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Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.

This week

Trump leaves Paris pact

US EXIT: Donald Trump signed an executive order to withdraw the US from the Paris Agreement on his first day in office, the New York Times reported. By exiting, the world’s biggest historic emitter will join Iran, Libya and Yemen as the only countries not committed to the global deal to keep global warming well-below 2C by the end of the century. The decision will take one year to take effect, the newspaper added.

‘FATAL SIGNAL’: European leaders speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos this week condemned Trump’s decision, Bloomberg said. European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen said the Paris Agreement was “the best hope for all humanity”, while Germany’s economy minister described Trump’s exit as a “fatal signal to the world”, according to the publication. The Times reported that UK prime minister Keir Starmer refused to condemn Trump’s withdrawal from the pact.

CHINA ‘CONCERN’: The Associated Press reported that China expressed concern over Trump’s move, with Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun saying: “Climate change is a common challenge facing mankind. No country can be outside of it. No country can be immune to it.” At a press conference, however, he said China’s “resolve” to act was “unchanged”. African Business reported that the chair of the African climate negotiating bloc said the group was “deeply disappointed” by the decision.

US climate regime shift

WIND WOES: Amid shattering the record for the number of executive orders signed in one day, Trump also signed a bill temporarily halting offshore wind lease sales in federal waters and pausing the issuance of approvals, permits and loans for both onshore and offshore wind projects, the Associated Press reported. The Washington Post examined how the move could “significantly curtail” wind power growth over the next four years.

OIL AND GAS ‘UNLEASHED’: Trump became the first president to announce an “energy emergency”, as part of “a barrage of pro-fossil fuel actions to unleash already booming US energy production”, the Guardian reported. This included lifting the moratorium on new US licenses to export liquefied natural gas (LNG) put in place by Joe Biden, Bloomberg reported. The Financial Times reported that Trump could be thwarted by Wall Street’s “reluctance to approve another drilling binge” due to “investor pressure…[and] economic realities”.

EVS AXED: Reuters reported that Trump also signed an order to revoke a 2021 bill signed by Joe Biden, which sought to ensure half of all new vehicles sold in the US were electric by 2030. A Lex opinion article in the Financial Times said the move could be enough to have a “chilling effect on the market”. An FT editorial contrasted Trump’s approach with China’s push for EVs, calling it a “bet on the energy status quo, not on the future”.

Around the world

  • COP30 HEAD: Brazil appointed André Aranha Corrêa do Lago – an “experienced climate negotiator” and the country’s secretary for climate, energy and environment – as incoming president of the COP30 climate talks, the Guardian reported.
  • HEATHROW SPAT: The UK Labour Party is “split” over a plan from chancellor Rachel Reeves to approve a third runway at Heathrow airport, with energy secretary Ed Miliband and the mayors of London and Manchester strongly opposed to the move, according to the Independent.
  • INDONESIA FLOODS: At least 21 people have been killed and 300 more displaced in flash floods and landslides in Indonesia’s Java province, the Associated Press reported.
  • NIGERIA OIL PROTESTS: More than 20 environmental groups and local communities are protesting the planned return of oil drilling to Ogoniland, Nigeria – an area already deeply affected by pollution from oil spills, Reuters said.
  • LA ABLAZE: Multiple new fires have erupted amid continuing dry conditions in Los Angeles, the Los Angeles Times reported. It added that rain is now forecast for the weekend.

One-third

The proportion of Arctic tundra and ecosystems that has become a source of emissions, rather than a carbon sink, according to research covered by the Guardian.


Latest climate research

  • Anti-climate change groups are more likely to develop in countries with strong environmental plans, according to an analysis drawing on 30 years of data published in PLOS One.
  • A study in Limnology and Oceanography Letters recorded how corals in one area of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef fared after facing their most widespread bleaching event on record in 2024.
  • Arctic “ice roads” – temporary roads formed from the build up of snow that act as lifelines for isolated communities – have reduced because of climate change and are likely to decline further this century, according to research in Communications Earth and Environment.

(For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)

Captured

EU electricity generation from coal, gas, wind and solar, terawatt hours, 1990-2024.

The EU generated more electricity from solar than coal for the first time ever in 2024, according to analysis by the thinktank Ember covered by Carbon Brief. Solar power output in the EU more than tripled between 2014 and 2024, while coal has plummeted by 61%. The analysis also found that wind and solar growth over the past decade has pushed EU fossil-fuel generation in 2024 to its lowest level in 40 years, despite a long-term decline of nuclear power.

Spotlight

Tracing climate fingerprints on tropical storms

This week, Carbon Brief explores a new tool that could be used to calculate the economic damages from tropical storms that can be attributed to climate change.

Tropical storms – known as hurricanes, typhoons or cyclones depending on what part of the ocean they form in – are typically the most costly of all extreme weather events.

Amid a growing field aimed at understanding the influence of climate change on extreme weather, they have also emerged as one of the most difficult events for scientists to study.

There are several reasons for this. One is that tropical storms are rare in comparison to other types of extreme weather events, meaning scientists have less data to draw on to try to work out how they may have changed because of fossil-fuelled warming.

Another is that one of the main tools that scientists use to study climate change – climate models – are often not of high enough resolution to recreate the relatively small-scale structure of a storm. Global models can typically simulate Earth down to around a 100 kilometre (km) by 100km scale, whereas the eye of a storm tends to be just 30-40km wide.

To try to address these issues, researchers at Imperial College London have come up with a new tool for examining the influence of climate change on tropical storms.

Rapid attribution

The “Imperial College storm model” (IRIS) is a statistical technique that can be used to calculate how the potential intensity of any given tropical storm globally could have been affected by climate change.

IRIS has been used to create a database of millions of virtual tropical storms. The computing power for this is supported by a citizen science project, where people can download an app to donate the processing power of their smartphones.

Researchers can draw on this database to rapidly calculate how the potential intensity of a tropical storm occurring today compares to one in a hypothetical world without human-caused climate change.

IRIS works in a similar way to models used by the insurance sector, explained its creator Prof Ralf Toumi, co-director of the Grantham Institute – Climate Change and Environment at Imperial. He told Carbon Brief:

“There’s been a few academic attempts to replicate these models. We’ve taken a very different approach to everyone else and that allows us to do this attribution quite quickly.”

Toumi’s team outlined the workings of IRIS in a paper published in Scientific Data in 2024. 

Earlier this month, they published their first climate attribution study using the tool in Atmospheric Science Letters.

This study found that Typhoon Haiyan, the second-strongest landfalling tropical storm on record, which struck the Philippines in 2013, was “very unlikely to have occurred without the increase in potential intensity driven by global warming”.

In addition to this, Toumi and his team have been using the model to calculate how climate change may have affected the intensity of a wide range of recent storms, choosing to publish the results directly on Imperial’s website.

“We feel we should communicate [our results] immediately,” he told Carbon Brief, adding that the peer-review process for publishing scientific papers is comparatively “slow and painful”.

Loss and damage

In a recent analysis using the tool, the team estimated that around 45% of the $50bn in economic damages caused by Hurricane Milton, which struck Florida in 2024, can be attributed to climate change. 

Toumi hopes that the tool could one day be used to inform discussions about how much money polluting countries should pay into a new fund for loss and damage from climate change agreed at UN climate talks. He told Carbon Brief:

“If a Pacific island says ‘we’ve just been hit by a category 5 storm, we need some money’, a donor country may argue ‘your nation is bound to be hit by hurricanes, how do we know the extra risk from climate change?’ With this model we could provide answers to such statements.”

Harjeet Singh, a UN climate veteran involved in aiding negotiations for the loss and damage fund, said that advances in attribution science could be a “game changer” in assigning responsibility for damages from climate change. He told Carbon Brief:

“However, rigorous, event-specific attribution studies can be time-consuming and may not always be feasible – especially for communities needing urgent support. Simpler frameworks based on historical emissions, technological capacity and GDP can be more practical, while still being guided by scientific insights.

“Ideally, a hybrid approach would apply detailed attribution for unprecedented or contested events, while a simpler, responsibility-based funding mechanism covers more frequent climate impacts to ensure fair and timely financing.”

Watch, read, listen

PARIS EXIT EXPLAINED: Veteran US climate diplomat, Sue Biniaz, explained the ramifications of the wording of Trump’s Paris Agreement exit order, in Just Security.

‘THIRSTY’ AI: The Guardian’s Today in Focus podcast explored what the UK government’s plan to boost artificial intelligence could mean for energy and water resources.

SAVIOUR OR VICTIM: In the Conversation, a group of female academics explained why the portrayal of women as either “climate victims” or “saviours of nature” can be problematic.

Coming up

Pick of the jobs

  • La Trobe University, river communities research fellow | Salary: Unknown. Location: Bundoora/Albury-Wodonga, Australia
  • Climate Litigation Network, science adviser | Salary: £42,500 or €50,000. Location: London or Amsterdam
  • British Antarctic Survey, marine biologist | Salary: £30,201. Location: Rothera, Antarctica

DeBriefed is edited by Daisy Dunne. Please send any tips or feedback to debriefed@carbonbrief.org.
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The post DeBriefed 24 January 2025: Trump leaves Paris Agreement; EU solar outshines coal; Tracing climate fingerprints on tropical storms appeared first on Carbon Brief.

DeBriefed 24 January 2025: Trump leaves Paris Agreement; EU solar outshines coal; Tracing climate fingerprints on tropical storms

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‘Concerning’ low sea ice persists as Antarctic hits third-lowest winter peak

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Antarctic sea ice has recorded its third-smallest winter peak extent since satellite records began 48 years ago, new data reveals.

Provisional data from the US National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) shows that Antarctic sea ice hit its annual winter peak on 14 September, with an extent of 17.59m square kilometres (km2).

The organisation notes that the data is still preliminary, adding that “large fluctuations in extent are typical of Antarctic sea ice near the seasonal maximum”.

One expert tells Carbon Brief that it is “concerning to see these low values persisting”, but says that scientists need more time to determine whether this represents a “structural shift” in Antarctic sea ice extent.

Meanwhile, at the Earth’s other pole, Arctic sea ice reached its annual minimum on 12 September, ranking as the joint-10th lowest in the satellite record.

The NSIDC notes that the last 20 years have seen the lowest 20 Arctic sea ice extents in the satellite record.

Antarctic peak

Dr Lettie Roach, a polar climate scientist at the Alfred Wegener Institute in Germany, tells Carbon Brief that this year’s Antarctic sea ice maximum was “well below average for the season”. She warns that, “after several decades of stable or increasing winter Antarctic sea ice conditions, it is concerning to see these low values persisting”.

She adds:

“Compared with the Arctic, it’s less clear how recent changes in Antarctic sea ice are attributable to human-caused warming vs natural variability. We need more years of observations to better understand whether this is truly a structural shift.”

Dr Clare Eayrs, a postdoctoral researcher at the Korea Polar Research Institute (KOPRI), tells Carbon Brief that, since recording a “near-average February minimum” extent, Antarctic sea ice has “returned to unusually low winter coverage”.

She notes that Antarctic sea ice extent in July and August this year were the fifth and fourth lowest on record, respectively, adding that “all five of the lowest July extents have occurred since 2022 and all four of the lowest August extents since 2023”.

The chart below shows Antarctic sea ice extent in 2025 (dark blue) and 2026 (red) so far. For comparison, the chart shows decadal averages (dotted lines) as well as 2023 (mid blue), the year of the smallest winter sea-ice maximum on record.

Antarctic sea ice peak in 2026 is third smallest on record. Daily Antarctic sea ice extent for 2026, 2025, and 2023, as well as decadal averages, million km2. Source: NSIDC. Line chart showing 2026 peak in September remaining below 1980s-2010s averages but above Sep 2023's lowest record. - (alt text generated by Google Gemini)
Daily Arctic sea ice extent for 2026 and 2025, with decadal averages for comparison, based on data from the NSIDC. Chart by Carbon Brief.

Eayrs tells Carbon Brief that the regional pattern of Antarctic sea ice cover “changed substantially during the growth season”.

For example, she says that “in April, the Bellingshausen Sea remained almost entirely ice-free, while the neighbouring Amundsen Sea had more ice than usual”.

However, by late August, changes in atmospheric pressure and wind meant that “the Bellingshausen deficit had largely recovered, while ice was unusually scarce in the Amundsen Sea and across much of East Antarctica”.

Map showing the main regions of the Antarctic.
Map showing the main regions of the Antarctic. Credit: Carbon Brief

Arctic minimum

Meanwhile, the Arctic recorded its minimum summer sea ice extent on 12 September. At 4.60m km2, this year ties with 2025, 2010 and 2008 as the 10th-lowest sea ice extent on record.

The chart below shows Arctic sea ice extent in 2025 (dark blue) and 2026 (red) so far. For comparison, the chart shows decadal averages (dotted lines) as well as 2012 (mid blue), the year of the smallest summer sea-ice minimum on record.

Arctic sea ice minimum in 2026 is tied for 10th smallest on record. Daily Arctic sea ice extent for 2026, 2025 and 2012, as well as decadal averages, million km2. Source: NSIDC. The line graph shows annual ice extent reaching September lows, with 2026 far below 1980s-2000s averages. - (alt text generated by Google Gemini)
Daily Antarctic sea ice extent for 2026 and 2025, with decadal averages for comparison, based on data from the NSIDC. Chart by Carbon Brief.

Roach tells Carbon Brief that although this minimum is not “record setting”, it is still “lower than any sea ice minimum before 2007”. She adds:

“Human-caused climate change has reduced Arctic sea ice cover and thickness, so the region is fundamentally different compared to a few decades ago.”

Scientists have been tracking Arctic sea ice thickness using a reanalysis produced called the Pan-Arctic Ice Ocean Modeling and Assimilation System (PIOMAS) since 1979.

In March 2026, the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) terminated a global dataset of air pressure that scientists relied upon to produce PIOMAS, forcing both datasets to stop publishing updates.

The PIOMAS website says it will take “considerable effort and time” to find alternative data to use in their reanalysis. It adds that “we don’t yet have a good sense if that’s possible with available funds and if so, when we will be able to resume production of a new PIOMAS timeseries”.

Roach also notes that August saw record-breaking heat sweep across much of the world, explaining that high temperatures “extended into Arctic coastal regions, close to regions with substantial sea ice loss – particularly the Barents-Kara and East Siberian seas”.

Dr Zack Labe, a scientist at Climate Central, tells Carbon Brief that the absence of a new record does not mean that ice cover is becoming more “resilient”. He says:

“Local weather patterns across the Arctic play a really important role in year-to-year sea-ice extent, even as the long-term trend is clearly downward.”

Labe tells Carbon Brief that weather in the Arctic this summer was “influenced mainly by lower pressure toward the central Arctic, which brought cloudier and cooler conditions that limited surface melt and delayed the start of the melt season”.

He explains that this “was most obvious across parts of the Beaufort and Chukchi seas, where the melt season didn’t really kick off until after early July, which was more than two weeks later than normal”.

In contrast, he says, the Atlantic side of the Arctic “had a much more extreme summer”, with sea ice in the Barents Sea recording its “earliest melt-out on record”.

This was partly due to “unusually warm air and ocean temperatures”, Labe says. He notes, for example, that parts of western Siberia saw unusually persistent temperatures more than 5C above the 1981-2010 average for much of the summer, which extended out over the Kara Sea and contributed to substantial ice melt in this area”.

Map showing main regions of the Arctic.
Map showing main regions of the Arctic. Credit: Carbon Brief

Labe tells Carbon Brief that, going forward, scientists need “more data and observations of other sea-ice metrics, like ice thickness, which may give us better insight into the overall condition of the ice pack, especially during years like 2026 when it is very fragmented”.

(In March 2026, Arctic sea ice reached its peak extent for this winter, clocking in as the joint-smallest in a satellite record going back almost half a century.)

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COP31 attendees told not to interfere in Türkiye’s “internal affairs”

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Participants at COP31 in Antalya will have a “duty” not to interfere in Türkiye’s internal affairs under the country’s hosting deal with the UN, reviving a clause dropped for last year’s climate summit in Brazil that human rights groups warn could put activists at risk.

Türkiye has faced growing criticism from human rights groups over the jailing of opposition figures, journalists and activists and imposed a blanket protest ban around July’s summit of the NATO military alliance in Ankara.

The contested provision is included in the binding agreement between the UN climate secretariat and the Turkish government that sets out responsibilities over logistical arrangements and details participants’ rights and obligations.

The document, signed in June but only made public on Wednesday, gives accredited COP31 attendees immunity from legal action over what they say, write or do in connection with the conference. Climate Home News understands that this safeguard can be applied to what takes place both inside and, in certain circumstances, outside of the UN-controlled COP “Blue Zone”. For the first time, this protection explicitly continues after the summit ends.

Turkish riot police arrested protesters during the anti NATO protest on July 7, 2026 in Ankara, Turkey. (Photo by Sedat Suna/Getty Images)

But participants enjoying these “privileges and immunities” also have a duty to respect Türkiye’s laws and regulations and not to interfere in its internal affairs, the agreement states. Rights groups fear its wide-ranging formulation could be used to discourage criticism of the host government.

Climate Home News understands that whether an action is covered by the immunity or infringes on the host’s internal affairs would be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, with close coordination between the country’s authorities and the UN climate change body.

A separate provision states that immunity shall be waived where the UN believes it would “impede the course of justice”.

‘Chilling effect’

Those same provisions featured in the host country agreements for COP28 in the United Arab Emirates and COP29 in Azerbaijan, both regarded as authoritarian regimes, before being dropped for COP30 in Brazil.

Ann Harrison, climate justice policy advisor at Amnesty International, said it is “extremely disappointing” that the COP31 agreement re-introduced clauses that could “hinder the ability of human rights defenders and civil society organisations to conduct their work safely”.

COP31 electrification pledge leaves out clean power commitment

She added the provisions could have a “wider chilling effect” on rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly, given concerns over the human rights situation in Türkiye, including laws that “have shrunk civic space” and their “abusive” implementation by authorities.

The UN climate change body declined to comment.

Rights groups have documented blanket protest bans, unlawful use of force by the police and prosecutions of journalists, human rights defenders and lawyers across Türkiye in the last year.

Arrests and protest bans

Last July, environmental activist Esra Işık was sentenced to more than two years for “resisting” a public official over what Amnesty International described as a peaceful protest against an urgent expropriation order linked to the expansion of coal mining in south-western Türkiye. She is appealing the conviction.

Ahead of a summit of the NATO alliance in the capital Ankara in July, authorities put in place a 13-day blanket ban on demonstrations, citing “national security”, and arrested over 200 people. Human Rights Watch said the crackdown showed Türkiye’s “ruthless intolerance of freedom of speech and assembly”.

Earlier this month, Turkish police detained dozens of people as part of what rights groups described as the government’s widening crackdown on LGBTQ+ activists and venues.

Questioned by media as to how he would guarantee the right to protest at COP31, Kurum said earlier in September that his team would “try to meet” any request they receive from civil society and give them “a free space to express themselves”.

“Don’t worry, thinking you will not be able to voice your opinions or really share your thoughts,” he said in an attempt to reassure campaigners, adding that he had put former deputy environment minister Mehmet Birpinar in charge of liaising with civil society.

Civic space needed

Camilla Pollera, human rights and climate change campaigner at the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL), said meaningful participation at COP31 is fundamental to the legitimacy of climate action.

“At a climate summit, civil society participation necessarily includes being present, speaking out, scrutinising governments’ decisions and climate policies, and advocating for communities most vulnerable to climate change,” she added.

Thousands march in a COP30 protest calling for climate justice and protection of the Amazon among other things in Belem, Brazil on November 15, 2025.
Thousands march in a COP30 protest calling for climate justice and protection of the Amazon among other things in Belem, Brazil on November 15, 2025. (Photo: Mariel Lozada/Climate Home News)

At last year’s COP30 summit, thousands of Indigenous people and climate activists peacefully marched through the Amazonian city of Belém in the first major demonstration outside the UN venue in four years. Smaller-scale demonstrations were largely confined to the “Blue Zone” at COP27 in Egypt, COP28 in the UAE and COP29 in Azerbaijan.

In two other separate incidents in Belém, members of the Munduruku tribe blocked access to the conference centre for hours, demanding an end to development projects in their ancestral land, and protesters stormed through the venue clashing with UN security officials.

The COP31 hosting agreement keeps some of the safeguards previously hailed by civil society groups. The government and the UN secretariat commit to upholding “the fundamental human rights” of all participants in the agreement’s preamble.

Under the deal, Türkiye also needs to ensure that security personnel follow “the highest ethical and professional standards and are expected to behave with integrity and respect”.

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Threatened by rising seas, small islands secure right to keep their statehood

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As rising seas submerge growing swathes of land, countries that lose territory should still keep their national boundaries, sovereign rights and UN membership, according to a political declaration adopted at the UN General Assembly in New York on Thursday.

The declaration, which was championed by climate-vulnerable small island states, affirms “the presumption in favour of continued statehood” in the face of sea level rise fuelled by climate change, and urges countries to work together to assist communities affected by encroaching oceans.

Speaking at a high-level UN meeting to address the existential threats posed by sea level rise, Cabo Verde’s Prime Minister Francisco Carvalho, one of the initiative’s co-facilitators along with Australia, said the adoption of the text by consensus sends “a message of hope”.

“This declaration has a very special meaning. For us, sea level rise is neither a distant threat nor a theoretical concern,” he said, adding that rising seas put at risk key infrastructure, water resources and economic growth in small island states.

In the Pacific, sea levels have risen at twice the global rate, dramatically increasing coastal flooding events from two to 20 a year in the Republic of the Marshall Islands, and from zero to 102 events per year in American Samoa, according to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).

Surangel Whipps Jr., president of the Pacific island of Palau, said the summit in New York represents a “moment of international solidarity”, and highlighted that small island states will remain permanent members of the UN.

    Declaration recognises statehood

    An advisory opinion by the world’s top maritime court, the International Tribunal on the Law of the Sea (ITLOS), first upheld in 2024 that countries do not have to shrink their maritime borders even if they lose land territory due to sea level rise. This was reiterated by the International Court of Justice in last year’s landmark ruling on the climate obligations of states.

    The new declaration endorsed by all governments at the UN General Assembly stresses that sea level rise “is not a distant scenario but a real and lived experience for many”, and notes that international law must be implemented in global responses to rising seas.

    UN Secretary-General António Guterres said the “milestone must now be translated into action”, adding that the declaration should encourage an “ongoing dialogue” at the “highest possible level” leading to practical outcomes. Pacific islands have proposed an international treaty on sea level rise that would provide more legal certainty.

    “Those on the frontlines must be front and centre on every decision. We cannot allow countries and cultures to vanish beneath the waves,” he said. “The SOS has gone out. The world must answer.”

    At regional summit, Pacific islands ask for COP31 support for clean energy and finance

    Goodwin Friday, prime minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines, said measures to protect vulnerable states will require adequate finance. “Investing in resilience now is more cost-effective than paying the far greater price for loss and damage later,” he added.

    Championed by Australia’s COP31 co-presidency, Pacific islands have sought to put adaptation to sea level rise and ocean conservation at the top of the political agenda by inviting world leaders to attend the pre-COP31 summit co-hosted by Fiji and Tuvalu in October.

    Tuvalu will also host the second global fossil fuel phase-out summit in April 2027, after around 60 governments met this year in Santa Marta, Colombia, to discuss ending their dependence on coal, oil and gas.

    “Our coastlines, our reefs and our communities are living with the consequences of fossil fuel dependence every day, and our people have earned the right to help shape the way forward,” Lynda Tabuya, Fiji’s climate minister, said in a statement announcing details of the conference.

    Secretary-General António Guterres attending the meeting on addressing the existential threats posed by sea level rise at UN headquarters in New York.
    Secretary-General António Guterres attending the meeting on addressing the existential threats posed by sea level rise. (Photo: UN Photo/Manuel Elías)

    Ocean monitoring gets a boost in New York

    Amid record-breaking marine heat and seas rising at unprecedented speed, governments in New York announced new commitments to protect the world’s ocean, as efforts to bolster marine ecosystems and coastal communities rise up the political agenda.

    On Wednesday, the EU and Canada announced more funding for a new Europe-led ocean monitoring system called OceanEye, launched in the aftermath of a failed attempt by the Trump administration to dismantle the largest existing network of deep-sea observatories.

    During an event at UN headquarters in New York, EU President Ursula von der Leyen and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney announced around $163 million in new funding for the initiative, with the EU pledging €92 million ($105m) on top of existing seed funding and Canada pledging C$82 million (US$58m) over five years.

    According to an EU statement, while OceanEye will collaborate with the Global Ocean Observing System, that network “remains vulnerable to financial shortfalls and geopolitical disruptions”. A group of 30 countries from Europe, Africa and the Americas joined an international initiative in support of OceanEye, including large coastal nations like Brazil, Namibia and Mexico.

    Von der Leyen said OceanEye “can make us the leading ocean data provider in a matter of years”, including by launching new satellites and installing new observatories in the deep ocean. “From outer space to the deepest ocean, our funding helps us keep watch beneath the waves,” she added.

    Carney said the initiative would help protect Canada’s Arctic region with real-time monitoring operating year-round. “We can’t protect what we can’t see,” he said, also highlighting that Canada had expanded conservation of its ocean territory from 1% a decade ago to 15% now.

    In New York, a group of 19 countries said they are either developing or implementing plans to sustainably manage all of their ocean territory, with 12 new nations joining the initiative. In a joint communiqué, they called on more countries to sign up ahead of COP31.

    Warnings of El Niño-fuelled extreme heat

    Scientists and world leaders have raised the alarm over this year’s record-breaking marine temperatures, which have persisted above historical peaks for more than 100 days as the naturally occurring El Niño phenomenon intensifies in the Pacific.

    Extreme ocean heat could become a threat to coastal ecosystems and communities, experts fear. Water temperatures 1.5C above normal levels have also rapidly fuelled a strong hurricane in the Pacific in recent days.

    Despite scientific calls for additional ocean conservation efforts, a report launched this week in New York warned that efforts to protect ocean ecosystems are lagging behind, with only 10% of the global ocean covered by conservation areas and just 3.5% designated as “effectively protected”.

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