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Argentina flooding: 16 killed as two girls swept away by rising waters
Authorities warn more fatalities expected as a year’s worth of rain falls on Bahía Blanca in eight hours
Rescue teams in Argentina are searching for two girls, aged one and five, who were swept away by severe floods that ripped through Buenos Aires province, killing at least 16 people.
A year’s worth of rain fell on the city of Bahía Blanca and the town of Cerri on Friday, rapidly inundating neighbourhoods and destroying homes, bridges and roads. The rainfall – 400mm (15.7in) recorded in just eight hours – was more than twice the city’s previous record of 175mm (6.8in) set in 1930.
Continue reading...What the world needs now is more fossil fuels, says Trump’s energy secretary
Chris Wright signals abandonment of Biden’s ‘irrational, quasi-religious’ climate policies at industry conference
The world needs more planet-heating fossil fuel, not less, Donald Trump’s newly appointed energy secretary, Chris Wright, told oil and gas bigwigs on Monday.
“We are unabashedly pursuing a policy of more American energy production and infrastructure, not less,” he said in the opening plenary talk of CERAWeek, a swanky annual conference in Houston, Texas, led by the financial firm S&P Global.
Continue reading...US will be ‘central’ to climate fight even without Trump, says Cop30 president
André Corrêa do Lago suggests US organisations can play a constructive role even if government limits participation
The US will be “central” to solving the climate crisis despite Donald Trump’s withdrawal of government support and cash, the president of the next UN climate summit has said.
André Corrêa do Lago, president-designate of the Cop30 summit for the host country, Brazil, hinted that businesses and other organisations in the US could play a constructive role without the White House.
Continue reading...To win the bush, Australian politics needs to embrace its 'curves' | Nick Rodway
Regional voters are often stereotyped so I propose a new demographic category ahead of the election: conservative, uncommitted rural voters with environmental sympathies
Recently, an arborist operating in my town in remote north-western Australia put out a public statement. He found it necessary, given the number of queries he had received, to explain his reasons for cutting down native vegetation.
It sounds like the start of a joke, but what this contractor’s earnest explanation illustrates is how in tune regional voters can be with their environs.
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Continue reading...We Are Charting a Path for Science in the Trump Era
This past week was a busy one for the Union of Concerned Scientists.
On Monday, a whopping 48 scientific societies, associations, and organizations—representing almost 100,000 scientists from diverse disciplines—sent a letter, organized by UCS, to members of Congress demanding they protect federally funded scientific research and federal scientists. Anyone who’s worked with any scientific organization on a collective effort knows it is quite the feat to get such incredible unity in the scientific community.
On Thursday, the Campaign Legal Center filed suit on behalf of UCS and other groups against Elon Musk and his so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) for acting beyond their power to slash federal funding, dismantle federal agencies, and fire federal employees.
On Friday, UCS staff and members rallied with thousands of others at the Stand Up for Science 2025 events in cities and towns across the country. I spoke at the DC rally, and I was impressed to see the turnout and energy of the scientists and science supporters who trekked to the National Mall to tell the world in a unified voice that the administration’s attacks on science are unacceptable and the scientific community will not be silent.
That night, I shared my rally message on MSBNC “Prime.” Here is the full segment on how the Trump administration’s all-out assaults on science and scientists are harming real people’s health and safety.
This has been a challenging month. Many in the scientific community—and in the general population—have been unclear about what to do in response to the Trump administration’s aggressive and unlawful disruptions to the federal government. The speed and scale at which the Trump Administration has taken a sledgehammer to federal science agencies and the dedicated experts within them has been alarming and disorienting. With limited levers of power across the government to stop these actions, and a complete disregard for policy, process, and law by Trump Administration officials, it is no surprise that people feel disillusioned and powerless.
But we mustn’t. The scientific community has never been one to walk away from a challenging problem. In fact, we pursue them. We undoubtedly face an uphill battle in our current environment, but there is a path forward. We must preserve as much as we can in the federal government, prevent new damages from happening, and rebuild from outside the government when necessary.
In my conversation with MSNBC host and White House veteran Symone Sanders Townsend, she noted that no savior is coming to save us, that we need to lead ourselves out of this, and it is the scientists who are now stepping into the streets.
I felt that on Friday as I spoke to a sea of science supporters overlooking the Reflecting Pool. It is us, as the scientific community, who now have the chance to lead, to be brave, and to do everything in our power to insist on an administration and a world that uses science for good.
I’m determined to face the wind and I hope you are, too.
We are stuck. Declining. And spiraling. We need a breakthrough | Amana Fontanella-Khan
We live in dark, depressing and – frankly – terrifying times. Will technology push us over the edge or help us exit our many crises?
Today we live in an era defined by crisis. Indeed, we are facing multiple overlapping threats at once: from accelerating climate breakdown to the rise of authoritarianism across the world, we are in a situation that the historian Adam Tooze calls “polycrisis”. It is no wonder that hope is scarce, pessimism is high and despair is pervasive. As one meme that captures the grim, morbid mood of our age reads: “My retirement plan is civilisational collapse.”
But not everyone shares this gloomy outlook. On the extreme other end of public sentiment sit Silicon Valley billionaires: they are some of the most optimistic people on earth. Of course, it’s easy to be optimistic when you are sitting on enough money to sway national politics. And yet, the source of their optimism isn’t simply money. It is also a deep-seated faith in unfettered technological advances.
Continue reading...What the War on California’s Water Is Really About
What Kind of Workout Clothes Are Best for the Environment?
Trump’s USAid cuts will have huge impact on global climate finance, data shows
Campaigners say funding halt is a ‘staggering blow’ to vulnerable nations and to efforts to keep heating below 1.5C
Donald Trump’s withdrawal of US overseas aid will almost decimate global climate finance from the developed world, data shows, with potentially devastating impacts on vulnerable nations.
The US was responsible last year for about $8 in every $100 that flowed from the rich world to developing countries, to help them cut greenhouse gas emissions and cope with the impacts of extreme weather, according to data from the analyst organisation Carbon Brief.
Continue reading...Tree loss from hurricane leaves Asheville vulnerable to new climate shocks
Damage to trees in western North Carolina from Hurricane Helene was ‘extraordinary and humbling’ but urban areas face particular problems
The city of Asheville and its surrounding areas have been left vulnerable to floods, fires and extreme heat after Hurricane Helene uprooted thousands of trees that provided shade and protection from storms.
Helene was catastrophic for the region’s trees – in part due to the heavy precursor rainstorm that pounded southern Appalachia for two days straight, drenching the soil before Helene hit, bringing yet more heavy rain and 60-100mph winds.
Continue reading...As Utility Bills Soar, New Yorkers Face the Cost of a Greener Future
Valerie drove her bright red Suzuki into the eye of Alfred. Now she’s heading home to the northern rivers
Experience has taught many residents in flood-prone areas around Lismore and northern New South Wales the value of leaving early
- Ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred LIVE: latest news and updates
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Valerie Thompson is heading home to Brunswick Heads in an hour. The 52-year-old lives in a low-lying area just north of Byron Bay and was among those who got out early before Tropical Cyclone Alfred.
The idea that the climate crisis may generate a cyclone that ploughs into south-east Queensland was already a “nightmare scenario” for the country’s insurance industry – the same companies that wanted to charge Thompson $30,000 a year to insure her home. If they were taking it seriously, why shouldn’t she?
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Continue reading...Climate United Sues E.P.A. Over Frozen $20 Billion
More NOAA Employees May Be Let Go, Making 20% of Staff Cut
‘A new phase’: why climate activists are turning to sabotage instead of protest
Tougher laws said to be inspiring clandestine attacks on the ‘property and machinery’ of the fossil fuel economy
It was raining and the sparkling lights of the City of London shone back from the cold, wet pavement as two young men made their way through streets deserted save for a few police and private security. In the sleeping heart of the global financial system, they felt eyes on them from the city’s network of surveillance cameras, but hoped their disguise of high-vis vests and hoods hiding their faces would conceal them.
Reaching Lime Street, they stopped by a maintenance hole and looked around to make sure no one was watching. One took off the cover, located a bundle of black cables and started hacking away. Hours later, an email was circulated to news desks: “Internet cut off to hundreds of insurers in climate-motivated sabotage.”
Continue reading...Limited sleep, damp houses – and waiting for more wild weather: what it’s like on the ground as Alfred nears
Guardian Australia reporters, editors and contributors reflect on their experiences of wind, rain and power outages from ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred
- Ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred LIVE: latest news and updates
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At 9am it’s still gusting like a bastard in our corner of Surfers Paradise. The street is still OK, but there’s a fair bit of debris, and branches are still coming down during the more violent squalls. Quite deceptive really: one minute you think things have died down, and next minute another mini gale howls through.
Continue reading...US exits fund that compensates poorer countries for global heating
Trump pulls out of Cop28 loss and damage deal that recognises harms done by richer, polluting economies to vulnerable nations
The Trump administration has withdrawn the US from a global agreement under which the developed nations most responsible for the climate crisis pledged to partly compensate developing countries for irreversible harms caused by global heating.
The loss and damage fund was agreed at the Cop28 UN climate summit in late 2023 – a hard-won victory after years of diplomatic and grassroots advocacy by developing nations that bear the brunt of the climate crisis despite having contributed the least to greenhouse gas emissions. The fund signalled a commitment by developed, polluting countries to provide financial support for some of the irreversible economic and noneconomic losses from sea level rise, desertification, drought and floods already happening.
Continue reading...Fossil Fuels Are the Future, Chris Wright Tells African Leaders
Switzerland told it must do better on climate after older women’s ECHR win
Council of Europe says Swiss government failing to respect human rights court’s ruling on emissions
The Swiss government has been told it must do more to show that its national climate plans are ambitious enough to comply with a landmark legal ruling.
The Council of Europe’s committee of ministers, in a meeting this week, decided that Switzerland was not doing enough to respect a decision last year by the European court of human rights that it must do more to cut its greenhouse gas emissions and rejected the government’s plea to close the case.
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