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Most Dangerous Tourist Attractions on Earth

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Thousands of people enjoy thrilling vacation pastimes like white-water rafting, mountaineering, surfing, and scuba diving; and most of them make it home with a story and some great photographs. Unfortunately, however, some daring tourists lose their lives in tragic accidents at popular tourist attractions.

In order to find the most dangerous tourist attractions on Earth, 24/7 Tempo consulted travel sites and other media sources. We focused on places that tourists could reasonably get to – not mountains that require expert climbing or survival skills – and where accidents have been reported in the past. We did not include environmental disaster sites like Chernobyl or so-called “death roads” like Yungas Road in Bolivia.

Click here to read more about the most dangerous tourist attractions on Earth

Some of the most dangerous tourist attractions are beaches with an above average rate of shark attacks, or underwater caves where many cave divers are known to have drowned. Others are mountains with extreme weather or narrow paths and sheer drops where hikers have died due to hypothermia or falls. (These are America’s most dangerous beaches.)

Falls are also common as tourists attempt to take extreme selfies on cliff edges, and numerous attractions, including Hawksbill Crag in Arkansas and the Cliffs of Moher in Ireland, are known as common sites of accidental selfie deaths. (Read about the most preventable selfie deaths around the world.)

As China’s electric vehicle dominance grows, U.S. political obstacles loom large

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Political animosity in Washington D.C. over China and renewable energy is about to get a lot worse. Alongside the arguments over solar panels and battery technology, China is quickly becoming the world’s largest producer and seller of electric vehicles, and they are coming to America.

The International Energy Agency forecast today that one in five vehicles sold this year — 2023 — will be electric, with China responsible for about two-thirds of them. Almost a third of cars to be sold in China this year will be electric, compared to about a fifth in Europe and 8% in the U.S., up from 4% last year, the IEA said.

Chinese automakers such as BYD and Nio $NIO are exporting large amounts of EVs to Europe, and beginning to target the U.S. Already, some are comparing the wave to Japan’s auto dominance in the 1980s, which triggered the “buy American” theme that has become a political staple.

As Democrats and Republicans clash over energy security and how many solar panels and EV batteries or parts can come from China, the coming wave of EVs is largely overlooked. At some point, the IEA predicted the EV industry would center around 10 major auto developers, as just about everyone gears up to make their own models.

It is likely too soon to forecast how such a consolidation might happen, but when it comes, it won’t be without a heavy dose of nationalism all around.

Has anti-ESG backlash made corporate America less green?

. . . . Almost half of American households aren’t even moderately concerned about the environment, according to a new report. Mark Hulbert writes this is why red state politicians have found such fertile ground for their anti-ESG attacks, and why companies appear to be pulling back from some of their earlier climate pledges. He argues that a policy of engagement from activists, such as the one that worked with the Apartheid protests of the 1980s, is the only way the U.S can make any material progress in the battle against global warming. . . .

Read the full column

Thursday’s market insights

Bank shareholders give free ride on fossil fuels this annual meeting season

. . . . A two-year bear market and anti-ESG backlash in some states have added to a shareholder malaise when it comes to resolutions on fossil fuel financing.

Our own Mark Hulbert wrote as much in his column two weeks ago, and this week resolutions to phase out fossil financing at three of the largest U.S. banks failed miserably.

Shareholders at Citi $C , Bank of America $BAC , and Wells Fargo $WFC voted only about 10% in favor of climate resolutions, according to Reuters.

The apathy reflects concern that cutting financing for oil and gas companies will threaten energy security, and in part, if you listen to the banks, the belief that fossil fuel giants have to remain in the transition conversation.

Whatever it is, the results certainly indicate that shareholders aren’t the potent change force for climate progress they might have been thought to be a few years ago.

Anyone heard from Engine No. 1 $VOTE lately?. . . .

Top six states improving their grids this year

. . . . A surge in renewable energy such as wind and solar won’t help mitigate global warming without improvement to electric grids to distribute it, and last quarter 47 U.S. states took some form of action to improve their grid planning or energy storage deployment, according to a report today by the N.C. Clean Energy Technology Center in North Carolina.

California, Texas, New York, Minnesota, Connecticut, and Maine were the most active, while Illinois filed its first integrated grid plans, the center said.

A general move among utilities to store more energy for emergencies and to develop microgrids to keep electricity outages from spreading is driving the action, though many states also made improvements into how they price and deliver energy to low-income communities.

Renewable energy, including nuclear, accounts for more than a third of energy created in America and is rising fast. Without corresponding improvements in grid resiliency and distribution, the utility industry risks becoming a choke point on the nation’s economic transition away from fossil fuels.

Indeed, while a lot of investor attention is focused on smaller, sexier climate plays like electric cars, some of the biggest opportunities in coming years may be in the utility sector. One to watch. . . .

Editor’s picks: U.S., European startups urged to set early emissions targets; plus, a bear

Startups urged to set emission targets early on

Twenty-three venture capitalist firms in the U.S. and Europe have formed an alliance to push startups to set greenhouse gas emission targets from the outset. The Venture Climate Alliance offers a boost for the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero, the voluntary coalition of financial institutions formed in 2021 to accelerate the shift to a zero-emissions economy, Karin Rives writes in a post for S&P Global Market Intelligence. The venture capitalists become a new sector-specific alliance under GFANZ, adding fresh members to the umbrella organization after several high-profile departures in recent months, Rives notes. Entrepreneurs funded by VCA members will not be required to commit to net-zero emissions by 2050, the target set by the Paris Agreement on climate change. Rather, they will be coached and encouraged to build a sustainable business that will eventually meet that goal.

South Africa may delay coal plant shutdowns

South Africa, which gets 80% of its electricity from coal-fired power stations, could delay the planned shutdown of many of the country’s polluting coal plants, the government said this week. A report from The Associated Press notes that South Africa is suffering rolling nationwide blackouts, sometimes for more than 10 hours a day, because of an electricity shortfall. The blackouts have become worse over the past year and have damaged the economy and the popularity of the administration of President Cyril Ramaphosa. The AP reports that the new plan, outlined in Ramaphosa’s weekly letter to the nation, the government will consider postponing the decommissioning of some of its 14 coal plants to help ease the electricity cuts.

Where does the heat go?

The Earth climate system is out of energy balance, and heat has accumulated continuously over the past decades, warming the ocean, the land, the cryosphere, and the atmosphere, say the authors of new research titled Heat stored in the Earth system 1960–2020: where does the energy go?. “According to the Sixth Assessment Report by Working Group I of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, this planetary warming over multiple decades is human-driven and results in unprecedented and committed changes to the Earth system, with adverse impacts for ecosystems and human systems.” In a report on the study, the BBC highlights that in just the past 15 years, the planet has accumulated almost as much heat as it did in the previous 45 years, with most of the extra energy going into the oceans. “This is having real world consequences — not only did the overall temperature of the oceans hit a new record in April this year, in some regions the difference from the long term was enormous,” says the report. Last month, sea surface temperatures off the east coast of North America were as much as 13.8°C. higher than the 1981-2011 average. The report quotes Karina Von Schuckmann, the lead author of the new study and an oceanographer at the research group Mercator Ocean International, as saying, “It’s not yet well established why such a rapid change, and such a huge change, is happening.”

Words to live by . . . .

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” — Martin Luther King, Jr.

20 Banks Still Pouring Billions Into the Fossil Fuel Industry

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According to a recent report, the world’s 60 largest banks financed $5.5 trillion in deals and loans for the fossil-fuel industry over the last seven years, dating from the historic Paris climate change agreement. About $3.9 trillion were financed by just 20 banks.

To find the banks helping to finance the fossil fuel industry, 24/7 Wall St. reviewed the report Banking on Climate Chaos, a joint effort between Rainforest Action Network, BankTrack, Indigenous Environmental Network, Oil Change International, Reclaim Finance, the Sierra Club, and Urgewald. Banks are ranked by total financing – lending and underwriting – they have provided to fossil fuel companies since 2016.

The report considered a total of 3,210 companies – parent and independent companies, and subsidiaries – in the fossil fuel sector and the 60 largest banks and traced financing between the banks and fossil fuel companies using Bloomberg. For the report’s full methodology click here

Eleven of the 20 banks are based in the U.S. or Canada. The top four fossil-fuel financiers from 2016 to 2022 are American financial institutions. Japan, the United Kingdom, and China each have more than one bank on the list. 

With total financing of $434.1 billion, JPMorgan Chase is the leader, followed by Citi and Wells Fargo. In 2022, however, with total financing of $42.1 billion, Canada’s RBC bank was the list leader, followed by JPMorgan Chase, and Wells Fargo. (And these were the 18 separate billion dollar weather and climate disasters in 2022.)

Exxon Mobil Corp. stated in its 2023 Advancing Climate Solutions Progress Report that, through 2027, it intends to invest about $17 billion in lower-emission initiatives, an increase of about 15%. Exxon also noted it has cut methane emissions intensity from its assets by more than 50% through 2022 from 2016 levels. Even so, the American energy giant was the corporation that was the most financed by four banks on our list with many projects expanding current operations. 

Other companies getting financing from more than one bank were Enbridge Inc., Saudi Arabian Oil Company, TC Energy Corp., and Marathon Petroleum Corp. (TC Energy is the owner of Keystone pipeline – Keystone has worst oil spill record of any pipeline in the U.S.)

Click here to see 20 banks still pouring billions into the fossil fuel industry.

Click here to see our detailed methodology.

Has anti-ESG backlash made corporate America less green?

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(Mark Hulbert, an author and longtime investment columnist, is the founder of the Hulbert Financial Digest; his Hulbert Ratings audits investment newsletter returns.)

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. (Callaway Climate Insights) — Almost half of U.S. households aren’t even moderately concerned about the environment.

That’s the result of a recent survey conducted by Numerator, the data and technology company that conducts extensive market research. Specifically, they found that only 52% of U.S. households say that they are either “moderately” or “extremely” concerned about the environment. That means that 48% are not.

That stunning statistic captures the challenges that climate activists face in persuading corporate America and the U.S. government to do more to reduce global warming. In a free-market economy within a democratically-inspired political system, it’s difficult to make much headway when half the people on the boat are either not rowing or rowing in the opposite direction…

Subscribe to Callaway Climate Insights to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.

The Most Contaminated Foods in the Produce Aisle This Year

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You may want to reconsider eating those fiber-rich strawberries. And maybe think twice before adding two very popular vegetables to your smoothie to make it “green.” Yes, we’re talking about spinach and kale.

Those three items of produce are among nonorganic fruits and vegetables that contain the most pesticides in their nonorganic versions, according to the Environmental Working Group’s 2023 “Dirty Dozen” report. Kale has appeared on the list of contaminated foods since 2019, after not appearing on it for about a decade. (These are 29 healthy eating habits that will change your life.)

Pesticides include numerous different chemicals that are used to kill insects, weeds, mold, and rodents that may destroy the produce. While they may protect the food, they can also be toxic to people, according to the World Health Organization.

The pesticide that has been detected the most in leafy greens specifically was Dacthal, or DCPA. The Environmental Protection Agency classified DPCA in 1995 as a possible human carcinogen. Europe banned it from use in 2009. (These are 20 foods and drinks you only think are healthy.)

Click here to see the most contaminated foods in the produce aisle this year

While some produce items show up again and again on the EWG’s annual list, new ones do appear from time to time – and the big surprise this year are blueberries. Though revered by nutritionists and healthy-eating aficionados for their anti-inflammatory properties, they joined the Dirty Dozen in the second-to-last slot for 2023 – followed by another produce favorite, green beans. (Blueberries and green beans replaced celery and tomatoes, which were 11th and 12th, respectively, on last year’s list.)

AI triggers demand for the new climate thing, but don’t sell renewables short

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In today’s edition:

— From fusion to carbon capture, investors are scouring the market for the next new thing, but the big money is headed somewhere else
— Biden’s re-election fight will be first presidential campaign to focus on climate change
— A foreign energy giant makes a bid for the nascent U.S. charging station market
— In Latin America, the race is on among governments to get their hands on valuable lithium markets. Chile is the latest to make a move.

— Why sea levels are rising at about double the levels they did in the 1990s

The turn of a bear market back into a bull is always a great time to spec out what the next big thing will be for investors, and we’ve had no shortage this spring. Stories on AI abound, with Nvidia $NVDA , up 85% this year, taking most of the juice. In the climate space, carbon capture and storage remain hot, and just this week we got an update on all the billionaires behind the long-shot efforts on nuclear fusion, courtesy of my friends at the Wall Street Journal.

But a new report by Pitchbook and the American Investment Council for Earth Day over the weekend says the smart money in the past several months headed more into boring old wind and solar.

This is not surprising as the Inflation Reduction Act laid ample groundwork for big investors to back large projects to grow renewable energy. But it is noteworthy for two reasons. Despite the enthusiasm, local politics combined with supply chain issues have stalled many of these grand projects. And national politics, in the form of anti-ESG sentiment, continues to hammer away at any and all things clean energy.

While it’s always enticing to think of the big score in the form of carbon storage or nuclear fusion (or even fission), connecting out regional U.S. power grids to more renewable energy in coming years is most likely to be where most of the money is going to be made, and most of the jobs created. In this bet, solar probably holds a slight edge over wind in terms of speed to market.

But first we have to get to the new bull market. Until then, anything goes.

Subscribe to Callaway Climate Insights to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.

The Most Sanctioned Countries of All Time

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After a three-day summit in Japan, members of the G7 pledged to intensify sanctions. The consequences of the West’s sanctions on Russia drag on month after month. Energy prices, and inflation in general has fallen somewhat, but remain relatively high.

Economic sanctions are increasingly used to counter geopolitical threats, protest human right abuses, fight drug trafficking, promote the overthrow of governments, and even to protect the environment.

Proponents of economic sanctions argue that in an increasingly globalized and integrated world, no country can afford to lose access to the global trade and financial system. Therefore sanctions against a country’s key industries, or against its powerful bad actors, can force change without resorting to military intervention.  

Critics argue that sanctions can wind up punishing people in target countries who have little to do with the authoritarian powers that rule over them, and that sanctions often fail to achieve their objectives. In particular, unilateral sanctions are considered more harmful than those imposed by coalitions, like the sanctions G7 countries have imposed against Russia for its invasion of Ukraine earlier this year. (While Russia is being sanctioned, Ukraine is getting aid. These are the countries sending the most aid to Ukraine.)

“Such policies can reduce the economic performance of the targeted state, degrade public health, and cause tens of thousands of deaths per year under the most crushing sanctions regimes,” wrote Richard Hanania in a report for the libertarian think tank Cato Institute in February 2020. (Also, countries are interdependent. This is the country that is most dependent on Russian oil.)

Whatever the case may be about the ethics and efficacy of sanctions, the number of them against Russia has ballooned this year thanks to its full-blown invasion of Ukraine in February. Seven countries and the European Union have imposed more than 10,000 new sanctions against Russian enterprises and individuals this year, nearly quadrupling the number prior to the invasion. But not just Russia is being sanctioned.

To find the most sanctioned countries, 24/7 Wall St. reviewed sanctions compliance provider Castellum.AI’s Russia’s Sanctions Dashboard, which is updated weekly (data was retrieved on Dec. 13). Sanctions include export controls and regulatory fines, among others, and are since public records are available for each source country, according to Castllum.AI. Data on gross domestic product in current U.S. dollars, population, and exports and imports as a percent of a country’s GDP came from the World Bank. Democracy index for 2021 came from The Economist Intelligence Unit.

Russia is by far the most sanctioned country right now, but six other countries are also targets of this economic weapon, each with hundreds if not thousands of sanctions. Iran is the second-most sanctioned country for its nuclear weapons program, its support for Shia militant groups in the region, and its domestic human rights program. 

While the bulk of sanctions against Russia have been imposed since its invasion of Ukraine, sanctions against Iran and the other countries on the list have been imposed before the invasion. All the sanctioned countries are authoritarian regimes to a degree, scoring extremely low on the Democracy Index.

Here are the world’s most sanctioned countries.

Heavier cars. Lighter wine bottles and baseballs. Global warming making its mark.

Source: Doug Pensinger / Getty Images Sport via Getty Images

(A native of England, veteran journalist Matthew Diebel has worked at NBC News, Time, USA Today and News Corp., among other organizations.)

The climate reason he should not have given up baseball

My son was quite a good baseball player. Tall — 6’4” — and left-handed, he was a solid first baseman, excellent pitcher and a hard-hitting batsman who managed several home runs. Voted MVP as a high school sophomore, he became captain in his senior year. He was also captain of his school’s fencing team, leading them to win New York City’s public schools championships.

But he’s also lazy. And so, without his father on hand to get him off the couch and into his uniforms, he ditched sports when he went to college (though he now plays basketball and has resumed fencing).

Well, it turns out he maybe should have stuck with life on the baseball diamond. That’s because climate change, a study says, has led to 50 more home runs a year in the Major Leagues…

Subscribe to Callaway Climate Insights to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.

The US Oil Pipeline With the Worst Spill Record

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Following a serious rupture of the Keystone pipeline in Kansas this past December, the Federal government last month announced that stricter regulations were on the way, targeting Canada’s TC Energy Corp., the operator of the infamous pipeline.  The rupture this past winter dumped 14,000 barrels of heavy crude, some of it into a creek, in the largest U.S. oil spill in nearly a decade. The new regulations would require TC Energy to reduce the pipeline’s operating pressure. 

The temporary shutdown resulting from the December rupture interrupted the flow of this critical artery through which 622,000 barrels of heavy crude oil flows daily from Alberta, Canada, to U.S. refineries and oil farms as far south as Houston. (Also see, cities with the most land flagged for hazardous waste cleanup.)

The rupture, caused by faulty welding and stress fatigue on the pipe, was of the biggest spill in the company’s 71-year history. The 2,600-mile pipeline has had 22 accidents since its first phase went online in 2010, according to a report last year from the U.S. Government Accountability Office.

Unfortunately, Keystone’s track record is actually about on par for the industry, which  experiences dozens of “significant” oil pipeline incidents every year, according to data collected by the U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.

To determine the U.S.-based pipelines that have leaked the most oil since 2010, 24/7 Wall St. examined press coverage from Bloomberg and other local and national news sources. Revenue and profit figures for the publicly listed companies operating the leakiest oil pipelines in the U.S. were taken from 2021 annual regulatory filings.

Many of these spills are relatively small, but some are significant enough to cause property and environmental damage as well as, occasionally, the loss of life. Of Keystone’s 22 accidents reported by the GAO, six were large enough to impact people and the environment.

The Kansas spill helped put the Keystone Pipeline at the top of the list of the five leakiest crude oil arteries in the country. The five based pipelines listed have spilled nearly 92,000 barrels (3.8 million gallons) of crude in various incidents since 2010.

Owners of these pipelines include Marathon Petroleum Corp., which has owned the Tesoro High Plains Pipeline since 2018; Canadian pipeline and energy company Enbridge Inc.; and Houston-based Enterprise Products. (Find out which is the country that has the most oil.)

Here are the U.S. pipelines that have spilled the most crude oil since 2010.

Tesla on the defensive will be a business case study for the ages. What Musk must do.

Source: Courtesy of Tesla

Watching Elon Musk and Tesla $TSLA circle the electric wagons around their shrinking market share in EVs will be one of the wildest case studies in monopolies of this young century.

Think IBM $IBM , Standard Oil, AT&T $T , the big three broadcast television networks, Anheuser-Busch $BUD , your local newspaper. Google $GOOG . The great monopolies of the past century have given way to sudden and ferocious disintermediation, sometimes at judicial gunpoint, sometimes to innovation. The advent of electric vehicles will be no different.

But unlike in the past, even with Henry Ford or J.P. Morgan, Tesla’s stranglehold on the U.S. electric vehicle industry has manifested itself in one man, Musk, in ways that mean its demise will ultimately be his demise. And Musk doesn’t like to demise. He has enough on his plate with Twitter — and as of this morning, one of his SpaceX rockets failing and exploding after launch.

Tesla shares were trading down 10% this morning at their lowest level since January, having given back about half of their gains year-to-date, after a terrible 2022. A series of dramatic price cuts that slashed profit and promises of more to come as the company fights to retain its leading EV market share, are behind the declines.

Cutting prices will work for now. Even at the 11% margins Tesla is now down to on some models it still commands almost twice the margins Ford $F and GM $GM do on their EVs. So there is room for more pressure. Others will feel the need to follow but will have limits on what they can do. Renault (FR:RNO) this morning, for example, said it won’t follow Tesla with price cuts — news that chopped 8% off its share price.

Like his EVs, however, there is only so far Musk can go on that type of charge. Musk is clearly betting that follow-up service revenue, and advances and price increases on the software that runs the vehicles, will eventually win out if the customer base is big enough. The service route is the route IBM took under Lou Gerstner, for example, giving up on hardware sales eventually.

Scale, as Musk knows, is the name of the game here. And it will take a lot to keep Ford and GM, to say nothing of Volkswagen and Toyota, at bay as the world quickly shifts to EVs in the next decade. A Silicon Valley veteran, Musk knows that only innovation — a la Steve Jobs reinventing Apple $AAPL with music and the iPhone — can truly keep Tesla great.

Price cuts are a stalling tactic. If it’s not going to be rocket ships, then what? Autonomous vehicles? Flying vehicles? Electric grid innovation? The case studies, and Tesla investors suddenly on the defensive after a decade of gains, await.

Letter from Latin America: Mining companies change ESG tune after banner year

. . . . Some of Latin America’s largest mining companies are taking parts of their profits from last year’s commodities boom and putting them into low-carbon technologies, writes Michael Molinski. Companies such as Vale $VALE , Anglo American (NGLOY) and BHP Group $BHP are among the ones focusing on cleaner ways to mine lithium for electric vehicle batteries or using hydrogen to power mining tools. The move is an example of how traditional fossil fuel players are at least starting to adapt to investor pressure on their production methods. . . .

Read the full story

Thursday’s subscriber-only insights

. . . . The future of EVs is on display in China this week at the Shanghai Auto Show, and there aren’t a lot of Teslas, Fords or GM electric vehicles on display, writes Matthew Diebel. That’s because Chinese models such as Nios $NIO and Geelys (GELYF) are soaking up all the limelight in a country where 25% of new auto sales last year were electric, compared to 6% in the U.S. As the U.S. players engage in a price war, Chinese automakers are preparing to flood the American market with models that — even without subsidies — compete on price because of their low production costs. The competition will be welcome in a growing market starved for choices. Read more here. . .

. . . . Reports this week that Climeworks, Europe’s largest carbon removal and storage company, is hiring in the U.S. and looking at a handful of direct air capture (DAC) projects is sure to stoke speculation the Swiss company is finally ready to go public. Investors pumped more than $600 million into the company last spring to fund its next stage of growth, but so far it has been mum about an IPO.

Investors include well-known VCs and asset managers such as John DoerrBaillie Gifford and Swiss Re. The nascent carbon capture and storage (CCS) industry has attracted billions in investment in the last few years, with more than 300 startups working on ways to scale the removal of carbon from the atmosphere and ocean. The government is offering up to $3.5 billion in grants to build DAC hubs around the country, further attracting investment.

But so far, other than the oil giants already doing it, there are no big public start up plays. Climeworks would be the one. Watch this space. . . .

. . . . Just in time for Earth Day, environmental activist and media owner Andrew Dudley and his wife Kirsten have penned a children’s book called “The Adventures of Jungle Bird, Every Day is Earth Day,” which is out on Amazon now. The book is an educational romp through the world’s environmental challenges and what we can do about them, through the eyes of Andrew’s playful alias, Jungle Bird, who has been known to occasionally disrupt public sporting events in the name of environmental awareness. When Andrew and Kirsten aren’t writing, they run Earth Live, a media company focused on interviews of people on the front lines of conservation and sustainability and have traveled the world working with indigenous groups among others. . . .

Editor’s picks: Pumping up heat pumps; Chipotle’s going all-electric

Turning up the heat pumps

Heat pumps, when used as a main heating device, cover around 10% of heating needs in buildings today, according to the International Energy Agency. This corresponds to over 100 million households. However, many more households use heat pumps only part of the winter or as a supplementary source of heating in regions where they are mainly used for cooling buildings. To align with all existing national energy and climate pledges worldwide, heat pumps will have to meet nearly 20% of global heating needs in buildings by 2030, says the IEA. The world is almost on track to reach this milestone if new installations continue to grow at a similar rate globally as they did the last two years. However, sales need to expand by well over 15% per year this decade if the world is to achieve net zero emissions by 2050.

All-electric burritos

Chipotle Mexican Grill $CMG has created an all-electric restaurant designed to maximize energy efficiency and use 100% renewable energy from solar and wind power sources through the purchase of certified renewable energy credits. New restaurants with these features just opened in Virginia and Florida, and a third is scheduled to open this summer in Colorado. The company said in a news release that “the new restaurant design pilot will help Chipotle progress toward its science-based targets … to reduce direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions 50% by 2030 compared to a 2019 baseline.” Features include rooftop solar panels, cactus leather seats, heat pump water heaters, art made from recycled rice husks, and EV charging stations at select locations.

Explain that: Sea-level change

In our new feature Explain that we bring you clear, unbiased and authoritative explanations of terms relevant to climate change and climate finance. Today, let’s wade into sea level change.

. . . . Sea level change (sea level rise/sea level fall): Sea level can change, both globally and locally (relative sea level change) due to (1) a change in ocean volume as a result of a change in the mass of water in the ocean, (2) changes in ocean volume as a result of changes in ocean water density, (3) changes in the shape of the ocean basins and changes in the Earth’s gravitational and rotational fields, and (4) local subsidence or uplift of the land. Global mean sea level change resulting from change in the mass of the ocean is called barystatic. The amount of barystatic sea level change due to the addition or removal of a mass of water is called its sea level equivalent (SLE). Sea level changes, both globally and locally, resulting from changes in water density are called steric. Density changes induced by temperature changes only are called thermosteric, while density changes induced by salinity changes are called halosteric. Barystatic and steric sea level changes do not include the effect of changes in the shape of ocean basins induced by the change in the ocean mass and its distribution.

Words to live by . . . .

“Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures & the whole of nature in its beauty.” — Albert Einstein.

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