Ahead of Donald Trump’s second term as US president, a rerun of his first trade war with China is firmly on the cards – and minerals key to the energy transition may end up in the crossfire.
The president-elect has threatened to raise tariffs on goods from China, as well as on other countries through which Chinese goods flow to the US.
While his overall stance towards China remains unclear, Trump has also pinpointed eliminating “dependence on China in all critical areas” as a priority.
Meanwhile, China has been developing a “versatile” policy toolkit to cope with rising trade tensions – including with the EU and Japan, as well as the US.
One notable recent example is China’s use of export controls, which it has placed on four minerals: germanium, gallium, graphite and antimony.
All of these minerals play important roles in low-carbon technologies, but also have other applications, including military uses.
Analysis by Carbon Brief and others shows that China’s initial export controls, introduced in summer 2023, did not have a sustained impact on critical-mineral supply chains.
However, an announcement in early December 2024 of stricter controls, specifically on exports to the US, has sparked debate over how impactful these might be.
In this article, Carbon Brief examines what US-China tensions over critical minerals could mean for the stability of their supply chains and for the transition to cleaner energy.
- Which minerals are important to the clean-energy transition?
- How has China’s ability to control its critical minerals evolved?
- How did the initial export bans affect critical mineral trade flows?
- Do the US-specific controls represent a significant change in China’s strategy?
- Could future US-China tensions exacerbate critical mineral controls?
Which minerals are important to the clean-energy transition?
Minerals are crucial to the development of several low-carbon technologies.
Indium and gallium are used in the coatings for solar panels, copper and “rare earth” metals are used in the conductors and permanent magnets in wind turbines, and a plethora of minerals from lithium to manganese are used in various types of batteries.
China holds a significant presence in the supply chains for many minerals – particularly in terms of processing. As seen in the table below, more than half of global extraction of graphite, rare-earth elements (REEs) and vanadium, as well as the majority of processing of aluminium, cobalt, graphite, indium, lithium, REEs and silicon, occurs in China, according to a study by the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment.
A list of several minerals important for low-carbon technologies, plus the share that China holds in its reserves, extraction and processing industries. Source: Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment.
However, not all of these materials are considered “critical minerals”, which is a political term used to describe those that play a role in strategically important sectors, with each country setting their own parameters for strategic importance.
The US lists 50 minerals as critical, while the EU has identified 34 critical minerals and an additional 16 “strategic raw materials”, while Japan has 35 minerals on its list.
Although China has not updated its official critical minerals list since 2016, a November 2023 post on the official WeChat account of the Ministry of State Security (MSS) revealed that it considers at least 31 minerals to be critical.
The post compares areas of overlap and divergence between the critical mineral listings of China (orange), and those in the EU (green) or the US (blue).
The diagram above shows a non-comprehensive list of minerals that the US (red), EU (grey) and China (blue) consider to be critical minerals, with minerals featured on two or more countries’ lists placed in the corresponding overlapping section. Source: Ministry of State Security, translated by Carbon Brief.
The minerals that are “on similar lists” for China and the EU and US are “where there's more competition” when it comes to sourcing, John Johnson, special advisor and former CEO for commodities consulting firm CRU Group’s China office, tells Carbon Brief.
However, despite some countries’ efforts to diversify their imports of critical minerals away from China, analysis by the International Energy Agency (IEA) found that, based on announced projects, the status quo for supply of minerals such as lithium, nickel, cobalt and graphite was unlikely to change between now and 2030.
The IEA analysis noted that, in some areas, such as battery cell manufacturing, “announced capacity additions in Europe and the US should be sufficient to meet the 2030 domestic deployment needs” – although it added that, globally, demand for a number of critical minerals is likely to far exceed supply.
However, Tony Alderson, a senior analyst focused on graphite at price reporting agency Benchmark Minerals Intelligence, is sceptical, telling Carbon Brief that “it's almost unheard of for a facility to be at 100% utilisation rates”. He adds that, for graphite, demand in the US and EU would likely outstrip supply well beyond 2030.
How has China’s ability to control its critical minerals evolved?
China has a well-documented history of using trade restrictions to achieve broader political aims.
The first trade war with the US between 2016 and 2020 saw China try to deescalate US tariffs on Chinese goods by imposing tariffs of its own, as well as non-tariff trade barriers.
The country has also used trade controls to affect non-trade-related political clashes.
Under the Biden administration, the US developed a “small yard, high fence” approach – meaning the US would “be selective in choosing technologies that need protecting, but be aggressive in safeguarding them”.
It placed a series of export controls on semiconductors and products used to make them, encouraging allies such as Japan and the Netherlands to do the same.
In response, China began limiting exports of some critical minerals, placing restrictions in August 2023 on exports of certain types of gallium and germanium, followed by similar restrictions on graphite from December 2023 and on antimony from September 2024.
With the exception of antimony, these restrictions were enacted in a clear response to US moves to curb Chinese imports for use in its semiconductor sector.
At the same time, China began enhancing its export control regime, which unified and rationalised an existing constellation of export control policies into a single framework.
This included development of an “unreliable entity list”, an export control law, legislation to counter foreign sanctions and regulation of items that are considered “dual-use”, meaning they can be used for military as well as civilian purposes.
“Historically, [China’s] export control regime has been extremely piecemeal,” Cory Combs, head of critical mineral and supply chain research at consultancy Trivium China, tells Carbon Brief.
He adds that one of the recent policy push’s major aims was to improve compliance by “making sure everything's in one place and the rules are consistent – that you don't have slightly different standards for different types of controls”.
These efforts paved the way to restrictions on critical minerals being intensified in early December 2024, when China sharpened restrictions on exporting graphite and banned exports of gallium, germanium and antimony to the US “in principle”.
A spokesperson from China’s commerce ministry stated this was in response to the US “weaponising” its own export controls by imposing broad restrictions on the Chinese chip-making industry.
How did the initial export bans affect critical mineral trade flows?
Analysis of China’s initial export controls on gallium, graphite and germanium shows that trade largely continued to flow, despite the new rules.
As shown in the graphs compiled by Carbon Brief below, Chinese exports of restricted types of gallium and germanium stopped for two months after the August restrictions came into effect. However, exports resumed from October 2023, albeit at slightly lower levels.
Not all types of the targeted critical minerals seemed to have been affected by the two-month suspension, with flows of non-controlled products, such as germanium oxides, seeing no significant change.
For graphite, exports of major products remained relatively stable, with the exception of a spike in exports ahead of the restrictions coming into place, likely due to stockpiling. Average exports in 2024 were higher than in 2022.
Both Combs and Johnson both note that, anecdotally, they had not heard of any cases of exporters being unable to acquire licences to export products.
Alderson tells Carbon Brief that exporters, nevertheless, found that the approvals were particularly quick for South Korea and Japan, while it took “longer for [products destined for the] US and India to get licenses approved”.
Analysis by the US-based Peterson Institute for International Economics (PIIE) similarly found that, for the US in particular, the export controls on gallium, germanium and graphite “haven’t radically altered the US-China trading relationship around these minerals and related products”, as shown in the graph below.
For graphite (the blue line in the chart), US imports from February to August 2024 were “only a hair lower than in the seven months preceding the announcement of export controls”, it found.
For germanium (black), in 10 months following the enactment of controls, exports were “down only one percentage point from the ten months preceding the ban”, it added. For gallium (red), while exports have fallen to zero, “the chart makes very clear [that] the US was never particularly reliant on China for sourcing in the first place”.
The PIIE analysis concluded in August 2024, ahead of the restrictions on antimony and US-specific controls.
This outcome was likely by design, due to the calculated nature of China’s export controls.
The goal of the initial export controls was to improve China’s visibility of how the minerals it processed were being used, Combs tells Carbon Brief, which is why the initial controls required exporters to apply for licences, rather than implementing a blanket ban on exports.
Alderson says that the new licences required companies to share more information about themselves, their products and their end users.
As such, cutting off supplies to other countries immediately was not the aim of the original announcements.
The initial controls on critical minerals broadly follow similar patterns to China’s previous non-tariff trade measures. With the exception of antimony, the critical mineral controls were imposed in response to perceived attempts to “undermine China’s national sovereignty, security, and development interests”, rather than being the first salvo of a trade dispute.
This is because, according to a Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) report, China is aware that outright export bans would accelerate other nations’ efforts to derisk and diversify supply chains, weakening its long-term position.
The RUSI report added that export controls must be examined to determine whether the move is meant to be a political signal or a more serious attempt at “economic coercion”.
Stringent export controls incur a domestic cost in China, impacting both industrial activity and broader economic growth. As such, export controls are likely to be calibrated to capture headlines without incurring as severe an economic impact as they imply, RUSI said.
A government official involved in the design of the gallium and germanium controls said they were meant to be a “deterrent”, the Financial Times reported, quoting the official saying: “We had many options…This was not our most extreme move.”
An example of China “going for the throat” with export controls, Combs tells Carbon Brief before the US-specific controls were announced, would be placing controls on copper.
He explains this is because – although Chinese copper is a vital resource in global manufacturing, particularly in clean-energy technologies – the majority of copper smelted in China is consumed domestically. As a result, an export control on copper “would be a perfect case of hurting others without hurting itself too much”.
“Instead”, he says, the initial moves seemed to be saying “don’t test us”.
Do the US-specific controls represent a significant change in China’s strategy?
The measures announced in early December 2024 are a pointed escalation of China’s use of critical mineral export controls.
Under the new rules, gallium, germanium and antimony will “in principle” no longer be permitted to be shipped to the US and tighter controls will be placed on sales of graphite.
In an analysis, Combs and Trivium China co-founder Andrew Polk wrote that the restrictions are a signal that China is “ready to counter US moves much more aggressively”.
This was echoed by China’s former central bank governor Yi Gang, who the South China Morning Post quoted saying: “We all understand that, from an economics perspective, [retaliatory actions are] never a good choice…but there’s not much policymakers can do about that [in the face of domestic pressure].”
More time will be needed to see “how strict” implementation will be, Alderson says, adding that for graphite, it is not yet clear which products will be affected – the stricter controls could be limited to “the 99.999% [purity] which goes into military end-use materials”, rather than the lower-grade graphite used in electric vehicle batteries.
Trivium China’s assessment noted that the announcement suggested China would “close” loopholes that allowed for “export leakage”, adding that it is not clear “how far Beijing might go to investigate or punish third countries suspected of prohibited re-exports”.
Gerard di Pippo, senior geoeconomic analyst for Bloomberg Economics, was sceptical about the significance of the threat, writing that “China lacks the legal reach, export-control surveillance capabilities and alliance network” needed to enforce third-country compliance.
Other analysts told MIT Technology Review that, “for the most part, the bans won’t have major economic impacts”, due to existing US efforts to diversify its supply chains
Nevertheless, Alderson says, the current uncertainty underscores the fact that “localisation is critical” for those that rely on critical minerals.
Could future US-China tensions exacerbate critical mineral controls?
China’s motive for the most recent controls is unclear, Combs and Polk wrote. It could be to protest against the US move to restrict exports of particular chips and chip-making tools as well as the addition of 140 Chinese companies to a trade blacklist, they said, or to “warn the incoming Trump administration” against raising tensions.
It is broadly expected that US-China trade tensions will escalate after Donald Trump begins his second term as US president.
US concerns around the “threat” that China poses to its industrial capabilities have been notably bipartisan. However, where Biden’s approach was characterised by relatively nuanced policies, the second Trump administration – much like the first – could prioritise the use of broad tariffs to shrink the US’ trade deficit with China.
Combs tells Carbon Brief that Beijing’s goal is to “change US behaviour”, so it would “use terms that Trump understands”, such as broad trade tariffs, in trade disputes with the US, rather than the more nuanced controls it has used in response to the Biden administration. He explains:
“Most of the [trade volume and value of these] minerals are way too small to affect the trade balance…so purchases of beef, soy and similar items would make more sense as a retaliation mechanism [for China to use].”
It remains to be seen, he says, how much emphasis Trumps’ advisors, particularly new commerce secretary Howard Lutnick, will place on critical minerals. The issue could appear on the radar should Beijing use additional controls to pressure particular US companies to lobby the US government, he adds.
Johnson notes that China has reasons to avoid escalating the issue of critical mineral exports further, such as its dependency on the US for exports of a number of minerals, such as high purity quartz, iron ore and potash.
In addition, he says, the minerals that countries consider critical “change over time”, as new technologies create demand for new minerals and render other minerals obsolete.
Progress in developing recycling processes could also relieve pressure on supply chains. Scrap is already a small source for supply of gallium and germanium, while germanium can also be recovered from existing products.
According to the IEA, successful scaling-up of recycling could “lower the need for new mining activity by 25‑40% by 2050”, under a scenario that assumes governments will meet all of their climate goals on time and in full.
Meanwhile, other regions seem to be treading cautiously. The Washington Post notes that pushback from the Japanese and Dutch governments led to a “delay” in the launch of the most recent US semiconductor export controls, which were watered down to “accommodate” their concerns.
Combs tells Carbon Brief that he does not see any flashpoints significant enough to trigger export controls on critical minerals to the EU.
“[Restricting China’s ability to buy from] ASML was the single most impactful [move against China by the EU],” he says, adding that there are few, if any, remaining political disputes where Europe would willingly trigger “significant retaliation” from China.
The post Q&A: What could a US-China trade war mean for the energy transition? appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Q&A: What could a US-China trade war mean for the energy transition?
Greenhouse Gases
Cropped 25 February 2026: Food inflation strikes | El Niño looms | Biodiversity talks stagnate
We handpick and explain the most important stories at the intersection of climate, land, food and nature over the past fortnight.
This is an online version of Carbon Brief’s fortnightly Cropped email newsletter.
Subscribe for free here.
Key developments
Food inflation on the rise
DELUGE STRIKES FOOD: Extreme rainfall and flooding across the Mediterranean and north Africa has “battered the winter growing regions that feed Europe…threatening food price rises”, reported the Financial Times. Western France has “endured more than 36 days of continuous rain”, while farmers’ associations in Spain’s Andalusia estimate that “20% of all production has been lost”, it added. Policy expert David Barmes told the paper that the “latest storms were part of a wider pattern of climate shocks feeding into food price inflation”.
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NO BEEF: The UK’s beef farmers, meanwhile, “face a double blow” from climate change as “relentless rain forces them to keep cows indoors”, while last summer’s drought hit hay supplies, said another Financial Times article. At the same time, indoor growers in south England described a 60% increase in electricity standing charges as a “ticking timebomb” that could “force them to raise their prices or stop production, which will further fuel food price inflation”, wrote the Guardian.
‘TINDERBOX’ AND TARIFFS: A study, covered by the Guardian, warned that major extreme weather and other “shocks” could “spark social unrest and even food riots in the UK”. Experts cited “chronic” vulnerabilities, including climate change, low incomes, poor farming policy and “fragile” supply chains that have made the UK’s food system a “tinderbox”. A New York Times explainer noted that while trade could once guard against food supply shocks, barriers such as tariffs and export controls – which are being “increasingly” used by politicians – “can shut off that safety valve”.
El Niño looms
NEW ENSO INDEX: Researchers have developed a new index for calculating El Niño, the large-scale climate pattern that influences global weather and causes “billions in damages by bringing floods to some regions and drought to others”, reported CNN. It added that climate change is making it more difficult for scientists to observe El Niño patterns by warming up the entire ocean. The outlet said that with the new metric, “scientists can now see it earlier and our long-range weather forecasts will be improved for it.”
WARMING WARNING: Meanwhile, the US Climate Prediction Center announced that there is a 60% chance of the current La Niña conditions shifting towards a neutral state over the next few months, with an El Niño likely to follow in late spring, according to Reuters. The Vibes, a Malaysian news outlet, quoted a climate scientist saying: “If the El Niño does materialise, it could possibly push 2026 or 2027 as the warmest year on record, replacing 2024.”
CROP IMPACTS: Reuters noted that neutral conditions lead to “more stable weather and potentially better crop yields”. However, the newswire added, an El Niño state would mean “worsening drought conditions and issues for the next growing season” to Australia. El Niño also “typically brings a poor south-west monsoon to India, including droughts”, reported the Hindu’s Business Line. A 2024 guest post for Carbon Brief explained that El Niño is linked to crop failure in south-eastern Africa and south-east Asia.
News and views
- DAM-AG-ES: Several South Korean farmers filed a lawsuit against the country’s state-owned utility company, “seek[ing] financial compensation for climate-related agricultural damages”, reported United Press International. Meanwhile, a national climate change assessment for the Philippines found that the country “lost up to $219bn in agricultural damages from typhoons, floods and droughts” over 2000-10, according to Eco-Business.
- SCORCHED GRASS: South Africa’s Western Cape province is experiencing “one of the worst droughts in living memory”, which is “scorching grass and killing livestock”, said Reuters. The newswire wrote: “In 2015, a drought almost dried up the taps in the city; farmers say this one has been even more brutal than a decade ago.”
- NOUVELLE VEG: New guidelines published under France’s national food, nutrition and climate strategy “urged” citizens to “limit” their meat consumption, reported Euronews. The delayed strategy comes a month after the US government “upended decades of recommendations by touting consumption of red meat and full-fat dairy”, it noted.
- COURTING DISASTER: India’s top green court accepted the findings of a committee that “found no flaws” in greenlighting the Great Nicobar project that “will lead to the felling of a million trees” and translocating corals, reported Mongabay. The court found “no good ground to interfere”, despite “threats to a globally unique biodiversity hotspot” and Indigenous tribes at risk of displacement by the project, wrote Frontline.
- FISH FALLING: A new study found that fish biomass is “falling by 7.2% from as little as 0.1C of warming per decade”, noted the Guardian. While experts also pointed to the role of overfishing in marine life loss, marine ecologist and study lead author Dr Shahar Chaikin told the outlet: “Our research proves exactly what that biological cost [of warming] looks like underwater.”
- TOO HOT FOR COFFEE: According to new analysis by Climate Central, countries where coffee beans are grown “are becoming too hot to cultivate them”, reported the Guardian. The world’s top five coffee-growing countries faced “57 additional days of coffee-harming heat” annually because of climate change, it added.
Spotlight
Nature talks inch forward
This week, Carbon Brief covers the latest round of negotiations under the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), which occurred in Rome over 16-19 February.
The penultimate set of biodiversity negotiations before October’s Conference of the Parties ended in Rome last week, leaving plenty of unfinished business.
The CBD’s subsidiary body on implementation (SBI) met in the Italian capital for four days to discuss a range of issues, including biodiversity finance and reviewing progress towards the nature targets agreed under the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF).
However, many of the major sticking points – particularly around finance – will have to wait until later this summer, leaving some observers worried about the capacity for delegates to get through a packed agenda at COP17.
The SBI, along with the subsidiary body on scientific, technical and technological advice (SBSTTA) will both meet in Nairobi, Kenya, later this summer for a final round of talks before COP17 kicks off in Yerevan, Armenia, on 19 October.
Money talks
Finance for nature has long been a sticking point at negotiations under the CBD.
Discussions on a new fund for biodiversity derailed biodiversity talks in Cali, Colombia, in autumn 2024, requiring resumed talks a few months later.
Despite this, finance was barely on the agenda at the SBI meetings in Rome. Delegates discussed three studies on the relationship between debt sustainability and implementation of nature plans, but the more substantive talks are set to take place at the next SBI meeting in Nairobi.
Several parties “highlighted concerns with the imbalance of work” on finance between these SBI talks and the next ones, reported Earth Negotiations Bulletin (ENB).
Lim Li Ching, senior researcher at Third World Network, noted that tensions around finance permeated every aspect of the talks. She told Carbon Brief:
“If you’re talking about the gender plan of action – if there’s little or no financial resources provided to actually put it into practice and implement it, then it’s [just] paper, right? Same with the reporting requirements and obligations.”
Monitoring and reporting
Closely linked to the issue of finance is the obligations of parties to report on their progress towards the goals and targets of the GBF.
Parties do so through the submission of national reports.
Several parties at the talks pointed to a lack of timely funding for driving delays in their reporting, according to ENB.
A note released by the CBD Secretariat in December said that no parties had submitted their national reports yet; by the time of the SBI meetings, only the EU had. It further noted that just 58 parties had submitted their national biodiversity plans, which were initially meant to be published by COP16, in October 2024.
Linda Krueger, director of biodiversity and infrastructure policy at the environmental not-for-profit Nature Conservancy, told Carbon Brief that despite the sparse submissions, parties are “very focused on the national report preparation”. She added:
“Everybody wants to be able to show that we’re on the path and that there still is a pathway to getting to 2030 that’s positive and largely in the right direction.”
Watch, read, listen
NET LOSS: Nigeria’s marine life is being “threatened” by “ghost gear” – nets and other fishing equipment discarded in the ocean – said Dialogue Earth.
COMEBACK CAUSALITY: A Vox long-read looked at whether Costa Rica’s “payments for ecosystem services” programme helped the country turn a corner on deforestation.
HOMEGROWN GOALS: A Straits Times podcast discussed whether import-dependent Singapore can afford to shelve its goal to produce 30% of its food locally by 2030.
‘RUSTING’ RIVERS: The Financial Times took a closer look at a “strange new force blighting the [Arctic] landscape”: rivers turning rust-orange due to global warming.
New science
- Lakes in the Congo Basin’s peatlands are releasing carbon that is thousands of years old | Nature Geoscience
- Natural non-forest ecosystems – such as grasslands and marshlands – were converted for agriculture at four times the rate of land with tree cover between 2005 and 2020 | Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
- Around one-quarter of global tree-cover loss over 2001-22 was driven by cropland expansion, pastures and forest plantations for commodity production | Nature Food
In the diary
- 2-6 March: UN Food and Agriculture Organization regional conference for Latin America and Caribbean | Brasília
- 5 March: Nepal general elections
- 9-20 March: First part of the thirty-first session of the International Seabed Authority (ISA) | Kingston, Jamaica
Cropped is researched and written by Dr Giuliana Viglione, Aruna Chandrasekhar, Daisy Dunne, Orla Dwyer and Yanine Quiroz.
Please send tips and feedback to cropped@carbonbrief.org
The post Cropped 25 February 2026: Food inflation strikes | El Niño looms | Biodiversity talks stagnate appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Cropped 25 February 2026: Food inflation strikes | El Niño looms | Biodiversity talks stagnate
Rising temperatures across France since the mid-1970s is putting Tour de France competitors at “high risk”, according to new research.
The study, published in Scientific Reports, uses 50 years of climate data to calculate the potential heat stress that athletes have been exposed to across a dozen different locations during the world-famous cycling race.
The researchers find that both the severity and frequency of high-heat-stress events have increased across France over recent decades.
But, despite record-setting heatwaves in France, the heat-stress threshold for safe competition has rarely been breached in any particular city on the day the Tour passed through.
(This threshold was set out by cycling’s international governing body in 2024.)
However, the researchers add it is “only a question of time” until this occurs as average temperatures in France continue to rise.
The lead author of the study tells Carbon Brief that, while the race organisers have been fortunate to avoid major heat stress on race days so far, it will be “harder and harder to be lucky” as extreme heat becomes more common.
‘Iconic’
The Tour de France is one of the world’s most storied cycling races and the oldest of Europe’s three major multi-week cycling competitions, or Grand Tours.
Riders cover around 3,500 kilometres (km) of distance and gain up to nearly 55km of altitude over 21 stages, with only two or three rest days throughout the gruelling race.
The researchers selected the Tour de France because it is the “iconic bike race. It is the bike race of bike races,” says Dr Ivana Cvijanovic, a climate scientist at the French National Research Institute for Sustainable Development, who led the new work.
Heat has become a growing problem for the competition in recent years.
In 2022, Alexis Vuillermoz, a French competitor, collapsed at the finish line of the Tour’s ninth stage, leaving in an ambulance and subsequently pulling out of the race entirely.
Two years later, British cyclist Sir Mark Cavendish vomited on his bike during the first stage of the race after struggling with the 36C heat.
The Tour also makes a good case study because it is almost entirely held during the month of July and, while the route itself changes, there are many cities and stages that are repeated from year to year, Cvijanovic adds.
‘Have to be lucky’
The study focuses on the 50-year span between 1974 and 2023.
The researchers select six locations across the country that have commonly hosted the Tour, from the mountain pass of Col du Tourmalet, in the French Pyrenees, to the city of Paris – where the race finishes, along the Champs-Élysées.
These sites represent a broad range of climatic zones: Alpe d’ Huez, Bourdeaux, Col du Tourmalet, Nîmes, Paris and Toulouse.
For each location, they use meteorological reanalysis data from ERA5 and radiant temperature data from ERA5-HEAT to calculate the “wet-bulb globe temperature” (WBGT) for multiple times of day across the month of July each year.
WBGT is a heat-stress index that takes into account temperature, humidity, wind speed and direct sunlight.
Although there is “no exact scientific consensus” on the best heat-stress index to use, WBGT is “one of the rare indicators that has been originally developed based on the actual human response to heat”, Cvijanovic explains.
It is also the one that the International Cycling Union (UCI) – the world governing body for sport cycling – uses to assess risk. A WBGT of 28C or higher is classified as “high risk” by the group.
WBGT is the “gold standard” for assessing heat stress, says Dr Jessica Murfree, director of the ACCESS Research Laboratory and assistant professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Murfree, who was not involved in the new study, adds that the researchers are “doing the right things by conducting their science in alignment with the business practices that are already happening”.
The researchers find that across the 50-year time period, WBGT has been increasing across the entire country – albeit, at different rates. In the north-west of the country, WBGT has increased at an average rate of 0.1C per decade, while in the southern and eastern parts of the country, it has increased by more than 0.5C per decade.
The maps below show the maximum July WBGT for each decade of the analysis (rows) and for hourly increments of the late afternoon (columns). Lower temperatures are shown in lighter greens and yellows, while higher temperatures are shown in darker reds and purples.
Six Tour de France locations analysed in the study are shown as triangles on the maps (clockwise from top): Paris, Alpe d’ Huez, Nîmes, Toulouse, Col du Tourmalet and Bordeaux.
The maps show that the maximum WBGT temperature in the afternoon has surpassed 28C over almost the entire country in the last decade. The notable exceptions to this are the mountainous regions of the Alps and the Pyrenees.
The researchers also find that most of the country has crossed the 28C WBGT threshold – which they describe as “dangerous heat levels” – on at least one July day over the past decade. However, by looking at the WBGT on the day the Tour passed through any of these six locations, they find that the threshold has rarely been breached during the race itself.
For example, the research notes that, since 1974, Paris has seen a WBGT of 28C five times at 3pm in July – but that these events have “so far” not coincided with the cycling race.
The study states that it is “fortunate” that the Tour has so far avoided the worst of the heat-stress.
Cvijanovic says the organisers and competitors have been “lucky” to date. She adds:
“It has worked really well for them so far. But as the frequency of these [extreme heat] events is increasing, it will be harder and harder to be lucky.”
Dr Madeleine Orr, an assistant professor of sport ecology at the University of Toronto who was not involved in the study, tells Carbon Brief that the paper was “really well done”, noting that its “methods are good [and its] approach was sound”. She adds:
“[The Tour has] had athletes complain about [the heat]. They’ve had athletes collapse – and still those aren’t the worst conditions. I think that that says a lot about what we consider safe. They’ve still been lucky to not see what unsafe looks like, despite [the heat] having already had impacts.”
Heat safety protocols
In 2024, the UCI set out its first-ever high temperature protocol – a set of guidelines for race organisers to assess athletes’ risk of heat stress.
The assessment places the potential risk into one of five categories based on the WBGT, ranging from very low to high risk.
The protocol then sets out suggested actions to take in the event of extreme heat, ranging from having athletes complete their warm-ups using ice vests and cold towels to increasing the number of support vehicles providing water and ice.
If the WBGT climbs above the 28C mark, the protocol suggests that organisers modify the start time of the stage, adapt the course to remove particularly hazardous sections – or even cancel the race entirely.
However, Orr notes that many other parts of the race, such as spectator comfort and equipment functioning, may have lower temperatures thresholds that are not accounted for in the protocol, but should also be considered.
Murfree points out that the study’s findings – and the heat protocol itself – are “really focused on adaptation, rather than mitigation”. While this is “to be expected”, she tells Carbon Brief:
“Moving to earlier start times or adjusting the route specifically to avoid these locations that score higher in heat stress doesn’t stop the heat stress. These aren’t climate preventative measures. That, I think, would be a much more difficult conversation to have in the research because of the Tour de France’s intimate relationship with fossil-fuel companies.”
The post Dangerous heat for Tour de France riders only a ‘question of time’ appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Dangerous heat for Tour de France riders only a ‘question of time’
Greenhouse Gases
DeBriefed 20 February 2026: EU’s ‘3C’ warning | Endangerment repeal’s impact on US emissions | ‘Tree invasion’ fuelled South America’s fires
Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.
This week
Preparing for 3C
NEW ALERT: The EU’s climate advisory board urged countries to prepare for 3C of global warming, reported the Guardian. The outlet quoted Maarten van Aalst, a member of the advisory board, saying that adapting to this future is a “daunting task, but, at the same time, quite a doable task”. The board recommended the creation of “climate risk assessments and investments in protective measures”.
‘INSUFFICIENT’ ACTION: EFE Verde added that the advisory board said that the EU’s adaptation efforts were so far “insufficient, fragmented and reactive” and “belated”. Climate impacts are expected to weaken the bloc’s productivity, put pressure on public budgets and increase security risks, it added.
UNDERWATER: Meanwhile, France faced “unprecedented” flooding this week, reported Le Monde. The flooding has inundated houses, streets and fields and forced the evacuation of around 2,000 people, according to the outlet. The Guardian quoted Monique Barbut, minister for the ecological transition, saying: “People who follow climate issues have been warning us for a long time that events like this will happen more often…In fact, tomorrow has arrived.”
IEA ‘erases’ climate
MISSING PRIORITY: The US has “succeeded” in removing climate change from the main priorities of the International Energy Agency (IEA) during a “tense ministerial meeting” in Paris, reported Politico. It noted that climate change is not listed among the agency’s priorities in the “chair’s summary” released at the end of the two-day summit.
US INTERVENTION: Bloomberg said the meeting marked the first time in nine years the IEA failed to release a communique setting out a unified position on issues – opting instead for the chair’s summary. This came after US energy secretary Chris Wright gave the organisation a one-year deadline to “scrap its support of goals to reduce energy emissions to net-zero” – or risk losing the US as a member, according to Reuters.
Around the world
- ISLAND OBJECTION: The US is pressuring Vanuatu to withdraw a draft resolution supporting an International Court of Justice ruling on climate change, according to Al Jazeera.
- GREENLAND HEAT: The Associated Press reported that Greenland’s capital Nuuk had its hottest January since records began 109 years ago.
- CHINA PRIORITIES: China’s Energy Administration set out its five energy priorities for 2026-2030, including developing a renewable energy plan, said International Energy Net.
- AMAZON REPRIEVE: Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon has continued to fall into early 2026, extending a downward trend, according to the latest satellite data covered by Mongabay.
- GEZANI DESTRUCTION: Reuters reported the aftermath of the Gezani cyclone, which ripped through Madagascar last week, leaving 59 dead and more than 16,000 displaced people.
20cm
The average rise in global sea levels since 1901, according to a Carbon Brief guest post on the challenges in projecting future rises.
Latest climate research
- Wildfire smoke poses negative impacts on organisms and ecosystems, such as health impacts on air-breathing animals, changes in forests’ carbon storage and coral mortality | Global Ecology and Conservation
- As climate change warms Antarctica throughout the century, the Weddell Sea could see the growth of species such as krill and fish and remain habitable for Emperor penguins | Nature Climate Change
- About 97% of South American lakes have recorded “significant warming” over the past four decades and are expected to experience rising temperatures and more frequent heatwaves | Climatic Change
(For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)
Captured
Repealing the US’s landmark “endangerment finding”, along with actions that rely on that finding, will slow the pace of US emissions cuts, according to Rhodium Group visualised by Carbon Brief. US president Donald Trump last week formally repealed the scientific finding that underpins federal regulations on greenhouse gas emissions, although the move is likely to face legal challenges. Data from the Rhodium Group, an independent research firm, shows that US emissions will drop more slowly without climate regulations. However, even with climate regulations, emissions are expected to drop much slower under Trump than under the previous Joe Biden administration, according to the analysis.
Spotlight
How a ‘tree invasion’ helped to fuel South America’s fires
This week, Carbon Brief explores how the “invasion” of non-native tree species helped to fan the flames of forest fires in Argentina and Chile earlier this year.
Since early January, Chile and Argentina have faced large-scale and deadly wildfires, including in Patagonia, which spans both countries.
These fires have been described as “some of the most significant and damaging in the region”, according to a World Weather Attribution (WWA) analysis covered by Carbon Brief.
In both countries, the fires destroyed vast areas of native forests and grasslands, displacing thousands of people. In Chile, the fires resulted in 23 deaths.
Multiple drivers contributed to the spread of the fires, including extended periods of high temperatures, low rainfall and abundant dry vegetation.
The WWA analysis concluded that human-caused climate change made these weather conditions at least three times more likely.
According to the researchers, another contributing factor was the invasion of non-native trees in the regions where the fires occurred.
The risk of non-native forests
In Argentina, the wildfires began on 6 January and persisted until the first week of February. They hit the city of Puerto Patriada and the Los Alerces and Lago Puelo national parks, in the Chubut province, as well as nearby regions.
In these areas, more than 45,000 hectares of native forests – such as Patagonian alerce tree, myrtle, coigüe and ñire – along with scrubland and grasslands, were consumed by the flames, according to the WWA study.
In Chile, forest fires occurred from 17 to 19 January in the Biobío, Ñuble and Araucanía regions.
The fires destroyed more than 40,000 hectares of forest and more than 20,000 hectares of non-native forest plantations, including eucalyptus and Monterey pine.
Dr Javier Grosfeld, a researcher at Argentina’s National Scientific and Technical Research Council (CONICET) in northern Patagonia, told Carbon Brief that these species, introduced to Patagonia for production purposes in the late 20th century, grow quickly and are highly flammable.
Because of this, their presence played a role in helping the fires to spread more quickly and grow larger.
However, that is no reason to “demonise” them, he stressed.
Forest management
For Grosfeld, the problem in northern Patagonia, Argentina, is a significant deficit in the management of forests and forest plantations.
This management should include pruning branches from their base and controlling the spread of non-native species, he added.
A similar situation is happening in Chile, where management of pine and eucalyptus plantations is not regulated. This means there are no “firebreaks” – gaps in vegetation – in place to prevent fire spread, Dr Gabriela Azócar, a researcher at the University of Chile’s Centre for Climate and Resilience Research (CR2), told Carbon Brief.
She noted that, although Mapuche Indigenous communities in central-south Chile are knowledgeable about native species and manage their forests, their insight and participation are not recognised in the country’s fire management and prevention policies.
Grosfeld stated:
“We are seeing the transformation of the Patagonian landscape from forest to scrubland in recent years. There is a lack of preventive forestry measures, as well as prevention and evacuation plans.”
Watch, read, listen
FUTURE FURNACE: A Guardian video explored the “unbearable experience of walking in a heatwave in the future”.
THE FUN SIDE: A Channel 4 News video covered a new wave of climate comedians who are using digital platforms such as TikTok to entertain and raise awareness.
ICE SECRETS: The BBC’s Climate Question podcast explored how scientists study ice cores to understand what the climate was like in ancient times and how to use them to inform climate projections.
Coming up
- 22-27 February: Ocean Sciences Meeting, Glasgow
- 24-26 February: Methane Mitigation Europe Summit 2026, Amsterdam, Netherlands
- 25-27 February: World Sustainable Development Summit 2026, New Delhi, India
Pick of the jobs
- The Climate Reality Project, digital specialist | Salary: $60,000-$61,200. Location: Washington DC
- Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), science officer in the IPCC Working Group I Technical Support Unit | Salary: Unknown. Location: Gif-sur-Yvette, France
- Energy Transition Partnership, programme management intern | Salary: Unknown. Location: Bangkok, Thailand
DeBriefed is edited by Daisy Dunne. Please send any tips or feedback to debriefed@carbonbrief.org.
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The post DeBriefed 20 February 2026: EU’s ‘3C’ warning | Endangerment repeal’s impact on US emissions | ‘Tree invasion’ fuelled South America’s fires appeared first on Carbon Brief.
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