Delegates at the 61st meeting of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in Sofia, Bulgaria have failed to agree on a timeline for the upcoming seventh assessment report.
The week-long meeting saw more than 230 delegates from 195 member governments revisit an unresolved topic from the previous meeting in January – finalising the timeline for the IPCC’s seventh assessment report (AR7) cycle.
AR7 will be the IPCC’s latest round of reports summarising the most recently published climate science.
First published in 1990, the assessment reports typically take 6-7 years to complete. AR6’s concluding “summary for policymakers” was published in March last year.
Many countries said in Sofia that they favoured an accelerated timeline, in which all three “working group” reports would be completed by June 2028. This deadline would allow the findings to inform the UN’s second global stocktake, which will gauge progress towards the Paris Agreement goals.
Ahead of last week’s meeting, a group of 40 IPCC authors from developing countries published an open letter arguing that the AR7 reports “can and must” be produced by this date in order to remain policy-relevant.
However, countries including Kenya, India, China and South Africa opposed the accelerated timeline, warning that “haste leads to shoddy work” and saying that raising concerns that the decision was being rushed through.
Ultimately, the decision was delayed. The issue will be picked up again after the AR7 scoping meeting in December.
Delegates in Sofia had more success in agreeing outlines for the special report on “climate change and cities” and the methodology report on “short-lived climate forcers”, both of which will be published in 2027.
Tricky talks in Turkey
Following the completion of its sixth assessment report (AR6) last year, the IPCC’s attention has now turned to its seventh assessment (AR7).
In a four-day meeting in Istanbul in January, which focused on the IPCC’s “programme of work” for AR7, governments decided against adopting a new structure and instead committed to the traditional set of three “working group” reports and a final synthesis report.
Before the Istanbul meeting, governments had already agreed that the AR7 cycle would include a special report on climate change and cities, as well as a methodology report on short-lived climate forcers.
The meeting then saw the addition of a second methodology report on carbon dioxide removal technologies, carbon capture utilisation and storage, plus a revision to the IPCC’s 1994 technical guidelines on impacts and adaptation.
However, while there was agreement between government delegates on the selection of reports, a timeline for their delivery was not agreed.
The majority of countries meeting in Istanbul favoured delivering the working group reports on an “accelerated” timeline, which would see them published by the end of 2028. This would allow the reports to “inform” the UN’s second global stocktake (GST), which will gauge progress towards the Paris Agreement goals.
However, a few countries, including Saudi Arabia, India and China, “strenuously objected” to this timetable, reported the Earth Negotiations Bulletin (ENB), which has unique access to the closed talks.
It reported, for example, that Saudi Arabia “opposed the shorter timeline, saying this would lead to compromised working groups reports both in content and inclusivity”. While China “emphasised that AR7 aims to be inclusive and developing country scientists should be given time to make their contributions”.
As opposition to the accelerated timeline “held fast” – despite the meeting overrunning into a fifth day – no decision was made.
The final “decisions adopted” document instead requested that the IPCC bureau – experts with more managerial roles, including vice and co-chairs – prepare a document “outlining the month and year of delivery on the basis of an AR7 strategic plan, taking into account the different views expressed” in the meeting.
The instruction included an “oblique reference” to taking “into account” the GST, noted ENB. The report, it was decided, would be presented at the Sofia meeting “for consideration and decision”.
Decision delayed
A key goal of the meeting in Sofia last week was to nail down a timeline for AR7. Ahead of the meeting, a group of 40 IPCC authors from developing countries sent a letter arguing that the AR7 reports “can and must” be produced by 2028, in time to inform the second GST report.
On 31 July, former IPCC vice chair Dr Youba Sokona – a co-author of the letter – published a commentary in Climate Home News summarising its main arguments. He argued that “ensuring the IPCC cycle aligns with GST timelines is crucial for maintaining the integrity of international climate cooperation”, adding that, without input from the IPCC, the stocktake “may lack essential southern perspective”.
He also dismissed concerns that accelerating the timeline would compromise the robustness of the reports, or lead to under-representation of developing countries. The article also outlined ways these concerns could be addressed while implementing an accelerated timeline.
Dr Frederieke Otto – a senior lecturer in climate science at the Grantham Institute for Climate Change and the Environment and IPCC AR6 author – tells Carbon Brief that, in her view, the Working Group II (WG2) and III (WG3) reports are “really needed before the GST”.
Typically, the three working group reports focus on “the physical science basis”, “impacts, adaptation and vulnerability” and “mitigation of climate change”.
On the morning of 31 July, Dr Jim Skea – the IPCC chair for AR7 – presented a proposed schedule for AR7. The proposal was requested by the IPCC panel at the 60th session in Istanbul in January. It was developed by the co-chairs of the IPCC working groups and the Task Force on National Greenhouse Gas Inventories (TFI), then reviewed by the IPCC bureau.
Under this schedule, the AR7 cycle would last six-and-a-half years – similar to the fifth and sixth assessment cycles.
In the discussion that followed, a long list of countries supported the schedule as proposed, with many underscoring the importance of feeding into the second GST, according to the ENB’s summary of the entire meeting.
Belize, supported by the US, the Netherlands and the UK, said IPCC reports need to be ready for the Bonn Climate Change Conference in June 2028, according to the ENB. Belize added that “an inclusive cycle is only meaningful if it can feed into the GST”.
Saint Kitts and Nevis argued that the absence of “crucial” IPCC input into the GST would mean the IPCC would lose policy relevance. The country also argued that the schedule for AR7 is “neither compressed nor rushed”, because, while it is shorter than the schedule for AR6, it also contains fewer special reports.
The AR6 cycle included three special reports – on 1.5C of global warming in 2018, then, successively in 2019, on climate change and land, and the ocean and cryosphere.
(Discussions about linking IPCC reports with the GST are long-standing. During 2016-18, the IPCC panel “agreed to draft terms of reference for a task group on the organisation of future work of the IPCC in light of the GST under the Paris Agreement”, according to the ENB.)
Finland argued that “if we want science-based policymaking, the faster we have the next report, the faster policymakers are able to take science-based policy action”, according to the ENB. And many small-island developing nations also “underscored the critical importance of timely reports from small island developing states [SIDS] and less-developed countries”.
Several countries, including Brazil, Peru and the UK, “stressed that inclusivity concerns could be addressed in ways other than an extended timeline”.
However, several countries, including India, Algeria, Kenya, the Russian Federation and South Africa, argued that a longer timeline is needed to ensure “robust, rigorous scientific outputs, and to ensure greater inclusivity”.
India called the proposed schedule “unprecedented,” saying that the fourth and fifth assessment cycles had similar timeframes, but did not include special reports. It also argued that “producing the best science needs time, haste leads to shoddy work and retracted publications”, according to the ENB.
Kenya, supported by India and South Africa, warned that there are “major” gaps in literature on adaptation in Africa. It said that the “short time” between AR7 scoping meetings and the first author meetings may not be sufficient to identify and fill “literature gaps” for the continent.
And South Africa and Saudi Arabia opposed expediting the schedule to feed into the stocktake, suggesting this would not make the IPCC more “policy-relevant,” but more “policy-prescriptive.”
Dr David Lapola is a research scientist at the University of Campinas in Brazil and AR6 contributing author. He tells Carbon Brief that, “while inclusiveness is super important to bring more legitimacy to the process, it also slows down decisions when you have to have the agreement of all members”. He says that it is a “great challenge to imprint more agility to the IPCC decision processes without compromising inclusiveness”.
On the evening of 1 August, Skea “noted how difficult it had been to find a solution that satisfied all delegations” and he proposed to postpone a decision on the timeline until after the AR7 scoping meeting in December 2024.
In a press release published after the meeting closed, the IPCC stated that “at its next plenary in early 2025, the panel will agree on their respective scope, outlines and work plans, including schedules and budgets”.
“While some expressed disappointment about the lack of consensus, others were quick to point out that determining the timeline after the scoping meeting for the working groups is consistent with past practice and the IPCC’s principles and procedures”, says the ENB.
Dr Hannah Hughes is a senior lecturer in international politics and climate change at Aberystwyth University, who has written extensively about the IPCC. She tells Carbon Brief that it is “not surprising” that the decision has been further postponed. She explains that the IPCC is “balancing complex and competing dynamics”.
She adds:
“Delaying the finalisation of the timeline until after the scoping of reports offers the advantage of having a clear sense of the advances in science and the level of urgency in communicating these.”
However, Otto tells Carbon Brief that it will be “difficult to scope without a timeline”. She says that “with the decision postponed, it seems that conflicts could not be resolved, but everything is just postponed”.
What additional reports were discussed in Sofia?
Earlier this year, IPCC held scoping meetings (in Latvia and Australia, respectively) for a special report on climate change and cities and a methodology report on short-lived climate forcers – both of which are due for publication in 2027. The proposals suggested at these meetings were discussed in Sofia.
Special report on climate change and cities
In 2016, the IPCC decided to produce a special report on climate change and cities. A “cities and climate change science conference” was held in Canada in 2018 to “inspire the next frontier of research focused on the science of cities and climate change”. A scoping meeting was held in Latvia over 16-19 April 2024 to develop a proposed outline for the report.
On 27 July in Sofia, Diana Ürge-Vorsatz – IPCC vice-chair and chair of the scientific steering committee (SSC) for the cities report – presented the proposal.
Under the proposal, the report will have five main chapters. The first will provide framing for the report, the second will discuss “trends, challenges and opportunities” in a changing climate and the third will be called “actions and solutions to reduce urban risks and emissions”. The final two chapters will focus on facilitating change and solutions.
Ürge-Vorsatz also suggested a timeline in which authors for the report will be selected by the end of 2024 and the first meetings of lead authors will be held in 2025. The expert review of the first order draft will take place by the end of 2025, and 15-19 March 2027 will see the “approval of the summary for policymakers and acceptance of the special report”.
In Sofia, many countries proposed changes or raised queries, according to ENB. For example, countries including India, South Africa and Malawi questioned how cities are defined. Burundi, Kenya and Mauritius said early warning systems should be given more prominence. And countries including Burundi, Malaysia and Kenya called for a more “balanced consideration of adaptation and mitigation”.
Over the following days, there were multiple more rounds of comments and drafts. For example, India questioned the shift from “loss and damage” to “losses and damages” implemented in one of the drafts, noting IPCC precedents for use of the latter terminology are limited to one document.
Saudi Arabia opposed the use of “net-zero goals” for cities, saying that these are country-level objectives. And Kenya, supported by India and Algeria, “called for improvements in the way adaptation was addressed throughout the outline”, including the removal of a reference to “maladaptation”.
By 31 July, most countries had accepted the proposal. But others – including Saudi Arabia, India and Kenya – were continuing to raise concerns and to call for a chapter-by-chapter discussion of the report outline.
Skea said the situation was “at a crossroads, given the difficulty of opening only a few non-consensual issues without risking an unravelling, and [he] invited the SSC to confer on whether the issues expressed could be somehow incorporated without unacceptable implications”, according to the ENB.
Timor-Leste, supported by the US and the Netherlands, urged countries to reach a compromise in time for the end of the meeting, noting their delegation consists of a single person. But India, Saudi Arabia and Kenya “expressed concern with other delegations’ ‘refusal to engage’ with their concerns”.
A “huddle” was set up to address some of the key concerns and, on 2 August, the delegates approved a draft decision.
Dr Aromar Revi is the founding director of the Indian Institute for Human Settlements and author on multiple IPCC reports. He tells Carbon Brief that the approval of the outline for an IPCC special report on cities is “a historic step that brings the urban and infrastructure transition, up front and centre of the climate action solutions space”.
He adds:
“It has taken almost a decade of preparation by a wide range of urban and climate actors to make this possible, since it was first suggested in 2016 as a special report in the AR6 cycle…
“This report will be especially important to cities and urban areas in Asia, Africa and Latin America and the SIDS, where 90% of the incremental urban population will live over the next 30-odd years, often in informal settlements with poor services and high vulnerability.”
Revi adds that the proposed timescale, which would see the work completed by March 2027, sets a “high bar” for the authorship team.
Prof Lisa Schipper – a professor of development geography at the University of Bonn and IPCC AR6 author – tells Carbon Brief that the cities report “will be a critical meeting point of adaptation, mitigation and development agendas”.
She adds:
“I was happy to see the level of detail in the cities [report] outline. Normally, the IPCC report outlines are a shopping list of topics without any normative framing. This makes it challenging to write the report with a consistent narrative. I think IPCC member countries will find more relatable and usable content in the cities report.”
The report “will be arriving at a crucial time”, adds Dr Zachary Labe – a scientist at the NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory, noting that many cities are “leading examples of how to design and implement evidence-based climate action through adaptation and mitigation practices”.
“The calls for nominations of authors are scheduled for release as early as next week,” according to the IPCC press release.
Short-lived climate forcers methodology report
In 2019, the IPCC decided that the TFI should produce a methodology report on short-lived climate forcers (SLCFs) – gases and particulates, such as methane and carbon, that cause global warming, but typically only stay in the atmosphere for less than two decades.
At the 60th session in January 2024, the panel decided to produce the report by 2027. A scoping meeting for the report was held on 26-28 February 2024 in Brisbane, Australia.
On the first day of the 61st session, Dr Takeshi Enoki, the co-chair of the TFI, presented an overview of the group’s recommendations. He suggested a title for the report of “2027 supplement to the 2006 IPCC guidelines for national greenhouse gas inventories: short-lived climate forcers (2027 supplement on SLCFs)”, and said the report would be a supplement to the 2006 guidelines.
They added that the report would be made up of an overview chapter and five “volumes” following the format of the 2006 IPCC guidelines. These five volumes will focus on “general guidance”, the energy sector, industrial processes and product use, the agriculture, forestry and other land use sector, and waste, he said.
However, many countries raised concerns. First, there was disagreement about whether or not to include hydrogen and PM2.5 – particulate matter with a diameter of under 2.5 micrometres – in the report.
China, India, Iraq and Saudi Arabia, among others, argued that they should not be included, as the literature supporting their inclusion is not robust enough, the ENB says. However, it adds that many other countries – including the US, Canada and Chile – supported its inclusion.
Second, the title of the report was called into question. India said that linking the report to the 2006 guidelines “creates a whole new set of obligations and commitments through other channels”. It, along with Saudi Arabia, called for the report to be changed back to a standalone document. However, Denmark, Germany, Spain and Morocco expressed support for the current format.
A series of huddles were held to iron out these disagreements. On 2 August, the delegates agreed to change the name of the report to “2027 IPCC methodology report on inventories for short-lived climate forcers”.
However, in the absence of consensus on the case for including PM2.5 and hydrogen, the panel decided to come back to this discussion in the future.
What else was agreed in Sofia?
Updates on a range of other IPCC activities were also given, including the IPCC scholarship programme, terms of reference for the IPCC publication committee, and progress reports aimed at increasing accountability and transparency in the IPCC process.
Expert meetings
Ahead of the meeting in Sofia, the IPCC had already decided to limit the production of new special reports in line with the reported preferences of IPCC chair Jim Skea, who previously promised that he would strongly resist pressure to produce more reports.
The limited number of special reports was, in part, to allow more time for expert meetings or workshops. On 2 August, working group one co-chair Prof Xiaoye Zhang introduced the options for expert meetings and workshops for AR7, “highlighting the need for cross-working group collaboration”, according to the ENB.
He noted that expert meetings on reconciling land-use emissions and on CO2 removal technologies had been held in July 2024. Another meeting on gender, diversity and inclusivity has already been “tentatively” scheduled for later this year, and a workshop on the IPCC inventory software will be held in late August 2024.
Ahead of the meeting in Sofia, IPCC co-chairs and their working group bureaus had also proposed a range of extra meetings for 2025-26.
IPCC co-chair for working group one – Dr Robert Vautard – outlined the proposal for a meeting on high impacts and tipping points. The proposal suggests that 60 experts meet in April 2025 to “prepare consensus for the working group-specific assessments addressing
this important topic subject to intense research and debates in the community”.
Vautard explained that the meeting would be led by WG1, but include contributions from all working groups. He added that the meeting will receive financial support from the World Climate Research Programme.
Many countries supported this meeting, with Ukraine calling tipping points “the elephant in the room”. However, India opposed the meeting, saying it spans too many topics. And Saudi Arabia said the meeting is not needed as tipping points will be discussed in the WG1 report.
A meeting on “adaptation guidelines, metrics and indicators” was also proposed. Several countries, including Kenya and Saudi Arabia, said adaptation should be a priority in this cycle, according to the ENB
Finally, a meeting on “novel approaches to assessing knowledge on climate change and society’s responses” was suggested. Australia, Chile, France and others expressed support of this meeting, with many highlighting the importance of Indigenous knowledge and collaboration with the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services.
Health, overshoot and science communication were also identified among other key areas of interest for AR7.
Improving inclusivity
“The one issue on which all delegates seemed to agree was the need to enhance the inclusivity of the IPCC’s work in both its process and products,” the ENB says.
WG3 co-chair Prof Joy Pereira stressed that the bureau is committed to AR7 products being inclusive in terms of author representation and literature assessment, and pointed to a document on improving inclusivity in AR7.
The document suggests setting the agenda for the expert meeting on gender, diversity and inclusivity – which is planned in late 2024 or early 2025 – and providing training on inclusive practices for lead authors and contributing lead authors during the first lead author meeting.
Efforts will also be taken to sponsor measures such as internet access and access to literature for IPCC scientists, according to the document.
(Carbon Brief’s analysis on the change in diversity of IPCC authors over the past three decades highlights access to literature as a key barrier for IPCC authors from less wealthy institutions.)
The post IPCC meeting in Sofia fails to agree timeline for seventh assessment report appeared first on Carbon Brief.
IPCC meeting in Sofia fails to agree timeline for seventh assessment report
Ellen Davies is head of programmes at the African Climate Foundation and is based in Kenya. Wole Hammond is programme officer for adaptation and resilience at the foundation, based in Nigeria.
For generations, African communities have lived on the frontlines of climate disruption, managing erratic rainfall, prolonged droughts and the slow erosion of their livelihoods, which depend on predictable seasons.
When the rains failed across Southern Africa in 2024, it was but the latest chapter of a crisis already long underway. During that season, maize crop failures of 40-80% devastated farming communities in Zambia, Zimbabwe and Malawi, where roughly 70% of people depend on rain-fed agriculture. Governments already stretched by debt were forced to raid development budgets, trading long-term growth for emergency relief.
Then came the floods. In early 2026, parts of Mozambique, Zimbabwe and South Africa received over a year’s worth of rain in days. More than 2 million people were affected. In East Africa, drought has displaced nearly 62,000 people in Somalia this year alone, with nearly one in four Somalis now facing acute food insecurity.
This is what climate change looks like on the ground – not parts per million or diplomatic jargon, but whether a school stays open after floods cut off the road, whether a clinic can function in extreme heat, whether a country can still invest in its future when every year brings another disaster bill.
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Africa as a continent contributes the least to global emissions yet bears a disproportionate share of the consequences. Nine of the ten countries most vulnerable to climate change are African. As livelihoods collapse and rural economies fail, migration pressures will intensify, driven by climate change intersecting with poverty, conflict and constrained opportunity.
Chronic under-funding
Europe is only now beginning to experience, in more limited form, what African communities have navigated for decades with far less fiscal space, thinner insurance coverage and fewer resources for recovery. With El Niño conditions confirmed and a “super” version of the naturally occurring weather pattern possible later this year, the pressure is set to intensify further.
In Africa, climate action is fundamentally a development challenge where adaptation and mitigation must go hand in hand. Building a solar grid and flood-proofing the road that serves it are not separate agendas. Yet for too long, the global climate conversation has prioritised mitigation while leaving adaptation – the work of protecting lives, livelihoods and economies in a changing climate – chronically under-funded.
The result is three compounding gaps. A visibility gap: much of Africa’s adaptation work remains under-documented and under-recognised in global climate narratives. A financing gap: capital does not flow at the scale or speed required to the people and institutions best placed to use it. And a decision-making gap: too many solutions are still designed elsewhere and imported into African contexts, rather than backing African-led platforms to scale what is already working.
Live from LCAW – Raw diplomacy: Can new mineral alliances deliver a just energy transition?
Solutions ready for finance
The solutions exist. Rwanda’s green investment fund has mobilised climate finance at national scale through its own systems. Egypt’s Nexus of Water, Food and Energy programme has shown how integrated planning can stretch limited resources across interdependent systems.
Zambia’s Presidential Irrigation Initiative is building climate-resilient food production from the ground up. In Pata, Senegal, a solar irrigation project has unlocked agricultural production and created jobs, demonstrating how integrated investments in water, energy and livelihoods can deliver resilience and development gains simultaneously.
In South Africa, the African Climate Foundation’s work with the South African Local Government Association (SALGA) is supporting district municipalities to assess their climate risks and develop fit-for-purpose Climate Action Plans, building adaptation capacity where it is needed most – at the local level.
These are not pilot projects waiting to be validated. They are working systems waiting for investment.
Closing the gaps requires a decisive shift in posture from global finance, philanthropy and development institutions. It means backing country-led platforms that can prepare, aggregate and finance adaptation projects. It means investing in place-based initiatives grounded in local knowledge.
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It means fostering intra- and inter-continental collaboration, so that lessons from Kigali inform decisions in Nairobi and innovations in Lagos reach communities in Dakar. And it means treating adaptation as core economic infrastructure, not charitable relief.
Invest now for future gains
The economic case is clear. Every dollar invested in climate adaptation returns an estimated four dollars in benefits on average – and up to five in the poorest economies. Under-investment in African adaptation is as economically irrational as it is morally unjust.
The world depends on Africa’s food systems, its young workforce – the majority of the continent’s population is under 25 – and its minerals. Several African countries supply a substantial share of the copper, cobalt and other critical materials underpinning the global clean energy transition.
Drought in Zambia has already shown how climate stress can disrupt hydropower, electricity supply and mining output. A transition that depends on African minerals cannot afford to ignore African climate resilience.
The world can continue to under-fund adaptation and pay repeatedly for emergencies, instability and lost development. Or it can invest now in the people, institutions and systems already doing the work on the ground in Africa, not in solutions imported from elsewhere.
Africa has the agency, the knowledge and the platforms. What it needs is the finance to match. A super El Niño will not wait for consensus to form. Neither, frankly, should we.
The post Climate adaptation in Africa needs investment, not imported solutions appeared first on Climate Home News.
Climate adaptation in Africa needs investment, not imported solutions
Climate Change
DeBriefed 26 June 2026: Heat records broken across Europe | London climate action week | Introducing ‘Project Cosmos’
Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.
This week
Record Europe heat
HOTTEST EVER: The UK broke its temperature record for June twice this week, while France recorded its hottest day ever two days in a row, reported the Guardian. The Times reported that temperatures reached 36.7C in Somerset on Thursday, as the “London Ambulance Service had its busiest-ever day for life-threatening emergencies”.
FRANCE FRYING: French newspaper Libération said that temperatures reached as high as 44.3C in the south-western commune of Pissos on Wednesday. Spain also recorded its highest daily average temperature for June, said BBC News. On Thursday, Switzerland also had its hottest June day, when temperatures reached 37C in four locations, reported SwissInfo.
CLIMATE LINK: CNN covered a rapid analysis from the World Weather Attribution service finding that fossil-fuelled climate change has made this heatwave the most severe and widespread in Europe’s history. Carbon Brief covered the broken heat records, explaining the influence of climate change.
‘Electrifying’ London talks
‘LONDON COOKING’: In a sweltering, packed-out event at London climate action week, UN chief António Guterres quipped that “London is not just calling, it’s cooking”, reported Edie. Guterres also used his address to release a “global call to action on methane” and to call on artificial intelligence companies to reveal their environmental impact and source their power solely from renewables by 2030, said the publication.
‘ELECTRIFY NOW’: Elsewhere, dozens of governments, led by the EU and the UK, committed to throwing “their political weight” behind a rapid electrification of the world’s economy, according to Climate Home News. A high-level summit in London’s Mansion House saw energy ministers and business leaders, joined by Guterres, in “calling for faster action to curb demand for oil, coal and gas by powering homes, industry and transport with clean electricity”.
FOSSIL TRANSITION: At the same event, ministers from Colombia and the Netherlands, the co-hosts of the world’s first summit on transitioning away from fossil fuels in April, unveiled a report on their key takeaways. It comes after the current Colombian government has been ousted by a presidential election defeat to a fossil-fuel-supporting Trump ally. Carbon Brief examined what this could mean for the world’s energy transition.
Around the world
- UK TARGET: The UK parliament has approved its “seventh carbon budget”, aimed at cutting emissions 87% below 1990 levels by 2040.
- TOTAL ACCOUNTABILITY: A French court has ordered oil-and-gas giant TotalEnergies to account for the emissions from the use of its products, following a case brought by a climate NGO, reported Le Monde.
- METHANE RULES: The US, Qatar and other major energy exporters have urged the EU to “rewrite planned methane emissions” rules for oil-and-gas imports, saying that the policy could disrupt fuel supplies to Europe, according to Reuters.
- CHINA MESSAGE: China’s special envoy for climate change, Liu Zhenmin, said at the World Economic Forum that energy shortages triggered by the Iran war should be a “lesson to countries to accelerate their energy transitions”, reported Bloomberg.
- US WEBSITE REVIVED: Former US government workers have “recreated a valuable climate-science website” shut down by the Trump administration last year, said the New York Times.
6,600 animals
The number of livestock that perished in transport during heat in England and Wales from June to August 2025, double the number killed the year before, reported Carbon Brief.
Latest climate research
- Some world regions are experiencing up to 50 additional heat stress days annually, when compared to 1950 | Nature Climate Change
- Projections of national land-use emissions to 2100 suggest the strongest “carbon sinks” will be in China and Indonesia, whereas Brazil and the Democratic Republic of the Congo will “dominate global sources” | Nature
- Most carbon-offset projects relying on “avoided deforestation” have “mixed, negligible or negative impacts relative to control areas” | Nature Climate Change
(For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)
Captured
The UK government’s official climate advisers, the Climate Change Committee (CCC), has released its latest progress report, emphasising that faster electrification is the best way to secure lower energy bills and stronger energy security. Electrification has shot up the agenda in recent months, with the COP31 presidency calling for countries to back a global goal for 35% of “final” energy to come from electricity by 2035. The text of the CCC’s latest report uses the word “electrification” far more often than previous editions, as shown in the figure above. See Carbon Brief’s in-depth breakdown of the CCC’s latest advice.
Spotlight
Introducing ‘Project Cosmos’
Carbon Brief explains how it built a major new database of climate science research and unveils a new ranking of the 500 most highly cited publications, authors and institutions in climate science.
This week, Carbon Brief launched Project Cosmos – the world’s largest and most complete database of climate change research.
The database features more than 1.8m academic papers, books and reports, capturing the vast body of human knowledge about climate change that has accumulated over more than a century of academic study.
The climate science “universe” is based on reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which are recognised as the world’s most authoritative summaries of the latest climate science.
Since its first report was published in 1990, humanity’s knowledge about human-caused climate change has ballooned. The IPCC has published six sets of reports in total – each one longer than the last.
In total, IPCC reports reference more than 100,000 other papers, books and reports. This is the core of our climate science universe. Carbon Brief then built on this core, by looking at four other sources of data. Read more about how the Cosmos database was created here.
Every single publication in the Cosmos database is linked to at least one other through references. Visualising these links reveals a “galaxy” of references.
In the image above, each colour and cluster reveals different topics and densities of research. Explore the galaxy in an interactive map.
Cosmos 500
As part of an initial wave of preliminary analysis to demonstrate the scope of the Project Cosmos database, Carbon Brief has ranked the 500 most highly cited publications, authors and institutions in the database.
The most highly cited climate scientist is Prof Philippe Ciais, who has spent almost four decades researching the planet’s carbon cycle – and the ways in which humans have been impacting its balance. Carbon Brief recently interviewed Ciais in Paris.
The US tops the tables for the most highly cited authors and institutions. Almost half of the 500 most highly-cited authors are from US institutions. This raises particular concerns for the future of climate science, as US climate scientists and institutions are coming under attack under the Trump administration.
Experts from global south countries account for only 4% of all authors in the Cosmos 500. China stands out as the most highly-cited global south country. Meanwhile, only 10% of authors in the Cosmos 500 are women.
There are many possibilities for future avenues of research using the Cosmos database. Over time, the database could be used to reveal, for example, how interest in different areas of climate science has changed over time, plus identify potential knowledge gaps and, thus, opportunities for future research.
Carbon Brief invites researchers – including academics, journalists and analysts – to submit their own proposals for co-authored studies, literature reviews and analytical projects. Proposals should be sent to cosmos AT carbonbrief DOT org.
This spotlight first appeared in Cited, Carbon Brief’s new fortnightly newsletter focused on climate research. Sign up for free.
Watch, read, listen
‘DOOMSDAY CULT’: OpenDemocracy reported on a “religious cult” spreading climate misinformation in “parliaments” and at “COP summits”.
‘WEDGES’ EXAMINED: ProPublica and Drilled released an investigation into how oil executives worked to influence a climate research paper from Princeton University known as “wedges”.
‘1976 to 2056’: A 30-minute YouTube video from the Met Office had climate scientists explaining how current UK temperatures compare to the infamous 1976 heatwave, and how extremes could worsen by 2056.
Coming up
- 29-30 June: Hamburg sustainability conference, Hamburg, Germany
- 29-30 June: Seventh global conference on climate and sustainable development goals synergies, Bangkok, Thailand
- 29-30 June: 11th annual global conference on energy efficiency, Montreal, Canada
Pick of the jobs
- Drilled, series editor | Salary: $4,000 a month (six-month contract). Location: US
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Over the last four years, Colombia has emerged as one of the most vocal advocates for the world to transition away from fossil fuels.
Under the leadership of leftist politician and economist Gustavo Petro, it became the first major oil-and-gas producer to commit to halting all new fossil-fuel expansion.
In April, the nation hosted a first-of-its-kind meeting of countries on transitioning away from fossil fuels, alongside the Netherlands, in the Caribbean city of Santa Marta.
The meeting concluded with a promise for a new “Santa Marta process” spearheaded by Colombia and the Netherlands, a movement of countries that would continue to push for a transition away from fossil fuels at home – and at international climate talks.
But on 21 June, an ally of Petro suffered defeat in a presidential election runoff against Abelardo de la Espriella, a hard-right populist and favourite of US president Donald Trump, who has pledged to boost oil production and pursue “fracking to the max”.
Below, Carbon Brief examines what the loss could mean for Colombia’s stance on fossil fuels, as well as international efforts to transition away from coal, oil and gas, including at the COP31 climate summit in Turkey in November.
- How could the election defeat change Colombia’s stance on fossil fuels?
- How could it affect international efforts to transition away from fossil fuels?
- How could efforts to transition away from fossil fuels feature at COP31?
How could the election defeat change Colombia’s stance on fossil fuels?
In 2022, Petro became Colombia’s first left-wing president in recent history.
Under his leadership, Colombia became the first major oil producer and exporter to halt all new fossil-fuel expansion, boosted renewable energy and saw a sustained decline in deforestation.
At the COP28 summit in 2023, Petro announced that Colombia would become the first major oil exporter to sign the fossil-fuel non-proliferation treaty, a pact to legally control fossil-fuel production and use.
Successive Colombian environment ministers became among the most vocal supporters of transitioning away from fossil fuels at UN climate talks.
This included former minister Susana Muhamad, a political scientist and environmentalist who stepped in to lead the most recent UN biodiversity summit in 2024 after original host Turkey was forced to withdraw following earthquakes.
She was succeeded by Irene Vélez Torres, a former academic who led calls for a “fossil-fuel roadmap” to be part of the formal outcome at the COP30 summit in 2025.
At the sidelines of COP30, Vélez Torres and Netherlands climate minister Stientje van Veldhoven announced plans to co-host a first-of-its-kind summit on transitioning away from fossil fuels in Colombia in April 2026.
(In the end, countries failed to agree to a formally negotiated “fossil-fuel roadmap” at COP30. However, the Brazilian COP30 presidency promised to bring forward a voluntary roadmap instead, informed by the Santa Marta summit.)
Some 57 countries – representing one-third of the world’s economy – participated in the event, with officials describing it as “refreshing”, “highly successful” and “groundbreaking”, according to Carbon Brief’s reporting from Colombia.
The meeting concluded with a range of outcomes, including a second fossil-fuel transition summit to be co-hosted by Tuvalu and Ireland in 2027.
In stark contrast to Petro’s government, new hard-right populist president Abelardo de la Espriella has promised to quickly boost new fossil-fuel and mining projects, including by “fracking to the max”.
De la Espriella has also promised to build 10 “mega prisons” inside Colombia’s Amazon rainforest.
He has not yet commented on whether he will withdraw Colombia from Santa Marta’s “coalition of the willing”.
How could it affect international efforts to transition away from fossil fuels?
Just two days after the Colombian government’s election defeat, environment minister Vélez Torres took to the stage at London climate action week, alongside Netherlands climate minister van Veldhoven, to present a report on key takeaways from the Santa Marta summit.
The report, written before the election loss, speaks of an ongoing “Santa Marta process” to accelerate the global transition away from fossil fuels. It says that this will be coordinated by Colombia and the Netherlands, along with the two appointed co-hosts of the second conference on transitioning away from fossil fuels, Tuvalu and Ireland.
Acknowledging that this was likely to be one of her last addresses as Colombia’s environment minister, Vélez Torres told the audience that, going forward, the Santa Marta process must be resilient to “political setbacks”.
At the sidelines of the event, Vélez Torres told Carbon Brief that the work her government has done “cannot be erased”, despite a change in power. She said:
“Right now, we are facing the dark nights, this will really shift the politics in terms of energy position and environmental protection. But we are certain that our legacy will continue. It goes beyond governments.”
Dutch minister van Veldhoven told Carbon Brief that the plan for the “Santa Marta process” is to hold fossil-fuel transition summits in a different country every year, with two new co-hosts each time. This could help weather political shocks, she said:
“We know that every couple of years there will be elections. That is why [we have] the idea of rotating presidencies and chairmanships…while we make sure we make use of existing secretariats and organisations that are not subject to political changes every couple of years.
“In that combination, we hope to create a historic legacy and continue to drive the process forward, but also [create space for] a new energy from two new countries every year that bring their own perspective and their own dynamic.”
Although new countries could drive the process forward without Colombia, there are few major oil producers that have shown the same level of commitment to transitioning away from fossil fuels.
Ana Toni, an economist and CEO of the COP30 summit in Brazil, told Carbon Brief at London climate action week that the world will “miss the leadership of Colombia”, but added:
“Not one country will stop this movement. All countries need to chip in. There isn’t one leader for this topic. Everybody needs to join forces.”
How could efforts to transition away from fossil fuels feature at COP31?
At London climate action week, Colombia and the Netherlands presented their Santa Marta report to the Brazilian COP30 presidency.
The COP30 presidency is due to release a voluntary international “fossil-fuel roadmap” ahead of COP31 in Turkey in November, which it has promised will be informed by the takeaways from Santa Marta.
Speaking at the sidelines of London climate action week, Colombia and the Netherlands added that they have had “constructive” conversations with the COP31 co-presidencies, Australia and Turkey, about how to incorporate the discussions from Santa Marta.
Colombian environment minister Irene Vélez Torres told a small group of journalists:
“We had this very interesting conversation with COP31 and they were clearly open to suggestions about what is needed in the discussion in Turkey, and we were explicit about the need to engage with the phasing out of fossil fuels.”
However, both Colombia and the Netherlands added that they were unsure of how this might work in practice.
When asked about whether the Santa Marta discussions could be incorporated into formal COP texts, they were keen to emphasise that all the conversations in Colombia were specifically not negotiations.
They added that they were unsure of whether the group of 57 countries that gathered in Santa Marta would appear as a collective at press conferences or events at the COP31 summit.
The post Q&A: What change of power in Colombia could mean for world’s fossil-fuel transition appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Q&A: What change of power in Colombia could mean for world’s fossil-fuel transition
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