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Climate
Revealed: US climate denial group working with European far-right parties
Representatives of Heartland Institute linking up with MEPs to campaign against environmental policies
Climate science deniers from a US-based thinktank have been working with rightwing politicians in Europe to campaign against environmental policies, the Guardian can reveal.
MEPs have been accused of “rolling out the red carpet for climate deniers” to give them a platform in the European parliament, amid warnings of a “revival of grotesque climate denialism”.
Continue reading...US homeowners in disaster-prone states face soaring insurance costs
Climate crisis is making it harder for insurance companies to operate, with many pausing or withdrawing policies
Homeowners in the United States are facing an enormous financial crunch due to the climate crisis, with many struggling to find insurance or even dropping premiums that are soaring due to a mounting toll of wildfires, hurricanes and other disasters, new federal government data shows.
The figures, the most comprehensive numbers ever released by the US treasury department on the issue, show insurance premiums are increasing quickly across the country, with people living amid the greatest climate-driven risks experiencing the steepest rises of all. In the four years to 2022, people living in the top 20% riskiest places for such perils paid, on average, 82% more than those in the 20% lowest climate risk zip codes.
Continue reading...World’s addiction to fossil fuels is ‘Frankenstein’s monster’, says UN chief
António Guterres issues warning at Davos, days after Donald Trump pulled US out of Paris climate agreement
The world’s addiction to fossil fuels is a “Frankenstein’s monster sparing nothing and no one”, the UN secretary general, António Guterres, told leaders at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Wednesday.
“Our fossil fuel addiction is a Frankenstein’s monster, sparing nothing and no one. All around us, we see clear signs that the monster has become master,” Guterres said in a speech days after 2024 was revealed to have been the hottest year on record and Donald Trump began his second term as US president by pulling the country out of the Paris climate agreement and pledging to “drill, baby, drill” for more oil and gas. The fossil fuel industry gave $75m (£60m) to Trump’s campaign.
Continue reading...Oil and Gas Companies Should Pay for the Los Angeles Fires
Trump Wants to Unleash Energy, as Long as It’s Not Wind or Solar
California prepares for possible new fires as winds create conditions for ‘explosive growth’
Gusts could peak at 70mph (113km/h) along the coast and 100mph (160km/h) in the mountains and foothills
Winds picked up on Tuesday in southern California and at least a couple of new wildfires broke out as firefighters remained on alert in extreme fire weather, two weeks after major blazes started, two of them still burning, in the Los Angeles area.
The fresh high winds – that are coming amid still bone-dry conditions – mark the end of a break in dangerous high fire-risk conditions that have allowed the beleaguered city’s firefighters to largely contain the disastrous blazes that have burnt thousands of homes. The fires have killed at least 27 people and destroyed more than 14,000 structures since they broke out during fierce winds on 7 January.
Continue reading...Wind Power in U.S. Faces Hit From Trump’s Executive Order
Leaders at Davos Economic Forum Vow to ‘Stay the Course’ on Climate Action
Trump’s Executive Order to End E.V. Subsidies Draws Pushback
3 of the Most Important Trump Executive Orders on Climate
Donald Trump, día 1: un recuento de sus principales medidas
‘Catastrophic’: Great Barrier Reef hit by its most widespread coral bleaching, study finds
More than 40% of individual corals monitored around One Tree Island reef bleached by heat stress and damaged by flesh-eating disease
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More than 40% of individual corals monitored around a Great Barrier Reef island were killed last year in the most widespread coral bleaching outbreak to hit the reef system, a study has found.
Scientists tracked 462 colonies of corals at One Tree Island in the southern part of the Great Barrier Reef after heat stress began to turn the corals white in early 2024. Researchers said they encountered “catastrophic” scenes at the reef.
Continue reading...What Trump Did on Day 1: Tracking His Biggest Moves
Book Review: ‘Dark Laboratory,’ by Tao Leigh Goffe
A third of the Arctic’s vast carbon sink now a source of emissions, study reveals
Critical CO2 stores held in permafrost are being released as the landscape changes with global heating, report shows
A third of the Arctic’s tundra, forests and wetlands have become a source of carbon emissions, a new study has found, as global heating ends thousands of years of carbon storage in parts of the frozen north.
For millennia, Arctic land ecosystems have acted as a deep-freeze for the planet’s carbon, holding vast amounts of potential emissions in the permafrost. But ecosystems in the region are increasingly becoming a contributor to global heating as they release more CO2 into the atmosphere with rising temperatures, a new study published in Nature Climate Change concluded.
Continue reading...‘We ask to be recognised’: small fishers claim €12bn EU fund favours big players
Artisanal shellfish farmers face ruinous losses but money meant to help is going to the powerful fishing industry, say critics
Early on a warm September morning in southern Italy, Giovanni Nicandro sets out from the port of Taranto in his small boat. Summoning his courage, the mussel farmer inspects his year’s work – only to find them all dead, a sight that almost brings him to tears.
“We have many problems,” he says. “The problems start as soon as we open our eyes in the morning.” The loss is total – not only for Nicandro but also for Taranto’s 400 other mussel farmers, after a combination of pollution and rising sea temperatures devastated their harvest.
Continue reading...Trump returns to White House and unleashes barrage of executive orders
President pledges immigration crackdown, rolls back climate rules and pardons 1,500 January 6 rioters
Donald Trump launched his second term as US president with a barrage of executive orders reaching into broad swathes of American life, from pardoning hundreds of supporters who attacked Congress on January 6, including rightwing extremists convicted of seditious conspiracy, to rolling back LGBTQ+ rights and environmental rules while declaring an immigration emergency on the southern border.
Trump and his allies had long promised a “shock and awe” approach. They did not hold back.
Continue reading...Trump revokes Biden order that had set 50% electric vehicles target for 2030
President tells crowd that US ‘will not sabotage our own industries while China pollutes with impunity’
Donald Trump took aim at federal support for the sale of electric vehicles (EVs) on Monday, amid a flurry of promised executive orders on his first day back in the White House.
“The United States will not sabotage our own industries while China pollutes with impunity,” Trump said during a ceremony at Capitol One Arena, where he signed a raft of executive orders before a roaring crowd.
Trump embraces role of demagogue, claims to be ‘peacemaker’ – follow live inauguration updates
Elon Musk appears to make back-to-back fascist salutes
Activists ask: is there any point in mass protest?
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