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Climate

Summertime, and the Weather Is Crazy

On the start of a new season, Mississippi’s wind farm, and Stonehenge

Summertime, and the Weather Is Crazy
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

Current conditions: A dust storm is headed for New Mexico • Torrential rains flooded the French city of Nantes • Tourists are being turned away in Sicily due to water shortages and extreme heat.

THE TOP FIVE

1. U.S. plagued by wild weather as summer officially begins

The U.S. (along with the rest of the world) is experiencing a bunch of different extreme weather events all at the same time: an early and unusually long heat wave through the Midwest and East Coast, a tropical storm and the potential for 20 inches of rain in Texas, massive wildfires in New Mexico followed almost immediately by heavy rain and flash flooding, late-season snowfall in the Rockies. Oh and don’t forget that last week parts of Florida were under two feet of water. Almost every corner of the country has been subjected to some kind of weather-related threat in recent days. Of course, America is a big place, with lots of different landscapes and microclimates, and pinpointing the exact role climate change plays in extreme weather events can be hard. But there’s just no denying that things feel … strange. And, as I seem to keep hearing, “it’s only June!

Flooding in Surfside Beach, Texas, from Tropical Storm Alberto.Brandon Bell/Getty Images

Today marks the summer solstice, the longest day of the year here in the Northern Hemisphere and the official start of summer 2024. With global temperatures still at record highs, what we’re experiencing now is probably just a preview of what’s to come in the following months and years. “These days I think it’s much more appropriate to call it ‘global weirding’” than global warming, climate professor Katharine Hayhoe told Bloomberg. “Wherever we live, our weather is getting much weirder.”

2. Warm temperatures send U.S. power generation soaring

The warm temperatures across the U.S. are driving up power generation and putting a strain on the grid. Natural gas-fired power generation is up 6% so far this year compared to 2023, and in fact is at its highest since 2021, Reutersreported. While clean power output is also set to rise, natural gas is expected to remain the top fuel source in the U.S. “In turn, U.S. power sector emissions from gas use will likely also climb to new highs in 2024, potentially accelerating the climate warming trends that are fuelling increased higher gas demand in the first place,” Reuters added. The heat wave sweeping east prompted New England’s power grid operator to declare a level 1 emergency this week, and briefly pushed electricity prices up near $2,000 per megawatt-hour, “more than 10 times the day-ahead cost for the hour,” Bloombergreported. Back-up oil generation came online Tuesday.

3. Fossil fuel use and emissions reached record highs in 2023

Global fossil fuel use hit a record high last year as energy consumption rose, according to a report from the Energy Institute. Coal demand rose, oil consumption “rebounded strongly” after a pandemic dip, and crude oil consumption exceeded 100 million barrels per day for the first time ever. As a result, greenhouse gas emissions increased 2.1% and broke the record set the year before. Emissions from energy have increased by 50% since the year 2000, the report found. At the same time, renewable power generation reached a record high last year and accounted for about 15% of the global energy mix, and fossil fuel consumption for energy dropped ever so slightly (by 0.4%). The report sheds light on huge regional contrasts: “In advanced economies, we observe signs of demand for fossil fuels peaking, contrasting with economies in the Global South for whom economic development and improvements in quality of life continue to drive fossil growth,” Energy Institute Chief Executive Nick Wayth said.

Energy Institute

4. Utility-scale wind farm opens in Mississippi

Mississippi’s first utility-scale wind farm got up and running this week, marking a point of progress in the Southeast, where “wind energy development has long been stuck in the doldrums,” said Maria Gallucci at Canary Media. The 184-megawatt Delta Wind farm will provide power to Amazon for its regional data centers. One interesting detail is that this farm features some of the tallest onshore turbines in the country, manufactured to make the most out of the top wind speeds. Developers hope this will be “a catalyst for accelerated renewable energy and economic development throughout the South.”

5. Climate activists target Stonehenge

Activists from Just Stop Oil sprayed parts of the ancient Stonehenge monument with orange cornflour powder yesterday and called for an end to new fossil fuel use and extraction. Their actions were immediately and widely condemned and have sparked a national conversation about just how far climate protesters should go for their cause. The group said the powder will wash away with the rain, “but the urgent need for effective government action to mitigate the catastrophic consequences of the climate and ecological crisis will not.” This morning the group also spray painted private jets at a London airport.

X/JustStop_Oil

Meanwhile, also in the UK, the Supreme Court there today ruled that, before new oil drilling projects can commence, companies must disclose and consider the environmental impacts of the resulting emissions. The decision “could put future UK oil and gas projects in question,” reported the BBC.

THE KICKER

A new UN climate survey covering more than 70 countries representing most of the global population found that 80% of people worldwide want their governments to do more to address the climate crisis.

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Politics

The Climate Election You Missed Last Night

While you were watching Florida and Wisconsin, voters in Naperville, Illinois were showing up to fight coal.

Climate voting.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

It’s probably fair to say that not that many people paid close attention to last night’s city council election in Naperville, Illinois. A far western suburb of Chicago, the city is known for its good schools, small-town charm, and lovely brick-paved path along the DuPage River. Its residents tend to vote for Democrats. It’s not what you would consider a national bellwether.

Instead, much of the nation’s attention on Tuesday night focused on the outcomes of races in Wisconsin and Florida — considered the first electoral tests of President Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s popularity. Outside of the 80,000 or so voters who cast ballots in Naperville, there weren’t likely many outsiders watching the suburb’s returns.

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Green
Energy

Exclusive: Trump’s Plans to Build AI Data Centers on Federal Land

The Department of Energy has put together a list of sites and is requesting proposals from developers, Heatmap has learned.

A data center and Nevada land.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

The Department of Energy is moving ahead with plans to allow companies to build AI data centers and new power plants on federal land — and it has put together a list of more than a dozen sites nationwide that could receive the industrial-scale facilities, according to an internal memo obtained by Heatmap News.

The memo lists sites in Texas, Illinois, New Jersey, Colorado, and other locations. The government could even allow new power plants — including nuclear reactors and carbon-capture operations — to be built on the same sites to generate enough electricity to power the data centers, the memo says.

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Economy

AM Briefing: Liberation Day

On trade turbulence, special election results, and HHS cuts

Trump’s ‘Liberation Day’ Tariffs Loom
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

Current conditions: A rare wildfire alert has been issued for London this week due to strong winds and unseasonably high temperatures • Schools are closed on the Greek islands of Mykonos and Paros after a storm caused intense flooding • Nearly 50 million people in the central U.S. are at risk of tornadoes, hail, and historic levels of rain today as a severe weather system barrels across the country.

THE TOP FIVE

1. Trump to roll out broad new tariffs

President Trump today will outline sweeping new tariffs on foreign imports during a “Liberation Day” speech in the White House Rose Garden scheduled for 4 p.m. EST. Details on the levies remain scarce. Trump has floated the idea that they will be “reciprocal” against countries that impose fees on U.S. goods, though the predominant rumor is that he could impose an across-the-board 20% tariff. The tariffs will be in addition to those already announced on Chinese goods, steel and aluminum, energy imports from Canada, and a 25% fee on imported vehicles, the latter of which comes into effect Thursday. “The tariffs are expected to disrupt the global trade in clean technologies, from electric cars to the materials used to build wind turbines,” explained Josh Gabbatiss at Carbon Brief. “And as clean technology becomes more expensive to manufacture in the U.S., other nations – particularly China – are likely to step up to fill in any gaps.” The trade turbulence will also disrupt the U.S. natural gas market, with domestic supply expected to tighten, and utility prices to rise. This could “accelerate the uptake of coal instead of gas, and result in a swell in U.S. power emissions that could accelerate climate change,” Reutersreported.

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