FtF News #164 – 21st September 2022

A royal pause, Patagonia going all-in on the climate, and a chance at a green future for Ukraine

Sep 21, 2022

The UK has been a surreal place this past couple of weeks. As the energy crisis looms, the country has instead turned its attention to the death of the Queen, with the coverage of her funeral and the crowning of the new King absorbing nearly all media attention and even causing Parliament to be put on hold for several weeks. Whilst many are dubbing King Charles III ‘the climate king’, it’s worth taking such proclamations with a pinch of salt – Charles certainly cares about the environment, but in a distinctly dated fashion, and the colonial legacy of the monarchy on the globe should not be left out of the picture.

Once again, this week’s issue was ably assisted by Syuan Ruei Chang, who contributed a number of the articles and stories featured this week. If you spot any stories you’d like to share, you can submit them here.

Wild Weather

Mother nature’s reactions to the ever-warming world

August was the hottest August ever for Europe, North America and China, according to the NOAA, with 2022 predicted to fall amongst the top ten hottest years ever.
Similarly, Copernicus Climate Change Service put this summer as the hottest ever for Europe, sitting 0.4°C above the previous record (set only last year!).
Hong Kong broke its record for hottest ever September day twice, with one record lasting barely a week before it was broken again.
California faces brutal heat that could see the state grappling with blackouts with grid demand forecast to reach the highest ever seen.
Seattle’s air quality briefly became the worst of any major city in the world as wildfire smoke blanketed the area.

It’s Science!

The latest from in climate research and analysis

A new study suggests that large parts of the Amazon have been so thoroughly destroyed that they may never recover.
A new multi-agency report warns that the world is ‘going in the wrong direction’ on climate change, with UN secretary-general António Guterres saying we are headed to ‘uncharted territories of destruction’.
Research suggests that even our current level of warming might have pushed the world past five major climate tipping points, with 1.5°C pushing us yet further.
A rapid attribution study suggests the recent catastrophic flooding in Pakistan was made 75% more intense by climate change.
Researchers have found that hateful comments on social media increase markedly when temperatures rise above 30°C – yet another harmful impact of extreme heat.
Analysis has finally linked air pollution with lung cancer even in those who don’t smoke.
A new study in the UK is aiming to understand how and why woodland makes people happy, with the hope that new forests can be designed to better boost our mood.

Party Political Broadcast

Climate politics are a special creature indeed

Australia has passed its climate bill, and is now legally bound to its new target of a 43% reduction in emissions from 2005 levels by 2030.
The new UK PM has announced a huge bailout to cap energy prices, but in a way that doesn’t tackle windfall profits (unlike the EU), and will ultimately lump taxpayers with the bill. She’s also moving to lift a ban on fracking, despite limited public support and no way for it to impact the current crisis.
The UK is now one of the worst countries in Europe for home insulation, compounding the cost-of-living crisis and limiting the efficacy of the aforementioned massive bailout.
The bailout will also benefit richer households twice as much as the poorest, even as the combination of high energy prices and drought mean there could be food shortages on the horizon.
Meanwhile, the EU has apparently so successfully managed to shift away from Russian gas that Goldman Sachs is predicting that European gas prices will halve this winter (see this week’s renewables coverage for more on how they managed this).

Haha, Business!

Climate happenings in the corporate world

Patagonia’s founder, Yvon Chouinard, has given the company to a trust so that all of its profits will go to tackling the climate crisis.
Atlassian billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes, fresh from forcing Aussie utility AGL to clean up, is now eyeing up other polluters.
A year-long investigation by a House committee into Big Oil’s climate credentials suggests that it’s all greenwashing.
A new McKinsey report suggests that whilst companies are acknowledging climate change as a whole, they’re falling well short on targets for biodiversity and other important natural dimensions.

The Future is Electric

Renewables, EVs and all things electrification

EU efforts to ramp up renewables and avoid Russian fossil fuels have avoided the importation of €29bn in gas (although Germany is now leaning heavily on coal).
It’s hard sometimes to grasp how big a task replacing an entire planet’s worth of cars with EVs is, but this post does a good job at painting the picture.

Breakthroughs

New inventions to inspire hope

Investor interest in vertical farms is peaking again as food shortages become a more pressing concern worldwide.
The world’s largest solar tech company is building a lab to support space-based solar power development.

Speaking truths

Efforts in activism and awareness

Activists have managed to persuade a state judge in Louisiana to withdraw key air permits for a vast new petrochemical complex planned for the state’s ‘Cancer Alley’.
Campaigners are calling for a global day of climate action to coincide with the COP27 climate conference, to raise the plight of the most vulnerable communities around the world.
The Tyre Extinguishers movement claim to have now ‘disarmed’ more than 9,000 SUVs, in their bid to make driving the vehicles socially unacceptable.
Activists have ‘amended’ the Shell-sponsored carbon capture exhibition at London’s Science Museum, highlighting the greenwashing throughout.

Long Reads

Interesting deep-dives into climate-related topics

The art world is going bananas over the completion of the giant ‘land art’ sculpture, City, however most coverage fails to mention that it was built on stolen Indigenous land.

“In the end, City isn’t art: It’s a monument to the power of violence.”

The boreal forest of the Arctic is at the forefront of our warming world, but the changes going on there are poorly understood, and with the invasion of Ukraine, half of it has been closed off to much of the global scientific community.
The world’s third richest man made his fortune from coal power, but is now shifting to green energy. Is Gautam Adani’s shift genuine, or just cover for his coal empire?
Jackson, Mississippi has hit headlines in the US of late over its recent water crisis, but the problems grew from decades of neglect and systematic racism.
The devastation in Ukraine is immense, but some are trying to turn it into an opportunity to rebuild the country in a greener, more egalitarian way.
Nigeria’s Osun river supports food, religion and livelihoods aplenty, but now is heavily polluted by heavy metals from mining, threatening millions downstream.
Climate Action Tech’s Branch magazine has just published its latest issue, for your fill of articles about the intersection of tech and climate.