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Yale Environment 360
Next Year Likely to Surpass 2023 as the Hottest Ever
With climate change and an incipient El Niño driving up temperatures, 2024 is likely to eclipse 2023 as the hottest year ever, meteorologists project. According to the World Meteorological Organization, the first 10 months of this year measured 1.40 degrees C warmer than the preindustrial baseline, a product of both human-caused warming and, to a lesser extent, the onset of El Niño, when warm waters pool in the eastern Pacific Ocean. The previous hottest year, in 2016, also coincided with an El Niño.
A Year of Extreme Weather, as Seen from Space
This year will conclude as the hottest on record, with warming reaching new highs in the final months of 2023. Unprecedented heat helped fuel another year of extreme weather. From the worst wildfire season in Canadian history to the strongest cyclone ever recorded, 2023 saw record weather disasters worldwide. These satellite images, from NASA’s Earth Observatory, show the startling impact of extreme weather in 2023. Click photos to enlarge.
Energy Sector Not Ready for Rapid Rise of Renewables, Analysts Say
The rapid growth of wind, solar, and electric vehicles means that demand for fossil fuels is likely to peak this decade. Is the energy sector ready for the transition?. A survey of clean energy firms by the International Energy Agency (IEA) finds that not enough workers are pursuing the training needed to keep up with the rising number of skilled jobs. There is a great need, in particular, for trained electricians. “The unprecedented acceleration that we have seen in clean energy transitions is creating millions of new job opportunities all over the world — but these are not being filled quickly enough,” IEA chief Fatih Birol said in a statement.
As Extreme Weather Intensifies, Half the World Still Lacks Access to Early Warnings
While the world has made significant progress in building systems that can alert people to extreme weather, many places still lack access to early warnings, a new report finds. In November of 2022, UN Secretary-General António Guterres launched, at COP27, the Early Warnings for All initiative, which aims to cover...
U.S. Saw a Record Number of Billion-Dollar Weather Disasters in 2023
In 2023, the U.S. experienced a record 25 billion-dollar weather and climate disasters — three more than the previous record, set in 2020. As greenhouse gases continue to accumulate in the atmosphere, extreme events — hurricanes, severe storms, heavy rainfall, flooding, wildfires, extreme heat, and drought — are becoming ever more frequent, intense, and dangerous. Between 1980 and 2022, the U.S averaged eight billion-dollar weather disasters each year, according to NOAA. Between 2018 and 2022, it recorded 18 such disasters on average. This year saw an unprecedented 25 mega-disasters.
After a Decade of Planning, New York City Is Raising Its Shoreline
On a recent morning in Asser Levy Playground, on Manhattan’s East Side, a group of retirees traded serves on a handball court adjacent to a recently completed 10-foot-high floodwall. Had a sudden storm caused the East River to start overtopping this barrier, a 79-foot-long floodgate would have begun gliding along a track, closing off the playground and keeping the handball players dry. In its small way, this 2.4-acre waterfront park is a major proof of concept for a city at the forefront of flood resilience planning — a city working toward living with, and not against, water.
Canada to End Sales of Gas-Powered Cars by 2035
Canada is reportedly planning to phase out the sale of gas-powered cars by 2035. Under the rules, to be unveiled Tuesday, electric or hydrogen-powered cars will account for 20 percent of new sales by 2026, 60 percent by 2030, and 100 percent by 2035, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and Toronto Star have learned.
After a Record 2023, Coal Headed for Decline, Analysts Say
Global coal demand hit a record high in 2023, but with the renewables buildout continuing apace in China, coal is headed for a decline over the next two years, according to a new analysis. “We have seen declines in global coal demand a few times, but they were brief and...
‘Green Roads’ Are Plowing Ahead, Buffering Drought and Floods
Makueni County, a corner of southern Kenya that’s home to nearly a million people, is a land of extremes. Nine months a year, Makueni is a hardened, sun-scorched place where crops struggle and plumes of orange dust billow from dirt roads. Twice yearly, though, the county is battered by weeks of torrential rain, which drown farm fields and transform roads into impassable morasses. “Water,” says Michael Maluki, a Makueni County engineer, “is the enemy of roads.”
Climate Conference Delivers Agreement to Transition Away from Fossil Fuels
The 2023 UN climate conference has concluded with an agreement, approved by nearly 200 countries, to shift away from fossil fuels. An earlier proposal for a complete “phaseout” of hydrocarbons faced pushback from Mideast oil producers. The final text instead calls for “transitioning away from fossil fuels” while “accelerating action in this critical decade, so as to achieve net zero by 2050.” This is the first time the words “fossil fuels” have been included in a UN climate agreement.”
More Than 44,000 Species Now Threatened With Extinction
In its latest accounting, the International Union for Conservation of Nature finds that more than 44,000 species worldwide are threatened with extinction. Of these, nearly 7,000 face an immediate threat from climate change. “Species around the world are under huge pressure,” Craig Hilton-Taylor, of IUCN, said in a statement. “So...
Deep in the Wilderness, the World’s Largest Beaver Dam Endures
Wood Buffalo National Park, the largest national park in Canada, covers an area the size of Switzerland and stretches from Northern Alberta into the Northwest Territories. Only one road enters it from Alberta, and one from the NWT. If not for people observing it from airplanes and helicopters, and satellites photographing it, little would be known about big parts of it. The park is a variety of landscapes — boreal swamps, fens, bogs, black spruce forests, salt flats, gypsum karst, permafrost islands, and prairies that extend the continent’s central plains to their northern limit. The wood buffalo in the park’s name are bison related to the Great Plains bison. In this remoteness, the buffalo descend from the original population, and the wolves that prey on them are also the wild originals. Millions of birds summer and breed here. The park holds one of the last remaining breeding grounds of the whooping crane.
Report Alleges Intimidation of Families in Path of East African Pipeline Project
A new report implicates French oil giant TotalEnergies in the bullying and intimidation of families living in the path of its proposed oil pipeline in East Africa. The East African Crude Oil Pipeline, which would stretch 900 miles from eastern Uganda to the Tanzanian coast, threatens to displace more than 100,000 people and has drawn condemnation from activists, businesses, and governments around the world.
To Fight Plastic Waste, an Indonesian Campaign Aims High
For the industries that make and use disposable plastic packaging, developing countries are huge growth markets. But nations such as Indonesia are struggling to cope with the vast tide of waste this business strategy leaves behind. Tiza Mafira, cofounder of Plasticdiet Indonesia, says the volume of throwaway plastic that’s deluging...
Another Record-Hot Month Puts 2023 on Track to Be Hottest Year Ever
November was the sixth month in a row of record-warm weather, according to a new analysis that finds 2023 will almost inevitably end as the hottest year ever recorded. Last month measured on average 1.75 degrees C (3.15 degrees F) warmer than the preindustrial era, according to an analysis from the EU Copernicus Climate Change Service. And two days last month were more than 2 degrees C (3.6 degrees F) warmer, marking the first time daily warming breached the 2-degree threshold, scientists said. The hottest November on record comes on the heels of the hottest October, September, August, July, and June.
Extreme Weather Inflicting Higher Costs but Fewer Deaths, Report Finds
The last decade saw weather grow more extreme, with cyclones, floods, and fires incurring greater costs. But thanks to improved early warning systems, deaths from extreme weather fell, a new report finds. Climate changed accelerated between the years 2011 and 2020, with rising temperatures fueling more extreme weather, according to...
How Mounting Rubber Demand Is Driving Loss of Tropical Forests
The elephants are gone. The trees are logged out. The Beng Per Wildlife Sanctuary in central Cambodia is largely destroyed, after being handed over by the government to a politically well-connected local plantation company to grow rubber. In West Africa, the Luxembourg-based plantations giant Socfin has been accused in recent...
Why We Won’t Know When We’ve Passed the 1.5-Degree Threshold
While the Paris Agreement aims to limit warming to 1.5 degrees C, experts won’t know when we have surpassed this threshold, a fact that could undermine global efforts to tackle climate change, scientists say. Temperatures are creeping upwards, but they are doing so unevenly. Not every year is hotter...
As Temperatures Rise, Dengue Fever Spreads and Cases Rise
The monsoon season in Bangladesh typically runs from May to September, with rainfall peaking in July and sputtering out in early October. This year, however, there was more rain than usual in October and even some showers in normally dry November. The extra rain, along with overall warmer temperatures, contributed to a surge in cases of dengue fever, prolonging the country’s largest and deadliest recorded outbreak of the mosquito-borne disease.
Conservationists Sue to Stop the Planting of Giant Sequoias
The National Park Service is working to replant several groves of giant sequoias devastated by recent wildfires. But some conservationists say planting is unneeded and could damage forests. Severe wildfires in 2020 and 2021 killed as many as 19 percent of all giant sequoias, the largest trees in the world,...
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Yale Environment 360 is an online magazine offering opinion, analysis, reporting, and debate on global environmental issues.
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