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by Natalie HANDEL PARIS, France (AFP) — From a summer of fire and record floods, to freak frosts and locusts invasions, experts say man-made climate change is wreaking havoc on the world’s weather. Here are some of the most devastating climate-fuelled disasters from the past two years: Mediterranean on fire Greece’s worst heatwave in decades fuelled deadly wildfires that burned nearly 100,000 hectares (250,000 acres) this year in what the prime minister called the country’s […]
by Laurent Lozano Agence France-Presse SAINT-LOUIS, Senegal (AFP) – In the northern Senegalese city of Saint-Louis, excavators are ripping up the beach to lay giant blocks of basalt, in an eleventh-hour effort to keep the sea at bay. When work is finished, a black sea wall will stretch for kilometres along the coastline of the West African country’s former capital, famed for its colonial-era architecture. Dire warnings about the risk of rising sea levels due […]
by Stéphane ORJOLLET Agence France-Presse PARIS, France (AFP) – Half a degree Celsius may not seem like much, but climate experts say a world that has warmed 1.5 degrees Celsius above 19th-century levels compared to 2C could be the difference between life and death. A 2C Earth would see the number of people facing extreme heat waves more than double. A quarter of a billion more people would face water shortages. The Arctic Ocean will […]
by Margioni BERMÚDEZ Agence France-Presse VENEZUELA (AFP) – Congo Mirador was once an idyllic spot: a community of homes on stilts that seemed to float on the calm waters of a lagoon in western Venezuela. Now, the community is inundated with mud, a victim of silt generated by the Catatumbo river. Most of its residents have left, and Congo Mirador is slowly fading away. The river’s source is in Colombia, and it flows into Venezuela’s […]
by Amélie BOTTOLLIER-DEPOIS Agence France-Presse MILAN, Italy (AFP) – The forthcoming COP26 summit — which could determine the viability of the Paris Agreement — will “not be easy” but an outcome matching the urgency of the crisis is an “absolute necessity”, the UN’s climate chief said Wednesday. As the world faces stronger and more frequent droughts, wildfires, flooding and storm surges made worse as the planet warms, the COP26 summit in Glasgow is being billed […]
VIENNA, Austria (AFP) – OPEC said Tuesday it expects oil demand to rise between now and 2045, and remain the dominant source of energy despite warnings that it must fall to combat climate change. The cartel’s world oil outlook goes against the vision of the International Energy Agency, which warned in May that demand must fall over the next decades for the world to meet its climate goals. Oil demand and prices fell sharply as […]
MILAN, Italy (AFP) – Swedish activist Greta Thunberg opened a youth climate summit on Tuesday by lambasting three decades of government inaction, accusing world leaders of having “drowned” future generations with “empty words and promises”. Speaking weeks ahead of a crunch UN climate meeting in Glasgow, Thunberg accused governments of “shamelessly congratulating themselves” for insufficient pledges to cut emissions and promises of financing. Hurling leaders’ own words back at them, the 18-year-old laid bare to […]
SYDNEY, Australia (AFP) – Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, under pressure to adopt a 2050 net-zero carbon emissions target, said in an interview published Monday that he may not join this year’s landmark UN climate summit in Glasgow. The world’s biggest coal exporter by value, and still reliant on fossil fuels for most of its electricity, Australia has not made a firm commitment on its own greenhouse gas reductions. Morrison has vowed to mine and […]
by Paula RAMON Agence France-Presse LOS ANGELES, California (AFP) – The so-far successful battle this month in California to save the world’s biggest trees from ever-worsening forest blazes seems to offer an important lesson: You can fight fire with fire. Human-caused climate change has made the western United States hotter, drier and more vulnerable to increasingly destructive wildfires, which have this year taken a horrific toll on the region’s forests. That has included threatening huge […]
by Deborah COLE Agence France-Presse BERLIN, Germany (AFP) – With growing fears about global warming, deadly floods linked to climate change and a new political landscape as Angela Merkel leaves the stage, it should have been the German Greens’ year. After launching their campaign for Sunday’s general election in the spring with a youthful, energetic candidate in Annalena Baerbock, the sky seemed to be the limit — perhaps even taking the chancellery. But although Germany […]
by Deborah COLE Agence France-Presse BERLIN, Germany (AFP) – Tens of thousands of climate activists including Greta Thunberg are due to descend on German cities Friday ahead of the weekend general election to crank up the pressure on the candidates to succeed Angela Merkel. As Germany’s top parties hold final rallies ahead of Sunday’s vote, the Fridays for Future youth marches will make the case that the political class has let down the younger generation. […]
UNITED NATIONS, United States (AFP) – US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Thursday urged all countries to raise their climate ambitions as the UN Security Council took up the environmental crisis, warning that it is aggravating conflicts. Blinken pointed to recent record rains in New York that contributed to dozens of deaths and said climate has aggravated conflicts in countries including Syria, Mali, Yemen, South Sudan and Ethiopia. “The climate crisis isn’t coming. It’s […]
