The U.S. Grounds Its Climate Scientists

Current conditions: Waves off the coast of Washington could reach 25 feet tall as the atmospheric river peaks in the Pacific Northwest • It’s down to 87 degrees Fahrenheit in Rio de Janeiro, which has been enduring its hottest temperatures in a decade • Valentine, Nebraska, will be near 60 degrees on Monday after a -33 degrees day last week, a swing of 93 degrees.

THE TOP FIVE

1. Germany ousts its ‘climate chancellor’

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz conceded defeat in the country’s national elections on Sunday, marking the end of what Politico has described as “one of the world’s most climate-ambitious governments.” Under Scholz, Germany significantly reduced its emissions with renewables and became the European Union’s leader in producing solar and wind technologies. The country’s next chancellor is expected to be Friedrich Merz, the leader of the conservative Christian Democratic Union, which earned about 28% of Sunday’s vote. In the run-up to the election, Merz had excoriated the coalition government of Scholz’s Social Democratic Party and the Greens, arguing that Germany’s economic policies have been “almost exclusively geared toward climate protection,” and that “we will and we must change that.” Alternative for Germany, the nation’s populist far-right party that rejects the scientific consensus on climate change, earned the second-biggest share of the votes in Sunday’s election, about 20%.

2. IPCC meeting ‘in limbo’ after Trump orders U.S. scientists to stay home

A meeting of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change scheduled to take place this week in Hangzhou, China, is now “in limbo” after the Trump administration forbade the meeting’s co-chair, NASA Chief Scientist Kate Calvin, and other U.S. scientists from attending, CNN reports. The meeting was to discuss the steps to developing the IPCC’s next report, which assesses the state of global warming and is due out in 2029. Calvin had been the head of the working group on mitigation, one of the three main sections of the IPCC report. NASA also canceled a contract to provide technical support for the report.

3. Hochul pitches congestion pricing in the Oval Office

New York’s Governor, Democrat Kathy Hochul, met with President Donald Trump in the Oval Office last Friday to make the case for continuing New York City’s congestion pricing. Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy said last week that he would rescind the U.S. Transportation Department’s approval of the program, a move Hochul initially responded to by vowing to “see you in court.” Per the Associated Press, Hochul subsequently visited Trump in the Oval Office to show him a 22-page presentation boasting of the program’s benefits during its first month of operation, including reductions in traffic and boosts to businesses in the congestion pricing zone. Hochul told CBS’ Face the Nation on Sunday that she was unsure whether she had convinced Trump and predicted, “It’s going to the courts, and I believe we will be victorious in the courts, and this program will continue.”

4. It’s not all in your head: The U.S. is ‘unusually’ cold

Only five countries in the world have been more “unusually” cold than the United States so far this year, according to The Washington Post. (Those would be the much smaller nations of Turkmenistan, Belgium, France, Uzbekistan, and Iran.) More than 30 states have recorded below-average temperatures since the start of the new year, with at least 108 million Americans enduring subzero temperatures at some point. The reason for the chill is high-pressure zones that have lingered to the west of North America and Alaska, pushing polar air further south than normal; though much of the country will warm up this week, forecasters expect another polar vortex in early March. Meanwhile, if you live in Alaska, Florida, or Hawaii, count yourselves as comparatively lucky — they’re the only three states with higher-than-usual temperatures this year.

5. ICYMI: GSA pulls the plug on EV chargers at federal buildings

Beginning this week, the General Services Administration will instruct workers to shut off EV charging stations at all federal buildings, The Verge reported on Friday. The EV chargers — totaling about 8,000 all across the nation — had serviced both official government vehicles as well as employees’ private cars. “We have received direction that all GSA-owned charging stations are not mission critical,” reads an email that has already gone out to some workers. The decision follows an earlier move by the Department of Transportation to suspend the $5 billion National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure program, which provided funding to states to deploy charging stations.

THE KICKER

On Saturday, Yosemite National Park staffers hung an American flag upside down from the face of El Capitan as a distress signal in protest of the Trump administration’s deep cuts to their workforce.