English references

A recent UK national security assessment on biodiversity and ecosystem collapse made headlines, not for its dire warnings, but for its omissions. It's part of a larger trend of governments keeping climate security reports from the public.

“I suppose it is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail.” Thus wrote the famous psychologist Abraham Maslow in 1966.

Activist tells Swedish officials she has been subjected to harsh treatment, including insufficient food and water

Purpose Animal emissions account for nearly 60% of total greenhouse gas emissions from the livestock sector. To estimate these emissions, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) developed a dedicated module within the Global Livestock Environmental Assessment Model (GLEAM). Although previous studies have explored selected inputs for specific animals and emission types, a comprehensive analysis of all 92 inputs (parameters and emission factors) had not been conducted. This study aimed to identify the most influential inputs affecting ruminant emissions in GLEAM.

A decade ago several prominent climate scientists discussed the prospects of a 4C Earth. Their concern was qualified “… if greenhouse gases do not slow down, then expect a 4C Earth by 2055.” Of course, that would be catastrophic, and one can only assume those scientists must have recognized real risks. Otherwise, why address the issue of 4C by 2055 in the first instance?

Writer says for many years he has refused to use word but now must ‘with immense pain and with a broken heart’

A German court has delivered a landmark ruling in a climate lawsuit brought by Peruvian farmer, Saúl Luciano Lliuya, against German energy giant RWE. The German Higher Regional Court of Hamm has ruled that, in principle, companies can be held liable to people halfway around the world for their contribution to the impacts and risks of climate change . While the Court ultimately dismissed Mr Lliuya’s claim, its reasoning represents a significant breakthrough for climate litigation globally. Below we explain what the Court decided, why it matters, and what it might mean in a New Zealand context with Smith v Fonterra still moving through the courts.

Lenton, the founding director of the Global Systems Institute at the University of Exeter, was the lead author of the 2008 paper that formally introduced the idea of tipping points in the Earth’s climate system.

Several kinds of pressure can lead to the emergence of infectious diseases. In the case of zoonoses emerging from livestock, one of the most significant changes that has taken place since the mid twentieth century is what has been termed the "livestock revolution", whereby the stock of food animals, …

Greenpeace lost – not because it did something wrong but because it was denied a fair trial The stunning $667m verdict against Greenpeace last week is a direct attack on the climate movement, Indigenous peoples and the first amendment. The North Dakota case is so deeply flawed – at its core, the trial was really about crushing dissent – that I believe there is a good chance it will be reversed on appeal and ultimately backfire against the Energy Transfer pipeline company.

Experts believe H5N1 bird flu belongs in a growing category of infectious diseases that can cause pandemics across many species. But there are ways to reduce the risks..

Global projections of macroeconomic climate-change damages typically consider impacts from average annual and national temperatures over long time horizons1–6. Here we use recent empirical findings from more than 1,600 regions worldwide over the past 40 years to project sub-national damages from temperature and precipitation, including daily variability and extremes7,8. Using an empirical approach that provides a robust lower bound on the persistence of impacts on economic growth, we find that the world economy is committed to an income reduction of 19% within the next 26 years independent of future emission choices (relative to a baseline without climate impacts, likely range of 11–29% accounting for physical climate and empirical uncertainty). These damages already outweigh the mitigation costs required to limit global warming to 2 °C by sixfold over this near-term time frame and thereafter diverge strongly dependent on emission choices. Committed damages arise predominantly through changes in average tempe

A novel methodology is developed to dynamically assess the energy and material investments required over time to achieve the transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources in the electricity sector. The obtained results indicate that a fast transition achieving a 100% renewable electric system globally by 2060 consistent with the Green Growth narrative could decrease the EROI of the energy system from current ~12:1 to ~3:1 by the mid-century, stabilizing thereafter at ~5:1. These EROI levels are well below the thresholds identified in the literature required to sustain industrial complex societies. Moreover, this transition could drive a substantial re-materialization of the economy, exacerbating risk availability in the future for some minerals. Hence, the results obtained put into question the consistence and viability of the Green Growth narrative.

Potential external cost savings associated with the reduction of animal-sourced foods remain poorly understood. Here we combine life cycle assessment principles and monetarization factors to estimate the monetary worth of damage to human health and ecosystems caused by the environmental impacts of food production. We find that, globally, approximately US$2 of production-related external costs were embedded in every dollar of food expenditure in 2018—corresponding to US$14.0 trillion of externalities. A dietary shift away from animal-sourced foods could greatly reduce these ‘hidden’ costs, saving up to US$7.3 trillion worth of production-related health burden and ecosystem degradation while curbing carbon emissions. By comparing the health effects of dietary change from the consumption versus the production of food, we also show that omitting the latter means underestimating the benefits of more plant-based diets. Our analysis reveals the substantial potential of dietary change, particularly in high and upper-

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Les fourneaux du monde brûlent maintenant environ 2 millions de tonnes de charbon par an. Lorsque le charbon est brûlé, qu’il est assemblé à l’oxygène, cela ajoute environ 7 millions de tonnes de dioxyde de carbone dans l’atmosphère chaque année. (…) Ceci tend à faire de l’atmosphère une véritable couverture plus ‘efficace’ pour la planète, ce qui a pour effet d’augmenter sa température. L’effet sera probablement considérable dans quelques siècles.

A train derailed and flooded a town with cancer-causing chemicals. But something larger, and more troubling, is at work.

The goal of our project is to compile in a systematic manner the evidence in support of transmittable diseases being aggravated by climate hazards. To ensure a systematic review, we scrutinized the first 200 references in Google Scholar that resulted from using as keywords each possible combination of ten climate hazards (i.e., warming, heatwaves, precipitation, floods, drought, fires, sea level, storms, natural cover change, ocean climate change) and “human diseases”. We selected papers that reported cases examples of diseases regardless of whether impacts were positive or negative. Selected papers were read and from them extracted any mention to cases examples ofdiseasesaggravated by climate hazards.

Later this year, Egyptian engineering firm Arab Contractors is expected to complete the construction of the Julius Nyerere dam on the Rufiji River. Once completed, the $3 billion dam could be Africa’s fourth biggest by power production, producing up to 5920GWH of power annually, enabling Tanzania to close the gap between those with electricity and those who have no access.

Country hopes to ensure effects of climate crisis are always considered in business, investment, lending and insurance decisions