Headline News Archive
As climate change pushes seas to rise ever higher, shallow groundwater could become a more costly hazard across the Atlantic coast, particularly in South Florida where the water table sits just feet below the surface, according to a new study from the U.S. Geological Survey.
With a central focus on climate finance, COP29 brought together nearly 200 countries in Baku, Azerbaijan, and reached a breakthrough agreement that will:
- Triple finance to developing countries, from the previous goal of USD 100 billion annually, to USD 300 billion annually by 2035
- Secure efforts of all actors to work together to scale up finance to developing countries, from public and private sources, to the amount of USD 1.3 trillion per year by 2035
What was billed as a “sprint to cut climate super pollutants” may soon slow to a jog.
Top climate diplomats from the U.S., China and host country Azerbaijan gathered at COP29, the United Nations Climate Conference in Baku, this week to host a summit on methane and other “non-CO2” greenhouse gases.
However, efforts to curb emissions of these climate super pollutants—greenhouse gases that on a pound-for-pound basis are far more effective at warming the planet than carbon dioxide—are likely to stall under President-elect Donald Trump. He has pledged to pull the U.S. out of the Paris climate agreement, and the oil industry is lobbying him to roll back emission regulations.
Despite national election results that have left environmentalists and their allies wary of what’s to come in the next four years, ballot initiatives related to climate policies fared well across the country on election day.
At least five of six ballot measures related to climate change resulted in what most environmentalists consider wins. But state legislative races across the country that could impact climate policy had more uneven results.
For Florida’s Native American tribes, the watershed is sacred. A new National Academies report says the federal and state agencies guiding Everglades restoration can learn a lot from them.
Now a new report on the progress of the $21 billion effort to restore the vast watershed acknowledges a lack of meaningful engagement with the Miccosukee and Seminole tribes, who consider the soaring cypress swamps and sweeping sawgrass prairies of the river of grass that saved them from annihilation more than 100 years ago to be sacred.
The combination of more intense storms and rising seas poses a critical challenge for coastal infrastructure, particularly in Florida, where many communities are built near the water.
Hurricanes Milton and Helene caused major damage to coastal infrastructure, especially in the Tampa Bay area, such as Helene causing nearly 1.5 million gallons of sewage spilling in St. Petersburg and Milton leading to widespread power outages along the Gulf Coast.
Forty-four of the world's leading climate scientists have called on Nordic policymakers to address the potentially imminent and "devastating" collapse of key Atlantic Ocean currents.
The University of Miami research will engage a wide array of stakeholders across five key themes: western water resources, heat waves, coastal flood risk, wildfire risk, and extreme wind events. It aims to provide access to crucial datasets and analysis procedures while promoting education for the next generation of climate projection translators.
Earth faces a climate emergency which renders conservation goals largely obsolete. Current conservation actions are inadequate because they (i) underplay biodiversity's role in maintaining human civilisation, which contributes to its marginalisation, and (ii) rely on false assumptions of how to catalyse transformative change.
By Marshall Shepherd via Forbes
Hurricane Helene did what a Category 4 storm does. It caused destruction through extreme winds, storm surge, rainfall, and tornadoes. The sheer size of the storm also extended those impacts across many states.
FCI Co-Director, Sadie Ryan, contributes to this important piece.
Some researchers have described this as a steady move to "a warmer, sicker world". But to understand why this is happening, we need to understand a little more about the biology of mosquitoes and their life cycles.
A new interagency resource on U.S. sea level change, SeaLevel.GlobalChange.gov, is now available to the public. This platform represents the first whole-of-government resource for coastal residents and decision-makers on sea level rise projections, associated impacts, and adaptation measures.
This site pairs a dynamic delivery of the latest research on sea level change with foundational educational content on how and why sea level rise is happening, its impacts, and actions that can be taken to address the challenges coastal communities face from rising seas.
Explore more and register for webinar at https://sealevel.globalchange.gov/
The USGCRP also released a new federal interagency resource to support people in teaching, communicating, and making decisions about climate change. Climate Literacy: Essential Principles for Understanding and Addressing Climate Change presents information that is important for individuals and communities to understand about Earth’s climate, impacts of climate change, and solutions.
An increase in extreme heat and severe droughts lops off about 0.2% of a country’s GDP, a new study found.
Severe weather costs the global economy billions of dollars a year, highlighting the costs of climate change and the value of mitigating extreme weather, according to a new analysis of weather and economic data.
“This research gives guidance to policymakers to consider what kind of extreme events we should adapt to,” said Berkay Akyapi, Ph.D., co-author of the new study and a professor of business at the University of Florida. “If we don’t do anything to respond to these climate shocks, we are hurting the economy.”
By A.R Siders
U.S. towns are building new housing and infrastructure in their floodplains – but not as much as expected, and the tools to stop it may be more routine than we imagined.
Those are the key takeaways from two new papers: one in Oxford Open Climate Change OUP Academic (Siders et al.) today and one in Earth’s Future last week (Agopian et al). The findings could change how advocates, floodplain managers, and a new administration, think about policy reforms for flood risk management.
The United States faces an increasingly complex set of challenges from shocks and stressors to our systems. By understanding these challenges and applying a unified, whole community approach to addressing them, we can strengthen our collective security and resilience so that we can overcome these ever-evolving challenges and thrive as a nation.
Read the FULL REPORT
Check it out these innovative ideas for managed retreat by A.R Siders et. al.
This spring, Democrats wrapped up a nearly three-year investigation into the fossil fuel industry’s role in climate disinformation, and asked the Department of Justice to pick up where they left off.
In House and Senate Democrats’ final report and hearing, investigators concluded that major oil companies had not only misled the public on climate change for decades, but also were continuing to misinform them about the industry’s preferred climate “solutions”— particularly biofuels and carbon capture.
Environmental Defense Fund, a nonprofit that advocates for coastal and flood resilience, is seeking input to position Florida as a leader in nature-based solutions (NBS), including natural areas and artificial structures that harness nature.
Professionals working in Florida on any aspect of implementing NBS, from planning and constructing to monitoring and maintenance, are encouraged to complete a brief survey identifying recommendations that reduce barriers to and incentivize these vital solutions.
The Florida Climate Institute (FCI) is a multi-disciplinary network of national and international research and public organizations, scientists, and individuals concerned with achieving a better understanding of climate variability and change.