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  N e w s   f o r   J a n u a r y  2 0 2 2  

The 100 most crucial climate change news links from December 2021...

Contents of this page

 

1.          Business and Industry

1.1        Carbon pricing

2.          Climate effects

2.1        Cyclones / Hurricanes / Typhoons

2.2        Drought

2.3        Ecology

2.4        Fires

2.4.1     Fires – North America

2.5        Heat

2.6        Ice

2.6.1     Antarctic

2.6.2     Arctic

2.6.3     Mountains

2.7        Oceans

2.7.1     Changes to currents

2.8        Rain, floods and hail

2.9        Secondary climate effects

2.10      Tornadoes

2.11      Wet-dry extremes

3           Emissions

3.1        Coal

3.2        Land based emissions

3.2.1     Agriculture

3.3        Oil

4           Mitigation

4.1        Cleaner energy

4.2        Negative emissions activities

4.2.1     Agricultural drawdown

4.2.2     Forest and habitat drawdown

4.2.3     Oceans

4.3        Nuclear power

5           People

5.1        Activism

5.2        Belief systems about climate

5.3        Community

5.4        Food and crops

5.5        Health and safety

5.6        Indigenous peoples

5.7        Media

6           Politics

6.1        Climate Justice

6.2        National progress on emissions

7           Science

7.1        Summations

7.2        Tipping points

News links for December

1      Business and Industry

Investor group warns livestock industry needs to do

more on methane | Reuters

Carbon-Neutral Product Labels Are Proliferating. Will

They Pay Off? - WSJ

Fires, Landslides, Lack of Snow: The Ski Industry

Girds for Battle - The New York Times

 

Full article: The appallingly bad neoclassical economics of climate change

Global warming of 3C could cost $1.6 trillion a year in lost labour | Reuters

U.S. tornadoes push insurers 2021 bill over $105 bln as climate change impact grows | Reuters

 

1.1     Carbon pricing

 

COP26 agreed rules on trading carbon emissions – but they're fatally flawed

 

 

 

2      Climate effects

 

2.1     Cyclones / Hurricanes / Typhoons           

 

Philippine supertyphoon Rai 'exceeded all predictions' - forecaster | Reuters

Plains mega-cyclone shreds December weather history » Yale Climate Connections

This Surprise Super Typhoon Is Further Proof the Climate Crisis Is Here

 

 

2.2     Drought

 

‘All I can think about is the children’s future’: drought devastates Kenya | Global development | The Guardian

 

Changing climate parches Afghanistan, exacerbating poverty | AP News

 

 

2.3     Ecology

 

BG - Not all biodiversity rich spots are climate refugia

Phenological mismatches between above- and belowground plant responses to climate warming | Nature Climate Change

 

 

2.4     Fires

 

We are professional fire watchers, and we're astounded by the scale of fires in remote Australia right now

 

 

2.4.1   Fires – North America

From Siberia to the U.S, wildfires broke emissions records this year | Reuters

 

 

2.5     Heat

 

Rain to replace snow in the Arctic as climate heats, study finds | Polar regions | The Guardian

 

‘This new snow has no name’: Sami reindeer herders face climate disaster | Arctic | The Guardian

 

Warmer winters can wreak as much havoc as hotter summers, say scientists | Climate crisis | The Guardian

 

 

2.6     Ice

 

Climate change has destabilized the Earth’s poles, putting the planet in peril - The Washington Post

 

 

2.6.1   Antarctic ice

Ice shelf holding back keystone Antarctic glacier within years of failure | Science | AAAS

 

Opinion | Humanity should not test whether Antarctica’s ice will hold out - The Washington Post

 

 

2.6.2   Arctic ice

 

Trends in Arctic Report Card: ‘Consistent, Alarming and Undeniable’ - The New York Times

 

 

2.6.3   Mountain ice

Himalayan glaciers melting at 'exceptional' rate: research | TheHill

 

2.7    Oceans

 

2.7.1   Changes to currents

 

World’s strongest ocean current is speeding up — and humans are to blame - The Washington Post

 

2.8    Rain, floods and hail

 

New climate models reveal faster and larger increases in Arctic precipitation than previously projected | Nature Communications

 

‘Heartbreaking’ clean-up of animal corpses as Canada floodwaters ebb | Canada | The Guardian

 

Record floods linked to climate change have left the people of South Sudan in crisis - Washington Post

 

Death toll rises, thousands displaced after floods batter Brazilian state of Bahia

 

Flooding Rains--And Blizzard Conditions--Hit Hawaii - Scientific American

 

Spanish floods claim first victim as towns are engulfed - BBC News

 

 

2.9    Secondary climate effects

 

Why climate change could make flights a whole lot bumpier | The Independent

 

UN chief: Climate change aggravates conflict and terrorism | AP News

 

 

2.10   Tornadoes

 

‘Really abnormal’ storms and tornadoes tear through Great Plains and midwest | Iowa | The Guardian

 

December tornado record crushed by historic onslaught of storms - The Washington Post

 

FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell says powerful storms 'new normal' in era of climate change - CNNPolitics

 

Study: Winter tornadoes to get more powerful as world warms

 

 

2.11    Wet-dry extremes

 

Too dry, too hot, or too wet: Increasing Weather Persistence in European Summer — Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research

 

 

 

3      Emissions

'Electric vehicles are not the only tool': Reducing traffic key to achieving UK climate targets, report argues | BusinessGreen News

 

Indian demand for air-conditioning heats up climate fears | Financial Times

 

 

3.1     Coal

 

Half of global coal companies continue to develop new assets

 

Coal Powered the Industrial Revolution. It Left Behind an ‘Absolutely Massive’ Environmental Catastrophe - Inside Climate News

 

India ‘Can’t Escape’ Coal Phasedown, Needs Funding to Drive Just Transition for 33 Million Workers - The Energy Mix

 

The end of coal is coming 3 times faster than expected. Governments must accept it and urgently support a 'just transition'

 

 

3.2     Land based emissions

 

3.2.1   Agriculture

 

Nitrogen fertiliser use could ‘threaten global climate goals’

 

 

3.3     Oil

 

A ‘false solution’? How crypto mining became the oil industry’s new hope | Cryptocurrencies | The Guardian

 

Exclusive: oil companies’ profits soared to $174bn this year as US gas prices rose | Oil and gas companies | The Guardian

 

How 'Big Oil' works the system and keeps winning » Yale Climate Connections

 

Oil companies blame clean energy transition for market volatility | Oil | The Guardian

 

What Big Oil knew about climate change, in its own words

 

 

 

4      Mitigation

 

4.1     Cleaner energy

On the edge of greenness: Can we make green hydrogen commercially viable? | BusinessGreen Opinion

 

The wind farms angering renewable energy fans - ABC News

 

Using a City’s Excess Heat to Reduce Emissions - The New York Times

 

 

4.2     Negative emissions activities

 

Q&A: Can ‘nature-based solutions’ help address climate change? - Carbon Brief

 

 

4.2.1     Agricultural drawdown

 

Opinion: Agro-ecology holds the key to fighting climate change - Farmers Weekly

 

 

4.2.2     Forest and habitat drawdown

Multidimensional tropical forest recovery

The Amazon is the Planet's Counterweight to Global Warming, a Place of Stupefying Richness Under Relentless Assault - Inside Climate News

 

 

4.2.3     Oceans

 

To draw down carbon and cool off the planet, ocean fertilization gets another look | Science | AAAS

 

 

4.3      Nuclear power

 

Dutch explore nuclear 'taboo' as part of energy transition | Reuters

Nuclear power has no business case and could make climate change worse | TheHill

 

 

5      People

 

See the climate change-inspired art put together by Utah musicians, poets and researchers

 

 

5.1     Activism

 

Greta Thunberg on the state of the climate movement and the roots of her power as an activist - The Washington Post

 

 

5.2     Belief systems about climate

 

The Trap of Climate Optimism

In Deep Adaptation’s Focus on Societal Collapse, a Hopeful Call to Action - Inside Climate News

 

The “Selling” of Degrowth - Resilience

Climate change: Small army of volunteers keeping deniers off Wikipedia - BBC News

 

5.3     Community

 

Nottingham's coal industry died, so it reinvented itself in a bid to be the UK's greenest city - ABC News

Why climate-change gardening means breaking all the rules | Gardens | The Guardian

 

 

5.4     Food and crops

 

Global Climate Change Impact on Crops Expected Within 10 Years, NASA Study Finds – Climate Change: Vital Signs of the Planet

 

Native Americans farming practices hold potential amid climate change - Washington Post

 

 

5.5     Health and safety

 

Climate change and the right to health of people with disabilities - The Lancet Global Health

Deforestation making outdoor work unsafe for millions, says study | Deforestation | The Guardian

 

5.6     Indigenous peoples

 

Marooned by Morakot: Indigenous Taiwanese typhoon survivors long to return home

Quannah Chasinghorse Is Fighting to Save the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge | Teen Vogue

 

5.7     Media

 

Changing the world with words? Euphemisms in climate change issues - ScienceDirect

 

Netflix's 'Don't Look Up' Movie Review

 

 

 

6      Politics

Rich Countries' Climate Policies Are Colonialism in Green

A climate-vulnerable country's experience at a UN summit: ignored, overlooked, then targeted by investment banks

 

Russia vetoes U.N. Security Council resolution linking climate change and peace - The Washington Post

 

The case for going to war against climate change - Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

 

There should be no more Cop climate summits. We need an alternative that could actually work | The Independent

 

 

6.1     Climate Justice

 

‘2.4C is a death sentence’: Vanessa Nakate’s fight for the forgotten countries of the climate crisis | Climate crisis | The Guardian

 

Equity implications of net zero visions | SpringerLink

In this pivotal year, rich nations failed woefully on climate justice | New Scientist

 

Who Has The Most Historical Responsibility for Climate Change? - The New York Times

 

 

6.2     National progress on emissions

 

The Millions of Tons of Carbon Emissions That Don’t Officially Exist | The New Yorker

 

Who will be the judge of countries' climate plans?

 

In Brazil, an agribusiness haven’s green pivot leaves many skeptical

The dark side of the Nordic model | Environment | Al Jazeera

The Democratic Republic of Congo faces pressure to preserve its peatlands or develop them for profit - Washington Post

 

Biden orders U.S. to stop financing new carbon-intense projects abroad | Reuters

 

 

7      Science

Earth Is Getting a 'Black Box' Because of Climate Change - The New York Times

 

Frontiers | Editorial: New Techniques for Improving Climate Models, Predictions and Projections | Climate

 

Guest post: How weather forecasts can spark a new kind of extreme-event attribution - Carbon Brief

 

How will our warming climate stabilize? Scientists look to the distant past | Ars Technica

 

The Man Who Predicted Climate Change | The New Yorker

 

 

7.1      Summations

 

 

2021: when the link between the climate and biodiversity crises became clear | Max Benato | The Guardian

Biggest science news of 2021: Weather records around the world weren't just broken, they were smashed | New Scientist

 

Opinion | Climate Change’s Effects on 193 Countries - The New York Times

 

 

7.2      Tipping points

 

The Amazon is turning into savannah – we have 5 years to save it | New Scientist

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