Elizabeth Rush, author of “The Quickening, Creation, and Community at the Ends of the Earth”
Episode 94: Antarctic Awakenings: Unveiling Climate Change at the Ends of the Earth with Elizabeth Rush and Brett Cease
In this episode of Citizens’ Climate Radio, co-hosts Peterson Toscano and Erica Valdez explore the theme of climate change and its impact on Antarctica. They interviewed Elizabeth Rush, author of “The Quickening, Creation, and Community at the Ends of the Earth,” who shares her experiences and insights from a research expedition to Thwaites Glacier.
They also spoke with Brett Cease, Vice President of Programs for Citizens’ Climate Lobby, who traveled to Antarctica and shared his observations. Additionally, they discuss sustainable fashion, resilience, and the Great School Electrification Challenge.
Journey to Thwaites Glacier with writer Elizabeth Rush
Elizabeth Rush joined a research expedition aboard an icebreaker in 2019 and headed for Thwaites Glacier for 54 days. This remote and deteriorating glacier is critical in understanding global sea level rise. Her book documents this journey, weaving together the awe-inspiring encounters with icebergs and the intense efforts of scientific labor.
A Deep Feminist Rewriting of Antarctic History
During her time on the icebreaker, Elizabeth embraced her role as writer-in-residence to shift the narrative focus. Antarctic history, often dominated by tales of conquest by wealthy, white men from the Global North, is ripe for reexamination. Elizabeth spent considerable time engaging with the ship’s diverse crew members, including engineers and cooks from the Philippines, whose stories are usually overshadowed by scientists’ stories. By doing so, she highlights the essential labor that makes scientific discovery possible and challenges the traditional narrative that has long defined Antarctic expeditions.
Life Aboard the Icebreaker
Elizabeth’s account transcends typical adventure narratives, offering a glimpse into the daily realities of life on a research vessel. The absence of the internet and the close quarters created an environment of authenticity and camaraderie among the crew. This unique setting allowed genuine interactions and reflections that are rare in our every day, digitally-saturated lives.
A Thoughtful Dialogue on Climate Change and Parenthood
“The Quickening” provocatively explores the intersections of climate change and the decision to bring children into the world. Elizabeth tackles this complex topic not by dictating what to think but by inviting readers to engage in a thoughtful dialogue. The narrative steers clear of simplifying the issue to mere carbon footprints, instead enriching the discussion with nuanced perspectives on regeneration and balance.
About Elizabeth Rush
Elizabeth Rush is a distinguished author known for her impactful exploration of climate change and its effects on communities. Her acclaimed book, “Rising: Dispatches from the New American Shore,” was a Pulitzer Prize finalist and has garnered praise for its deeply felt portrayal of frontline communities facing environmental challenges. Rush’s writing is characterized by her commitment to listening to marginalized voices, whether they are those affected by climate change, the melting glaciers of Antarctica, or individuals excluded from environmental conversations.
“Rising” has been lauded as a vital contribution to the discourse on climate change and sea levels, earning acclaim from publications like the New York Times and the Chicago Tribune. Rush’s work extends beyond her book, with her writings appearing in prestigious publications such as Orion and Guernica. Rush has received numerous fellowships from institutions like the National Endowment for the Arts, National Geographic, and the Andrew Mellon Foundation. Currently based in Providence, Rhode Island, she teaches creative nonfiction at Brown University while living with her husband and two children.
This is the fourth time CCR has featured Elizabeth Rush on the show. She also appears in Episode 26 In Deep Water, Episode 29, Truth, Fact, and Cli-Fi, and Episode 47, Eco-Grief in a Time of Coronavirus Mourning.
Brett Cease’s Antarctic Adventure
Brett Cease, Vice President of Programs for Citizens’ Climate Lobby, shared his enlightening journey to the Antarctic Peninsula. His voyage on the Ushuaia, a research vessel turned expedition ship, offered firsthand insights into Antarctica’s harsh realities and stunning beauty.
Navigating through towering waves and enduring 24-hour daylight, Brett’s expedition highlighted the Southern Ocean’s raw power and unpredictability. The trip provided an up-close view of the continent’s dramatic landscapes and unique wildlife, including several species of penguins.
Penguins and the Impact of Climate Change
One of the most striking aspects of the journey was observing the effects of climate change on local wildlife. The Adelie penguins, in particular, suffer as rising temperatures cause the sea ice they depend on to form later and melt earlier each year.
Brett vividly described the overwhelming smell of penguin colonies, a mix of old cigarettes, ammonia, and rotten shrimp, illustrating the less glamorous side of these adorable but squalid creatures.
Ice Loss and Its Global Implications
The voyage underscored the dramatic ice loss in Antarctica, with the continent shedding approximately 150 billion tons of ice annually. Witnessing these changes was humbling and a stark reminder of the urgent need for global climate action.
Listen Now!
Resilience Corner
Tamara Staton explores the surprising relationship between puppies and climate change. Through her experience with her puppy, Mica, Tamara highlights how pets contribute to our well-being, from reducing stress to promoting physical activity and combating loneliness. She emphasizes how the positive effects of pet ownership can indirectly support climate action by fostering healthier, happier individuals. Tamara invites us to consider pet ownership or pet-sitting as a means of experiencing these benefits.
To learn more about building resilience in the face of climate challenges, visit the Resilience Hub. Share your resiliency questions with Tamara via email at radio @ citizensclimate.org or you can text or leave a message at 619-512-9646.
CCL Youth Corner with Veda Ganesan
Veda tells us about the Great School Electrification Challenge, an initiative spearheaded by CCL National Youth Action Team that aims to transform schools into hubs of sustainability by advocating for the electrification of various systems, including HVAC, transportation, and energy sources like solar panels. Through the stories of youth teams in Cincinnati, Ohio, and Dallas, Texas, Veda showcases the grassroots efforts to engage school boards, policymakers, and the community in adopting clean energy practices. Highlighting the recent success of the Cincinnati team in getting their electrification resolution unanimously passed, she encourages listeners to join the cause and participate in the challenge.
Veda Genesan is a high school student from Texas and the host of the Sustainable Cents podcast.
Good News
Erica Valdez shares the adverse environmental effects of the fashion industry, as it uses resources and generates emissions to produce, package, and transport clothing. The good news is there are many groups taking action and bringing this issue to light.
Erica highlights the Scrounger’s Center for Reusable Art Parts (SCRAP), a nonprofit center for creative reuse in San Francisco.
Through after-school programs like Sustainable Fashion Design for Teens, SCRAP educates students about the environmental effects of the fashion industry and teaches them how to reuse and revitalize clothing materials. This program empowers young people with hands-on workshops and educational sessions. It also provides a space to learn and process climate information and connect with other young advocates. SCRAP is a perfect example of how important individual and collective action is and how creative it can look.
Monthly Question
If you could advocate for the climate through art, what kind of art piece would you create?
This can be music, dance, film, writing, or other mediums you’ve used in rural climate work. We want to hear about it. Please email your answer to radio @ citizens climate.org. You can also text or leave a voicemail at 619-512-9646. Tell us your story of using art in your climate work.
Listener Survey
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Read the Transcript
Episode 94: Antarctic Awakenings: Unveiling Climate Change at the Ends of the Earth with Elizabeth Rush and Brett Cease
SPEAKERS
Elizabeth Rush, Tamara Staton, Brett Cease, Peterson Toscano, Veda Ganesan, Erica Valdez
Peterson Toscano 00:00
Welcome to Citizens’ Climate Radio, your climate change podcast.
Erica Valdez 00:05
In this show, we highlight people’s stories. We celebrate your successes, and together we share strategies for talking about climate change.
Peterson Toscano 00:12
I’m your host, Peterson Toscano,
Erica Valdez 00:14
and I’m your other host, Erica Valdez. Welcome to Episode 94 of Citizens’ Climate Radio, a project of Citizens’ Climate Education.
Peterson Toscano 00:22
This episode is airing on Friday, April 26 2024. Hey, Erica, Welcome to the show.
Erica Valdez 00:30
Hey, Peterson, I’m happy to be here.
Peterson Toscano 00:32
Congratulations, being co host first time, well done.
Erica Valdez 00:35
Thank you.
Peterson Toscano 00:36
We have a very, very full show today. lots of moving parts. What’s something you’re excited about listeners hearing on today’s show?
Erica Valdez 00:44
I’m especially looking forward to hearing from Elizabeth Rush. She talks about her new book, The Quickening. It’s about her experience on a trip to Antarctica and how she sees this continent being impacted by humans. I’m always looking for a good environmental book recommendation. And I just love hearing personal stories about other climate advocates.
Peterson Toscano 01:01
Yeah, she’s an amazing writer. She’ll give us a reading as well. I’m super excited about your good news story that you worked on. You researched it? You recorded it. You did all the audio and it’s about sustainable fashion. I’m super excited about that. Yeah, me too. Well, with this Antarctica theme, we also have a segment with Brett Cease from Citizens’ Climate Lobby, he traveled to Antarctica to and he shares with us the sights, the sounds and the smells, which I didn’t realize they were so strong in Antarctica.
Erica Valdez 01:32
And we also have a CCL Youth Corner. Today, we’re bringing you a special episode focusing on the Great School Electrification Challenge. They talk about what electrification is all about, and how either igniting change in their schools and how you can inspire youth to join the cause.
Peterson Toscano 01:48
We have a new section thanks to you questions and answers with listeners. So thanks for that suggestion. So are you ready, Erica?
Erica Valdez 01:56
Yep. Are you?
Peterson Toscano 01:57
I think so. Let’s do it.
Peterson Toscano 02:00
Elizabeth Rush is the author of Rising, Dispatches from the New American Shore, a Pulitzer Prize finalist. Her work focuses on listening to marginalized voices and frontline climate-affected communities, and she explores the crucial questions of our responsibilities and emotional responses in a rapidly changing world. Elizabeth returns to Citizens’ Climate Radio to tell us about her newest book, The Quickening: Creation and Community at the Ends of the Earth.
Erica Valdez 02:34
In 2019 Elizabeth Rush joined a research expedition aboard an icebreaker to Thwaites Glacier, a remote and rapidly deteriorating region critical to understanding global sea level rise. Her book, The Quickening, documents this journey, blending on inspiring encounters with icebergs and intense scientific labor, while pondering the profound personal question of what it means to bring a child into a world undergoing radical change.
Elizabeth Rush 02:59
When I took a position on this boat as like the writer in residence, I knew that I wanted to spend a lot of time on this ship, interviewing and speaking to people whose voices are traditionally left out of Antarctic stories. It turns out, as I like delved into Antarctic research, that like if you’re not a wealthy white dude from the global north like you’ve definitely been written out of Antarctic history, I did very purposefully spend a lot of time during the expedition talking to like the engineers, and the able-bodied seaman who all came from the Philippines, the cooks on board, because our modern Antarctic stories tend to center the work of the scientists that are trying to do climate science or groundbreaking science in Antarctica. And if you just look at like the crew list on our boat, the Nathanial B. Palmer. We were 50/50 support staff and scientists federally funded scientists, so I was really interested in like whose labor makes the scientific discovery possible. Who aren’t we hearing from?
Elizabeth Rush 04:12
I mean, it’s a book about Antarctic history. It’s a book about how in the little bit of time that human beings have had contact with Antarctica, we’ve really like crushed this continent of ice into like a very limited masculine narrative of conquest and derring do and Antarctica serves as like a backdrop and that story, I sometimes say it’s like a deep feminist rewriting of Antarctica. A lot of these books tend to be about like extreme environments. And I was like, you know, for all the time I spent in Antarctica, the reality is most of it was inside a climate controlled boat with like four meals a day cooked for me and stuff. So I tried to kind of lean into what it was actually like and not to over dramatize it, there was no choice but to be yourself. People really didn’t perform for each other, there was a certain amount of like deep authenticity that being on this boat just demanded, because otherwise you would wear yourself out by like day three.
Elizabeth Rush 04:13
I don’t think I’ve ever been in a situation like that. The closest is sort of like summer camp when I was 10, or something. I mean, I don’t know how people felt about summer camp, but, I don’t know just like there’s like a deep sense of camaraderie that developed amongst us going through this like really strange experience together. I think all the characters in the book come across as very authentic, and they just kind of like shed their armor, and let it all hang out.
Elizabeth Rush 05:48
The mechanism of the book is one where you’re kind of a fly on the wall eavesdropping on really interesting people for like two and a half months as they, I don’t know, plow into the ice and like go sedate elephant seals, and then play bridge for hours on end because they have nothing else to do. We had no internet, like no functional internet, which was awesome. Like, you just had to be with each other. It was really fun. I think it was some of the happiest of my adult life. Without internet, there was none of that kind of like knee-jerk. Oh, I’m like standing waiting for my groceries, let me read the newspaper. My time became way more expansive, because it wasn’t divided into these smaller and smaller chunks constantly, which I really, really, really liked.
Elizabeth Rush 06:43
It was after dinner and you’re sort of like, oh, I don’t know what to do with myself, you’re not like wow, let me just like read something on Twitter. Maybe I should walk up to the bridge and look to see if there are whales out there. And maybe I’ll chat with someone, I felt that there was a lot more sort of very low-stakes socializing that happened. And that replaced the internet a little bit like it replaced Twitter, it replaced social media. But with actual human beings, it was wonderful, I really felt liberated.
Elizabeth Rush 07:17
Experiencing something extraordinary with other human beings, there’s nothing quite like it. And it doesn’t have to be a glacier, it can just be a shared space. It can be a fire at the end of the day. I want to make the reader feel like they’re pulling close to this glacier, and looking at it, and having to kind of like consider it fully, physically, spiritually. The book really doesn’t tell you what to think about climate change and parenthood. Instead, I hope it creates a meaningful space for the reader to like engage in their own thinking on that quandary. It’s not you should have kids, you shouldn’t have kids. There’s no shoulds at all. It’s just, man, this is complicated. Here are lots of ways to think about it.
Elizabeth Rush 08:17
When I read about climate change and Parenthood in the news, it often gets sort of reduced to like conversations on the carbon footprint. And like, oh, a kid is like your biggest contribution to your carbon footprint. And I just think that’s a bunch of BS, and I could go down that rabbit hole. We don’t have to right now, but choosing to have a kid is not the same as like getting a Jetta, or a Prius, or whatever. And I really don’t appreciate the comparison because I think it denies folks the opportunity to have a real conversation about like what does regeneration mean as the planet tips out of balance? I really wanted the book to have space for like a thoughtful conversation around those subjects without getting prescriptive.
Erica Valdez 09:02
Elizabeth agreed to read from the quickening.
Peterson Toscano 09:05
Think of this section as a monologue spoken in the voice of Peter, one of the researchers aboard the ship.
Elizabeth Rush 09:14
So this is Peter. I had a moment yesterday. Do you ever just stop and think: what the eff am I doing? That we’re about to sail to the goddamn Southern Ocean? Why would anybody in their right mind go to Antarctica, which is like the great beyond? I just had one of those moments where I went, What am I doing? I’m from Norfolk, I shouldn’t be here. Most of my friends who are not scientists think I’m kind of mad. Antarctica is bad enough, but Thwaites? They look at me like really? Is there a need? They find the fact that it’s called a cruise particularly entertaining because you know, a cruise to them means rattling around the Caribbean on the QM2 with a cocktail in hand.
Elizabeth Rush 10:00
On our cruise, there’s no alcohol, you have to share a cabin, you eat what you’re given, and it’s freezing bloody cold. And the thing is, you can’t get off if you don’t like us. If there’s someone you really hate, you can’t get away from them. It’s the same on all the scientific cruises, no matter where you go. At breakfast, they’re there. They spent all night on the same boat as you, you have no choice but to make it work. Otherwise, you’d throw yourself off the side. It may surprise you to find that I’m a quite sociable person. So to cut myself off from all my friends almost completely? Well, I’ve got to find some sustenance somewhere. Here we are, on this boat with this motley crew of people who most of us just met, and now will embark on this incredibly intense journey. That is its own kind of social experiment.
Elizabeth Rush 10:57
All right, and then this is arriving at Thwaites. This is the night into morning that we arrive at Thwaites. That night sound sleep eludes me. I wake often, each time hopeful that we’ve arrived. Finally around five o’clock in the morning I rise, shuffle up the four flights of stairs, undog the door by the ice tower, and walk out on the bridge wings. Thwaite’s gray margin wobbles in the gloaming. We wind alongside entering small coves and rounding odd promontories. Our pace slow to hold this precarious line. The ice face soft as dunes. The night’s new hint of darkness gives way to the bruised light of dawn, and many others appear to watch what each of us has been working toward for weeks for years, and in some cases for decades, come into sharp focus. We don’t talk. When someone wants to say something, they whisper as though we’re in a giant, roofless cathedral. We, who’ve been at sea for so long, finally gaze upon the glacier that has already given us one another. Rick stands attentive at the ship’s helm. The captain next to him, steering us along the edges of Thwaites’ unfathomable fracturing, its hemorrhaging heart of milk.
Peterson Toscano 12:55
That was Elizabeth Rush, author of The Quickening: Creation and Community at the Ends of the Earth, which is available wherever books are sold.
Erica Valdez 13:05
To learn more about Elizabeth and her other publications, visit elizabethrush.net
Peterson Toscano 13:13
It turns out, you don’t need to be a fancy scientist or a creative writer to visit Antarctica. There are tourist cruises you can take. Well, not luxury cruises, but you can travel with scientists who are doing their research.
Erica Valdez 13:29
Brett Cease, Citizens’ Climate’s vice president of programming, traveled to Antarctica with his father and sister. He shares some of his experiences with us, including the shocking truth about penguins.
Brett Cease 13:42
We were on a boat called the Ushuaia, named for the city, obviously, that you leave from South America to get to the peninsula on. It’s a 279-foot ice-strengthened expedition ship, specifically that was built for NOAA as a research vessel back in 1970, it tops out at about 16 miles an hour. So, it goes very slowly, chugging along with its old diesel engines. It’s about 52 feet wide, and there was space enough for 90 passengers and 38 crew. And it now serves as not only as a transportation for those scientists to get to the peninsula but for tourists and individuals that are interested, like my family was, to go along with them and during the journey, learn about the research that they’re doing, get educated and have the chance to interact with those people as we made the voyage.
Brett Cease 14:36
These were the people in the world that are doing some of the front line research, trying to understand the changing climate of Antarctica, the early signals that we’re already detecting and impacts that it’s going to have on a whole system of food chains. Just imagine a house-sized wave crashing over your boat, your, the bow of the boat every five to 10 seconds for two days straight. Yo u literally kind of have to velcro your head to your pillow, or else you’ll roll out the bed. The winds and the current swirling around, this endless surging raw power of the Southern Ocean. It felt like being at the bottom of an endless grandfather clock pendulum.
Brett Cease 15:16
It wasn’t too cold, we were in the Antarctic summer. There’s no darkness, that is another beautiful thing. You know, imagine being in a world of 23+ plus of light. And yes, we, just like Elizabeth, we reveled in the chance to share and get to know the other travelers in the crew. Just to get into the flow of the season, and the wildlife, and the quiet ice passing by us. It was unforgettable. You’re struck immediately by how quickly the mountains rise up from the ocean. It’s actually the highest, and driest, and windiest continent of the world, not just the coldest. It’s known for its katabatic winds, which have speeds of over 200 miles an hour. And it’s constantly there.
Brett Cease 16:02
There are three types of penguins in the Antarctic Peninsula that we all got to see during the expedition: the gentoo penguin, the chinstrap penguin, and the adelie penguin. And here is where climate change rears its head. Rising temperatures on the Antarctic Peninsula are actually hammering the region’s adelie penguins and the sea ice that they depend. Ice forms continually later each year, it melts earlier, and that whole species is disappearing entirely from that Peninsula. Some of the sounds that you might, kind of, imagine with penguins include the cooing, the beautiful squawks that they give to each other as mates. Penguins make affectionally for life. So, it was really inspiring to see both the male and the female parents take care of their young chicks, and build up their stone nests with little pebbles that they’d wobble over across all the mud to collect.
Brett Cease 16:56
On top of being adored lovable birds that we all just enjoy looking at, penguins live in absolute squalor. This is one of the things that I wasn’t prepared for. It’s detailed by an NPR article that I love replicating here. They say the best way for you here at home, listener, to recreate the old factory experience for your own nose is to take some old cigarettes, soak them in ammonia, mix in some rotten shrimp, put this all in a bottle if you will. And then let it sit out on your windowsill in the sun for several days. Mix it up, and then take a big whiff in. And then breathe that in constantly, and that is the smell of penguin guano. Because of their sheer scale, these colonies that we visited were literally hundreds of thousands of birds. You can imagine that that gets overpowering pretty quickly.
Brett Cease 17:49
Antarctica is losing ice mass, that means it’s melting at an average rate of 150 billion tons of ice each year. Witnessing these icebergs that are floating now in the cold, open channels of the ocean, hundreds and hundreds of them, we got to see icebergs calving, we got to see the ship being navigated through channels that were clogged with them. They were composed of snow that had been compacted long before I was born, long before even, on some of them, the dawn of humankind. And thinking about the impact that all of us have in changing, so dramatically and so quickly, this entire landscape was incredibly humbling in harrowing.
Peterson Toscano 18:45
That was Brett Cease, vice president of programming for CCL.
Erica Valdez 18:50
Visit cclusa.org/radio to see some of Brett’s photos. Still to come, you hear some good news for me about a program that teaches school students about making fashion sustainably. We also learned about resilience and puppies from Tamara Staton. And hear the next installment of the CCL youth corner. Stay tuned!
Peterson Toscano 19:20
Now it is time for the resilience corner with Tamra Staton.
Tamara Staton 19:24
Hi, I’m Tamara Staton, CCL’s education and resilience coordinator. And this is Resilient Climateering Through Unexpected Climate Connections. Today’s topic is puppies and climate, two seemingly unrelated concepts that actually relate to one another in quite a few interesting ways. And to be clear, while this episode highlights the relationship between puppies and climate change, you could easily substitute puppies for kittens or many other sweet pets that regularly bring you joy.
Tamara Staton 19:54
In March, we got a puppy and we named her Mika she’s almost a year now, and it’s been quite an amazing journey. I don’t know if you’ve ever had a puppy, especially a working breed like a German Shepherd, but as much work as she’s been, I’m so happy that she’s in our lives. When Mika was just a few months, old romping around in the backyard, I found myself wondering if there’s a connection between puppies and climate change. While it may seem like a stretch at first, I actually see a boatload of connections.
Tamara Staton 20:25
In a nutshell, puppies, and the pets that we love, offer so many benefits to our lives, which end up helping us in our efforts to address climate change. According to Johns Hopkins Medicine, for example, simply petting a dog, or a pet, lowers the stress hormone, cortisol. And the social interaction between people and their dogs actually increases levels of the feel good hormone, oxytocin. As highlighted from the National Institutes of Health, oxytocin can induce anti stress-like effects, such as reduction of blood pressure and cortisol levels. It increases pain thresholds, and stimulates various types of positive social interaction. It also promotes growth and healing. When we’re growing, healing, and healthy, climate action gets to take a front seat in our lives. Pets and puppies can help us stay healthier, and naturally reduce the stress that many of us feel on a regular basis when we think about climate change.
Tamara Staton 21:24
In addition to lowering my stress, and blood pressure, at least most of the time, my puppy, Mika, forces me to be more active and more present and to go outside. I take her on walks in the sun and the rain, I head to the park, and walk through the trees. I meander through my neighborhood speeding up at times, but also slowing down so that we can both take in our surroundings and be fully present with whatever we see, hear, and smell. And perhaps most importantly, at least for me, having a puppy leaves me feeling more fulfilled and less lonely. Granted, she’s on on their climate advocate working on the same cause. But the opportunity to snuggle with her on a regular basis, to feel her love to feel her loyalty? Those are sensations that are hard to replicate even with other people.
Tamara Staton 22:14
In fact, one study in 2011 found that pets provided greater social support than humans in mitigating depression. And another study found that pet owners had better self-esteem. Maybe you’re not up for a puppy, or a kitten, or a pet of your own anytime soon. There’s definitely a time and a place for taking that on. But maybe you consider pet sitting or time sharing or borrowing a snuggly pet from a friend or family member. Or maybe, you just lean into the love that you recognize that your own pet offers you. I’m Tamara Staton with the Resilience Corner. Thank you for listening and for your commitment to progress. To learn more about tools, training, and resources for staying strong through the climate challenge, check out our resilience hub at cclusa.org/resilience. And until next month, remember this. Find your passion, let it guide you, and you’ll do amazing things for our world.
Peterson Toscano 23:14
Thank you, Tamara. You know, Erica, now I definitely need a puppy. Desperately.
Erica Valdez 23:19
You and me both. Do you have a question for Tamara? She’s very happy to consider your resilience questions, conundrums, and suggestions. Send an email to radio@citizensclimate.org. That’s radio @ citizensclimate.org or text us at 619-512-9646.
Peterson Toscano 23:39
The resilience corner is made possible through a collaboration with Tamara Staton, education and resilience coordinator for Citizens’ Climate Education. Now it is time for the CCL youth corner with Veda Ganessan, our youth correspondent.
Veda Ganesan 23:55
Welcome to Citizens’ Climate Radio’s Youth Corner. We’ll delve into the latest developments in climate action and environmental issues, all from the youth’s point of view. I’m Veda Ganessan, CCL’s national youth podcast lead. Today, we’re bringing you a special episode focusing on the Great School Electrification Challenge. What is electrification all about? How are youth igniting change in their schools? And how can you inspire youth to join the cause? Oh, and I’ll be telling you about one team that got their resolution passed.
Veda Ganesan 24:36
Schools are among the largest energy consumers in the public sector. They generate emissions equivalent to those of 18 million cars each year. We students hope to change that. Enter the Great School Electrification Challenge. This initiative was launched by CCL’s national youth action team. In this challenge, teams of students are calling on their school boards to pledge to electrify everything in their schools. That means HVAC systems, lawn maintenance, school bus fleets, and even adding solar panels. It’s about embracing clean energy and sustainability in the places where we learn and grow. We’re gearing up for round two of the challenge right now.
Veda Ganesan 25:15
Sharon Bagatell, the CCL youth action coordinator, describes the challenge as fun, informative, and empowering. And it’s no wonder. Students hold a unique position as the primary users of school facilities, giving them the right to influence and advocate for change. The challenge is also about creating a safer, more comfortable school environment that fosters better academic performance. Now, the big question: how do students make it happen? I’ll tell you about two different use teams, one in Cincinnati, Ohio, and one in Dallas, Texas.
Veda Ganesan 25:48
First, let’s take a look at DFW Gen Green. Led by me and Care Share, our team in Texas has developed a meticulous roadmap that includes electric school bus fleets and solar panel installations. We’ve convened high-level discussions with representatives from critical departments. These include the school superintendent, CFO, facilities, energy construction and contracts to enhance our efforts. We’ve connected with the community through tabling at local events, publishing op-eds, and organizing district-wide art shows. This ambitious endeavor comes at a crucial time for the district, particularly amidst budgetary challenges.
Veda Ganesan 26:25
Now, zooming in on the Electrified Cincinnati Schools Team, we see that they have been developing relationships with board members and influential policymakers to make changes. They’ve even hosted discussions with guest speakers and local environmental activists. And just recently, the Cincinnati Board of Education unanimously passed the team’s electrification resolution. They’re the first team to do so in the national youth action team.
Veda Ganesan 26:48
With 11 more teams across the United States, including the Los Alamos High Eco Club and the Tahoe Youth Action Team, the opportunity to get involved awaits you. To learn more and to register, visit youth.citizensclimatelobby.org/school-electrification. Again, that’s youth.citizensclimatelobby.org/school-electrification. The Electrification Challenge is an invitation to contribute to a greater cause, affect real change within the community, and ignite inspiration for others. The top three electrification teams in round one will be receiving cash prizes for their hard work. Learn more at youth.citizensclimatelobby.org/school-electrification.
Veda Ganesan 27:35
As a high school student, I see the great electrification challenge as a symbol of our commitment to a brighter, greener and more sustainable future. It empowers us to be innovators, forward thinkers, and environmental stewards. So let’s embrace the challenge, ignite change, and create a world we’re proud to pass on to future generations. We’ll report more on this in future episodes as more teams join the challenge.
Veda Ganesan 28:00
So that concludes our time with you. Thank you for joining us for the CCL youth corner and stay tuned for our next episode on the goat campaign. To learn more about CCL youth, visit cclusa.org/youth.
Erica Valdez 28:18
Thank you, Veda. That was Veda Ganessan with the CCL youth corner. Now it’s time for our good news story.
Peterson Toscano 28:40
This story was researched, written, and produced by you, Erica Valdez; thank you so much.
Erica Valdez 28:46
Do you know which of these products takes more water to produce? Is it our food, our clothing, our cars? If you guess clothing, you’re right. The fashion industry is the second most water-intensive industry in the world. To produce and packaged clothing takes a lot of resources, not to mention the greenhouse gas emissions it produces to transport all of them. These processes have a huge impact on the environment. And it’s hard for us as individuals to steer clear from the consumer culture when things have become so accessible.
Erica Valdez 29:16
The good news is, that groups are stepping up to bring this issue to light and support individuals in taking action. One of these groups is the Scroungers Center for Reusable Art Parts, or SCRAP. I had a great conversation with Danielle grant. She’s a programs director at SCRAP. She told me about the background of the nonprofit and how it’s empowering young people in the climate conversation.
Erica Valdez 29:39
Here are some quick facts about SCRAP. It’s the oldest and largest creative reuse nonprofit center in the United States. Scrap was started in response to the defunding of arts education in the San Francisco School District. And it was established nearly 50 years ago, in 1976. At this time, the environmental movement was gaining momentum worldwide. I mean, it was the 70s. This decade brought the first Earth Day and the Environmental Protection Agency. People were advocating for the climate by sharing the science, protesting, and collaborating with others across the world.
Erica Valdez 30:11
I love that SCRAP is open to the public. People can shop, explore how to use materials, and attend educational workshops. What caught my attention was one of SCRAP’s after-school programs that teaches students how to reuse and revitalize clothing materials. This program is called Sustainable Fashion Design for Teens. In this program, students usually have two classes per week. One is more learning and curriculum based where they discuss the fashion industry worldwide and its environmental effects. The second is a hands-on workshop. Over 12 weeks, students work up to a final project, or fashion show, to present to their friends and family.
Erica Valdez 30:43
SCRAP’s main objectives with these school programs are to 1.) keep materials out of landfills and reuse them in schools. And 2.) to teach a young generation the importance of reducing waste in the fashion industry. While talking with Danielle, it’s obvious that these students need these spaces. SCRAP provides a space to learn and process climate information. Students not only hear about our shifting climate, but they also experience it in the Bay Area of San Francisco. They see and breathe in wildfire smoke and they also experienced a new phenomenon: the atmospheric river bringing extreme amounts of rainfall. This is a very heavy topic and SCRAP gives them tools to cope with climate anxiety. They also get to connect with other teens and make an impact.
Erica Valdez 31:24
Danielle phrased it perfectly. Quote, “This program gives students a little bit of hope and agency around participating in the fight that lies ahead” end quote. Sustainable Fashion Design for Teens is just one of many programs that SCRAP offers. And it’s not the only one doing this work. In fact, when looking for sustainable fashion groups to feature in this episode, I found so many around the world, I had trouble narrowing it down to just one. These groups show how important individual and collective action is, and how creative it can look.
Erica Valdez 31:52
Want to get involved? SCRAP has worked with other reuse nonprofits to help them implement similar programs. And they’re looking to collaborate in other areas and schools to create more learning opportunities like these. You can find more information about SCRAP programs at scrap-sf.org. Again, that’s scrap-sf.org. I put that link in the show notes for you. And there, you can also find photos of the students SCRAP projects. Just visit cclusa.org/radio.
Peterson Toscano 32:19
Thank you Erica. If you have good news you want to share send us an email radio @ citizensclimate.org.
Erica Valdez 32:26
You can also text us at 619-512-9646.
Peterson Toscano 32:31
Last month, we asked listeners to tell us about the role they play in the climate movement. Are you a helper, advocate, organizer, or a rebel? Tanya wrote to say she is a helper, but reading her message, you can see she’s also an advocate. Tanya wrote, quote, “I made a decision to live a more sustainable life and do things like buy bamboo toilet paper, and try really hard to stay away from plastic. I also sometimes make calls for the environmental voter project. And I belong to my local chapter of CCL. I make calls to my congressmen and senators when asked, and before all of this, I actually met with my congressman on my own and gave him a presentation and specific asks.” Thank you, Tanya, so much for that message.
Erica Valdez 33:16
We want to give listeners a chance to respond just like Tanya did. So, if you could advocate for the climate through art, what kind of piece would you create? This can be music, dance, film, writing or other mediums you’ve used in your climate work. We want to hear about it! So feel free to send us an email radio @ citizensclimate.org. You can also text or leave a voicemail at 619-512-9646 and tell us your story of using art and your climate work.
Peterson Toscano 33:43
Thank you for joining us for episode 94 of Citizens’ Climate Radio. Our show is written and produced by Erica Valdez.
Erica Valdez 33:52
And Peterson Toscano along with Horace Mo. Other technical support from Ricky Bradley and Brett cease social media assistance from Flannery Winchester. Moral support from Madeline Para.
Peterson Toscano 34:02
Over the last month, many of you have shared our post on your social media. Here are some of the people and organizations that have shown us some love: CCL groups in Boulder, Colorado in Arkansas, Austin, Texas and San Diego. Many thanks also to Robin Elsebeth Jenkins, Robert D. Evans, Michael Cooper, and Bill Nash. Thank you so much.
Erica Valdez 34:26
You can now follow us on Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook and TikTok. Call our listener voicemail hotline- not hotline.
Peterson Toscano 34:34
I like hotline.
Erica Valdez 34:35
Yeah? Caller listener voicemail line at 619-512-9646. That number again is 619-512-9646. Visit cclusa.org/radio to see our show notes and find links toward guests.
Peterson Toscano 34:51
Citizens’ Climate Radio is a project of Citizens’ Climate Education.
The post Episode 94: Antarctic Awakenings appeared first on Citizens' Climate Lobby.
https://citizensclimatelobby.org/blog/podcast/episode-94-antarctic-awakenings/
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.
Heatwaves driving recent ‘surge’ in compound drought and heat extremes
Greenhouse Gases
DeBriefed 6 March 2026: Iran energy crisis | China climate plan | Bristol’s ‘pioneering’ wind turbine
Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.
This week
Energy crisis
ENERGY SPIKE: US-Israeli attacks on Iran and subsequent counterattacks across the Middle East have sent energy prices “soaring”, according to Reuters. The newswire reported that the region “accounts for just under a third of global oil production and almost a fifth of gas”. The Guardian noted that shipping traffic through the strait of Hormuz, which normally ferries 20% of the world’s oil, “all but ground to a halt”. The Financial Times reported that attacks by Iran on Middle East energy facilities – notably in Qatar – triggered the “biggest rise in gas prices since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine”.
‘RISK’ AND ‘BENEFITS’: Bloomberg reported on increases in diesel prices in Europe and the US, speculating that rising fuel costs could be “a risk for president Donald Trump”. US gas producers are “poised to benefit from the big disruption in global supply”, according to CNBC. Indian government sources told the Economic Times that Russia is prepared to “fulfil India’s energy demands”. China Daily quoted experts who said “China’s energy security remains fundamentally unshaken”, thanks to “emergency stockpiles and a wide array of import channels”.
‘ESSENTIAL’ RENEWABLES: Energy analysts said governments should cut their fossil-fuel reliance by investing in renewables, “rather than just seeking non-Gulf oil and gas suppliers”, reported Climate Home News. This message was echoed by UK business secretary Peter Kyle, who said “doubling down on renewables” was “essential” amid “regional instability”, according to the Daily Telegraph.
China’s climate plan
PEAK COAL?: China has set out its next “five-year plan” at the annual “two sessions” meeting of the National People’s Congress, including its climate strategy out to 2030, according to the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post. The plan called for China to cut its carbon emissions per unit of gross domestic product (GDP) by 17% from 2026 to 2030, which “may allow for continued increase in emissions given the rate of GDP growth”, reported Reuters. The newswire added that the plan also had targets to reach peak coal in the next five years and replace 30m tonnes per year of coal with renewables.
ACTIVE YET PRUDENT: Bloomberg described the new plan as “cautious”, stating that it “frustrat[es] hopes for tighter policy that would drive the nation to peak carbon emissions well before president Xi Jinping’s 2030 deadline”. Carbon Brief has just published an in-depth analysis of the plan. China Daily reported that the strategy “highlights measures to promote the climate targets of peaking carbon dioxide emissions before 2030”, which China said it would work towards “actively yet prudently”.
Around the world
- EU RULES: The European Commission has proposed new “made in Europe” rules to support domestic low-carbon industries, “against fierce competition from China”, reported Agence France-Presse. Carbon Brief examined what it means for climate efforts.
- RECORD HEAT: The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has said there is a 50-60% chance that the El Niño weather pattern could return this year, amplifying the effect of global warming and potentially driving temperatures to “record highs”, according to Euronews.
- FLAGSHIP FUND: The African Development Bank’s “flagship clean energy fund” plans to more than double its financing to $2.5bn for African renewables over the next two years, reported the Associated Press.
- NO WITHDRAWAL: Vanuatu has defied US efforts to force the Pacific-island nation to drop a UN draft resolution calling on the world to implement a landmark International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling on climate, according to the Guardian.
98
The number of nations that submitted their national reports on tackling nature loss to the UN on time – just half of the 196 countries that are part of the UN biodiversity treaty – according to analysis by Carbon Brief.
Latest climate research
- Sea levels are already “much higher than assumed” in most assessments of the threat posed by sea-level rise, due to “inadequate” modelling assumptions | Nature
- Accelerating human-caused global warming could see the Paris Agreement’s 1.5C limit crossed before 2030 | Geophysical Research Letters covered by Carbon Brief
- Future “super El Niño events” could “significantly lower” solar power generation due to a reduction in solar irradiance in key regions, such as California and east China | Communications Earth & 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
UK greenhouse gas emissions in 2025 fell to 54% below 1990 levels, the baseline year for its legally binding climate goals, according to new Carbon Brief analysis. Over the same period, data from the World Bank shows that the UK’s economy has expanded by 95%, meaning that emissions have been decoupling from growth.
Spotlight
Bristol’s ‘pioneering’ community wind turbine
Following the recent launch of the UK government’s local power plan, Carbon Brief visits one of the country’s community-energy success stories.
The Lawrence Weston housing estate is set apart from the main city of Bristol, wedged between the tree-lined grounds of a stately home and a sprawl of warehouses and waste incinerators. It is one of the most deprived areas in the city.
Yet, just across the M5 motorway stands a structure that has brought the spoils of the energy transition directly to this historically forgotten estate – a 4.2 megawatt (MW) wind turbine.
The turbine is owned by local charity Ambition Lawrence Weston and all the profits from its electricity sales – around £100,000 a year – go to the community. In the UK’s local power plan, it was singled out by energy secretary Ed Miliband as a “pioneering” project.
‘Sustainable income’
On a recent visit to the estate by Carbon Brief, Ambition Lawrence Weston’s development manager, Mark Pepper, rattled off the story behind the wind turbine.
In 2012, Pepper and his team were approached by the Bristol Energy Cooperative with a chance to get a slice of the income from a new solar farm. They jumped at the opportunity.
“Austerity measures were kicking in at the time,” Pepper told Carbon Brief. “We needed to generate an income. Our own, sustainable income.”
With the solar farm proving to be a success, the team started to explore other opportunities. This began a decade-long process that saw them navigate the Conservative government’s “ban” on onshore wind, raise £5.5m in funding and, ultimately, erect the turbine in 2023.
Today, the turbine generates electricity equivalent to Lawrence Weston’s 3,000 households and will save 87,600 tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) over its lifetime.
‘Climate by stealth’
Ambition Lawrence Weston’s hub is at the heart of the estate and the list of activities on offer is seemingly endless: birthday parties, kickboxing, a library, woodworking, help with employment and even a pop-up veterinary clinic. All supported, Pepper said, with the help of a steady income from community-owned energy.
The centre itself is kitted out with solar panels, heat pumps and electric-vehicle charging points, making it a living advertisement for the net-zero transition. Pepper noted that the organisation has also helped people with energy costs amid surging global gas prices.
Gesturing to the England flags dangling limply on lamp posts visible from the kitchen window, he said:
“There’s a bit of resentment around immigration and scarcity of materials and provision, so we’re trying to do our bit around community cohesion.”
This includes supper clubs and an interfaith grand iftar during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
Anti-immigration sentiment in the UK has often gone hand-in-hand with opposition to climate action. Right-wing politicians and media outlets promote the idea that net-zero policies will cost people a lot of money – and these ideas have cut through with the public.
Pepper told Carbon Brief he is sympathetic to people’s worries about costs and stressed that community energy is the perfect way to win people over:
“I think the only way you can change that is if, instead of being passive consumers…communities are like us and they’re generating an income to offset that.”
From the outset, Pepper stressed that “we weren’t that concerned about climate because we had other, bigger pressures”, adding:
“But, in time, we’ve delivered climate by stealth.”
Watch, read, listen
OIL WATCH: The Guardian has published a “visual guide” with charts and videos showing how the “escalating Iran conflict is driving up oil and gas prices”.
MURDER IN HONDURAS: Ten years on from the murder of Indigenous environmental justice advocate Berta Cáceres, Drilled asked why Honduras is still so dangerous for environmental activists.
TALKING WEATHER: A new film, narrated by actor Michael Sheen and titled You Told Us To Talk About the Weather, aimed to promote conversation about climate change with a blend of “poetry, folk horror and climate storytelling”.
Coming up
- 8 March: Colombia parliamentary election
- 9-19 March: 31st Annual Session of the International Seabed Authority, Kingston, Jamaica
- 11 March: UN Environment Programme state of finance for nature 2026 report launch
Pick of the jobs
- London School of Economics and Political Science, fellow in the social science of sustainability | Salary: £43,277-£51,714. Location: London
- NORCAP, innovative climate finance expert | Salary: Unknown. Location: Kyiv, Ukraine
- WBHM, environmental reporter | Salary: $50,050-$81,330. Location: Birmingham, Alabama, US
- Climate Cabinet, data engineer | Salary: hourly rate of $60-$120 per hour. Location: Remote anywhere in the US
DeBriefed is edited by Daisy Dunne. Please send any tips or feedback to debriefed@carbonbrief.org.
This is an online version of Carbon Brief’s weekly DeBriefed email newsletter. Subscribe for free here.
The post DeBriefed 6 March 2026: Iran energy crisis | China climate plan | Bristol’s ‘pioneering’ wind turbine appeared first on Carbon Brief.
China’s leadership has published a draft of its 15th five-year plan setting the strategic direction for the nation out to 2030, including support for clean energy and energy security.
The plan sets a target to cut China’s “carbon intensity” by 17% over the five years from 2026-30, but also changes the basis for calculating this key climate metric.
The plan continues to signal support for China’s clean-energy buildout and, in general, contains no major departures from the country’s current approach to the energy transition.
The government reaffirms support for several clean-energy industries, ranging from solar and electric vehicles (EVs) through to hydrogen and “new-energy” storage.
The plan also emphasises China’s willingness to steer climate governance and be seen as a provider of “global public goods”, in the form of affordable clean-energy technologies.
However, while the document says it will “promote the peaking” of coal and oil use, it does not set out a timeline and continues to call for the “clean and efficient” use of coal.
This shows that tensions remain between China’s climate goals and its focus on energy security, leading some analysts to raise concerns about its carbon-cutting ambition.
Below, Carbon Brief outlines the key climate change and energy aspects of the plan, including targets for carbon intensity, non-fossil energy and forestry.
Note: this article is based on a draft published on 5 March and will be updated if any significant changes are made in the final version of the plan, due to be released at the close next week of the “two sessions” meeting taking place in Beijing.
- What is China’s 15th five-year plan?
- What does the plan say about China’s climate action?
- What is China’s new CO2 intensity target?
- Does the plan encourage further clean-energy additions?
- What does the plan signal about coal?
- How will China approach global climate governance in the next five years?
- What else does the plan cover?
What is China’s 15th five-year plan?
Five-year plans are one of the most important documents in China’s political system.
Addressing everything from economic strategy to climate policy, they outline the planned direction for China’s socio-economic development in a five-year period. The 15th five-year plan covers 2026-30.
These plans include several “main goals”. These are largely quantitative indicators that are seen as particularly important to achieve and which provide a foundation for subsequent policies during the five-year period.
The table below outlines some of the key “main goals” from the draft 15th five-year plan.
| Category | Indicator | Indicator in 2025 | Target by 2030 | Cumulative target over 2026-2030 | Characteristic |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Economic development | Gross domestic product (GDP) growth (%) | 5 | Maintained within a reasonable range and proposed annually as appropriate. | Anticipatory | |
| ‘Green and low-carbon | Reduction in CO2 emissions per unit of GDP (%) | 17.7 | 17 | Binding | |
| Share of non-fossil energy in total energy consumption (%) | 21.7 | 25 | Binding | ||
| Security guarantee | Comprehensive energy production capacity (100m tonnes of standard coal equivalent) |
51.3 | 58 | Binding |
Select list of targets highlighted in the “main goals” section of the draft 15th five-year plan. Source: Draft 15th five-year plan.
Since the 12th five-year plan, covering 2011-2015, these “main goals” have included energy intensity and carbon intensity as two of five key indicators for “green ecology”.
The previous five-year plan, which ran from 2021-2025, introduced the idea of an absolute “cap” on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, although it did not provide an explicit figure in the document. This has been subsequently addressed by a policy on the “dual-control of carbon” issued in 2024.
The latest plan removes the energy-intensity goal and elevates the carbon-intensity goal, but does not set an absolute cap on emissions (see below).
It covers the years until 2030, before which China has pledged to peak its carbon emissions. (Analysis for Carbon Brief found that emissions have been “flat or falling” since March 2024.)
The plans are released at the two sessions, an annual gathering of the National People’s Congress (NPC) and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC). This year, it runs from 4-12 March.
The plans are often relatively high-level, with subsequent topic-specific five-year plans providing more concrete policy guidance.
Policymakers at the National Energy Agency (NEA) have indicated that in the coming years they will release five sector-specific plans for 2026-2030, covering topics such as the “new energy system”, electricity and renewable energy.
There may also be specific five-year plans covering carbon emissions and environmental protection, as well as the coal and nuclear sectors, according to analysts.
Other documents published during the two sessions include an annual government work report, which outlines key targets and policies for the year ahead.
The gathering is attended by thousands of deputies – delegates from across central and local governments, as well as Chinese Communist party members, members of other political parties, academics, industry leaders and other prominent figures.
What does the plan say about China’s climate action?
Achieving China’s climate targets will remain a key driver of the country’s policies in the next five years, according to the draft 15th five-year plan.
It lists the “acceleration” of China’s energy transition as a “major achievement” in the 14th five-year plan period (2021-2025), noting especially how clean-power capacity had overtaken fossil fuels.
The draft says China will “actively and steadily advance and achieve carbon peaking”, with policymakers continuing to strike a balance between building a “green economy” and ensuring stability.
Climate and environment continues to receive its own chapter in the plan. However, the framing and content of this chapter has shifted subtly compared with previous editions, as shown in the table below. For example, unlike previous plans, the first section of this chapter focuses on China’s goal to peak emissions.
| 11th five-year plan (2006-2010) | 12th five-year plan (2011-2015) | 13th five-year plan (2016-2020) | 14th five-year plan (2021-2025) | 15th five-year plan (2026-2030) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chapter title | Part 6: Build a resource-efficient and environmentally-friendly society | Part 6: Green development, building a resource-efficient and environmentally friendly society | Part 10: Ecosystems and the environment | Part 11: Promote green development and facilitate the harmonious coexistence of people and nature | Part 13: Accelerating the comprehensive green transformation of economic and social development to build a beautiful China |
| Sections | Developing a circular economy | Actively respond to global climate change | Accelerate the development of functional zones | Improve the quality and stability of ecosystems | Actively and steadily advancing and achieving carbon peaking |
| Protecting and restoring natural ecosystems | Strengthen resource conservation and management | Promote economical and intensive resource use | Continue to improve environmental quality | Continuously improving environmental quality | |
| Strengthening environmental protection | Vigorously develop the circular economy | Step up comprehensive environmental governance | Accelerate the green transformation of the development model | Enhancing the diversity, stability, and sustainability of ecosystems | |
| Enhancing resource management | Strengthen environmental protection efforts | Intensify ecological conservation and restoration | Accelerating the formation of green production and lifestyles | ||
| Rational utilisation of marine and climate resources | Promoting ecological conservation and restoration | Respond to global climate change | |||
| Strengthen the development of water conservancy and disaster prevention and mitigation systems | Improve mechanisms for ensuring ecological security | ||||
| Develop green and environmentally-friendly industries |
Title and main sections of the climate and environment-focused chapters in the last five five-year plans. Source: China’s 11th, 12th, 13th, 14th and 15th five-year plans.
The climate and environment chapter in the latest plan calls for China to “balance [economic] development and emission reduction” and “ensure the timely achievement of carbon peak targets”.
Under the plan, China will “continue to pursue” its established direction and objectives on climate, Prof Li Zheng, dean of the Tsinghua University Institute of Climate Change and Sustainable Development (ICCSD), tells Carbon Brief.
What is China’s new CO2 intensity target?
In the lead-up to the release of the plan, analysts were keenly watching for signals around China’s adoption of a system for the “dual-control of carbon”.
This would combine the existing targets for carbon intensity – the CO2 emissions per unit of GDP – with a new cap on China’s total carbon emissions. This would mark a dramatic step for the country, which has never before set itself a binding cap on total emissions.
Policymakers had said last year that this framework would come into effect during the 15th five-year plan period, replacing the previous system for the “dual-control of energy”.
However, the draft 15th five-year plan does not offer further details on when or how both parts of the dual-control of carbon system will be implemented. Instead, it continues to focus on carbon intensity targets alone.
Looking back at the previous five-year plan period, the latest document says China had achieved a carbon-intensity reduction of 17.7%, just shy of its 18% goal.
This is in contrast with calculations by Lauri Myllyvirta, lead analyst at the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA), which had suggested that China had only cut its carbon intensity by 12% over the past five years.
At the time it was set in 2021, the 18% target had been seen as achievable, with analysts telling Carbon Brief that they expected China to realise reductions of 20% or more.
However, the government had fallen behind on meeting the target.
Last year, ecology and environment minister Huang Runqiu attributed this to the Covid-19 pandemic, extreme weather and trade tensions. He said that China, nevertheless, remained “broadly” on track to meet its 2030 international climate pledge of reducing carbon intensity by more than 65% from 2005 levels.
Myllyvirta tells Carbon Brief that the newly reported figure showing a carbon-intensity reduction of 17.7% is likely due to an “opportunistic” methodological revision. The new methodology now includes industrial process emissions – such as cement and chemicals – as well as the energy sector.
(This is not the first time China has redefined a target, with regulators changing the methodology for energy intensity in 2023.)
For the next five years, the plan sets a target to reduce carbon intensity by 17%, slightly below the previous goal.
However, the change in methodology means that this leaves space for China’s overall emissions to rise by “3-6% over the next five years”, says Myllyvirta. In contrast, he adds that the original methodology would have required a 2% fall in absolute carbon emissions by 2030.
The dashed lines in the chart below show China’s targets for reducing carbon intensity during the 12th, 13th, 14th and 15th five-year periods, while the bars show what was achieved under the old (dark blue) and new (light blue) methodology.
The carbon-intensity target is the “clearest signal of Beijing’s climate ambition”, says Li Shuo, director at the Asia Society Policy Institute’s (ASPI) China climate hub.
It also links directly to China’s international pledge – made in 2021 – to cut its carbon intensity to more than 65% below 2005 levels by 2030.
To meet this pledge under the original carbon-intensity methodology, China would have needed to set a target of a 23% reduction within the 15th five-year plan period. However, the country’s more recent 2035 international climate pledge, released last year, did not include a carbon-intensity target.
As such, ASPI’s Li interprets the carbon-intensity target in the draft 15th five-year plan as a “quiet recalibration” that signals “how difficult the original 2030 goal has become”.
Furthermore, the 15th five-year plan does not set an absolute emissions cap.
This leaves “significant ambiguity” over China’s climate plans, says campaign group 350 in a press statement reacting to the draft plan. It explains:
“The plan was widely expected to mark a clearer transition from carbon-intensity targets toward absolute emissions reductions…[but instead] leaves significant ambiguity about how China will translate record renewable deployment into sustained emissions cuts.”
Myllyvirta tells Carbon Brief that this represents a “continuation” of the government’s focus on scaling up clean-energy supply while avoiding setting “strong measurable emission targets”.
He says that he would still expect to see absolute caps being set for power and industrial sectors covered by China’s emissions trading scheme (ETS). In addition, he thinks that an overall absolute emissions cap may still be published later in the five-year period.
Despite the fact that it has yet to be fully implemented, the switch from dual-control of energy to dual-control of carbon represents a “major policy evolution”, Ma Jun, director of the Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs (IPE), tells Carbon Brief. He says that it will allow China to “provide more flexibility for renewable energy expansion while tightening the net on fossil-fuel reliance”.
Does the plan encourage further clean-energy additions?
“How quickly carbon intensity is reduced largely depends on how much renewable energy can be supplied,” says Yao Zhe, global policy advisor at Greenpeace East Asia, in a statement.
The five-year plan continues to call for China’s development of a “new energy system that is clean, low-carbon, safe and efficient” by 2030, with continued additions of “wind, solar, hydro and nuclear power”.
In line with China’s international pledge, it sets a target for raising the share of non-fossil energy in total energy consumption to 25% by 2030, up from just under 21.7% in 2025.
The development of “green factories” and “zero-carbon [industrial] parks” has been central to many local governments’ strategies for meeting the non-fossil energy target, according to industry news outlet BJX News. A call to build more of these zero-carbon industrial parks is listed in the five-year plan.
Prof Pan Jiahua, dean of Beijing University of Technology’s Institute of Ecological Civilization, tells Carbon Brief that expanding demand for clean energy through mechanisms such as “green factories” represents an increasingly “bottom-up” and “market-oriented” approach to the energy transition, which will leave “no place for fossil fuels”.
He adds that he is “very much sure that China’s zero-carbon process is being accelerated and fossil fuels are being driven out of the market”, pointing to the rapid adoption of EVs.
The plan says that China will aim to double “non-fossil energy” in 10 years – although it does not clarify whether this means their installed capacity or electricity generation, or what the exact starting year would be.
Research has shown that doubling wind and solar capacity in China between 2025-2035 would be “consistent” with aims to limit global warming to 2C.
While the language “certainly” pushes for greater additions of renewable energy, Yao tells Carbon Brief, it is too “opaque” to be a “direct indication” of the government’s plans for renewable additions.
She adds that “grid stability and healthy, orderly competition” is a higher priority for policymakers than guaranteeing a certain level of capacity additions.
China continues to place emphasis on the need for large-scale clean-energy “bases” and cross-regional power transmission.
The plan says China must develop “clean-energy bases…in the three northern regions” and “integrated hydro-wind-solar complexes” in south-west China.
It specifically encourages construction of “large-scale wind and solar” power bases in desert regions “primarily” for cross-regional power transmission, as well as “major hydropower” projects, including the Yarlung Tsangpo dam in Tibet.
As such, the country should construct “power-transmission corridors” with the capacity to send 420 gigawatts (GW) of electricity from clean-energy bases in western provinces to energy-hungry eastern provinces by 2030, the plan says.
State Grid, China’s largest grid operator, plans to install “another 15 ultra-high voltage [UHV] transmission lines” by 2030, reports Reuters, up from the 45 UHV lines built by last year.
Below are two maps illustrating the interlinkages between clean-energy bases in China in the 15th (top) and 14th (bottom) five-year plan periods.
The yellow dotted areas represent clean energy bases, while the arrows represent cross-regional power transmission. The blue wind-turbine icons represent offshore windfarms and the red cooling tower icons represent coastal nuclear plants.
The 15th five-year plan map shows a consistent approach to the 2021-2025 period. As well as power being transmitted from west to east, China plans for more power to be sent to southern provinces from clean-energy bases in the north-west, while clean-energy bases in the north-east supply China’s eastern coast.
It also maps out “mutual assistance” schemes for power grids in neighbouring provinces.
Offshore wind power should reach 100GW by 2030, while nuclear power should rise to 110GW, according to the plan.
What does the plan signal about coal?
The increased emphasis on grid infrastructure in the draft 15th five-year plan reflects growing concerns from energy planning officials around ensuring China’s energy supply.
Ren Yuzhi, director of the NEA’s development and planning department, wrote ahead of the plan’s release that the “continuous expansion” of China’s energy system has “dramatically increased its complexity”.
He said the NEA felt there was an “urgent need” to enhance the “secure and reliable” replacement of fossil-fuel power with new energy sources, as well as to ensure the system’s “ability to absorb them”.
Meanwhile, broader concerns around energy security have heightened calls for coal capacity to remain in the system as a “ballast stone”.
The plan continues to support the “clean and efficient utilisation of fossil fuels” and does not mention either a cap or peaking timeline for coal consumption.
Xi had previously told fellow world leaders that China would “strictly control” coal-fired power and phase down coal consumption in the 15th five-year plan period.
The “geopolitical situation is increasing energy security concerns” at all levels of government, said the Institute for Global Decarbonization Progress in a note responding to the draft plan, adding that this was creating “uncertainty over coal reduction”.
Ahead of its publication, there were questions around whether the plan would set a peaking deadline for oil and coal. An article posted by state news agency Xinhua last month, examining recommendations for the plan from top policymakers, stated that coal consumption would plateau from “around 2027”, while oil would peak “around 2026”.
However, the plan does not lay out exact years by which the two fossil fuels should peak, only saying that China will “promote the peaking of coal and oil consumption”.
There are similarly no mentions of phasing out coal in general, in line with existing policy.
Nevertheless, there is a heavy emphasis on retrofitting coal-fired power plants. The plan calls for the establishment of “demonstration projects” for coal-plant retrofitting, such as through co-firing with biomass or “green ammonia”.
Such retrofitting could incentivise lower utilisation of coal plants – and thus lower emissions – if they are used to flexibly meet peaks in demand and to cover gaps in clean-energy output, instead of providing a steady and significant share of generation.
The plan also calls for officials to “fully implement low-carbon retrofitting projects for coal-chemical industries”, which have been a notable source of emissions growth in the past year.
However, the coal-chemicals sector will likely remain a key source of demand for China’s coal mining industry, with coal-to-oil and coal-to-gas bases listed as a “key area” for enhancing the country’s “security capabilities”.
Meanwhile, coal-fired boilers and industrial kilns in the paper industry, food processing and textiles should be replaced with “clean” alternatives to the equivalent of 30m tonnes of coal consumption per year, it says.
“China continues to scale up clean energy at an extraordinary pace, but the plan still avoids committing to strong measurable constraints on emissions or fossil fuel use”, says Joseph Dellatte, head of energy and climate studies at the Institut Montaigne. He adds:
“The logic remains supply-driven: deploy massive amounts of clean energy and assume emissions will eventually decline.”
How will China approach global climate governance in the next five years?
Meanwhile, clean-energy technologies continue to play a role in upgrading China’s economy, with several “new energy” sectors listed as key to its industrial policy.
Named sectors include smart EVs, “new solar cells”, new-energy storage, hydrogen and nuclear fusion energy.
“China’s clean-technology development – rather than traditional administrative climate controls – is increasingly becoming the primary driver of emissions reduction,” says ASPI’s Li. He adds that strengthening China’s clean-energy sectors means “more closely aligning Beijing’s economic ambitions with its climate objectives”.
Analysis for Carbon Brief shows that clean energy drove more than a third of China’s GDP growth in 2025, representing around 11% of China’s whole economy.
The continued support for these sectors in the draft five-year plan comes as the EU outlined its own measures intended to limit China’s hold on clean-energy industries, driven by accusations of “unfair competition” from Chinese firms.
China is unlikely to crack down on clean-tech production capacity, Dr Rebecca Nadin, director of the Centre for Geopolitics of Change at ODI Global, tells Carbon Brief. She says:
“Beijing is treating overcapacity in solar and smart EVs as a strategic choice, not a policy error…and is prepared to pour investment into these sectors to cement global market share, jobs and technological leverage.”
Dellatte echoes these comments, noting that it is “striking” that the plan “barely addresses the issue of industrial overcapacity in clean technologies”, with the focus firmly on “scaling production and deployment”.
At the same time, China is actively positioning itself to be a prominent voice in climate diplomacy and a champion of proactive climate action.
This is clear from the first line in a section on providing “global public goods”. It says:
“As a responsible major country, China will play a more active role in addressing global challenges such as climate change.”
The plan notes that China will “actively participate in and steer [引领] global climate governance”, in line with the principle of “common,but differentiated responsibilities”.
This echoes similar language from last year’s government work report, Yao tells Carbon Brief, demonstrating a “clear willingness” to guide global negotiations. But she notes that this “remains an aspiration that’s yet to be made concrete”. She adds:
“China has always favored collective leadership, so its vision of leadership is never a lone one.”
The country will “deepen south-south cooperation on climate change”, the plan says. In an earlier section on “opening up”, it also notes that China will explore “new avenues for collaboration in green development” with global partners as part of its “Belt and Road Initiative”.
China is “doubling down” on a narrative that it is a “responsible major power” and “champion of south-south climate cooperation”, Nadin says, such as by “presenting its clean‑tech exports and finance as global public goods”. She says:
“China will arrive at future COPs casting itself as the indispensable climate leader for the global south…even though its new five‑year plan still puts growth, energy security and coal ahead of faster emissions cuts at home.”
What else does the plan cover?
The impact of extreme weather – particularly floods – remains a key concern in the plan.
China must “refine” its climate adaptation framework and “enhance its resilience to climate change, particularly extreme-weather events”, it says.
China also aims to “strengthen construction of a national water network” over the next five years in order to help prevent floods and droughts.
An article published a few days before the plan in the state-run newspaper China Daily noted that, “as global warming intensifies, extreme weather events – including torrential rains, severe convective storms, and typhoons – have become more frequent, widespread and severe”.
The plan also touches on critical minerals used for low-carbon technologies. These will likely remain a geopolitical flashpoint, with China saying it will focus during the next five years on “intensifying” exploration and “establishing” a reserve for critical minerals. This reserve will focus on “scarce” energy minerals and critical minerals, as well as other “advantageous mineral resources”.
Dellatte says that this could mean the “competition in the energy transition will increasingly be about control over mineral supply chains”.
Other low-carbon policies listed in the five-year plan include expanding coverage of China’s mandatory carbon market and further developing its voluntary carbon market.
China will “strengthen monitoring and control” of non-CO2 greenhouse gases, the plan says, as well as implementing projects “targeting methane, nitrous oxide and hydrofluorocarbons” in sectors such as coal mining, agriculture and chemicals.
This will create “capacity” for reducing emissions by 30m tonnes of CO2 equivalent, it adds.
Meanwhile, China will develop rules for carbon footprint accounting and push for internationally recognised accounting standards.
It will enhance reform of power markets over the next five years and improve the trading mechanism for green electricity certificates.
It will also “promote” adoption of low-carbon lifestyles and decarbonisation of transport, as well as working to advance electrification of freight and shipping.
The post Q&A: What does China’s 15th ‘five-year plan’ mean for climate change? appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Q&A: What does China’s 15th ‘five-year plan’ mean for climate change?
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