Over two weeks in November, more than 55,000 government negotiators, business representatives, activists and journalists gathered in Azerbaijan’s capital Baku for the annual conference of parties (COP) to the UN’s climate change convention (UNFCCC).
They were joined on the opening days of COP29 by about 105 heads of state and government who made back-to-back speeches. Most, like UNFCCC Executive Secretary Simon Stiell, emphasised the urgency of addressing the climate crisis. But the host, Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev, went the other way with a speech praising fossil fuels as a “gift of the god” and calling on leaders to be “realistic”.
Negotiators and ministers then got to work hammering out a new goal to finance climate action in developing countries after the current one runs out next year. Those talks inched forward for two weeks, with rich nations refusing to put a concrete offer on the table.
At the last minute, as the pavilions of the international trade show that accompanies COPs were packed away on the official closing day, the negotiations exploded. On that Friday, a number for the core finance goal was finally put on the table, sparking anger among developing nations which dismissed it as too low. On Saturday evening, negotiators from small islands and the world’s poorest countries stormed out – and a target of $300bn a year by 2035 was pushed through in controversial circumstances in the early hours of Sunday.
Fractious COP29 lands $300bn climate finance goal, dashing hopes of the poorest
Climate Home had a reporting team in Baku throughout, producing a bulletin and newsletter each day. As well as our explainer on what was agreed at COP29, below we bring you our five most dramatic moments from the Baku talks.
1.UN’s climate head gets personal
At the start of every COP, the head of the UN’s climate body gives what amounts to a motivational speech, calling on governments to do more to tackle the climate crisis.
This year, instead of reeling off statistics or listing climate-driven disasters, Simon Stiell got personal. He became emotional as he put up on a big screen a photograph of him hugging his neighbour Florence in front of her hurricane-destroyed house on their native Caribbean island of Carriacou (part of Grenada).
“At 85, Florence has become one of the millions of victims of climate change this year alone,” he said. In perhaps a coded reference to Donald Trump’s recent election as US president, he said Florence was “knocked down and getting back up again” – and government officials in the audience should too.
2. Host-nation leader calls fossil fuels “gift of the god”
On COP29’s second day, after a long cultural ceremony of music and dancing, Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev kicked off a series of speeches by the UN secretary-general and world leaders – and used it to double down on his past public backing of fossil fuels.
After attacking American”fake news media” and “so-called independent NGOs”, Aliyev repeated his claim that fossil fuels are “a gift of the god” and called out the European Union for criticising fossil fuels while doing a multi-year deal to buy gas from Azerbaijan.
He later used a summit of small island developing states to accuse France and the Netherlands of ongoing “colonial rule”, sparking a diplomatic spat with those countries and the European Union, which sprang to their defence. As a result, France’s environment minister decided to boycott COP29.
3. Finance goal: “Is it a joke?”
Nine days into COP29, developed countries had yet to put forward a proposal for how much they were willing to contribute to the post-2025 climate finance goal.
The most anyone had to go on was a Politico report that the European Union was considering $200bn-300bn a year – so the $200bn figure was raised by a journalist at a press conference of Bolivia’s chief negotiator Diego Pacheco, Uganda’s Adonia Ayebare and Kenya’s Ali Mohamed.
“Is it a joke?” asked Pacheco with a smile, to applause from climate campaigners in the room.
Ayebare laughed and repeated his words, before Mohamed added more sternly: “We don’t know where you’re getting the 200 but, joke or otherwise, the quantum we are putting forward is nothing near to what you have just suggested.”
This off-the-cuff remark led to the word “joke” being used repeatedly by campaigners and negotiators about the finance goal for the rest of the summit. The next day, the COP29 presidency published a $250-billion-a-year proposal, which increased to $300 billion in the final agreement.
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4. Vulnerable nations storm out
On the last night of the negotiations, all government delegations were summoned to a meeting room where Azeri diplomats showed them a copy of the latest draft text.
According to Michai Robertson, finance negotiator for the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS), developed countries and big developing nations like China, India and Brazil had been consulted by the presidency the night before, with those conversations informing the new text.
But, he said, AOSIS and the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) had not been asked for their views. So after reading it, the chair of the LDC group Evans Njewa told the room: “We are not ready to associate with this paper and our sitting here means nothing to us.”
“If you want to continue discussing on this paper, then you can do so – this will allow us to leave this room – when you are done, maybe you call us back,” he added.
1 day over time at the #COP29 & LDCs walked out in protest for the iteration of the new #NCQG which is far from the €1.3trill needed in public grant based #ClimateFinance @social_rights https://t.co/cfUnICc9Qf pic.twitter.com/ZuRvMhFUls
— MariaRonBalsera.bsky.social (@MariaRonBalsera) November 23, 2024
He called for the meeting’s suspension, stood up, picked up his bag and walked out. So did the rest of the negotiators for his group and those of AOSIS.
Robertson was among them. He told Climate Home the walk-out was unplanned and spontaneous.
Video of the #COP29 walkout from Panama’s lead negotiator Juan Carlos Monterrey: pic.twitter.com/9H2HM0oDA4
— Richard Delevan Wicked Problems Climate Tech (@rdelevan) November 23, 2024
Robertson said the presidency then gathered representatives of the LDCs, small island developing states (SIDS) and developed countries upstairs, where the LDCs and SIDs won compromises like a commitment to triple the amount of finance that goes through multilateral UN climate funds like the Green Climate Fund.
On their way to that meeting, rich-country negotiators were mobbed by climate campaigners and journalists who had gathered in the hall outside the meeting rooms. Germany’s climate envoy Jennifer Morgan rushed out, leaving journalists running after her as she refused to answer questions on her way to the presidency’s private office.
US climate envoy John Podesta, meanwhile, walked off more slowly and was surrounded by security and TV cameras as a campaigner shouted “shame” and “you’re selling us out”. He told reporters that he hoped this was the “storm before the calm”.
US climate envoy John Podesta heckled with cries of “shame” after climate vulnerable countries (temporarily?) walk out of finance talks #COP29 https://t.co/VnsmUcEE1L pic.twitter.com/bh8tmKEOf8
— Joe Lo (@joeloyo) November 23, 2024
5. India ignored?
As negotiators huddled in the plenary room in the early hours of Sunday morning, a rumour spread to journalists at the back of the room that India was preparing to block the agreement on the post-2025 finance goal.
Their objection, it was said, was over language that recognised “the voluntary intention of [governments] to count all climate-related outflows from and climate-related finance mobilised by multilateral development banks towards achievement of the goal”.
A big chunk of climate finance comes from multilateral development banks (MDBs) like the World Bank. These banks are mostly owned by developed countries – but big emerging economies like China and India also have stakes in some of them.
Currently, developed countries are only given credit for 70% of the climate finance flowing through MDBs – roughly equivalent to their share in these banks. But the change in the new goal to include all of it could count developing countries’ share of MDB funding as well, making it easier for developed nations to meet the target without mobilising additional money.
Shortly before 3am on Sunday morning after a string of mundane decisions, COP29 President Mukhtar Babayev invited the room to adopt the draft and without pausing for a second, banged down his gavel to signal official agreement.
Some negotiators stood up to applaud, some stayed sitting and clapped politely, while others looked on sternly. Babayev and Stiell hugged on stage and Azerbaijani negotiators punched the air.
Three members of the Indian delegation rushed onto the stage where Babayev was presiding, said something to the officials there and walked back looking angry.
When given the floor to speak, India’s head of delegation Chandni Raina said: “This has been an unfortunate incident and it is in continuation of a string of such unfortunate incidents that we have seen of not following inclusivity”.
She said she had informed the UNFCCC and COP29 presidency that she had wanted to make a statement before any decision was made. “However,” she said to whoops and applause, “this has been stage-managed and we are extremely, extremely disappointed with this incident.”
Later in the plenary, Nigeria’s climate envoy Nkiruka Maduekwe said she “lent [her] voice to India”, adding that “we have a right as countries to choose if we are going to take this or not – and I am saying that we do not accept this.”
“It is 3am and we are going to clap our hands and say this is what we are going to do – I don’t think so,” she finished. “Your statement will be reflected in the report,” replied Babayev.
Despite the objections of two nations representing a fifth of the world’s population, the deal appeared to have been done. Joanna Depledge, who researches climate talks at Cambridge University, said that “once a decision has been gavelled through, it would be a really big thing for it to be overturned”.
(Reporting by Joe Lo and Mariel Lozada; editing by Megan Rowling)
The post COP29: Five most dramatic moments from the UN climate summit in Baku appeared first on Climate Home News.
COP29: Five most dramatic moments from the UN climate summit in Baku
Welcome to Carbon Brief’s China Briefing.
China Briefing handpicks and explains the most important climate and energy stories from China over the past fortnight. Subscribe for free here.
Key developments
Tasks for 2026
‘GREEN RESOLVE’: The Ministry of Ecology and Environment (MEE) said at its annual national conference that it is “essential” to “maintain strategic resolve” on building a “beautiful China”, reported energy news outlet BJX News. Officials called for “accelerating green transformation” and “strengthening driving forces” for the low-carbon transition in 2026, it added. The meeting also underscored the need for “continued reduction in total emissions of major pollutants”, it said, as well as for “advancing source control through carbon peaking and a low-carbon transition”. The MEE listed seven key tasks for 2026 at the meeting, said business news outlet 21st Century Business Herald, including promoting development of “green productive forces”, focusing on “regional strategies” to build “green development hubs” and “actively responding” to climate change.
CARBON ‘PRESSURE’: China’s carbon emissions reduction strategy will move from the “preparatory stages” into a phase of “substantive” efforts in 2026, reported Shanghai-based news outlet the Paper, with local governments beginning to “feel the pressure” due to facing “formal carbon assessments for the first time” this year. Business news outlet 36Kr said that an “increasing number of industry participants” will have to begin finalising decarbonisation plans this year. The entry into force of the EU’s carbon border adjustment mechanism means China’s steelmakers will face a “critical test of cost, data and compliance”, reported finance news outlet Caixin. Carbon Brief asked several experts, including the Asia Society Policy Institute’s Li Shuo, what energy and climate developments they will be watching in 2026.
COAL DECLINE: New data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed China’s “mostly coal-based thermal power generation fell in 2025” for the first time in a decade, reported Reuters, to 6,290 terawatt-hours (TWh). The data confirmed earlier analysis for Carbon Brief that “coal power generation fell in both China and India in 2025”, marking the first simultaneous drop in 50 years. Energy news outlet International Energy Net noted that wind generation rose 10% to 1,053TWh and solar by 24% to 1,573TWh.
EV agreement reached
‘NORMALISED COMPETITION’?: The EU will remove tariffs on imports of electric vehicles (EV) made in China if the manufacturers follow “guidelines on minimum pricing” issued by the bloc, reported the Associated Press. China’s commerce ministry stated that the new guidelines will “enable Chinese exporters to address the EU’s anti-subsidy case concerning Chinese EVs in a way that is more practical, targeted and consistent with [World Trade Organization] rules”, according to the state-run China Daily. An editorial by the state-supporting Global Times argued that the agreement symbolised a “new phase” in China-EU economic and trade relations in which “normalised competition” is stabilised by a “solid cooperative foundation”.
SOLAR REBATES: China will “eliminate” export rebates for solar products from April 2026 and phase rebates for batteries out by 2027, said Caixin. Solar news outlet Solar Headlines said that the removal of rebates would “directly test” solar companies’ profitability and “fundamentally reshape the entire industry’s growth logic”. Meanwhile, China imposed anti-dumping duties on imports of “solar-grade polysilicon” from the US and Korea, said state news agency Xinhua.
OVERCAPACITY MEETINGS: The Chinese government “warned several producers of polysilicon…about monopoly risks” and cautioned them not to “coordinate on production capacity, sales volume and prices”, said Bloomberg. Reuters and China Daily covered similar government meetings on “mitigat[ing] risks of overcapacity” with the battery and EV industries, respectively. A widely republished article in the state-run Economic Daily said that to counter overcapacity, companies would need to reverse their “misaligned development logic” and shift from competing on “price and scale” to competing on “technology”.
High prices undermined home coal-to-gas heating policy
SWITCHING SHOCK: A video commentary by Xinhua reporter Liu Chang covered “reports of soaring [home] heating costs following coal-to-gas switching [policies] in some rural areas of north China”. Liu added that switching from coal to gas “must lead not only to blue skies, but also to warmth”. Bloomberg said that the “issue isn’t a lack of gas”, but the “result of a complex series of factors including price regulations, global energy shocks and strained local finances”.
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HEATED DEBATE: Discussions of the story in China became a “domestically resonant – and politically awkward – debate”, noted the current affairs newsletter Pekingnology. It translated a report by Chinese outlet Economic Observer that many villagers in Hebei struggled with no access to affordable heating, with some turning back to coal. “Local authorities are steadily advancing energy supply,” People’s Daily said of the issue, noting that gas is “increasingly becoming a vital heating energy source” as part of China’s energy transition. Another People’s Daily article quoted one villager saying: “Coal-to-gas conversion is a beneficial initiative for both the nation and its people…Yet the heating costs are simply too high.”
DEJA-VU: This is not the first time coal-to-gas switching has encountered challenges, according to research by the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, with nearby Shanxi province experiencing a similar situation. In Shanxi, a “lack of planning, poor coordination and hasty implementation” led to demand outstripping supply, while some households had their coal-based heating systems removed with no replacement secured. Others were “deterred” from using gas-based systems due to higher prices, it said.
More China news
- LOFTY WORDS: At Davos, vice-premier He Lifeng reaffirmed commitments to China’s “dual-carbon” goals and called for greater “global cooperation on climate change”, reported Caixin.
- NOT LOOKING: US president Donald Trump, also at Davos, said he was not “able to find any windfarms in China”, adding China sells them to “stupid” consumers, reported Euronews. China installed wind capacity has ranked first globally “for 15 years consecutively”, said a government official, according to CGTN.
- ‘GREEN’ FACTORIES: China issued “new guidelines to promote green [industrial] microgrids” including targets for on-site renewable use, said Xinhua. The country “pledged to advance zero-carbon factory development” from 2026, said another Xinhua report.
- JET-FUEL MERGER: A merger of oil giant Sinopec with the country’s main jet-fuel producer could “aid the aviation industry’s carbon reduction goals”, reported Yicai Global. However, Caixin noted that the move could “stifl[e] innovation” in the sustainable air fuel sector.
- NEW TARGETS: Chinese government investment funds will now be evaluated on the “annual carbon reduction rates” achieved by the enterprises or projects they support, reported BJX News.
- HOLIDAY CATCH-UP: Since the previous edition of China Briefing in December, Beijing released policies on provincial greenhouse gas inventories, the “two new” programme, clean coal benchmarks, corporate climate reporting, “green consumption” and hydrogen carbon credits. The National Energy Administration also held its annual work conference.
Spotlight
Why gas plays a minimal role in China’s climate strategy
While gas is seen in some countries as an important “bridging” fuel to move away from coal use, rapid electrification, uncompetitiveness and supply concerns have suppressed its share in China’s energy mix.
Carbon Brief explores the current role of gas in China and how this could change in the future. The full article is available on Carbon Brief’s website.
The current share of gas in China’s primary energy demand is small, at around 8-9%.
It also comprises 7% of China’s carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from fuel combustion, adding 755m tonnes of CO2 in 2023 – twice the total CO2 emissions of the UK.
Gas consumption is continuing to grow in line with an overall uptick in total energy demand, but has slowed slightly from the 9% average annual rise in gas demand over the past decade – during which time consumption more than doubled.
The state-run oil and gas company China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) forecast in 2025 that demand growth for the year may slow further to just over 6%.
Chinese government officials frequently note that China is “rich in coal” and “short of gas”. Concerns of import dependence underpin China’s focus on coal for energy security.
However, Beijing sees electrification as a “clear energy security strategy” to both decarbonise and “reduce exposure to global fossil fuel markets”, said Michal Meidan, China energy research programme head at the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies.
A dim future?
Beijing initially aimed for gas to displace coal as part of a broader policy to tackle air pollution.
Its “blue-sky campaign” helped to accelerate gas use in the industrial and residential sectors. Several cities were mandated to curtail coal usage and switch to gas.
(January 2026 saw widespread reports of households choosing not to use gas heating installed during this campaign despite freezing temperatures, due to high prices.)
Industry remains the largest gas user in China, with “city gas” second. Power generation is a distant third.
The share of gas in power generation remains at 4%, while wind and solar’s share has soared to 22%, Yu Aiqun, research analyst at the thinktank Global Energy Monitor, told Carbon Brief. She added:
“With the rapid expansion of renewables and ongoing geopolitical uncertainties, I don’t foresee a bright future for gas power.”
However, gas capacity may still rise from 150 gigawatts (GW) in 2025 to 200GW by 2030. A government report noted that gas will continue to play a “critical role” in “peak shaving”.
But China’s current gas storage capacity is “insufficient”, according to CNPC, limiting its ability to meet peak-shaving demand.
Transport and industry
Gas instead may play a bigger role in the displacement of diesel in the transport sector, due to the higher cost competitiveness of LNG – particularly for trucking.
CNPC forecast that LNG displaced around 28-30m tonnes of diesel in the trucking sector in 2025, accounting for 15% of total diesel demand in China.
However, gas is not necessarily a better option for heavy-duty, long-haul transportation, due to poorer fuel efficiency compared with electric vehicles.
In fact, “new-energy vehicles” are displacing both LNG-fueled trucks and diesel heavy-duty vehicles (HDVs).
Meanwhile, gas could play a “more significant” role in industrial decarbonisation, Meidan told Carbon Brief, if prices fall substantially.
Growth in gas demand has been decelerating in some industries, but China may adopt policies more favourable to gas, she added.
An energy transition roadmap developed by a Chinese government thinktank found gas will only begin to play a greater role than coal in China by 2050 at the earliest.
Both will be significantly less important than clean-energy sources at that point.
This spotlight was written by freelance climate journalist Karen Teo for Carbon Brief.
Watch, read, listen
EV OUTLOOK: Tu Le, managing director of consultancy Sino Auto Insights, spoke on the High Capacity podcast about his outlook for China’s EV industry in 2026.
‘RUNAWAY TRAIN’: John Hopkins professor Jeremy Wallace argued in Wired that China’s strength in cleantech is due to a “runaway train of competition” that “no one – least of all [a monolithic ‘China’] – knows how to deal with”.
‘DIRTIEST AND GREENEST’: China’s energy engagement in the Belt and Road Initiative was simultaneously the “dirtiest and greenest” it has ever been in 2025, according to a new report by the Green Finance & Development Center.
INDUSTRY VOICE: Zhong Baoshen, chairman of solar manufacturer LONGi, spoke with Xinhua about how innovation, “supporting the strongest performers”, standards-setting and self-regulation could alleviate overcapacity in the industry.
$574bn
The amount of money State Grid, China’s main grid operator, plans to invest between 2026-30, according to Jiemian. The outlet adds that much of this investment will “support the development and transmission of clean energy” from large-scale clean-energy bases and hydropower plants.
New science
- The combination of long-term climate change and extremes in rainfall and heat have contributed to an increase in winter wheat yield of 1% in Xinjiang province between 1989-2023 | Climate Dynamics
- More than 70% of the “observed changes” in temperature extremes in China over 1901-2020 are “attributed to greenhouse gas forcing” | Environmental Research Letters
China Briefing is written by Anika Patel and edited by Simon Evans. Please send tips and feedback to china@carbonbrief.org
The post China Briefing 22 January 2026: 2026 priorities; EV agreement; How China uses gas appeared first on Carbon Brief.
China Briefing 22 January 2026: 2026 priorities; EV agreement; How China uses gas
Every year, understanding of climate science grows stronger.
With each new research project and published paper, scientists learn more about how the Earth system responds to continuing greenhouse gas emissions.
But with many thousands of new studies on climate change being published every year, it can be hard to keep up with the latest developments.
Our annual “10 new insights in climate science” report offers a snapshot of key advances in the scientific understanding of the climate system.
Produced by a team of scientists from around the world, the report summarises influential, novel and policy-relevant climate research published over the previous 18 months.
The insights presented in the latest edition, published in the journal Global Sustainability, are as follows:
- Questions remain about the record warmth in 2023-24
- Unprecedented ocean surface warming and intensifying marine heatwaves are driving severe ecological losses
- The global land carbon sink is under strain
- Climate change and biodiversity loss amplify each other
- Climate change is accelerating groundwater depletion
- Climate change is driving an increase in dengue fever
- Climate change diminishes labour productivity
- Safe scale-up of carbon dioxide removal is needed
- Carbon credit markets come with serious integrity challenges
- Policy mixes outperform stand-alone measures in advancing emissions reductions
In this article, we unpack some of the key findings.
A strained climate system
The first three insights highlight how strains are growing across the climate system, from indications of an accelerating warming and record-breaking marine heatwaves, to faltering carbon sinks.
Between April 2023 and March 2024, global temperatures reached unprecedented levels – a surge that cannot be fully explained by the long-term warming trend and typical year-to-year fluctuations of the Earth’s climate. This suggests other factors are at play, such as declining sulphur emissions and shifting cloud cover.
(For more, Carbon Brief’s in-depth explainer of the drivers of recent exceptional warmth.)
Ocean heat uptake has climbed as well. This has intensified marine heatwaves, further stressing ecosystems and livelihoods that rely on fisheries and coastal resources.
The exceptional warming of the ocean has driven widespread impacts, including massive coral bleaching, fish and shellfish mortality and disruptions to marine food chains.
The map below illustrates some of the impacts of marine heatwaves from 2023-24, highlighting damage inflicted on coral reefs, fishing stocks and coastal communities.
Land “sinks” that absorb carbon – and buffer the emissions from human activity – are under increasing stress, too. Recent research shows a reduction in carbon stored in boreal forests and permafrost ecosystems.
The weakening carbon sinks means that more human-caused carbon emissions remain in the atmosphere, further driving up global temperatures and increasing the chances that warming will surpass the Paris Agreement’s 1.5C limit.
This links to the fourth insight, which shows how climate change and biodiversity loss can amplify each other by leading to a decrease in the accumulation of biomass and reduced carbon storage, creating a destabilising feedback loop that accelerates warming.
New evidence demonstrates that climate change could threaten more than 3-6 million species and, as a result, could undermine critical ecosystem functions.
For example, recent projections indicate that the loss of plant species could reduce carbon sequestration capacity in the range of 7-145bn tonnes of carbon over the coming decades. Similarly, studies show that, in tropical systems, the extinction of animals could reduce carbon storage capacity by up to 26%.
Human health and livelihoods
Growing pressure on the climate system is having cascading consequences for human societies and natural systems.
Our fifth insight highlights how groundwater supplies are increasingly at risk.
More than half the global population depends on groundwater – the second largest source of freshwater after polar ice – for survival.
But groundwater levels are in decline around the world. A 2025 Nature paper found that rapid groundwater declines, exceeding 50cm each year, have occurred in many regions in the 21st century, especially in arid areas dominated by cropland. The analysis also showed that groundwater losses accelerated over the past four decades in about 30% of regional aquifers.
Changes in rainfall patterns due to climate change, combined with increased irrigation demand for agriculture, are depleting groundwater reserves at alarming rates.
The figure below illustrates how climate-driven reductions in rainfall, combined with increased evapotranspiration, are projected to significantly reduce groundwater recharge in many arid regions – contributing to widespread groundwater-level declines.
These losses threaten food security, amplifying competition for scarce resources and undermining the resilience of entire communities.
Human health and livelihoods are also being affected by changes to the climate.
Our sixth insight spotlights the ongoing and projected expansion of the mosquito-borne disease dengue fever.
Dengue surged to the largest global outbreak on record in 2024, with the World Health Organization reporting 14.2m cases, which is an underestimate because not all cases are counted.
Rising temperatures are creating more favourable conditions for the mosquitoes that carry dengue, driving the disease’s spread and increasing its intensity.
The chart below shows the regions climatically suitable for Aedes albopictus (blue line) and Aedes aegypti (green line) – the primary mosquitoes species that carry the virus – increased by 46.3% and 10.7%, respectively, between 1951-60 and 2014-23.
The maps on the right reveal how dengue could spread by 2030 and 2050 under an emissions scenario broadly consistent with current climate policies. It shows that the climate suitable for the mosquito that spreads dengue could expand northwards in Canada, central Europe and the West Siberian Plain by 2050.
The ongoing proliferation of these mosquito species is particularly alarming given their ability to transmit the zika, chikungunya and yellow fever viruses.
Heat stress is also a growing threat to labour productivity and economic growth, which is the seventh insight in our list.
For example, an additional 1C of warming is projected to expose more than 800 million people in tropical regions to unsafe heat levels – potentially reducing working hours by up to 50%.
At 3C warming, sectors such as agriculture, where workers are outdoors and exposed to the sun, could see reductions in effective labour of 25-33% across Africa and Asia, according to a recent Nature Reviews Earth & Environment paper.
Meanwhile, sectors where workers operate in shaded or indoor settings could also face meaningful losses. This drain on productivity compounds socioeconomic issues and places a strain on households, businesses and governments.
Low-income, low-emitting regions are set to shoulder a greater relative share of the impacts of extreme heat on economic growth, exacerbating existing inequalities.
Action and policy
Our report illustrates not only the scale of the challenges facing humanity, but also some of the pathways toward solutions.
The eighth insight emphasises the critical role of carbon dioxide removal (CDR) in stabilising the climate, especially in “overshoot” scenarios where warming temporarily surpasses 1.5C and is then brought back down.
Scaling these CDR solutions responsibly presents technical, ecological, justice, equity and governance challenges.
Nature-based approaches for pulling carbon out of the air – such as afforestation, peatland rewetting and agroforestry – could have negative consequences for food security, biodiversity conservation and resource provision if deployed at scale.
Yet, research has suggested that substantially more CDR may be needed than estimated in the scenarios used in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC’s) last assessment report.
Recent findings showed that a pathway where temperatures remain below 1.5C with no overshoot would require up to 400Gt of cumulative CDR by 2100 in order to buffer against the effect of complex geophysical processes that can accelerate climate change. This figure is roughly twice the amount of CDR assessed by the IPCC.
This underscores the need for robust international coordination on the responsible scaling of CDR technologies, as a complement to ambitious efforts to reduce emissions. Transparent carbon accounting frameworks that include CDR will be required to align national pledges with international goals.
Similarly, voluntary carbon markets – where carbon “offsets” are traded by corporations, individuals and organisations that are under no legal obligation to make emission cuts – face challenges.
Our ninth insight shows how low-quality carbon credits have undermined the credibility of these largely unregulated carbon markets, limiting their effectiveness in supporting emission reductions.
However, emerging standards and integrity initiatives, such as governance and quality benchmarks developed by the Integrity Council for Voluntary Carbon Markets, could address some of the concerns and criticism associated with carbon credit projects.
High-quality carbon credits that are verified and rigorously monitored can complement direct emission reductions.
Finally, our 10th insight highlights how a mix of climate policies typically have greater success than standalone measures.
Research published in Science in 2024 shows how carefully tailored policy packages – including carbon pricing, regulations, and incentives – could consistently achieve larger and more durable emission reductions than isolated interventions.
For example, in the buildings sector, regulations that ban or phase out products or activities achieve an average effect size of 32% when included in a policy package, compared with 13% when implemented on their own.
Importantly, policy mixes that are tailored to the country context and with attention to distributional equity are more likely to gain public support.
These 10 insights in our latest edition highlight the urgent need for an integrated approach to tackling climate change.
The science is clear, the risks are escalating – but the tools to act are available.
The post Guest post: 10 key climate science ‘insights’ from 2025 appeared first on Carbon Brief.
The annual World Economic Forum is underway in the Swiss ski resort of Davos, providing a snowy backdrop for leaders and CEOs to opine on international affairs, including close to 65 heads of state and government On Wednesday afternoon, US President Donald Trump is set to speak, with all eyes on whether he will further stoke a potential US-European trade war over his bid to grab Greenland.
Despite geopolitics grabbing the limelight, there are panels addressing issues including electric vehicles, energy security and climate policy. Keep up with top takeaways from those discussions and other climate news from Davos in our bulletin, which we’ll update throughout the day.
In energy transition’s “messy phase”, climate policy falters but clean tech marches on
Politicians may be struggling to free themselves from the clutches of fossil fuel interests, but that won’t slam the brakes on the march of clean tech and renewables worldwide, former US Vice-President and longtime climate advocate Al Gore said at Davos on Wednesday.
Moderating one of the first panels on day two in an almost empty room, he made a stab at answering the question posed by the World Economic Forum: “How do we avoid a climate recession?”
Gore said he sees “a climate policy recession, but not a recession in the energy transition”. That, he explained, is because policy is controlled by governments – “and too many governments are now, unfortunately, controlled by special interests”, namely the fossil fuel industry which is “significantly better at capturing politicians than at capturing emissions”.
The result has been “schizophrenic” policy on addressing climate change in some countries, including in the US, he said, with periods of slamming on the brakes and “going back to the dirty fossil fuels” to satisfy the industry.
In the real world, however, the advantages of renewable energy have become obvious, as have the consequences of the climate crisis, he added, listing a litany of recent impacts.
On the technology front, Gore pointed out that in 2025, of all new electricity generation installed worldwide, 93% was renewables, and “the only thing coming down faster in price than solar panels is utility-scale batteries, because the production is doubling every year”. “So we don’t have a recession in the movement toward this energy transition, in my opinion,” he added.
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Climate at Davos: Energy security in the geopolitical driving seat
While climate change is a lower priority for leaders at this year’s World Economic Forum, control of energy supplies and minerals is a hot topic -
Roadmaps and Colombia conference aim to shift fossil fuel transition into higher gear
In 2026, global dialogues will chart a path to shift away from fossil fuels without harming workers or financial systems, experts told Climate Home -
At ‘Davos of mining’, Saudi Arabia shapes new narrative on minerals
Over 100 countries attended the Future Minerals Forum in Riyadh, putting the Kingdom at the heart of discussions on minerals for the energy transition
Entrepreneur Zhang Lei, founder and CEO of Envision, which develops technology for clean energy systems and AI-powered energy digital platforms, said there may be some swings in climate policy but “the fundamental physics is actually improving”.
He pointed to an 80% drop in the price of energy storage in the last three years, which he said opens up a lot of opportunities to increase the penetration of wind and solar. That, he added, is exactly what is needed to meet the upsurge in electricity demand driven by the advent of artificial intelligence (AI), describing renewables as “infinite and inexpensive energy resources”.
Fossil fuels, by contrast, are “finite” and therefore not up to the job of powering an AI-based future, with electricity supply expected to increase by 10 times in the next 15 years. Renewables, however, are competitive and approaching “zero marginal cost”, he noted.
“We are so lucky to have renewable energy ready” to take advantage of “great prosperity” driven by AI, Zhang Lei added, noting China’s pivotal role in providing the necessary clean tech to much of the world.
Investment by China is making the renewable energy transition “irreversible”, argued Elizabeth Thurbon, professor of international political economy and director of the Green Energy Statecraft Project at the University of New South Wales.
China will stay on this path, she added, because the government understands that the energy transition “is a massive national security multiplier” by boosting economic security, energy security, environmental security, social security through jobs and geo-strategic security.
Globally, however, she warned that the transition is “in a really messy, messy phase”, due largely to poor governance, especially across a lot of Western countries.
Carsten Schneider, Germany’s environment minister, argued that the European Union, for one, has not taken its foot off the climate policy pedal, agreeing a new emissions reduction goal of 90% by 2040 last December. But that was a hard-fought win, amid pressure from some coal-reliant Eastern European countries to soften the target.
EU’s new climate target lines up multibillion-dollar boost for carbon markets
On Tuesday afternoon, in a separate panel, Andrew Forrest, executive chairman and founder of Australian mining company Fortescue, advised politicians and business people not to waver in their commitment to the energy transition – from an economic perspective, if nothing else.
He spoke of his company’s plan to save up to a billion dollars per year in operating costs by removing over a billion litres of diesel from its supply chains by 2030, replacing the dirty fuel used by trucks, trains and ships with renewable energy and batteries. This will improve Fortescue’s efficiency and competitiveness, and cut pollution, Forrest added, enabling it to outperform its peers.
He appealed to fellow business and political leaders to follow economic sense, urging them not to turn away from renewables in 2026 “because the winds of politics blew your values over”.
The post Climate at Davos: Clean tech powers on despite policy wobbles appeared first on Climate Home News.
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