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Climate

2024 Will Top 2023 as the Hottest Year Ever

On heat records, climate finance, and global aridity

2024 Will Top 2023 as the Hottest Year Ever
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

Current conditions: Tens of thousands of people are without power in the UK after Storm Darragh • A volcanic eruption of Mount Kanlaon in the Philippines triggered emergency evacuations • Red Flag fire warnings are in effect across Southern California as Santa Ana winds encounter dry weather.

THE TOP FIVE

1. Copernicus: 2024 will be hottest year on record

The EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service confirmed what many experts have long anticipated: 2024 will almost certainly beat 2023 to become the hottest year on record. It will also be the first with an average temperature exceeding the 1.5 degrees Celsius threshold – in fact the average temperature for 2024 is likely to be close to 1.6C above pre-industrial averages.

Copernicus

Last month was the second warmest November on record (surpassed only by last November). The global average temperature over the last 12 months through November was nearly 3 degrees Fahrenheit above the pre-industrial average and 1.3 degrees Fahrenheit above the more recent averages between 1991 and 2020. Sea surface temperatures also remain abnormally high.

2. World Bank raises $100 billion for poorest nations

The World Bank received $23.7 billion in increased contributions from donor countries to replenish its International Development Association, the lending arm dedicated to the world’s poorest and most vulnerable nations. That brings the total financing to $100 billion and marks “a significant moment for global development,” the bank said. African countries had hoped for more, given the strength of the dollar. Still, the development raises hopes for more climate resilience funding. The U.S. has pledged $4 billion to the IDA under President Biden, but that is expected to change under the incoming Trump administration.

3. Goldman Sachs pulls out of Net Zero Banking Alliance

In case you missed it: Goldman Sachs announced it is leaving the Net Zero Banking Alliance, a global climate coalition for banks. The group didn’t elaborate on the reasoning for the decision, but sources toldBloomberg it was due to mandatory reporting guidelines. “Firms have been struggling to adapt to a deluge of environmental, social, and governance requirements being enforced by regulators in key markets,” Bloombergreported. Meanwhile, Republican lawmakers have been aggressively targeting ESG investment strategies. BlackRock and other investors are being sued by GOP-led states for allegedly breaching antitrust law in ESG investment. Goldman joined the NZBA in 2021. The coalition asks members to set interim five-year targets toward a goal of net zero financed emissions by 2050.

4. Global aridity crisis worsens

Over the last 30 years, large swathes of land that were once lush and humid have dried out, becoming too arid to sufficiently support robust ecosystems, according to a new report on global aridity from the UN Convention to Combat Desertification. The study found that more than 75% of all land on Earth has become drier over the last three decades, and that during that time, drylands expanded by an area the size of the Australian continent to cover 40% of all the global land (excluding Antarctica). This is a very bad trend. Aridity is different from drought. While drought eventually recedes, aridity is “an unrelenting menace,” leading to land degradation, water scarcity, biodiversity decline, crop losses, and large-scale human migration. Human-caused climate change is the main cause of the aridity crisis. “If the world fails in efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions,” the UN warned, “another 3% of the world’s humid areas are projected to transform into drylands by the end of this century.”

UNCCD

5. Trump considering nixing plans to electrify USPS fleet

President-elect Trump’s transition team reportedly wants to kill the Postal Service’s plans to electrify its delivery trucks. The team is examining ways to cancel the various contracts between USPS and providers like Ford and Oshkosh for tens of thousands of EVs, as well as charging stations. As Heatmap’s Jeva Lange reported recently, the small trucks driven by most local mail carriers get an abysmal 9 miles per gallon, “burning fuel by the tankful and spewing emissions as they go about their appointed rounds.”

THE KICKER

Rules designed to protect whales from deadly collisions with ships are in place across just 7% of whale movement hotspots.

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Q&A

You, Too, Can Protect Solar Panels Against Hail

A conversation with VDE Americas CEO Brian Grenko.

This week's interview subject.
Heatmap Illustration

This week’s Q&A is about hail. Last week, we explained how and why hail storm damage in Texas may have helped galvanize opposition to renewable energy there. So I decided to reach out to Brian Grenko, CEO of renewables engineering advisory firm VDE Americas, to talk about how developers can make sure their projects are not only resistant to hail but also prevent that sort of pushback.

The following conversation has been lightly edited for clarity.

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Hotspots

The Pro-Renewables Crowd Gets Riled Up

And more of the week’s big fights around renewable energy.

The United States.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

1. Long Island, New York – We saw the face of the resistance to the war on renewable energy in the Big Apple this week, as protestors rallied in support of offshore wind for a change.

  • Activists came together on Earth Day to protest the Trump administration’s decision to issue a stop work order on Equinor’s Empire Wind project. It’s the most notable rally for offshore wind I’ve seen since September, when wind advocates protested offshore opponents at the Preservation Society of Newport County, Rhode Island.
  • Esther Rosario, executive director of Climate Jobs New York, told me the rally was intended to focus on the jobs that will be impacted by halting construction and that about a hundred people were at the rally – “a good half of them” union members or representing their unions.
  • “I think it’s important that the elected officials that are in both the area and at the federal level understand the humans behind what it means to issue a stop-work order,” she said.

2. Elsewhere on Long Island – The city of Glen Cove is on the verge of being the next New York City-area community with a battery storage ban, discussing this week whether to ban BESS for at least one year amid fire fears.

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Spotlight

How a Carbon Pipeline Is Turning Iowa Against Wind

Long Islanders, meanwhile, are showing up in support of offshore wind, and more in this week’s edition of The Fight.

Iowa.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images, Library of Congress

Local renewables restrictions are on the rise in the Hawkeye State – and it might have something to do with carbon pipelines.

Iowa’s known as a renewables growth area, producing more wind energy than any other state and offering ample acreage for utility-scale solar development. This has happened despite the fact that Iowa, like Ohio, is home to many large agricultural facilities – a trait that has often fomented conflict over specific projects. Iowa has defied this logic in part because the state was very early to renewables, enacting a state portfolio standard in 1983, signed into law by a Republican governor.

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