Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.
This week
Australia votes for climate action
CLIMATE PROMISE: Australia’s Labor party has secured a second term in power following a landslide election victory, reported CNN. Prime minister Anthony Albanese “reiterated his commitment to climate action” and his government’s target to reach net-zero by 2050, added the outlet. Bloomberg said Albanese’s “next campaign” is to stave off Turkey to secure hosting the COP31 climate summit, along with Pacific nations, in 2026.
PUBLIC SUPPORT: The Conversation said that Australia now has “five huge climate opportunities”, including setting an ambitious new international climate pledge for 2035. Columnist David Fickling wrote in Bloomberg that the “historic” victory of the Labor party proved the right-wing opposition party’s plan to replace “renewables-focused climate targets with a switch to nuclear energy” was not widely supported. Guardian Australia’s climate and environment editor Adam Morton said that the country “backed a rapid shift to renewable energy”.
EU eyes renewable future
RUSSIAN GAS: The European Commission published a “roadmap” for ending reliance on Russian energy, which includes a ban on all Russian gas imports by the end of 2027, BBC News reported, adding that the bloc hopes to move away by “accelerating the deployment of renewable energy”. Meanwhile, Chinese president Xi Jinping was expected to talk about the China-Russia Siberia 2 gas pipeline, which could send 50bn cubic metres of gas to China, during his visit to Moscow this week, the Guardian reported.
SPAIN’S TRANSITION: Following last week’s blackout in Spain and Portugal, the Spanish prime minister Pedro Sánchez said that he will not deviate a “single millimetre” from his commitment to renewable energy, calling it “our country’s energy future” and “our only and best option”, reported the Financial Times. Sanchez rejected nuclear-power advocates, saying the blackout was used as an excuse for a “gigantic manipulation exercise”, reported the Daily Telegraph.
Trump regime continues
DISASTERS DELETED: The New York Times reported that the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has announced that it will stop tracking the cost of the country’s most expensive disasters – defined as those that cause at least $1bn in damage. The newspaper described this as the “latest effort from the Trump administration to restrict or eliminate climate research”.
MORE TRUMP: The Trump administration also proposed to cut more than $21bn in climate-related funding, including $15bn for carbon capture and renewable energy and $6bn for electric-vehicle chargers, reported Reuters. Elsewhere, two major science unions pledged to produce “over 29 peer-reviewed journals that will cover all aspects of climate change” after the administration dismissed a “key Congress-mandated report on climate”, reported the Guardian.
Around the world
- UN REFORM: The UN is “considering sweeping reforms”, which could “integrate” the “climate change arm” into the “environment programme”, following “even deeper funding cuts” from the Trump administration, said the Financial Times. The newspaper added that the reform memo also “mulled whether the COP climate change summit…‘should be discontinued’ in its current form”.
- WINDFARM BLOW: The construction of Hornsea 4, a windfarm that aimed to add 2.4GW to the UK’s clean energy capacity, was cancelled by its Danish owner Ørsted, reported BBC News. The Guardian said the decision was a “major blow to the government’s plan to quadruple the UK’s offshore wind capacity by the end of the decade”.
- CHINA EXTREME WEATHER: Upcoming “hot and dry” weather will pose risks to the wheat harvest in China’s Henan province, which accounted for nearly a third of the nation’s total wheat output in 2024, Bloomberg reported.
- METHANE EMISSIONS: Record fossil-fuel production pushed methane emissions close to an all-time high in 2024, according to a report by the International Energy Agency, covered by Agence France-Presse.
65%
The proportion of global warming from 1990-2020 that the “wealthiest 10%” of people are “responsible” for, according to research covered by Carbon Brief.
Latest climate research
- Research in PLOS Climate found that just 4% of hyperlinks point to “scientific sources” in 1.3m posts and 20.3m comments related to climate change on Reddit from 2009-22.
- Climate change intensified deadly rainfall and made storms more likely to occur in Arkansas, Kentucky, Tennessee and other states across the US south and midwest in early April, a new World Weather Attribution analysis found.
- Science Advances published a study finding that an unprecedented surge in concurrent heatwave-drought events from Eastern Europe to East Asia has been “amplified” by climate change.
For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)
Captured
Children born in 2020 – of which there are about 124 million – will face “unprecedented exposure” to extreme weather events, even if global warming is limited to 1.5C by the end of the century, according to a new study published in Nature and covered by Carbon Brief. The chart above illustrates how many millions of children born in 2020 are expected to face a range of extremes, from heatwaves to tropical cyclones, throughout their lifetime at 1.5C (dark blue), compared to even higher levels of warming. Limiting global warming to 1.5C could save 77.2 million children from exposure to extremes, the research concluded.
Spotlight
Taiwan’s nuclear phaseout
This week, Carbon Brief examines what Taiwan’s decision to phase out nuclear power means for its climate policies.
Taiwan will shut down its last nuclear power reactor on 17 May.
Nuclear has played an important role in Taiwan’s energy supply, which is 97% imported.
Nuclear provided 12% of electricity in 2016, according to the Taiwanese Energy Administration. In 2025, it accounted for about 3% of the electricity supply, while gas contributed 46%, coal 34% and renewable energy 15%.
In 2016, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), an anti-nuclear party, won the presidential election. Then-president Tsai Ing-wen launched her “nuclear-free homeland policy”, with a pledge to avoid nuclear incidents similar to the Fukushima disaster in Japan.
The DPP has said that going “nuclear-free” is part of its “net-zero” transition. The party aims to have 50% of its electricity generated from gas, 30% from coal and 20% from renewable sources by 2025.
Public concerns
Nevertheless, its nuclear-free policy faces pressures from the opposition parties, as well as the public.
The Taipei Times, a Taiwanese newspaper, reported that 48% of the public was “dissatisfied” with the plan in 2017.
Protests against the plan continued until May 2025, with many people citing worries about having a stable electricity supply.
Seeking to reassure the public, the government’s Energy Administration said that the need to source more electricity to replace nuclear has “already been included in the long-term electricity development plan” and that “there will be no power shortage”.
More fossil fuels?
The environmental impact of the government’s “long-term power electricity plan” has also been under scrutiny.
The Taipei Times said the plan is “substituting nuclear sources of energy with coal-fired sources”.
A study in Energy Strategy Review found that the plan “lack[s]” a “coal phase-out schedule”, which may “render Taiwan’s energy transition unjust”.
In 2016, about 45.9% of electricity supply was from coal, while gas and renewable energy accounted for 31.5% and 4.8% respectively.
Rather than gradually reducing coal-fired power as the DPP planned, the share of coal increased to more than 47% in 2018, which then fell back to 45% in 2020, due to the temporary increase of nuclear power, said the study.
The growth of gas and renewable sources did not go as fast as the DPP predicted, according to the study, making the nuclear-free energy transition “unlikely to be achieved”.
As of today, only 14.6% of electricity in Taiwan is from renewable sources, far behind its goal of 20%.
Meanwhile, burning gas, which is the main energy source under the plan, releases carbon emissions, making it harder for the island to achieve net-zero.
Focus Taiwan said the move could promote the use of fossil fuels to as high as 84%.
The official nuclear research institute National Atomic Research Institute in Taiwan refused a request to comment.
Watch, read, listen
WEATHER AND PANGOLINS: A TEDxLondon podcast focused on how crop failure, drought and extreme weather are damaging the livelihood of pangolins.
DEEP DIVE: A new feature-length documentary “Ocean With David Attenborough” is in cinemas now.
US AND CLIMATE: An editorial in the Break-Down, a new publication focusing on the “political economy of climate and ecological crisis”, dissects “this moment in climate politics”.
Coming up
- 10-11 May: 2025 international workshop on methane observation and quantification, Xuzhou, China
- 12 May: Philippines elections
- 12-14 May: African Union conference on debt, Lomé, Togo
- 14 May: NDC partnership public webinar, online
Pick of the jobs
- BBC World Service, science/climate journalist and senior science/climate journalist | Salary: £28,000-£35,000 and £42,000-£49,000. Location: London
- Global Renewables Alliance, various roles | Salary: Unknown. Location: Various
- EarthRights International, Mekong communications manager | Salary: Unknown. Location: Chiang Mai, Thailand
DeBriefed is edited by Daisy Dunne. Please send any tips or feedback to debriefed@carbonbrief.org.
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The post DeBriefed 9 May 2025: Australia elects climate action; Spain ‘committed’ to renewables; Taiwan’s nuclear phaseout appeared first on Carbon Brief.
American farmers are drowning in health insurance costs, while their German counterparts never worry about medical bills. The difference may help determine which country’s small farms are better prepared for a changing climate.
Samantha Kemnah looked out the foggy window of her home in New Berlin, New York, at the 150-acre dairy farm she and her husband, Chris, bought last year. This winter, an unprecedented cold front brought snowstorms and ice to the region.
On the Farm, the Hidden Climate Cost of the Broken U.S. Health Care System
Climate Change
A Little-Used Maneuver Could Mean More Drilling and Mining in Southern Utah’s Redrock Country
Two Utah Congress members have introduced a resolution that could end protections for Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. Conservation groups worry similar maneuvers on other federal lands will follow.
Lawmakers from Utah have commandeered an obscure law to unravel protections for the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, potentially delivering on a Trump administration goal of undoing protections for public conservation lands across the country.
A Little-Used Maneuver Could Mean More Drilling and Mining in Southern Utah’s Redrock Country
Drought and heatwaves occurring together – known as “compound” events – have “surged” across the world since the early 2000s, a new study shows.
Compound drought and heat events (CDHEs) can have devastating effects, creating the ideal conditions for intense wildfires, such as Australia’s “Black Summer” of 2019-20 where bushfires burned 24m hectares and killed 33 people.
The research, published in Science Advances, finds that the increase in CDHEs is predominantly being driven by events that start with a heatwave.
The global area affected by such “heatwave-led” compound events has more than doubled between 1980-2001 and 2002-23, the study says.
The rapid increase in these events over the last 23 years cannot be explained solely by global warming, the authors note.
Since the late 1990s, feedbacks between the land and the atmosphere have become stronger, making heatwaves more likely to trigger drought conditions, they explain.
One of the study authors tells Carbon Brief that societies must pay greater attention to compound events, which can “cause severe impacts on ecosystems, agriculture and society”.
Compound events
CDHEs are extreme weather events where drought and heatwave conditions occur simultaneously – or shortly after each other – in the same region.
These events are often triggered by large-scale weather patterns, such as “blocking” highs, which can produce “prolonged” hot and dry conditions, according to the study.
Prof Sang-Wook Yeh is one of the study authors and a professor at the Ewha Womans University in South Korea. He tells Carbon Brief:
“When heatwaves and droughts occur together, the two hazards reinforce each other through land-atmosphere interactions. This amplifies surface heating and soil moisture deficits, making compound events more intense and damaging than single hazards.”
CDHEs can begin with either a heatwave or a drought.
The sequence of these extremes is important, the study says, as they have different drivers and impacts.
For example, in a CDHE where the heatwave was the precursor, increased direct sunshine causes more moisture loss from soils and plants, leading to a drought.
Conversely, in an event where the drought was the precursor, the lack of soil moisture means that less of the sun’s energy goes into evaporation and more goes into warming the Earth’s surface. This produces favourable conditions for heatwaves.
The study shows that the majority of CDHEs globally start out as a drought.
In recent years, there has been increasing focus on these events due to the devastating impact they have on agriculture, ecosystems and public health.
In Russia in the summer of 2010, a compound drought-heatwave event – and the associated wildfires – caused the death of nearly 55,000 people, the study notes.
The record-breaking Pacific north-west “heat dome” in 2021 triggered extreme drought conditions that caused “significant declines” in wheat yields, as well as in barley, canola and fruit production in British Columbia and Alberta, Canada, says the study.
Increasing events
To assess how CDHEs are changing, the researchers use daily reanalysis data to identify droughts and heatwaves events. (Reanalysis data combines past observations with climate models to create a historical climate record.) Then, using an algorithm, they analyse how these events overlap in both time and space.
The study covers the period from 1980 to 2023 and the world’s land surface, excluding polar regions where CDHEs are rare.
The research finds that the area of land affected by CDHEs has “increased substantially” since the early 2000s.
Heatwave-led events have been the main contributor to this increase, the study says, with their spatial extent rising 110% between 1980-2001 and 2002-23, compared to a 59% increase for drought-led events.
The map below shows the global distribution of CDHEs over 1980-2023. The charts show the percentage of the land surface affected by a heatwave-led CDHE (red) or a drought-led CDHE (yellow) in a given year (left) and relative increase in each CDHE type (right).
The study finds that CDHEs have occurred most frequently in northern South America, the southern US, eastern Europe, central Africa and south Asia.
Threshold passed
The authors explain that the increase in heatwave-led CDHEs is related to rising global temperatures, but that this does not tell the whole story.
In the earlier 22-year period of 1980-2001, the study finds that the spatial extent of heatwave-led CDHEs rises by 1.6% per 1C of global temperature rise. For the more-recent period of 2022-23, this increases “nearly eightfold” to 13.1%.
The change suggests that the rapid increase in the heatwave-led CDHEs occurred after the global average temperature “surpasse[d] a certain temperature threshold”, the paper says.
This threshold is an absolute global average temperature of 14.3C, the authors estimate (based on an 11-year average), which the world passed around the year 2000.
Investigating the recent surge in heatwave-leading CDHEs further, the researchers find a “regime shift” in land-atmosphere dynamics “toward a persistently intensified state after the late 1990s”.
In other words, the way that drier soils drive higher surface temperatures, and vice versa, is becoming stronger, resulting in more heatwave-led compound events.
Daily data
The research has some advantages over other previous studies, Yeh says. For instance, the new work uses daily estimations of CDHEs, compared to monthly data used in past research. This is “important for capturing the detailed occurrence” of these events, says Yeh.
He adds that another advantage of their study is that it distinguishes the sequence of droughts and heatwaves, which allows them to “better understand the differences” in the characteristics of CDHEs.
Dr Meryem Tanarhte is a climate scientist at the University Hassan II in Morocco, and Dr Ruth Cerezo Mota is a climatologist and a researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. Both scientists, who were not involved in the study, agree that the daily estimations give a clearer picture of how CDHEs are changing.
Cerezo-Mota adds that another major contribution of the study is its global focus. She tells Carbon Brief that in some regions, such as Mexico and Africa, there is a lack of studies on CDHEs:
“Not because the events do not occur, but perhaps because [these regions] do not have all the data or the expertise to do so.”
However, she notes that the reanalysis data used by the study does have limitations with how it represents rainfall in some parts of the world.
Compound impacts
The study notes that if CDHEs continue to intensify – particularly events where heatwaves are the precursors – they could drive declining crop productivity, increased wildfire frequency and severe public health crises.
These impacts could be “much more rapid and severe as global warming continues”, Yeh tells Carbon Brief.
Tanarhte notes that these events can be forecasted up to 10 days ahead in many regions. Furthermore, she says, the strongest impacts can be prevented “through preparedness and adaptation”, including through “water management for agriculture, heatwave mitigation measures and wildfire mitigation”.
The study recommends reassessing current risk management strategies for these compound events. It also suggests incorporating the sequences of drought and heatwaves into compound event analysis frameworks “to enhance climate risk management”.
Cerezo-Mota says that it is clear that the world needs to be prepared for the increased occurrence of these events. She tells Carbon Brief:
“These [risk assessments and strategies] need to be carried out at the local level to understand the complexities of each region.”
The post Heatwaves driving recent ‘surge’ in compound drought and heat extremes appeared first on Carbon Brief.
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