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Welcome to Carbon Brief’s Cropped.
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

Brazil agri investigations

BOATLOAD OF BEEF: Major shipping firms transported more than half a million tonnes of beef and leather from slaughterhouses “linked to tropical forest destruction in Brazil” over the course of two years, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ) reported. Data showed that 12 meat plants run by Brazil’s top three beef companies were linked to an area of forest loss “three times the size of London” from 2021-23. Shipping firms then moved “hundreds of consignments” of beef and leather from these meat plants to Europe, the US and China in 2022-23, TBIJ found. Alex Wijeratna from environmental campaign group Mighty Earth told the outlet: “Major shipping companies are the silent enablers in the billion-dollar global trade of deforestation-risk commodities.”

DEFORESTATION LINKS: Separately, a report found that around 80% of Brazil’s major beef and leather organisations, plus their financiers, “have made no commitments to stop deforestation”, the Associated Press said. The report from nonprofit Global Canopy ranked meat giant JBS as the “most likely to be buying cattle and cow leather from recently deforested land” – despite the company being one of the few that have made public pledges to halt supply chain deforestation in future. JBS told the newswire that the report’s methodology provided a simplistic and inaccurate assessment of deforestation risk and ignored other factors, such as corporate policies. 

MULTIPLE CRISES: Elsewhere, a new report covered by Carbon Brief found that “siloed” approaches to tackling the interconnected issues of biodiversity, climate change, food, water and health are not “fully effective”. The report from the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) found that focusing on a single element of these issues at the expense of the others will have negative impacts for humans and the planet. A second IPBES report looked at the “urgent and necessary” need for “transformative change” to tackle biodiversity loss and nature decline. Inger Andersen, executive director of the UN Environment Programme, said it “offers a roadmap for addressing the drivers of the nature crisis with tools for action across sectors and society”, Down to Earth reported. 

Desertification COP ends in disarray

NO DROUGHT DEAL: The COP16 desertification summit in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, ended with no agreement on a “legally binding response to drought”, the Financial Times reported. Countries need more time to agree on the “best way” to deal with this “critical issue”, the head of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), Ibrahim Thiaw, said. The FT noted: “African countries in particular pushed for the establishment of a legally binding drought protocol, while the US and EU bloc sought a framework that was less economically onerous, but was ready to be operational.” This outcome follows the recent “failure” to reach key agreements at biodiversity talks in Colombia and plastics talks in South Korea, the newspaper said.

ENDING: Countries signed off on some outcomes at the Riyadh COP, including to set up “official groupings for Indigenous peoples and local communities”, Climate Home News reported. Governments also agreed to extend the desertification convention’s remit “beyond drylands, to cover grasslands, shrublands, woodlands, savanna and tundra”, the outlet said. On the other hand, the summit left a “lot of loose ends”, including on finance, according to Think Landscape. In total, $12bn was pledged at COP16 to tackle desertification, drought and land degradation – but an estimated $355bn will be needed each year by 2030, the outlet noted. 

DRY LAND: Almost 78% of land around the world “likely became permanently drier” between 1990 and 2020, according to a UN report covered by Down to Earth. The report, released during COP16, said that 4.3m square kilometres of “previously humid landscapes” have turned into drylands over those three decades. The outlet said: “This transition has dire implications for agriculture, ecosystems and the livelihoods of those dependent on these regions, as reduced rainfall affects crops, pastures, people and nature.” 

Spotlight

The top five food, land and nature stories of 2024

For the final Cropped issue of the year, Carbon Brief rounds up our selection of the five food, land and nature stories that marked 2024. Cropped will return to your inbox on 15 January 2025.

SEVERE DROUGHT: In February, Carbon Brief covered research revealing that half of the Amazon will face “unprecedented” stress that could lead to a tipping point by 2050. Such stress – the result of a combination of factors, including climate change, deforestation, biodiversity loss and extreme weather – may convert vast rainforest areas into savannas. In October, Brazil’s Globo Rural reported that the drought in the southern Amazon – ongoing since 2023 – reached “critical levels”, hindering river navigation and isolating riverside communities.

SKYROCKETING FOOD COSTS: This year saw a global rise in food prices, from olive oil and oranges through to cocoa and coffee. Carbon Brief consulted a range of scientists and policy experts to best understand the factors behind the spiking prices, including extreme weather events, high input costs, geopolitical conflicts and increasing demand. The Financial Times reported that climate change is a major trigger for these prices, as it is “reducing crop yields, squeezing supplies and driving up prices”. Carbon Brief produced five charts that highlight climate impacts on food production and prices for various crops in the EU, UK, US and China.

DE- AND REFORESTATION: A report by the Forest Declaration Assessment noted that the world is “not on track to meet” its goals to halt and reverse deforestation and forest degradation by 2030. According to the report, the world has “barely made a dent in curbing deforestation”. In June this year, the EU Council gave the final sign-off to a nature law aiming to restore 30% of degraded habitats, including forests, rivers and wetlands by 2030, as Carbon Brief reported. EU countries will start implementing their restoration plans in July 2026, according to Earth.org.

MASS BLEACHING: This year also saw the “most extensive on record” event of coral bleaching, Reuters reported, citing the US National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Satellite data revealed 77% of the world’s coral reef areas have undergone heat stress, leading to bleaching events, against a backdrop of “near-record ocean temperatures across the world”. Scientists dubbed this the “fourth global coral bleaching”. 

THREE COPS: Three COPs in a row closed out the year. Carbon Brief covered the COP16 biodiversity summit in Cali, which will resume in Rome in February 2025 to address unresolved issues, such as creating a new fund under the COP and a monitoring framework for countries’ progress in tackling biodiversity loss. Carbon Brief also reported on the COP29 climate talks in Baku, where food and nature featured “pretty weakly” in the negotiations, according to observers. The year ended with the UN desertification conference in Riyadh, which ended last week and failed to agree on a legally binding drought protocol, Inter Press Service reported.

News and views

‘EPIC’ MIGRATION: Climate change may have led a humpback whale to undertake “one of the longest and most unusual migrations ever recorded”, BBC News reported. The whale traveled from the Pacific Ocean to the Indian Ocean, covering a distance of 13,000 kilometres. Scientists described it as an “epic” migration and said it could have been driven by a reduction of food availability due to climate change or the search for a mate. 

PRICING BIODIVERSITY: Investors are “increasingly interested in addressing biodiversity risks in their portfolios” and putting a price on biodiversity through the creation of “green” funds, the Financial Times reported. The outlet cited experts in biodiversity investments who said the sector is becoming more aware of the impacts of biodiversity loss on inflation and GDP. It also said that the topic drew more attention at the COP16 biodiversity summit, held in Colombia this year, than at previous biodiversity summits. Separately, a recent study outlined a new framework for defining what a unit of nature is, as well as the risks of biodiversity credits.

FARMER FRUSTRATIONS: In Spain, tens of thousands of farmers took to the streets of Madrid to protest against a trade agreement between the EU and Mercosur countries in South America, Euractiv reported. The deal, which has been in the works for 25 years, would “create a free-trade zone spanning more than 700m people”, Politico said. It was given the final green light on 6 December, but has not yet taken effect, the outlet noted, adding that it is “furiously opposed by France, which fears that a glut of cheap poultry and beef imports would undercut its farmers”. Elsewhere, DeSmog and other outlets compiled a database of interests and “side jobs” of politicians on an EU agriculture committee. In the UK, farmers protested in London over tax changes, according to Reuters. 

RISKY BUSINESS: Bloomberg reported on the risks of an “unusual insurance policy” to aid disaster recovery that is “gaining ground” in Asia, Africa and the Caribbean. The policy, known as parametric insurance, provides a payout only when a “specific metric is triggered”, such as low rainfall levels harming crop growth. The outlet spoke to people in a small Malawi village which has received “only a trickle” of a payout from this policy. Chilimani has been hit by floods, cyclones and now its “worst drought in decades”, which has “obliterated the harvest of corn, the main food”, Bloomberg said. One villager told the outlet: “It’s the worst time of our lives…Everything has become unpredictable.” 

Watch, read, listen

LAND RIGHTS: The Africa Daily podcast from the BBC World Service explored whether a recent “major land policy shift” in Zimbabwe will “empower black farmers”. 

‘SACRED’ CENOTES: An Associated Press video covered the Indigenous Mayans’ quest to obtain personhood status for their “sacred cenotes”, a group of subterranean lakes in Mexico.

RISKY SHIFT: Farmers and fishermen are starting to work at night in response to extreme heat. Grist navigated the “new dangers” these changes may lead to. 

HOPEFUL NOTE: The Guardian detailed “five UK biodiversity success stories” – including butterfly comebacks and helping a river “start from scratch”. 

New science

  • A new study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that less than a quarter of tropical rainforests are of “high integrity”, meaning they are “intact and undisturbed”. The researchers analysed forest areas inhabited by 16,396 species of terrestrial vertebrates, finding that species threatened with extinction were especially affected by the loss of habitat.
  • Species extinctions will “accelerate rapidly” if global temperatures go beyond 1.5C above pre-industrial levels, a Science meta-analysis study suggested. The research synthesised the findings of 485 studies and more than 5m projections of future extinctions.
  • Deforestation-induced climate change has made soybean and maize crop shortages “more frequent and severe”, according to new research published in Nature Sustainability. The authors examined the effects of climate change on these crops in the Cerrado, a vast savanna in eastern Brazil.

In the diary

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 18 December 2024: No UN deal for drought; Brazil beef investigations; New IPBES reports appeared first on Carbon Brief.

Cropped 18 December 2024: No UN deal for drought; Brazil beef investigations; New IPBES reports

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Climate Change

Is FOMO undermining climate diplomacy?

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Benito Müller, Anju Sharma, Jen Allan, Matthias Roesti and Luis Gomez-Echeverri.

Every November, tens of thousands of people descend on the world’s annual UN climate conference. Presidents and prime ministers, negotiators, business executives, campaigners, journalists, celebrities and lobbyists converge on one city for two frenetic weeks, all convinced they need to be there.

Everyone with a stake in climate action feels they must be present. Any suggestion of a smaller, more focused conference is quickly met with concerns about exclusion. But it is time to ask an uncomfortable question: has the fear of missing out (FOMO) become one of the biggest obstacles to effective international climate cooperation?

The story in numbers

When governments first met under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in the 1990s, the annual Conferences of the Parties (COPs) attracted only a few thousand participants. Even the Kyoto conference, which produced the first legally binding emissions agreement, hosted fewer than 10,000 people.

Since then, analysis by ecbi reveals a striking trend: after each major treaty COP, the participation at the next COP approximately doubled (see chart below).

Why?

Part of the answer is success. As climate change has risen up the political and economic agenda, more actors quite rightly want to engage. But our analysis reveals that a less acknowledged force is also driving the spikes in participation: FOMO.

As more heads of state attended, ministers concluded they had to be there too. As ministers arrived in greater numbers, government delegations expanded. Businesses, investors, researchers, campaigners, journalists, city leaders and philanthropies reached the same conclusion: if everyone important is going to COP, we cannot afford to stay away.

The result is a self-reinforcing cycle. The larger COP becomes, the more indispensable attendance appears, because presence signals relevance.



The negotiating community has barely grown

The headline attendance figures tell only part of the story. At COP28, more than 42,000 Party badges were issued to official national delegations. However, only 1,581 delegates had also attended the technical negotiating session in Bonn just five months earlier. Fewer than 4% of Party delegates formed the core negotiating community.

Comment: The UN climate process was built for negotiation – now it must support implementation

This core negotiating community has remained remarkably stable: across the five COPs since Paris, between roughly 1,300 and 1,600 delegates consistently attended both the June negotiating session and the annual COP.

The negotiating community has not become twenty times larger, but the COP has.

One COP, three different events

Today’s COP has, in fact, evolved into three very different events rolled into one.

The first is the formal negotiating session, where governments agree rules, guidance and decisions under the Convention and the Paris Agreement.

The second is a global political summit, where leaders announce initiatives and demonstrate political commitment.

The third is a vast climate expo, where businesses, cities, researchers, financial institutions and civil society showcase solutions, build partnerships and engage the public.

Each of them serves a valuable purpose, but the problem is that they have become bundled together by historical accident rather than institutional design.

Bigger is not always better

The consequences of “mega-COPs” are becoming increasingly difficult to ignore.

The countries most vulnerable to climate change are increasingly less able to host COPs and thus lose the ability to have their voices properly heard. Hosting a modern COP now requires enormous financial resources, extensive security operations and accommodation capacity that many countries simply do not possess. Even wealthier nations have become more reluctant to take on the burden.

Inside the venue, size creates its own inefficiencies. Climate negotiations often advance through informal conversations: a chance meeting in a corridor, a discussion over coffee, an impromptu conversation between delegates who discover common ground. Those opportunities become rarer when participants spend hours navigating enormous venues and crowded security checkpoints.

Comment: COP presidencies should focus less on climate policy, more on global politics

Observer access is constrained by overcrowding. National delegations increasingly include large numbers of non-government participants, sometimes outnumbering officials from government ministries. Meanwhile, businesses, campaigners and journalists compete with negotiators for the same space and attention.

The very scale of the event also creates a reputational problem. A gathering of 60,000 or more people inevitably creates expectations of dramatic political breakthroughs every year. Yet much of today’s climate diplomacy involves steady, technical progress. When those quieter achievements are judged against the expectations generated by a mega-event, disappointment in the UN climate change process becomes almost inevitable.

Time to unbundle

Not everything must happen in the same place at the same time. Negotiations, political leadership and implementation partnerships each deserve their own space. They should become separate events.

Routine governing body sessions, involving the roughly 5,000 participants directly engaged in the formal process, could be held in Bonn, where the UN climate secretariat is based. Political summits could be convened separately when leaders’ intervention is genuinely needed. Climate expos could continue to rotate with the COP Presidency, providing dedicated opportunities for businesses, investors, cities, researchers and civil society to showcase solutions and forge partnerships.

Such an approach would strengthen, not weaken, participation. Negotiators would benefit from a more focused and effective working environment. Host countries would face a far more manageable logistical and financial challenge. Climate-vulnerable countries would once again have a realistic opportunity to host key meetings and shape the global agenda. Businesses, investors, cities and civil society would gain greater visibility by engaging in forums designed for partnership, innovation and implementation, rather than competing with formal negotiations for space and attention.

Comment: Not another COP-out: We must rewrite the rules of the UN climate talks

Today’s mega-COPs evolved incrementally, one seemingly sensible decision at a time, until their sheer scale began to undermine many of the objectives they were intended to serve. The fear of missing out now risks becoming one of the biggest barriers to the reforms needed to make the process more effective.

The greatest fear now is not missing out on the next COP, but missing the opportunity to redesign the process so it can deliver on its ultimate purpose: tackling the climate crisis.

Benito Müller is managing director of Oxford Climate Policy and director of the European Capacity Building Initiative (ecbi).

Anju Sharma is a climate policy specialist with Oxford Climate Policy.

Jen Allan is a senior Lecturer at Cardiff University and strategic advisor at the International Institute for Sustainable Development.

Matthias Roesti is a postdoctoral researcher studying the political economy of climate change at the University of Pennsylvania’s Environmental Politics Lab.

Luis Gomez-Echeverri is a former senior staff member with UNDP and UNFCCC and currently an emeritus research scholar at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, working at the intersection of climate and development.

The post Is FOMO undermining climate diplomacy? appeared first on Climate Home News.

Is FOMO undermining climate diplomacy?

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Climate Change

Factcheck: How nuclear, gas, wind and solar power are affected during heatwaves

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Heatwaves are becoming more likely and more intense due to climate change, impacting sources of power generation around the world as they work to meet increased demand.

When temperatures soared past 40C in parts of Europe in June and July 2026, nuclear reactors shuttered, gas plants’ efficiency fell, wind speeds dropped and electricity networks sagged.

Yet, while all types of electricity generation are affected variously by extreme heat, some commentators are quick to point the finger at “intermittentwind and solar, while downplaying the impact on sources such as gas or nuclear power.

Extreme heat also drives up electricity demand, as people turn on air conditioning and fridges work harder.

For example, in France, daily electricity demand rose by almost 20% during a two-week heatwave in June 2026.

This often leads to an increase in power prices, as generation strains and demand rises, putting a premium on electricity.

Below, Carbon Brief – amid a slew of misleading claims – explains how key power sources cope with extreme heat.

Nuclear

The impact of heatwaves on nuclear power generation is well documented, with a plethora of headlines often accompanying record temperatures in nations that rely on the technology.

For example, around 70% of electricity is generated by nuclear power in France, leaving it vulnerable to the impacts of heatwaves.

During the July 2026 heatwave, three of France’s 57 nuclear reactors had to shut down. Generation was reduced at another seven, causing an almost 9% dip in power production.

(This is a well-known phenomenon – France has seen reductions in nuclear generation due to heatwaves in 2003, 2006, 2015, 2018, 2019, 2022 and 2025.)

A similar story is true across various countries in Europe. Low river levels on the Danube have hit nuclear reactors in Romania, Hungary and Serbia this summer, while a Swiss nuclear reactor shuttered due to high river temperatures.

It is nuclear plants using river water to cool their reactors that are most significantly affected by heatwaves and droughts. These make up 14% of the global fleet. Around 60 of the world’s 440 river-cooled reactors are located in France, with a further seven across Europe.

Nuclear power plants use fission to generate heat, which is used to create steam. This steam spins the blades of a turbine that is connected to a generator to create electricity.

Following this process, the water is cooled to allow it to be recycled back through the system as steam again. Nuclear power plants generally use water from rivers or the sea to help cool and condense this steam.

As such, when water temperatures rise due to a heatwave, their cooling capacity is reduced and the overall efficiency of the nuclear power station is affected. Similarly, if there is less water available due to drought, they cannot be cooled as effectively.

Michael Tadrous, a researcher at McMaster University’s DeGroote School of Business in Canada, tells Carbon Brief that the “impact [of heatwaves] is real, but it is far smaller than many headlines suggest” and that the “effect [of heat] is gradual”. He adds:

“Warmer intake water makes a reactor slightly less efficient. [But] even an extreme 15C rise in cooling-water temperature would cost a large reactor only about 6% of its output.

“The real pressure point during a heatwave is usually legal rather than technical. Plants return their cooling water to the river a few degrees warmer than they drew it and the law limits how warm that water may be in order to protect aquatic life.”

Henry Preston, a spokesperson for the industry body the World Nuclear Association, adds that reactor shutdowns due to high river temperatures are “typically an automatic response to comply with regulations to protect local ecosystems, rather than a technological fault”.

He notes that in some extreme heatwaves, these regulations are waived given the “essential need for electricity and taking a proportional approach to climate risks”.

While nuclear power plants can generally return to standard operation quickly if they have been affected by high water temperatures, drought can cause a more significant impact.

Preston tells Carbon Brief:

“In contrast to high river temperatures, which can quickly return to acceptable levels once a heatwave passes, low river levels can persist for much longer, if drought conditions continue. As a result, low water levels may have a more prolonged impact on plant operations than elevated water temperatures.”

This is set to be the case in the current European drought, where multiple reactors in Hungary and Romania have shut down or reduced their output due to low water levels.

Simon Evans on Bluesky: Hungary's Paks nuclear plant is close to complete shutdown due to low water levels on the Danube

The Danube is not expected to return to normal water levels for “days or even weeks as no significant rainfall is forecast”, reported the Associated Press on 3 August 2026. It said this was “push[ing] some countries in eastern Europe to the brink of energy emergency”.

While heatwaves and drought can produce significant short-term effects, their impact on the availability of nuclear power across a full year is generally minimal.

On average, heatwaves cut annual nuclear generation by 0.6% between 2003 and 2022, according to a recent study that Tadrous co-authored.

He adds that, across the whole period studied, the only time a national nuclear fleet lost more than 1% of its nuclear power over a year to heat- and drought-related curtailments was France in 2003, which lost 1.3%.

According to an article in Forbes, for every additional degree Celsius in temperature, a nuclear power plant loses around 0.6-1% in cycle efficiency.

To minimise the impact on both energy security and costs, governments and nuclear companies are looking at a range of solutions to adapt to heatwaves.

For example, French nuclear-plant operator EDF is looking at additional cooling towers for its sites that are the most exposed to the impacts of a warming climate, reported Bloomberg recently.

Tadrous says the nuclear power industry is already adapting to heatwaves that are “more frequent and more intense”, adding:

“France’s river-cooled fleet lost 5.5 terawatt hours (TWh) of output to the 2003 heatwave. By 2022, one of the most severe heat-and-drought summers on record, losses had fallen to 0.5TWh, a reduction of roughly 90%, as utilities upgraded cooling systems, refined operating practices and scheduled maintenance around periods of extreme heat.”

There remain challenges for adapting nuclear power – and the wider electricity systems in which it sits – to heatwaves. However, Tadrous notes that this is less about “technical feasibility than of economic prioritisation and timely implementation”.

Gas

Gas power plants have a reputation for being reliable and able to switch on at any moment, sometimes referred to as “firm, dispatchable” capacity.

Yet, as a type of thermal generation, they are subject to many of the same stresses during heatwaves as nuclear power.

An article by the science advocacy organisation Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) notes that the “purported ability of gas plants to be available at all times to generate electricity, particularly when the grid needs it most, is increasingly under scrutiny” due to heatwaves.

As a matter of physics, the efficiency of gas power plants drops as temperatures rise. At 40C, a gas-fired power station can expect its capacity to be reduced by 13% and its efficiency by 7% compared to when running at 20C, according to Electric Insights.

Dr Iain Staffell, associate professor in sustainable energy at Imperial College London, tells Carbon Brief:

“Simple gas turbines (the kind which turn on rapidly to meet peak demand) are hit harder [than solar, for example], with their power output falling by about 10% per 10C.”

(He adds that the transmission system struggles more than electricity generation during high temperature. Power line capacity can fall by up to 16% for a 10C rise in temperature, according to a report for the UK government.)

Several types of gas power plants require cooling as part of their process, including gas steam and combined cycle turbines (CCGTs). They usually rely on nearby bodies of water for this.

Additionally, as the UCS article notes, hot air has a lower density than cool air. As gas CCGTs rely on burning a mix of gas and air, this lower density means air takes up more space, leaving less room for gas.

Ultimately, this means that when the air is hot, gas power plants cannot generate as much electricity as normal.

These effects are not just theoretical. For example, across two nights in August 2020, there were rolling blackouts in California, US, as demand exceeded supply amid a heatwave.

While a number of factors contributed to the blackouts, gas plants made up around 79% of the capacity that dropped off the system on 14 August and a similar share the following day.

Amid record-breaking heat in summer 2026, gas power plants have also seen their capacity cut in the UK, France and other countries.

Simon Evans on Bluesky says: HEATWAVE HITS GAS POWER? Amid tight GB supplies, looks like gas plants cutting output due to heat?

Dr Staffell adds that gas power stations are thought of as “reliable, because of the way we use them” in the UK.

Whereas wind and solar are usually used to the maximum extent possible, he says that on average, only around 40% of the gas fleet is in use at any one time. As such, even if the efficiency of one gas power plant is affected by high temperatures, “we have a lot of slack to call on more of them to run”. He adds:

“The issue is less that they can’t deliver, but we have to pay through the nose to persuade more to turn on at critical times, adding to sky-high energy bills.”

Wind

The impact of heatwaves on wind generation is less direct than for other technologies.

However, wind speeds often drop during heatwaves, which tend to build during periods of sustained high pressure into extreme events such as “heat domes”.

Dr Staffell, explains to Carbon Brief:

“The very hottest days tend to create heat domes with very low wind speeds, which directly reduces the output that windfarms can produce. Air is also less dense the hotter it is, so it carries less energy within it, so there is a double impact on wind turbines.”

High temperatures are linked to low wind speeds across three-quarters of the globe, according to one recent study, looking at data from 1980 to 2023.

The study found that, as a result, across Australia, northern Asia and Europe, wind power decreased by an average of 30-50% during heatwaves.

This is inconsistent globally, however, with the Amazon, the Great Plains in North America and central Africa actually seeing a slight increase in wind during high temperatures.

As such, while the effect of heatwaves on wind generation is less direct than other generation technologies, it can have a significant impact.

In the UK in June 2026, wind generation fell to around 15% of the electricity mix due to low wind speeds, from an average for the month of about 30%, according to Octopus.

Low wind generation during this period was a key feature of the strain on the grid experienced during this time – in particular, as demand rose amid record-high temperatures.

On Wednesday 24 June, for example, the National Electricity System Operator (Neso) had to pay high prices to balance supply and demand. This included paying as much as £1,400 a megawatt-hour to secure around 1.7 gigawatts (GW) of imported power, nearly 20 times the average price for electricity in June 2025.

A Neso spokesperson said in a statement: “This is due to the impact of extremely high temperatures affecting Great Britain and the continent, and low wind.”

While reduced wind generation is common during a heatwave, it is not generally viewed as a concern for energy system operators. This is due to wind following well-established seasonal patterns – it generates less power in summer than in winter – as well as being complementary to other renewable technologies, such as solar.

Dr Chris Rosslowe, senior energy analyst for Europe at Ember, tells Carbon Brief:

“Power systems are less reliant on wind power in the summer months and its lower-than-average output is already expected and planned for. Heatwaves often bring still, but clear conditions, highlighting the benefit of wind and solar as a duo – poor conditions for one often mean good conditions for the other.”

As such, wind power remains one of very few technologies considered “resilient” to heatwaves by the UK government.

However, this did not stop the anti-renewables Daily Mail from attempting to blame the technology for strain on the UK grid on 24 June 2026, despite its own article acknowledging that gas plants had also been forced to cut their output by 2.5GW on the day.

Solar

Another common claim seen in the media is that solar “struggles” during heatwaves, with high temperatures pushing down the technology’s efficiency.

Yet heatwaves tend to coincide with long, cloudless days, when solar generation is reliably above average – despite the impact of high temperatures.

While hot weather does reduce the efficiency of solar cells, the effect is relatively modest – and widely understood. Each 1C of temperature rise reduces output by around 0.4-0.5%, according to a recent study.

This is in line with an evidence review for the UK government, which suggests the performance of solar panels falls by 0.2-0.5% for every degree of heat above 25C.

Generally, however, this effect is easily outweighed by high sunlight hours during hot spells. For example, across a four-day heatwave in the UK in June 2026, solar generated 484 gigawatt-hours (GWh) of electricity – a 46% increase over the same period a week earlier.

Similar generation highs were seen across Europe, amid record temperatures and dangerous heat that was pushing people towards the use of air conditioning.

Solar generated a record 52TWh across the EU in June 2026, beating the high set just the month before of 47TWh.

In fact, solar – especially when combined with battery storage – is a complementary technology to air conditioning, given their similar seasonal patterns. Over the course of the day, demand from air conditioning and generation from solar also marry up well.

Dr Rosslowe says:

“Solar, battery storage and air conditioning are a highly complementary trio of technologies during heatwaves. There’s a high overlap between solar output and demand from AC.”

For example, on the hottest day of the year so far in Great Britain (the island grid serving England, Wales and Scotland), on 26 June 2026, solar surged to 13.9GW in the middle of the afternoon, as demand also hit its highest point, as shown in the chart below.

Solar power tends to match high electricity demand during heatwaves. Half-hourly electricity demand and generation by source, gigawatt (GW). Area chart shows demand peaking around 40GW between 12pm and 2pm on 26 June 2026, with solar power supplying a major share of electricity during these peak daytime hours. Source: Neso. - (alt text generated by Google Gemini)
Generation on the 26 June in Great Britain, highlighting the match between solar power (yellow) and the demand profile for electricity (blue line). Source: Neso.

Across June 2026, homes with solar panels generated the equivalent of five hours of “free” self-supplied air conditioning, according to recent analysis.

Despite the impact of heat on solar efficiency, the technology is, therefore, well placed to bolster energy systems during heatwaves.

Indeed, as Dr Rosslowe tells Carbon Brief, solar suppresses power prices during daylight hours. But, even though it is predictable, there are still challenges around managing the dip in solar generation as the evening sets in. This is often compounded because it coincides with the usual evening increase in demand.

Dr Rosslowe explains:

“Problems arise when the sun goes down, but demand for cooling remains high. In the early evening hours, when gas power typically ramps up to replace solar, we have seen prices spike to extreme levels, made worse by high international gas prices.”

Storage

Energy storage systems are increasingly key to managing the impact of heatwaves on electricity systems.

The category of technologies is dominated by batteries, with more than 108GW of battery storage added in 2025 alone, according to the International Energy Agency.

Already, batteries have been used to take advantage of surges in solar generation during the daytime, amid high summer temperatures.

This is particularly useful to meet evening peaks in electricity demand, as well as the need for air conditioning overnight when temperatures do not fall.

In a statement, Pawel Czyzak , Europe programme director at Ember, said:

“Heatwaves will not go away – they will only get more severe in the future. Solutions that can help mitigate their impacts, such as battery storage, interconnection, demand flexibility and dynamic tariffs, should become a key part of grid planning and power market design.”

However, batteries are not without their challenges during heatwaves. Battery performance also decreases as temperatures exceed their optimal level.

Additionally, high temperatures can accelerate the degradation of components in lithium-ion batteries, which dominate the sector.

Analysis for the UK government found that prolonged operation at very high temperatures could – at least in theory – “overwhelm” the cooling systems built into batteries, “posing risks such as thermal runaway and explosions”. However, it noted that in practice, these cooling systems are “routinely” designed to handle temperatures of up to 45C.

(The analysis added that “developers and manufacturers have a strong understanding of risk to [battery storage systems] from high temperature and mitigate risks through regular maintenance, design improvements, and passive cooling strategies”.)

Other storage technologies also face challenges during heatwaves. For example, pumped hydro storage can be significantly impacted by drought.

Australia – which now has 4.3GW of large-scale battery storage capacity – saw its fleet of batteries and pumped hydro storage tested at the beginning of 2026, amid the most severe heatwave in years.

Temperatures above 40C posed “challenges” to storage technologies, reported Energy Storage News, which explained that their output and operating times were reduced by the increased need for their cooling systems to operate.

Despite these challenges, the use of battery storage is helping to spread the ability of renewables to meet electricity demand during heatwaves. For example, a combination of solar and battery energy storage “kept the lights on” in California amid a heatwave in 2024.

By storing abundant power during the day, it can be discharged during evening peaks, helping to minimise generation constraints and thereby keep power prices down.

Dr Rosslowe says:

“The extreme price spikes that we witness during heatwaves are a blaring signal for more power system flexibility. That could come from battery storage, demand response, or increased interconnection between countries or regions.”

The post Factcheck: How nuclear, gas, wind and solar power are affected during heatwaves appeared first on Carbon Brief.

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Governments weigh response to US going alone on deep-sea mining

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As governments at the UN seek ways to prevent the US from unilaterally mining the deep ocean floor for critical minerals, the latest UN seabed talks launched “long” processes that would seek to challenge Washington’s approach.

The International Seabed Authority (ISA), the UN body regulating the deep ocean floor, held annual three-week talks ending on Friday. The discussions come as the US – which is not a member country – moved forward in its unilateral deep-sea mining push, and as mining companies applying for American permits fought back a UN inquiry into their behaviour.

The Trump administration and mining frontrunners, among them Canadian firm The Metals Company (TMC), want to mine a huge area of the Pacific Ocean known as the Clarion-Clipperton Zone. Although it holds deposits of mangenese, nickel and rare earths – key for military use and clean energy components – it is also an unexplored ecosystem with thousands of unnamed species.

The meeting, held at ISA headquarters in Jamaica’s capital Kingston, ended with no immediate breakthroughs. Instead, it started long processes that seeks to hold mining firms and the US accountable, according to ocean governance expert Pradeep Singh, from the Oceano Azul Foundation.

“It shows some level of maturity as well as understanding from member states that this is a long process that requires policy discussions that might not be resolved by acting right away without considerate thought” he said.

    Countries have begun consultations on whether to request an advisory opinion from the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS), which would seek to clarify the legality of the US-issued permits in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone and whether other states should recognise them.

    The ISA will also move forward with an inquiry into its contractors, including The Metals Company (TMC). The company tried to prevent this inquiry by suing the ISA at the ITLOS for allegedly acting in bad faith, an argument that the world’s top maritime court rejected.

    ISA secretary-general Letícia Carvalho said in her closing remarks that the past year “presented both significant challenges and noteworthy achievements”. Earlier in the talks, she said the agency’s role is “more important than ever” and that resources in the deep seabed are “the common heritage of humankind”.

    Advisory opinion on legality of US mining push

    Towards the end of the ISA assembly, Carvalho submitted a draft text to countries proposing they request an advisory opinion from the ITLOS, clarifying the legality of the US deep-sea mining push.

    Brazilian oceanographer Letícia Carvalho is secretary-general of the ISA (Photo: IISD ENB/Andrés Felipe Carvajal Gómez)

    The initiative proposed questions to the court, including whether international law backs the principle that the deep seafloor cannot be appropriated by any single country, and whether other governments should avoid recognising any similar effort.

    Several nations including the African group, New Zealand, Norway, France, Singapore, Jamaica and Canada argued that while they could back such a proposal, it required careful legal consideration. Some regretted that the note was not sent earlier in the talks.

    Russia and China backed the request for an advisory opinion. The Chinese delegation suggested asking whether unilateral actions by non-member states – such as the US – would break international law, and what the consequences of such actions would be.

    Egypt seeks to unlock renewable potential to power regional clean energy hub

    By the end of the talks there was no consensus on this proposal. The assembly decided instead to hold consultations led by Malta, and decide on whether to request an advisory opinion by next year’s meeting.

    “They are not rushing into this,” Singh explained. “It also seems that they are not feeling immediately threatened at this stage, and that there are still some things that could be done to find a way forward and perhaps persuading the US from acting unilaterally.”

    Growing call for deep-sea mining moratorium

    Activists were also critical of the ISA deciding to renew one of TMC’s exploration licenses in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone, which expired last month. Haldis Helle, ocean campaigner at Greenpeace, said this was a “reward” for TMC despite “their clear disregard for international law”.

    But Singh argued that the renewal was “not an endorsement to act unilaterally” but an effort from countries to make the “whole decision-making including the inquiry process robust”, without showing signs of any bias.

    Instead, campaigners highlighted a growing call for a moratorium on deep-sea mining, which seeks to halt all activity until enough scientific evidence can show that it is not harmful for marine wildlife. The initiative is now backed by 46 governments, with Mauritius, Mozamboque and the Republic of Congo becoming the latest supporters.

    “The lesson from the past three weeks is clear: only a pause on exploitation, now backed by over a quarter of ISA member states, can deliver the legal certainty this moment demands and rein in a situation being driven out of control by a handful of reckless companies“, said Sofia Tsenikli, global campaign director at the Deep-Sea Conservation Coalition (DSCC).

    The post Governments weigh response to US going alone on deep-sea mining appeared first on Climate Home News.

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