Skeptical Science

A listing of 28 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, August 30, 2026 thru Sat, September 5, 2026. Stories we promoted this week, by category:

Climate Change Impacts (6 articles)

• When a mountain falls: How ice and rock triggered Nepal`s catastrophic flood - and why climate change is raising the risks The Conversation, Umesh Haritashya, Aug 29, 2026.
• Climate crisis pushes French winemakers to bet on warmer future in Brittany and Normandy An important part of the French economy is chased north by climate change but successful adapatation is not a certainty. France 24, France 24 staff, Aug 31, 2026.
• Coral Reefs Are Running Out of Time to Recover, Research Finds Rising sea temperatures mean reefs don’t have enough time to bounce back between intense heat waves, a new report warns. New York Times, Quinn Glabicki, Aug 31, 2026.
• Nepal`s glacial collapse foreshadowed a future of climate disaster | Michael Mann The deluge capped a summer of extreme climate events, from deadly heatwaves to wildfires. We must take action now The Guardian, Michael Mann, Sep 01, 2026.
• UN finally admits global warming will shoot past 1.5 ºC climate limit According to a report released today by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the best the planet can hope for on its current emissions trajectory is warming of about 1.8 ºC above pre-industrial levels this century. Nature, James Dinneen, Sept 2 2026.
• Canadians should prepare for a 5 C hotter future, report warns The second edition of Canada's Changing Climate Report, a synthesis of the science on the impact of a warming planet on Canadians, confirms with greater confidence that burning fossil fuels, or what the report calls "human activities," are responsible for climate change. CBC Canada News, David Thurton, Sep 04, 2026.

Climate Science and Research (6 articles)

• How the greenhouse effect was discovered A video about the first paper detailing the greenhouse effect and examining the role of varying levels of carbon dioxide was released back in 1896. Youtube, Simon Clark, Aug 29, 2026.
• As super El Nino strengthens, study suggests that climate change is intensifying El Ninos Phys.org, Seth Borenstein, Aug 30, 2026.
• Forests didn't fare well during an ancient global warming event, offering a 'cautionary' tale about today's climate change Smithsonian Magazine, Sarah Hashemi, Aug 30, 2026.
• Explainer: The CMIP7 emissions scenarios - and how they explore future climate change Every six to seven years, climate modelling groups around the world run a coordinated set of simulations that explore how the climate could change in the future. Carbon Brief, Zeke Hausfather, Aug 31, 2026.
• EXPERT REACTION: Quick action needed as the world is set to get hotter than we hoped Rapid expert reaction to the UN's belated acknowledgement of committed overshoot of the previously agreed acceptable 1.5°C global warming threshold. Australian Science Media (scimex), Australian Science Media Centre staff, Sept 2, 2026.
• Skeptical Science New Research for Week #36 2026 Highlighted articles in our latest weekly climate research scan focus on various forms of reality-denial, purposefully for profit or as unconscious obedience to political ideology. Skeptical Science, Doug Bostrom & Marc Kodack, Sep 03, 2026.

Public Misunderstandings about Climate Solutions (4 articles)

• Rebutting 38 False Claims About Solar, Wind, Electric Vehicles, and Battery Storage In this report, the Sabin Center identifies and examines 38 of the most pervasive false claims about solar energy, wind energy, and electric vehicles, with the aim of promoting a more informed discussion about energy modernization Sabin Center for Climate Change Law, Andrew Kieffer, Sep 02, 2026.
• Energy In, Motion Out EVs waste miles less energy than their fossil-fuelled counterparts. Climate Trunk, John Lang, Sep 02, 2026.
• How to respond to disinformation about clean energy, at scale David Roberts interviews Leah Qusba about scalable methods for leveling the playing field when countering organized energy modernization disinformation campaigns. Volts, David Roberts, Sep 02, 2026.
• Widespread Local Opposition, Often Driven by Misinformation, Continues to Hamper Renewable Energy Development Opposition frequently stems from, and/or is heightened by, mis- and dis-information about renewable energy development which is often spread by the fossil fuel industry and its supporters. Climate Law Blog, Ivonne Norman, Andrew Kieffer and Romany Webb, Sep 03, 2026.

Climate Education and Communication (3 articles)

• The Earth is sizzling, but climate isn't a hot topic for Democrats in this year's campaigns Climate change has become a less prominent election-year issue for Democrats as voters say concerns such as affordability are more pressing ABC News, Nicholas Riccardi, Jennifer McDermott, Leah Willinghanm, Aug 29, 2026.
• Inside the passage of America`s biggest climate law In a new memoir, author Leah Stokes takes readers behind the scenes of U.S. democracy – and shows how people can still have an outsize impact by working together. Yale Climate Connections, Michael Svoboda, Sep 02, 2026.
• Who decides what climate change caused? Critical analysis of climate change attribution in press coverage of disasters finds generally good results, advises guarding credibility without underplaying the role climate change is playing in amplifying havoc. Atmos, Miranda Green, Sep 03, 2026.

Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation (2 articles)

• Vycarb Successfully Stores Low-Purity CO2 In Seawater Some fairly easy chemistry not only can handle impurecombustion gas streams but also offers a side-benefit for at least somewhat offsetting ocean acidification. CleanTechnica, Larry Evans, Aug 29, 2026.
• Guest post: Why tough methane cuts are crucial for keeping warming `well-below` 2C A new study highlights that, to limit peak warming to well-below 2C, net-zero CO2 targets must be complemented by stringent methane emissions cuts. Carbon Brief, Konstantin Weber, Prof Reto Knutti, Dr Cyril Brunner, Sep 01, 2026.

Public Misunderstandings about Climate Science (2 articles)

• Koonin`s Temperature of the LOL Stratosphere Longest-running climate blog does a forensic deconstruction of a ''climate skeptic'' claim, presented as part of the US Department of Energy's ''Climate Working Group'' misinformation workshopping. RealClimate, RealClimate Group, Aug 31, 2026.
• How climate denialism finds its way to the US 's highest office The Guardian on Youtube, Dharna Noor, Sep 3, 2026.

Climate Policy and Politics (2 articles)

• Heathrow expansion would make UK `overshoot` climate targets, report suggests New modelling says UK aviation industry is already forecast to exceed limits in the seventh carbon budget, even before third runway is built The Standard News, Tom Place, Sep 02, 2026.
• Oil lobby tanking climate Superfund bills in Oregon, 11 states despite public support, study finds Brown University researchers found that a small amount of testimony from fossil fuel lobbyists opposing polluter pay laws has had greater power than massive public support. Oregon Capital Chronicle, Alex Baumhart, Sept 3, 2026.

Miscellaneous (2 articles)

• 2026 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #35 A listing of 29 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, August 23, 2026 thru Sat, August 29, 2026. Skeptical Science, Bärbel Winkler & Doug Bostrom, Aug 30, 2026.
• Readers reply: If all car tyres were filled with CO2, would this cut atmospheric carbon significantly? Newspaper readers answer an intriguing question; one reader goes through the numbers quantifying correct intuition. The Guardian, Guardian Staff, Aug 31, 2026.

Climate Law and Justice (1 article)

• Science, Attribution Studies, & Identifying Climate Criminals CleanTechnica, Steve Hanley, Aug 31, 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

Misrepresentation of Human Climate Fingerprint in DOE Report, Santer et al., Earth s Future

A July 2025 report from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) made the key claim that the stratosphere has warmed since 2000, contrary to model projections and inconsistent with the expected anthropogenic fingerprint. The DOE report provided no references or data to support this claim. Its basis appears to be an unpublished figure comparing simulated and observed tropical trends in the temperature of the lower stratosphere (TLS), a layer extending from roughly 15 to 20 km above Earth's surface. The observed tropical TLS trends shown in the unpublished DOE figure are incorrect. When the correct observational data sets are used, model tropical TLS trends are consistent with satellite observations, and a model-predicted anthropogenic fingerprint is identifiable with high confidence in observed latitude-altitude profiles of tropical temperature change. An earlier rebuttal of the DOE “no human fingerprint” claim considered global-mean temperature changes only and did not perform a pattern-based fingerprint study. Unless corrected or retracted, the DOE report will continue to misinform policymakers and the public about the reality of human effects on climate.

Climate disinformation and moral distortion, Hopster & Martini, Environmental Politics

Disinformation is commonly understood as the distortion, omission or framing of facts, in the interest of deceiving. But does disinformation merely stem from an untruthful representation of facts, or can it also involve a distortion of morals? This question is not easily answered: while factual information can be untruthfully represented, it is less straightforward what ‘moral distortion’ might involve. In this paper we investigate the nature of moral distortion, by scrutinizing two case-studies from climate discourse. We argue that moral distortion involves the selective representation of morally relevant facts, which leaves an audience with a biased appreciation of an issue, even though the sender of information positions themselves as a trustworthy partner in public inquiry. We clarify how moral distortion relates to ‘moral corruption’, ‘greenwashing’, and other types of environmental disinformation, and address the objection that the cultural relativity of moral claims shields them from criticism.

[Comment] The imperative to counter fossil fuel industry disinformation for public health, Narayan et al., The Lancet Planetary Health

Despite claims of being climate solution leaders, fossil fuel companies continue to spend billions on lobbying and disinformation to delay meaningful climate action. The medical and public health community is uniquely positioned at the forefront of the battle against fossil fuel disinformation, and their role has never been more crucial. As some of the most trusted voices in society, health professionals hold a powerful influence over public opinion and policy, making them essential advocates for truth and health. However, the growing tide of fossil fuel industry disinformation, aimed at confusing the public, deflecting responsibility, and delaying action, threatens to erode the foundation of this trust and the ability of the health community to advocate on climate-related health threats. Therefore, it is imperative for health professionals to take a proactive, united stand in countering this influence.

When beliefs meet technology: conservatism, climate denialism, and support for solar geoengineering, Lee et al., Environmental Politics

Solar geoengineering is an object of deep political contestation. Public responses to solar geoengineering technologies cannot be as easily explained by political ideology alone. Hypothesizing that climate denialism mediates ideology’s influence on public support for solar geoengineering, we ask: (1) What is the relationship between political conservatism and support for solar geoengineering, and does it differ by country and technology? (2) Is this relationship mediated by climate denialism? We answer these questions using mediation analyses of public attitudes toward three climate intervention technologies across thirteen countries. Our findings show that conservatives are generally less supportive of solar geoengineering, and this opposition is largely rooted in climate denialism with variation across technologies. Once denialism is controlled for, conservatism is associated with greater support for certain technologies in some countries but not others. Therefore, the relationship between conservatism and climate intervention support does not reflect a single, stable ideological association.

 From this week's government/NGO section:

Summary Report: Second Conference on Attribution Science and Climate Law, Jessica Wentz, Columbia Law School, Sabin Center for Climate Change Law

A summary report for the Second Conference on Attribution Science and Climate Law, held at Columbia University on June 10–11, 2026. The event brought together physical scientists, legal scholars, public health researchers, economists, and policy experts to discuss key developments in climate change attribution science and its evolving role in climate law and governance. The author provides an overview of key themes and topics covered at the conference, as well as a detailed summary of the presentations and panel discussions. Video recordings of the event can also be accessed from the event website and the Sabin Center Youtube channel. Rapid advances in attribution research—including storyline approaches, integrated impact modeling, and end-to-end attribution—are strengthening the scientific foundation for linking GHG emissions, climate change, and specific harms. Panelists highlighted the utility of these methods not only as evidentiary support in climate litigation and corporate accountability claims, but also as vital tools for informing government decision-making, adaptation planning, disaster risk reduction, and international loss and damage frameworks. Discussions also confronted ongoing challenges, including political pressures on climate science, the necessity of clear communication regarding scientific uncertainties, and the importance of addressing structural inequalities alongside physical hazards.

Climate Double Agents: The Congressional lobbyists pushing fossil fuels and solutions to the climate crisis, F Minus

The authors reviewed Congressional lobbyist disclosures of 228 lobbying firms. They found fossil fuel lobbyists simultaneously lobbying on almost every aspect of the climate crisis, from climate mitigation to disaster relief to wildlife conservation. The most conflicted firm on the issue of climate mitigation funding for local governments was Greenberg Traurig, which lobbied for the American Petroleum Institute (API) and ConocoPhillips in Congress, the Western States Petroleum Association in California, and the American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufactures (AFPM) in New York, all of which have opposed the creation of climate superfunds. Greenberg Traurig also lobbied on shoreline protection and Everglades restoration for Miami-Dade County and lobbied for the City of Rochester and Westchester County in New York, both of which would lose tens of millions in future climate mitigation funds if the firm’s clients API and AFPM succeed in passing a Congressional bill invalidating state Climate Superfunds, including New York’s. 156 articles in 71 journals by 1074 contributing authors

Physical science of climate change, effects

Centennial AMOC Variability of North Atlantic–Arctic Origin: Mechanism and Future State, Yang, International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70480

Climate extremes drive increased fire nitrogen release in boreal forest, Liu et al., Atmospheric Environment 10.1016/j.atmosenv.2026.122330

Detectability of Forced ENSO Changes Under Global Warming: Insights From the Recharge Oscillator, Han et al., arXiv (Cornell University) Open Access 10.48550/arxiv.2608.26767

Global warming enhances salinity gradient energy potential through hydroclimatic change, Xu et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-04010-z

Hydrographic variability associated with enhanced warming in the eastern Antarctic region during the austral summer, Krishnan et al., Polar Science 10.1016/j.polar.2026.101390

Limiting warming by CO2 and methane mitigation in an expanded scenario space, Weber et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-03832-1

Maritime Continent freshening intensifies the observed La Niña-like warming, Cao et al., npj Climate and Atmospheric Science Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41612-026-01523-4

Sea surface warming suppresses primary sea spray aerosol number production, Leibensperger et al., Atmospheric chemistry and physics Open Access 10.5194/acp-26-12211-2026

When the Mountains Stop Warming the Plains: Anomalous Winter and Spring Cooling in Southeastern Alberta Linked to Reduced Chinook Activity, Yackel et al., ATMOSPHERE-OCEAN 10.1080/07055900.2026.2716651

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Walker circulation strengthening driven by sea surface temperature changes outside the tropics, Nature Geoscience, 10.1038/s41561-024-01510-5 14 cites.

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Observations of climate change, effects

Changes in Arctic and Antarctic sea-ice properties and processes, Webster et al., Nature Reviews Earth & Environment 10.1038/s43017-026-00816-9

Long-term monitoring of active layer thickness confirms global permafrost degradation, Streletskiy et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-03824-1

Marine Heatwave Trends in Eastern North America Waters Using a High-Resolution (5-km) SST Dataset, Stone & Milrad, International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70474

Misrepresentation of Human Climate Fingerprint in DOE Report, Santer et al., Earth s Future Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026ef008831

Narwhals document atlantification of East Greenland, Heide-Jørgensen et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.adr1424

Soil moisture–atmosphere coupling intensifies wildfires in Siberia in 2021, Xiao et al., Agricultural and Forest Meteorology 10.1016/j.agrformet.2026.111437

Trends in Heat Stress During Heat Waves Across Europe (1979–2023), Zhang et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl124082

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Rock glaciers across the United States predominantly accelerate coincident with rise in air temperatures, Nature Communications, 10.1038/s41467-024-52093-z 29 cites.

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Instrumentation & observational methods of climate change, effects

CSRFormer: An Instantaneous Global-ocean Clear-sky Radiative Flux Dataset Derived From CERES, Zheng et al., Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.20046058

ERA5 Can Overstate Changes in the Frequency of Extreme Heat: A New Zealand Case Study, Iqbal et al., International Journal of Climatology Open Access 10.1002/joc.70571

Heatstroke mortality in a warming climate: From physiological risk to reporting practices in a multi-country study, Tob??as et al., Temperature 10.1080/23328940.2026.2698161

Investigating Climate Change Impacts on the 2020 Extreme Meiyu Through Global Variable-Resolution Ensemble Subseasonal Hindcasts, Xu et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres 10.1029/2025jd045982

Six-fold reduction in ocean heat content estimate uncertainty since 1960, Cheng et al., Research Square Open Access pdf 10.21203/rs.3.rs-9248956/v1

Top-of-Atmosphere Radiation over the Last Millennium Reconstructed from Proxies, Stiller & Hakim, Journal of Climate pdf 10.1175/jcli-d-25-0568.1

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Coordinated Geostationary, Multispectral Satellite Observations Are Critical for Climate and Air Quality Progress, AGU Advances, 10.1029/2024av001322 9 cites.

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Modeling, simulation & projection of climate change, effects

Heatwaves in a 15 °C World: Exploring remote drivers’ influence on Northern Italy with a storyline-based approach, Squintu et al., Weather and Climate Extremes Open Access 10.1016/j.wace.2026.100949

Projections of Climate-Driven Changes in Fire Regimes and Implications for Boreal Landscapes in Alaska and Northwest Canada, Littell et al., Earth s Future Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026ef008324

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Impacts of AMOC Collapse on Monsoon Rainfall: A Multi-Model Comparison, Earth s Future, 10.1029/2023ef003959 30 cites.

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Advancement of climate & climate effects modeling, simulation & projection

Assessing the Impact of Sea Surface Temperature Biases in CMIP6 Coupled Models on the North Pacific Westerly Jet, Ushijima et al., Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.19705804

Causes of the Delayed Seasonality of Northern Hemisphere Tropical Cyclones in CMIP6 Models, Jiawei, Figshare Open Access 10.6084/m9.figshare.31224409

ClimAVA-SWE: A High-Resolution CMIP6-Based Snow Water Equivalent Dataset for the Western United States, Sajad et al., Harvard Dataverse Open Access 10.7910/dvn/scd2vt

Compound Climate Events and Cascading Impacts in the IPCC AR6: Analysis of Gaps and Avenues for the AR7, Duvat, Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews Climate Change Open Access 10.1002/wcc.70046

DeepMelt-GL v1: a neural network emulator of sub-shelf melt rates for the unrepresented regions of ice-shelf cavities in ocean models, Ockenden et al., Geoscientific model development Open Access pdf 10.5194/gmd-19-7979-2026

Dominant Biases in Atmospheric Radiative Heating Rates in Global Climate Models, Huang & Huang, Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl122611

Excessive Negative Surface Heat Flux Feedback in CMIP6 Models, George et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Oceans 10.1029/2026jc024124

Forest canopy decline under elevated CO2 during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum, Dunn et al., DRYAD Open Access 10.5061/dryad.wdbrv164q

IAM-FIRE: A Climate Emulator–Based Framework to Project Wildfire Impacts and Risks for Integrated Assessment Models, Rouhette et al., Global Change Biology Open Access 10.1111/gcb.70951

Improving simulation of Earth system variability through weakly coupled ocean data assimilation in E3SM, Shi et al., Geoscientific model development Open Access 10.5194/gmd-19-8003-2026

Three Generations of NARCliM: Evaluation of Precipitation, Temperature and Their Extremes Over the CORDEX Australasia Domain, Ji et al., International Journal of Climatology Open Access 10.1002/joc.70353

Urban climate evaluation in the upcoming generation of CMIP6-Driven EURO-CORDEX regional climate simulations, Díez-Sierra et al., Urban Climate Open Access 10.1016/j.uclim.2026.103103

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
On the Realism of Tropical Cyclone Intensification in Global Storm-Resolving Climate Models, Geophysical Research Letters, 10.1029/2024gl109841 21 cites.

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Cryosphere & climate change

A 1 km resolution dataset of Northern Hemisphere permafrost active layer thickness (2000–2024), Wei & Chen, Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.20602924

Changes in Arctic and Antarctic sea-ice properties and processes, Webster et al., Nature Reviews Earth & Environment 10.1038/s43017-026-00816-9

Earlier lake ice breakup in response to warming in the Novaya Zemlya Archipelago, Russian High Arctic: Evidence from MODIS data (2000-2024), Maraldo et al., Polar Science 10.1016/j.polar.2026.101365

Emergent Regimes of River Meandering and Permafrost Extent in Arctic Floodplains, Lamb et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl124384

Global database of glacier failures (1900–2025), Ekaterina & Summer, Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.19477908

Long-term change of the ice phenology in Saroma-ko Lagoon, Hokkaido, Japan, Shiomoto et al., Polar Science 10.1016/j.polar.2026.101388

Long-term monitoring of active layer thickness confirms global permafrost degradation, Streletskiy et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-03824-1

Meltwater movement and refreezing in the wet snow zone of Qaanaaq Ice Cap, northwest Greenland, Minowa et al., Polar Science 10.1016/j.polar.2026.101395

On the non-linear response of Antarctic ice shelf surface melt to warming, Hofsteenge et al., cryosphere Open Access 10.5194/tc-20-4747-2026

Thermodynamic Control of Global Seasonal Snow Decline, Song et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl122806

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Toward long-term monitoring of regional permafrost thaw with satellite interferometric synthetic aperture radar, cryosphere, 10.5194/tc-18-3723-2024 7 cites.

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Sea level & climate change

Human-induced subsidence exceeds sea-level rise in driving future coastal flood exposure in China’s Greater Bay Area, Wang et al., Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.20603078

Sea-level rise projections tailored for spatial adaptation planning in the U.S., Konfirst et al., Scientific Data Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41597-026-06669-7

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Simulated Impact of Time-Varying River Runoff and Greenland Freshwater Discharge on Sea Level Variability in the Beaufort Gyre Over 2005–2018, Journal of Geophysical Research Oceans, 10.1029/2024jc021237 6 cites.

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Paleoclimate & paleogeochemistry

Forest canopy decline under elevated CO2 during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum, Dunn et al., DRYAD Open Access 10.5061/dryad.wdbrv164q

Modern anthropogenic subsidence rivals deglacial meltwater pulse rates in the Bohai and Yellow Seas, Qin et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-03889-y

Recent strengthening of eastern Pacific ENSO in the last millennium paleorecord, Cole et al., Science 10.1126/science.ady2660

Upcoming climate change: fossil record as a key to predict future biotic response, B?k & B?k, Frontiers in Earth Science Open Access pdf 10.3389/feart.2026.1950918

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Eocene maar sediments record warming of up to 3.5 °C during a hyperthermal event 47.2 million years ago, Communications Earth & Environment, 10.1038/s43247-024-01628-9 4 cites.

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Biology & climate change, related geochemistry

Arboreal Mammals Are at Risk Under Climate Change: Insights From a Global Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis, Silva et al., Global Change Biology Open Access 10.1111/gcb.71034

Blind Spots in Traditional Approaches to Conservation Prioritization in a Climate Change Context, Bondi et al., Diversity and Distributions Open Access pdf 10.1111/ddi.70259

Climate Warming Drives the Breakdown of Plant–Pollinator Mutualisms Despite Phenological Synchrony, Manincor et al., Global Change Biology Open Access 10.1111/gcb.71074

Climate-driven mobilization of rare earth elements and metals in Antarctica: Pathways, ecological exposure, and implications for trophic transfer, Khamis et al., Polar Science 10.1016/j.polar.2026.101394

Coral Reef In Situ Product (CRISP): a global compilation of coral reef temperature time series, Larson et al., Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.21045962

Declines in European bumblebee habitat suitability attributable to climate change, Tandt et al., Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-026-02734-6

Declining hydraulic safety in a drier world, Liang et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 10.1073/pnas.2622754123

Direct and indirect effects of elevated CO2, warming and drought on plant–consumer interactions of Plantago lanceolata, Davidova et al., DRYAD Open Access 10.5061/dryad.r2280gbv1

Ensemble Modeling of Shifts in the Suitable Distribution and Ecological Niche of the Alpine Tibetan Medicinal Herb Corydalis hendersonii Hemsl. Under Climate Change and Human Activity, Wu et al., Ecology and Evolution Open Access 10.1002/ece3.73861

Future Climate Change and Bioclimatic Suitability of Two Endemic Balkan Water Frogs, Papežík et al., Diversity and Distributions Open Access pdf 10.1111/ddi.70246

Global spatial heterogeneity of changes in vegetation resistance to compound drought and heat events during 2001–2020, HAN et al., Advances in Climate Change Research Open Access 10.1016/j.accre.2026.08.016

Increased Atmospheric CO2 Adversely Affects Large Pollinators, but Benefits Small Pollinators, Khan et al., DRYAD Open Access 10.5061/dryad.m37pvmdgh

Intensifying Flash Droughts Aggravate Vegetation Ecosystem Vulnerability in the Monsoon Region of China: Evidence From Resistance and Resilience Responses, Qi et al., Earth s Future Open Access 10.1029/2025ef006987

Large fisheries declines linked to compound and extreme climate events, Cheung et al., Nature Communications Open Access 10.1038/s41467-026-77077-z

Long-Term Evolution Under Heatwave Conditions in the Seed Beetle, Callosobruchus maculatus, Ivimey-Cook et al., Ecology and Evolution Open Access 10.1002/ece3.73562

Narwhals document atlantification of East Greenland, Heide-Jørgensen et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.adr1424

Projecting future habitat suitability and range dynamics of Spermophilus dauricus on the Mongolian Plateau under climate change, Wang et al., Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution Open Access 10.3389/fevo.2026.1921190

Reply to: Antarctic greening is constrained by biology and requires field validation, Roland et al., Nature Geoscience 10.1038/s41561-026-02080-4

Reply to: Estimated tree longevity response to climate at risk of methodological bias, Gao et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-03935-9

Saturation effect of background temperature and aridity on vegetation phenological sensitivity to urban warming, Zhang et al., Biogeosciences Open Access 10.5194/bg-23-5943-2026

Saturation effect of background temperature and aridity on vegetation phenological sensitivity to urban warming, Zhang et al., Biogeosciences Open Access 10.5194/bg-23-5943-2026

Space Use Change Associated With Climate Induces Camouflage Mismatch to Increase Extinction Risk in an Endangered Mammal, Mahoney et al., Global Change Biology Open Access pdf 10.1111/gcb.71079

The Impact of Climate Change on the Spatial Distribution of Seven Meconopsis Species in China: A MaxEnt Model-Based Predictive Analysis, Yang et al., Ecology and Evolution Open Access 10.1002/ece3.73824

The Potential Habitat of Liparis campylostalix (Orchidaceae) in China Under Climate Change Scenario Predicted by MaxEnt Model, Deng et al., Ecology and Evolution Open Access 10.1002/ece3.73536

Thermal Stress and Habitat Loss: Assessing the Vulnerability of Potamon fluviatile (Decapoda: Potamidae) to Climate Change in Italy, Sorboni et al., Ecology and Evolution Open Access pdf 10.1002/ece3.74256

Warming Reduces Cold Hardiness of Boreal Plants but Damage Risk Varies by Species and Season, Campos-Arguedas et al., Global Change Biology Open Access 10.1111/gcb.71081

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Global increase in the optimal temperature for the productivity of terrestrial ecosystems, Communications Earth & Environment, 10.1038/s43247-024-01636-9 35 cites.

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GHG sources & sinks, flux, related geochemistry

A Step Forward to Global Segment CO2 Flux Estimation Benefiting from Large Swath of Coordinated CO2 and Solar-Induced Fluorescence Measurements from the TanSat-2 Mission, Yang et al., Advances in Atmospheric Sciences Open Access 10.1007/s00376-026-6150-1

Blue carbon functional collapse precedes physical marsh retreat, Wang et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access 10.1038/s43247-026-03971-5

Correction for Zhou et al., Warming substantially amplifies Antarctic coastal polynyas as key carbon sinks, [authors did not process], Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 10.1073/pnas.2627297123

Divergent Trends in the Seasonal Amplitude of Atmospheric CO2 Across the Globe, Linyang & Jiawen, Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.17810400

Estimation of forest carbon storage with small samples based on Bayesian hierarchical model, Fan et al., Frontiers in Forests and Global Change Open Access 10.3389/ffgc.2026.1909517

Exploring atmospheric CH4 monitoring network expansion in Italy using inverse modelling, Mil et al., ICOS Carbon Portal Open Access 10.18160/tgmj-4ygj

Global methane emission estimates from a dual-isotope inversion: new constraints from δD-CH4, Dasgupta et al., Utrecht University Repository (Utrecht University) Open Access pmh:oai:dspace.library.uu.nl:1874/486815

Global peatlands formed via paludification since the Last Glacial Maximum are more conducive to absorbing CO2, Gao et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105692

Hydropower reservoirs will lead energy-sector carbon emissions by 2050 under a net-zero scenario, Wang et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-03982-2

Impact of land use on carbon dynamics in cold-temperate rivers: A case study of the Ussuri (Wusuli) River basin, Northeast China, Zhang et al., Anthropocene 10.1016/j.ancene.2026.100575

Increased maximum carbon release offsets half of the growth trend in annual land carbon sink, Bai et al., Nature Communications Open Access 10.1038/s41467-026-77462-8

Multidimensional inequalities in attributed passenger-transport CO2 across 21 EU member States in 2015, Álvarez-Antelo et al., Energy Policy Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.enpol.2026.115582

Polar and subpolar shelf seas dominate enhanced coastal CO2 uptake during marine heatwaves, Hu et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-77165-0

Radiocarbon in atmospheric CH4 and CO2 at Jungfraujoch in 2019–2024: influence of regional nuclear emissions and current global atmospheric 14CH4 signal, Laemmel et al., Open Access CRIS of the University of Bern Open Access 10.48620/100501

Soil disturbance in wetlands by feral pigs increases greenhouse gas emissions, Adame et al., Biogeosciences Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-23-5781-2026

Synergistic effects of warming and elevated CO2 intensify drought impacts on grassland carbon and water fluxes, Tissink et al., MPG.PuRe (Max Planck Society) Open Access pdf pmh:oai:pure.mpg.de:item_3716274

Synergistic Interactions Between Warming and Elevated Atmospheric CO2 Increase Soil Organic Carbon Sequestration, Yao, Figshare Open Access 10.6084/m9.figshare.31563121

Temporal lag in post-mining regrowth amplifies carbon loss in tropical forests during the period 2000–2023, He et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-77252-2

The EDGAR-LULUCF Dataset of forest-related carbon emissions and removals, Rossi et al., Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.20381555

Three-Fourths of Carbon Emissions From 2023 Record-Breaking Wildfires in Canada Traced to Soil and Peat Combustion, Zhong et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026gl123393

Trophic regulation constrains ecosystem carbon accumulation under global change, Xu et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Open Access 10.1073/pnas.2610728123

Using Tower-Based Observational Networks to Assess the Impact of COVID-19 Lockdowns on Greenhouse Gas Emissions in Six North American Cities, Barkley et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres Open Access 10.1029/2025jd045115

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Reducing the uncertainty in estimating soil microbial-derived carbon storage, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 10.1073/pnas.2401916121 157 cites.

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CO2 capture, sequestration science & engineering

Assessment of formation brine salinity, pressure and temperature in selected structures in eastern Denmark and implications for CO2 storage, Schovsbo et al., GEUS Bulletin Open Access 10.34194/62417j08

Industrializing reactive capture of CO2, Xiao et al., Nature Energy 10.1038/s41560-026-02113-7

Near-term, geospatial opportunity for biomass carbon storage to address the wildfire and climate crises, Clayton et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.aee6185

Seismic investigations of eight geological structures for potential storage of CO2 in Denmark: an introduction, Gregersen et al., GEUS Bulletin Open Access 10.34194/299dt488

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
The feasibility of reaching gigatonne scale CO2 storage by mid-century, Nature Communications, 10.1038/s41467-024-51226-8 64 cites.

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Decarbonization

Regional retrofit, net-zero aspirations, and their whole-life carbon burden, Zune et al., Environmental Research Infrastructure and Sustainability Open Access 10.1088/2634-4505/ae9984

Sustainable polar shipping under climate change: A bibliometric review of emissions and efficiency, Tuti, Polar Science 10.1016/j.polar.2026.101392

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Pathway decisions for reuse and recycling of retired lithium-ion batteries considering economic and environmental functions, Nature Communications, 10.1038/s41467-024-52030-0 224 cites.

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Geoengineering climate

Wind-Driven Circulation Feedbacks Offset Tropical Geoengineered Sea Salt Emissions, Wang et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres Open Access 10.1029/2026jd047411

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Africa's Climate Response to Marine Cloud Brightening Strategies Is Highly Sensitive to Deployment Region, Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres, 10.1029/2024jd041070 6 cites.

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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

Instantaneous radiative forcings due to the first indirect effect linked to low-level liquid clouds in the Amazon, Pugliesi et al., Atmospheric chemistry and physics Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-26-12151-2026

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
On the sensitivity of aerosol–cloud interactions to changes in sea surface temperature in radiative–convective equilibrium, Atmospheric chemistry and physics, 10.5194/acp-24-9323-2024 2 cites.

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Climate change communications & cognition

A systematic review and meta-analysis of communication strategies to promote climate action, Uenal et al., OSF Preprints (OSF Preprints) pmh:oai:share.osf.io:acc66f76-7427-4f8d-ae9b-f0597aaf12dd

Aiding or shaming in climate politics: Evidence from a survey experiment in Brazil, Calacino, Energy Research & Social Science Open Access 10.1016/j.erss.2026.104919

Climate disinformation and moral distortion, Hopster & Martini, Environmental Politics Open Access pdf 10.1080/09644016.2026.2721054

Comparing threat- and solution-oriented climate communication: The role of hope, self-efficacy, and climate anxiety in motivating high-impact climate-friendly behavior, Ringhofer et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology 10.1016/j.jenvp.2026.103194

In Sickness and in Heat – A Content Analysis of German Media Coverage of Chronic Diseases and Climate-Related Weather Events, Singh & Metag, Environmental Communication Open Access pdf 10.1080/17524032.2026.2723748

Misrepresentation of Human Climate Fingerprint in DOE Report, Santer et al., Earth s Future Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026ef008831

Stereotypes Shape Public Impressions of Unconventional Climate Advocates Across Urban and Regional Communities, Wang et al., Environmental Communication Open Access pdf 10.1080/17524032.2026.2723751

When beliefs meet technology: conservatism, climate denialism, and support for solar geoengineering, Lee et al., Environmental Politics Open Access pdf 10.1080/09644016.2026.2721030

[Comment] The imperative to counter fossil fuel industry disinformation for public health, Narayan et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2026.101435

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
For cash, the planet, or for both: Evaluating an informational intervention for energy consumption reduction, Energy Policy, 10.1016/j.enpol.2024.114314 6 cites.

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Agronomy, animal husbundry, food production & climate change

Climate change and food security in sustainable finance: a South African perspective, Zenda, Frontiers in Climate Open Access 10.3389/fclim.2026.1926592

Compound Hot-Dry Days (CHDDs) and Their Implications on Maize Yields in the Free State Province, South Africa, Moeletsi & Tsubo, International Journal of Climatology Open Access pdf 10.1002/joc.70281

Dam Regulation Moderates Climate-Induced Rice Yield Loss in the Mekong-Tonle Sap Lake System, Zhang et al., Earth s Future Open Access pdf 10.1029/2025ef008053

Evaluating Crop Yield Sensitivity to Climate Change Using a Deep-Learning Framework Incorporating Vegetation and Groundwater Memory, Baluch et al., Earth s Future Open Access 10.1029/2026ef008560

Fostering the forest circular bioeconomy to combat climate change by producing biochar from conifer and broadleaf stands, Mosquera-Losada et al., Frontiers in Forests and Global Change Open Access pdf 10.3389/ffgc.2026.1821315

From soft limits to hard thresholds: mapping the adaptation gap in sub-Saharan African agriculture – a systematic review, Madanzi et al., Frontiers in Climate Open Access pdf 10.3389/fclim.2026.1807595

Grazing Enhances System Carbon Balance via the Soil-Plant-Livestock Carbon Pump Regulation Despite Suppressing Specific Carbon Cycling Pathways, Zhou et al., Earth s Future Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026ef008382

Heterogeneous persistent ENSO impact on China’s agricultural economy in a warming climate, Wang, Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.18168708

Irrigation Impact on Humid Heat Stress: Divergent Metrics, Vegetation Dynamics, and Future Worsening, Shen et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl123720

Making climate governance actionable: a corpus-based analysis of institutionalizing climate change in tuna fisheries governance, He et al., npj Ocean Sustainability Open Access 10.1038/s44183-026-00240-y

Research priorities for climate adaptation and resilience in smallholder livestock systems in sub-Saharan Africa: a systematic review, Slayi et al., Frontiers in Climate Open Access 10.3389/fclim.2026.1924189

Retraction Note: An autocatalytic multicomponent DNAzyme nanomachine for tumor-specific photothermal therapy sensitization in pancreatic cancer, Yan et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-75939-0

Straw mulching mitigates warming-induced yield loss and leverages elevated CO2 to improve winter wheat productivity under projected climate scenarios, Yang et al., Agricultural and Forest Meteorology 10.1016/j.agrformet.2026.111449

[Articles] Impacts of climate-driven yield changes on the affordability of healthy diets: a modelling study, Jiang et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2026.101519

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Losses and destabilization of soil organic carbon stocks in coastal wetlands converted into aquaculture ponds, Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.17480 43 cites.

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Hydrology, hydrometeorology & climate change

Comment on “Flooding Is Not like Filling a Bath” by Sanders et al., Dijk et al., Global Change Biology 10.1111/j.1365-2486.2008.01708.x

Multilayer soil moisture depletion intensifies drought impacts on global ecosystems, Gu et al., Nature Geoscience Open Access 10.1038/s41561-026-02083-1

Spatiotemporal Evolution of Regional Heavy Rainfall Events in Guangdong, South China: Intensification and Expansion Since the Early 1990s, Liu et al., International Journal of Climatology Open Access pdf 10.1002/joc.70572

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Increasing extreme precipitation variability plays a key role in future record-shattering event probability, Communications Earth & Environment, 10.1038/s43247-024-01622-1 32 cites.

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Climate change mitigation public policy research

Decarbonisation policy instruments and climate justice: Insights from a systematic literature review of social science literature, Ramôa & Pires, Environmental Science & Policy Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.envsci.2026.104461

Institutional compression in climate policy integration: coordinating green electricity certificates and carbon emissions trading in China, Tian & Wang, Climate Policy 10.1080/14693062.2026.2722557

Resilient futures: integrating nature-based solutions and community innovation to combat climate change and foster environmental sustainability, Yu, Climate and Development 10.1080/17565529.2026.2690614

Uneven geographies of climate change mitigation: labour, territorial defence, and the blue economy in Colombian Caribbean mangroves, Manrique, Global Environmental Change Open Access 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2026.103223

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Energy transition at the crossroads of energy depletion and environmental policy stringency: Energy policy framework for energy giants in the indo-pacific belt, Energy Policy, 10.1016/j.enpol.2024.114311 23 cites.

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Climate change adaptation & adaptation public policy research

A Systematic Review of the Ways Schools Engage With Climate Change Adaptation, Laub et al., Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews Climate Change 10.1002/wcc.70080

Adaptation dominates climate responses in social-ecological systems in northern Sweden, Ohlsson et al., Communications Sustainability Open Access pdf 10.1038/s44458-026-00143-6

Authoritarian diversity and its limits: regime subtypes and climate change adaptation readiness, Ko, Environmental Sociology Open Access 10.1080/23251042.2026.2724934

Climate precarity and the mobilities of rural youth: land, politics, and labour in southern Ethiopia, Chung & Schwanen, Global Environmental Change Open Access 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2026.103221

Desert flooding highlights a critical gap in climate change adaptation, Gao et al., Science 10.1126/science.aek8173

Sea-level rise projections tailored for spatial adaptation planning in the U.S., Konfirst et al., Scientific Data Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41597-026-06669-7

The climate refugee misnomer, Auslender et al., Environmental Politics 10.1080/09644016.2026.2724664

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Climate change in Africa: Impacts, adaptation, and policy responses, Global Environmental Change, 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2024.102912 75 cites.

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Climate change impacts on human health

Age-specific exposure to human-induced increases in humid heat, Pietroiusti et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.aeb3232

Climate change and child undernutrition in Nigeria: a systematic review of evidence and policy gaps, Langkulsen et al., Frontiers in Climate Open Access pdf 10.3389/fclim.2026.1767416

Epidermal growth factor receptor dysregulation and climate change: insights into pollution-promoted lung cancer, Nikaido-Landry et al., Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences Open Access 10.1098/rstb.2024.0508

Erratum for the Research Article “Forecast attribution reveals enhanced heat mortality from climate change in British Columbia heatwave” by C.Y. Shapland et al., [authors did not process], Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.aej3478

Heat exposure and adaptive responses: a systematic literature review in Southeast Asia, Sugesti & Nastiti, Urban Climate 10.1016/j.uclim.2026.103119

Heat stress and public health issues: impacts, adaptation, and mitigation, [authors did not process], Frontiers research topics 10.3389/978-2-8325-8532-0

Heatstroke mortality in a warming climate: From physiological risk to reporting practices in a multi-country study, Tob??as et al., Temperature 10.1080/23328940.2026.2698161

[Articles] Direct and spillover hospitalisation patterns during climate hazards across regions of different health-system resilience levels in China: a nationwide retrospective analysis, Wang et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2026.101512

[Articles] Five years of Greener NHS: improved carbon footprint assessment of the National Health Service in England, Simpson et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2026.101464

[Articles] Health integration in national climate adaptation policies from 198 countries: a global policy analysis, Morneau et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2026.101466

[Articles] Heat waves and annual mortality among older adults (aged ≥65 years) in the USA, Healy et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2026.101432

[Comment] The imperative to counter fossil fuel industry disinformation for public health, Narayan et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2026.101435

[Personal View] Reforming public health law to adapt to the changing climate: a case study of mosquito-borne disease management, Boocock et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2025.101427

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Population at risk of dengue virus transmission has increased due to coupled climate factors and population growth, Communications Earth & Environment, 10.1038/s43247-024-01639-6 77 cites.

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Climate change & geopolitics

Climate change as a driver of transformative evolution in international environmental law: a systematic review and bibliometric analysis (2014–2025), Carvajal-Morales et al., Frontiers in Environmental Science Open Access pdf 10.3389/fenvs.2026.1813963

Climate change impacts on human culture Other

Artificial intelligence and climate change: Lessons for global governance, Swain, Energy Research & Social Science 10.1016/j.erss.2026.104937

Escalating Uncertainty Under Increasing Risk in Compound Heat and Precipitation Extremes, Zhou et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl124193

Informed opinion, nudges & major initiatives

UN finally admits global warming will shoot past 1.5 ºC climate limit, Dinneen, Nature 10.1038/d41586-026-02753-5

[Comment] A call for evidence-based adaptation: mitigating the rising global health burden of extreme heat, Li et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.lanplh.2025.101287

[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:
Integrating night studies into climate science, Nature Climate Change, 10.1038/s41558-024-02117-9 19 cites.

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Book reviews

Climate politics: can’t live with it, can’t mitigate without it, Manjima, Political Studies Review Open Access pdf 10.1177/14789299261477263

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

An Affordability Crisis of Trump’s Own Making. The Trump administration’s energy policy is driving up costs for American households and making us sick, Yuqi Zhu, Natural Resources Defense Council

Thanks to the Trump administration’s policies to stop renewable energy and promote fossil fuels; by 2035, U.S. consumers are projected to spend up to an extra $30 billion a year on electricity under Trump’s policies, with household electricity bills increasing up to 25 percent in certain parts of the country. Trump’s energy agenda could result in up to $700 billion in lost investment in the U.S. power system over the next decade. The country could lose between 390 and 540 gigawatts of new wind, solar, and energy storage power plants over the next decade—requiring the U.S. power grid to keep more expensive, aging coal, gas, and oil plants online instead to meet growing power needs. Increased air pollution due to these policies could result in up to 69,000 additional early deaths and 85,000 extra emergency room visits and hospital admissions. This could increase health-care spending by up to $1.7 billion per year, adding further pressure on already high health-care insurance premiums for American households. Power sector carbon dioxide emissions could be twice as high by 2035. In total, the United States is projected to emit an additional 3.6 to 5.5 billion metric tons economy-wide over the next decade due to Trump’s agenda, with more than half of this extra climate pollution coming from the power sector.

Water Behind the Watts: The Hidden Risk of Powering Data Centers, James et al., Ceres

Power generation makes up the bulk of the data center water use. Data centers in the states analyzed depend on about 3.4 trillion gallons of freshwater annually for electricity, around 12 times the annual water use of Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Washington D.C., combined. The amount of water needed to produce electricity varies widely by state, depending on the type of electricity generation used. 78% of the electricity in the states analyzed came from power plants that use water to operate. Most electricity is generated by power plants located in areas facing water stress or drought (or both). In these states, 66% of power plants that use water were exposed to medium-high to extremely high water stress. Most power producers identify data centers as a primary driver of rising electricity demand, but few have considered the potential water risks tied to this growth. Most companies operating data centers do not take into account the water risks linked to the electricity they purchase.

What do Global Warming’s Six Americas think about data centers?, Gour et al., Yale University and George Mason University

Opposition to building data centers in local communities varies across Global Warming’s Six Americas, ranging from 71%1 among the Alarmed to 32% among the Disengaged. The Alarmed and the Concerned are the most likely to expect that new data centers will increase local electricity bills, while the Disengaged are the most likely to say they do not know. The Alarmed and Concerned are the most supportive of requiring data centers to offset their electricity use by installing rooftop solar on and/or weatherizing and insulating local homes, while the Dismissive are the least supportive.

The PennFuture Energy Playbook: Building Our Energy Future, Donna Kohut, Citizens for Pennsylvania’s Future

The PennFuture Energy Playbook offers policy suggestions for state lawmakers, including updating the Alternative Energy Portfolio Standard by passing legislation requiring 35% of electricity to be generated by renewable energy sources; passing Community Solar enabling legislation; incentivizing solar development on previously impacted, commercial, or industrial properties, prioritizing the rooftops of warehouses, fulfillment centers, and large government buildings; and promoting sustainable economic development by leveraging environmental standards attached to financial resources.

Solar Schools for North Carolina. Repowering education with clean energy, Quentin Good and Johanna Neumann, Frontier Group and Environment North Carolina

To tap the benefits of solar schools, North Carolina should protect and expand policies that make it easier and more financially appealing for schools to install solar panels. Schools are often ideal sites for solar energy. North Carolina could generate enough electricity from solar on public school rooftops each year to power 150,000 typical homes. Solar panels on schools reduce pollution. State policies can make it easier for schools to go solar. Local, state and federal officials should take steps to make it as easy as possible for schools to go solar, while school districts should consider adopting solar on rooftops and school grounds.

Summary Report: Second Conference on Attribution Science and Climate Law, Jessica Wentz, Columbia Law School, Sabin Center for Climate Change Law

A summary report for the Second Conference on Attribution Science and Climate Law, held at Columbia University on June 10–11, 2026. The event brought together physical scientists, legal scholars, public health researchers, economists, and policy experts to discuss key developments in climate change attribution science and its evolving role in climate law and governance. The author provides an overview of key themes and topics covered at the conference, as well as a detailed summary of the presentations and panel discussions. Video recordings of the event can also be accessed from the event website and the Sabin Center Youtube channel. Rapid advances in attribution research—including storyline approaches, integrated impact modeling, and end-to-end attribution—are strengthening the scientific foundation for linking GHG emissions, climate change, and specific harms. Panelists highlighted the utility of these methods not only as evidentiary support in climate litigation and corporate accountability claims, but also as vital tools for informing government decision-making, adaptation planning, disaster risk reduction, and international loss and damage frameworks. Discussions also confronted ongoing challenges, including political pressures on climate science, the necessity of clear communication regarding scientific uncertainties, and the importance of addressing structural inequalities alongside physical hazards.

Climate Double Agents: The Congressional lobbyists pushing fossil fuels and solutions to the climate crisis, F Minus

The authors reviewed Congressional lobbyist disclosures of 228 lobbying firms. They found fossil fuel lobbyists simultaneously lobbying on almost every aspect of the climate crisis, from climate mitigation to disaster relief to wildlife conservation. The most conflicted firm on the issue of climate mitigation funding for local governments was Greenberg Traurig, which lobbied for the American Petroleum Institute (API) and ConocoPhillips in Congress, the Western States Petroleum Association in California, and the American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufactures (AFPM) in New York, all of which have opposed the creation of climate superfunds. Greenberg Traurig also lobbied on shoreline protection and Everglades restoration for Miami-Dade County and lobbied for the City of Rochester and Westchester County in New York, both of which would lose tens of millions in future climate mitigation funds if the firm’s clients API and AFPM succeed in passing a Congressional bill invalidating state Climate Superfunds, including New York’s.

What to Make of Data Center Moratoriums?, Melissa Birchard, Georgetown Climate Center

State and local governments have been proposing – and in many cases enacting – data center permitting moratoriums at an increasingly rapid pace over the past six months. According to recent Heatmap reporting, over 530 local laws have been enacted to ban or restrict data center development, while many more jurisdictions are considering enacting moratoriums. However, all moratoriums are not the same. The purpose of this brief is to make these developments a little more understandable by breaking them down into some of their uses and characteristics. Identifying potential differences between moratoriums may help state and local leaders understand their options for responding to the concerns of their constituents. Looking beyond the headlines may also point policymakers and the data center industry toward substantive issues that can be addressed – in advance of any potential moratorium – through measures such as increased transparency, focused community consultation, and conservation and emissions reduction measures.

Fires without Borders: Understanding Wildfire Risks and Transboundary Challenges in the Asia-Pacific Region, Du et al., Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific

Wildfires are increasingly recognized as a systemic and transboundary challenge in the Asia Pacific region. The authors examine the evolving wildfire risk landscape by situating wildfires within a disaster risk framework that integrates hazard, exposure, and vulnerability. Drawing on historical fire events in the region and recent case studies from Thailand and Indonesia, the authors highlight persistent challenges in wildfire monitoring and mapping, including visibility, accessibility, and complexity gaps. Regional institutional mechanisms and wildfire monitoring systems are also presented and summarized, with critical gaps identified between global data infrastructures and local operational needs. Strengthening integrated fire management will require linking Earth observation and frontier technologies, institutional cooperation, and community-based approaches, to translate international commitments into local resilience.

Workshop: Regulatory Barriers to Small Modular Reactor Technologies for Maritime Applications, US. Center for Maritime Innovation

The workshop was held to generate insights on maritime nuclear regulatory development. A series of questions was used to gather insight on a range of topics for floating nuclear power plants (FNPPs) and nuclear-powered vessels. Over 90 stakeholders gathered in person, with another 90 participating online, each submitting recommendations in response to facilitated questions. Group discussions supplemented insights from individual participants. The workshop’s message was clear: maritime nuclear deployment will require a blended regulatory model, not piecemeal adaptation of existing rules. The highest-value near-term action is for U.S. Coast Guard and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to jointly define responsibilities, publish an interface framework, and establish a predictable approval pathway for demonstration projects. Without that, regulatory uncertainty will remain a primary barrier to deployment. It should be noted that not all recommended changes are under agency control, often requiring statutory changes. The USCMI has a planned project to further develop the regulatory framework, focusing on testing the new MOU and developing insights into further needed regulatory refinements.

GLOBSEC Competitiveness Tracker: Energy Security & Critical Raw Materials, Andrei Covatariu and Jan Rosenow, GLOBSEC

Energy security and access to critical raw materials (CRMS) have become defining factors of Europe's competitiveness and resilience. Once centered on fossil fuels, energy security now depends on reliable access to clean technologies, industrial capacity, and diversified CRM supply chains. The EU’s Competitiveness Compass connects innovation, decarbonization, and security — supported by simplification, Single Market integration, financing, skills, and EU–Member State coordination. In Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), where exposure to high energy prices and external dependencies remains acute, aligning national priorities with EU frameworks is crucial. Surveyed stakeholders highlight slow progress, weak regulatory clarity, and limited institutional capacity, but also identify regional opportunities in grid integration, clean-firm energy, and CRM processing. CEE can either become a resilience hub or remain a vulnerability corridor. Thus, accelerating reforms and leveraging EU instruments will determine whether Europe secures its industrial base and sustains global competitiveness in the clean-energy era.

Europe’s energy security in 2026: More resilient, but systematically exposed, Izabela Surwillo and Julia Schwab, Danish Institute for International Studies

Europe has come a long way since the 2022 energy crisis—but greater resilience has not eliminated vulnerability. The authors show how Europe’s energy security risks are shifting: from dependence on Russian fossil fuels toward concentrated LNG supplies, overstretched electricity grids, critical raw-material dependencies and infrastructure that must withstand increasingly complex disruptions. As electrification accelerates, the challenge is no longer simply securing enough energy, but ensuring that grids, supply chains and essential services can keep functioning under stress. Three priorities for action stand out: stronger cross-sector crisis preparedness, better access to emergency energy equipment, and more effective support for strategic critical-material projects.

The take-off in African solar that official statistics can’t yet see, Dave Jones and Joel Nana, Ember

The authors present their estimates of solar power capacity installed in every African country from 2023 to 2026, built from Chinese customs data using a new calibrated method. They compare these estimates with official national and international statistics, examine the split between utility-scale and distributed solar, and review Africa’s emerging solar panel manufacturing. Seventeen gigawatts of solar were installed across Africa in 2026 is up 45%, the third consecutive record year. A hundred thousand solar panels were installed across Africa every day during 2026. Seventy five percent of Africa’s solar growth in 2023-2025 is likely from distributed solar – and is largely missing from official statistics.

U.S. Energy Storage Market Outlook, Quarter 3, 2026, Solar Energy Industries Association

In Q2 2026, battery energy stationary storage (BESS) installations reached 20.2 GWh GWh, the largest quarter in history and a a 108% quarter-over-quarter increase. The utility-scale market continued underpin growth, with 18 GWh installed, largely supported by seven gigawatt scale projects. Arizona installed over 6.2 GWh of utility scale projects, the largest quarterly deployment for any state in history. Residential storage added 657 MWh and commercial and industrial (C&I) added 1.8 GWh, largely on the back of demand from data centers. Two cell factories opened in Q2, bringing total cell manufacturing capacity to over 50 GWh. A new module manufacturing facility opened as well, bringing total module manufacturing capacity to over 100 GWh. By 2030, the market is set to exceed annual installations of 110 GWh and install a cumulative 683 GWh.

Limiting Overshoot: Navigating exceedance of 1.5°C and pathways towards return, Atallah et al., United Nations Environment Program

The authors found that as global temperature rise gets set to cross 1.5°C, pushing climate risks and effects to dangerous new heights, the world must strive to return to below 1.5°C as soon as possible and simultaneously reduce the vulnerability of societies, communities and economies to climate impacts. The authors suggest that the world can achieve this goal by acting now to get on an ‘overshoot, peak, and decline’ pathway. About New Research

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This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Karin Kirk

It’s been a rough summer for outdoor sports. July was the hottest month ever recorded in the contiguous U.S., and wildfire smoke has repeatedly reached unhealthy levels across large areas of the country.

Soccer players competing in the World Cup had to grapple with potentially dangerous heat and humidity, two ski areas suffered major damage from wildfires this summer, trout streams in the Rockies were closed to fishing in the afternoons due to warm water, and the list goes on. Many people who love the outdoors are left with choosing between not recreating at all or doing so in marginal conditions.

But athletes, fans, and outdoor enthusiasts can all be part of the solution. Outdoor recreation is a potentially powerful constituency – it engages millions of people across many age groups, demographics, and geographies. Outdoor recreation is also a substantial contributor to the U.S. economy, with a lot on the line as a warming climate threatens outdoor activities.

“I think there is a role for outdoor recreation to step up more, be more vocal,” said John Burrows, the energy and climate policy director of the Wyoming Outdoors Council. “I think it's a really important constituency.”

Here are ideas for getting started. 

1. Recognize that sports and recreation have more influence than you might think

Athletes, teams, and recreational organizations have a powerful tool that the fossil fuel industry lacks: popular goodwill. Participation in sports can be an important part of people’s identities, so a brand or a team can have an outsize impact compared to its size or financial might.

2. Don’t be afraid to share your climate values 

Climate change is a polarizing topic, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t embrace it. “It's OK to say something and have people disagree,” said Chris Miller, senior vice president of sustainability at Aspen One, which owns four ski areas. 

“I get that it feels scary,” Miller said, “but being led by something real and authentic and rooted in values is an incredible competitive advantage.”

The clothing company Patagonia is known for its commitment to environmental activism. 

“Why is Patagonia constantly mentioned as one of the most authentic brands in the world?” Miller asked. “It isn't because they're a jacket company. Because there are a lot of jacket companies.”

The middle of the road may feel safe, but having noncommittal values can do lasting damage to a brand’s reputation. Miller described recent high-profile examples of companies that backtracked on their support for diversity, equity, and inclusion, which angered customers on both sides of the political spectrum.

“When someone disagrees with your point of view, the most important thing is not to say, ‘Oh, whoops, we made a mistake, we didn't really believe that,’” Miller said. “It's to lean in and say why you believe it and why it's important.”

“Have a bit of courage, stand for something. And people will respect you for it,” he added.

Read more: The ski industry is oddly quiet on climate change 

3. Consider making climate an integral part of your team or brand’s identity 

The Vermont Green soccer club in Burlington, Vermont, has made addressing climate change part of the team’s mission since its founding. The team promotes activism, social justice, and climate action at every game. 

Read: A champion soccer team is taking on climate change, too

“We're gonna not miss that. We're not going to let that opportunity go to waste and just watch soccer,” said Patrick Infurna, a cofounder of the team.

At home matches, nonprofit organizations set up tables and educate fans about actions they can take. Halftime includes a 15-minute talk about pressing issues in front of sold-out crowds, Infurna said.

Infurna said that the team’s stance on climate has helped it become more popular. 

“You might find a whole new audience of people that are more attracted to your thing, your products, your event, because you are showing not just a compassionate approach to things, but maybe a backbone as well,” Infurna said. “We've been fortunate to have a pretty cool fan base, and we sell out all of our games.”

Vermont Green’s men’s team had an undefeated season in 2025 and won the national championship.

“We're taking care of the planet, and we're winning as we do it,” Infurna said.   

4. Identify the ways that climate is affecting your sport

Outdoor sports are subject to all sorts of weather conditions, and you can use recent research and free tools to help identify the role of climate change.

After some extreme weather events, the researchers at World Weather Attribution rapidly analyze the influence of climate change on the event. For example, the group found that a heat wave that caused dozens of ski resorts to close in the Western U.S. in 2026 was virtually impossible without climate change.

Climate Central, a nonprofit research organization, offers several tools that can help you determine how climate change is affecting your sport, including a marathon tool that shows how warm race-day temperatures are slowing running performance, a database of billion-dollar climate disasters that adds up the costs in each state, and the Climate Shift Index, which shows how much the temperature in your area has been affected by climate change on a given day. 

Meanwhile, NOAA’s Climate at a Glance tool makes it easy to look up temperatures, precipitation, drought, and other climate indicators over time. The data is available at the national, state, county, and city level and is easily customizable. 

A soccer player cools off during a match. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson, File)

5. Leverage the economic impact of outdoor sports

Miller sees climate change as not just an environmental issue: “It's an economic issue. It's a jobs issue. It's a tax issue,” he said.

In fact, outdoor recreation is a powerful economic engine, generating $1.3 trillion dollars in economic output in 2024.

You can make that case to elected officials using a dashboard that shows the economic impact of outdoor recreation in all 50 states, including jobs, wages, and the contribution to each state’s GDP. This tool was compiled by nonpartisan researchers at Headwaters Economics. 

6. Participate in climate and energy policy

The Wyoming Outdoor Council works with groups around the state to address environmental challenges for public land, air quality, water quality, and wildlife.

“But in the last 10 years, the intersection with climate has just been so obvious,” said Burrows, the energy and climate policy director. “It impacts all these other things. And so I think that's how we justify working on it, even in one of the most heavily dependent states on fossil fuels in the country.”

During the last legislative session, the group worked at the state level to push for plug-in solar, which allows households to shave 10 to 20% off their electricity bills.

Burrows offered this suggestion for individuals or groups working on climate solutions: “Narrow it down to a few things that you and your group, or you and your friends, or you and your sports team can really digest and are passionate about, and focus on that.” 

“That's how you're going to make a meaningful impact,” he added. 

7. Become a watchdog of your energy provider

Ski resorts, stadiums, and other outdoor recreation amenities need electricity. And you can influence the climate footprint of that electricity by getting involved with your public utility commission, which makes decisions about energy sources, power plants, energy prices, and more. 

Public utility commissions offer regular opportunities for public input, including during the selection or election of commissioners. Canary Media wrote a beginner’s guide to public utility commissions, and Earthjustice has a detailed explainer that describes how and where action can make a difference.

8. Step up to the mic and give public comments

It’s not too often that you can speak your mind directly to policymakers, and opportunities to do so can be especially valuable. A powerful example of this is the relentless public pushback on data center proposals, which are often reviewed by county commissioners.

The Center for Health Law and Policy Innovation at Harvard Law School wrote a short guide for giving effective public comments. This is a great time to make use of what you learned from the fourth item in this list: Show the ways climate change is affecting your sport.

Winter Olympians speak about the negative impact climate change is having on winter sports. (Image credit: AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

9. Coordinate with other teams and groups

Many sports have organizing bodies and networks of guides, coaches, or athletes. These groups can be useful for communicating to larger groups, pooling resources, and building coalitions. For example, the International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation published a Climate Action Plan for Member Federations, which outlines steps for getting started. 

That said, many sports organizations position themselves in a safe, middle-of-the-road stance or nibble at the edges of climate policy with less controversial topics like access to public lands. For more assertive climate action, look for organizations that are unapologetically working to reduce fossil fuel development and burning, such as the Surfrider Foundation and Protect Our Winters.

Another option is to join nearby efforts to advance climate action. In many locations, you can find advocacy groups working to expand climate solutions and improve public policy. Joining an existing group is easier than trying to launch a new initiative from scratch.

“Look at groups that are doing that good work,” Burrows said, “and support them, however you can.”

10. Work to end fossil fuel sponsorships

Sponsorships of events, teams, and athletes can create a positive brand image and build consumer trust. Fossil fuel companies use sports sponsorships to boost their image – which has been termed “sportswashing” – even as the actions of these companies put athletes in jeopardy.

There are many efforts underway to remove fossil fuel advertising from sports teams and events, and this is an action that a team of any scale can tackle.

The Ski Fossil Free campaign is circulating a petition demanding sports organizing bodies publish a report that evaluates whether fossil fuel marketing is acceptable in organized winter sports. Over 25,000 people have signed the petition, and winter sports brands and organizations can sign up to join the campaign.

A similar effort is underway for soccer, prompted in part by Saudi Aramco’s sponsorship of the World Cup. A Dutch advocacy group is calling for Fossil Free Football.

Another group, called Cool Down, is advocating to end fossil fuel advertising across multiple sports and countries.

Most of all, show up

Burrows acknowledged it can be hard to know where to start with a new climate advocacy effort.

“I do think we kind of have this decision paralysis, like, ‘It's too big of an issue. I don't know how to even get started,’” he said. “We gotta get past that.”

Burrows advised new advocates to find an angle that they find especially motivating, and dig in to become a bit of an expert.

If only a small fraction of people did that, Burrows said, “I think it would really move the needle in good ways.”

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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This is a re-post from By the Numbers by Hannah Ritchie

A few weeks ago, I wrote an article about why the UK needs to get its act together and build some new reservoirs. It hasn’t built one in my lifetime — despite adding 10 million people — and the mismatch between winter and summer rain is probably going to get worse.

Someone asked a very reasonable question: why don’t we just build some desalination plants instead? Reservoirs are pretty big infrastructure projects. They constantly get blocked by local communities. They clearly disrupt the ecosystems and environments where they’re built.

Now, a lot of you will immediately think this is an insane idea. Do you realise how much energy desalination uses?!

I admit, it does seem a bit mad. Rather than just collecting freshwater in a big hole before it goes into the ocean, we’ll let it run in there, get all salty, then use a bunch of energy to pull the salt back out again.

For a long time, I had also held the “desalination consumes so much energy” tightly. It was a mantra I’d been taught a long time ago, and never updated. That is, until a few years ago, when I dug into the latest numbers. Supplying drinking and household water through desalination is really quite cheap, and uses far less energy than I’d have guessed.

How would these numbers work out for the UK? By that, we’re really talking about England, because that is where most of the water demand will be.

The Environment Agency estimates that by 2050, England will need to fill a deficit of 5 billion litres per day.1 Reverse osmosis from seawater consumes around 4 kWh per cubic metre (m3).2 Or 4 Wh per litre. That means we’d need 7 terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity to meet all of England’s additional demand from desalination.3

The UK consumes around 290 TWh of electricity a year, so this would add a little over 2% to our annual demand.4 That’s not that much.

The UK’s electricity demand is already set to roughly double by 2050 to meet growing demand from the shift to electrified transport, heating, and industry. An extra 1% or 2% to have adequate water supplies doesn’t seem like a huge deal.

Producing that extra electricity has some (but small) environmental impact, whether it’s the materials or the land use. They also have the problem of managing brine — the plant’s output that they need to discharge somewhere. But reservoirs have environmental costs, too. How do they compare on other measures?

Why wouldn’t we go for desalination?

England already has a desalination plant — Beckton in London — which gives us some insights into how this goes.

How long does it take to build them?

I first thought this would be a win for desalination. Historical experience is actually quite positive. The Beckton plant took six years to build; the first planning application was submitted in 2004, and it was completed in 2010. Compare that to the Abingdon reservoir, which has been a saga going on for more than 15 years.

The prospects for desalination plants looked good until I found out that two plants — Bacton and Mablethorpe — in the early feasibility stages are not expected until at least 2040. That’s no better than a reservoir. It seems that Beckton was built under a far simpler regulatory regime that no longer exists. Desalination projects will be stuck in the long planning and approval queues that almost every infrastructure project now faces.

How many would we need?

If they were the same size as the Beckton one, we’d need around 50.5 The desalination plant the UK has built is small. We could dramatically reduce that by building much larger plants. The Sorek plant in Israel, for example, has a capacity five or six times larger. With these designs, we’d need around 8.

Would they be expensive?

Building desalination plants would be more expensive than many alternatives. The government plans to fill a lot of the water deficit, not through supply solutions like desalination or reservoirs, but by fixing leakages in the water system (which are pretty large) and improving efficiency. Those solutions obviously make sense and are far cheaper than building large infrastructure projects (although there are diminishing returns: the first leaks are very cheap to fix, but there is a tail where things get increasingly expensive).

But for the remaining gap that needs to be filled with new supplies, is it cheaper to desalinate or to build a reservoir?

There are two ways to compare these: the upfront cost to build, and how expensive water is over the lifetime of the project.

Reservoirs are not automatically cheaper than desalination plants. Costed over their lifetime (which can be more than 80 years), they often are. But in the near- to medium-term, I don’t think they clearly win on economics. Reservoirs do come with high upfront costs, even if they’re then cheaper to run. Recent figures from Severn Trent put the average capital cost at £8.12 million per Ml per day for reservoirs, compared with £9.77 million per Ml per day for desalination.6 Desalination is around 20% more expensive to build. But these projected costs have a habit of ballooning, so I could quite plausibly believe that the inverse becomes true.

Desalination plants in the UK are expensive by international standards. In the UK, it costs somewhere between $1.50 and $12 per m3. That range is so large because it depends on how often the desalination plant is running (we’ll come on to this later). That compares to around $0.50 in the Middle East, $1 in Australia, and $2 to $3 in the US.

There are a couple of reasons why it’s more expensive. The UK doesn’t have much experience building desalination plants, so it misses out on some of the learning that drives down costs. Its current plant and proposed ones are small, so we miss out on economies of scale. The UK has strict planning regulations that extend timelines and are costly, even before construction begins. Finally, its plants would be used intermittently — probably only in the summer, and not even every summer. That redundancy drives up costs compared to a plant that runs continuously, as in countries like Australia or the Middle East.

The real problem with desalination plants in the UK is how rarely they’d run

The places where desalination works well have one thing in common: they’re running almost all the time. They don’t just get turned on in a drought. They’re there to provide basic water services year-round.

That’s not how the UK’s current desalination plant works. It’s not how its future ones would work either.

This affects the economics: the unit price is lower for plants running 24/7. But it also affects their reliability.

The Beckton plant was completed more than 15 years ago, and it has only been switched on 5 times. When the UK was facing severe droughts in 2022, it was ordered to come online. Despite assurances that it was ready to go online, it was not. The plant did not run and provided no help whatsoever during the crisis period that it was specifically built for.

This year was a repeat of that. Most of England was in drought this summer. The Beckton plant was “unusable” because it needed “essential operational upgrades”.

The problem is that the infrastructure that is almost never used does not go through the same continual operational testing as stuff that runs continuously.

Here’s an excerpt of a government examination with the CEO of Thames Water:

Chris Weston: The first thing I would say is we have a team at the desalination plant that is working very hard to try to make it work.

Chair: Has it ever worked properly?

Chris Weston: It has worked in the past.

Chair: It is not going to work this year though?

Chris Weston: No, and I share your concerns. The desalination plant is a big problem for us. I wonder why it was built in the first place.

Chair: Two hundred and fifty million pounds.

Chris Weston: Yes, I accept that. It is not a good story, it was not a good investment, and there are no excuses about it. I would point out one thing with the desalination plant: at the moment, it relies on a very complicated and expensive process. Within it, it has certain treatment membranes. Those treatment membranes are at the end of their life.

This is nothing specific to the UK. We see it in Australia, too. Desalination plants have worked well in Perth because they are used as a key source of drinking water, and these plants run almost continuously.

Elsewhere, the story is similar to Beckton’s. Melbourne’s plant was completed in 2012, but mothballed until 2017, when it started delivering water for the first time. The government had agreed contracts to pay for this every year, despite receiving no water in return. In Adelaide, the plant sits idle for most of the wetter months. But Sydney has gone in the other direction: in 2023, the government stopped regarding it as an on-off backup, and it now runs close to a full-time operation. Maybe that’s something Britain can learn from.

For me, this is the crux of it.

I am not worried about the energy demands of desalination for the UK. I think adding 1% to 2% to our electricity demand is not unmanageable. I’d be happy with that trade-off if it reduced the environmental impact of reservoirs and unsustainable extraction from existing aquifers.

The problem is that reserving desalination for emergency situations does not seem to work well. It hurts the economics. It means they sit idle for years, and then are not ready to go when a crisis hits. Desalination plants work far better when you need continuous freshwater supplies. For Britain, that means they’d be far better suited to relieving pressure on existing aquifers (which is less stop-start) than to being kept on reserve for drought management.

If we build them, we should make sure we actually use them.

1 This is partly due to population growth, partly due to climate change, but actually the biggest driver is more water resources to reduce pressure on existing aquifers in environmentally-sensitive areas.

2 This is on the higher end of the estimates, but I'm trying to be conservative/harsh here.

3 5 billion * 365 * 4 = 7.3x10 12 Wh. That's 7 billion kWh (or 7 TWh). One point to note is that electricity generation also uses water (how much depends on the electricity source). But even if this extra demand was being supplied by gas (which uses the most water), it would be far less than 1% of the water deficit: millions rather than billions of m3.

4 7 / 290 * 100 = 2.4%

5 Thames Water previously scoped the plant to have a capacity for around 150 million litres per day. But has since said that its more realistic capacity is around 100 million litres.

6 This report cites a range of £1000 to £9000 per ML. I've converted that to cubic metres, and dollars. https://committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/157464/html/

This is a re-post from The Climate Brink

On the morning of August 26th, part of a glacier cliff on the north face of Langtang Lirung (a ~7,200 meter peak 60 km north of Kathmandu) collapsed. The falling mass of ice and rock released energy equivalent to a magnitude 5.2 earthquake according to the USGS, and set off a debris flow that traveled ~100 km down into the Trishuli and Bhote Koshi rivers. This buried and washed away large parts of towns, severed the only highway between Nepal and China, and damaged at least six hydropower facilities. Currently (the morning of August 28th), reports put the death toll at around 500, with roughly 2,000 people still missing across Nepal and Tibet, and we expect these numbers to continue to rise.

The tragedy is unfortunately familiar for the Langtang valley. In 2015, shaking from a magnitude 7.8 earthquake released an avalanche of ice and rock from this same mountain that buried Langtang village and killed around 300 people. But there is an important difference between the two events: in 2015 an earthquake triggered the collapse. This time there was no tectonic trigger. The mountain simply failed, and the collapse itself produced a seismic event that was initially mistaken for an earthquake.

Within hours, some people on social media were confidently asserting that climate change caused the disaster, while others were just as confidently asserting it had nothing to do with it. In this piece I’ll try and lay out what the data and the scientific literature actually supports.

The short version is this: any formal attribution of this specific collapse to climate change is premature, and single events like this are genuinely hard to attribute even after careful study. At the same time, the collapse happened on a mountain that has warmed rapidly for decades, immediately after four consecutive summers that all rank among the five warmest in at least 86 years, and in a valley that has been losing ice at an accelerating rate. A rapidly warming climate and retreating glaciers are increasing risks of these sorts of events in the region, whether or not we can ultimately attribute this particular event.

A rapidly warming mountain

Let’s take a look at how temperatures have changed in the region where the glacier collapsed. The figure below shows ERA5 surface air temperatures for the ~25 km grid cell containing the glacier, both for monthly anomalies since 1940 and the summer (June–August) average for each year.1

ERA5 2m temperature for the 0.25° grid cell containing the Langtang Lirung collapse source zone (28.25N, 85.5E, with a gridcell elevation of 4,322 m). Top: monthly anomalies relative to a 1961–1990 baseline, with a 12-month running mean. Bottom: June–August mean temperature per year, 1940–2026; the 2026 value is preliminary (ERA5T, August through the 22nd). See this article’s GitHub page for underlying data.

Summers at the site have warmed at around 0.29C per decade since 1940, with the most recent 30 years (1996-2025) averaging about 1C warmer than the 1961-1990 baseline. The four most recent summers (2022 through 2025) all rank among the five warmest on record. A newly published study of the Langtang Catchment (Silwal et al 2026) also provides a separate check on my numbers. Using the higher-resolution ERA5-Land product, they find the glacial areas of the catchment (above 4000 m) warmed at 0.31C per decade over 1960-2023.

The glacial collapse came at the end of an exceptionally warm monsoon season. July 2026 was the second warmest July in the 86-year record (at 9.4C, behind only 2024’s 9.8C). The first three weeks of August (the latest daily data available when I ran this analysis) averaged 9.3C, running above the warmest complete August on record (9.1C in 2022). The collapse came on August 26th.2

Warm summers do not by themselves knock a mountain down. But sustained warmth at a glacial cliff increases risks by melting the ice that buttresses steep slopes, sending meltwater into cracks in the rock, and degrading the permafrost that acts as a frozen glue holding fractured high-altitude rock faces together (Gruber and Haeberli 2007). As the glaciologist Jakob Steiner told Scientific American, “you basically had the lower part of a glacier tongue that sheared off because the rock below failed.”

A valley losing its ice

Next let’s look at whats been happening to the region’s glaciers. The figure below shows glacier mass balance for the surrounding region (the Randolph Glacier Inventory’s South Asia East region, which spans the Himalaya east of ~81E, including Nepal) from the WGMS annual mass change estimates, along with in-situ measurements from two Nepali glaciers where long term measurements are available. This includes Yala Glacier in the Langtang valley itself, around 10 km from the collapse site.

Annual and cumulative glacier mass balance for the RGI South Asia East region (WGMS annual mass-change estimates v2026, hydrological years 1957–2025, ±1σ shading), and annual in-situ mass balance for Yala Glacier (Langtang valley) and Mera Glacier (Everest region) from the WGMS Fluctuations of Glaciers database. See this article’s GitHub page for underlying data.

Regional glaciers have lost a cumulative 26 meters of water equivalent since 1957 – equivalent to shaving roughly 30 meters of ice thickness off the average glacier surface. More than half of that loss (about 14 m w.e.) has occurred since the year 2000, with 2024 and 1997 as the two biggest loss years on record. Yala Glacier, the closest measured glacier to the collapse site, lost an average of 0.92 m w.e. per year over 2012–2025, with its worst year (-1.90 m w.e.) in 2024.3

Yala has become something of a symbol of Himalayan ice loss: this past May, ICIMOD and local communities held a tribute ceremony at the glacier, which has shrunk by 66% and retreated 784 meters since it was first surveyed in the 1970s. In their new paper, Silwal and colleagues find Yala’s equilibrium line (the altitude above which a glacier gains mass) has risen roughly 200–250 m since the 1980s and now sits above 5600 m. This is above the top of the glacier itself, meaning the entire glacier now sits in the melt zone.

Studies of the Langtang catchment specifically have found glacier thinning nearly doubled between 1974-2006 and 2006-2015 Ragettli et al 2016, mirroring the Himalaya-wide doubling of ice loss between 1975-2000 and 2000-2016 found by Maurer et al (2019) and the global acceleration documented by Hugonnet et al (2021).

The Langtang catchment has lost around 42% of its glacier area since the Little Ice Age (~1815, Silwal et al 2026), with the rate of loss more than quadrupling from 0.11% per year over 1815-1964 to 0.49% per year over 1964-2023, and the fastest loss coming after 2000. The number of glaciers nearly doubled (58 to 115) over that period as retreating glaciers have fragmented and disconnected into pieces.

The cause of this ice loss is clear. The IPCC’s Sixth Assessment Report concluded that “human influence is very likely the main driver of the global retreat of glaciers since the 1990s.” When researchers have done formal attribution studies of individual glacier hazards (e.g. Stuart-Smith et al (2021) on the glacial lake threatening Huaraz, Peru), they have found glacier retreat that is “virtually certain” to be outside natural variability.

Why attribution of the collapse itself is premature

So why not simply connect the dots, and say that a warming mountain, retreating glaciers, and a record-warm August led to the collapse? The challenge is that the chain of causation for rock-ice avalanches is much messier than for glacier retreat, and the scientific literature on these events is consistently, and appropriately, cautious.

The Himalayan mountains have always shed ice and rock, as skeptics of any climate link will point out. The 2015 Langtang avalanche in the region was caused by a magnitude 7.8 earthquake rather than a string of warm summers. Steep glaciated faces fail for reasons of geometry, geology, and bad luck that have nothing to do with human emissions. Attribution of a specific collapse requires detailed forensic reconstructions on specific drivers before causes can be known with any certainty, and that work will take months to years.

The best precedent here is the February 2021 Chamoli disaster in the Indian Himalaya, where a rock-ice avalanche killed more than 200 people. The definitive study of that event (Shugar et al 2021 in Science) reconstructed the failure in detail but stopped short of attributing it to climate change, while noting that warming increases the probability of such events. Studies of other large glacier collapses, like the 2016 twin glacier detachments in Tibet (Kääb et al 2018), reach similarly hedged conclusions. A 2021 survey found an apparent increase in large glacier-related landslides in High Mountain Asia over 1998–2018, but its authors flagged the small sample size and cautioned that the association with warming “requires further research.” We simply do not have the kind of long, well-observed event record for high-mountain collapses that we have for heatwaves or heavy rainfall, where rapid attribution is now routine.

There is a related argument I’ve seen circulating online that events like this happened long before modern warming, and if anything a world with more glaciers should have more ice available to fall. The first part is clearly true. The largest ice avalanche ever observed in the Alps came off the Altels glacier in 1895 (around 4 million cubic meters), and a 1962 rock-ice avalanche from Huascarán in Peru killed around 4,000 people with no apparent trigger at all. Mountains were shedding ice catastrophically well before we started burning fossil fuels in earnest. But the existence of old events tells us nothing about whether the odds are changing, and heat waves happened in 1900 too (just less frequently). It is worth noting that the the best modern reanalysis of the Altels collapse, Faillettaz et al 2011, suspects hot summers in the preceding years warmed the glacier’s frozen bed toward the melting point.

Hazard from these slopes are not solely determined by how much ice sits on them. Rather, what drives risks is how fast the ice and the frozen ground beneath the ice are changing. A cold glacier frozen to its bed in a stable climate will be comparatively secure, but one in transition will be more at risk. Thinning glaciers withdraw support from the steep rock faces they once buttressed (called the “paraglacial response”, Ballantyne 2002), meltwater reaches previously dry failure planes, and warming permafrost loses the ice cement that held fractured rock together.

Its also worth listening to what experts have been saying about the event. Kristen Cook of Grenoble Alpes University told Scientific American that “it’s difficult to conclusively link a single event directly to climate change. We know it’s getting warmer in the Himalaya.” Dan Shugar, who led the Chamoli study, was cautious on this event’s specific cause while noting he is “100 percent” certain climate change will make such events more likely, “by some combination of glacier melt, permafrost thaw, and changes to precipitation and temperature patterns.”

Confident claims that climate change caused this disaster are getting ahead of the evidence. But at the same time, confident claims that it played no role ignore the rapid changes that we’ve observed in the area around where the mountain failed.

What are the takeaways here?

This is a humanitarian catastrophe, and the immediate causes of the enormous death toll include things like villages and infrastructure concentrated along narrow river corridors, a debris flow that covered 100 km, and limited warning systems that have little to do with climate change. As with other extreme events, we shouldn’t let debates about attribution distract from the urgent need to reduce vulnerability.

It is clearly premature to attribute the collapse itself to climate change. Given the messy causality of rock-ice avalanches, a definitive single-event attribution may never be possible. We will likely see careful forensic studies to be published over the next year or two (as happened after Chamoli), and I’d treat any confident causal claim made this week (in either direction) with a lot of skepticism.

But the broader context is not in doubt. The collapse happened on a mountain warming at around 0.29C per decade in summer, immediately after four consecutive summers that all rank among the five warmest in an 86-year record, during an August that was running warmer than any complete August on record, in a valley that has lost ice at an accelerating pace, and in a region where human influence is very likely the main driver of glacier retreat.

High Mountain Asia already has more people exposed to glacier flood hazards than anywhere else on Earth, and projections suggest the Hindu Kush Himalaya could lose a large fraction of its remaining ice this century, with losses scaling with emissions (Rounce et al 2023). The ice that holds these mountains together is being lost, and every tenth of a degree of additional warming pushes these systems further outside the conditions in which the region’s settlements, trails, and hydropower plants were built.

So when people ask whether climate change caused the disaster in Nepal, the answer is that we don’t know, and we may never know for this specific event. But if the question is whether a warming climate is making disasters like this one more likely in the Himalayas, the literature and essentially every scientist working on these hazards point in the same direction.

I’ve included a more detailed methods writeup and code to reproduce this analysis on my GitHub here.

1 A single 0.25° ERA5 grid cell in terrain this steep is an imperfect measure of the temperatures at the glacier itself; the grid cell spans valley floors around 1,400 m to the 7,200 m summit, with a mean elevation of 4,322 m. Early reports put the failure zone above 5,000 m. Absolute temperatures at the failure zone are substantially colder than the cell average, but anomalies and trends should be more consistent across elevations (if anything we’d expect slightly faster warming at higher elevations). ERA5 also has some limitations in the High Mountain Asia region before the satellite era (pre-1979), so I’d put less weight on individual early extremes than on the long-term trend.

2 For what it’s worth, the partial 2026 summer (8.0C) sits close to the long-term trend line, well below 2024, so the striking 2026 signal is in the July and August values specifically rather than the summer as a whole.

3 Yala is a small, debris-free, relatively low-elevation glacier that is known to lose mass faster than the regional average, and it is not a direct proxy for the hanging glaciers on Langtang Lirung’s north face. I’m showing it because it is the closest long-running measured glacier to the collapse site.

A listing of 29 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, August 23, 2026 thru Sat, August 29, 2026. Stories we promoted this week, by category:

Climate Change Impacts (8 articles)

• Climate change is unearthing new archeological discoveries, while also threating them NPR's Danielle Kurtzleben speaks with Jørgen Hollesen, a Senior Researcher at the National Museum of Denmark, about how climate change is impacting the study of archaeology. NPR, Danielle Kurtzleben, Aug 23, 2026.
• The world inches toward catastrophic climate events: ‘Bigger shocks are on the way’ Scientists have long warned that the world will experience more intense extreme weather events like heat waves, storms, floods and droughts. But what once seemed like the realm of fiction is now discussed as a possibility, even an inevitability. AP News, Peter Pringaman, Aug 24, 2026.
• Five ways Europe's heat-wave summer is hot, hot, hot Phys.org, Edward Zinin (editor), Aug 24, 2026.
• World`s oceans hit hottest temperature on record in August The new ocean heat record being set in August is especially remarkable as global sea temperatures are typically highest in March and April, after the austral summer. The Guardian, Damian Carrington, Aug 24, 2026.
• How does a collapsing glacier turn into a lethal wall of mud and water? An expert explains what happened in Nepal A collapsing glacier in Tibet led to a devastating wall of water and debris roaring through a valley in Nepal, leaving hundreds dead and many hundreds still missing. The Conversation, Stuart Dunning, Aug 27, 2026.
• Nepal`s devastating floods reveal the danger of `cascading hazards` in Himalayas How many factors driven by climate change can add up to disaster. The Conversation, Daniel Parsons, Aug 27, 2026.
• El Niño climate patterns supercharged by burning of fossil fuels, study finds ‘Godzilla’ event currently brewing could push 50 million people into acute hunger before the end of next year The Guardian, Oliver Milman, Aug 27, 2026.
• Climate crisis could be destabilising mountain areas like Nepal, experts warn Unusual heat this year may have melted ice and thawed bonds that hold glaciers in place – leading to catastrophe The Guardian, Jonathan Watts, Aug 27, 2026.

Climate Science and Research (6 articles)

• Near-real-time storyline attribution for everyday global weather An experimental reanalysis-based approach for extreme event attribution Climate Lab Book, Ed Hawkins, Aug 24, 2026.
• Climate Model Benchmarking: Building Trust and Advancing Science A critical look at how well climate models work, how to successfully use them, and the anticipated challenges for their next-generation development. Eos, Birgit Hassler, Forrest Hoffman, Ranjini Swaminathan and Beth Dingley, Aug 24, 2026.
• The biggest carbon polluters are to blame for half of U.S. western water lost, `groundbreaking` paper says Some of the largest fossil fuel companies on Earth are disproportionately responsible for the water crisis in the American West, according to a first-of-its-kind study published Tuesday. Inside Climate News, Jake Bolster, Aug 25, 2026.
• Skeptical Science New Research for Week #35 2026 Skeptical Science's weekly survey of freshly published climate research. Skeptical Science, Doug Bostrom & Marc Kodack, Aug 27, 2026.
• Climate change is strengthening El Niño, coral records suggest 1000-year archive from the Galápagos portends greater weather disruptions from the Pacific climate cycle. Science, Julia Vaz, Aug 27, 2026.
• Scientists collaborated with narwhals to study warming waters in the Arctic Scientists collaborated with narwhals for a new study to understand human-caused climate change in the Arctic and rising sea levels around the world. NPR, Rachel Carlson, Aug 28, 2026.

Climate Policy and Politics (5 articles)

• U.S. Cuts Colorado River Water for Arizona, California and Nevada Arizona’s share of the river will shrink by a third, likely increasing reliance on groundwater and raising pressure on agriculture. NYT, Scott Dance, Aug 21, 2026.
• Council set to axe climate emergency declaration UK political party Reform discovers that basic physics is ''woke."" BBC News, Victoria Scheer and Annaleece Longmore, Aug 22, 2026.
• Trump demands `lies` in West Point climate curriculum, professor claims in new lawsuit A tenured professor at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point claims he was fired after pushing back on a presidential directive to “defy science” and stop teaching cadets that climate change had “primarily human causes, something contrary to the ideology of the Commander in Chief and forbidden at West Point.” The Independent News, Justin Rohrlich, Aug 26, 2026.
• West Point Climate Professor Says He Was Fired for Refusing to `Defy Science` Dr. Adam Kalkstein is suing the U. S. Military Academy, where he was a professor of geography and the only climate scientist, after being fired. New York Times, Michael C. Bender and Greg Jaffe, Aug 26, 2026.
• ?W?hy are European leaders staying silent after our summer of climate shock? Lethal temperatures ?and wildfires have exposed a widening gulf between voters demanding ?action and politicians unwilling to confront the long-term choices global heating requires The Guardian, Jon Henley, Aug 26, 2026.

Miscellaneous (3 articles)

• 2026 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #34 A listing of 28 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, August 16, 2026 thru Sat, August 22, 2026. Skeptical Science, Bärbel Winkler & Doug Bostrom, Aug 23, 2026.
• If all car tyres were filled with CO2, would this cut atmospheric carbon significantly? Skeptical Science would like to hear your answer to this in comments: ''If all the vehicles on the planet had their tyres pumped up with CO2, would this lock up enough carbon to lower the amount in the air significantly?'' The Guardian, Guardian Staff, Aug 23, 2026.
• Mission impossible? Quantifying military emissions Military and wartime emissions are difficult to track—but too important to ignore. Bulletin of the Atomic Scienctists, Neta C. Crawford, Aug 24, 2026.

Public Misunderstandings about Climate Solutions (2 articles)

• Against the wind: despite Trump`s attacks, unions are fighting for good US clean energy jobs Since Hurricane Sandy in 2012, a growing labor movement has addressed the climate crisis and economic inequality The Guardian, Dharna Noor, Aug 23, 2026.
• Fact brief - Do wind turbines release more emissions than burning fossil fuels? No - Wind turbines generate emissions during construction and transportation, but their overall climate impact is far lower than that of fossil fuels. Skeptical Science, Sue Bin Park, Aug 25, 2026.

Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation (2 articles)

• Florida shows how to adapt as coastal cities face growing threats from sea level rise and storms With a state government locked in denial of climate change, Floridians ''DIY'' and show how to self-help as coastal cities face growing threats from sea level rise and storms. Associated Press, Dorany Pineda, Aug 22, 2026.
• Empty North Sea oil fields could store enough green hydrogen to power the country for seven years Depleted oil and gas fields that powered Britain for half a century could be refilled with hydrogen made from wind and solar power. The Conversation, Stuart Jones , Aug 24, 2026.

Health Aspects of Climate Change (2 articles)

• Climate change exposes 580 million children to 20 extra `heat-stress days` every year Carbon Brief, Ayesha Tandon, Aug 26, 2026.
• Climate Change Exposes 580 Million Children to 20 Extra "Heat-Stress Days" Every Year More than 40% of children under the age of 10 globally are already experiencing at least 20 additional “heat-stress days” due to climate change. CleanTechnica, Ayesha Tandon, Aug 28, 2026.

Public Misunderstandings about Climate Science (1 article)

• How the Black Summer fires failed to shift Australians` climate views The research, published today by the Royal Society, indicates that misinformation may have dampened the fires’ impact on the public’s perception of climate risk, as evidenced by the widespread endorsement of the false claim that arsonists caused the bushfires – a belief held by 88.89 per cent of sceptics, 56.96 per cent of fence-sitters, and 38.79 per cent of acceptors. Sydney Morning Herald, Nick O'Malley, Aug 25, 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

Carbon emissions exacerbating the Western US water crisis, Williams et al., Communications Earth & Environmen

In the western US, limited water supply and high demand--accentuated by anthropogenic climate change--have resulted in overallocated water resources and rapidly depleting groundwater. Simultaneously, legal and policy mechanisms are being pursued regarding the contributions of large emitting entities (“Carbon Majors”) to such impacts. Here, we quantify impacts on western US water resources attributable to the Carbon Majors, and compare results with a simpler-to-use (‘proportional’) approach. Anthropogenic climate change has driven large decreases in water supply (snowpack and streamflow) and increases in water demand (irrigation demand), with roughly half attributable to the Carbon Majors. These changes have led to a widening seasonal gap between water supply and demand, and with Carbon Majors emissions accounting for ~1/3 of observed, climatically-driven groundwater loss in the Central Valley during 2003-2024. Though both approaches yield similar results, consistent over- and underestimations are present in each variable, suggesting caution is needed when using the proportional approach.

Evolution of Global Sea-Level Rise Projections and Their Uncertainty, Garner et al., Earth's Future

For more than 40 years, scientists have projected future sea-level change. Documenting how sea-level projections have evolved is vital for tracking progress, uncertainties, and future research needs. Here, we update and analyze a database of global-mean sea level (GMSL) projections dating from 1982 to 2025, identifying five key findings. First, GMSL projection generation has been concentrated in a small number of developed countries, with 95% of projections produced in the United States, United Kingdom, European Union, or Australia. Second, while GMSL projections for 2050 and 2100 have been published regularly since the early 1980s, only 30 of 103 studies have produced projections extending beyond 2100; all but one of these 30 studies postdates 2010. Third, among studies providing multiple estimates, the range of highest GMSL projections for 2100 has broadened since 2007, reaching 0.6–2.0 m across publications since the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Sixth Assessment Report (AR6). Fourth, GMSL projections from the IPCC have historically been conservative compared to projections from individual studies. Prior to AR6, ∼66% of 2100 projections at the upper end of uncertainty intervals from individual studies exceeded the corresponding upper projections from IPCC reports. However, the inclusion of “low-confidence” GMSL projections in AR6 to assess higher amounts of GMSL change of poorly known likelihood reduces this problem: the 83rd percentile of these low-confidence projections is exceeded by <25% of upper estimates from individual studies. Finally, analyses suggest that the arrival time of key GMSL milestones are often similar for projections spanning multiple eras and using various methodologies.

Equatorial Extreme Convective Storms Are Expanding and Becoming More Persistent, Zhuang et al., AGU Advance

Extreme rainfall is projected to intensify with climate warming, yet changes in the spatiotemporal structure of extreme-producing storms remain poorly understood in the tropics, as the most convectively active regions of the world are also the most data-scarce. We here leverage the first long-term, sub-kilometer, sub-hourly observational network in equatorial Singapore (730 k?m2), with 122 rain gauges reporting 5 min intensities for 2020–2024 and 82 stations with hourly accumulations for 1980–2024, combined with X-band radar (5 min, 100 m) to produce a high-resolution gridded rainfall reanalysis. Our findings indicate that extreme rainfall in Singapore is becoming larger and more persistent, with intensification resulting in higher storm rainfall volumes while rainfall peak intensities remain largely unchanged. Furthermore, extreme rainfall storms are strikingly compact, with spatial and temporal correlations halving over just 2 km and 4 min, decaying faster than previously recognized and observed elsewhere. This suggests that analyses based on coarse data sets or single stations may have misrepresented rainfall intensification under warming.

From this week's government/NGO section:

Survey reveals gap between climate change concern and actual news coverage, Climate News Tracker/Kantar

A survey of journalists and production staff across UK public service media concluded climate reporting needs new approaches. Broadcast journalists in Britain say they rank climate change and environmental issues above many of the traditional pillars of news coverage – including the National Health Service, international conflict and immigration – yet this is not reflected in what audiences actually see and hear. More than 80% of respondents said crowded news agendas and packed running orders hinder climate coverage. Program editors and channel schedulers may be willing to extend a bulletin for a dramatic, unexpected and consequential story, but the climate crisis rarely meets the threshold for such immediate editorial prioritization. The planet heating up is a slow-burning story whose significance has developed over years rather than hours, making it harder to compete with the urgency of daily news. Journalists also highlighted the difficulty of finding strong editorial “pegs” for climate stories outside major weather events or political announcements. Some 65% said climate stories do not always have a clear or timely news peg.

Climate change is driving unprecedented European ocean temperatures, with severe impacts for marine life, Bergin et al., World Weather Attribution

Researchers from Switzerland, Sweden, the United States, Ireland, and the United Kingdom collaborated to assess the extent to which human-induced climate change altered the likelihood and intensity of the extreme sea surface temperature (SSTs) conditions along the European coasts in July 2026. This year’s high SSTs have been remarkable not only in their intensity, but also in how early in the year they were reached. To assess whether all of the observed warming is attributable to human-induced climate change, we combine observations and climate models. In the Celtic region, climate models and observations show very similar trends, while in all other regions the observed trends are much stronger than those simulated by climate models. Despite this, the authors found that in the two Mediterranean regions, the increase in warming attributable to human-induced climate change is about 2°C, substantially surpassing the level of global warming, even under this conservative estimate. 121 articles in 54 journals by 866 contributing authors

Physical science of climate change, effects

Disturbance characteristics and forest properties regulate surface warming and recovery across Europe, Su et al., Nature Geoscience 10.1038/s41561-026-02071-5

Strengthening impact of Indian Ocean Basin Mode on ENSO under greenhouse warming, Zhao et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105688

Transient Global Overturning Following the Shutdown of North Atlantic Deep Water Formation, Sun & Thompson, AGU Advances Open Access 10.1029/2026av002462

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Understanding the role of contrails and contrail cirrus in climate change: a global perspective, Atmospheric chemistry and physics, 10.5194/acp-24-9219-2024 25 cites.

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Observations of climate change, effects

A Subtle Atmospheric Shift Is Redefining Winter Hydrology on the Tibetan Plateau, Chen et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2025gl121477

Attribution of Summer Warming Trends in the North China Plain during 1968–2023, Li et al., Journal of Hydrometeorology 10.1175/jhm-d-25-0102.1

Carbon emissions exacerbating the Western US water crisis, Williams et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access 10.1038/s43247-026-03900-6

Equatorial Extreme Convective Storms Are Expanding and Becoming More Persistent, Zhuang et al., AGU Advances Open Access 10.1029/2026av002370

Evolution of Climate Extremes Over the Indian Subcontinent Using a Revised CEI, Thota et al., International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70467

Recent Warming Amplification in the Yangtze River Basin Compared to the Global Land, Liu et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres 10.1029/2026jd046491

State of the UK Climate in 2025, Kendon et al., International Journal of Climatology Open Access 10.1002/joc.70470

Synoptic drivers of the August 2024 record-breaking rainfall in the Chadian Sahara: dynamics, thermodynamics, and socio-economic consequences, Tchinda et al., Weather and Climate Dynamics Open Access pdf 10.5194/wcd-7-1425-2026

Widespread coral bleaching across subtropical and temperate Japan under record marine heat stress, Kurihara et al., Scientific Reports Open Access 10.1038/s41598-026-65095-2

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Drivers and Impacts of the Record-Breaking 2023 Wildfire Season in Canada, Nature Communications, 10.1038/s41467-024-51154-7 295 cites.

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Instrumentation & observational methods of climate change, effects

A Guide to Single Changepoint Tests for the Climate Researcher, Lund & Shi, Journal of Climate Open Access pdf 10.1175/jcli-d-25-0681.1

Application of spatial statistics for climate-sensitive natural hazard management, Reinprecht et al., Climate Risk Management Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.crm.2026.100873

Historical cold biases exaggerate future elevation-dependent warming over the Tibetan Plateau, Deng et al., Atmospheric Research 10.1016/j.atmosres.2026.109288

Sensitivity to climate Delta selection in Pseudo-global warming simulations of mesoscale convective systems: case study of the august 2022 event in northern Japan, Tahara & Hiraga, Frontiers in Climate Open Access pdf 10.3389/fclim.2026.1921704

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Tipping point detection and early warnings in climate, ecological, and human systems, Earth System Dynamics, 10.5194/esd-15-1117-2024 92 cites.

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Modeling, simulation & projection of climate change, effects

100 m resolution projection of future urban heat Island of a tropical Coastal City, Chen et al., Urban Climate Open Access 10.1016/j.uclim.2026.103100

CMIP6 Historical Evaluation and Future Changes of Climate Extreme Indices at Regional Scale From the US-Mexico Border Region to Central America, Ramos-Esteban et al., International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70536

Disentangling Anthropogenic Effects on Southern Hemisphere Circulation and Surface Climate: A Multi-Model Large Ensemble Approach, Diaz et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres Open Access 10.1029/2025jd046229

Projection and Uncertainty of Midsummer Precipitation in the Northern China Monsoon Region by CMIP6 Models, Yang et al., International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70438

Regional Temperature Trends and Future Warming Risks in Pakistan Using Bias-Corrected CMIP6 Ensembles and Machine Learning Techniques, Ullah et al., International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70497

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
IMO2020 Regulations Accelerate Global Warming by up to 3 Years in UKESM1, Earth s Future, 10.1029/2024ef005011 22 cites.

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Advancement of climate & climate effects modeling, simulation & projection

A sea ice free Arctic: CMIP7 Assessment Fast Track abrupt-127k experimental protocol and motivation, Sime et al., Geoscientific model development Open Access pdf 10.5194/gmd-19-5881-2026

Drought forecasting across multiple temporal scales using CMIP6 projections and hybrid deep learning models for Central Anatolia, Türkiye, Citakoglu et al., Atmospheric Research 10.1016/j.atmosres.2026.109271

Evaluating North American Winter Extreme Precipitation Variability and Its Drivers in CMIP6 Models, Jeong et al., Weather and Climate Extremes Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.wace.2026.100948

Evaluation of Downscaled CMIP6 Performance for Rainfall and Wind Over the Maritime Continent, Alifdini et al., International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70476

Evaluation of the ALARO1-SFX (CY43T2) regional climate model over Belgium across different resolutions, Dewettinck et al., Geoscientific model development Open Access 10.5194/gmd-19-7911-2026

GCAM-Europe v7.2.0: enhancing policy-relevant climate modelling through spatial and sectoral detail, Sampedro et al., Geoscientific model development Open Access pdf 10.5194/gmd-19-7741-2026

How Observation-Based Data Influence Uncertainty in Local Climate Projections, Taylor et al., Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology 10.1175/jamc-d-25-0146.1

Representation of Long-Term Observed UK Winter Precipitation Trends and Variability in UKCP18 Global Climate Models, Carruthers et al., International Journal of Climatology Open Access 10.1002/joc.70540

The CMIP6-downscaled CORDEX-Southeast Asia (SEA) ensemble: evaluation and benchmarking for megacities of SEA, Nguyen et al., Geoscientific model development Open Access 10.5194/gmd-19-7653-2026

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Pushing the frontiers in climate modelling and analysis with machine learning, Nature Climate Change, 10.1038/s41558-024-02095-y 157 cites.

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Cryosphere & climate change

Enhanced interannual variability of early-winter snowfall in northern Xinjiang since the 1990s and its relationship with Arctic sea ice, Han et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105684

Event-driven atmospheric forcing and meltwater lake response in maritime antarctic, Shah et al., Frontiers in Environmental Science Open Access pdf 10.3389/fenvs.2026.1916729

Fate of heat approaching the Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf mediated by continental shelf eddies, Stewart et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.aec8232

Historical and Projected Antarctic Sea Ice Trends Across High-Resolution Coupled Model Hierarchies, Bushuk et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl124043

Multiyear tropical warm pool warming drives slowdown in Antarctic mass loss, Wang et al., Nature Open Access 10.1038/s41586-026-10912-x

Reconsidering the drivers of ice-shelf collapse, Arthur et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-76772-1

Relationships between Arctic sea-ice concentration, temperature, and specific humidity in the lower troposphere during 1980–2021, Uhlíková et al., cryosphere Open Access pdf 10.5194/tc-20-4585-2026

The multilayer ocean circulation melting the 79N Glacier ice tongue, Reinert et al., cryosphere Open Access pdf 10.5194/tc-20-4563-2026

What SAR Labels Hide About a Changing Arctic, Mahmud, Earth s Future Open Access 10.1029/2026ef008828

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
The West Antarctic Ice Sheet may not be vulnerable to marine ice cliff instability during the 21st century, Science Advances, 10.1126/sciadv.ado7794 38 cites.

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Sea level & climate change

Addendum: Sea level much higher than assumed in most coastal hazard assessments, Seeger & Minderhoud, Nature Open Access 10.1038/s41586-026-11017-1

Evolution of Global Sea-Level Rise Projections and Their Uncertainty, Garner et al., Earth s Future Open Access 10.1029/2025ef007836

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Tropical Cyclone Storm Surge-Based Flood Risk Assessment Under Combined Scenarios of High Tides and Sea-Level Rise: A Case Study of Hainan Island, China, Earth s Future, 10.1029/2023ef004236 16 cites.

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Paleoclimate & paleogeochemistry

Asian summer monsoon orbital variability directly paced by CO2 and precession, not eccentricity, Millot-Weil et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-76856-y

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Dry hydroclimates in the late Palaeocene-early Eocene hothouse world, Nature Communications, 10.1038/s41467-024-51430-6 10 cites.

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Biology & climate change, related geochemistry

Arctic and Tibetan Plateau Tundra Show Divergent Temperature and Precipitation Thresholds Under Climate Change, Zhu et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl124727

Breaking Boundaries: Multidirectional Responses of Malagasy Bats to Unmitigated Future Climate Change, Stewart-Roberts et al., Diversity and Distributions Open Access 10.1111/ddi.70254

Brood Chamber Carbonate Chemistry in the oyster Ostrea edulis Is Dynamically Shaped by Warming, Acidification, and Ventilation, Gray et al., Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.71007

Carbon emissions exacerbating the Western US water crisis, Williams et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access 10.1038/s43247-026-03900-6

Climate Controls Cold- But Not Warm-Adapted Sphagnum Distribution and Carbon Sink Capacity, Wang et al., Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.71006

Climate warming drives thermal shocks and accelerated freshwater habitat fragmentation, Wang et al., Nature Climate Change Open Access 10.1038/s41558-026-02731-9

CO2 physiological forcing mitigates climate-driven water limitation on vegetation growth and carbon uptake, Kang et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-76835-3

Comparative Distribution Projections of Hydrophilic and Xerophytic Invasive Species in Turkey Under CMIP6 Climate Scenarios, Tursun et al., Ecology and Evolution Open Access pdf 10.1002/ece3.74172

Distribution Shifts of Vaccinium Berry Wild Relatives in China Under Climate and Land-Use Changes, Pang et al., Ecology and Evolution Open Access 10.1002/ece3.74154

High elevation shrubification in the subarctic during the Holocene Thermal Maximum and 21st century, Harning et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access 10.1038/s43247-026-03965-3

Hot temperature during development alters iridescence in Morpho butterflies, Rubin et al., PNAS Nexus Open Access 10.1093/pnasnexus/pgag243

Impacts of Climate Change on Alpha and Beta Diversity Patterns of Cerrado anurans, Sabino et al., Ecology and Evolution Open Access 10.1002/ece3.73983

Increasing CO2 levels fertilize C4 grass production, Simpson et al., Nature Open Access 10.1038/s41586-026-10935-4

Limits on the capacity of an ectotherm to buffer temperature extremes through the construction of a central refuge, Ord & Blazek, Oecologia Open Access pdf 10.1007/s00442-026-05959-6

Modeling the effects of climate risk on primates globally: New perspectives on conservation priorities, Teng et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.aeg0031

Population Structure of a Living Fossil, the Atlantic Horseshoe Crab, and Its Vulnerability in the Face of Imminent Climate Change, Luo et al., Diversity and Distributions Open Access 10.1111/ddi.70256

Post-heatwave immune challenge reshapes selection on heatwave responses, Salo et al., Royal Society Open Science Open Access 10.1098/rsos.260674

Prediction of the Potential Distribution of Cirsium vulgare in China Under Climate Change Scenarios Based on Its First Recorded Occurrences in Southern China, Hu et al., Ecology and Evolution Open Access 10.1002/ece3.74028

Projected Effects of Climate-induced Changes in Phytoplankton biomass in the Southern South China Sea, Kiel et al., Biogeosciences Open Access 10.5194/bg-23-5827-2026

Responses of Antarctic seabird populations to past climate change, Ng et al., Ecography Open Access 10.1002/ecog.08322

Soil Warming Shifts Seasonal and Soil Depth-Related Root Growth Dynamics in Subarctic Grasslands, Bhattarai et al., Global Change Biology pdf 10.1111/gcb.71055

The giant Antarctic amphipod Paraceradocus miersi will not fare well if freshening continues in the Southern Ocean, Spicer et al., Marine Environmental Research Open Access 10.1016/j.marenvres.2026.108368

The policy relevance of climate-change scenarios for biodiversity research, Schoeman et al., Nature Reviews Biodiversity 10.1038/s44358-026-00193-7

The ‘Lifeboat Hypothesis’: Aquatic Microplastics in a Warming World—Climate-Resilient Refugia for Bacterial Pathogens, Quilliam & Ormsby, Global Change Biology Open Access 10.1111/gcb.71078

Thermophilization: Concepts, Methods, and Implications of Changes in Community Composition due to Global Warming, Feeley et al., Global Change Biology pdf 10.1111/gcb.71063

Widespread coral bleaching across subtropical and temperate Japan under record marine heat stress, Kurihara et al., Scientific Reports Open Access 10.1038/s41598-026-65095-2

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Impacts of marine heatwaves in coastal ecosystems depend on local environmental conditions, Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.17469 37 cites.

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GHG sources & sinks, flux, related geochemistry

A global atmospheric methane record from a tropical ice core, Lamantia et al., Nature Open Access 10.1038/s41586-026-10938-1

Analysis of the temporal variability of CO2, CH4 and CO concentrations at Lamto, West Africa, Tiemoko et al., Tellus B Open Access pdf 10.1080/16000889.2020.1863707

Carbon dioxide and methane emissions from plants and peat soil in a Cyperus papyrus wetland in Uganda, Farmer et al., Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences Open Access 10.1098/rstb.2025.0048

Decorrelating carbon and water fluxes in the Amazon Basin, Worden et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-75526-3

Environmental controls over greenhouse gas dynamics of tropical peatlands of the Central Congo Basin, Girkin et al., PubMed pmid:42619525

Experimental warming alters iron–carbon interactions and CO2 and CH4 emissions in pristine mangrove soils, Molitor et al., Atmospheric Environment Open Access 10.1016/j.atmosenv.2026.122315

Extensive parasite transmission and variation in a functional receptor associated with drug resistance in endemic Schistosoma mansoni, Berger et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.adt3721

Hydrological controls on dissolved carbon export from permafrost peatland catchments of northeastern China, Wang et al., Frontiers in Environmental Science Open Access pdf 10.3389/fenvs.2026.1915601

Lakes Amplify Carbon Emissions Relative to Downstream Export in Aquatic Networks, Alriksson et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2025gl120340

Land-use change causes rapid carbon losses in Congo Basin peatlands across climate scenarios, whereas the effects of climate change alone are uncertain, Young et al., Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences Open Access 10.1098/rstb.2024.0486

Limited blue carbon potential of intertidal seagrass meadows in the Wadden Sea – a case study in a tidal basin, Mohr et al., Biogeosciences Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-23-5715-2026

Mesenchymal stem cells receive adaptive islet–derived miR-151–containing sEVs to promote β cell compensation in obesity, Guo et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.adu4196

Methane Emissions From U.S. Lakes Dominated by Ebullition, Shallow Zones, and Anthropogenic Drivers, Shen & Raymond, Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl124792

Precipitation-dependent nonlinear accumulation of soil organic carbon in response to warming via microbial residues, Chen et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-03941-x

Quantifying climatic drivers and identifying spatial risks of vegetation carbon sink instability: a case study of central–western Inner Mongolia, Liu et al., Frontiers in Environmental Science Open Access pdf 10.3389/fenvs.2026.1819623

Shaping of developmental gradients through selection on multiple loci in Antirrhinum, Bradley et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.adx2011

Soil disturbance in wetlands by feral pigs increases greenhouse gas emissions, Adame et al., Biogeosciences Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-23-5781-2026

Strategic design of methane observation networks to improve emission estimates: A case study in Africa, Li et al., Atmospheric chemistry and physics Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-26-11893-2026

Surface-water carbon exchange from mangroves and responses to global warming, Ouyang et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-77058-2

The Fragile Sink: Reconceptualizing Soil Carbon Stabilization and Its Vulnerability Under Global Change, Iqbal et al., Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.71071

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
A large net carbon loss attributed to anthropogenic and natural disturbances in the Amazon Arc of Deforestation, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 10.1073/pnas.2310157121 41 cites.

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CO2 capture, sequestration science & engineering

Bamboo carbon pathways: sustainable approach to climate change mitigation, TK & S, Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution Open Access pdf 10.3389/fevo.2026.1876587

ForestERW: a spatially explicit carbon dioxide removal model for practical enhanced rock weathering applications in United States forests, McDonnell et al., Frontiers in Climate Open Access 10.3389/fclim.2026.1855001

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Non-aqueous alkoxide-mediated electrochemical carbon capture, Nature Energy, 10.1038/s41560-024-01614-7 27 cites.

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Decarbonization

Multi-Scenario Carbon Peak Prediction for Aviation Logistics Based on an Extended STIRPAT Model: Empirical Analysis From Guangxi, China, Zhang et al., Geoscience Data Journal Open Access pdf 10.1002/gdj3.70089

National hydrogen policy inequality in aviation: a hidden barrier to climate mitigation, Rostami et al., Climate Policy 10.1080/14693062.2026.2713870

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Future hydrogen economies imply environmental trade-offs and a supply-demand mismatch, Nature Communications, 10.1038/s41467-024-51251-7 180 cites.

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Geoengineering climate

Mapping the future of ocean carbon dioxide removal in Australia: site suitability for electrochemical ocean alkalinity enhancement, Benjamin et al., Frontiers in Climate Open Access 10.3389/fclim.2026.1854445

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Technical note: Ocean Alkalinity Enhancement Pelagic Impact Intercomparison Project (OAEPIIP), Biogeosciences, 10.5194/bg-21-3665-2024 9 cites.

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Black carbon

Warming potential of atmospheric black carbon modulated by particulate matter, Liu et al., Nature Geoscience 10.1038/s41561-026-02068-0

Aerosols

Future projections of surface dust concentrations in major dust source regions of the Mesopotamian plains, Abadi et al., Atmospheric Research 10.1016/j.atmosres.2026.109282

Particle Size as a Key Remaining Uncertainty in Dust Direct Radiative Effect After EMIT: An Earth System Model Study, Li et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2025gl121571

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Has Reducing Ship Emissions Brought Forward Global Warming?, Geophysical Research Letters, 10.1029/2024gl109077 73 cites.

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Climate change communications & cognition

A caution on climate hope, Blakey & Hudson, Environmental Politics 10.1080/09644016.2026.2721047

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
A 27-country test of communicating the scientific consensus on climate change, Nature Human Behaviour, 10.1038/s41562-024-01928-2 47 cites.

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Agronomy, animal husbundry, food production & climate change

Circular nutrient recycling via Juncus effusus-derived biochar: impacts on soil properties, sorghum yield, and GHG fluxes, Wilson et al., ENVIRONMENTAL SYSTEMS RESEARCH Open Access 10.1186/s40068-026-00496-w

Climate-Induced Severe Water Scarcity Events as Harbingers of Global Wheat Price, Trnka et al., Earth s Future Open Access 10.1029/2025ef006095

Modeling agricultural water deficit risk in finland under CMIP6 climate scenarios, Jahromi et al., Scientific Reports Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41598-026-65956-w

Overcoming barriers to achieving a Net Zero agri-food sector: Challenges and solutions, McGuire et al., Environmental Science & Policy Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.envsci.2026.104469

Research on the impact mechanism of climate risks on financial vulnerability of farmers in typical ecologically fragile regions of Northwestern China, Liu et al., Frontiers in Environmental Science Open Access 10.3389/fenvs.2026.1892381

Social network structure and climate change adaptation information diffusion among dairy farmers: evidence from northern Tunisia, Gara et al., Frontiers in Climate Open Access pdf 10.3389/fclim.2026.1848645

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Optimistic growth of marginal region plantations under climate warming: Assessing divergent drought resilience, Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.17459 36 cites.

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Hydrology, hydrometeorology & climate change

A Subtle Atmospheric Shift Is Redefining Winter Hydrology on the Tibetan Plateau, Chen et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2025gl121477

Carbon emissions exacerbating the Western US water crisis, Williams et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access 10.1038/s43247-026-03900-6

Equatorial Extreme Convective Storms Are Expanding and Becoming More Persistent, Zhuang et al., AGU Advances Open Access 10.1029/2026av002370

Synoptic drivers of the August 2024 record-breaking rainfall in the Chadian Sahara: dynamics, thermodynamics, and socio-economic consequences, Tchinda et al., Weather and Climate Dynamics Open Access pdf 10.5194/wcd-7-1425-2026

Time Series Analysis of Temperature and Precipitation Dynamics Using CETA and MCETA Methods, Gul et al., International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70484

Warming-driven rise in soil moisture entropy signals growing instability risk in the Asian Water Tower, Xie et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-76955-w

Yellow River sediment sinks exhibit divergent decadal responses to anthropogenic and climatic forcing, Li et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access 10.1038/s43247-026-03969-z

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Declining Reservoir Reliability and Increasing Reservoir Vulnerability: Long-Term Observations Reveal Longer and More Severe Periods of Low Reservoir Storage for Major United States Reservoirs, Geophysical Research Letters, 10.1029/2024gl109476 26 cites.

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Climate change economics

Developing double materiality for climate-related financial policy, Stiroh, Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-026-02725-7

Extreme temperatures and low-income household finance: evidence from payday loans, Xie et al., Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-76945-y

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Equity weighting increases the social cost of carbon, Science, 10.1126/science.adn1488 25 cites.

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Climate change mitigation public policy research

Fast Today, Fair Tomorrow: Competing Priorities Shaping EU Climate Law and Policy, Accogli et al., Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews Climate Change Open Access 10.1002/wcc.70081

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Climate policies that achieved major emission reductions: Global evidence from two decades, Science, 10.1126/science.adl6547 303 cites.

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Climate change adaptation & adaptation public policy research

AQUA v1.0.0: The Application for QUality Assessment for the Climate Change Adaptation Digital Twin – the core engine, Nurisso et al., Geoscientific model development Open Access pdf 10.5194/gmd-19-7725-2026

Climate change adaptation strategies of rural women-headed households in southwestern Ethiopia, Sherif et al., Discover Sustainability Open Access 10.1007/s43621-026-04230-5

Ethical and governance frontiers in big data for climate resilience, Pokharel & AlQahtani, Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.cosust.2026.101723

Incident Risk Prediction for Global Maritime Networks Under a Changing Climate, Azadnia & Miller-Hooks, Risk Analysis Open Access pdf 10.1111/risa.70340

Leveraging social capital for climate change adaptation in the Mara River Basin, Kenya, Omondi, Environmental Sociology 10.1080/23251042.2026.2721649

Thermal justice in urban climate change adaptation, Gobatti et al., Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-026-02727-5

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Lessons from a decade of adaptive pathways studies for climate adaptation, Global Environmental Change, 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2024.102907 114 cites.

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Climate change impacts on human health

Climate change and hypertension: global trends, temporal patterns, and regional insights, Ye et al., Frontiers in Climate Open Access 10.3389/fclim.2026.1703142

From climate hazards to early warning: Salmonella as a sentinel for the Climate–AMR–WASH nexus, Tang et al., PLOS Climate Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0001040

Global analysis of sub-daily urban impacts on atmospheric variables and thermal comfort in a climate change scenario, Hoffmann et al., Urban Climate 10.1016/j.uclim.2026.103079

Marine heatwaves and undernutrition in low- and middle-income countries, Gray et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Open Access 10.1073/pnas.2528506123

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Integrating effects of overheating on human health into buildings’ life cycle assessment, The International Journal of Life Cycle Assessment, 10.1007/s11367-024-02353-3 11 cites.

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Other

Ecological regime shifts decouple organic carbon sequestration from nutrient-driven productivity in Anthropocene shallow lakes, Huang et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105686

Gender, power, and tokenism in nature-based solutions to climate change, Yamoah & Nyantakyi-Frimpong, Climate and Development 10.1080/17565529.2026.2712491

Perfluoroalkyl substance release in permafrost surface waters is projected to increase under global warming, Yu et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-03946-6

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
The history and future of IPCC special reports: A dual role of politicisation and normalisation, Climatic Change, 10.1007/s10584-024-03788-1 13 cites.

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Informed opinion, nudges & major initiatives

Future Projections of Burned Area in Europe Highlight the Importance of Human Action, Billing et al., Global Change Biology Open Access 10.1111/gcb.71043

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Bring digital twins back to Earth, Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews Climate Change, 10.1002/wcc.915 29 cites.

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

Unlocking California's Flexible Load: A Durable Blueprint for Affordability and Reliability, Cutter et al., GridLab, Kevala, and Energy and Environmental Economics

Realizing the full potential of flexible load requires consolidating California’s fragmented landscape into a clear set of complementary pathways anchored by three core principles: compensating below verified avoided costs, paying exclusively for measured performance, and building on standardized, interoperable program architecture. Time-of-use (TOU) and dynamic rate structures can drive persistent behavior shifts without counterfactual baselines or aggregator overhead, but they are unlikely to fully deliver the benefits that many hope for. Only by advancing rate design and programmatic pathways together can California fully unlock the state’s load flexibility potential. To capture the value rates leave behind, load-serving entities (LSEs) should deploy three standardized mechanisms:- Retail Pay-for-Performance: Accessible, non-firm, as-available load reduction compensated against verified individual-level regression baselines. - Firm Capacity: Contracted, predictable load shift carrying Resource Adequacy (RA) value and clear performance accountability.- Wholesale Market Access: Streamlined direct California Independent System Operator (CAISO) market participation tailored for large commercial loads and sophisticated aggregations. Locationally targeted dispatch specifically tailored to defer infrastructure upgrades at high-value, constrained distribution nodes.

Evaluating the implementation and effectiveness of heat action plans, Sobhaninia et al., Red Cross Red Crescent Global Disaster Preparedness Center

The authors analyzed the content of Heat Action Plans (HAPs) from different regions of the world, interviewed local officials involved in HAP development and implementation to understand their impact then developed and piloted an actionable HAP Implementation and Effectiveness (HAPIE) Tool that can help cities to track the implementation and effectiveness of HAPs.

Advancing policy coherence for agrifood systems transformation, Bedeau et al., Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

The authors examine how policy coherence is being advanced in practice to enable agrifood systems transformation, drawing on experiences from 10 countries. It explores the continuous and iterative processes that countries are following to align agriculture, climate, biodiversity, nutrition and equity agendas and translate shared goals into policy processes, institutional arrangements and coordinated action across sectors and levels of governance. By focusing on implementation rather than policy design alone, the authors highlight enabling factors, common challenges and practical entry points to move beyond siloed approaches. The publication is intended for policymakers, practitioners and development partners seeking actionable insights to advance multiple agrifood systems outcomes in complex national contexts.

Climate change is driving unprecedented European ocean temperatures, with severe impacts for marine life, Bergin et al., World Weather Attribution

Researchers from Switzerland, Sweden, the United States, Ireland, and the United Kingdom collaborated to assess the extent to which human-induced climate change altered the likelihood and intensity of the extreme sea surface temperature (SSTs) conditions along the European coasts in July 2026. This year’s high SSTs have been remarkable not only in their intensity, but also in how early in the year they were reached. To assess whether all of the observed warming is attributable to human-induced climate change, we combine observations and climate models. In the Celtic region, climate models and observations show very similar trends, while in all other regions the observed trends are much stronger than those simulated by climate models. Despite this, the authors found that in the two Mediterranean regions, the increase in warming attributable to human-induced climate change is about 2°C, substantially surpassing the level of global warming, even under this conservative estimate.

Water Reuse Energy Demands and Water Quality Metrics, Shurtliff et al., Idaho National Laboratory

The authors discuss strategies for enhancing water resilience in energy production by advancing water reuse and reclamation technologies, particularly for thermoelectric power plants and data centers. The focus is on efficiently closing the water loop by processing discharged cooling water to recover valuable minerals, thereby reducing energy-intensive water sourcing and management. This approach aims to alleviate water scarcity issues, especially in arid regions, while also promoting operational sustainability.

Water Availability for Cooling Systems: Assessing Demands, Constraints, and Alternative Sources for Thermoelectric Plants and Data Centers, Bastidas Pacheco et al., Idaho National Laboratory

The authors address Water-for-Energy by focusing on improving water management to provide additional cooling water to further thermoelectric energy production and support data center deployments. They assessed existing demands and constraints on cooling water and identified alternative sources of water to meet growing needs of large-scale water and energy users.

All hazards operational guidance: responding to climate disruption, Chartered Institution of Highways & Transportation

The authors provide guidance to help local highway authorities (LHAs) design, implement, and test their operational response to disruption to their networks caused by extreme heat, flooding, wildfires, and other hazards. Leaders must ensure that an operational framework is in place that allows the authority to act quickly when faced with credible risks from such events, prioritize interventions where consequences for communities are greatest, and make available suitably qualified, experienced, and empowered professionals to take timely, defensible decisions under conditions of uncertainty. The operational framework should facilitate coordinated action across the organization and with partners, supported by “good enough” information, sound governance arrangements, and effective communication. It should also ensure that decisions are recorded and used after the event to inform future planning and investment.

Climate Resilience as Strategy: Scaling Corporate Action on Physical Risks from Climate Change, Radulovic et al., Systemiq and the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions

Most companies now acknowledge growing physical risk and have begun strengthening business continuity. But maturity still lags exposure. Many adaptation plans push implementation far into the future — and only 25% of corporate adaptation measures are genuinely strategic in nature. A key gap is valuation — the ability to quantify avoided losses in ways finance teams trust. Without this, resilience falls down the priority list against nearer-term initiatives. The mismatch between capital planning cycles and multi-decade physical risk trajectories compounds the problem. Guidance is expanding quickly, and strongest on risk assessment and disclosure. But it remains fragmented and uneven on the elements that convert insight into action: valuing resilience, building financeable pipelines of interventions, and enabling ecosystem collaboration.

Survey reveals gap between climate change concern and actual news coverage, Climate News Tracker/Kantar

A survey of journalists and production staff across UK public service media concluded climate reporting needs new approaches. Broadcast journalists in Britain say they rank climate change and environmental issues above many of the traditional pillars of news coverage – including the National Health Service, international conflict and immigration – yet this is not reflected in what audiences actually see and hear. More than 80% of respondents said crowded news agendas and packed running orders hinder climate coverage. Program editors and channel schedulers may be willing to extend a bulletin for a dramatic, unexpected and consequential story, but the climate crisis rarely meets the threshold for such immediate editorial prioritization. The planet heating up is a slow-burning story whose significance has developed over years rather than hours, making it harder to compete with the urgency of daily news. Journalists also highlighted the difficulty of finding strong editorial “pegs” for climate stories outside major weather events or political announcements. Some 65% said climate stories do not always have a clear or timely news peg. That is disappointing.

Current Best Practices on Wildfire Risk Reduction for Electric Transmission and Distribution Systems, Coleman et al., Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

To help utilities, states, and municipalities address growing wildfire risks, the authors prepared a comprehensive report outlining current best practices for wildfire planning, prevention, response, and recovery. They highlight utility-led strategies for mitigating wildfire risks from electric transmission and distribution systems. This work underscores the urgent need for proactive investment in resilience as wildfire threats intensify across the nation.

Managing construction in a changing climate, Suzanne Davenport, NHBC Foundation

The authors explore how climate change is affecting construction across the UK, the effects of extreme weather on construction quality, programs, materials and costs, the risks to worker health, safety and wellbeing, practical guidance and checklists for site managers to prepare for extreme weather, and, resilient construction solutions, technologies and techniques to improve climate adaptation on site.

U.S. gas power proposals tied to data centers nearly double in six months, Jenny Martos, GEM

Driven by rapid data center expansion, U.S. gas-fired power capacity in development jumped 50% to 378 GW, with Texas leading the push and developers pivoting to faster-to-install engines to skip supply backlogs. However, severe turbine supply constraints, project delays, local moratoriums, and mounting public opposition leave the true scale of this US$647 billion gas buildout highly uncertain.

Evaluation of ARPA-E's Mission and Goals, Marchant et al., National Academies of Science

The Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) was established in 2009 to address barriers to developing transformational science and technology solutions for the nation's energy and environmental challenges. The authors evaluate ARPA-E's operations and assesses the effects of its' programs to date. The authors also explore the agency's future challenges and opportunities, recommending ways ARPA-E can build on its' early successes to respond effectively to emerging energy needs. Key recommendations address funding and leadership stability, strategic planning and evaluation, risk and failure management, process innovation and experimentation, and transparency and public communication. About New Research

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This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections

Electric vehicle sales are a surprising beneficiary of the Trump presidency – at least outside of the United States.

The Iran conflict caused global oil prices to surge above $100 per barrel in March, April, and May of this year. Gasoline prices soon followed suit, exceeding $4 per gallon in the United States most days since April Fools’ Day.

As the biggest consumer of oil from the Middle East, Asia was hit hardest by its rising prices, shortages, and restrictions. But China’s measures to cut back on its oil imports have prevented global oil prices from escalating as high as many experts predicted.

Electric vehicles are one contributing factor. A recent analysis estimated that China’s rapid adoption of EVs has reduced the country’s oil consumption by 1.5 million barrels per day, or nearly 10%.

A new global electric car market report from the International Energy Agency, or IEA, also concluded that the Iran conflict and associated energy crisis “has clearly reinforced the case for EVs as a way to address energy security and fuel cost concerns," and that it “may therefore further accelerate ongoing shifts in global car markets towards more electrification.”

The share of global new car sales that are electrified – meaning both fully electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids – has grown steadily in recent years, according to the IEA. In 2020, EVs represented under 5% of global new car sales. That share rose rapidly to 20% in 2024 and reached one-in-four new cars sold last year. 

A slump followed by renewed interest

EV policies in China and the U.S. are a big deal, because 38% of all cars sold in 2025 were purchased in China and another 18% in the United States. 

“China and the U.S. are such big markets in absolute terms that they shape the global picture,” explained Euan Graham, senior analyst at the energy think tank Ember, in an email.

As an example, EV sales abruptly slumped during the first two months of 2026, after Republicans eliminated the U.S. federal EV tax credit and China slashed its EV tax exemption.

But on the last day of February, the U.S. and Israel launched coordinated military strikes against Iran, which responded by shutting down the Strait of Hormuz, through which 20% of the global oil supply previously flowed. 

The price of oil and refined fuels spiked, and interest in EVs followed. Since March, electric car sales have surged in Europe, Southeast Asia, Latin America, and Asia Pacific. In Europe, the world’s third-largest auto market, EVs now represent nearly 30% of new car sales. Their popularity has even begun to rebound in China and the U.S.

Electric vehicle sales in various regions during the first half of 2026 compared to the first half of 2025. (Image credit: IEA/CC BY 4.0)

As to just how much the Iran conflict supercharged EV sales, “I think it’s a bit tricky to nail down precisely,” said Elizabeth Connelly, energy technology and transport analyst at IEA and co-author of the report, in an email.

That's because individual countries’ policies and economic conditions have a big influence on consumer behavior. But the data certainly indicate that the war and resulting high fuel prices made EVs more appealing to consumers.

For example, the IEA report noted that in China, total car sales have declined this year due largely to an economic slowdown in the country. That slump has hit internal combustion engine car sales particularly hard. While the EV share fell to 42% of China’s new car sales in the first two months of the year when government subsidies were first slashed, it quickly rebounded after the Iran conflict began. Electrified vehicles set records by exceeding 60% of China’s reduced volume of new car sales in each of the past three months.

That makes the United States’ persistently stagnant EV market unique. 

“As some markets see a step change in EV sales this year, boosted by the conflict in Iran, the U.S. is seeing sales slump having rolled back policy support,” Graham said.

Electrified vehicles have represented under 7.5% of new American car sales in each of the 10 months since federal tax credits were eliminated. Although rising gasoline prices spurred record domestic purchases of hybrid cars and used EVs, new EVs have not experienced the same sales boost.

Read: The rest of the world is lapping the U.S. in the EV race

The share of quarterly new car sales in the U.S. since 2018 that were fully electric (green), plug-in hybrids (blue), and standard hybrids (gray). The start and end of the Inflation Reduction Act EV tax credit availability are indicated in red. (Image credit: Created by Dana Nuccitelli with data from Argonne National Laboratory)

The future of the car market is electric, to China’s benefit

As China’s domestic car sales have slowed this year, the country’s automakers have responded by ramping up their vehicle exports. That’s especially true of EVs, which the IEA reports surged to 35% of Chinese car exports in 2025 and 45% in the first half of 2026.

Total number of car exports (left frame) and percentage of those that are electrified (right frame) from China (red), the European Union (blue), the United States (green), and Japan (purple). (Image credit: IEA / CC BY 4.0)

And the IEA data illustrates that fossil-fueled cars are quickly going the way of the dinosaurs. Global internal combustion engine vehicle sales reached their apex in 2017. The COVID pandemic caused car sales to plummet, and although they have now rebounded to pre-pandemic levels, all of the post-pandemic sales recovery has come from EVs. Fewer cars with internal combustion engines are being sold around the world today than were in 2011.

Global car sales of internal combustion engine vehicles (ICEV; gray); hybrid electric vehicles (HEV; yellow); electric vehicles (EV, including both fully electric and plug-in hybrids; blue); and hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles (green; too small to be visible), including IEA 2026 estimates (2026e). (Image credit: IEA / CC BY 4.0)

And a recent forecast by JD Power predicted that EVs will comprise a majority of new global car sales by 2033, reaching over 80% of the new car market by 2040.

JD Power forecast of the electrified share of new car sales in China (red), Europe (blue), the U.S. (purple), and the global average (black). (Image credit: Created by Dana Nuccitelli with data from JD Power)

The IEA is a bit less optimistic in its EV sales forecasts. 

“Our two policy-based scenarios project around a 50% electric car sales share by 2035,” Connelly said. 

The IEA is particularly bearish about the U.S., expecting no more than 20% of new American car sales to be electrified by 2035 unless new policies are introduced. 

“The changes in U.S. policy over the past two years have pulled down the projected global EV sales share,” Connelly said. “That being said, there is upside potential to our outlook based on the progress seen in emerging markets and developing economies, and more broadly depending on how policymakers respond to the recent energy crisis.”

Chinese automakers dominate the electrified sector, accounting for about two-thirds of all global EV sales today. Expanding Chinese EV exports have contributed to rapidly growing electric car adoption in countries around the world, including Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Australia, New Zealand, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines, Belgium, the United Kingdom, United Arab Emirates, Russia, and Ethiopia. In total, the IEA reports that 50 countries set records for EV sales in the second quarter of 2026.

Can American automakers survive?

The rapid global transition to EVs and the Chinese dominance of that market have American automakers frightened about their companies’ futures. Recent U.S. government policies and regulatory rollbacks have undercut an already weak domestic EV market, and with the exception of Tesla, American automakers have been unable to compete with Chinese EVs in the international market. 

There remain a few glimmers of hope in the American EV market. California, which accounts for one-quarter to one-third of annual electrified vehicle sales in the country, just launched its own rebate program for first-time EV buyers. And American legacy automakers like Ford and newcomers like Slate are taking innovative approaches in an effort to introduce more affordable electric vehicles.

But unless those efforts achieve success soon, the formerly dominant American auto industry will be relegated to fighting over the scraps of an ever-shrinking internal combustion engine vehicle market as the world transitions to an electrified future, unintentionally supercharged by the consequences of Trump’s Iran war.

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

//

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.

Do wind turbines release more emissions than burning fossil fuels?

Wind turbines generate emissions during construction and transportation, but their overall climate impact is far lower than that of fossil fuels.

“Lifecycle emissions” is a measure of all emissions from raw materials, manufacturing, transportation, installation, operation, and disposal. A National Renewable Energy Laboratory review estimates that wind power produces about 13 grams of CO2-equivalent per kilowatt-hour over its full lifecycle. Natural gas averages about 486 grams, while coal is roughly 1,001 grams–or about 77 times wind’s emissions.

Most wind power emissions occur before turbines begin generating electricity, mainly from transporting components and to a lesser degree, manufacturing. Once operating, turbines generate electricity without directly burning fuel, allowing their low-emissions electricity to offset the emissions associated with their production and transportation.

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.

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National Renewable Energy Laboratory Life Cycle Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Electricity Generation: Update

Yale Climate Connections What’s the carbon footprint of a wind turbine?

Industrial Ecology Life Cycle Greenhouse Gas Emissions of Utility-Scale Wind Power

Journal of Cleaner Production Life-cycle green-house gas emissions of onshore and offshore wind turbines

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

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This video includes personal musings and conclusions of the creator and climate scientist Dr. Adam Levy. It is presented to our readers as an informed perspective. Please see video description for references (if any).

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In the fight against climate change, the world has made immense progress on renewable power - with wind and solar growing faster than ever. And finally carbon dioxide emissions are flatlining. But if we've made so much progress, why is CO2 building up in our atmosphere faster than ever before? And what can we do to finally protect our climate and ourselves?

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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, August 16, 2026 thru Sat, August 22, 2026. Stories we promoted this week, by category:

Climate Education and Communication (6 articles)

• The false and the furious: We aren't just bothered by different beliefs-we're bothered when we think others are wrong When people use facts to defend their preferences, tastes or values, they may turn a disagreement over priorities into a dispute over who is right and who is wrong, turning up the emotional heat. The Conversation, Andras Molnar, George Loewenstein, Aug 15, 2026.
• `It is not only a future certainty - the disaster is already here`: why we need climate fiction As wildfires rage across Europe and Britain swelters through its hottest summer on record, literary fiction has a vital role to play in capturing the severe consequences of climate crisis The Guardian, Tara Menon, Aug 16, 2026.
• Climate Trunk - Science Summary post of John Lang's Climate Trunk visuals in the "Science" ring Skeptical Science, Bärbel Winkler, Aug 18, 2026.
• Climate doom may discourage climate action, but there`s a way to counter it The Conversation, Sander van der Linden & Rachel O'Boyle, Aug 18, 2026.
• The cognitive bias behind bad climate math A new study finds two persistent mental shortcuts—not ignorance—are why people keep overrating recycling and underrating flying less. The Anthropocene, Sarah DeWeerdt, Aug 18, 2026.
• In a Summer of Catastrophe, Climate Scientist`s Words from the 80s Playing Out A review of what scientists were saying to the public about climate change in the 1980s. This is Not Cool, Peter Sinclair, Aug 19, 2026.

Climate Policy and Politics (6 articles)

• In Germany, record heat meets climate action fatigue DW, Oliver Pieper, Aug 17, 2026.
• UK politicians vastly overestimate public opposition to climate policies, study finds Members of Parliament from the UK's three biggest political parties in the House of Commons significantly overestimate levels of public resistance to major policy proposals for tackling climate change, a University of Cambridge study suggests. Phys.org, Gaby Clark, Aug 19, 2026.
• How far-right parties are using extreme weather events to boost their cause Political scientists explain why extreme weather events like this summer's European heatwaves can drive support to parties that traditionally deny human-made climate change. NPR, Ruth Sherlock, Aug 19, 2026.
• How Florida quietly removed climate change content from textbooks Publishers acceded to state requests watering down information on climate change’s impact, WUSF/Hechinger Report investigation finds. Now the state has turned to updating its science standards The Hechinger Report, Jessica Meszaros and Katie Worth, Aug 20, 2026.
• How Trump Is Trying to Crush California`s Climate Policies At least a half-dozen federal agencies have taken action against the state that has led the nation in environmental protections. New York Times, Maxine Joselow, Aug 20, 2026.
• Extreme Heat Waves Fuel Political Tensions in Europe At the limits of adaptation, governments face a choice: point fingers, or seize the moment for transformational change. Inside Climate News, Bob Berwyn, Aug 21, 2026.

Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation (4 articles)

• With Puerto Rico`s water crisis, climate change meets ineptitude LA Times, Carlos De Loera, Aug 14, 2026.
• Fire rangers of Mongolian steppe: climate crisis spurs revival of ancient knowledge - photo essay Fire has always be part of life on the grasslands, but has grown worse due to rising temperatures and severe droughts. In response, people have turned to their nomadic heritage to help tackle the blazes The Guardian, Michael O Snyder, Aug 16, 2026.
• Flights over Atlantic will adjust paths in test to reduce contrails Hundreds of commercial flights will be told to change their paths over the northeastern Atlantic Ocean during the next two winters to show how minor altitude adjustments can reduce aviation’s climate impact. AP News, Jennifer McDermott, Aug 19, 2026.
• As Minnesota gets warmer and wetter, what does that mean for drought? Climate change demands climate adaptation; Minnesota Public Radio unpacks how this looks for farmers and others in daily life. MPR News, Harshawn Ratanpal, Aug 21, 2026.

Climate Science and Research (4 articles)

• Scientists detect a surprising shift in human blood as atmospheric CO2 rises Researchers analyzing more than two decades of U.S. health data found that blood bicarbonate levels have climbed about 7% since 1999, while calcium and phosphorus have declined—changes that closely track increasing atmospheric CO2. Science Daily , The Kids Research Institute, Australia, Aug 15, 2026.
• Explainer: How the ‘super El Niño’ will reshape the world’s weather Carbon Brief, Robert McSweeney and Daisy Dunne, Aug 18, 2026.
• The pace of climate change matters more than overall heat in the race to save key Atlantic currents, study finds The rate of global warming, rather than the extra heat itself, could determine whether a system of ocean currents known as the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation will cross a tipping point, new research suggests. Live Science, Sascha Pare, Aug 18, 2026.
• Skeptical Science New Research for Week #34 2026 Skeptical Science's weekly survey of the entire scope of climate research, from physics to policy. Skeptical Science, Doug Bostrom & Marc Kodack, Aug 20, 2026.

Health Aspects of Climate Change (3 articles)

• As temperatures get hotter, pesticides are more dangerous to farmworkers Research shows heat amplifies the dangers of pesticides for farmworkers, and that the problem is poised to grow as the global climate warms. Inside Climate News, Amy Green, Aug 17, 2026.
• A federal case in Texas could change how we treat prisoners during hot weather As heat waves intensify, advocates are pushing for protections for incarcerated people, who have little ability to escape dangerous temperatures. Yale Climate Connections, Sarah Kennedy, Aug 21, 2026.
• Heat wave-hit Europe logs over 30,000 excess summer deaths: First figures Phys.org, Luca MATTEUCCI, Olivia BUGAULT, Pascale JUILLIARD , Aug 22, 2026.

Climate Change Impacts (2 articles)

• Is this El Niño a glimpse of a future, hotter Earth? There are important differences between long-term global warming and El Niño warming The Climate Brink, Andrew Dessler & Zeke Hausfather, Aug 17, 2026.
• Emissions are Flatlining. So Why’s CO2 Rising at Record Speed? ClimateAdam on Youtube, Adam Levy, Aug 22, 2026.

Climate Law and Justice (1 article)

• What happened after 13 young people in Hawaii sued over climate change Charlotte Madin joined the lawsuit at age 12. Today, she is part of a youth council advising the Hawaii Department of Transportation on climate priorities. Yale Climate Connections, Bridgett Ennis, Aug 17, 2026.

Public Misunderstandings about Climate Science (1 article)

• Witnessing a grand jeté of climate-change denial Defense and policy analyst Gwynne Dyer critiques climate change fatalists. Brandon Sun, Gwynne Dyer, Aug 19, 2026.

Miscellaneous (1 article)

• Skeptical Science New Research for Week #33 2026 A listing of 28 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, August 9, 2026 thru Sat, August 15, 2026. Skeptical Science, Bärbel Winkler & Doug Bostrom, Aug 16, 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

Marine Heatwaves Overwhelm the Buffering Benefits of Marine Protected Areas: Two Decades of Collapse in a Mediterranean Gorgonian, Zentner et al., Global Change Biology

Marine heatwaves (MHWs) are driving mass mortalities of coastal foundation species globally, threatening their persistence and the ecosystems they support. However, long-term demographic evidence of these impacts at regional scales is scarce. Accordingly, whether ongoing conservation actions, mainly marine protected areas (MPAs), mitigate the impact of MHWs is still an open question. Here, we address these gaps by analysing over two decades of demographic monitoring data from 49 shallow (< 40 m depth) populations of the foundation gorgonian Paramuricea clavata paired with in situ temperature records across the north-western Mediterranean (38°–43° N, 0°–8° E). Using hierarchical Bayesian models, we estimated regional-scale trends and assessed the combined influence of MHW exposure and protection status. We found that increasingly frequent extreme thermal events have caused widespread mass mortality, resulting in a 45% median decline in biomass at the regional scale over the past two decades. Within this context of extensive decline, protection temporarily buffered MHW impacts by sustaining higher overall biomass, despite protected populations experiencing greater absolute losses. Taken together, these findings indicate that local protection alone cannot offset climate-driven mortality and underscore the urgent need to integrate conservation measures with global climate action to preserve shallow marine ecosystems.

Petermann Glacier on the brink: Progress, challenges and insights, Fahrner et al., Science Advances

Petermann Glacier (PG), the largest marine-terminating glacier in northern Greenland based on catchment area and ice discharge, plays a key role in modulating ice export from the Greenland Ice Sheet (GrIS). With an upstream catchment connected to the GrIS interior via a deep subglacial canyon, its future stability has major implications for sea level rise. This review synthesizes recent advances in understanding PG’s dynamics across three critical interfaces. At the surface, reanalysis data and regional climate models diverge from observations in estimates of air temperature and surface mass balance, underscoring the need for improved in situ data and models. At the ocean boundary, enhanced basal melting driven by subglacial runoff and Atlantic water intrusions is identified as dominant driver of recent mass loss of PG, with continued warming posing a serious threat to the stability of the floating tongue. At the bed, geophysical synthesis reveals complex geology, likely spatial variability in geothermal heat flux, and the megacanyon’s influence on seasonal hydrology and velocity fluctuations. An ongoing rifting event, initiated in September 2025, highlights PG’s vulnerability. The anticipated retreat reduces buttressing and brings the terminus closer to the grounding zone, where additional calving could trigger retreat and accelerate ice discharge. As one of Greenland’s largest floating ice tongues, PG may provide important insights into the stability of other marine-terminating glaciers across the GrIS. Improved observations, sustained monitoring of oceanographic and atmospheric parameters, and high-resolution modeling are critical for constraining projections of PG’s future and its role in GrIS stability.

Near-total loss of buttressing stresses observed on Pine Island Ice Shelf, West Antarctica, Wells-Moran et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

Ice shelves, the floating extensions of the Antarctic Ice Sheet, provide critical buttressing stresses that resist the seaward flow of ice and help set the position of the grounding line, where the ice goes afloat. As buttressing stresses are diminished by thinning or fracturing and collapse of the ice shelf, glaciers tend to accelerate. Here, we focus on the response of Pine Island Ice Shelf (PIIS) in West Antarctica to multiple calving events and the disintegration of the lateral shear margins. Using observed time-series of the surface velocity fields between 2015 and 2024, we show multiple episodes of acceleration in ice flow and a marked reduction in the buttressing stresses. These observations show that PIIS experienced a significant reduction of its buttressing capacity during the observational record. We then investigate how a model glacier responds to loss in margin buttressing, and are able to broadly reproduce observations. By linking model simulations to observations, we recreate a timeline of buttressing loss on PIIS. These losses likely foreshadow a period of grounding line retreat and acceleration of Pine Island Glacier’s contribution to global mean sea level rise.

Failure to track a stable AMOC state under rapid climate change, Westen et al., Nature Climate Change

The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), a tipping element of the climate system, currently has an estimated global warming threshold for collapse of +4.0 °C (uncertainty range 1.4–8 °C). However, such a threshold may not be meaningful because AMOC stability depends on the rate of radiative forcing change, not a set temperature. Here we identify an AMOC stabilizing mechanism that operates on timescales slower than present-day warming rates. Slow forcing permits coherent adjustment of surface and interior ocean properties, supported by enhanced evaporation and reduced sea-ice extent, counteracting destabilizing feedbacks. Using a slow CO2 ramp (+0.5 ppm yr−1) climate model simulation, we explicitly demonstrate the AMOC remains stable up to +5.5 °C of global warming. By contrast, under faster CO2 ramps, the AMOC collapses at substantially lower warming levels (+2 °C). Our findings demonstrate rate-induced AMOC tipping and imply that limiting the rate of emissions is critical for reducing the risk of an AMOC collapse.

Disrupting the “wrong” target? Climate protest tactics affecting entities deemed undeserving are perceived as immoral, unjust, and reduce activist support, Nylund et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology

In recent years, disruptive climate protest organisations—such as Extinction Rebellion, Just Stop Oil, and Last Generation—have sought to convey the urgency of the climate crisis through actions that deliberately interrupt daily life. Many of these tactics have targeted entities perceived as having relatively minimal responsibility for climate change, such as cultural institutions, art galleries, or the general public, whereas others have targeted entities seen as highly responsible, such as fossil fuel companies or governments that could regulate them. Yet little empirical work has examined how the perceived responsibility—and resulting perceived deservingness—of targets shapes public reactions to disruptive climate protest. Across two preregistered studies using US participants (Study 1; N = 246) and UK participants (Study 2; N = 640), we found that climate protest tactics directed toward targets deemed undeserving (vs. deserving) were judged as less moral, provoked greater anger at the activists, and reduced support for them. Study 2 further demonstrated that these actions were evaluated as more unjust. However, target deservingness did not affect support for the broader climate movement, cause, or policies. These findings highlight the importance of perceived target deservingness in forming public judgments of disruptive protest and suggest that climate activists may reduce backlash to their activism by directing tactics toward entities seen as more responsible for contributing to the climate crisis. From this week's government/NGO section:

Temperature Check 2025–26, The Center for Climate Journalism and Communication, University of Southern California

Even though fewer Americans now hear about global warming and climate change through news, newspapers are still the top source of information for climate communicators. Climate communicators still prefer LinkedIn as their go-to social media platform for climate information, followed by Instagram and BlueSky. The use of X/Twitter for engaging in climate media continues to drop even more among climate communicators. Climate communicators are most concerned about the lack of climate action, global warming and the health impacts of climate change this year. Yet, the authors' survey shows climate communicators are also increasingly avoiding terms and phrases such as “climate change” and “global warming,” likely due to increasing politicization of the terms as well as pushback from the government as well as the public.

Climate Change in the American Mind: Politics & Policy, Spring 2026, Leiserowitz et al., Yale University and George Mason University

With the primaries in the 2026 midterm elections underway, the authors found that 58% of registered voters prefer to vote for a candidate for public office who supports action on global warming, while 14% prefer to vote for a candidate who opposes action. 42% would like to hear from political candidates more often about efforts to reduce global warming, while 23% would like to hear about this less often. 31% will only vote for a congressional candidate who supports increasing the use of renewable energy, while 7% will only vote for a candidate who supports decreasing the use of renewable energy. 25% will only vote for a candidate who supports decreasing the use of fossil fuels, while 14% will only vote for a candidate who supports increasing the use of fossil fuels. 93 articles in 45 journals by 733 contributing authors

Physical science of climate change, effects

Abrupt Increase in Marine Heatwave Accumulated Days Over the Gulf Stream Extension Around 2013 Linked to Subtropical Eastern Pacific Warming, Song et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Oceans 10.1029/2026jc024006

Failure to track a stable AMOC state under rapid climate change, Westen et al., Nature Climate Change Open Access 10.1038/s41558-026-02730-w

Intensified Oxygen Minimum Zone in Response to Both Insolation Maxima and Carbon Dioxide?Driven Warmth in the Tropical North Atlantic, Fayolle et al., Paleoceanography and Paleoclimatology Open Access 10.1029/2026pa005463

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Deforestation amplifies climate change effects on warming and cloud level rise in African montane forests, Nature Communications, 10.1038/s41467-024-51324-7 26 cites.

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Observations of climate change, effects

Enhanced Subsurface Warming of the Kuroshio Revealed by Long-Term Observations During 1965–2020, Du et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2025gl120916

From Rare to Recurrent: Intensifying Hot–Dry Extremes Across Romania, Nagavciuc & Ioni??, International Journal of Climatology Open Access 10.1002/joc.70559

Strong human fingerprint on low snowpack amid increasing volatility, Swain, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 10.1073/pnas.2620765123

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
The ocean losing its breath under the heatwaves, Nature Communications, 10.1038/s41467-024-51323-8 38 cites.

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Instrumentation & observational methods of climate change, effects

A climate impact taxonomy operationalizing IPCC physical driver and risk concepts, Michaela et al., IIASA PURE (International Institute of Applied Systems Analysis) pmh:oai:pure.iiasa.ac.at:21196

A global high-resolution dataset of snowmelt runoff onset timing from Sentinel-1 SAR, 2015–2024, Gagliano et al., Earth system science data Open Access 10.5194/essd-18-5871-2026

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Toward Low-Latency Estimation of Atmospheric CO 2 Growth Rates Using Satellite Observations: Evaluating Sampling Errors of Satellite and In Situ Observing Approaches, AGU Advances, 10.1029/2023av001145 10 cites.

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Modeling, simulation & projection of climate change, effects

Catalogue of strong nonlinear surprises in ocean, sea-ice, and atmospheric variables in CMIP6, Angevaare & Drijfhout, Earth System Dynamics Open Access 10.5194/esd-17-1081-2026

Heat Extremes Within Hot Summer Seasons Intensify More Than in Average Summers Under Global Warming, Pfleiderer et al., Earth s Future Open Access 10.1029/2026ef008241

Intercomparison of a Regional Climate Model Ensemble for Selected European Catchments, Roque et al., International Journal of Climatology Open Access 10.1002/joc.70554

Pacific Warming Pattern Discrepancy Linked to Spurious Rainband in Climate Models, Wills & DiNezio, Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl122859

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Increasing frequency and precipitation intensity of convective storms in the Peruvian Central Andes: Projections from convection?permitting regional climate simulations, Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society, 10.1002/qj.4820 10 cites.

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Advancement of climate & climate effects modeling, simulation & projection

Bridging the weather and climate divide with artificial intelligence, Camps?Valls et al., Nature Communications Open Access 10.1038/s41467-026-75787-y

Rapid Evaluation Framework for the CMIP7 Assessment Fast Track, Hoffman, Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.21919074

Recent Temperature and Energy Imbalance Trends Point to Higher Estimates of Future Warming, Gyuleva et al., Earth s Future Open Access 10.1029/2026ef008356

The source of uncertainty in future warming and wetting projections over Northwest China, Wei et al., Advances in Climate Change Research Open Access 10.1016/j.accre.2026.08.008

Uncertainty in Land Carbon Fluxes Simulated by CMIP6 Models from Treatments of Crop Distributions and Photosynthetic Pathways, Ovwemuvwose et al., Biogeosciences Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-23-5593-2026

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Uncertainties Inherent from Large-Scale Climate Projections in the Statistical Downscaling Projection of North Atlantic Tropical Cyclone Activity, Journal of Climate, 10.1175/jcli-d-23-0475.1 6 cites.

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Cryosphere & climate change

Atmospheric Blocking Pattern as the Primary Driver of Subseasonal Greenland Ice Sheet Summer Melt Variability, Guo et al., International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70547

Data-driven equation discovery of a sea ice albedo parametrisation, Atmojo et al., cryosphere Open Access 10.5194/tc-20-4437-2026

Loss of hydroclimate archives in glacier-fed basins worldwide, Vystavna et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-03825-0

Near-total loss of buttressing stresses observed on Pine Island Ice Shelf, West Antarctica, Wells-Moran et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Open Access 10.1073/pnas.2602994123

Petermann Glacier on the brink: Progress, challenges and insights, Fahrner et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.aee4522

Quick northward retreat of the permafrost boundary and controlling mechanisms in northeastern China, Zhou et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105678

Strong human fingerprint on low snowpack amid increasing volatility, Swain, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 10.1073/pnas.2620765123

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
State of Wildfires 2023–2024, Earth system science data, 10.5194/essd-16-3601-2024 236 cites.

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Sea level & climate change

Large-scale climate oscillations induce accelerated high tide flooding along the U.S. East Coast, Zhu et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-03932-y

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Quantifying the Mean Sea Level, Tide, and Surge Contributions to Changing Coastal High Water Levels, Journal of Geophysical Research Oceans, 10.1029/2023jc020737 11 cites.

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Paleoclimate & paleogeochemistry
Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Late Pleistocene glacial terminations accelerated by proglacial lakes, Climate of the past, 10.5194/cp-20-1761-2024 3 cites.

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Biology & climate change, related geochemistry

Antarctic greening is constrained by biology and requires field validation, Bokhorst et al., Nature Geoscience 10.1038/s41561-026-02076-0

Climate change and conservation of caecilians (order Gymnophiona): prediction of distributional shifts and risk assessment in Chiapas, Mexico, Cabrera-Hernández et al., Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution Open Access pdf 10.3389/fevo.2026.1886733

Faster, bigger, more severe: Extreme wildfire spread sets the stage for forest ecosystem change in western and boreal North America, Coop et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.aeg5802

Food Plant Availability Constrains Climatic Niches of Host?Specialized Europe?Centred Butterflies, Rashid et al., Diversity and Distributions Open Access pdf 10.1111/ddi.70245

Linear resistance but threshold-controlled recovery of vegetation to compound heatwave–drought extremes, Zhou et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105668

Mapping climate-related forest risks: An index-based approach, Martes & Köhl, PLOS Climate Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000931

Marine Heatwaves Overwhelm the Buffering Benefits of Marine Protected Areas: Two Decades of Collapse in a Mediterranean Gorgonian, Zentner et al., Global Change Biology Open Access pdf 10.1111/gcb.71052

Quantifying the alpha diversity of vascular plants vulnerable to climate change in protected areas, Wan et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105679

Terrestrial Arthropod Responses to Arctic Cryosphere Degradation, Gillespie & Høye, Global Change Biology Open Access pdf 10.1111/gcb.71062

The Biodiversity of Retreating Glaciers Leaves an Ecological Legacy in Emerging Soil Communities, Cantera et al., Global Change Biology Open Access pdf 10.1111/gcb.71040

Using a “Super” El Niño to understand how lakes respond to climate extremes, Culpepper et al., PLOS Climate Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0001021

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Climate change and California’s terrestrial biodiversity, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 10.1073/pnas.2310074121 42 cites.

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GHG sources & sinks, flux, related geochemistry

From Stable to Labile: Forest Expansion Drives Changes in Alpine Soil Carbon Fractions, Man et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Biogeosciences 10.1029/2026jg009751

Implementing methane dynamics into the LPJmL6 model, Schaphoff et al., Geoscientific model development Open Access 10.5194/gmd-19-7615-2026

Net lateral carbon export from eroding United States Atlantic and Gulf Coast marshes, Vittorio et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-03911-3

No single rule explains how climate affects carbon storage in tropical forests, Uriarte & Macedo, Nature 10.1038/d41586-026-02291-0

Persistent Shelf?to?Basin Export of Bioavailable Dissolved Organic Carbon in the Arctic Ocean, Gao et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl124640

Soil carbon gains from salt marsh recovery in China, Zheng et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access 10.1038/s43247-026-03944-8

Soil Moisture Thresholds for the Temperature Sensitivity of Ecosystem Respiration, Zhang et al., Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.71066

Sphagnum and herbaceous net ecosystem exchanges in a Pyrenean peatland: a long-term study using the ISBA model, Garisoain et al., Biogeosciences Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-23-3407-2026

Uncertainty in Land Carbon Fluxes Simulated by CMIP6 Models from Treatments of Crop Distributions and Photosynthetic Pathways, Ovwemuvwose et al., Biogeosciences Open Access pdf 10.5194/bg-23-5593-2026

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
An Independent Evaluation of GHGSat Methane Emissions: Performance Assessment, Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres, 10.1029/2023jd039906 27 cites.

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CO2 capture, sequestration science & engineering

Cities need robust carbon dioxide removal strategies to meet net-zero targets, Ulpiani et al., Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-026-02676-z

CO2 geological storage in China: a mini review of technical options, trade-offs, and pathways toward carbon neutrality, Zhao, Frontiers in Earth Science Open Access 10.3389/feart.2026.1873039

Influence of Deep?Sea Carbonate Sediments on the Long?Term Durability of Carbon Storage From Ocean Alkalinity Enhancement, Acksen et al., Global Biogeochemical Cycles Open Access 10.1029/2026gb009203

Techno-economics and value judgments of modeling biochar production for carbon removal in climate change mitigation scenarios, Dorndorf et al., Energy Research & Social Science Open Access 10.1016/j.erss.2026.104882

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Enhanced silicate weathering accelerates forest carbon sequestration by stimulating the soil mineral carbon pump, Global Change Biology, 10.1111/gcb.17464 65 cites.

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Decarbonization

Impacts of solar panels on vegetation biomass shift with climate aridity, Zhai et al., AMBIO 10.1007/s13280-026-02466-z

Phased fuel transition for low-carbon shipping, Li et al., Nature Sustainability Open Access 10.1038/s41893-026-01907-7

Projected impacts of future offshore wind farms on coastal precipitation over the Northwest European shelf, Akhtar et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-03852-x

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Challenges and opportunities in truck electrification revealed by big operational data, Nature Energy, 10.1038/s41560-024-01602-x 72 cites.

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Geoengineering climate

Unveiling the Shortwave Absorption Spectra of Alumina Aerosols: Radiative Implications for Solar Radiation Modification, Kapoor et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl121668

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
An assessment of ocean alkalinity enhancement using aqueous hydroxides: kinetics, efficiency, and precipitation thresholds, Biogeosciences, 10.5194/bg-21-3551-2024 31 cites.

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Black carbon

Black carbon emissions and climate impacts of cost-saving Arctic transit shipping through 2050, Yi et al., Nature Sustainability 10.1038/s41893-026-01877-w

Aerosols

Sea Surface Temperature Feedbacks and Convective Organization Mediate the Tropical Circulation Response to Aerosols, Sokol & Wright, Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl122829

Climate change communications & cognition

A Rapid Systematic Map of Youth Engagement With Marine Environments in a Changing Climate, Ceglia et al., Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews Climate Change Open Access 10.1002/wcc.70087

Disrupting the “wrong” target? Climate protest tactics affecting entities deemed undeserving are perceived as immoral, unjust, and reduce activist support, Nylund et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology Open Access 10.1016/j.jenvp.2026.103184

Inoculating Voters Against Misinformation in Greenspace Ballot Measures, Pitas & Zou, Journal of Environmental Psychology Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.jenvp.2026.103164

Media Framing of Climate Change and Its Dual Impact on Subjective Well-Being and Pro-Environmental Engagement, Lei & Yu, Journal of Environmental Psychology 10.1016/j.jenvp.2026.103178

Youth climate activism and the Global South gap in environmental citizenship research, Mubarak et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology 10.1016/j.jenvp.2026.103182

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Can large language models estimate public opinion about global warming? An empirical assessment of algorithmic fidelity and bias, PLOS Climate, 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000429 29 cites.

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Agronomy, animal husbundry, food production & climate change

Adoption levels of climate-smart agricultural practices through agricultural innovation systems among women smallholder farmers in Tanzania, Ndosi et al., Frontiers in Climate Open Access pdf 10.3389/fclim.2026.1891580

Bridging local decisions and regional forest strategies under climate risks: a flexibility-based optimization framework, Labarre et al., Annals of Forest Science Open Access 10.1186/s13595-026-01355-5

Climate Change Intensifies Cropland Drought Exposure in the Indus River Basin During the 21st Century, Hussain et al., International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70544

Climate Transitions in the Argentine Pampas Exceed Global Rates and Reshape Crop Exposure: A Multi?Period Köppen–Geiger Analysis (1901–2020), Brendel, International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70558

Disentangling the nonlinear responses of rainfed rice growth to climatic factors in South and Southeast Asia, Sun et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105673

High-resolution climate-driven potential evapotranspiration to assess climate change impacts on Mediterranean agriculture, Fonseca et al., Frontiers in Climate Open Access 10.3389/fclim.2026.1854734

Institutions and climate risk adaptation among smallholder livestock farmers in North Wollo Zone, Ethiopia, Yilma et al., PLOS Climate Open Access 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000751

Methane mitigation in ruminants for sustainable livestock production in tropical climates, Oke et al., Discover Environment Open Access pdf 10.1007/s44274-026-00971-2

Quantifying methane and ammonia emissions from beef cattle finishing systems under sorghum and corn diets, Santos et al., Agricultural and Forest Meteorology Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.agrformet.2026.111368

Systematic review of resilience pathways for smallholder farmers in semi-arid Southern Africa, Mutatu et al., Discover Sustainability Open Access 10.1007/s43621-026-04328-w

Winter wheat yield responses to extreme heat in the North China Plain: GGCMI-AgMIP model evaluation and a heat-stress phenology improvement in JULES-crop, You et al., Agricultural and Forest Meteorology Open Access 10.1016/j.agrformet.2026.111404

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Reducing climate change impacts from the global food system through diet shifts, Nature Climate Change, 10.1038/s41558-024-02084-1 105 cites.

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Hydrology, hydrometeorology & climate change

Hot Droughts Increase the Likelihood and Impacts of Abrupt Drought?to?Pluvial Transitions Worldwide, Fu et al., Earth s Future Open Access 10.1029/2026ef008638

Physical Constraints on Future Tibetan Plateau Summer Precipitation: Emergent Relationships and Pareto Optimal Ensembles, Li et al., International Journal of Climatology 10.1002/joc.70560

Rapid Increases in Heat?Driven Extreme Moisture Demand in the Southern Amazon, Chang et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl123139

Riverine flood risk mapping using GIS–AHP and climate-driven hydrodynamic simulations in an alpine basin of the Indus River system, Jamshed et al., PLOS Climate Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000915

The Portrait of Flood Risk in Italy: Past, Present and Future, From 1870 to 2100, Pavesi et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl122987

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Rapid intensification of tropical cyclones in the Gulf of Mexico is more likely during marine heatwaves, Communications Earth & Environment, 10.1038/s43247-024-01578-2 45 cites.

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Climate change economics
Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Renewable energy and CO2 emissions in developing and developed nations: a panel estimate approach, Frontiers in Environmental Science, 10.3389/fenvs.2024.1405001 44 cites.

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Climate change and the circular economy Climate change mitigation public policy research

Climate change mitigation practices in Porto's Atlantic-front municipalities: A comparative analysis, Leitão et al., Urban Climate 10.1016/j.uclim.2026.103094

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Feasibility of peak temperature targets in light of institutional constraints, Nature Climate Change, 10.1038/s41558-024-02073-4 47 cites.

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Climate change adaptation & adaptation public policy research

Deferred climate-related migration, Melillo, Frontiers in Climate Open Access 10.3389/fclim.2026.1800309

Evaluating urban heat adaptation strategies for extreme heatwaves in complex terrain: A case study of Grenoble, France, Gabeiras et al., Urban Climate 10.1016/j.uclim.2026.103059

Intention versus reality: insights from the implementation of the Green Climate Fund's adaptation project in Ethiopia, Kidane et al., Climate Risk Management Open Access 10.1016/j.crm.2026.100870

Opportunities for pathways approaches for adapting to complex climate change risks, Sparkes et al., Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.cosust.2026.101721

Widening climate adaptation gaps in the Chinese expressway network under climate change, Huang et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-03913-1

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Relational geographies of urban unsustainability: The entanglement of California’s housing crisis with WUI growth and climate change, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 10.1073/pnas.2310080121 25 cites.

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Climate change impacts on human health

Drought dynamics explain once in a century yellow fever virus outbreak in Brazil with implications for climate change, Caldwell et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.adz6832

Exceeding human heat tolerance in a warming, ageing world: a global projection modelling study, Kong et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2026.101494

Exceeding human heat tolerance in a warming, ageing world: a global projection modelling study, Kong et al., The Lancet Planetary Health Open Access 10.1016/j.lanplh.2026.101494

The effect of natural climate variability on future vector-borne disease suitability: A mathematical modelling study, Kaye et al., PLOS Climate Open Access 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000877

Urban heat vulnerability in a warming climate in Denmark: Projected temperature-related mortality for Copenhagen and the remaining areas, Kloster et al., Urban Climate Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.uclim.2026.103093

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Climate change and public health in California: A structured review of exposures, vulnerable populations, and adaptation measures, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 10.1073/pnas.2310081121 20 cites.

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Climate change & geopolitics

Strategic objectives underpin national climate pledges, Fransen & Meckling, Nature Communications Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41467-026-76467-7

The ocean as a unifying agenda across the climate, biodiversity, and land degradation conventions, Geddes et al., npj Ocean Sustainability Open Access 10.1038/s44183-026-00227-9

Other

The Critical Role of Moisture in the Record?Breaking Warm Event Over East Antarctica in March 2022, Cui et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres 10.1029/2026jd047167

Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
Government participation in virtual negotiations: evidence from IPCC approval sessions, Climatic Change, 10.1007/s10584-024-03790-7 4 cites.

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Informed opinion, nudges & major initiatives
Most cited from this section, published 2 years ago:
State of polar climate (2025), Advances in Climate Change Research, 10.1016/j.accre.2024.08.004 20 cites.

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

Ruta Energetica 2026–2030 (Energy Roadmap), Government of Chile

Chile se encuentra en una etapa decisiva de su transición energética, enfrentando el desafío de consolidar los avances alcanzados durante la última década y, al mismo tiempo, responder a nuevas exigencias en materia de seguridad energética, crecimiento económico y competitividad internacional. La presente Ruta 2026–2030 tiene por objetivo acelerar y robustecer la transición energética del país, promoviendo una agenda que combine seguridad del suministro, modernización institucional, competitividad económica, y desarrollo territorial equilibrado. Para ello, se busca impulsar una transición energética con foco en la seguridad, posicionando a la energía como un motor habilitante del crecimiento, inversión, empleo, productividad e innovación. En este marco, la Ruta define las prioridades estratégicas y lineamientos de acción que orientarán la gestión sectorial durante el período 2026–2030. (Chile is at a decisive stage in its energy transition, facing the challenge of consolidating the progress made during the last decade and, at the same time, respond to new demands in terms of energy security, economic growth, and international competitiveness. This roadmap 2026–2030 aims to accelerate and strengthen the energy transition of the country, promoting an agenda that combines security of supply, institutional modernization, economic competitiveness, and balanced territorial development. To this end, it seeks to promote a energy transition with a focus on security, positioning energy as an enabling engine growth, investment, employment, productivity and innovation. In this framework, the roadmap defines the strategic priorities and guidelines for action that will guide sectoral management during the period 2026–2030.)

he Demand Stack: An Assessment of the Benefits, Hledik et al., Uplight

The authors analyzed the potential for Demand Stack implementation to unlock new demand response (DR), time-of-use (TOU) rate, and energy efficiency (EE) capabilities for a representative SPP utility’s service territory. The “Demand Stack” represents a set of strategic initiatives to expand the impact and effectiveness of each individual utility’s demand-side management (DSM) portfolio through a more integrated approach to program design and implementation. Operationally, the Demand Stack allows a portfolio of demand-side programs to be collectively deployed and dispatched to reliably address system needs, similar to conventional supply-side resources. The range of Demand Stack strategies includes regulatory, operational, and behavioral measures that can enable new program offerings, increase enrollment, and improve the performance and cost-competitiveness of the portfolio. The authors focus exclusively on the quantifiable impacts that Demand Stack strategies could have by 2030 for a representative portfolio of demand-side offerings.

Americans Oppose AI Data Centers in Their Area, Jeffrey Jones, Gallup

Seven in 10 Americans oppose constructing data centers for artificial intelligence in their local area, including nearly half, 48%, who are strongly opposed. Barely a quarter favor these projects, with 7% strongly in favor. These results, from a March 2-18 Gallup survey, represent the first time Gallup has asked about data center construction, a topic that has met fierce opposition from local residents in many parts of the country. The March survey asked people to rate their level of concern about the environmental impact of AI data centers. Forty-six percent say they worry a great deal and 24% a fair amount, largely mirroring the degrees of opposition to data center construction. Half of opponents mention data centers’ excessive use of resources, including 18% each mentioning their use of water and energy. Sixteen percent mention a related environmental concern of pollution, including noise pollution and air and water pollution.

The Environmental Cost of Artificial Intelligence: Carbon, Water, and Land Footprints, Aczel et al., United Nations University

The authors examine one of the most underexplored consequences of AI’s rapid expansion: the environmental footprints of the energy required to power it. As artificial intelligence becomes embedded in economies, public services, research, communication, and everyday life, it depends on a growing physical infrastructure of data centers, advanced chips, cooling systems, electricity grids, water resources, land, and critical mineral supply chains. The report shows that AI is not only a digital technology, but also a material system with measurable environmental costs. The authors frame AI’s environmental footprint as a governance and justice challenge, not only a technical problem. The benefits of AI often flow across borders and sectors, while the environmental burdens of data center siting, electricity demand, water withdrawals, land use, mineral extraction, and e-waste can be concentrated in specific communities and regions. To address these risks, the authors call for a responsible AI ecosystem grounded in transparency, efficiency by design, equity and environmental justice, lifecycle responsibility, global cooperation, and sustainable use. By making AI’s carbon, water, and land footprints visible and comparable, the authors provide a practical basis for integrating AI into energy, climate, water, and land-use planning, ensuring that innovation advances without shifting environmental costs onto vulnerable communities.

Advancing Industrial Electrification in Pennsylvania, Quinn et al., The 2035 Initiative, University of California, Santa Barbara

Pennsylvania has one of the largest and most energy-intensive manufacturing sectors in the country, making it a major source of greenhouse gas emissions and local air pollution. This also makes it one of the best near-term opportunities to deploy cleaner, more efficient manufacturing technologies. The Reducing Industrial Sector Emissions in Pennsylvania (RISE PA) program has allocated $396 million to industrial decarbonization, making the Commonwealth an early leader in this area. The authors explore one way the state can effectively deploy its resources: low- and medium-temperature (LMT) process heat electrification. Building on national-scale engineering models, the authors identify how electrification of Pennsylvania’s industrial sector can deliver cost-effective emissions reductions, long-term health benefits for Pennsylvanians, and economic growth in the manufacturing sector.

Global Justice Report, Aggarwal et al., World Inequality Lab

The authors attempt to set out a new vision for global progress in the 21st century: grounding human development and equality in planetary habitability. They explore the conditions under which the world could move toward this horizon and traces an economically and ecologically consistent transition path from 2026 to 2100. Their main conclusion is simple: it is possible to reconcile planetary habitability and high well-being for all, but only if the transformation rests on three pillars simultaneously. Fast decarbonization of energy systems is necessary. But we also need a major shift toward sufficiency – understood as a sharp reduction in labor hours and material footprint and large changes in consumption patterns, food habits, land use, and forest cover. In addition, neither decarbonization nor sufficiency can be financed and politically sustained without a drastic reduction in inequality of income, wealth and power, both between countries and within them. The compression of global inequality is not only compatible with deep decarbonization; it is a necessary condition for shared prosperity on a finite planet.

Temperature Check 2025–26, The Center for Climate Journalism and Communication, University of Southern California

Even though fewer Americans now hear about global warming and climate change through news, newspapers are still the top source of information for climate communicators. Climate communicators still prefer LinkedIn as their go-to social media platform for climate information, followed by Instagram and BlueSky. The use of X/Twitter for engaging in climate media continues to drop even more among climate communicators. Climate communicators are most concerned about the lack of climate action, global warming and the health impacts of climate change this year. Yet, the authors' survey shows climate communicators are also increasingly avoiding terms and phrases such as “climate change” and “global warming,” likely due to increasing politicization of the terms as well as pushback from the government as well as the public.

The New Geopolitics of LNG: Asia’s Energy Security in a Divided World, Andrews-Speed et al., The National Bureau of Asian Research

Liquefied natural gas constitutes a growing share of the global energy mix and is an increasingly important element of the energy mix in Asia. The authors examine the role of liquefied natural gas in the energy strategies of the United States, Japan, and China and assess the implications of deepening geopolitical divides for Asia’s future energy security.

Drivers of supply and demand of terrestrial animal source food, Tak et al., Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

Diverse foods derived from livestock production systems, including grazing and pastoralist systems, and from the hunting of wild animals, provide high-quality proteins, important fatty acids and various vitamins and minerals – contributing to healthy diets for improved nutrition and health. Challenges related to high resource utilization and pollution, food–feed competition, greenhouse gas emissions, antimicrobial resistance and animal welfare, as well as zoonotic and food-borne diseases, accessibility and affordability, need to be solved if agrifood systems are to become more sustainable.

Clean industry rising: the foundation of resilient value chains, Mission Possible Partnership

The authors highlight the acceleration in the shift to decarbonized industrial production. The latest wave of projects includes clean fuels, chemicals, fertilizers and metals: the industrial essentials needed to grow food, build infrastructure, manufacture goods and move the products that underpin modern economies. As the need for more resilient industrial systems intensifies, clean industry is emerging as a strategic advantage. The authors explore the trends in detail, including country progress, analysis of which projects are progressing along the announced pipeline and the new clean industry value chains that are taking shape worth an estimated $4.7 trillion.

China Carbon Neutrality Tracker 2025 Annual Report Green and Low-Carbon Transition in China's Provincial Level Regions: A Decade in Review, Li et al., Institute for Global Decarbonization Progress

As China's "dual carbon" targets have been enshrined as national strategy and the "1+N" policy framework continues to take shape, the country's green and low-carbon transition has moved into a phase of accelerated implementation at the subnational level. Given China's vast territory and the significant differences among provincial level regions1 in economy, energy mix, and resource endowments, the transition varies notably across regions in terms of starting points, pathways, and outcomes. Therefore, systematically tracking subnational climate action carries significant potential to inform policymaking and ensure the timely achievement of China's "dual carbon" goals. The authors apply Subnational Low-Carbon and Green Index for China (Subnational LOGIC), an indicator tool developed by iGDP, to track and quantitatively assess the low-carbon transition of 30 provincial level regions between 2013 and 2022. Subnational LOGIC encompasses 26 specific indicators under four categories: carbon productivity; carbon emissions including six sub-categories covering energy, power, industry, buildings, transport, and agriculture; environmental conditions and land use; and policy systems and public participation, together capturing the overall quality of regional economic growth and progress on sectoral emission reductions.

Gas share in global power mix has declined for a fifth consecutive year, Malgorzata Wiatros-Motyka, Ember

The author examines how the role of gas in the global power sector is changing as renewable electricity expands across major economies. She explores long-term trends in gas-fired generation globally and across key markets, including the G7, China, India and Brazil.

Climate Change in the American Mind: Politics & Policy, Spring 2026, Leiserowitz et al., Yale University and George Mason University

With the primaries in the 2026 midterm elections underway, the authors found that 58% of registered voters prefer to vote for a candidate for public office who supports action on global warming, while 14% prefer to vote for a candidate who opposes action. 42% would like to hear from political candidates more often about efforts to reduce global warming, while 23% would like to hear about this less often. 31% will only vote for a congressional candidate who supports increasing the use of renewable energy, while 7% will only vote for a candidate who supports decreasing the use of renewable energy. 25% will only vote for a candidate who supports decreasing the use of fossil fuels, while 14% will only vote for a candidate who supports increasing the use of fossil fuels.

The Intersection of Data Center Development, Water Availability, and Environmental Justice In California, Stewart-Frey et al., NEXT 10

The authors assess the intersection of direct water use by data centers with water availability and distribution in California, focusing on the potential effect of large-scale data center operations on local water resources. The authors also evaluate how data centers might affect the water access and sustainability for communities located near these facilities, highlighting potential disparities in water access for particularly vulnerable communities. As part of this assessment, the authors developed a comprehensive database of California data centers, as well as a newly developed index to evaluate water scarcity and community vulnerability.

Banking on Climate Crisis. Fossil Fuel Finance Report 2026, Lusiani et al., Banking on Climate Chaos Coalition

Affordable energy, environmental justice, respect for human rights, and a livable climate are all critical pillars of society, and all profoundly influenced by choices made by the world’s largest banks. Many of these banks continue to put their — and others — money into the fragile fossil fuel energy system, which has become a source of great wealth for the few and a deepening fault line of vulnerability for everyone else. At a time of great change in the global energy sector, this 17th edition of the Banking on Climate Chaos report tracks these financing choices by the world’s largest banks and provides a roadmap of how to phase out bank financing for fossil fuels.

SLCP Impact Report: A decade of driving decent working conditions, The Social and Labor Convergence Program

In 2025, SLCP added new climate data points to the Converged Assessment Framework (CAF) ensuring alignment with Human Rights Due Diligence requirements and recognizing that climate change is no longer solely an environmental sustainability issue, but that it directly affects worker wellbeing too. The authors who that 69% of facilities are not preparing for climate effects and have not yet made a formal plan for dealing with climate change. This is particularly urgent given that 16% of SLCP facilities maintain indoor temperatures exceeding 31°C, a level that sits dangerously close to or above recognized safe heat thresholds for workers. About New Research

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

Global temperatures are predicted to soar due to theEl Niño event that is currently ramping up. Most forecasts predict that 2027 will set records, with the global average temperature reaching levels we would not expect until the late 2030s.

This plot, from the Washington Post and one of us (ZH), shows how 2027’s temperatures could rise to levels expected in 2037.

To what extent does this upcoming El Niño give us a preview of what the climate will be like a decade or two from now?

What is El Niño?

Here’s what one of us (AD) wrote in his climate textbook:

The best-known example of unforced variability in our climate is the El Niño/Southern Oscillation (referred to by scientists as ENSO). El Niño events, which make up the warm phase of ENSO, occur every few years and last a year or so, and alternate with cooler La Niña events. These ENSO events are associated with large-scale shifts of rainfall and temperature patterns around the globe, and these have enormous consequences for humanity. Some regions see more rainfall during an El Niño, and some see less; some regions experience warmer temperatures than normal, while others are cooler.

Here’s something Kevin Trenberth wrote about ENSO (from a not-yet-published article):

ENSO is the dominant mode of interannual climate variability. It is a natural phenomenon arising from coupled interactions between the atmosphere and ocean in the tropical Pacific Ocean. El Niño events occur roughly every two to seven years and each event has its own character. Surface tropical winds create changes in sea temperatures that determine where the main tropical convection and storm activity occur, and thus further change the winds.

ENSO redistributes heat and moisture around the globe and regulates temperatures in the tropical Pacific Ocean, which cools mainly from increased evaporation. The added atmospheric moisture is realized in rainfall and as latent heat in the atmosphere, which contributes to a general warming of the global atmosphere and global mean surface temperature that peaks a few months after a strong El Niño event. ENSO underpins seasonal climate prediction, and has major impacts and strongly influences ecosystems, economies, and society.

The global picture

This figure from AD’s textbook shows global average temperature measured by satellite and color coded by phase of ENSO. It is clear that, when you are in an El Niño, the Earth’s global average temperature rises dramatically:

Thus, from a global average perspective, the framing of “El Niño is a time machine” is correct. Indeed, one of us (ZH) has been using this analogy to try and explain 2027’s El Niño-fueled global average temperatures, which may equal what the long-term trend predicts the temperature of 2037 will be.

The catch

The catch is that the future world that has been warmed by greenhouse gases and a present-day world that has been temporarily warmed by El Niño can have the same global-average temperature while having significant differences in the impacts of this warming.

The reason is that the two kinds of warming come from different physical processes. Greenhouse-gas-driven global warming (hereafter, GHG warming) results from greenhouse gases trapping heat that would otherwise escape to space, leading to an accumulation of energy in the Earth system, which in turn leads to increasing temperatures.

El Niño is different. To a first approximation, it is better thought of as a redistribution of heat already in the climate system. During El Niño, changes in winds in the tropical Pacific allow warm water that had been stored below the surface in the West Pacific to spread eastward and warm the surface. That warming then propagates to the rest of the planet.

Those different mechanisms leave very different fingerprints.

Temperature

Here is the pattern of long-term warming, calculated from Berkeley Earth data:

The first thing to notice is that greenhouse warming really is global warming. Almost every spot on the planet is experiencing long-term warming. There are well-understood spatial variations in the rate of warming: e.g., land has warmed faster than the oceans because of water’s high heat capacity.

Any individual year, of course, will not look like this because a single year’s pattern is the combination of GHG warming and random variability from ENSO and an alphabet of other modes of variability (PDO, NAO, etc.).

The strength of an El Niño is measured by the average temperature in the tropical Pacific (the black box in the figures below), which we refer to as the ENSO index, with units of degrees Celsius.

We can regress the global average temperature against the ENSO index, which tells us that the globe warms about 0.08°C for every degree increase in the ENSO index. The forecast is for the ENSO index to reach +3.9°C in November 2026, which implies approximately +0.3°C of (temporary) global warming in the following year1. This additional ENSO warming is the reason that 2027 will be a record breaker and a preview of a greenhouse-warmed world of the late 2030s.

We can also estimate the spatial pattern of the global warming due to El Niño by regressing the ENSO index against the temperature at each grid point (at two lags, zero and 6 months):

slope of regression of temperature at each grid point vs. ENSO index. (left) regression with zero lag, (right) temperatures lag ENSO index by 6 months

As you can see, the El Niño warming pattern is very different than the GHG warming pattern. It is definitely not global; instead, a large fraction of the warming occurs in the tropical Pacific. And some regions actually cool during an El Niño.

So while the global average temperature in 2037 may equal that of 2027, the warming will be distributed differently. You should therefore not expect your local conditions in 2027 to equal your local conditions in 2037.

Precipitation

As temperatures shift in response to an El Niño, the distribution of rainfall also shifts.

Observational records of precipitation aren’t as good for this type of calculation, so for these plots I am using ten members of the CESM1 Large Ensemble. Here is the long-term change in precipitation between the early 20th century and the late 21st century:

There is a broad increase in global precipitation, which makes physical sense. Surface energy balance requires evaporation to increase as the globe warms, so precipitation, which must balance evaporation, must also increase.

But, as with temperature, the increase is not distributed evenly. Some regions will see very large increases in precipitation while others get drier. Many of the drying regions are in the subtropics, including parts of the Mediterranean, southern Africa, Australia, and the Americas.

Now compare that with the rainfall response to El Niño, calculated the same way as the temperature response above:

There are similarities between the responses to GHG warming and ENSO — but also important differences, particularly at high latitudes and in the tropics.

Other differences

The differences extend beyond temperature and precipitation. For example, consider hurricanes. During an El Niño, the distribution of hurricanes changes in significant ways:

adapted from Trenberth, K. E., 2007: Warmer oceans, stronger hurricanes. Scientific American, July, 2007, 45-51.

Thus, a future greenhouse-warmed climate of 2037 with exactly the same global-average temperature as 2027 but in an ENSO-neutral state (neither El Niño nor La Niña) would be expected to have more Atlantic hurricanes than El Niño-enhanced 2027 would.

The same logic applies to droughts, floods, heat waves, and many other climate impacts.

So is El Niño a preview of the future?

Yes, in a limited sense.

The coming El Niño may temporarily push global-average temperatures to a level that will not occur during (ENSO-neutral) conditions for another decade or two. In that sense, it really is a glimpse of the future.

But it is not a true time machine. It does not provide a full picture of what the Earth will actually look like a decade hence.

The future greenhouse-warmed Earth of 2037 will contain more energy than today’s Earth. Its oceans will be warmer, its land will be warmer, and the underlying changes in temperature and precipitation will be driven by persistent greenhouse forcing rather than the temporary rearrangement of heat associated with ENSO.

So while the 2027 El Niño may well help us gain some insight into what a hotter planet looks like, we should avoid thinking this is the climate of the future.

We thank Kevin Trenberth for his comments on a draft of this post.

Code to reproduce the figures is here.

1 This is a back-of-the-napkin calculation. If you want a high-quality estimate, you need to do the regression at a range of lags and use that to do a full-year calculation.

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

This is the second in our three-part series discussing the use of unadjusted data and how it overstates the warmth of the 1930s over the U.S. See part one and part three for more.

Here on The Climate Brink, we’ve written manymany posts about whether temperatures were more extreme in the 1930s than today. Just last week, we wrote about one such plot and pointed out one problem with using raw station records that do not account for well-understood biases associated with large changes in the way we measure temperature over the past century.

There are many similar plots that make the rounds; some focus on the frequency of US heatwaves, others on the number of records set over time. All suffer from similar problems when changes in measurement techniques are not taken into account.

One criticism we got on our prior article that we used the Berkeley Earth data, a different dataset than was used in the construction of the original plot. In this post, we look at a different plot – the number of records over time – and use the same dataset used in the original plot, the Global Historical Climatology Network-daily (GHCNd) data, to analyze it.

The plot

If you’re on social media, you’ve probably seen a plot that look like this:

Let’s focus on the top panel, which shows that more high-temperature records were set in the 1930s than today by a huge margin. It’s not even close. And there’s been no increase over time since then, which seems to confound expectations for a warming planet.

This would be great news, if it were true.

Reproducing the result

Let’s see if it is. The data in plots like this almost always come from one dataset: the Global Historical Climatology Network Daily (GHCNd), which covers the continental U.S. (CONUS), or a closely related variant.

Using those data, we can accurately reproduce the top panel of the plot in the figure above.

Number of high temperature records each year in 1,266 CONUS temperature stations. The light line shows the annual values and the heavy value shows a 15-year smooth.

It shows the number of high-temperature records in each year in the 125-year record of 1,266 stations located in the CONUS. It looks an awful lot like the plot above (although the values are larger because we’re looking at more stations), confirming the methodology used in the plot.

Biases in the data

But, as discussed in our last post, these daily GHCN data are raw or unhomogenized, meaning they have not accounted for known biases in the data. These include time-of-observation changes, biases in the conversion from liquid-in-glass to electronic thermometers, biases due to stations moves, urbanization, etc.

Because the data are biased, you knowthis result is wrong. But, without estimating the size of the bias, you don’t know how wrong.

So let’s estimate how wrong the plot is. To quantify the impact of the biases, we created an adjusted or homogenized daily dataset by applying the adjustments NOAA used in the production of NOAA’s homogenized GHCN monthly data. See the appendix for details about how that was done.

Here are plots of temperature records using the raw and the homogenized daily dataset:

Same as previous figure, but showing only the smoothed lines for the raw and adjusted (homogenized) data.

We see that correcting the biases reduces the number of records in the 1930s and increases the number of records in the present period, leading these two periods to be have roughly equal numbers of records. There’s also now an upward trend in record-setting temperatures starting around 1970s, which makes sense given the overall warming of the planet since then.

Check out our demonstrations of how time-of-observation changes and biases in the conversion from liquid-in-glass to electronic thermometers affect the temperature record.

Biases in space

But we’re not done. Here is a plot of the location of stations we’re analyzing along with the summertime average daily high temperature anomaly for the 1930s:

As you can see, the stations are not evenly distributed — there are a lot more stations in the middle of the continent — the exact location where the heat of the 1930s was focused. This is the Dust Bowl region, whose exceptional heat was due to drought exacerbated by poor land management by humans.

Without adjusting for this, the result will be biased towards the hottest part of the continent, thereby overestimating the heat of the 1930s.

To fix that, we area-weight the data by gridding and then averaging the gridded values. We’ve done that here:

Same as previous figure, but showing only the smoothed lines for the raw, adjusted (homogenized) data, and area-weighted adjusted data.

As expected, area weighting further reduces the number of record highs in the 1930s and increases it in the recent decades. By the late 2000s, the number of high-temperature records clearly exceeds the 1930s.

We also did this calculation using the gridded Berkeley Earth daily homogenized dataset, which we used in our rebuttal to the DOE Climate Working Group report (see Fig. 2 on page 186) and which was used in our last post. It shows a similar result to the one above. The agreement with our analysis here provides independent confirmation of the result.

But … but … but … adjustments!

Adjustments are a source of controversy among Twitter Ph.D.’s. For example, here’s a comment on our last post:

a “thoughtful” comment from our last post

To scientists, adjustments to account for known biases are entirely uncontroversial. For example, James Webb Space Telescope images are heavily adjusted. Because the telescope captures a vast dynamic range of light across the universe, scientists mathematically shift pixel values, boosting the brightness of the darkest regions while compressing the brightness of the brightest areas.

The data are then further adjusted by removing various digital and physical artifacts. This includes digitally filling in black star cores — areas where bright light oversaturated the detector — as well as filtering out faint vertical striations caused by the camera’s readout noise. The team must also erase ghost stars, which are leftover light signatures from previous exposures, and delete bright spots caused by energetic cosmic rays physically striking the camera’s detectors.

The UAH (University of Alabama in Huntsville) satellite temperature dataset provides another example of the importance of adjustments. Since 1978, it has relied on more than fifteen satellites with different instruments and degradation rates. The satellites do not agree with each other for various reasons, so they use overlapping observations to adjust them into a consistent long-term record.

In addition, satellites gradually lose altitude, altering sensor viewing angles, and their observation times can drift, creating false temperature trends. UAH adjusts for these effects to remove artificial warming or cooling. In the end, the UAH data are heavily adjusted:

a summary of adjustments to the UAH satellite temperature record, from Skeptical Science

The bottom line is this: If you do not adjust the data for known biases, you’re getting the wrong answer.

Thus, adjustments and bias correction are not a conspiracy, they’re good science. In fact, the NCEI group has documented the algorithm and published the code used to bias correct these data (this is what we use to adjust the daily data). If you want to claim that the adjustments are wrong/bad science/fraudulent, please be specific about which adjustments should not be made.

Ultimately, the opposition to adjustments is entirely instrumental: climate skeptics like the results that the raw, biased data give them for the US, and they don’t like the results that bias-corrected data give them. So they oppose adjustments to the data.

It’s worth noting that globally the picture is reversed, with the raw data actually showing more warming than the adjusted data.

Cherry picking

Another issue with the plot is the focus on the U.S. As we wrote last week, the heat of the 1930s was a regional event, due to a combination of unforced variability and human activities (poor agricultural land management). The continental U.S. was indeed hot, while the rest of the globe was cool:

average summertime daily maximum temperature. link

Today, the continental U.S. is just about as hot as the 1930s, but everywhere else is also very hot.

What this means is that, had they picked any other region, they would not have gotten this result — even using raw, unadjusted data (something discussed in the last post). Thus, the focus on the U.S. in the 1930s is a classic cherry pick.

So: next time you see a plot focusing on:

1. The U.S.

2. In the 1930s

3. Using raw, unadjusted GHCNd data

The argument is most likely a scam. Please hit the “share” button below and send them a link and use the hashtag #1930sScam.

A listing of 28 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, August 9, 2026 thru Sat, August 15, 2026. Stories we promoted this week, by category:

Climate Change Impacts (10 articles)

• Climate Change Is Rewriting Europe`s Nuclear Cooling Assumptions Much of Europe’s existing nuclear fleet was designed around historical ranges of water temperature and flow that are becoming less dependable. CleanTechnica, Michael Barnard, Aug 06, 2026.
• The Disaster Economy: How Markets, and Con men, are Responding to Climate Change As climate change unleashes billions of dollars of insurance compensation, the climate of fraud also changes. This is Not Cool, greenman3610, Aug 07, 2026.
• What Happens When the World is on Fire The immeasurable gains fossil fuels have given us over the past century are now being taken away in real time, hundreds of houses, thousands of evacuations, and billions of dollars at a time, leaving behind mass trauma, ravaged landscapes, impoverished communities, and a tattered social fabric. TIME, John Vaillant, Aug 08, 2026.
• Alarming charts that reveal a planet in peril - as experts warn record-breaking heatwaves are just the start From record-breaking heatwaves and worsening droughts to deadly wildfires, experts say this record-breaking summer means the case for net zero has never been clearer. The Independent News, Nick Ferris, Aug 08, 2026.
• The U.S. just had its hottest month on record NOAA’s report said last month was not only the warmest July but also the warmest month in the agency’s 132 years of record-keeping. NBC News, Denise Chow, Aug 10, 2026.
• In a Summer of Climate Misery, Businesses Confront the Need to Adapt Businesses are reckoning with the financial toll of this year’s brutal climate shocks. NYT, Lydia DePillis, Aug 11, 2026.
• Drought, water rationing and dry rivers: our water crisis is here | Peter Gleick It doesn’t have to be this way. We know what needs to be done The Guardian, Peter Gleick, Aug 11, 2026.
• Scientists define a new category of heat wave: `Snow eaters` Unseasonably warm weather that rapidly melts snowpack is becoming more widespread in the U.S. West and happening earlier in the year. Grist, Kate Yoder, Aug 12, 2026.
• 2026, the summer that keeps on giving. DrGilbz on Youtube, Ella Gilbert, Aug 13, 2026.
• Antarctica Is Releasing Mercury Faster Than Ever Because of Climate Change A new study shows melting glaciers are remobilizing pollutants. Eos, Grace van Deelen, Aug 14, 2026.

Climate Policy and Politics (5 articles)

• First Nations chiefs in B.C. call on Carney, Smith to halt advancing West Coast pipeline Group says expanding the oil industry will accelerate climate change, natural disasters CBC, CBC staff, Aug 09, 2026.
• As U.S. offshore wind disappears, a generation of workers is left behind Building trades spent the past five years preparing for an offshore wind boom that went bust. Now, U.S. workers mourn the well-paying careers they don’t see coming back Inside Climate News, Inside Climate News, Aug 10, 2026.
• AI`s climate problem is worse than we thought A new study reveals that AI’s climate impact extends far beyond its massive data center footprint. HEATED, Emily Atkin, Aug 12, 2026.
• Half the problem Half of annual carbon emissions can be traced to just 32 firms. Climate Trunk, John Lang, Aug 12, 2026.
• Imposing ignorance': US climate science under siege Phys.org, Issam Ahmed, Aug 13, 2026.

Climate Education and Communication (4 articles)

• 6 Myths About the Climate Debate Reframing the unconscious assumptions that hold us back. Reframing America, Antonia Scatton, Aug 7, 2026.
• A review of rescued climate data The Trump administration has shut down websites like climate.gov and other climate data projects. Academics, journalists, and nonprofit organizations are working to rebuild what has been lost. Yale Climate Connections, SueEllen Campbell, Aug 12, 2026.
• Sabin Center Interns Get to the Core of Climate Science A group of Sabin Center staff and summer interns travelled to the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory (LDEO) to learn about the science behind the work done to combat the climate crisis and advance climate justice. Climate Law Blog, Rebecca Lowy, Aug 14, 2026.
• How can we talk about this extreme weather now that it`s a battleground in the culture wars? | Andy Beckett Weather forecasts once gave Britons something safe to chat about. Not any more, and that’s a problem for the experts – indeed, for all of us The Guardian, Andy Beckett, Aug 14, 2026.

Climate Science and Research (4 articles)

• Skeptical Science New Research for Week #32 2026 Highlighted in our latest climate research roundup: how misinformation abut EVs is normalized; aligning climate mitigation to better correspond with climate overshoot; how Earth's ionosphere is being altered by excess CO2 emissions; mortality effects of this year's historically unmatched heatwaves in the UK. Skeptical Science, Doug Bostrom & Marc Kodack, Aug 06, 2026.
• A Cancer Diagnosis Reframed How Ben Santer Thinks About Climate Science A podcast featuring an indepth talk with Dr. Benjamin Santer about the similarities between diagnosing his type of cancer and the human fingerprints in the climate system. Climate One, Greg Dalton, Ariana Brocious and Kousha Navidar, Aug 7, 2026.
• NOAA pulls support from Arctic climate report The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is pulling its support from an Arctic climate and environment report it has helped with in the past. TheHill, Rachel Frazin, Aug 11, 2026.
• Why Europe Keeps Being Pummeled by Heat Waves The whole planet is warming, but changes in weather patterns could help explain why the continent is suffering so many bouts of severe heat. NYT, Raymond Zhong, Aug 14, 2026.

Climate Law and Justice (1 article)

• What to know about the Supreme Court`s major climate case this fall The Supreme Court is set to hear oral arguments this fall in a landmark case to determine whether local and state governments can sue fossil fuel companies for climate-related disaster costs. TIME, Simmone Shah, Aug 13, 2026.

Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation (1 article)

• Fact brief - Are there enough minerals for solar power expansion to help mitigate climate change? Global mineral supplies are large enough to support solar development for climate change mitigation. Skeptical Science, Sue Bin Park, Aug 11, 2026.

Health Aspects of Climate Change (1 article)

• Tick populations surge as the climate warms, and farmers bear the brunt Farmers are at an elevated risk for tick-borne illnesses, which can have devastating health and economic consequences. Civil Eats, Meg Wilcox, Aug 13, 2026.

Public Misunderstandings about Climate Science (1 article)

• The CLIMATE argument that sounds true - but is a LIE. "Just have a think" on Youtube, Dave Borlace, Aug 9, 2026.

Miscellaneous (1 article)

• 2026 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #32 A listing of 29 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, August 2, 2026 thru Sat, August 8, 2026. Skeptical Science, Bärbel Winkler & Doug Bostrom, Aug 9, 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

Methane Emissions From Wildfires: Trends and Anomalies, Zhu et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres 

Wildfires emit smoke particles and trace gases including greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, impacting the environment and leading to detrimental impacts on human health and economy. The estimation of spatially and temporally resolved methane emissions from biomass burning (BB) provides critical information in developing measurement-informed methane inventories. The use of satellite active fire products (fire radiative power) is an effective pathway to investigate wildfire emissions around the world. In this study, the Global BB Emissions Product-eXtended algorithm is employed to estimate long-term temporal variation and geographic distribution of methane emissions from BB using satellite observations from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer and the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite. Globally, on average about 19 Megatonnes of BB methane are released to the atmosphere every year, nearly half of it originating from Africa, where BB represents a significant proportion of the total methane emissions. Our findings show that methane emissions from wildfires are substantial and can exceed other source sectors during extreme wildfire events, negating gains from years of emission reductions from anthropogenic sources. The contribution of fires to the methane budget is significant for regions with intense fire activities. Effective wildfire prevention and management could be beneficial to rapidly reduce methane emissions from BB.

Diurnal asymmetry in heat stress intensification across Bangladesh, 1985–2024: Accelerated nighttime warming and emerging urban risk, Kamruzzaman et al., PLOS Climate

Bangladesh’s rapidly growing cities are becoming hotter, but how heat stress is changing over the day–night cycle has remained unclear. Using 40 years (1985–2024) of hourly Universal Thermal Climate Index (UTCI) data from ERA5-HEAT, we examined long-term changes in physiologically relevant heat stress across Bangladesh and its major cities. Results show a clear day–night imbalance in warming: nighttime heat stress (UTCI???) is rising faster than daytime extremes. National trends indicate increases of +0.03 °C per decade for UTCI???, +0.02 °C for daily mean UTCI, and +0.01 °C for UTCI???, with the strongest warming occurring in the early morning hours. These national spatially averaged trends reflect the mean across all 194 grid cells; individual grid cells show local trends of +0.1 to +0.4°C per decade, and the cumulative nighttime warming over the full 40-year period reaches approximately 1.0–1.7°C across most of the country. This signals a steady loss of nighttime cooling that people rely on for physical recovery. The most pronounced nighttime warming occurs in western and southern Bangladesh. Major cities—including Dhaka, Rajshahi, Khulna, Chattogram, and Sylhet—show additional intensification consistent with, but not directly attributed to, urban heat-island dynamics at the spatial scale of this analysis. The number of very strong heat stress days (UTCI > 38 °C) has increased by 4–15 days per decade, and cities such as Rajshahi and Dhaka now experience more than 150 such days annually. Together, these findings indicate a transition from occasional heat extremes to persistent, 24-hour heat stress, increasing risks to health, labor productivity, and urban resilience. By identifying when heat stress is rising fastest and where it is concentrated, this study provides evidence to support city-specific heat-action plans, early-warning systems, and climate-responsive urban design in rapidly warming regions.

Significant soil warming across Alaska permafrost and non-permafrost regions from 1997 to 2023, Oliver & Phillips, Frontiers in Climate

Air temperatures in Alaska are increasing at twice the rate of the contiguous United States. Soil temperatures have been shown to be increasing across various landscapes but have overall received less attention. No comprehensive studies have been conducted in Alaska looking at soil temperature trends on a broad scale. In this paper we synthesized soil and air temperature data from 43 weather stations across Alaska spanning a 27-year period (1997-2023). Stations were divided into three regions based on permafrost extent (continuous, discontinuous, and no permafrost). Soil temperature trends were calculated at 5, 20, and 50 cm depth in all three permafrost regions, and additionally at 70, 95, and 120 cm depth for the continuous permafrost region only. Annual average soil temperatures increased significantly across all regions with the fastest warming rates occurring at the highest latitudes. Whole profile warming averaged 0.64, 0.37, and 0.35°C dec-1 in the continuous, discontinuous, and no permafrost regions, respectively. Warming was not slowed by increasing soil depth. Air temperatures warmed faster than soil (p < 0.05) in the continuous permafrost region (1.15°C dec-1) but were not significantly different from soil in the discontinuous and no permafrost regions (p > 0.1). Seasonally, soils in the continuous and discontinuous regions warmed fastest in the winter months, whereas in the no permafrost region soils warmed fastest in the summer months.

Optimizing the Rainwater Harvesting and Roof Sprinkling System to Adapt to Urban Extreme Heat, Yu et al., Earth s Future

Roof watering is a novel strategy for reducing air conditioning energy consumption and mitigating excess urban heat, yet its application is often constrained by water availability. To address this challenge, we propose an adaptation strategy that integrates rainwater harvesting tank with roof sprinkling to strengthen urban heat resilience. We develop a new module implemented in the Community Land Model Urban (CLMU) to evaluate the efficacy of the proposed strategy, whose parameters were further determined by a framework using multi-objective optimization combined with a transformer-based tabular foundation model. This integrated modeling framework enables the optimization of the proposed strategy and provides insights into its impacts on air conditioning energy consumption and its co-benefits on the urban thermal environment. Results show that the temperature threshold for triggering sprinkling is a more important parameter than rainwater tank size or sprinkling intensity. The optimal strategies effectively reduce cooling energy demand, lower extreme temperatures, and decrease heatwave days. However, a trade-off exists between rainwater tank size and the reduction in cooling energy consumption and heatwave days. Additionally, the energy saving is more pronounced under higher atmospheric temperatures. The implementation of the rainwater harvesting and roof sprinkling system in CLMU provides valuable insights for improving urban resilience and can be further coupled into Earth system model for large-scale studies.

From this week's government/NGO section:

State of the Climate in 2025, Blunden et al., American Meteorological Society

The authors provide a comprehensive, observation-based assessment of Earth’s climate system that not only documents what happened during a given year (e.g., 2025), but also how that year compares to previous years in the observational record. Thus, it is critical to have continuous, long-term observations of various components of the Earth system to document variability and change over time. Many of these observations, both current and historical, are also assimilated into various reanalysis products (e.g., ERA5 and MERRA-2), which are physically constrained representations of the Earth system and are used extensively throughout the State of the Climate report. Reanalyzes are particularly useful in regions where in situ and satellite observations are sparse.

Built for backup, contracted to run: China’s coal support system risks crowding out clean power, Qin et al., The Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air and Global Energy Monitor

New coal power plants entering operation in China reached the highest first-half year level since 2016, with 10 GW entering operation for every 1 GW retired, despite a policy shift towards tighter control of new project approvals. China commissioned 30 GW of new coal power, up 43% from last year, while retiring only 2.7 GW. Another 25.4 GW started construction; Coal power generation rebounded 3.4% year-on-year in H1 2026, reversing the 2025 decline. The rapid expansion of coal power capacity led to worsening oversupply, reflected both in the increase of wasted wind and solar generation and in falling utilization of coal power plants; The rebound was not evidence of a broad return to coal following LNG shipping disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz. China’s combined domestic coal production and imports in fact fell by 1.4% year-on-year in H1 2026, rather than expanding in response to the external energy shock. Growth in clean energy supply and electrification helped offset the fall in oil supply and limit increases in fossil fuel consumption; Estimated wind and solar curtailment, including both reported and unreported curtailment, reached 360 TWh in H1 2026, up 49% year-on-year. Had this electricity been absorbed, the additional power supply could have met all demand growth and allowed coal power generation to fall. 132 articles in 58 journals by 1667 contributing authors

Physical science of climate change, effects

Regime shifts of AMOC-sea surface temperature relationship, Fan et al., Nature Communications Open Access 10.1038/s41467-026-76149-4

Trends in the Seasonal Cycle of the Equatorial Pacific Cold Tongue, Jiang et al., Journal of Climate Open Access pdf 10.1175/jcli-d-26-0049.1

Observations of climate change, effects

Diurnal asymmetry in heat stress intensification across Bangladesh, 1985–2024: Accelerated nighttime warming and emerging urban risk, Kamruzzaman et al., PLOS Climate Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000848

Globally and intergenerationally unequal exposure to hourly heat extremes, Liao et al., Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-026-02724-8

Recent History of Surface Ocean Acidification Extremes That Compound Marine Heatwaves, Gregor & Gruber, AGU Advances Open Access 10.1029/2025av002112

Significant soil warming across Alaska permafrost and non-permafrost regions from 1997 to 2023, Oliver & Phillips, Frontiers in Climate Open Access pdf 10.3389/fclim.2026.1887902

Spatiotemporal Patterns of Drought and Flood Abrupt Alternation and Their Driving Factors in China from 1951 to 2020, Li et al., Journal of Hydrometeorology Open Access pdf 10.1175/jhm-d-25-0187.1

State of the Climate in 2025, Zhao et al., Atmospheric and Oceanic Science Letters Open Access 10.1016/j.aosl.2026.100897

Instrumentation & observational methods of climate change, effects

The rise of AI in weather and climate information and its impact on global inequality, Mozaffari et al., npj Climate Action Open Access pdf 10.1038/s44168-026-00412-z

Modeling, simulation & projection of climate change, effects

Intensification of the North Pacific Storm Track in the Mid-1980s: Internal Variability Versus External Forcing, Yang, Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl124032

Machine learning-based projection of China's ski resort suitability under CMIP6 scenarios, ZHAO et al., Advances in Climate Change Research Open Access 10.1016/j.accre.2026.08.002

Projections of Earth's Hottest Surface Temperatures in CMIP6, Wilson et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl122540

Advancement of climate & climate effects modeling, simulation & projection

Advances in regional climate science in South America and Central America during the CORDEX Era, Bettolli et al., PLOS Climate Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0001015

Global fully coupled climate-aerosol CMA-CPSv4 – Part 1: Aerosol simulation performance, Zheng et al., Geoscientific model development Open Access 10.5194/gmd-19-7279-2026

Impact of mesoscale eddy parameterization on Arctic Atlantic Water circulation and heat transport in the eddy-permitting grey zone, Pemberton et al., Ocean science Open Access 10.5194/os-22-2375-2026

Statistical Downscaling of Daily Temperature and Precipitation From Regional Climate Models in Complex Mountain Terrain, Matiu et al., International Journal of Climatology Open Access 10.1002/joc.70545

Underestimated Arctic “Radiator Fin” Effect in Climate Model Simulations, Huang & Huang, Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2026gl122725

Cryosphere & climate change

A nine-year record of slush on the Greenland Ice Sheet, Glen et al., cryosphere Open Access pdf 10.5194/tc-20-4345-2026

A State-Space Model for Monitoring Greenland Ice Sheet Surface Elevation Change from CryoSat-2, Andersen et al., cryosphere Open Access pdf 10.5194/tc-20-4327-2026

Arctic sea ice loss amplifies local evaporation influence on water vapor isotopes: insights from cruise observations, Zhang et al., Atmospheric chemistry and physics Open Access pdf 10.5194/acp-26-11189-2026

Destabilization of seasonal snow cover under climate warming: Mechanisms and implications from four decades of satellite observations across mainland China, Wu et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105644

Future climate change will intensify snow drought in the high-latitude water tower, Changbai Mountain, Xu et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105646

Glacier mass balance response to extreme precipitation events in the Western Himalaya, India, Kumar et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105643

Glacier surges on James Ross Island, Antarctica, and their relationship with climate, Davison et al., cryosphere Open Access 10.5194/tc-20-4293-2026

Snow-eater heat waves of the western United States, Rhoades et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.aeb3361

Synchronous Holocene thinning of Pine Island Glacier and its tributaries influenced by ice-shelf unpinning, Johnson et al., Nature Communications Open Access 10.1038/s41467-026-76244-6

Sea level & climate change

Diverse response of extreme sea levels amplification and more vulnerable deltas/islands in the northern South China Sea by the end of the 21st century, Chen et al., Advances in Climate Change Research Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.accre.2026.07.021

Increasing Frequency of Coastal Erosion Indicated by a Hindcast Model of Storm-Driven Forcing Calibrated With Beach Stratigraphy, Schmelz et al., Earth s Future Open Access 10.1029/2025ef007482

Paleoclimate & paleogeochemistry

Planetary energy budget during abrupt glacial climate events set by Atlantic Ocean heat valve, Buizert et al., Nature Geoscience 10.1038/s41561-026-02070-6

Biology & climate change, related geochemistry

Abalone Mortality Associated With Hypoxia in Tidepools During a Summer Heatwave, Gagnon et al., Ecology and Evolution Open Access 10.1002/ece3.74126

Arctic sea-ice variability is linked to long-term changes in bowhead whale foraging, Teixeira et al., Marine Environmental Research 10.1016/j.marenvres.2026.108344

Beyond temperature: The environmental constraints of high-mountain microrefugia, Vrábel et al., Journal of Ecology Open Access 10.1111/1365-2745.70422

Blue rings in Scots pine indicate cooling in the early and late growing season at the northern treeline, ?ermák et al., Dendrochronologia Open Access 10.1016/j.dendro.2026.126592

Climate Warming Is Causing an Increasing Dominance of Smaller Moth Species, Ellis et al., Global Ecology and Biogeography Open Access 10.1111/geb.70294

Continental-Scale Biodiversity Predictions Are Influenced by Climatic Variability and Extreme Weather, Cohen et al., Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.71028

Coupling Climate Downscaling With Species Distribution Models to Identify Potential Climate Refugia for Giant Panda Forage Bamboos, Shang et al., Ecology and Evolution Open Access 10.1002/ece3.74162

Denning Phenology Mediates Sea-Ice Loss Impacts on Early Reproductive Success in Polar Bears, Naciri et al., Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.71042

Evaluation and Forecasting of Habitat Suitability and Thermal Growth Responses in the Mud Clam Geloina coaxans under Climate Change, Liu et al., Marine Environmental Research 10.1016/j.marenvres.2026.108337

Future NDVI projections and ensemble strategy comparison in Inner Mongolia under CMIP6 scenarios, Li et al., Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution Open Access 10.3389/fevo.2026.1921058

Global threat exposure of islands in a changing world, Marino et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Open Access 10.1073/pnas.2534106123

Hydraulic traits govern opposing range shifts of montane trees under warming, Zhang et al., Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-026-02726-6

Metabolic Responses of Mammals to Temperature Anomalies Vary Across Climates, Rubalcaba & Correas-Araus, Global Ecology and Biogeography 10.1111/geb.70293

Oxygen Deprivation Implicated in Rapid Coral Mortality Under Acute Heating Events, Dhillon et al., Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.71030

Projecting the impact of climate change on the lipid profile of the hydrocoral Millepora alcicornis: Relative lipid homeostasis under warming and ocean acidification, Marrero et al., Marine Environmental Research 10.1016/j.marenvres.2026.108349

Resident and Migratory Falcons' Breeding Phenology and Productivity Respond Differently to Weather and Climate Change Across the Arctic, Gulotta et al., Global Change Biology Open Access 10.1111/gcb.71022

The Impact of Climate Change and Human Habitation on Long-Term Ecological Stability, Staples et al., Global Ecology and Biogeography Open Access 10.1111/geb.70296

GHG sources & sinks, flux, related geochemistry

Accelerating biomass loss from forest disturbances across Europe, Kowalski et al., Nature Geoscience Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41561-026-02032-y

Carbon dioxide fluxes of two differently managed sites in a former Scots pine plantation in response to widespread drought mortality, Sulzer et al., Agricultural and Forest Meteorology Open Access 10.1016/j.agrformet.2026.111398

Decadal doubling of Siberian methane emissions due to warming-induced fires and methanogenesis, Zhu et al., Science Open Access 10.1126/science.aea5828

Global Change Impacts on Mineral-Associated Organic Matter: Consequences for Soil Carbon Persistence, Jia & Feng, Global Change Biology 10.1111/gcb.71037

Global methane emissions from rice paddies are now increasingly quantifiable, Mehla et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-03902-4

Mechanical thresholds constrain global peatland carbon accumulation, Mahdiyasa et al., Scientific Reports Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41598-026-66259-w

Methane Emissions From Wildfires: Trends and Anomalies, Zhu et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres Open Access 10.1029/2026jd046687

Persistence of Arctic Ocean acidification under negative emissions, Köhn et al., Nature Climate Change Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41558-026-02715-9

Snow depth shifts greenhouse gas balance during freeze–thaw periods in grasslands, Luo et al., Journal of Ecology 10.1111/1365-2745.70421

The impact of artificial intelligence on carbon emission intensity: evidence for an early-stage inverted U-shaped relationship, Wang, Frontiers in Environmental Science Open Access pdf 10.3389/fenvs.2026.1756431

Decarbonization

A policy-navigation framework for exploring hydrogen integration pathways in Great Britain towards net zero, Abuella et al., Energy Policy Open Access 10.1016/j.enpol.2026.115535

Charging infrastructure network expansion for electric vehicles in Norway from a grid perspective: Barriers and solutions, Hjelkrem & Flataker, Energy Policy Open Access 10.1016/j.enpol.2026.115528

CO2 mitigation potential of biomass-derived charcoal in Indian iron and steel industry: A case study from Karnataka, Tikadar et al., Energy Sustainable Development/Energy for sustainable development 10.1016/j.esd.2026.102093

Decarbonization potential and limits of e-fuel policies in the EU, Campos-Rodríguez et al., Energy Policy 10.1016/j.enpol.2026.115529

Evidence of predation events by marine mammals at offshore wind farms, Bicknell et al., Scientific Reports Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41598-026-65167-3

Impact of renewable energy communities on the Italian day-ahead electricity market: A scenario analysis, Koltunov et al., Energy Policy pdf 10.1016/j.enpol.2026.115518

Linking photovoltaic development with energy storage: A review of solar-to-battery integration pathways, Kashyap et al., Energy Sustainable Development/Energy for sustainable development 10.1016/j.esd.2026.102096

Geoengineering climate

Assessing combinations of regional MCB designed to target multiple climate response objectives, Mason et al., Atmospheric chemistry and physics Open Access 10.5194/acp-26-10861-2026

Middle atmosphere chemical and dynamical effects in the CCMI-2022 stratospheric aerosol injection scenario, Jörimann et al., Atmospheric chemistry and physics Open Access 10.5194/acp-26-11207-2026

Aerosols

A global model of dust mineralogy: Impacts on aerosol absorption, radiative balance and climate, Liu et al., Atmospheric Environment 10.1016/j.atmosenv.2026.122263

Effects of East Asian Anthropogenic Aerosol Emissions Reduction on Summer Extreme Heat Events in Eastern China, Shu et al., Journal of Geophysical Research Atmospheres 10.1029/2025jd045994

Global fully coupled climate-aerosol CMA-CPSv4 – Part 1: Aerosol simulation performance, Zheng et al., Geoscientific model development Open Access 10.5194/gmd-19-7279-2026

Climate change communications & cognition

Beyond the Greenwash: Understanding and Mitigating the Impact of Misleading Native Advertisements from Fossil Fuel Companies, Krishna et al., Environmental Communication 10.1080/17524032.2026.2714124

Climate imagination. Dispatches from hopeful futures, Blanchard, Environmental Politics 10.1080/09644016.2026.2709209

Delay Means Death: Development of a Scale to Measure Public Support or Rejection of Climate Delay Discourses, Wójcik et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology 10.1016/j.jenvp.2026.103168

Discourses on the roots and resilience of climate misinformation: perspectives from the Canadian agri-food sector, Kabir & Chowdhury, Climate Policy 10.1080/14693062.2026.2713878

IPCC experts as passeurs actors: A new typology of international experts in domestic science-policy interfaces, Gaveau et al., Environmental Science & Policy Open Access 10.1016/j.envsci.2026.104464

National Survey Explores Associations between Climate Knowledge, Visual Interpretation, Sociodemographics, and Flood Risk Perceptions in U.S. Adults, Ruckert et al., Weather Climate and Society Open Access pdf 10.1175/wcas-d-25-0216.1

Transportation and Climate Behaviors: Comparing Difficulty of Transportation-related Behaviors Across Different Populations, Naseri et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology Open Access pdf 10.1016/j.jenvp.2026.103173

Agronomy, animal husbundry, food production & climate change

A Machine Learning Framework for Rice Yield Prediction under Heat Stress: Enhancing Model Training through Crop-Simulation-Based Scenario Generation, R et al., Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology 10.1175/jamc-d-25-0201.1

Cover crops for soil carbon sequestration and sustainable agroecosystem: a review of ecological processes, Demissie et al., Ecological Processes Open Access 10.1186/s13717-026-00738-w

Designing farmer-centered extension programmes for low-carbon agriculture: evidence from a discrete choice experiment in China, Jiang et al., Figshare Open Access 10.6084/m9.figshare.33204022.v1

Global methane emissions from rice paddies are now increasingly quantifiable, Mehla et al., Communications Earth & Environment Open Access pdf 10.1038/s43247-026-03902-4

Impacts of Future Oil Palm Expansion on Carbon and Hydrological Fluxes Across the Tropics, Xu et al., Geophysical Research Letters Open Access 10.1029/2025gl120846

Long-Term Analysis of Winter Wheat Yield and Climatic Influences in Ukraine, Grabovska et al., International Journal of Climatology Open Access 10.1002/joc.70524

The possibility of growing winter crops in the face of global warming; variation in seed yield and phytochemistry of selected fenugreek (Trigonella foenum-graecum L.) genotypes, Yaldiz & Camlica, Scientific Reports Open Access pdf 10.1038/s41598-026-66442-z

Hydrology, hydrometeorology & climate change

Changes in tropical cyclone size over the western North Pacific, Feng et al., Weather and Climate Extremes Open Access 10.1016/j.wace.2026.100946

Climate change impacts on streamflow in a dam-regulated Mountain Watershed in South Korea using SWAT and CMIP6 projections, Sadiqi et al., Arabian Journal of Geosciences 10.1007/s12517-026-12568-3

Climate extremes expose groundwater risks, Wei & Cao, Science 10.1126/science.aek2112

Future climate change will intensify snow drought in the high-latitude water tower, Changbai Mountain, Xu et al., Global and Planetary Change 10.1016/j.gloplacha.2026.105646

Global River Discharge Projections From a Large Multi-Model Ensemble of CMIP6 and ISIMIP3b Simulations, Seubert et al., Earth s Future Open Access 10.1029/2025ef007982

Periodic extreme rainfall in a warmer climate due to stronger convectively coupled waves, Quan et al., Science Advances Open Access 10.1126/sciadv.aed1634

Record-Breaking Atmospheric River Drives April 2024 Extreme Precipitation in the United Arab Emirates and the Surrounding Gulf Region, Massoud et al., Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 10.1175/bams-d-26-0052.1

Climate change economics

Beyond the mean: the macroeconomic consequences of shifting temperature anomaly distributions, Winter et al., Climatic Change 10.1007/s10584-026-04257-7

Geopolitical fragmentation, climate risk, and crude oil price dynamics: Evidence from TVP-VAR-SV and causal forest models, Aloui et al., Energy Policy 10.1016/j.enpol.2026.115531

The political feasibility of Degrowth and the Green New Deal: Swedish politicians on the relation between economic growth and climate policy, Sellbjer, Environmental Sociology Open Access 10.1080/23251042.2026.2712609

Climate change mitigation public policy research

Climate-friendly food advertising and procurement in English local authorities: A systematic scoping review of policy ambition, Sermin-Reed et al., PLOS Climate Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000971

Climate change adaptation & adaptation public policy research

Advancing a justice-centred approach to climate (un)inhabitability through transformative adaptation, [] et al., Climate and Development 10.1080/17565529.2026.2714547

Assessing the integration of older adults’ vulnerability in climate adaptation policies in a developing country, Opoku et al., Climate and Development 10.1080/17565529.2026.2714549

Climate adaptation among transnationally connected households in Coastal Havana Province, Cuba, Bernasconi, Frontiers in Climate Open Access pdf 10.3389/fclim.2026.1812869

Climate adaptation investment planning: insights from applications in developing countries, Watkiss et al., Climate and Development 10.1080/17565529.2026.2689995

Climate change and efficiency losses in combined heat and power plants: Evidence from China, Xiao et al., Energy Policy 10.1016/j.enpol.2026.115546

Non-linear urban overheating increments under climate change: Evidence from UKCP18 nighttime temperatures, Zhang et al., Urban Climate Open Access 10.1016/j.uclim.2026.103082

Optimizing the Rainwater Harvesting and Roof Sprinkling System to Adapt to Urban Extreme Heat, Yu et al., Earth s Future Open Access 10.1029/2026ef008876

Putting children at the heart of climate change adaptation policies via Allyship, Bias Recognition and Child Centeredness: A global qualitative interview study, Zangerl et al., PLOS Climate Open Access 10.1371/journal.pclm.0001025

Climate change impacts on human health

Aedes albopictus and Dengue Transmission Risk in France Over the 21st Century, Radici et al., Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) Open Access 10.5281/zenodo.21281650

Diurnal asymmetry in heat stress intensification across Bangladesh, 1985–2024: Accelerated nighttime warming and emerging urban risk, Kamruzzaman et al., PLOS Climate Open Access pdf 10.1371/journal.pclm.0000848

Globally and intergenerationally unequal exposure to hourly heat extremes, Liao et al., Nature Climate Change 10.1038/s41558-026-02724-8

Public perceptions of extreme heat: A review, Howarth & Bedenk-Smith, Environmental Science & Policy Open Access 10.1016/j.envsci.2026.104457

Spatial Heterogeneity in Heat-Related Mortality in the Valencian Region: Implications for Climate Adaptation Beyond Administrative Boundaries, Paredes-Fortuny et al., GeoHealth Open Access 10.1029/2025gh001699

Climate change & geopolitics

The geopolitics of decarbonization: How changing international relations reshape the European Union's sustainability transition, Kiefer, Energy Research & Social Science 10.1016/j.erss.2026.104910

Other

Climate change may increase landslide frequency despite generally drier conditions in the Mediterranean area, Quintero et al., Natural hazards and earth system sciences Open Access pdf 10.5194/nhess-26-3723-2026

Landscape context constrains climate regulation recovery in Amazonian secondary forests, Oliveira et al., Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Open Access 10.1073/pnas.2426400123

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

Climate change means extreme fire seasons in Canada are here to stay, Keeping et al., World Weather Attribution

At the time of writing, Ontario and the Northwest Territories have been especially affected regions in Canada’s 2026 wildfire season, with hundreds of active fires, many of them out of control. Scientists from Canada, the U.S., the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom collaborated to assess to what extent human-induced climate change altered the likelihood and intensity of the weather conditions at the time of the fires, and how the conditions will be affected with further warming. To assess the role of human-induced climate change the authors combine the observation-based assessments with climate models. In both regions and for both event definitions the climate models show a much smaller increase in likelihood and intensity. Combining models and observations gives an increase in likelihood of about a factor of 5 in the Northwest Territories for DSR7 and a factor 2 for DSR30 and in Ontario of about 2 for both event definitions.

Most Americans have been affected by extreme heat this year, AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research

Adults are increasingly likely to say extreme heat in the past year has impacted their electricity bills, outdoor plans, and other routines. At the same time, the public has become slightly less inclined to believe that climate change is happening. About half of adults say extreme heat has had a major impact on their electricity bills, while 3 in 10 say the same about their outdoor activities. Fewer report major impacts on their exercise routines, sleep, pets, travel or vacation plans, the timing of events like weddings or reunions, or their job or commute. Ninety percent of adults say extreme heat has had at least a minor impact on their lives, up from 83% two years ago.

Built for backup, contracted to run: China’s coal support system risks crowding out clean power, Qin et al., The Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air and Global Energy Monitor

New coal power plants entering operation in China reached the highest first-half year level since 2016, with 10 GW entering operation for every 1 GW retired, despite a policy shift towards tighter control of new project approvals. China commissioned 30 GW of new coal power, up 43% from last year, while retiring only 2.7 GW. Another 25.4 GW started construction; Coal power generation rebounded 3.4% year-on-year in H1 2026, reversing the 2025 decline. The rapid expansion of coal power capacity led to worsening oversupply, reflected both in the increase of wasted wind and solar generation and in falling utilization of coal power plants; The rebound was not evidence of a broad return to coal following LNG shipping disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz. China’s combined domestic coal production and imports in fact fell by 1.4% year-on-year in H1 2026, rather than expanding in response to the external energy shock. Growth in clean energy supply and electrification helped offset the fall in oil supply and limit increases in fossil fuel consumption; Estimated wind and solar curtailment, including both reported and unreported curtailment, reached 360 TWh in H1 2026, up 49% year-on-year. Had this electricity been absorbed, the additional power supply could have met all demand growth and allowed coal power generation to fall.

State of the Climate in 2025, Blunden et al., American Meteorological Society

The authors provide a comprehensive, observation-based assessment of Earth’s climate system that not only documents what happened during a given year (e.g., 2025), but also how that year compares to previous years in the observational record. Thus, it is critical to have continuous, long-term observations of various components of the Earth system to document variability and change over time. Many of these observations, both current and historical, are also assimilated into various reanalysis products (e.g., ERA5 and MERRA-2), which are physically constrained representations of the Earth system and are used extensively throughout the State of the Climate report. Reanalyzes are particularly useful in regions where in situ and satellite observations are sparse.

2026 Progress report: National adaptation plan (New Zealand), He Pou a Rangi Climate Change Commission

The author's assessment of progress found that adaptation is not keeping pace with escalating climate risks in Aotearoa New Zealand, and in some cases is slipping further behind. This reflects their 2024 finding, that the work underway is not enough to make the country resilient to current pressures, let alone into future decades. The progress made since 2024 has been uneven and serious gaps remain. This matters, critically. As climate effects intensify, weaknesses in the country’s response increase in consequence – as harm and costs experienced by families, communities, workers and businesses across the motu. Aotearoa New Zealand is – too often – paying to react and recover after damage occurs, rather than preparing ahead of time.

Opposition to Local Data Centers Rises Sharply, The Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania

The survey was conducted among a nationally representative sample of 1,320 U.S. adult citizens from June 16-July 19, 2026. The authors found that three in five Americans (61%) now somewhat or strongly oppose the construction of new data centers in their area, up from 49% in the survey ending in March; majorities of Democrats (69%), Republicans (54%) and independents (53%) oppose new local data centers. Opposition is highest among young adults under 30 (70%) and declines to 57% among those 65 and older, the inverse of what one might expect for a new technology; 39% expect AI’s effect on the United States to be negative over the next decade, against 18% who expect it to be positive, unchanged from the spring. Two-thirds (68%) say the government has done “too little” to regulate AI; and across 13 areas, only medical research and discoveries draws a net-positive assessment (+41 points) in which the anticipated benefits of AI outweigh the expected negatives. The most negative areas are personal privacy and data security (-63 points), children’s safety online (-50 points), and employment and jobs (-46 points). About New Research

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This is a re-post from The Climate Brink

AI energy use is a huge and controversial topic at the moment. Credible estimates have AI data centers accounting for around 12% US electricity use by 2030. But at the same time consumers have been given reassuringly small numbers about the impact of their own AI use, numbers that seem on their face somewhat inconsistent with the staggering size of their aggregate usage.

In 2025 Google published an article calculating that median Gemini text prompt used only 0.24 watt-hours (Wh), less energy than “watching nine seconds of television”. Around the same time, Sam Altman said that an average ChatGPT query uses about 0.34 Wh, and Epoch AI came out with similar numbers. Writers like Andy Masley and Hannah Ritchie have shown that at these rates an individual using chatbots has a pretty negligible impact, with one prompt only amounting to roughly 1/150,000th of an average American’s daily emissions.

Those numbers are basically right. They are also increasingly divorced from how AI is actually being used today.

The fastest-growing way that software engineers and scientists actually use AI is not typing questions into a chat box. Rather, we use AI agents through tools like Claude Code and Codex that plan, write code, run it, read the results, and iterate on their own. These agents make dozens of model calls per human prompt, and engage in complex reasoning chains that involve attempting and evaluating multiple answers to the same question.

I work for a company in Silicon Valley (Stripe) and admittedly use the latest AI tools more than most people. But I thought it would be instructive to take a deep dive into my own AI use over the past 8 weeks and calculate the actual energy use I was responsible for.

Over the past 8 weeks I typed 1,138 prompts into Claude Code. Those prompts triggered more than 14,000 model calls that processed 3.2 billion tokens. My best estimate is that this used around 170 kWh of data center electricity (with an uncertainty range of roughly 70 to 330 kWh across methods and assumptions). That works out to around 150 Wh per prompt (60 to 290 Wh), which is roughly 600 times (250 to 1,200) the energy of a median chat prompt. A “prompt” is ultimately not a unit of AI use any more than “trips” is a measurement of driving; it’s how far you go that matters.

Agents supercharge AI usage

Part of the impetus for this post is the publication of a new white paper from Watershed (Bistline et al. 2026) proposing a standardized framework for corporate AI emissions accounting. It is the most careful treatment I have seen of why published per-query numbers differ by orders of magnitude (system boundaries, mostly), and it contains a figure that should reframe the whole discussion: electricity per AI task spans more than five orders of magnitude, from thousandths of a watt-hour for text classification to 50-500 Wh for an agentic workflow making 5-50 frontier model calls. As they put it, emissions attributed to one “interaction” may understate the compute actually consumed “by an order of magnitude or more.”

Other researchers have found similar results. Bai et al. (2026) measured coding agents on real software tasks and found they consume roughly 1,000 times the tokens of an ordinary chatbot interaction. And these sort of agents tasks represent the most rapid driver of increased AI usage; Anthropic’s Economic Index found that 97% of their API usage now show “automation-dominant” patterns associated with agents.

To put these values in perspective, the figure below compares published per-prompt and task estimates (blue) with what I measured from my Claude Code use (orange) as well as common benchmarks for energy use (running a microwave, a fridge, or a whole home):

Electricity consumption per AI task, including published estimates (blue) and values computed from my own Claude Code session logs (orange). Measured token counts converted using Bistline (2026) activity-tier energy factors; orange ranges span cache-read energy assumptions of 1% to 25%.

My median Claude Code session uses around 0.6 kWh (0.25 to 1.2 kWh), which is at the top end of Watershed’s generic agentic usage estimate, and fifty times the energy used to charge a cellphone. My average day of Claude Code (3.0 kWh, range 1.2 to 5.9 kWh) uses more electricity than running two refrigerators.

Measuring my own footprint

Claude Code keeps complete local transcripts of every session, including the exact token counts the API reports for every model call.1 This lets me precisely know how much AI usage I was responsible for rather than simply extrapolating it from published benchmarks; its only the step to convert tokens used to energy that requires assumptions.

The first thing I found is that the gap between “prompts” and reality is massive: my 1,138 typed prompts resulted in just over 14,000 distinct model calls (12 per prompt), and each prompt consumed on average 2.9 million tokens. For comparison, typical web-based AI chat exchanges with no reasoning or web searches only use around a thousand tokens.

Over the past the 8 weeks, my Claude Code used 3.2 billion tokens. These overwhelmingly came from the agent re-reading its own working memory. Every time an agent takes a step (e.g. runs a command, reads a file, or calls a tool), the model re-processes its entire accumulated context. The figure below shows the breakdown of how tokens were used and their share of total electricity use.

Token and estimated electricity composition of my Claude Code usage, May 31 to July 25, 2026. “Cache reads” are previously processed context re-read from the key-value cache on each model call; “cache writes” are new context being processed and stored; “output” is text and code generated by the model. Electricity shares use Bistline (2026) factors with cache reads at 10% of the fresh-input energy rate.

The text I actually see (e.g. the model’s output) is only around 0.4% of total tokens processed. Some 96% of the tokens are cache reads where the agent re-reads its own context at each of those 14,000 steps. This matters enormously for the energy estimate, because a cached token is much cheaper to re-read than a fresh one is to process. AI companies charge about 10% of the price for cache reads compared with fresh content, and I use that ratio as my central energy assumption, with 1% and 25% as bounds.2

Since nobody outside of the labs actually knows the true per-token energy of a frontier model (Anthropic has published no per-prompt or per-token figures, something the Watershed paper politely but firmly flags as the field’s biggest data gap), I ran my measured token counts through three independent published methodologies: Watershed’s activity-tier factors, the per-token factors Simon Couch’s estimates derived from Epoch AI’s work, and the claude-carbon tool’s pricing-inferred coefficients.

Estimated electricity consumption for the 3.2 billion tokens I used under three published methodologies: Watershed activity-tier factors under three cache read assumptions, Couch (2026) per-token factors, and claude-carbon per-model coefficients.

Every one of these methodologies gives an answer between roughly 70 and 330 kilowatt-hours over 8 weeks. The estimate is genuinely uncertain, by a factor of ~2 in either direction. But the broader conclusion is not: counting my 1,138 prompts at published per-chat-prompt rates would have suggested about 0.3 kWh, while the reality is 150 to 1,200 times that.

My daily pattern of energy use is shown in the figure below. The day to day variability is huge: my heaviest day (11 kWh central estimate) involved multiple parallel agents churning through a large geospatial analysis, and used more than a third of the total daily electricity of an average US home. This reflects that fact that even within the category of agentic usage, the complexity of the task and the number of simultaneous sub-agents used will greatly influence the resulting energy use.

Estimated daily electricity consumption of my Claude Code usage(bars: cache reads at 10% of input energy; whiskers: 1% to 25%). Reference lines show typical daily electricity use of a refrigerator and of an average US household.

My numbers are a bit higher than some of the other published estimates of agentic use, and it is worth digging in a bit to determine why. Couch estimated that a median Claude Code session uses around 41 Wh, involving 24 model calls and 592k tokens. Andy Masley’s June 2026 calculator puts a 100k-token Claude Opus agent session at ~459 Wh. My median session is ~600 Wh, involving a hundred-plus calls and around ten million tokens including numerous subagents for large data analyses projects. Hannah Ritchie’s hypothetical heavy user (24 agentic queries a day) came out at 2.4 kWh/day, while I measured a central estimate of 3.0 kWh/day (1.2 to 5.9 kWh) for my actual usage.

None of these estimates are necessarily wrong, they just reflect a wide range of actual usage assumptions. Software engineers, researchers, and data analysts (e.g. folks like me) probably lie pretty far down the tail of the usage distribution. At the same time, usage will likely grow over time as more complex agentic tools increasingly become the norm.

What a year of this looks like

If we assume that these 8 weeks are fairly typical, we can estimate that a full year of my agentic Claude Code use would consume roughly 1.1 MWh of data center electricity (0.4 to 2.2 MWh), which is about a tenth of what an average US household uses. Applying the US-average grid intensity, that is roughly 370 kgCO2e per year (150 to 730 kgCO2e).3

Annual emissions of common activities compared with my annualized Claude Code usage. Car: EPA typical passenger vehicle (22.2 mpg, 11,500 mi/yr). EV: 11,500 mi/yr at 0.30 kWh/mi on the California grid. Flight: ICAO-method economy round trip, CO2 only. Home electricity: EIA average US household on the US-average grid. Dryer: typical electric clothes dryer at ~770 kWh/yr (DOE) on the US-average grid.

My personal and professional AI usage now emits a bit more per year than running an electric clothes dryer, and about half as much as driving an electric car 11,500 miles in California or taking one San Francisco to New York round-trip flight in economy.4 It is about 8% of the annual emissions of a typical American gasoline car, and roughly 2% of the average American’s ~18-ton annual greenhouse gas footprint.

This is simultaneously a large emissions source and a relatively modest part of my total carbon footprint. I typically take a round trip flight from San Francisco to the East Coast twice a year to visit my aging parents (not to mention work travel), and I generally don’t lose sleep over that choice. It is also fundamentally a much easier-to-decarbonize end-use than aviation (more on that below). But this also represents a net new source of emissions, at a time when global temperatures are skyrocketing and our emissions reduction goals are increasingly off track.

So what do we do about it?

Having spent most of this post arguing that agentic AI use is hundreds of times more energy intensive than the chatbot numbers suggest, let me be clear that I don’t think the answer is guilt or abstinence. But there are real levers here that we can use to shape the trajectory of AI energy use and emissions going forward.

On the personal side we can try and not be frivolous with agentic tools. There is a real difference between pointing five parallel agents at a hard research problem and doing the same to settle a bar bet (or, in my case, making axolotl-themed games with my daughter). What models you use matters too: sending simple tasks to smaller models uses perhaps 5 to 7 times less energy per token than defaulting to a frontier model,5 and it is what I increasingly do for searches and mechanical work. That said, I don’t want to oversell this. My entire annual AI footprint is a few hundred kilograms of CO2; personal restraint by the small population of heavy users is not going to bend any curves.

The technology lever is more powerful, and it is genuinely impressive. The figure below shows the energy efficiency of NVIDIA’s data center chips over the past decade. The amount of math an AI chip can do per joule of energy has grown roughly 150-fold since 2016, doubling about every two years, per Epoch AI. The latest B300 chips running at their lowest supported precision use about a quarter of the energy per operation of the 2022-era H100s that trained today’s frontier models. This represents a 3.8-fold improvement in energy efficiency in three years. Software gains can make this even faster: Google reports the energy of a median Gemini prompt fell 33-fold in a single year through a combination of better models, better tools, and better hardware.

Peak dense tensor throughput per watt of rated chip power for NVIDIA data center GPUs, by release year and numeric precision. Dashed line shows Epoch AI’s trend of energy efficiency doubling every two years for leading ML hardware.

But if 150-fold efficiency gains were going to reduce AI’s energy use, they would have done it by now. This is the Jevons paradox in action: making compute cheaper per token in turn tends to lead to greater levels of AI use. Efficiency is why my agentic habit costs 170 kWh rather than the 950 kWh it would have used with 2020-era hardware. But efficiency only determines how much intelligence we get per unit of energy, but so far it has so far shown no sign of determining AI’s total energy use.

Which is why the lever that actually matters most is the carbon intensity of the electricity. Every number in this post assumed the US-average grid; run the same workload on largely clean power and my footprint falls by roughly 90%. Unlike aviation, this is an end-use we already know how to decarbonize.

The problem is that we are moving in the wrong direction today: a sizable portion of planned US data center capacity intends to build its own behind-the-meter generation, and nearly three quarters of that is natural gas. AI companies with genuine climate commitments need to do better at finding alternatives: solar plus storage (which I helped lead a study about in 2024), next-generation nuclear and restarts of retired reactors, enhanced geothermal, and siting data centers in regions where both the average and the marginal generation is low-carbon).

There is also a silver linings version of this story where AI demand becomes an asset for decarbonization. Getting to net-zero emissions requires roughly tripling electricity generation by mid-century as we replace nearly all the current uses of fossil fuels with clean electricity. The barriers are mostly not technological, but rather things like interconnection queues, permitting, transmission. The AI buildout is a preview of that world of rapidly increasing electricity demand, backed by companies with enormous capital and unusual urgency. If that money and impatience gets spent speed-running the elimination of those barriers (buying firm clean power, funding transmission, absorbing the early costs of advanced nuclear and geothermal the way early corporate buyers did for wind and solar), the AI boom could leave the grid cleaner than it found it. If it gets spent on behind-the-meter gas turbines, it won’t. That choice is being made right now, and it will matter far more than how many prompts any of us type.

In the interest of full disclosure: the python code underlying the analysis and figures in this post were, naturally, built with the help of Claude Code, but the writing is all mine.6

1 Claude Code records API usage including the amount of uncached input tokens, cache-creation tokens, cache-read tokens, and output tokens, per model call, with model IDs and timestamps. One logging subtlety matters a lot: each API response is written to the log as one line per content block, with every line repeating the message’s full usage object, so a naive line-by-line sum double-counts tokens by a factor of ~2.2. All numbers here count each API message once, deduplicated by message ID.

2 A cache read retrieves already-computed attention states from memory rather than recomputing them, so it is much cheaper than inputting fresh data, but its not free. Cache reads context still makes each output token more expensive to generate at long context. Anthropic prices cache reads at 10% of fresh input, and the claude-carbon and Couch methodologies both adopt ~10% as an energy ratio. Watershed flags cache handling as a known gap in per-token accounting; my 1%-25% band is intended to span the plausible range.

3 Using the eGRID 2024 US-average 341 gCO2e/kWh, since Anthropic does not disclose where their data centers are located and what electricity sources they use. Market-based emissions (counting providers’ clean power purchases) would probably be lower, potentially much lower. This estimate excludes my laptop, which at ~50 W is negligible against 3.0 kWh/day of data center load.

4 Note that the flight estimate here only includes direct CO2 emissions from aviation; including contrails and other secondary factors would probably increase flight emissions by at least 50%.

5 Based on inferring energy use through token pricing, claude-carbon gives ~0.3 J/token for Haiku-class vs ~2 J/token for Opus-class models.

6 In a good example of why you always need to double check work done with AI coding tools, Claude accidentally doubled its original estimate of my token use as all the relevant files were stored twice and it simply added them all up. I only caught it because the numbers seemed too high!

 

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Are there enough minerals for solar power expansion to help mitigate climate change?

Global mineral supplies are large enough to support solar development for climate change mitigation.

A 2023 analysis of 75 emissions-reduction scenarios found that projected median mineral demand largely remains within known geological resources. Projected median demand for silver was about 68,000 metric tons, compared to 530,000 tons of estimated reserves; cadmium demand was 38,000 tons against 500,000 tons of reserves.

Tellurium may constrain cadmium-telluride panels, a minority of the global solar market, but research suggests improved refining and material efficiency could substantially reduce this strain.

Recycling can further reduce demand for newly mined minerals by recovering silver, copper, silicon, and other components for reuse in future panels. Recent innovations are improving recycling cost-effectiveness, while federal programs continue to support domestic mineral supply chains and recycling research. 

The main challenge lies in expanding production and supply chains, not mineral shortages.

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MIT Climate Can solar panels be recycled?

U.S. Department of Energy End-of-Life Management for Solar Photovoltaics

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This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Jeff Masters

When a weak 45-mph tropical storm named Harvey moved through the Lesser Antilles Islands in August 2017 and then petered out in the central Caribbean Sea, no one could have suspected that the meager clump of clouds that remained would go on to become the second-costliest weather disaster in world history. But after crossing Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula into the Gulf of Mexico, Harvey was rejuvenated, rapidly intensifying into a ferocious Category 4 hurricane that hit Texas just north of Corpus Christi.

Harvey's true mischief came after it stalled inland as a tropical storm for two days, dumping at least 40 inches of rain across a gigantic area from Houston to Port Arthur — larger than the entire state of Delaware. The storm total of 60.58 inches (1,534 mm) at Nederland, Texas, was the heaviest single amount ever recorded from a tropical cyclone or its remnants in the U.S. With damages of $164 billion (2026 USD) — mostly from flooding, Harvey became a historical catastrophe exceeded only by Hurricane Katrina of 2005.

When all of Harvey’s rainfall runoff rushed toward the ocean, it encountered the blocking influence of seawater being pushed inland by the persistent onshore winds of the tropical storm, creating a significant compound flood event — coastal flooding that resulted from a combination of storm surge and river runoff unable to drain into the ocean because of the storm surge waters piled up against the coast.

A similar setup could cause an even worse catastrophe in the future. Climate change is causing more intense, slower-moving hurricanes, increased rainfall, and higher sea levels. But traditional risk assessment methods typically consider one hazard at a time — ignoring compound flood events — leading to an underestimation of the danger. If we include all the ways climate change will likely increase flooding, the future flood risk along significant portions of the U.S. Gulf and Atlantic coasts is nearly certain to make them unlivable by late this century, even under a moderate global warming scenario.

How climate change worsens the danger

A 2023 study looking at the flooding from Harvey near Port Arthur, Texas, found that 19% of the flood area occurred because of compound flooding. Under a global warming scenario where a repeat of Harvey hits with an additional sea level rise of 0.57 meters (1.9 feet), accompanied by 18% more total rainfall — plausible in 2050 — this area would increase to 33%. A potential sea level rise of 1.6 meters (5.2 feet) and an additional 50% in total rainfall, plausible by 2100, would cause the compound flooding area to rise to 46%, increasing the number of structures impacted by about a factor of 23 compared to 2017, causing tens of billions in additional damage.

Figure 1. Storm-total rainfall from Hurricane Harvey, August 24-31, 2017. Harvey dumped over 40 inches (yellow colors) in Houston, with isolated amounts over 50 inches (pink colors) south of Houston and northwest of Port Arthur. Image credit: NOAA.

There are three main ways climate change can increase flood risk along the U.S. Atlantic and Gulf coasts:

1. An increase in the frequency of more intense hurricanes and ones moving more slowly at landfall, which will dump more rain
2. Increased heavy rainfall because a warmer atmosphere holds more water vapor
3. Sea level rise

The relative importance of these three factors in a future warmer climate will vary depending upon the location, according to a 2022 study. This study found that across the Gulf of Mexico and Florida coastlines, the increase in rainfall was expected to be the largest driver. For parts of the Southeast and mid-Atlantic, the increase in the number of intense or slow-moving hurricanes would predominate. And along the upper mid-Atlantic and New England coastlines, sea level rise will dominate the future compound flood risk.

Figure 2. The main driver of compound flooding on the U.S. coast. Across the Gulf of Mexico and Florida coastlines, the increase in rainfall is the largest driver (yellow colors), while the increase in storm frequency (of more intense, slow-moving storms) has the largest impact for parts of the Southeast and mid-Atlantic (blue). Along the upper mid-Atlantic and New England coastlines, sea level rise causes the most impact (green). Locations with no clear main driver are labeled NA (gray). (Image credit: Gori et al., Tropical cyclone climatology change greatly exacerbates US extreme rainfall–surge hazard, Nat. Clim. Chang. 12, 171–178 (2022), https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-021-01272-7, open access)

Sea level rise has already led to a massive increase in flood risk

Sea level rise from all causes – for example, human-caused climate change, natural tectonic processes, and subsidence from groundwater pumping — has already led to a massive increase in the risk of damaging coastal flooding from storm surges alone, according to a 2026 study, Human-driven sea-level rise has quadrupled the frequency of coastal sea-level extremes since 1900. Relative sea level rise from all causes made a 100-year coastal flood in 1900 into a one-in-five-year flood or less by 2005 in Key West, Jacksonville, Atlantic City, and Maine. Because sea level rise is accelerating, the odds of coastal flooding will increase even faster than the increases already observed since 1900.

Flood risks are growing

Charleston, South Carolina: What was a one-in-10-year coastal flood in 1901 occurred 17 times in 2025.
Galveston, Texas: What was a one-in-10-year flood in 1904 occurred nine times in 2024.
Atlantic City, New Jersey: What was a one-in-10-year coastal flood in 1911 occurred 10 times in 2024.
Miami, Florida: What was a one-in-10-year coastal flood in 1931 occurred 14 consecutive days during the "king tides" of October 2025.
Key West, Florida: What was a one-in-10-year coastal flood in 1913 occurred an astonishing 26 out of 27 days during the "king tides" of October 2025; what was a one-in-100-year flood in 1913 has occurred three times in the past 10 years.

Data: NOAA

Dramatic rises in compound flood risk are coming

A return period refers to how often we can expect a weather event of a given severity to occur. For example, we use rainfall statistics from NOAA to compute how often a flood with a 1% chance of occurring in a given year will recur — which is defined as a one-in-100-year storm, with a return period of 100 years.

A 2022 paper, Tropical cyclone climatology change greatly exacerbates US extreme rainfall-surge hazard, studied the odds of a truly extreme compound flood event — a one-in-100-year storm surge occurring at the same time as a one-in-100-year rainfall event. Historically, the return period of such an event was about once every 200-500 years along the coastlines of the Gulf of Mexico and southeast Atlantic (up to the Chesapeake Bay), shifting to once every 1,000 years or even less frequently along the New England coastline.

But under an extreme global warming scenario for the year 2100, these odds would generally (with some exceptions, see Fig. 4) increase by seven- to 36-fold in the South and 30- to 195-fold to the north — a massive rise in extreme flood risk. Although this result was for an extreme global warming scenario, the strong signal found implies that a significant increase in extreme flood risk would occur even in a moderate global warming scenario.

Figure 3. The return period in years in 2005 for what was a one-in-100-year flood in 1900 because of relative sea level rise. Data is plotted from the 2026 paper, Human-driven sea-level rise has quadrupled the frequency of coastal sea-level extremes since 1900. For example, a 100-year coastal flood in 1900 in Jacksonville, Florida, and Atlantic City, New Jersey, was a one-in-two-year flood by 2005 (red circles with the number "2" in them). This change in flood risk is for sea level rise alone — additional increases in flood risk because of changes in precipitation are not included.

The greatest rises in risk were to the north, because climate change is expected to bring greater increases in extreme precipitation closer to the poles. This was also the finding of a 2020 study, More meteorological events that drive compound coastal flooding are projected under climate change, which predicted that the greatest increases in compound flood threat should occur north of 40°N latitude.

Figure 4. The change in return period for an extreme compound flood, defined as a one-in-100-year storm surge occurring at the same time as a one-in-100-year rainfall event, under an extreme global warming scenario. Left side of table: the return period in the historical climate (1980-2005). Right side: return period in the 2070-2100 period under an extreme global warming scenario, using the median value from eight different climate models. The return period increases by a factor of 14 to 265 for these nine cities. Data taken from the supplemental materials in: Gori et al., Tropical cyclone climatology change greatly exacerbates US extreme rainfall–surge hazard, Nat. Clim. Chang. 12, 171–178 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-021-01272-7.

Main cause of future increased compound coastal flood risk: more intense and slower-moving hurricanes

The model used in the 2022 study projected that the top 10% of most intense hurricanes would, along the majority of the U.S. coast, increase in intensity by 15-30% and move 20-30% slower in the future compared to the historical period. “The increase in storm intensity coupled with the decrease in translation speed drives an increased likelihood to observe both extreme rainfall and extreme storm tide in the future,” the authors wrote. 

A substantial inland compound flood risk along the Gulf of Mexico coast

Rivers draining into the Gulf of Mexico have seen large increases in their maximum streamflow in recent decades (commonly 20-40% increases), making them susceptible to increased compound flooding. A 2021 paper found long-term increases in the frequency of compound storm surge and heavy rainfall flooding along the rivers of the northeastern Gulf of Mexico. Surprisingly, these compound flood events were largest a good distance inland, near the limit of where tidal influences stopped — not at the coast where compound events are usually expected. A 2026 study focused on North and South Carolina also found a considerable expansion of the threat of compound flooding inland in a future warmer climate.

A Hurricane Sandy-like compound flood event: five times more likely by 2100?

Hurricane Sandy in October 2012 caused devastating surge-driven flooding across heavily populated coastal areas in New York City, resulting in more than $91 billion (2026 USD) in damages. A 2024 paper, Climate Change Contributions to Increasing Compound Flooding Risk in New York City, found that a Sandy-like event can be expected about once every 150 years in the present climate. But climate change — through sea level rise and an increase in hurricane strength and rainfall — can be expected to make a similar storm about a one-in-65-year event by 2050, and a one-in-30-year event by 2100, under an emissions scenario slightly higher than the trajectory humanity is currently on.

Increased compound flood threat from hurricanes earlier in the season

A 2022 paper, Earlier onset of North Atlantic hurricane season with warming oceans, found that initial threshold dates of continental U.S. named storm landfalls have trended earlier by two days per decade since 1900. Modeling work suggests that the length of hurricane season will continue to increase because of climate change. A 2017 study found that a hurricane season that was two months longer (May-December) would increase the number of flood-risk days by 28-180% along rivers in four Southeast U.S river basins.

Figure 5. Predicted water levels at the Carrollton gage on the Mississippi River in New Orleans as of July 10, 2019. The river was running high, at 16 feet above sea level, and the city’s levees protect the city to a height of 20 feet. The storm surge from Hurricane Barry was predicted to reach that level on July 13. The last time water levels that high were observed at this point on the Mississippi was in the Great Flood of 1927. Image credit: NOAA.

As I wrote in a 2019 post, New Orleans’ Achilles Heel: A Hurricane Storm Surge During a Mississippi River Flood?, a trend toward earlier hurricanes increases the risk of storm surge moving up the Mississippi River that could overwhelm the levees in New Orleans, since the river tends to run high in late spring and early summer. This situation was feared in July 2019, when Hurricane Barry sent a storm surge up the river when the river was already running high from early-summer runoff (Fig. 5). Fortunately, Barry ended up delaying its intensification into a hurricane until after it passed the mouth of the Mississippi, resulting in a storm surge that was not as high as initially forecast.

Other compound hurricane threats

Climate change is likely to make two other types of compound hurricane threats more severe. One of these was covered in my previous post, The emerging danger of post-hurricane heat waves (2026). In addition, more intense hurricanes with higher winds and heavier rains have the potential to create a double-whammy of high-end wind damage and extreme inland flooding simultaneously, overwhelming infrastructure and emergency preparedness and response efforts that could have handled one of these hazards alone, but not both together.

A preprint of a 2026 paper that has not yet undergone peer review, Global Warming Amplifies Inland Compound Risks From Tropical Cyclones, found that when comparing the recent climate (1981-2020) with an extreme climate-change projection for later this century (2061-2100), the annual probability of compound wind and precipitation extreme hazards ranking in the 99th percentile globally increases by 61-115% within 100 kilometers of the coast, and further escalates by 92-204% in areas 100-500 kilometers inland. This inland amplification is driven by more intense landfalling hurricanes and the increased moisture available caused by the 7% increase in water vapor holding capacity of the air per degree Celsius of warming. Hurricane Helene’s impact in 2024 in western North Carolina can be regarded as a harbinger storm in this regard.

Coastal areas becoming unlivable

A 2020 paper, Sea-level rise exponentially increases coastal flood frequency, found that for the most susceptible sites around the U.S., the odds of a one-in-50-year coastal flood “are likely to double approximately every five years into the foreseeable future.” This finding took into account not just storm surges from hurricanes but also from more common coastal storms such as Nor'easters. According to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, most coastal engineering works in the U.S. are designed for return periods of 50 to 100 years, so the increase in flood risk at so many sites represents a drastic increase in vulnerability. And if high-end sea-level rise projections of one meter (3.28 feet) by 2100 come true, sea-level rise will likely cause "once-in-a-lifetime" coastal flooding events to occur nearly every day before 2100. (NOAA's 2022 sea level rise forecast gives 50% odds that sea level rise along the contiguous U.S. coast by 2100 will exceed 0.7 meters.)

Figure 6. The return period in years in 2050 for what was a one-in-100-year flood in 2005 because of relative sea level rise. Data is plotted using data from the 2020 paper, Sea-level rise exponentially increases coastal flood frequency, in combination with observed and predicted sea level rise from The Virginia Institute of Marine Science annual Sea Level Rise Report Cards. For example, a one-in-100-year coastal flood in 2005 in Key West, Florida, is predicted to recur every 0.04 years (two weeks) by 2050 (red circle with the number "0.04" in it). This change in flood risk is for sea level rise alone — additional increases in flood risk because of changes in precipitation are not included. The forecasts out to 2050 are generated using the observed acceleration trend fitted with a quadratic curve (since sea level rise is increasing exponentially, and a straight-line linear fit is not appropriate). Note that these forecasts are not based on a climate model and may be underestimated.

If we now add in the massive additional increase in flood risk resulting from compound flooding, good luck trying to insure your home. The huge increase in climate change-induced flood risk from sea level rise, heavier rainfall, and stronger/slower-moving hurricanes is nearly certain to force abandonment of portions of the U.S. Gulf and Atlantic coasts by late this century, even under a moderate global warming scenario. A 2026 study, The Growth Effects of Natural Disasters: Evidence From A Novel Global Dataset Over 1970-2023, found that a one-in-100-year flood reduces GDP by about 0.5%, so it is easy to see how the coast could quickly become unlivable if once-in-a-lifetime floods are occurring nearly yearly in low-lying regions. Indeed, hurricane flooding has already led to the unofficial abandonment of several U.S. communities, and a number of others are already at significant risk, which I will detail in a series of future posts (spoiler alert: Barrier islands are high on the list).

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The only recourse we will have is to spend vast amounts of money to defend the most important places and retreat from or abandon the rest. A society-shaking mass migration of millions of Americans away from the coast is inevitable in future decades because of increased climate change-induced flood risk. The trigger for the beginning of this exodus may be only a few years away. To understand what’s coming, I recommend reading my 2024 post, When will climate change turn life in the U.S. upside down?

Related posts on sea level rise

• Book review: “On the Move” is a must-read account of U.S. climate migration (2024)
• Book review: “The Great Displacement” is a must-read (2023)
• Part one of my three-part sea level rise series: How fast are the seas rising? (2023)
• Part two of my three-part sea level rise series: Eight excellent books on sea level rise risk for U.S. cities (2023)
• Part three of my three-part sea level rise series: 30 great tools to determine your flood risk in the U.S. (2023)
• Bubble trouble: Climate change is creating a huge and growing U.S. real estate bubble (2023)
• How sea level rise contributes to billions in extra damage during hurricanes (2022)

Bob Henson contributed to this post.

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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