Climate Update

IMPACTS

Waldbrände bedrohen die Stadt Fort McMurray in der Provinz Alberta. Tausende Bewohnerinnen und Bewohner von Vororten im Süden der Stadt mussten ihr Zuhause verlassen. Laut Behörden ist dies nötig, damit die Einsatzkräfte das Feuer bekämpfen könnten.

IMPACTS

Some scientists in the region said many of the effects seen today weren’t expected until the second half of the century.

IMPACTS

Mexico City is staring down a water crisis. It won’t be the last city to do so.

IMPACTS

Torrential rains have caused one of Brazil’s worst floods in modern history, leaving more than 100 dead and nearly an entire state submerged.

IMPACTS

The number of tornadoes so far in the United States this year is just above average. But their distribution is changing.

IMPACTS

Canadian authorities are urging all remaining residents in a town in British Columbia to leave immediately, despite improving weather conditions, after many were already evacuated due to a fast-growing wildfire.

IMPACTS

Schwere Überschwemmungen haben weite Teile Ostafrikas verwüstet. Es sei ein Albtraum, berichtet eine kenianische Klimaaktivistin. Zur gleichen Zeit leiden auch Regionen in Brasilien und China unter extremen Starkniederschlägen.

MITIGATION & ADAPT.

Tropische Vögel, die im Atlantischen Regenwald Brasiliens leben, verbreiten Pflanzensamen und könnten so die Wiederaufforstung der Region unterstützen. Erschwert wird das aber durch die Fragmentierung des Waldes, wie ein Team der ETH Zürich herausgefunden hat.

IMPACTS

Vom Hochwasser seien etwa 850’000 Einwohner in 340 Ortschaften des Bundesstaates Rio Grande do Sul betroffen. In den meisten von ihnen wurde der Notstand ausgerufen.

ÉCONOMIE

Faith-based climate advocates’ transparency efforts are more than a “Hail Mary.”

IMPACTS

High temperatures across the US have the potential to increase risks for drought, wildfires, and hurricanes. The United States could be in for another scorcher this summer, per a new study from the National Weather Service (NWS).

ANTI-CLIMAT

Dangerous, polluting SUVs and pickups took over America. Lawmakers are partly to blame.

POLITIQUE

Mexican citizens will go to the polls on 2 June 2024 to elect a new president, a new legislature and thousands of other local government officials.

IMPACTS

This part of South America is no stranger to major rainfall, but last week’s storms were particularly devastating

ÉCONOMIE

Argentinische Aktivist:innen kritisieren die lasche Politik der Schweiz: Nationalbank und UBS sollen Aktien von Firmen aufgeben, die im argentinischen Frackinggeschäft mitmischen.

IMPACTS

Le bilan s'est alourdi samedi au Brésil où des inondations ont dévasté l'Etat du Rio Grande do Sul depuis plusieurs jours, faisant au moins 56 morts et 67 disparus dans cette région du sud du pays. La capitale régionale Porto Alegre est fortement touchée.

RECOMMANDÉ CAUSES

Despite major progress in Brazil and Colombia, deforestation led by farming still cleared an area nearly equal to Switzerland

MITIGATION & ADAPT.

Noch nie hat es in Amazonien so viel gebrannt wie in diesem Jahr. Mit altem Wissen und moderner Technik versuchen indigene Feuerwehr­leute den Regenwald zu retten. Eine Reportage von einem Brennpunkt des Klimawandels.

IMPACTS

The reading is the city’s highest in a decade. Heat index measures what a temperature feels like, taking into account humidity.

DROIT & LITIGE

The ruling is the first time Peru has recognized that ecosystems possess legal rights and is based on a constellation of legal precedents in international and Peruvian law.

ACTIVISME

Brutally attacked for his work as one of the Dominican Republic’s leading land defenders, Polanco says the next generation must fight environmental destruction

CAUSES

Die Abholzung im brasilianischen Amazonasregenwald ist einem Bericht zufolge in den ersten beiden Monaten des Jahres auf dem niedrigsten Stand seit 2018 in diesem Zeitraum gewesen.

IMPACTS

Hundreds of square miles of the rainforest have burned as countries in the region battle a record number of fires fueled by extreme weather.

IMPACTS

A government forecast suggests that there could be even more wildfires this season than during last year’s exceptional fire period.

ANTI-CLIMAT RECOMMANDÉ POLITIQUE

Ultra free-market president Javier Milei has not so far been able to get cuts to environmental regulations through Congress

POLITIQUE

To fund a crackdown against gang violence, Ecuador’s recently elected president Daniel Noboa suggested a moratorium on a vote to ban an Amazon oil drilling project.

IMPACTS

Two disasters, far apart, show how a dangerous climate cocktail can devastate places known for mild weather.

IMPACTS

Chile erlebt derzeit die tödlichsten Waldbrände in der Geschichte des Landes. Mindestens 112 Menschen kamen bereits ums Leben. Es besteht der Verdacht, dass zumindest einige der Brände absichtlich gelegt worden sind.

IMPACTS

Climate change was the primary driver of a massive drought in the Amazon basin in 2023 and will likely cause future extreme droughts, with potentially dire consequences for global efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions, according to a new report from World Weather Attribution.

MITIGATION & ADAPT.

The $1.8 million Centre for International Police Cooperation will be built in the Brazilian Amazon city of Manaus and funded by the Norwegian-backed Amazon Fund

JUSTICE CLIM.

The first time, they came at 2am and without a warrant. Rosa* was alone. She was gagged, her eyes covered, and her hands bound with a cable tie. It was the night after widespread protests against sweeping changes to the constitution in Jujuy, a northern Argentine province.

CAUSES

Mongabay Latam traveled along 38 kilometers (24 miles) of Peru’s Cenepa River, near the border with Ecuador, where illegal mining dredges run around the clock in search of gold, hemming in seven Indigenous Awajún communities.

DROIT & LITIGE

The Education of Judith Kimerling: An American lawyer’s epic struggle to stop expanding oil operations harming Indigenous peoples in Ecuador’s Amazon. Part one.

DROIT & LITIGE

The Education of Judith Kimerling: An American lawyer’s epic struggle to stop expanding oil operations harming Indigenous peoples in Ecuador’s Amazon. Part two.

POLITIQUE

Colombia’s ambitious green plans have hit headwinds, as tricky politics hampers renewable growth and plans to stop oil and gas exploration spark economic fears. Last June, left-winger Gustavo Petro was elected president, vowing to make Colombia a “world power of life” in his four-year term.

DROIT & LITIGE

Retten wir die Erde, nicht den Kapitalismus! In etwa so lässt sich zusammen­fassen, was der damalige bolivianische Präsident Evo Morales der Welt­gemeinschaft am Uno-Klimagipfel 2010 im mexikanischen Badeort Cancún zurief.

ÉCONOMIE

The South American country has become the next energy powerhouse, bringing jobs, rib-eye steaks—and a jarring new realityGEORGETOWN, Guyana—New supermarkets here are stocked with prime Texas rib-eyes. A recently opened waterfront hotel offers executive suites for $750 per night.

IMPACTS

Hurricane forecasts have improved, but Otis still surprised meteorologists with how rapidly it intensified. On Tuesday morning, Otis was a mere tropical storm with sustained winds of 70 miles per hour.

IMPACTS

In a large church displaying a big blue cross near the Acapulco beachfront, dozens of people dozed in sleeping bags along the pews, prayed in silence or anxiously discussed their next move.

MITIGATION & ADAPT.

Dominica’s traditional foods are countering modern threats. KALINAGO TERRITORY, Dominica — Inside a small yellow roadside shop on the edge of a lush hill, two sisters are reviving an ancient staple to serve modern tastes and stave off a future threat.

IMPACTS

Their pink bodies began to wash ashore last month, startling locals and scientists in the remote Amazon town of Tefé, Brazil, who had never seen anything like it.

JUSTICE CLIM.

Days ago, voters in Ecuador approved a total ban on oil drilling in protected land in the Amazon, a 2.5m-acre tract in the Yasuní national park that might be the world’s most important biodiversity hotspot.

MITIGATION & ADAPT.

After 50 years of expanding oil operations in its Amazonian region, Ecuador will close the door on crude extraction in three oil fields that are home to Indigenous communities, including one of the country’s uncontacted groups.

MITIGATION & ADAPT.

Jair Candor had been searching the Amazon rainforest for three days when he heard their voices.

POLITIQUE

Joy and hope are all too rarely associated with the environmental movement, but both have been in abundant supply since Ecuador’s people voted on Sunday to keep the country’s oil in the subsoil of the Yasuní national park.

POLITIQUE

Das Öl unter dem Yasuní-Nationalpark in Ecuador muss im Boden bleiben. Dafür stimmten knapp 60 Prozent der Wähler:innen bei einem landesweiten Referendum, das am vergangenen Sonntag parallel zu den vorgezogenen Präsidentschaftswahlen in dem südamerikanischen Land stattfand.

POLITIQUE

Lors d'un référendum organisé dimanche, parallèlement à des élections générales anticipées, les Equatoriens ont dit oui à 59% à l'arrêt de la production du "bloc 43", selon les résultats publiés lundi.

RECOMMANDÉ MITIGATION & ADAPT. POLITIQUE

En los resultados oficiales, con un 95,58% escrutado, el Sí se impone en la consulta del Yasuní. Esa opción también lleva la delantera en las preguntas del Chocó Andino.

IMPACTS

During an extraordinarily busy couple of days for the Atlantic hurricane season, Tropical Storm Gert formed early Monday before weakening over the course of the day. Gert was one of three tropical storms that formed in the Atlantic Ocean within a span of 18 hours.

IMPACTS

Die Klimaveränderung führt durch Dürren und Starkregen nicht nur zu landwirtschaftlichen Produktionsausfällen und der Zerstörung von Gebäuden und Infrastruktur, sondern kann auch ganz andere gravierende wirtschaftliche Schäden zur Folge haben. Ein gutes Beispiel dafür ist der Panamakanal.

IMPACTS

Temperatures in parts of Chile and northern Argentina have soared to 10°C-20°C above average over the last few weeks.

POLITIQUE

Leaders of the eight Amazon basin countries committed this week to act together to prevent the rainforest “from reaching the point of no return” – although they stopped short of agreeing upon a common target for ending deforestation.

IMPACTS

La sécheresse frappe fort au lac Titicaca. Depuis deux ans, les précipitations qui remplissent le lac entre décembre et mars sont plus faibles que d’habitude. Résultat, le niveau est extrêmement bas et les populations locales souffrent.

MITIGATION & ADAPT.

Until I moved to the Amazon, I assumed a sapling would grow into a tree as long as it had water, sunshine and decent soil. Now I am starting to realise the survival of plants needs political nourishment too. And that is sorely lacking.

POLITIQUE

Good morning. “I think the world needs to see this meeting in Belém as the most important landmark ever … when it comes to discussing the climate question.

POLITIQUE

Eight Amazon nations agreed to a list of unified policies and measures to bolster regional cooperation at a major rainforest summit in Brazil on Tuesday, but failed to agree on a common goal for ending deforestation.

IMPACTS

Alors que le mois de juillet est en passe de devenir le mois le plus chaud jamais mesuré au monde, en Amérique du Sud, en plein hiver, la canicule s'installe. Wxcharts "Winter is disappearing", "L’hiver est en train de disparaître".

MITIGATION & ADAPT.

Experts consulted by Climate Home News suggested the vote will define Ecuador’s economic model for the future.

IMPACTS

Tagelanger Regen hat in Chile Überschwemmungen verursacht. Umstürzende Bäume haben mindestens zwei Menschen erschlagen. Zudem gebe es sechs Vermisste infolge von Überschwemmungen, teilte das Innenministerium des südamerikanischen Landes am Sonntag mit.

CAUSES

“Maria Joel was a normal housewife with four underage children whose husband was murdered. She held her husband in her arms while he was dying. She had two choices.

DROIT & LITIGE

The current Colombia head of coal miner Drummond Co Inc and his predecessor will be tried for allegedly funding right-wing paramilitaries, the country’s attorney general’s office said on Wednesday, as the U.S.-based company denied any wrongdoing by the executives.

IMPACTS

Follow live updates as Canadian wildfire smoke pollutes air across the northern U.S.

MITIGATION & ADAPT.

At the United Nations climate summit in Egypt last year, Prime Minister Philip Davis of the Bahamas emerged as one of the most impassioned speakers among the more than 100 heads of state in attendance. Yet even as Mr.

One of the world’s greatest environmental heroes doesn’t even have a Wikipedia page. Though he has done more to protect the living planet than almost anyone alive, his name is scarcely known.

TECH. & ÉNERGIE

Mit Wut im Bauch fährt Cristián Osorio über die kleinen Strassen seiner Gemeinde an der chile­ni­schen Küste. Er zeigt mit dem Finger in Rich­tung Meer, weisse Pfosten spriessen zwischen der Strasse und den steilen Felsen wie Pilze aus dem Boden.

IMPACTS

Skip to content Two patches of land sit in a dried up lake bed in 2022. These were once islands in Laguna de Aculeoa, a popular freshwater lake for fishing, boating and swimming, just an hour from Santiago, Chile. The lake dried up completely in 2018 due to the ongoing megadrought.

IMPACTS

BUENOS AIRES, March 9 (Reuters) - A historic drought ravaging Argentina's crops is deepening the grain exporting giant's economic crisis, crushing farmers across the Pampas, heightening default fears and putting at risk targets agreed with the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

CAUSES

Climate change was not the main driver of the drought plaguing large parts of central South America late last year, according to a new “rapid attribution” study. South America has been suffering through a prolonged dry spell for the past three years.

IMPACTS

SANTIAGO, Feb 6 (Reuters) - Chilean firefighters were battling to hold back forest fires on Monday as authorities said hot and dry weather would continue this week, potentially exacerbating what are already the deadliest blazes in the country's recent history.

Der fossile Kapitalismus lasse sich eher von den Rändern her bezwingen, sagt der argentinische Aktivist Esteban Servat. Mit der Initiative «Debt for Climate» glaubt er, einen wirksamen Hebel gefunden zu haben.

CAUSES

Die amerikanische Erdölfirma ExxonMobil hat über viele Jahre hinweg die Bedrohung durch den Klimawandel heruntergespielt. Das ist hinlänglich dokumentiert. Ganze Bücher wurden über das Thema bereits geschrieben.

ACTIVISME

Suzanne Simard helped people see forests as complex communities. Now she's translating that research into a roadmap for protecting trees amid climate change.

IMPACTS

The record-breaking heatwave that hit northern Argentina and Paraguay in early December was made about 60 times more likely by human-caused climate change, according to a new rapid attribution study.

POLITIQUE

Mexico’s new climate plan, announced last month at COP27 in Sharm El-Sheikh, is less ambitious than the previous government’s pledge, a new policy analysis by Climate Action Tracker suggests.

MITIGATION & ADAPT.

The experience of Lytton — a town in British Columbia that suffered a disastrous fire last year and has yet to rebuild — shows how adapting to climate threats, and its slow and arduous recovery phase, can inflict its own wounds.

DROIT & LITIGE

The same racketeering legislation used to bring down mob bosses, motorcycle gangs, football executives and international fraudsters is to be tested against oil and coal companies who are accused of conspiring to deceive the public over the climate crisis.

DROIT & LITIGE

One of the victims says “nobody listens to us” while the spotlight has shifted to his American lawyer, whom the oil giant has pursued in U.S. legal proceedings.

POLITIQUE

This article is part of our Women and Leadership special report that profiles women leading the way on climate, politics and business around the globe.

MITIGATION & ADAPT.

The president says oil is his economy’s worst addiction. Phasing it out would be a global first for a major oil producer. ARAUCA, Colombia — Over the past four decades, Colombia has pumped billions of barrels of oil from under a vast savanna it shares with neighboring Venezuela.

POLITIQUE

It is unclear whether Cop27 will have any real impact on efforts to halt climate change but one leader is likely to return from the international summit feeling that the trip to Egypt was well worth it: Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro.

Mia Mottley, prime minister of Barbados, has criticised industrialised nations for failing the developing world on the climate crisis, in a blistering attack at the Cop27 UN climate talks.

TURNEFFE ATOLL, Belize — Belize faced an economic meltdown. The pandemic had sent it into its worst ever recession, putting the government on the brink of bankruptcy. For Belize, that meant its oceans, endangered mangroves and vulnerable coral reefs.

IMPACTS

Even if global warming is limited to just 1.5 degrees Celsius, which now seems unlikely, all glaciers in Yosemite National Park and in Africa will be lost.

POLITIQUE

Denmark and Costa Rica jointly launched the Beyond Oil and Gas Alliance (Boga) at last year’s Cop26 climate summit along with six other core members. This “group of first movers” committed to phase out or rule out fossil fuel development in their countries.

MITIGATION & ADAPT.

Unusual winter rainfall has produced a floral bloom and explosion of colour on the barren plains of the Atacama desert, prompting Chile’s government to move to protect the area.

TECH. & ÉNERGIE

About 350 miles northwest of Montreal, amid a vast pine forest, is a deep mining pit with walls of mottled rock. The pit has changed hands repeatedly and been mired in bankruptcy, but now it could help determine the future of electric vehicles.

IMPACTS

Environmental destruction in parts of the Amazon is so complete that swathes of the rainforest have reached tipping point and might never be able to recover, a major study carried out by scientists and Indigenous organisations has found.

A member of the A'i Cofan community guard walks across the Aguarico River in Ecuador's Amazon, where indigenous groups were granted power to block mining projects after a ruling by the country's Constitutional Court, in Sinangoe, Ecuador March 5, 2022. Picture taken March 5, 2022.

DROIT & LITIGE

A potential lawsuit by Vancouver would be the first in Canada to target the fossil fuel industry’s role in climate change.The scars left by a wildfire that destroyed the small town of Lytton, British Columbia.Credit...

MITIGATION & ADAPT.

Peru’s Sacred Valley, the breathtaking landscape between Cusco and Machu Picchu, has always had a few conventional fire brigades, but anyone who has ever witnessed a bushfire will know there is little you can do once it takes hold.

RECOMMANDÉ

Caribbean nations are trapped between the global financial system and a looming climate disaster. One country’s leader has been fighting to find a way out.

IMPACTS

Mexico, or large parts of it, is running out of water. An extreme drought has seen taps run dry across the country, with nearly two-thirds of all municipalities facing a water shortage that is forcing people in some places to line up for hours for government water deliveries.

ÉCONOMIE

The oil giant has found a climate bargain in some of Mexico’s poorest areas, paying a fraction of market rate for carbon offsets to rural villagers working to protect their forests.

MITIGATION & ADAPT.

Rain clouds cover the peaks of the west Maui mountains, one of the wettest places on the planet, which for centuries sustained biodiverse forests providing abundant food and medicines for Hawaiians who took only what they needed. Those days of abundance and food sovereignty are long gone.

POLITIQUE

Francia Márquez, a vice presidential candidate from the mountainous department of Cauca in southwestern Colombia, has become a national phenomenon.Credit...

IMPACTS

The Penuelas reservoir in central Chile was until twenty years ago the main source of water for the city of Valparaiso, holding enough water for 38,000 Olympic-size swimming pools. Water for only two pools now remains.

IMPACTS

From the Atacama Desert to Patagonia, a 13-year megadrought is straining Chile’s freshwater resources to breaking point.

CAUSES

Hühner und Schweine in Deutschland fressen Soja, für das auch im brasilianischen Amazonasgebiet Wald gerodet wird. Seit Jahren wollen Supermarktketten auf dieses Soja verzichten – aber kaum etwas ändert sich. Warum?  Read the English version of this article.

CAUSES

Jaim Teixeira surveys his property near Trairão, Brazil from the back of a motorcycle, wearing jeans and a long-sleeved, sun-proof shirt to shield him from the jungle’s breathtaking heat.

CAUSES

Mexico increased the amount of gas it burns as a byproduct of oil production for the fourth year in a row in 2021 despite its target to eliminate routine flaring by 2030.