Well, there's a headline that certainly captures the moment: Big banks predict catastrophic warming, with profit potential.

“We now expect a 3°C world,” Morgan Stanley analysts wrote earlier this month."

"The stunning conclusion indicates that the bank believes the planet is hurtling toward a future in which severe droughts and harvest failures become widespread, sea-level rise is measured in feet rather than inches and tropical regions experience episodes of extreme heat and humidity for weeks at a time."

"Morgan Stanley’s climate forecast was tucked into a mundane research report on the future of air conditioning stocks, which it provided to clients on March 17."

https://www.eenews.net/articles/big-banks-predict-catastrophic-warming-with-profit-potential/

h/t @ai6yr
#GlobalWarming #Climate #ClimateChange #Capitalism #Banking

Big banks predict catastrophic warming, with profit potential - E&E News by POLITICO

Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan and an international banking group have quietly concluded that climate change will likely exceed the Paris Agreement's 2 degree

^{Corbin Hiar (E&E News by POLITICO)}

The news has been more than a bit grim of late, so hooray for Carbon Brief providing some genuine and really meaningful **good** news: the UK's carbon emissions in 2024 were the lowest since 1872, because demand for fossil fuels just keeps decreasing.

https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-uk-emissions-fall-3-6-in-2024-as-coal-use-drops-to-lowest-since-1666/

#climate #GHG #science #GoodNews

A beaver dam in British Columbia shows its ability to hold back sediment pollution during heavy rainfall, sediment damages freshwater habitat.

Two pairs of beavers are making a new home in Studland #UK unrestricted by fences or enclosures. This reintroduction follows the government's decision to allow wild populations return to England's rivers & wetlands. #Wales needs them too.

#hedgesandedges - #trees & #nature reducing floods, restoring nature & #climate

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwygxvzpkevo

Rice causes ~12% of methane emissions or 1.5% of global greenhouse gas emissions.

Researchers in China and Sweden cross-bred a variety which could reduce CH4 by 70% while doubling yields!

But it won't grow everywhere, and the scientists have just started registering it.

https://grist.org/food-and-agriculture/rice-paddies-methane-new-variety/

#Food #Climate #Methane #Farming #Rice #Science #China #Sweden

Rice paddies, like cows, spew methane. A new variety makes them a lot less gassy.

Rice plants are a big source of methane, a potent greenhouse gas. Scientists just developed a strain that cuts those emissions by 70 percent.

^{Matt Simon (Grist)}

“We prefer your extinction to the loss of our job.”

#Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #Capitalism

Net zero by 2050 — a great idea! 🙄

#Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #BusinessAsUsual

🙄 Another day, another lying capitalist corporation. (Capitalists, of course, always lie.)

This time it's Coca-Cola, reneging on their "pledge" to cut back on plastic waste and pollution. But we know they never intended to do that. It was an empty promise, a phony slogan to make themselves look good while continuing to rake in profits. A classic example of #greenwashing.
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Despite growing public scrutiny and legal challenges over its use of plastic, Coca-Cola appears to be moving backward on packaging sustainability.

Earlier this decade, the soda giant publicly pledged to decrease its use of virgin plastic and boost the share of its beverages sold in reusable containers. But in a blog post last week, the company quietly dropped those targets.

Coke’s announcement is part of a broader trend of companies walking back or falling short of their plastics sustainability targets. Last month, a progress report from the Ellen MacArthur Foundation showed that hundreds of companies had collectively fallen short of the progress needed to meet a range of voluntary plastics commitments by 2025.
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FULL STORY -- https://grist.org/accountability/coca-cola-virgin-plastic-reuse-sustainability-targets-ellen-macarthur-foundation/

#Economics #Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #Pollution

In the least surprising news of the day, we find that UN-sponsored talks aimed at producing a treaty to reduce plastic production and pollution have failed. 🙁
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Countries negotiating a global treaty to curb plastic pollution failed to reach agreement, with more than 100 nations wanting to cap production while a handful of oil producers were prepared only to target plastic waste.

Delegates remained far apart on the basic scope of a treaty and could agree only to postpone key decisions and to resume talks at a later date.

Plastic production is on track to triple by 2050, and microplastics have been found in the air, in fresh produce, and in human breast milk.

China, the United States, India, South Korea, and Saudi Arabia were the top five plastic-producing nations in 2023.
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FULL STORY -- https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/over-100-countries-back-plastic-treaty-caps-talks-reach-fierce-finish-2024-11-30/
SEE ALSO -- https://www.politico.eu/article/un-plastic-treaty-talks-end-without-a-deal/

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#Politics #Economics #Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #Capitalism #BusinessAsUsual

There's no rush, no reason to panic. Everything is fine. #COP29

#Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #ClimateEmergency

Google and Microsoft recently admitted their emissions are soaring as they build out data centers to power the AI boom.

But new analysis from The Guardian suggests the data center emissions of Google, Meta, Microsoft, and Apple are 662% higher than the companies reporting.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2024/sep/15/data-center-gas-emissions-tech

#tech #ai #datacenters #microsoft #google #apple #meta #climate

Data center emissions probably 662% higher than big tech claims. Can it keep up the ruse?

Emissions from in-house data centers of Google, Microsoft, Meta and Apple may be 7.62 times higher than official figures

^{Guardian staff reporter (The Guardian)}

In the news, we find that it's Business As Usual for Shell Oil — which means both polluting our atmosphere with greenhouse gases AND polluting our political system with disinformation. 😠
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A US foundation associated with the oil company Shell has donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to religious right and conservative organizations, many of which deny that climate change is a crisis, tax records reveal.

Fourteen of those groups are on the advisory board of Project 2025, a conservative blueprint proposing radical changes to the federal government, including severely limiting the Environment Protection Agency.
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FULL STORY -- https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/aug/15/shell-oil-project-2025-climate-crisis

#Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #Politics #Capitalism #BusinessAsUsual