Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.
This week
Biden’s ‘climate legacy’
BIDEN OUT: US energy policy expert Jason Bordoff was among commentators reacting to the news that Joe Biden has withdrawn from the 2024 presidential race, telling Axios that he will “leave office with the strongest record on climate change of any president in US history”. The Associated Press reported that the Environmental Protection Agency announced $4.3bn in funding this week for decarbonisation efforts across 30 states. The timing of the grants will “ensure Biden’s environmental legacy will remain intact”, Inside Climate News said.
STILL OFF TRACK: Despite Biden’s efforts, the US remains off track for its Paris Agreement pledge of halving emissions from 2005 levels by 2030, according to a new report from US thinktank Rhodium Group, covered by the Financial Times. Rhodium’s analysis suggests the US would only reach 32-43% reductions by 2030, despite a record $71bn of clean energy investment in the first quarter of 2024. The Guardian covered how the US became the world’s biggest oil and gas producer, noting that no other country has ever produced as much of the fossil fuels.
KAMALA IN?: The New York Times is among publications examining the climate record of Kamala Harris, current vice-president and Biden’s most likely successor in the presidential race. “Harris has for years made the environment a top concern,” the newspaper said. The Guardian noted that, when Harris ran for the Democratic presidential primary in 2019, she promoted a “green agenda that was more ambitious than Biden’s, including calling for a carbon tax, a ban on fracking on public lands and a $10tn investment” to help combat climate change.
Global burning
NORTH AMERICA ON FIRE: Biden’s departure from the presidential race comes as US firefighters continue to battle wildfires in Utah and California amid blistering heat, the Guardian reported. NBC News noted that wildfires are also raging across Oregon and Washington, as well as across the border in Alberta, Canada. Fires forced 25,000 people to evacuate the tourist town of Jasper in Alberta, where flames have reached as high as 100 metres, the New York Times reported.
EUROPE ON FIRE: Parts of Europe are also battling blazes, with Greece facing its “most difficult wildfire season in two decades”, according to Bloomberg. There were 30 wildfires reported within a 24-hour period through last Sunday, it added. At least 20 wildfires were also reported in North Macedonia, with firefighters from neighbouring countries called in to help, according to Euronews.
Around the world
- FOSSIL CLIMATE FUNDS: Azerbaijan, host of the COP29 climate summit in November, is setting up a “Climate Finance Action Fund”, which will take money from fossil-fuel producing countries and companies in order to finance climate action in the global south, Reuters reported.
- ALTÉRRA-IA MOTIVE: Climate Home News reported on how money from a $30bn climate fund set up by COP28 host UAE, known as ALTÉRRA, has been used to help finance a gas pipeline project in the US.
- CLIMATE HYPOCRISY: A Guardian exclusive revealed how five wealthy countries are responsible for the majority of the new oil and gas licences handed out in 2024, with these projects due to emit 12bn tonnes of CO2 over their lifetimes. UN chief Antonio Guterres responded to the news by saying rich nations “are signing away our future”, reported Inside Climate News.
- WORST OIL SPILL: An oil tanker carrying 1.4m litres of oil capsized off the coast of the Philippines, with the country’s coast guard saying it “would be the worst oil spill in Philippine history if it were to leak”, reported the Inquirer.
- SA CLIMATE BILL: South Africa’s president Cyril Ramaphosa signed a new climate change bill into law this week, reported the Citizen. The bill introduces a regulatory framework for climate mitigation and adaptation, something that had been lacking up to now.
- ETHIOPIA MUDSLIDES: At least 229 people have been killed in mudslides triggered by heavy rains in Ethiopia, Al Jazeera reported.
17.15C
The global temperature on Monday 22 July, which was likely the hottest day in human history, according to Carbon Brief’s latest “state of the climate” update.
Latest climate research
- A study in Nature Climate Change showed that only 8% and 53% of African nations’ nationally determined contributions (NDCs) and national adaptation plans (NAPs), respectively, provide sufficient baselines for tracking progress on climate adaptation.
- The current “science-based” climate targets that have been adopted by companies across the world suffer from three issues: “basic misrepresentation”; “narrow and arbitrary benchmarks”; and “unequal effort sharing in an unequal world”. This makes them in need of reform, argued a comment piece published in Nature Communications Nature and Environment.
- A Nature study found that as well as absorbing carbon dioxide, trees also absorb methane from the atmosphere through their bark, making them more effective in absorbing greenhouse gases than previously thought.
(For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)
Captured
The Paris 2024 Olympics officially start today and these Games are likely to be the hottest ever, with the organisers attempting to mitigate impacts from the likely heatwaves. Carbon Brief analysis shows that the greenhouse gas emissions from these Games are expected to be less than half of those from London 2012. The Paris organisers have explicitly set a carbon budget of 1.75m tonnes of CO2 equivalent (which is half of the average of London 2012 and Rio 2016) and, according to their latest estimates, they are set to meet this target with total emissions coming in at 1.58m tonnes. Organisers said they had aimed to reduce emissions through use of temporary and low-carbon construction materials, as well as by encouraging sustainable travel. The Paris total is set to be even lower than the emissions from the Tokyo 2020 games held in 2021, when emissions were significantly reduced due to a ban on spectators amid the Covid-19 pandemic. The emissions figures exclude any carbon offsets and, for Rio 2016, do not include emissions from legacy construction.
Spotlight
Life in Louisiana’s ‘Cancer Alley’
This week, Carbon Brief interviews Dr Joy Banner, co-founder and co-director of the Descendants Project, about her work trying to uplift Black communities in the face of industrial pollution and increasing climate impacts.
Banner is based in a region along the Mississippi River in Louisiana known as “Cancer Alley”. It is so named due to the high prominence of cancer, which has been linked to local industrial air pollution from the area’s 150 industrial plants. These plants contributed 66% of Louisiana’s greenhouse gas emissions in 2020.
Levels of the carcinogen ethylene oxide, used in plastics production, were found to be 1,000 times higher than safe levels in the region. The health impacts disproportionately affect Black communities. This has been labelled by the UN as a form of “environmental racism”.
Banner’s organisation, the Descendants Project, aims to raise awareness of how Black communities in the region are “descended from the enslaved men, women and children who were forced to labour at plantations”, many of which were purchased by “large industrial petrochemical plants” fromin the 1970s onwards.
Carbon Brief: How would you say that your work relates to petrochemicals and climate change?
Joy Banner: To be honest, when we first started the Descendents Project…we didn’t see it as intersecting our work. But, pretty early on, Jo [co-founder and Joy’s sister] was invited to a conference in Texas, which is another location where there is a proliferation of petrochemical development. That work brought to mind the environmental issues that we are having in Louisiana. So, we are known as “Cancer Alley”, because of the health consequences of having so much industry right on top of us. Our cancer risk is 95% higher than the rest of the country. And the reason why we have so much production is plastics – and plastics is petrochemical[s] and so I guess I didn’t put two and two together [until then].
CB: The carbon emissions released in the production of plastics is having a global impact, but what are the kind of local impacts that you’re seeing in your community?
JB: I don’t know the statistics of how much [petrochemical production in] the Gulf Coast region is impacting climate overall, but it’s not insignificant at all. But, it’s just, for us, we are inundated with the smells. You can taste it, you can feel it, you can see it, you can hear it. It takes over your senses. And the other side of it is the impact that is happening to our climate and the way it’s impacting the strength of the hurricanes and the storm systems that are coming through…Our storms are getting worse. Those hurricanes are getting worse. And the impact of those storms are having more dire consequences.
CB: What are things that you’re trying to do [through the Descendants Project]?
JB: One of the strategies…[is] this dependence that we feel that we have on industries is false. It’s an illusion, it’s not actually a dependence because the plants are not doing s**t for us. Excuse my language, they really are not. Like they’re making billions of dollars. And why, if they’re so rich, then why are we in an impoverished community? Why do we have food deserts? Why are our school systems not better? And so, so our work is breaking that illusion, educating people and getting them to the point where they’re asking questions…We’re just strategising and highlighting the ways in which our communities are doing things for ourselves.
Watch, read, listen
BATTERY DEMANDS: A new report from the US thinktank RMI explored future demand for batteries and the critical raw minerals required to make them.
NOT SO RARE: The podcast BBC Rare Earth explored whether the rise in wildfires around the world is unstoppable and whether the solutions might be found through applying Indigenous fire management practices.
JAILED PROTEST: George Monbiot appeared on Guardian’s Science Weekly podcast to discuss the record-long jail terms for non-violent protest given to five Just Stop Oil activists for planning the blocking of a motorway in the UK.
Coming up
- 27 July-2 August: 61st session of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Sofia, Bulgaria
- 28 July: Venezuelan presidential elections
- 29 July-2 August: International Seabed Authority Assembly, second part of the 29th session, Kingston, Jamaica
- 30 July-1 August: UN Environment Programme Dialogue on Actionable Steps for Inclusive Climate Resilience Monitoring and Reporting, online
Pick of the jobs
- International Energy Agency, China programme officer | Salary: €5,741 per month. Location: Paris
- Internews, environmental media consultant – Middle East North Africa | Salary: Unknown. Location: Remote (based in UK or Tunisia)
- Earth Journalism Network, virtual reporting fellowships to the UNCBD (COP16) and UNFCCC (COP29) | Salary: $100 communications stipend
- Reuters Institute, Oxford Climate Journalism Network Engagement Manager | Salary: £32,332-£38,205. Location: Oxford, UK
DeBriefed is edited by Daisy Dunne. Please send any tips or feedback to debriefed@carbonbrief.org.
This is an online version of Carbon Brief’s weekly DeBriefed email newsletter. Subscribe for free here.
The post DeBriefed 26 July 2024: Biden’s ‘climate legacy’; Global wildfires; Life in Louisiana’s ‘Cancer Alley’ appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Climate Change
DeBriefed 15 August 2025: Raging wildfires; Xi’s priorities; Factchecking the Trump climate report
Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.
This week
Blazing heat hits Europe
FANNING THE FLAMES: Wildfires “fanned by a heatwave and strong winds” caused havoc across southern Europe, Reuters reported. It added: “Fire has affected nearly 440,000 hectares (1,700 square miles) in the eurozone so far in 2025, double the average for the same period of the year since 2006.” Extreme heat is “breaking temperature records across Europe”, the Guardian said, with several countries reporting readings of around 40C.
HUMAN TOLL: At least three people have died in the wildfires erupting across Spain, Turkey and Albania, France24 said, adding that the fires have “displaced thousands in Greece and Albania”. Le Monde reported that a child in Italy “died of heatstroke”, while thousands were evacuated from Spain and firefighters “battled three large wildfires” in Portugal.
UK WILDFIRE RISK: The UK saw temperatures as high as 33.4C this week as England “entered its fourth heatwave”, BBC News said. The high heat is causing “nationally significant” water shortfalls, it added, “hitting farms, damaging wildlife and increasing wildfires”. The Daily Mirror noted that these conditions “could last until mid-autumn”. Scientists warn the UK faces possible “firewaves” due to climate change, BBC News also reported.
Around the world
- GRID PRESSURES: Iraq suffered a “near nationwide blackout” as elevated power demand – due to extreme temperatures of around 50C – triggered a transmission line failure, Bloomberg reported.
- ‘DIRE’ DOWN UNDER: The Australian government is keeping a climate risk assessment that contains “dire” implications for the continent “under wraps”, the Australian Financial Review said.
- EXTREME RAINFALL: Mexico City is “seeing one of its heaviest rainy seasons in years”, the Washington Post said. Downpours in the Japanese island of Kyushu “caused flooding and mudslides”, according to Politico. In Kashmir, flash floods killed 56 and left “scores missing”, the Associated Press said.
- SOUTH-SOUTH COOPERATION: China and Brazil agreed to “ensure the success” of COP30 in a recent phone call, Chinese state news agency Xinhua reported.
- PLASTIC ‘DEADLOCK’: Talks on a plastic pollution treaty have failed again at a summit in Geneva, according to the Guardian, with countries “deadlocked” on whether it should include “curbs on production and toxic chemicals”.
15
The number of times by which the most ethnically-diverse areas in England are more likely to experience extreme heat than its “least diverse” areas, according to new analysis by Carbon Brief.
Latest climate research
- As many as 13 minerals critical for low-carbon energy may face shortages under 2C pathways | Nature Climate Change
- A “scoping review” examined the impact of climate change on poor sexual and reproductive health and rights in sub-Saharan Africa | PLOS One
- A UK university cut the carbon footprint of its weekly canteen menu by 31% “without students noticing” | Nature Food
(For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)
Captured
Factchecking Trump’s climate report
A report commissioned by the US government to justify rolling back climate regulations contains “at least 100 false or misleading statements”, according to a Carbon Brief factcheck involving dozens of leading climate scientists. The report, compiled in two months by five hand-picked researchers, inaccurately claims that “CO2-induced warming might be less damaging economically than commonly believed” and misleadingly states that “excessively aggressive [emissions] mitigation policies could prove more detrimental than beneficial”80
Spotlight
Does Xi Jinping care about climate change?
This week, Carbon Brief unpacks new research on Chinese president Xi Jinping’s policy priorities.
On this day in 2005, Xi Jinping, a local official in eastern China, made an unplanned speech when touring a small village – a rare occurrence in China’s highly-choreographed political culture.
In it, he observed that “lucid waters and lush mountains are mountains of silver and gold” – that is, the environment cannot be sacrificed for the sake of growth.
(The full text of the speech is not available, although Xi discussed the concept in a brief newspaper column – see below – a few days later.)
In a time where most government officials were laser-focused on delivering economic growth, this message was highly unusual.
Forward-thinking on environment
As a local official in the early 2000s, Xi endorsed the concept of “green GDP”, which integrates the value of natural resources and the environment into GDP calculations.
He also penned a regular newspaper column, 22 of which discussed environmental protection – although “climate change” was never mentioned.
This focus carried over to China’s national agenda when Xi became president.
New research from the Asia Society Policy Institute tracked policies in which Xi is reported by state media to have “personally” taken action.
It found that environmental protection is one of six topics in which he is often said to have directly steered policymaking.
Such policies include guidelines to build a “Beautiful China”, the creation of an environmental protection inspection team and the “three-north shelterbelt” afforestation programme.
“It’s important to know what Xi’s priorities are because the top leader wields outsized influence in the Chinese political system,” Neil Thomas, Asia Society Policy Institute fellow and report co-author, told Carbon Brief.
Local policymakers are “more likely” to invest resources in addressing policies they know have Xi’s attention, to increase their chances for promotion, he added.
What about climate and energy?
However, the research noted, climate and energy policies have not been publicised as bearing Xi’s personal touch.
“I think Xi prioritises environmental protection more than climate change because reducing pollution is an issue of social stability,” Thomas said, noting that “smoggy skies and polluted rivers” were more visible and more likely to trigger civil society pushback than gradual temperature increases.
The paper also said topics might not be linked to Xi personally when they are “too technical” or “politically sensitive”.
For example, Xi’s landmark decision for China to achieve carbon neutrality by 2060 is widely reported as having only been made after climate modelling – facilitated by former climate envoy Xie Zhenhua – showed that this goal was achievable.
Prior to this, Xi had never spoken publicly about carbon neutrality.
Prof Alex Wang, a University of California, Los Angeles professor of law not involved in the research, noted that emphasising Xi’s personal attention may signal “top” political priorities, but not necessarily Xi’s “personal interests”.
By not emphasising climate, he said, Xi may be trying to avoid “pushing the system to overprioritise climate to the exclusion of the other priorities”.
There are other ways to know where climate ranks on the policy agenda, Thomas noted:
“Climate watchers should look at what Xi says, what Xi does and what policies Xi authorises in the name of the ‘central committee’. Is Xi talking more about climate? Is Xi establishing institutions and convening meetings that focus on climate? Is climate becoming a more prominent theme in top-level documents?”
Watch, read, listen
TRUMP EFFECT: The Columbia Energy Exchange podcast examined how pressure from US tariffs could affect India’s clean energy transition.
NAMIBIAN ‘DESTRUCTION’: The National Observer investigated the failure to address “human rights abuses and environmental destruction” claims against a Canadian oil company in Namibia.
‘RED AI’: The Network for the Digital Economy and the Environment studied the state of current research on “Red AI”, or the “negative environmental implications of AI”.
Coming up
- 17 August: Bolivian general elections
- 18-29 August: Preparatory talks on the entry into force of the “High Seas Treaty”, New York
- 18-22 August: Y20 Summit, Johannesburg
- 21 August: Advancing the “Africa clean air programme” through Africa-Asia collaboration, Yokohama
Pick of the jobs
- Lancaster Environment Centre, senior research associate: JUST Centre | Salary: £39,355-£45,413. Location: Lancaster, UK
- Environmental Justice Foundation, communications and media officer, Francophone Africa | Salary: XOF600,000-XOF800,000. Location: Dakar, Senegal
- Politico, energy & climate editor | Salary: Unknown. Location: Brussels, Belgium
- EnviroCatalysts, meteorologist | Salary: Unknown. Location: New Delhi, India
DeBriefed is edited by Daisy Dunne. Please send any tips or feedback to debriefed@carbonbrief.org.
This is an online version of Carbon Brief’s weekly DeBriefed email newsletter. Subscribe for free here.
The post DeBriefed 15 August 2025: Raging wildfires; Xi’s priorities; Factchecking the Trump climate report appeared first on Carbon Brief.
DeBriefed 15 August 2025: Raging wildfires; Xi’s priorities; Factchecking the Trump climate report
Climate Change
New York Already Denied Permits to These Gas Pipelines. Under Trump, They Could Get Greenlit
The specter of a “gas-for-wind” compromise between the governor and the White House is drawing the ire of residents as a deadline looms.
Hundreds of New Yorkers rallied against new natural gas pipelines in their state as a deadline loomed for the public to comment on a revived proposal to expand the gas pipeline that supplies downstate New York.
New York Already Denied Permits to These Gas Pipelines. Under Trump, They Could Get Greenlit
A “critical assessment” report commissioned by the Trump administration to justify a rollback of US climate regulations contains at least 100 false or misleading statements, according to a Carbon Brief factcheck involving dozens of leading climate scientists.
The report – “A critical review of impacts of greenhouse gas emissions on the US climate” – was published by the US Department of Energy (DoE) on 23 July, just days before the government laid out plans to revoke a scientific finding used as the legal basis for emissions regulation.
The executive summary of the controversial report inaccurately claims that “CO2-induced warming might be less damaging economically than commonly believed”.
It also states misleadingly that “excessively aggressive [emissions] mitigation policies could prove more detrimental than beneficial”.
Compiled in just two months by five “independent” researchers hand-selected by the climate-sceptic US secretary of energy Chris Wright, the document has sparked fierce criticism from climate scientists, who have pointed to factual errors, misrepresentation of research, messy citations and the cherry-picking of data.
Experts have also noted the authors’ track record of promoting views at odds with the mainstream understanding of climate science.
Wright’s department claims the report – which is currently open to public comment as part of a 30-day review – underwent an “internal peer-review period amongst [the] DoE’s scientific research community”.
The report is designed to provide a scientific underpinning to one flank of the Trump administration’s plans to rescind a finding that serves as the legal prerequisite for federal emissions regulation. (The second flank is about legal authority to regulate emissions.)
The “endangerment finding” – enacted by the Obama administration in 2009 – states that six greenhouse gases are contributing to the net-negative impacts of climate change and, thus, put the public in danger.
In a press release on 29 July, the US Environmental Protection Agency said “updated studies and information” set out in the new report would “challenge the assumptions” of the 2009 finding.
Carbon Brief asked a wide range of climate scientists, including those cited in the “critical review” itself, to factcheck the report’s various claims and statements.
The post Factcheck: Trump’s climate report includes more than 100 false or misleading claims appeared first on Carbon Brief.
https://www.carbonbrief.org/factcheck-trumps-climate-report-includes-more-than-100-false-or-misleading-claims/
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