What comes up might go back down. (credit: Pete Markham) Yesterday was a bad day to be an oil company. First, a court in the Netherlands ruled that Royal Dutch Shell needs to slash its emissions more than it had planned in order to meet Paris Agreement targets. The court ordered the oil supermajor to […]
Enlarge / White smoke rising from the tundra in front of the Baird Mountains. (credit: Western Arctic National Parklands (CC BY 2.0)) Each winter, as snow blankets Alaska and northern Canada, the wildfires of the summer extinguish, and calm prevails—at least on the surface. Beneath all that white serenity, some of those fires actually continue […]
Enlarge / You might associate the Florida Keys with Crimson Jihad, but this red is actually called Rosso Portofino. (credit: Elle Cayabyab Gitlin) A couple of years ago, Ars got to spend a rather enjoyable morning with a Ferrari Portofino on a very deserted, very twisty Californian road. It was revelatory, demonstrating that this entry […]
Enlarge / Detailed rock-art recording by ARKENAS archaeologist in Maros-Pangkep. (credit: Adhi Agus Oktaviana) The limestone caves and rock shelters of Indonesia’s southern Sulawesi island hold the oldest traces of human art and storytelling, dating back more than 40,000 years. Paintings adorn the walls of at least 300 sites in the karst hills of Maros-Pangkep, […]
Enlarge (credit: Jose Luis Stephens | Getty Images) To limit global warming to 1.5˚C by the end of the century, the world has to deploy clean technologies en masse while slashing investment in new oil, gas, and coal supplies, according to a new report by the International Energy Agency. Getting to net zero carbon emissions […]
Enlarge (credit: Aurich Lawson / Getty) Few bitcoin projects illustrate the cryptocurrency’s enormous climate impact better than the Greenidge power plant in upstate New York. The once-abandoned power plant was bought by private equity firm Atlas Holdings and retasked. A significant portion of Greenidge’s electricity no longer powers nearby homes or businesses; rather, the plant’s […]
Enlarge (credit: Getty | AFP) Carbon pollution from China’s bustling, coal-intensive economy last year outstripped the carbon pollution of the US, the EU, and other developed nations combined, making up a whopping 27 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions worldwide. As China’s economy has grown in the last 30 years, so too have its emissions. […]
Enlarge / What a difference a decade makes. Even though 2/3 of the data in the new normals is present in the previous ones, the last decade’s still been hot enough to drag the temperatures upwards. (credit: NOAA) On Tuesday, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) released a set of data it terms the […]
Enlarge (credit: Open Grid Scheduler / Grid Engine/Flickr) The US Environmental Protection Agency announced a rule Monday that would phase out hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), the potent greenhouse gases that are widely used as refrigerants. Though HFCs aren’t intentionally emitted in the regular use of refrigerators and air conditioners, they often leak out at various phases in an […]
Enlarge / Wind turbines spin as steam rises from the cooling towers of the Jäenschwalde coal-fired power plant in the distance. (credit: Sean Gallup/Getty Images) Germany’s top court struck down part of the nation’s sweeping climate law, saying it violates people’s freedoms. By many standards, the law is aggressive, requiring the country to slash emissions […]