Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.
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This week
Offshore wind off track
EMPIRE WIND 2: Energy majors BP and Equinor have terminated their power agreement with the state of New York to build a 1.26 gigawatt offshore wind farm, according to Bloomberg. The deal for the 147 turbine wind farm, 15 miles south of New York’s Long Island was signed in 2022, for a strike price of $107.50 per megawatt-hour, the Financial Times noted.
WIND WOES: BP and Equinor pointed to the “unforeseeable economic forces” – including inflation stemming from the war in Ukraine and Covid-19, supply chain bottlenecks and interest rate increases, along with permitting delays – which affected the “financial attractiveness” of the project, the FT added. Offshore wind developers have cancelled contracts to sell power in Massachusetts, Connecticut and New Jersey, as well as threatening to cancel agreements in other states, as project costs rise, Reuters reported.
VINEYARD WIND: Meanwhile, the first turbine in the Vineyard offshore wind development began generating power this week, delivering around 5 megawatts of power to the New England grid, the Guardian reported. Vineyard Wind is the first US large-scale offshore wind project, and is expected to have 62 turbines in total when complete.
UK’s second-warmest year
SECOND WARMEST: Data from the Met Office shows that 2023 was the UK’s second-warmest year of record, and the warmest year on record for Wales and Northern Ireland, BBC News reported. The average absolute temperature for last year was 9.97C, only slightly lower than the 10.02C recorded in 2022 – the warmest year on record for the UK – according to the Guardian.
TOP 10: The UK’s 10 warmest years have all occurred since 2003, the Guardian noted, with Met Office scientists emphasising that “such a warm year would have occurred only once in 500 years without human-caused global heating”. The news comes as heavy flooding driven by Storm Henk has hit the UK, with more than 550 flood warnings and alerts in place in England and Wales and hundreds of homes flooded, the Guardian reported.
REPEAT RECORDS: While 2023 is expected to be announced as the warmest on record in the coming weeks, the contributing factors that made it so warm will likely “push the dial even further in 2024”, New Scientist reported. The El Niño climate pattern in the Pacific Ocean is expected to reach its full strength – on top of warming driven by greenhouse gases – next year, it noted.
Around the world
- GERMAN EMISSIONS: Germany’s carbon dioxide emissions fell to their lowest level since the 1950s in 2023, due to less coal-fired power and a reduced output by energy-intensive industries, reported Reuters, but the decline is “unsustainable without climate policy changes”.
- OVERTAKING TESLA: Chinese firm BYD has knocked Elon Musk’s company “off the top spot” to become the world’s best-selling electric vehicle manufacturer for the first time, according to the Financial Times.
- COP29 PRESIDENT: Azerbaijan has appointed environmental minister Mukhtar Babayez as president of the COP29 climate talks, reported Climate Home News. Babayez is the former head of the country’s state-owned oil and gas company Socar.
- LOW-CARBON HYDROGEN: The US government has unveiled a new framework to support the production of low-carbon hydrogen, offering tax credits based on the life-cycle greenhouse gas emissions from the power source used in hydrogen production, according to Reuters.
- ‘POSTCODE LOTTERY’: Analysis of the 20 costliest climate disasters of 2023 has shown that “countries less able to rebuild or who have contributed least to climate crisis suffer worst”, reported the Guardian.
- PIPELINE PRACTICES: French energy giant TotalEnergies has launched a review of its land acquisition practices for the controversial $10bn East African crude oil pipeline in Uganda and Tanzania, Agence France-Presse reported.
324tn yuan
China will need to spend around 324tn yuan ($45.5tn), roughly 2.7 times its GDP in 2022, to realise its climate targets of peaking CO2 emissions before 2030 and going carbon neutral before 2060, reported China Daily.
Latest climate research
- Diversifying agricultural production in sub-Saharan Africa towards more micronutrient-rich foods is “necessary” to provide an adequate nutrient supply under increasing climate risks and population growth, according to a new study published in Nature Food.
- Using a large-scale experiment on Facebook, a new paper in Climatic Change found “little to no support” for the fear that attention on solar radiation management or carbon dioxide removal “might crowd out the desire to cut emissions”.
- The genes of an Antarctic octopus provide “empirical evidence” that the West Antarctic ice sheet previously “collapsed when the global mean temperature was similar to that of today”, warned a new study in Science, suggesting “the tipping point of future WAIS collapse is close”.
(For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)
Captured
Last year, the UK’s electricity from fossil fuels dropped to its lowest level since 1957, new analysis from Carbon Brief reveals. The amount of electricity from fossil fuels fell 22% year-on-year in 2023, to 104 terawatt hours (TWh), its lowest level in 66 years. Back then, Harold Macmillan was the UK prime minister and the Beatles’ John Lennon and Paul McCartney had just met for the first time. The chart above shows the fall of fossil fuels in the electricity mix, to meet just 33% of electricity needs in 2023, while renewable energy generation continues to surge.
Spotlight
Carbon Brief’s top five articles of 2023
Carbon Brief takes a look at its top five most-read stories published in 2023.
Factcheck: 21 misleading myths about electric vehicles
Carbon Brief’s most-read new article of 2023 was a factcheck by deputy editor Dr Simon Evans of 21 of the most common misleading myths about electric vehicles (EVs). The article explored claims often seen in the press, such as EVs having to travel more than 50,000 miles for their emissions to break even with a conventional car, EVs having little or no CO2 advantage over a car someone already drives, and sales of EVs appearing to be slowing.
As Evans explained, the sales of EVs have continued to surge in the UK and globally, as the vehicles become cheaper, charging infrastructure more widespread and bans on combustion engines loom closer. Despite this growth, EVs are still subject to “relentless hostile reporting across mainstream media in many major economies, including the UK”, Evans noted.
COP28: Key outcomes agreed at the UN climate talks in Dubai
At COP28 in Dubai, nearly every country in the world agreed to “transition away from fossil fuels” within the global stocktake – the first time fossil fuels have been explicitly mentioned in the 28 years of international climate negotiations.
Ten of Carbon Brief’s journalists attended the two-week event and pulled together this mammoth summary – covering everything from the significant loss-and-damage fund on the first day to the gritty negotiations around Article 6 and a just transition.
Analysis: Which countries have sent the most delegates to COP28?
More than 97,000 badges were issued for COP28 in Dubai, almost twice the number of participants that travelled to Sharm El Sheikh in Egypt in 2022. In Carbon Brief’s third most-read article of 2023, senior science editor Robert McSweeney detailed who registered for COP28, including 24,488 delegates representing parties, 14,338 observers from NGOs and 3,972 media delegates.
Analysis: China’s emissions set to fall in 2024 after record growth in clean energy
China’s carbon dioxide emissions are set to fall in 2024, according to analysis for Carbon Brief by Lauri Myllyvirta, lead analyst and co-founder of the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA). Myllyvirta explained how China’s emissions “could now be facing structural decline due to record growth in the installation of new low-carbon energy sources”. This came despite CO2 emissions rising 4.7% year-on-year in the third quarter of 2023 as they continued to rebound following China’s “zero-Covid” period.
Analysis: How low-sulphur shipping rules are affecting global warming
Rounding out the list of Carbon Brief’s top five most-read articles of 2023, is an analysis of how new international rules to reduce air pollution from shipping could affect the climate. The article – by Dr Zeke Hausfather, climate science contributor for Carbon Brief, and Prof Piers Forster, professor of climate physics at the University of Leeds – found that the new regulations, imposed in 2020, will likely add 0.05C to global temperatures by 2050.
Watch, read, listen
DOCUMENTING DROUGHT: A Guardian article explored the images Maasai photographers Claire Metito and Irene Naneu have been using to chronicle the everyday experiences of two elderly women in Esiteti in southern Kenya, where a prolonged drought has made life more challenging for women in pastoralist communities.
WITNESSING A WARMING WORLD: BBC’s Future Planet’s team of climate reporters have written from across five continents to share their thoughts on what they have witnessed as the world warmed in 2023.
PRESCIENT POSTERS: An article in the New York Times explored some of the most arresting images on display at a new exhibition at Poster House in Manhattan that highlights the differing approaches – “bright, witty, sombre, blunt, even sexy” – the environmental movement has taken in an effort to “save the world”.
Coming up
- 4-5 January: Goldman Sachs Energy, CleanTech and Utilities Conference 2024, Miami, Florida
- 10 January: Winter school on “Dealing Professionally with Climate Change Issues”, online event
- 17 January: Climate change adaptation: evaluating Scottish Marine Protected Area resilience, webinar
Pick of the jobs
- Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, research officer | Salary: £40,229-£48,456. Location: London, UK
- European Geosciences Union, media and communications officer | Salary: €53,000-€58,000. Location: Munich, Germany
- Rewilding Britain, chair and trustees | Salary: unknown. Location: UK
- ODI, communications collaborators | Salary: unknown. Location: unknown
DeBriefed is edited by Daisy Dunne. Please send any tips or feedback to debriefed@carbonbrief.org
The post DeBriefed 5 January 2024: US offshore wind; UK’s second warmest year; Carbon Brief’s top articles of 2023 appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Mining companies are showcasing new technologies which they say could extract more lithium – a key ingredient for electric vehicle (EV) batteries – from South America’s vast, dry salt flats with lower environmental impacts.
But environmentalists question whether the expensive technology is ready to be rolled out at scale, while scientists warn it could worsen the depletion of scarce freshwater resources in the region and say more research is needed.
The “lithium triangle” – an area spanning Argentina, Bolivia and Chile – holds more than half of the world’s known lithium reserves. Here, lithium is found in salty brine beneath the region’s salt flats, which are among some of the driest places on Earth.
Lithium mining in the region has soared, driven by booming demand to manufacture batteries for EVs and large-scale energy storage.
Mining companies drill into the flats and pump the mineral-rich brine to the surface, where it is left under the sun in giant evaporation pools for 18 months until the lithium is concentrated enough to be extracted.
The technique is relatively cheap but requires vast amounts of land and water. More than 90% of the brine’s original water content is lost to evaporation and freshwater is needed at different stages of the process.
One study suggested that the Atacama Salt Flat in Chile is sinking by up to 2 centimetres a year because lithium-rich brine is being pumped at a faster rate than aquifers are being recharged.
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Colombia proposes expert group to advance talks on minerals agreement
A draft resolution aimed at advancing talks on a global minerals treaty will be discussed at a major UN environment meeting later this year -
Panama environment minister backs calls for reform of UN climate process
Panama’s environment minister told Climate Home that decision-making rules at the UN climate talks should be reformed to deliver faster changes. -
Global renewables goal slips off course after Trump, China moves
The IEA downgrades its forecast for renewables growth due to the US cutting renewable tax credits and China’s electricity market reforms
Lithium extraction in the region has led to repeated conflicts with local communities, who fear the impact of the industry on local water supplies and the region’s fragile ecosystem.
The lithium industry’s answer is direct lithium extraction (DLE), a group of technologies that selectively extracts the silvery metal from brine without the need for vast open-air evaporation ponds. DLE, it argues, can reduce both land and water use.
Direct lithium extraction investment is growing
The technology is gaining considerable attention from mining companies, investors and governments as a way to reduce the industry’s environmental impacts while recovering more lithium from brine.
DLE investment is expected to grow at twice the pace of the lithium market at large, according to research firm IDTechX.
There are around a dozen DLE projects at different stages of development across South America. The Chilean government has made it a central pillar of its latest National Lithium Strategy, mandating its use in new mining projects.
Last year, French company Eramet opened Centenario Ratones in northern Argentina, the first plant in the world to attempt to extract lithium solely using DLE.
Eramet’s lithium extraction plant is widely seen as a major test of the technology. “Everyone is on the edge of their seats to see how this progresses,” said Federico Gay, a lithium analyst at Benchmark Mineral Intelligence. “If they prove to be successful, I’m sure more capital will venture into the DLE space,” he said.
More than 70 different technologies are classified as DLE. Brine is still extracted from the salt flats but is separated from the lithium using chemical compounds or sieve-like membranes before being reinjected underground.
DLE techniques have been used commercially since 1996, but only as part of a hybrid model still involving evaporation pools. Of the four plants in production making partial use of DLE, one is in Argentina and three are in China.
Reduced environmental footprint
New-generation DLE technologies have been hailed as “potentially game-changing” for addressing some of the issues of traditional brine extraction.
“DLE could potentially have a transformative impact on lithium production,” the International Lithium Association found in a recent report on the technology.
Firstly, there is no need for evaporation pools – some of which cover an area equivalent to the size of 3,000 football pitches.
“The land impact is minimal, compared to evaporation where it’s huge,” said Gay.
The process is also significantly quicker and increases lithium recovery. Roughly half of the lithium is lost during evaporation, whereas DLE can recover more than 90% of the metal in the brine.
In addition, the brine can be reinjected into the salt flats, although this is a complicated process that needs to be carefully handled to avoid damaging their hydrological balance.
However, Gay said the commissioning of a DLE plant is currently several times more expensive than a traditional lithium brine extraction plant.
“In theory it works, but in practice we only have a few examples,” Gay said. “Most of these companies are promising to break the cost curve and ramp up indefinitely. I think in the next two years it’s time to actually fulfill some of those promises.”
Freshwater concerns
However, concerns over the use of freshwater persist.
Although DLE doesn’t require the evaporation of brine water, it often needs more freshwater to clean or cool equipment.
A 2023 study published in the journal Nature reviewed 57 articles on DLE that analysed freshwater consumption. A quarter of the articles reported significantly higher use of freshwater than conventional lithium brine mining – more than 10 times higher in some cases.
“These volumes of freshwater are not available in the vicinity of [salt flats] and would even pose problems around less-arid geothermal resources,” the study found.
The company tracking energy transition minerals back to the mines
Dan Corkran, a hydrologist at the University of Massachusetts, recently published research showing that the pumping of freshwater from the salt flats had a much higher impact on local wetland ecosystems than the pumping of salty brine. “The two cannot be considered equivalent in a water footprint calculation,” he said, explaining that doing so would “obscure the true impact” of lithium extraction.
Newer DLE processes are “claiming to require little-to-no freshwater”, he added, but the impact of these technologies is yet to be thoroughly analysed.
Dried-up rivers
Last week, Indigenous communities from across South America held a summit to discuss their concerns over ongoing lithium extraction.
The meeting, organised by the Andean Wetlands Alliance, coincided with the 14th International Lithium Seminar, which brought together industry players and politicians from Argentina and beyond.
Indigenous representatives visited the nearby Hombre Muerto Salt Flat, which has borne the brunt of nearly three decades of lithium extraction. Today, a lithium plant there uses a hybrid approach including DLE and evaporation pools.
Local people say the river “dried up” in the years after the mine opened. Corkran’s study linked a 90% reduction in wetland vegetation to the lithium’s plant freshwater extraction.
Pia Marchegiani, of Argentine environmental NGO FARN, said that while DLE is being promoted by companies as a “better” technique for extraction, freshwater use remained unclear. “There are many open questions,” she said.
AI and satellite data help researchers map world’s transition minerals rush
Stronger regulations
Analysts speaking to Climate Home News have also questioned the commercial readiness of the technology.
Eramet was forced to downgrade its production projections at its DLE plant earlier this year, blaming the late commissioning of a crucial component.
Climate Home News asked Eramet for the water footprint of its DLE plant and whether its calculations excluded brine, but it did not respond.
For Eduardo Gigante, an Argentina-based lithium consultant, DLE is a “very promising technology”. But beyond the hype, it is not yet ready for large-scale deployment, he said.
Strong regulations are needed to ensure that the environmental impact of the lithium rush is taken seriously, Gigante added.
In Argentina alone, there are currently 38 proposals for new lithium mines. At least two-thirds are expected to use DLE. “If you extract a lot of water without control, this is a problem,” said Gigante. “You need strong regulations, a strong government in order to control this.”
The post Efforts to green lithium extraction face scrutiny over water use appeared first on Climate Home News.
Efforts to green lithium extraction face scrutiny over water use
Climate Change
Maryland’s Conowingo Dam Settlement Reasserts State’s Clean Water Act Authority but Revives Dredging Debate
The new agreement commits $340 million in environmental investments tied to the Conowingo Dam’s long-term operation, setting an example of successful citizen advocacy.
Maryland this month finalized a $340 million deal with Constellation Energy to relicense the Conowingo Dam in Cecil County, ending years of litigation and regulatory uncertainty. The agreement restores the state’s authority to enforce water quality standards under the Clean Water Act and sets a possible precedent for dozens of hydroelectric relicensing cases nationwide expected in coming years.
Local officials see millions of dollars in tax revenue, but more than 950 residents who signed ballot petitions fear endless noise, pollution and higher electric rates.
This is the second of three articles about Michigan communities organizing to stop the construction of energy-intensive computing facilities.
A Michigan Town Hopes to Stop a Data Center With a 2026 Ballot Initiative
Pentagon’s $1B Mineral Stockpile Boosts U.S. Independence from China
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Efforts to green lithium extraction face scrutiny over water use
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