Fossil fuels affect all stages of human life, with their consequences starting even before the fuels are burned – releasing climate-heating gases and other pollutants – and extending long after, according to a new report by the Global Climate and Health Alliance.
The effects of fossil fuel extraction and use are also unevenly distributed, the report says, impacting marginalised groups including Indigenous peoples, racial minorities and low-income populations the most, and exacerbating other pre-existing health inequalities in those vulnerable communities.
Published this Tuesday, the flagship report compiles more than 600 scientific citations, case studies from around the world, and testimonials from affected communities and health professionals in every region, from oil spills in Nigeria to coal pollution in India and gas extraction in the United States.
Dr Jemilah Mahmood, executive director at the Sunway Centre for Planetary Health, whose testimonial features in the report, said in a statement: “Fossil fuels are not just an environmental crisis – they are a public health emergency… As health professionals, we know the cost of inaction is measured in lives.”
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In an interview with Climate Home News, study co-author Shweta Narayan, campaign lead at the Global Climate and Health Alliance (GCHA), which unites over 200 health and development organisations, explained that the report – more than a year in the making – focuses on the unseen health effects of fossil fuels.
“It was important to show the scale of the problem that we’re dealing with,” she said. “Unless you understand the scope and the scale, you will not be able to advocate for the appropriate policies for climate action.”
According to the report, there are three main ways for pollutants from fossil fuel activities to enter the body: contact or absorption, ingestion or inhalation. Children are especially vulnerable to inhalation, since they breathe more rapidly than adults and take in more air as well as the pollutants it carries relative to their body weight, and those pollutants may be more damaging to their narrower airways.
In addition, children directly exposed to fossil fuel activities like unconventional oil and gas developments, refineries, major roads and petrol stations show higher rates of cancer, most consistently with leukemia.
Trillions in dirty subsidies
The report authors debunk the popular argument that fossil fuels are the cheapest way to obtain energy. In 2022, estimated global fossil fuel subsidies were $7 trillion, of which $5.7 trillion represented indirect costs such as healthcare spending, productivity losses and climate-related damages, the report notes.
Children also bear a large share of those costs as the money spent on subsidising fossil fuels diverts public resources from essential services such as healthcare and education.
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Dr. Jeni Miller, the GHCA’s executive director, called on governments to halt “new oil, gas and coal projects, setting clear timelines to phase out existing projects, and ending the shocking $1.3 trillion in direct subsidies that keep this industry afloat”.
Instead, they should invest that sum in public health, clean energy and protecting the communities suffering from the impacts of climate change, she added.
She urged political leaders at the COP30 climate summit in November to recognise fossil fuel dependence as a widespread driver of disease and inequality, as well as planet-heating emissions.
The most affected groups
The report documents how the impacts of coal, oil and gas start even before their extraction and processing, with the worst consequences for those least able to protect themselves.
Exploration and site development often result in environmental destruction, disrupting access to clean water, polluting the air and sometimes displacing people from their homes. One Texas study noted an increase in hospitalisation among children with asthma during periods of gas drilling. Another study from Colombia showed that people exposed to open pit mines were more likely to have DNA damage.
The transportation of fossil fuels can also end up being a health hazard to workers and the environment, especially when disasters like spills and explosions occur. Leaks release harmful pollutants into marine, freshwater and land ecosystems.
Many fossil fuel workers come from already vulnerable communities, including rural areas where poverty is rife and work options are limited, which can push people to labour in hazardous conditions.
The report shows that workers exposed to fossil fuels face an elevated risk of developing cancer and cardio-respiratory diseases that can lead to impairment, disability and premature death. To make matters worse, they often face greater exposure to climate impacts, resulting in “disproportionate health, economic and social harms”, it adds.
And because of their limited political and social power, relocation – or even opposition to the siting of industrial facilities, landfills and extractive operations – is less of an option, which further fuels a cycle of vulnerability, the report says.
These populations are also among the hardest to study, with the health risks they face under-researched, and relevant data and information non-existent or inaccessible, it notes.
Other hard-hit groups include older people with underlying conditions exacerbated by fossil fuel-driven air pollution. One quoted study from China found that increased exposure to sulphur dioxide, mostly from burning coal and oil, was associated with premature mortality.
For pregnant women, exposure to fossil fuel pollutants is associated with early birth, low birth weight and congenital abnormalities including anencephaly, spina bifida, and heart and gastrointestinal defects.
In 2018, air pollution cost the global economy $2.9 trillion through premature mortality, lost labour and diminished quality of life, the report notes, citing a Greenpeace study.
The politics behind the harm
GCHA’s Miller called for the influence of the fossil fuel industry on international climate negotiations to be reined in. Almost 1,800 coal, oil and gas lobbyists attended COP29 last year – a sharp increase from the roughly 500 present at COP26.
“Just as governments once curbed tobacco industry influence, they must now ban fossil fuel lobbying and disinformation,” she added in a statement. “COP30 is the moment to act – not only for the climate, but for people’s health and futures.”
And this lobbying is not limited to climate diplomacy, with Narayan pointing to the negotiations on a global treaty to rein in plastic pollution that ended with no agreement or clear way forward.
Plastics treaty talks collapse without a deal after “chaotic” negotiations
“The disruption of the process itself because of undue influence of petrostates and industry lobbyists was very evident,” she said, noting that all multilateral processes are “riddled with undue influence by the industry. And that undue influence has to be curbed and restricted if we want to protect people’s health and have a livable future.”
The authors of the report call for a just transition away from fossil fuels, defining it as one “shaped by policy frameworks that ensure it is fair, inclusive, and health-promoting”.
That transition must also include the cleanup of existing fossil fuel sites, as the toxins that harm health remain in the environment for a long time – and that remediation should be done by the polluting companies, which often try to avoid it due to the high cost, Narayan told Climate Home.
“That’s why we see them evading the issue of accountability and responsibility,” she said. “But accountability is very important for protecting people’s health.”
The post “Public health emergency”: Report shows fossil fuel impacts on every stage of life appeared first on Climate Home News.
“Public health emergency”: Report shows fossil fuel impacts on every stage of life
Artificial intelligence (AI) has undergone a rapid expansion in recent years.
Tech leaders have hailed an “AI revolution” – predicting “transformative” effects for humanity – while some governments have set their sights on AI-driven economic growth.
Yet, the industry is also facing scrutiny on many fronts, from inaccuracies in AI outputs through to the threat it poses to democracy.
One major critique concerns the environmental impact of AI, particularly the intensive energy use and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions of the data centres that power it.
Campaigners, journalists and researchers have warned that the rapid expansion of data centres could slow down or even reverse the global shift towards net-zero.
The topic is complex, not least because the future of AI – and the role it could play in increasing or potentially helping to reduce emissions – remains highly uncertain.
Below, Carbon Brief takes a look at some of the best available figures, largely from the International Energy Agency (IEA), to explore the energy and emissions impact of AI.
- Data centres currently account for a small share of global emissions and electricity use
- Around a tenth of the electricity demand growth by 2030 is set to be driven by data centres
- Data centres could account for half of electricity demand growth in some countries
- Fossil-fuel use will likely expand to power data centres, but clean-energy supplies are set to grow faster
- There is a lot of uncertainty about how much data centres will expand
1. Data centres currently account for a small share of global emissions and electricity use
The process of training and deploying AI models relies on data centres – large, energy-intensive facilities that house computing infrastructure.
Data centres already underpin the internet, among other things, making them essential for modern life. But as hype around AI has grown in recent years, investment in new data centres has ballooned.
The global electricity consumption of expanding data centres has grown by around 12% each year since 2017, according to the IEA’s recent “energy and AI” report.
Concerns about “skyrocketing” electricity demand have also prompted warnings of data centres driving up CO2 emissions, as fossil fuels still generate much of the world’s power.
Indeed, companies, such as Google, Meta and Microsoft, have reported large emissions spikes over the past few years due to data-centre expansion, despite their net-zero pledges.
One research paper concludes that the electricity demand of AI “runs counter to the massive efficiency gains that are needed to achieve net-zero”. Others have voiced concerns that data centres will “overwhelm” and “undermine” both national and company-level climate targets.
Reporting often mentions the electricity demand of data centres – or their emissions – “doubling”, “tripling” or increasing by some other large percentage in the coming years.
But these increases, while potentially dramatic in relative terms, are starting from a low baseline. As shown in the chart below, data centres are currently responsible for just over 1% of global electricity demand and 0.5% of CO2 emissions, according to IEA data.
Given this starting point, even as data centres expand, the IEA suggests that they will make a relatively small contribution to climate change, in the short term.
The agency estimates that data-centre emissions will reach 1% of CO2 emissions by 2030 in its central scenario, or 1.4% in a faster-growth scenario.
Nevertheless, it notes that this is one of the few sectors where emissions are set to grow – alongside road transport and aviation – as most will likely decarbonise in the coming years.
2. Around a tenth of the electricity demand growth by 2030 is set to be driven by data centres
The world is entering what the IEA describes as a “new age of electricity”, in which the electrification of transport, buildings and industry drives a surge in demand for power.
Along with electric cars and factories, data centres are frequently highlighted by analysts as a key “emerging driver” of this demand.
Under the IEA’s central scenario for data-centre growth, the sector’s global electricity consumption would more than double between 2024 and 2030, reaching 945 terawatt-hours (TWh) by the end of the decade. This is equivalent to the current electricity demand of Japan.
The IEA describes AI as “the most important driver of this growth”.
As it stands, AI has been responsible for around 5-15% of data-centre power use in recent years, but this could increase to 35-50% by 2030, according to another report prepared for the IEA.
However, the 530TWh rise in electricity demand in data centres by 2030 would only be 8% of the overall increase in demand that the IEA projects, as shown in the chart below.
This is less than electric vehicles (838TWh) or air conditioning (651TWh). It is considerably less than the 1,936TWh growth expected in industrial sectors by 2030.
If data-centre electricity use rose in line with the IEA’s faster-growth scenario, the facilities would be responsible for around 12% of global demand growth overall.
While the IEA says “uncertainties widen” when considering electricity demand growth beyond 2030, it expects a continued – albeit slower – increase to 1,193TWh by 2035.
This would mean annual demand growth roughly halving, from around 90TWh per year out to 2030, down to less than 50TWh a year out to 2035.
3. Data centres could account for half of electricity demand growth in some countries
While the global picture suggests a relatively modest role for data centres in driving near-future electricity demand growth, it could be far more pronounced in some countries.
Data centres are very geographically concentrated, both in terms of their global distribution and within leading countries. Today, nearly half of their electricity consumption takes place in the US, 25% in China and 15% in Europe, according to the IEA.
US data centres used around 4% of the nation’s electricity in 2023 and this is set to rise to 7-12% by 2028, according to analysis by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
In Ireland – regarded as a European “tech hub” – around 21% of the nation’s electricity is used for data centres. The IEA estimates that this share could rise to 32% by 2026.
Data-centre electricity demand tends to be further localised in certain regions. In the US state of Virginia, these facilities already consume 26% of electricity, while in the Irish capital, Dublin, the figure is 79%, according to analysis by Oeko-Institute.
Much of the commentary on AI threatening climate goals comes from “advanced economies” in the global north, where the IEA estimates that, on average, a quarter of electricity demand growth by 2030 will be driven by data centres.
(In many of these countries, electricity demand has previously been flat or falling for years.)
Roughly half of the power demand growth in the US and Japan over the next five years is expected to come from data centres, according to the IEA, as shown in the figure below.
While there are some notable exceptions, such as Malaysia, data centres are set to be a relatively small portion of electricity demand growth in developing and emerging markets.
Around the world, electricity grids are under strain, with many developed countries, in particular, seeing long wait times for grid connections and new transmission lines. Data-centre growth is raising this pressure.
There are also growing concerns, notably in the US, about the impact data-centre growth could have on energy bills.
The IEA says that demand growth presents “advanced economies” with a “wake-up call” for the electricity sector to invest in infrastructure, otherwise “there is a risk that meeting data-centre load growth could entail trade-offs with other goals, such as electrification”.
4. Fossil-fuel use will likely expand to power data centres, but clean-energy supplies are set to grow faster
The extent to which data-centre growth increases emissions depends on which energy sources power those data centres.
Data centres can use power from the grid, in which case their electricity mix will reflect that of the region they are in and could therefore become cleaner as nations decarbonise.
They can also be powered by “captive” sources, built to supply specific facilities, such as solar panels, small nuclear reactors or gas turbines.
There are concerns that data-centre expansion will be used to justify the prolonged use of fossil fuels, “locking in” a future of elevated emissions.
Indeed, the likes of Shell have framed AI in such terms and some data-centre operators have been explicitly seeking gas connections to meet their electricity needs.
Currently, coal is the biggest single electricity source for data centres globally, largely due to the numerous facilities in China.
Overall, fossil fuels provide nearly 60% of power to data centres, according to the IEA. Renewables meet 27% of their electricity demand and nuclear another 15%.
(These figures are based on the electricity these facilities consume, rather than any contracts they have to buy clean energy credits.)
In the IEA’s central scenario, by 2035 the ratio of the data-centre electricity mix switches from around 60% fossil fuels and 40% clean power to 60% clean power and 40% fossil fuels, as shown in the chart below.
This is expected to be driven primarily by the wider global expansion of renewables, although some projects will be funded directly by data-centre companies.
However, the IEA says significantly more gas and coal power would likely still be required to meet data-centre demand, both from ramping up existing plants and building new ones.
Gas-power generation for data centres is expected to more than double from 120TWh in 2024 to 293TWh in 2035, with much of this growth in the US, according to the IEA.
About 38GW of captive gas plants currently “in development” – roughly a quarter of all such projects – are planned to power data centres, according to Global Energy Monitor (GEM).
The US has doubled the amount of gas- and oil-fired capacity it has in development over the past year, driven partly by the energy demand of the “burgeoning AI industry”, according to GEM.
However, these projects are facing long lead times and “sharply” rising costs, with GEM noting, as a result, that many may never materialise.
5. There is a lot of uncertainty about how much data centres will expand
Currently, there are no comprehensive global datasets available on data-centre electricity consumption or emissions, with few governments mandating any reporting of such numbers.
All figures concerning the energy and climate impact of AI are therefore estimates.
The IEA has assessed hundreds of available estimates and forecasts, noting that even historical data can be “widely divergent”, due in part to a lack of common definitions.
On top of this, there are major uncertainties, including over how quickly AI will be adopted. Despite the enthusiastic uptake of generative AI by individuals and companies, some argue that the business case for continued, rapid growth may be weaker than suggested.
Another uncertainty is how energy-efficient AI will be. Experts have already identified efficiency improvements resulting from better chips, more efficient training algorithms and larger data centres, all of which could continue curbing electricity demand.
(Google has also reported a substantial drop in the electricity use required for individual AI search queries, which is already small compared to the power needed to train AI models.)
A final uncertainty is over how many proposed data centres will actually get built, with some speculative requests for grid capacity relating to plans that may never materialise.
As a result of these knowledge gaps, there have been numerous estimates of short-term electricity demand growth from data centres, which have produced very different results, as shown in the chart below.
Some estimates – such as one from the Gas Exporting Countries Forum arguing that more gas exports will be needed to fuel meteoric rises in electricity demand for AI – have been deemed less credible in reviews by independent experts.
Another area of great uncertainty concerns the impact that the application of AI could have on electricity use and emissions.
Some researchers have attempted to calculate how much AI could curb emissions, by helping to identify efficiency gains in other parts of the energy system, or by making technological breakthroughs.
In some “exploratory” analysis, the IEA says such gains could cancel out any extra data-centre emissions due to the growth of AI.
However, it adds that despite the AI hype, “there is currently no existing momentum of AI adoption that would unlock these emissions reductions”.
The post AI: Five charts that put data-centre energy use – and emissions – into context appeared first on Carbon Brief.
AI: Five charts that put data-centre energy use – and emissions – into context
Climate Change
Cropped 10 September 2025: Flooded ‘food baskets’; Brazil eyes forest finance; Resilient rice
We handpick and explain the most important stories at the intersection of climate, land, food and nature over the past fortnight.
This is an online version of Carbon Brief’s fortnightly Cropped email newsletter. Subscribe for free here.
Key developments
Flooded food baskets
AG EMERGENCY: Flash flooding has destroyed thousands of acres of crops in Punjab, a province that accounts for 68% of Pakistan’s total annual food grain production, Bloomberg reported. Around 60% of the province’s rice crops and 30% of its sugarcane have been lost, according to preliminary estimates by the Pakistan Business Forum. Pakistan’s Dawn newspaper reported that the forum has written to the prime minister to ask the government to declare an “agricultural emergency”. The New York Times spoke to farmers affected by the flooding.
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CROSS-BORDER IMPACTS: In Indian Punjab, at least 148,000 hectares of cropland have been “submerged” by floodwaters, BBC News reported. It continued: “Punjab is often referred to as the ‘food basket’ of India and is a major source for agricultural production, particularly of staples like wheat and rice.” It added that a “quarter of Punjab’s 30 million people depend on agriculture” for their livelihoods. The Guardian spoke to Indian farmers left reeling from the impacts of flooding on their crops. Reuters reported that flooding has driven up the prices of aromatic basmati rice, grown exclusively in India and Pakistan.
CLIMATE ‘VULNERABLE’: In its coverage, Al Jazeera reported that there has not yet been a formal assessment of the role of climate change in the ongoing floods, but it is likely to be a key factor in their severity. It added that Pakistan “ranks among the top 10 most climate-vulnerable nations, but it contributes less than 1% of global emissions”. The Washington Post covered how deforestation has conspired with accelerating glacier melt and harsher monsoon rains to drive worse flash floods in the country.
‘Tropical forests forever’
FLAGSHIP FUND: Brazil is planning to make its Tropical Forest Forever Facility one of two priority initiatives at the COP30 climate summit in the Amazon city of Belém in November, according to a Financial Times report from São Paulo and Brasília. First proposed at COP28 in 2023, the facility aims to leverage finance from developed nations and philanthropic foundations to make protecting tropical forests in developing nations profitable, the Financial Times explained in a second report.
RAISING BILLIONS: A “crucial” aspect of the plan is to “not rely on donations”, the newspaper said, adding: “Instead it would be financed entirely by interest-bearing debt.” It noted that the fund “would become the world’s biggest ‘blended finance’ vehicle if it can get anywhere close to its target size [of $125bn]”. There are 74 developing countries with a total of more than 1bn hectares of tropical forests that could be eligible for the scheme if they can prove that they have an annual deforestation rate of less than 0.5%, the newspaper added.
SUBSIDY REFORM: Meanwhile, Astrid Schomaker, the executive secretary of the UN biodiversity convention, has written to countries urging them to identify subsidies that are harmful to nature in their long-overdue national biodiversity plans and “take concrete implementation action” to reform them. Reducing the amount spent on subsidies harmful to nature by $500bn by 2030 was one of the targets of the landmark Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF). However, countries have so far done little to identify such spending or conceptualise paths for reform at talks following the agreement of the GBF, Carbon Brief reporting has shown.
News and views
TREATY AHOY?: Two more countries – Cape Verde and Saint Kitts and Nevis – ratified the landmark High Seas Treaty during preparatory meetings last week, Earth Negotiations Bulletin reported. Grenada and Cambodia also ratified the agreement, meaning only four more countries need to officially sign before the treaty can enter into force. Separately, the Philippines “br[oke new] ground” by establishing the 370-acre Bitaug marine protected area, creating a “safe space” for sharks and rays and allowing revenue-sharing from eco-tourism, Forbes reported.
ACT-ING UP: ACT, part of New Zealand’s ruling coalition, called for the country to leave the “broken” Paris Agreement, citing the “real cost to firms, farms and families” from net-zero targets, Radio New Zealand reported. The country’s prime minister, Christopher Luxon, pushed back against pulling out from the accord, it added, telling reporters that it would be the “quickest way” to hurt New Zealand farmers and that “competitor countries would like nothing more than to see New Zealand products off their shelves”.
FIRE-PROOFING: In the aftermath of August’s “heatwave-fuelled” wildfires, Spain’s prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, announced a 10-point plan to prepare the country for climate change, including a “rethink of forest management and land use”, the Guardian reported. Sanchez was quoted as saying: “If we don’t want to bequeath our children a Spain that’s grey from fire and flames, or a Spain that’s brown from floods, then we need a Spain that’s greener.” CBS News reported that two climate activists were arrested for throwing paint at Barcelona’s Sagrada Familia while protesting government “complicity” in the fires, which they attributed to livestock farming.
OCTOPUS ‘PLAGUE’: An unusual explosion in octopus numbers in English waters this summer has left UK shellfish harvesters at a loss, Agence France-Presse reported. A long-lasting marine heatwave gave a boost to octopus populations earlier in the year, delighting some fishers that were able to profit from the boom, but harming others that make a living from shellfish, the newswire said. “The tentacled molluscs are notoriously voracious eaters, hoovering up crustaceans such as crabs and shellfish,” the article explained, adding that many UK crab potters found their traps empty when octopus numbers increased.
JAGUARS RETURN: Jaguar numbers in Mexico have risen by 30% over the past 15 years following a “conservation drive”, the Guardian reported. Based on a census carried out with 920 motion-capture cameras across 414,000 hectares, researchers estimated that there are now 5,326 jaguars in Mexico, the newspaper said. A local expert listed three main reasons for the uptick: “Maintaining natural protected areas where jaguars can roam freely, reducing the conflict between cattle ranchers and jaguars and a publicity campaign that has put the jaguar on the map.”
LEGAL EFFORTS: Four residents of the Indonesian island of Pari are seeking damages from the world’s largest cement producer, the Swiss company Holcim, due to the impact of climate change on their lives, Reuters reported. A hearing was held in the Swiss city of Zug on 3 September, but ended with no decision, according to the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights. Elsewhere, Climate Home News reported on how farmers in Zambia are threatening to sue a Chinese copper company following a “massive toxic spill”.
Spotlight
Grains of truth
This week, Cropped talks to the authors of a new graphic novel about food sovereignty and resilient rice cultures in India’s eastern Indigenous heartlands.
The eastern Indian state of Jharkhand is better known for its rich coal reserves than for its grain.
Unlike India’s breadbasket in the north-west, less than 10% of Jharkhand’s cultivated land is irrigated, making its rainfed paddy highly reliant on a changing Indian monsoon.
In 2022, the state received its lowest rainfall in 121 years.
‘Plastic’ rice
The previous year, many of Jharkhand’s Indigenous villages were among the first to taste the outcome of a new Indian government strategy to combat malnutrition and anaemia: fortified rice.
Essentially, “fortification” involves mixing broken rice kernels and rice powder with nutrients, such as iron and vitamin B12. After being passed through an extrusion machine, these new “grains” are then mixed with regular rice that is distributed to India’s poor under India’s National Food Security Act, the world’s largest and most far-reaching food safety scheme.
According to a three-part investigation by journalist Anumeha Yadav in the Wire, Jharkhand’s Indigenous rice-growing communities were not convinced of the new grain’s benefits, dubbing it “plastic rice” and questioning its effects on their health.
The Indian government attributed farmers’ reactions to a “lack of awareness” and has since expanded the programme.
Yadav’s reportage led to the publication of a new graphic novel, Our Rice Tastes of Spring, illustrated by Bangalore-based studio Spitting Image.
Yadav told Carbon Brief she wrote the novel to document diverse food cultures and as a response to “tech fixes” being promoted to address climate change and achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
According to Yadav, there’s widespread consensus that farming methods ushered in by the Green Revolution have made diets cereal-heavy and depleted India’s soils, meaning the “food we’re eating is much, much worse than what even our parents ate”.
At the same time, the industrial agricultural industry – and even some NGOs – are pushing a “tech fix” aimed at India’s poor that “makes money for themselves”, she added.
Drawn from real life
Lead illustrator Sandhya Visvanathan told Carbon Brief she combined Yadav’s photographs – of “life and people as they are” on Jharkhand’s Netarhat plateau – with “painterly” drawings of daily life in a community “whose lives are intertwined with the land”.
While the plot is set in a fictional Indigenous village, the conversations, rituals and rice varieties the book depicts are very real.
For instance, Ranikajal rice grows longer stems as floodwaters rise and iron-rich red Agni-sal grain has stems known to resist even cyclones.
Anumeha warns that many of these varieties – and the creative, traditional knowledge systems associated with them – are at risk of being lost forever, as India promotes and procures input-intensive white rice.
She concluded:
“Many people looked at the images and said: ‘Hey, that seed used to grow here.’ But there’s also a question of dignity and agency here: even farmers know there is corporate interest involved in these saviour[-like] solutions. Someone actually said that to me: ‘The market is not the only principle in our life.’”
Watch, read, listen
SECTS, SOYA AND CATTLE: A new documentary by the Gecko Project investigated the key drivers behind the worst fires on record in Bolivia’s Chiquitano forest.
DURIAN DURIAN: The New York Times profiled “self-described fanatics” of the “odoriferous” durian fruit, who gathered in Puerto Rico to sample durian in a “judgment-free zone”.
SAVING THE ‘FATTEST PARROT’: The Guardian reported on efforts to protect New Zealand’s kakapos, the “world’s fattest parrot”, by vaccinating them against bird flu.
BEGIN AGAIN: A Financial Times column explored how “why veganism lost” out to “influencers and gym bros” pushing protein and how it could regain momentum in the public.
New science
- Human impacts on global marine ecosystems are expected to more than double by the mid-century | Science
- Deforestation accounted for about three-quarters of the reduction in rainfall and surface temperature increase recorded during the dry season in the Brazilian Amazon over the past 35 years | Nature Communications
- Nearly 40% of the world’s transboundary river basins could see conflicts arising from water scarcity in 2041-50, although these conflicts could be mitigated by “proactive measures” | Nature Communications
In the diary
- 18 September: Earthed Summit 2025: Generation Restoration | London
- 19 September: Call for evidence on EU fertiliser product regulation | Online
- 21-28 September: New York Climate Week | New York City
- 24 September: UN General Assembly high-level week climate summit | New York City
- 29 September-1 October: FAO global conference on sustainable livestock transformation | Rome
Cropped is researched and written by Dr Giuliana Viglione, Aruna Chandrasekhar, Daisy Dunne, Orla Dwyer and Yanine Quiroz. Please send tips and feedback to cropped@carbonbrief.org
The post Cropped 10 September 2025: Flooded ‘food baskets’; Brazil eyes forest finance; Resilient rice appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Cropped 10 September 2025: Flooded ‘food baskets’; Brazil eyes forest finance; Resilient rice
The second Africa Climate Summit wrapped up in Ethiopia with a bold assertion of the continent’s ability to chart a path to green growth with homegrown resources, but climate campaigners expressed disappointment that leaders had not swung behind the COP28 pledge to transition away from fossil fuels.
While a copy of the final declaration from the three-day summit in Addis Ababa had yet to be released a day after it ended, Ethiopian President Taye Atske Selassie told the closing ceremony on Wednesday that the summit had re-positioned Africa “not as victims of a crisis it never created but as a global centre for climate solutions, renewable energy and green growth”.
Selassie said it is an injustice that 600 million Africans live without electricity access, adding that the continent is no longer waiting for charity but will use the abundant sun it has and the critical minerals beneath its soils to drive its own progress.
According to a statement from the summit organisers, the leaders’ declaration calls for “strengthened and sustained support” to scale up African-led climate initiatives such as the 8,000-km Great Green Wall across the Sahel and the African Forest Landscape Restoration Initiative.
It also noted that the Africa Climate Innovation Compact (ACIC) and the African Climate Facility (ACF) had been set up to to mobilise $50 billion annually in catalytic finance to deliver “1,000 solutions” for climate challenges in energy, agriculture, water, transport and resilience by 2030.
To meet Africa’s clean energy goals, investors urged to tolerate higher risk
Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed described the new compact as a “bold, continent-wide partnership uniting our universities, research institutions, startups, rural communities and innovators”.
The announcement came after African financial institutions on Monday backed a green industrialisation initiative for the continent with $100 billion from a range of development and commercial banks to support renewable energy projects and new green industry sectors.
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Ethiopia’s preparedness puts it ahead of Nigeria in bid to host COP32, campaigners say
Ethiopia’s logistics, infrastructure and climate diplomacy make it seem better placed to host the 2027 UN climate talks than its West African rival – for now -
Digging beyond oil: Saudi Arabia bids to become a hub for energy transition minerals
The top crude exporter is using its oil riches to position itself as a major player in clean energy supply chains. Investors are interested, but hurdles remain -
China on course to peak fossil fuel power as soon as this year, reports say
The Asian nation’s energy transition is entering a new phase, with soaring renewables reducing demand for fossil fuels, analysis shows
Backing for “transitional energy sources” draws fire
Despite these major green growth programmes, civil society groups criticised the summit declaration for recognising “the role of transitional energy sources in ensuring a just transition that safeguards the energy security of developing countries”. On the other hand, it did not mention the COP28 promise to transition away from fossil fuels in energy systems.
Activists said the wording leaves room for the use of fossil gas in Africa’s transition to a low-carbon, climate-resilient economy.
“Fossil gas is a false solution that cannot drive development agenda across the African continent,” said Dean Bhebhe, a senior advisor at think-tank Power Shift Africa. A path grounded in gas is not “just” because Africa “risks further trapping itself into a cycle of debt, wants, needs and fears in the African continent”, he added.
The Nairobi declaration from the first Africa Climate Summit in 2023 recognised the need to phase down unabated coal power and phase out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies, but it is “disappointing” to see that those were not featured in the Addis decision while messaging on transitional fuel was sneaked in, Bhebhe added.
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Nafi Quarshie, Africa director at the Natural Resource Governance Institute (NRGI), said that despite the sufferings of oil and gas communities in parts of Africa and the realities of the transition, including pressure on local economies and livelihoods, “the declaration made no reference to these impacts”.
“African governments must now use COP30 to ensure that they move toward a just, orderly and equitable transition that responds to the needs of the communities behind every oil field,” she added.
International finance sought
In addition to the climate finance announced by African funders, the international community still has an obligation to provide support, said Richard Muyungi, chair of the African Group of Negotiators (AGN) at the UN climate talks.
The climate negotiator added that Africa’s demand “is not charity but our just rights under the [UN Climate] Convention and the Paris Agreement: adequate, accessible, and grant-based finance, alongside technology transfer and debt relief”.
Few pledges were made at the summit by donors, apart from Denmark announcing $79 million for supporting agricultural transformation and Italy reaffirming a commitment of $4.2 billion to the Italian Climate Fund, of which around 70% will be allocated to Africa.
Ahead of November’s COP30 climate summit, the Addis declaration highlighted an urgent need for new, innovative climate finance mechanisms adapted to Africa’s sustainable development priorities, including blended finance mechanisms, debt-for-climate project swaps and strategic public-private partnerships.
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Carlos Lopes, special envoy of the Brazilian COP30 presidency to Africa, said Africa had shown commitment by coming up with initiatives and also strengthening its continental institutions, “but true progress requires developed countries to lead with predictable, accessible, and just climate finance”.
African leaders asked for international support to implement Africa’s key energy access and transition initiatives including Mission 300 to provide 300 million people with electricity by 2030, clean cooking programmes and efforts to scale up renewables to meet a goal of 300 gigawatts of capacity by 2030.
“Climate finance is the critical enabler: without it, our people cannot thrive and our economies cannot grow,” said Dion George, South Africa’s minister of forestry, fisheries and the environment and head of the country delegation at the Addis summit. “With it, Africa can drive a just transition, create jobs, and play a central role in the global effort to address the climate crisis.”
The post Addis summit trumpets African climate solutions, while quietly backing gas appeared first on Climate Home News.
Addis summit trumpets African climate solutions, while quietly backing gas
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