals and markets, with low-income and other marginalised groups disproportionately affected.

Inland encroachment of seawater leads to the saltwater intrusion and threatens agriculture in low-lying coastal areas.

Vertical land motion can also amplify the risk of rising seas. This includes a shifting of the land in response to seismic or volcanic activity or to land sinking, known as subsidence. The changes in local sea level due to these types of vertical motion can equal or surpass the contributions of climate-driven sea level rise.

Many of the coastal cities experiencing the largest changes in their relative sea level are located in east and south-east Asia. One notable example is Jakarta, Indonesia, which has been sinking by up to 15cm per year over the past decade, due largely to the overextraction of groundwater, which leads to the collapse of underground aquifers. 

But even as the risks from sea level rise increase, population growth in coastal areas continues to outstrip that of inland areas. Between 2000 and 2018, the global population grew by slightly more than 23%. The population living within 5km of a coast increased by 28% over that same time.

The associated development of coastal areas means that, even without future sea level rise, global losses from flooding in the world’s largest 136 coastal cities could reach up to $52bn per year by 2050 – up from $6bn in 2005.

In response to the growing threats posed by sea level rise, communities around the world have implemented a number of adaptive actions. 

Venice’s MOSE 1 flooding protection system, Italy. Credit: James Hancock / Alamy Stock Photo

In 2003, the Italian city of Venice began a years-long project to construct three floodgates that could be raised during high tide events to protect the city’s lagoon from the encroachment of the Adriatic Sea. The system was engaged for the first time in October 2020 and then another 48 times in the following two years. 

Other communities have opted for less technologically intensive adaptations, including constructing seawalls, restoring mangrove forests and marshes, disincentivising development in high-risk areas and relocating residents, buildings and infrastructure to higher ground or inland areas. 

However, existing adaptations may not be sufficient to protect communities. Under a low-emissions scenario, these protections may be breached 10 times as frequently over the next 30 years as they currently are.

Biodiversity and coastal ecosystems

The world’s coastal ecosystems are rapidly being destroyed due to both development and sea level rise. 

This combination of pressures is called “coastal squeeze”, where ecosystems that may have otherwise shifted inland in response to sea level rise find their paths blocked by human-made structures. 

Coastal squeeze has contributed to the widespread loss of the world’s wetlands.

Globally, nearly 28m hectares of coastal wetlands – including estuaries, tidal flats, mangroves and seagrass – have disappeared since 1970, according to the 2025 “global wetland outlook” report. This is an area equivalent to roughly the size of Ecuador. 

Although the report names conversion to agriculture as the largest driver of wetland loss, it notes:

“Climate change is increasingly exacerbating the impact of other drivers on wetlands and human wellbeing through changes in the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events, associated fires, floods and droughts and through sea level rise.”

In the continental US, just 16% of coastal wetlands are migrating inland at rates that exceed local sea level rise. Nearly three-quarters of sites are moving at rates that do not outpace sea level rise, while 11% are submerging. 

Low-lying islands are particularly threatened by sea level rise, due to their large amounts of coastline relative to their land areas. At the same time, islands are often “hotspots” of biodiversity, with many home to species found nowhere else in the world. More than 20% of the Earth’s known plant species are found only on islands.

A 2013 study modelled the impact of different amounts of sea level rise on 10 island biodiversity hotspots, comprising nearly 4,450 individual islands. It found that in a future with one metre of sea level rise, around 6% of the island habitat area would be completely submerged, while more than 11% of the hotspot islands would see their land area reduced by at least half. This could put dozens of species at risk of extinction, the study said.

Beach spectaclepod (Dithyrea maritima). Credit: piemags/nature / Alamy Stock Photo

In 2024, researchers documented the first known extirpation, or local extinction, of a plant species in the US due to sea level rise. Hurricanes and storm surges – amplified by sea level rise – began to kill off the only US population of the Key Largo cactus in the 2010s. 

The remaining cacti suffered from soil erosion and saltwater intrusion and the final remaining specimens were removed in 2021 in an effort to cultivate them in greenhouses. (Other Caribbean islands, including Cuba, do still have surviving populations of the cactus.)

As native flora and fauna are diminished or even eliminated by rising sea levels, coastal ecosystems may become vulnerable to colonisation by invasive alien species, further harming biodiversity. 

And as coastal communities are forced to relocate due to sea level rise, there are knock-on effects for biodiversity as they develop on new lands. These secondary biodiversity impacts are likely to be particularly prevalent in south-east Asia, due to the large number of people living in low-lying areas who may be forced to migrate due to sea level rise.

Small island developing states

Sea level rise poses an “acute and disproportionate” threat to small island developing states, says the recent UN report. It adds:

“Even under moderate scenarios, rising seas will render many low-lying coastal zones and small island developing states increasingly uninhabitable without extraordinary adaptation.”

Climate change is already resulting in loss and damage to small island nations, which are particularly vulnerable to both climate change in general and sea level rise specifically.

This vulnerability is in large part due to the geography of these countries. Several small island Pacific states are made up of atolls – ring-shaped coral or sandy islands that encircle lagoons. These often have average elevations of 1-2 metres above sea level and maximum elevations of 3-5 metres above sea level. 

Panoramic aerial view of Kanton Island. Kiribati. Credit: Galaxiid / Alamy Stock Photo

Some modelling evidence has shown that reef islands can grow vertically in response to sea level rise, as waves washing over the islands transport sediment from the ocean onto the surface. However, the strength of such waves would likely make these islands unsuitable for building on.

Other research has shown that Pacific islands respond in many different ways to rising sea levels, with “complex” outcomes, both positive and negative.

In addition, most of the small-island nations in the Pacific Ocean are located in a region where relative sea level rise from the melting of the Antarctic ice sheet is projected to be 11-33% higher than the global average rise in 2100 – regardless of emissions scenario.

The effects of this higher-than-average sea level rise is already evident.

In 1999, Kiribati lost two small, uninhabited islands to the rising seas. Several uninhabited islands in the Solomon Islands had vanished by 2014, while a further six islands had been severely eroded by the ocean, necessitating the relocation of some communities. 

In addition, most small island developing states are located in parts of the ocean that are often hit by tropical cyclones. Sea level rise can enhance storm surge, leading to greater destruction during such storms.

However, small island developing states are also vulnerable “because they lack the means to address the impacts on their own”, reads the UN report. 

According to the UN, these countries will require up to $6bn annually by 2035 in order to adapt to climate change. However, they received just $1.2bn in public adaptation finance in 2022-23.

Aerial view of the damage caused by hurricane Dorian, Bahamas. Credit: AC NewsPhoto / Alamy Stock Photo

Currently, small island developing states experience “expected” annual climate damages of $1.64bn due to coastal flooding, equivalent to 0.13% of their cumulative GDP. But, even if warming were limited to 1.5C above pre-industrial temperatures, these annual damages are projected to grow to $24bn.

In the international policy arena, questions have arisen over what should happen to island nations’ maritime boundaries as their land is enveloped by the sea. This is because maritime holdings, such as exclusive economic zones, are determined based on a country’s land borders.

However, a 2025 report by the UN International Law Commission considered the legal implications of sea level rise. It concluded that international law allows for countries’ borders to stay the same, “notwithstanding changes to the coastline as a result of climate change-related sea level rise”. It also noted:

“There is a need to develop legal and practical solutions to better protect persons affected by sea level rise, including those who remain in situ and those who are internally or externally displaced by it.”

Other small islands also face similar issues in their exposure to threats posed by sea level rise.

Coral reefs

Coral reefs are among the ecosystems that are most vulnerable to climate change.

They are also being visibly affected already – almost entirely due to ocean warming. Even though these ecosystems are completely submerged to begin with, they are also impacted by sea level rise. 

As the ocean rises, the water over shallow ecosystems deepens. 

The effects of this are twofold. Deeper water reduces the temperatures experienced by reefs. This can act as a buffer against marine heatwaves and global ocean warming. 

At the same time, the increased depth reduces the amount of light that can reach the coral communities, which can impact their survival.

In addition, sea level rise-assisted erosion will add more sediment to the near-shore waters. These particles can settle on corals, impeding their ability to feed and reproduce, as well as interfering with photosynthesis by the zooxanthellae algae that live symbiotically with corals. Together, this leads to slower coral growth and increased stress on reefs. 

So far, reefs in some parts of the world have been able to “keep pace” with sea level rise, growing vertically at accelerated rates and therefore maintaining suitable levels of light availability.

However, modelling has shown that few reefs have the capacity to continue to maintain their distance from the surface under a moderate-emissions scenario. 

Coral reef. Credit: imageBROKER.com / Alamy Stock Photo

As coral reefs degrade, the seafloor below them can wear away. This erosion is contributing to greater apparent levels of sea level rise on coral reefs in the Caribbean, as well as the US states of Florida and Hawaii. 

Sea level rise may also have the ability to spur reef growth in shallow environments previously thought to be uninhabitable for corals. In Sanya Bay in the northern South China Sea, sea level rise since the mid-1980s has allowed for the recolonisation of a reef that had been dormant for more than five millennia. 

But the opportunities for such recolonisation are far outstripped by the loss of coral elsewhere. Since 1980, the world has lost nearly 10% of its coral cover due to climate change-induced ocean warming. The UN declaration reads:

“Every fraction of a degree of global warming increases the risks to coral reefs.”

Heritage sites

Throughout human history, many societies developed along rivers and coastlines, due to the abundance of food and ease of transportation. However, their proximity to the sea means that many of these sites are now at risk of being damaged or destroyed by sea level rise.

Cultural heritage includes “physical sites, living heritage, traditional lands, burial grounds, underwater cultural heritage, archaeological and sacred sites and culturally significant coastal landscapes”, according to the UN sea level rise report. 

Tongariki, Rapa Nui, Chile. Credit: Robert Wyatt / Alamy Stock Photo

Several studies have mapped the cultural and natural heritage sites that are most at risk from flooding and erosion due to sea level rise. 

There are 49 Unesco world heritage sites located at low elevations along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea. Nearly every one of these is already at risk from erosion or severe flooding events – 42 face issues with erosion, while 37 are at risk from a 100-year flood event. Both of these risks will increase over the remainder of the century as sea levels continue to rise. 

The locations at risk include the archaeological sites of the ancient cities of Carthage in present-day Tunisia and Ephesus in Turkey, the ruins of Pompeii and Herculaneum in Italy and the medieval Cathedral of St James in Šibenik, Croatia. 

The sea level rise associated with warming of 3C above pre-industrial temperatures would impact nearly one-fifth of all Unesco cultural world heritage sites. The sites at risk include Japan’s Hiroshima Peace Memorial, South Africa’s Robben Island, Chile’s Rapa Nui and the Sydney Opera House. Many of these become vulnerable at lower levels of global warming.

In Africa, 56 out of 284 cultural and natural heritage sites already face threats from flooding or erosion due to sea level rise. This number is expected to nearly triple – to 191 threatened sites – by 2050 under a moderate-emissions scenario. However, mitigating emissions could reduce the number of very-highly exposed sites – those with at least 75% of their area vulnerable – by one-quarter.

Globally, there are 386 Unesco heritage sites along the coast that are, at most, 20 metres above sea level and are therefore potentially affected by coastal erosion and flood hazards.

These threatened sites include 289 cultural heritage sites and 91 natural heritage sites, as well as six “mixed” sites that are recognised for both their cultural and natural significance.

The UN declaration calls for action to mitigate damage to significant sites, saying:

“Protection, preservation and documentation of cultural heritage is a priority.”

Mombasa: Key outcomes from the Our Ocean Conference in Kenya 24.06.2026 Marine life Guest post: How a record-high ‘energy imbalance’ is driving global warming 10.06.2026 Climate system AMOC: Is global warming tipping key Atlantic ocean currents towards ‘collapse’? 24.04.2026 AMOC Guest post: The challenges in projecting future global sea levels 17.02.2026 Greenland

The post Explainer: How sea level rise poses an ‘existential threat’ to humans, heritage and nature appeared first on Carbon Brief.

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• Nepal’s needs
• Requests vs pledges
• ‘Rapid response’

The Nepali government has requested $20m from the UN fund for “loss and damage”, following the devastating floods that hit the country in late August.

This amounts to just 0.7% of the $2.7bn it has estimated in “physical damage” to infrastructure and “economic losses” from the flooding, according to Carbon Brief analysis.

The $20m request would, nevertheless, make Nepal the fourth-largest claimant to the UN loss-and-damage fund, which is intended to help deal with climate-related disasters.

Developing countries have already made 176 applications to the UN fund for responding to loss and damage, requesting, in total, $2.8bn to help recover from a variety of damaging events, such as drought, floods and storms.

Yet, to date, predominantly developed nations have only pledged $0.8bn to support the fund.

This means requests to the fund are already three times larger than the total amount pledged, raising questions about its potential to respond to emergencies.

As yet, no funding has been paid out of the fund to developing countries grappling with intensifying and more frequent climate change-induced disasters since it was established in 2023.

Nepal’s needs

On 26 August, Nepal was hit by flash floods following a catastrophic rock-ice avalanche in the Himalayan border region. The flooding has killed more than 1,400 people, with thousands still missing. 

Days later, the Nepali government sought an “urgent response” from the board of the UN fund for climate-driven loss and damage. 

It subsequently requested $20m in “financial compensation” from the fund. This is the maximum amount that can currently be requested for a single project.

“Loss and damage” is a term used to describe how climate change is causing serious and, in many cases, irreversible impacts around the world. Nations established the UN fund in 2023, after decades of effort by climate-vulnerable nations.

Nepal’s national disaster management authority has now released an extensive rapid preliminary assessment of “damage and needs” from the floods.

As the chart below shows, Nepal’s $20m loss-and-damage claim would only cover 0.7% of what authorities describe as $2.7bn in “total damage and loss” from the floods.

When accounting for another $4.8bn in “recovery and reconstruction” costs – part of how loss and damage is internationally defined – then Nepal’s $20m claim would be just 0.3% of the needs it estimates.

Reacting to the analysis, Nepal’s climate negotiator Raju Pandit Chhetri tells Carbon Brief that the country’s $20m request was for “rapid response”, adding: 

“That money is going to be a peanut if it was to be invested into reconstruction.”

Requests vs pledges

Vulnerable, developing countries have long argued that developed nations should be held responsible for loss and damage, while countries such as the US have blocked moves that could have led to them being liable for climate-related damages

From December 2025 until July 2026, developing countries made 176 applications to the loss-and-damage fund, requesting over $2.8bn in assistance.

So far, predominantly developed countries have pledged only $822m to the fund. (Some nations that are not categorised as “developed” under the UN, such as the UAE and South Korea, have also committed funds.)

Funding requests from developing countries to date are, therefore, more than triple what has been pledged.

Apart from Nepal’s new request, “requested” data is based on the project pipeline as of 29 June 2026. Analysis by Carbon Brief.

Moreover, only around half of the money pledged so far has been paid into the fund by donor nations, with large sums from France, Italy and the UAE still outstanding.

The fund has made $342m available in its initial funding round in July 2026. However, as of September, no money from the fund has been distributed to any countries facing climate-related disasters.

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According to Carbon Brief analysis, off the 176 loss-and-damage fund requests received from 118 countries, more than 60% are from least developed countries  – such as Nepal – and small-island nations. So far, each individual funding request is capped at $20m. 

The flood-related request is Nepal’s fourth appeal to the fund and, as the chart below shows, this makes it the fourth-largest claimant overall. 

Apart from Nepal’s new request, data is based on the project pipeline as of 29 June 2026. Analysis by Carbon Brief.

Nine other countries have made multiple requests to the fund. Madagascar – hit by back-to-back cyclones after a prolonged drought – has made six requests in total. 

Drought-ravaged Suriname, Ecuador, Brazil and Barbados have specified that their funding requests are part of an “emergency response”.

‘Rapid response’

Nepal’s $20m claim has sparked a conversation on climate justice and the ability of the loss-and-damage fund to deliver, in the face of increasingly frequent extreme-weather events.

In a letter sent five days after the disaster, Nepal’s finance minister Dr Swarnim Wagle appealed to the fund’s board to mobilise an “urgent response” that would “signal” that the fund:

“[I]s capable of responding with humanity, speed, flexibility and solidarity when climate-vulnerable countries face losses and damages beyond their capacity to address alone.”

Board members from Asia-Pacific and African countries wrote a letter in support of the Himalayan country in crisis, urging the board to convene and “potentially agree to a provisional set-aside allocation of resources to support rapid response funding for Nepal”. 

They pointed out that the board’s response to Nepal could offer “procedural lessons” in how to strengthen its “rapid-response” to sudden-onset extreme-weather events. Such support is explicitly part of the fund’s mandate.

On 14 September, developed-country members of the fund’s board wrote that they supported a “consultation” on Nepal, but made no commitments in terms of actual funding. 

Harjeet Singh, loss-and-damage expert and global convenor of the Fill the Fund campaign, tells Carbon Brief that the fund’s board deals with most funding requests as regular projects, rather than emergencies. Singh continues: 

“Developed countries gave a really cold response to Nepal’s request. They have not addressed it because they know that if this happens once, they are going to be under pressure all the time. This is unacceptable.” 

Meanwhile, BBC News reported that Nepal plans to use climate attribution studies to strengthen its claim.

According to a rapid attribution study by World Weather Attribution and climate experts who spoke to Carbon Brief, factors such as glacial retreat and permafrost thaw that played a key role in the disaster have been linked to climate change. A full attribution study is pending. 

Nepal’s prime minister Balendra Shah will address the UN general assembly on 24 September and is expected to raise issues around climate justice, loss and damage and the vulnerability of mountain countries.

The next board meeting of the loss and damage fund is on 15 December, two months from now, and a fortnight after the conclusion of COP31 in Turkey.

Pandit Chhetri tells Carbon Brief:

“It’s a shame that, until now, the fund has not been able to even give a penny to developing countries. And, starkly, the event in Nepal only demonstrates why this kind of fund is so important for highly vulnerable, poor, developing countries.”

Pandit Chhetri adds that, after nearly three weeks since the disaster, there is yet to be a decision on the request and that the country has “only received messages of solidarity”, with no assurance of rapid response funds. He says that it is “quite an interesting scene for [us] to observe”, adding:

“If the fund cannot respond in a crisis like this for a country like Nepal – when you have this massive destruction and devastation – then what is the use of the fund itself? That’s why it is a test for the fund, though the resources are limited.”

Related Analysis: India’s power-sector emissions flat for two years due to clean-energy surge 17.09.2026 Emissions World falling short on 22 of 23 nature targets for 2030, says draft UN report 29.07.2026 International policy Analysis: 84% of nations miss deadline to identify ‘nature-harming’ subsidies by 2025  28.07.2026 International policy Access to finance ‘strengthens climate resilience’ among sub-Saharan women 24.07.2026 International policy

The post Analysis: Nepal’s $20m ‘loss-and-damage’ claim only covers 0.7% of flood costs appeared first on Carbon Brief.

This is a re-post from World Weather Attribution

A catastrophic rock-ice avalanche that transitioned into a debris flood in the Himalayas along the Nepal–China border on 26 August 2026 has caused widespread destruction across Nepal and neighbouring regions. In Nepal, at the time of writing (14 September 2026) the disaster has resulted in over 1,300 confirmed deaths, with only a small fraction of victims identified and returned to their families. Over 5,000 people remain missing, around 13,700 people  have been rescued and more than 8,600 people have received medical treatment (NDRRMA, 2026e). About 3,400 people are currently sheltering in holding centres (NDRRMA, 2026a) and an estimated 84,270 people across 17 local levels in the six districts of Rasuwa, Nuwakot, Dhading, Gorkha, Chitwan and Tanahu are affected, with the government declaring 15 municipalities as disaster crisis-hit areas for three months (UNDP, 2026a; MOHA, 2026).

While initial reports suggested that the event may have been caused by an earthquake, later evidence indicates that the recorded seismic activity was actually linked to the rapid collapse of  roughly 2 square kilometers of  rock wall and glacier ice (US Geological Society Earthquake Hazards Program, August 26, 2026; Center for Hydrology and Water Resources Research, 2026). The collapsing material fell approximately 1,400 m, from around 5,150 m above sea level to the valley floor at about 3,750 m. This released a huge amount of energy and produced seismic waves that were initially detected as an earthquake-like signal.

The rock-ice avalanche then triggered a series of processes. As the ice, rock and debris moved rapidly down the mountain, friction and mechanical energy probably caused some of the glacier ice to melt, producing large amounts of meltwater (Le Page, 26 August 2026 [NewScientist]). When the avalanche reached the valley floor, it also hit buried ice, which probably melted and added more water to the debris flood.

Figure 1: Climate-sensitive processes potentially contributing to failure. Conceptual representation of the main mechanisms through which climate variability and climate change may have influenced the stability of the Rasuwa rock wall.  

The resulting debris flood was therefore likely caused by several sources of water, including melting glacier ice, water stored beneath the glacier and in permafrost, ice and water carried within the debris (see fig. 1), and river water pushed ahead of the flow. A wall of water, ice, rock and sediment reached the Rasuwagadhi border, 22 km downstream, within seven minutes, moving at an average speed of 188 km per hour, and wiped out the border facilities, the town of Timure and the Syabrubesi market town within the next quarter of an hour, catching pilgrims, border staff and hydropower workers (CHWRR, 2026; Lord, 2026). Within a further half hour it was in the Trishuli valley at Betrawati, and still moving boulders and pulling multi-storey buildings into the river in Betrawati and Trishuli Bazaar far downstream (CHWRR, 2026; Lord, 2026). The flood travelled 200 km to Devghat in under seven hours, where river flow more than doubled to about 5,850 cubic metres per second, and an estimated 20 million cubic meters of excess water passed in under four hours before the flood continued into India (CHWRR, 2026; Lord, 2026). The water deposited 30.5 million cubic meters of sediment and debris along the corridor, burying agricultural fields, settlements and hydropower plants (NDRRMA, 2026d).

This mixture of water, ice, rock and sediment created a highly destructive debris flood that swept away families, homes, settlements, roads, bridges and other infrastructure along the corridor, leaving survivors stranded and cut off, many having also lost family members and everything they owned more than 35 km downstream while the water travelled much further, at Glachi, 88 km downstream the water level of the river Trishuli rose by 8.5m (Center for Land Surface Hazards, 2026). The extent of the humanitarian catastrophe is still being assessed. 

Researchers from Nepal, Pakistan, the UK, Ireland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, the US, New Zealand and the Netherlands, including experts in glaciology, mountain hydrology, climate science, humanitarian aid, seismology and social science, have come together to examine the range of factors that may have contributed to this event. While the underlying geological structure controlled where and how the slope failed, longer-term warming and changing precipitation phase from snow to rain may have reduced its stability by weakening ice-filled fractures and rock–ice contacts and increasing water pressure. Climate change is thus best understood as a destabilising factor acting on a pre-existing geological predisposition, rather than the fundamental cause of the failure. Therefore, rather than conducting a conventional attribution study which is typically focused on a single, well-defined weather event, we are bringing together the available scientific knowledge on known and potential drivers, while also investigating how these drivers have changed in a warming climate.

Main Findings 

• Nepal has established early warning systems and adaptation measures that can help reduce impacts from more conventional and forecastable riverine floods, and have demonstrably helped save lives, including among communities downstream. However, the event was fundamentally different in its magnitude, speed and complexity. It was beyond the design and predictive limits of existing risk reduction measures, and no existing early warning system could have provided sufficient lead time or prevented the scale of impacts observed in the worst-affected areas, highlighting the limits of adaptation. In a rapidly warming Himalaya, increasingly extreme and complex hazards are exceeding adaptation capacity, resulting in loss and damage. This is occurring against a baseline of a high frequency of large earthquakes, which both destabilises slopes and hampers recovery from successive disasters.

• The immediate impacts of this cascading hazard were almost entirely dependent on exposure to hazard, whereas longer-term impacts (e.g. related to recovery, long-term health effects) are likely to vary based on socioeconomic vulnerability characteristics of the populations affected. In a high mountain context where habitable land is constrained, population is increasing, and economic activity is dependent on rivers, it would be very socially, economically and politically difficult to eliminate or even substantially reduce exposure in riverine valleys, representing a soft limit to adaptation.  

• The 26 August 2026 Rasuwa disaster was triggered by a large rock wall collapse from the Langtang Lirung mountain at 5,150 m asl., which also caused part of the overlying glacier to collapse. The resulting rock–ice avalanche rapidly transformed into a debris flood and then a water-dominated flash flood that traveled downstream at average speeds of 188 km/hr, causing extensive erosion and sediment deposition. The failure involved an exceptionally large volume of rock and ice that on impact with the ground released energy equivalent to a M5.5 earthquake. There are several possible contributing causes, as outlined in the following points.

• In 2015 an earthquake of magnitude 7.8 triggered a catastrophic rock–ice avalanche at Langtang Lirung and caused widespread damage across the region. Subsequent monitoring shows persistently elevated and, at high elevations, increased landslide activity, suggesting that earthquake shaking may have weakened the underlying rock mass over the long term. Although its specific contribution to the 2026 failure cannot yet be confirmed, the earthquake may have preconditioned the slope for failure, alongside geological and climatic factors.

• Warming and permafrost degradation likely weakened the source rock wall by increasing bedrock temperatures and thawing ice within fractures. Loss of ice bonding reduces fracture strength, while meltwater can increase water pressure and further destabilise pre-existing geological weaknesses. Thus, permafrost degradation may have acted as an additional climate-related factor preconditioning the slope for failure.

• Glaciers in the region have been losing mass for decades at a rate equivalent to more than half a metre of thinning per year. Since 2010 the rate of recession of the Langtang-Lirung glacier extent has accelerated, increasing from 0.5% per annum over the previous two centuries to 1-2.3% per annum in the past 16 years. Glacier thinning and retreat can reduce buttressing and alter stresses within adjacent rock walls, potentially weakening existing fractures and increasing slope instability. Combined with increased meltwater, these processes may have interacted to amplify the compound event. 

• Precipitation can provide an additional short-timescale forcing. As temperatures rise, the rain–snow transition moves upward, increasing the fraction of rain falling as snow at higher elevations. Rain produces an immediate liquid-water input to the slope, whereas snowfall temporarily stores water at the surface. Intense or prolonged rainfall can therefore rapidly increase water supply to fractures and potentially increase fracture-water pressure. At the rock-ice-avalanche location,  stations recorded exceptionally high precipitation during October 2025, which combined with subsequent warmth may have been a source for meltwater during the following spring and monsoon seasons. There is also a tendency of the greater fraction of precipitation falling as rain than snow in recent years. This means there can be an increase in the amount of water stored in the land under the avalanche site, even in the absence of anomalously high total precipitation. 

• Observations show unusually warm conditions before the failure, supporting enhanced snow and ice melt and more precipitation falling as rain rather than snow. The slope failure on August 26th occurred against the backdrop of a warm 12 month period from September 2025-August 2026, with the warmest two months of the year (July and August) directly preceding the event also substantially warmer than the climatological average. These conditions were anomalous at the location of the slope failure itself and across the wider Himalayan region.

• We also analysed the height of the 0°C isotherm, finding that it has shifted to higher elevations consistent with global warming, with particularly strong trends observed during the Monsoon and Postmonsoon seasons. This progressive upward retreat of the freezing threshold is on the order of 100m/decade in recent decades in the Monsoon and Postmonsoon season. This is highly relevant as it can contribute to the degradation of high-elevation permafrost, glacial thinning and retreat, the snowfall-rainfall transition, and associated slope instability.

• When analysing how these conditions were different in a 1.4°C cooler preindustrial climate, using the standard WWA attribution framework that compares possible weather in today’s climate with possible weather in a 1.4°C cooler preindustrial climate using climate models and statistical models based on weather observations. We find in all datasets a significant increase in the likelihood and intensity of the very warm July-August temperatures at the gridcell nearest to the slope failure as well as in the wider region with an increase in temperature attributable to human-caused climate change during July and August of about 1.5°C, comparable to the level of global warming. Annually, the attributable increase is larger than global warming, at about 2°C. In individual winter months, the observed increase is as high as 3°C.

• We have not assessed whether this specific rock-ice avalanche would have occurred in the absence of human-induced climate change. Such a direct attribution requires additional evidence linking atmospheric conditions to subsurface temperatures, fracture-water pressures and the mechanical evolution of the slope. However, rapidly rising temperatures at a rate beyond the global mean as a result of fossil fuel emissions increase the likelihood and severity of such hazards in the Himalayas.

• Significant progress in adaptation is needed, particularly through strengthened high Himalaya earth observation, hazard monitoring, risk communication  and transboundary data and knowledge sharing. But events of this magnitude ultimately exceed the limits of adaptation. Addressing unfolding and imminent loss and damage, through recovery and reconstruction support in impacted communities, has now become an unavoidable part of climate response. 

• Minimising future risk requires a rapid transition away from fossil fuel use and delivering on climate finance commitments for adaptation. This is particularly important in the Himalaya and other high mountains, where glacier decline and permafrost degradation are expected to continue even without further warming, meaning that some of the impacts of past warming have yet to fully emerge.