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Sparks

A Hilariously Sad Chart of COP28 Climate Pledges

See if you can identify the biggest scrooge here.

A woman in Tuvalu.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

Early on Thursday, the first day of the UN Climate Conference in Dubai, world leaders secured an agreement for a fund that will help vulnerable nations deal with the impacts of climate change. My colleague Charu has written about the fund in more detail, but I was curious about one thing: How do these pledges compare to each country’s GDP? The answer is hilariously stark — I originally tried making a chart of these pledges as a fraction of GDP, but they simply didn’t show up on the axes.

Chart of pledges vs GDP.

For a point of comparison, the United States has so far sent $75 billion worth of aid to Ukraine since the war began, while the Loss and Damage Fund will be doled among the various countries who ask the UN for assistance. Still, it’s a start, and hopefully these contributions will grow over time.

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Sparks

Gargantuan Solar Project in Nevada Appears to Be Moving Forward

The Esmeralda 7 project is another sign that Trump’s solar freeze is over.

Solar panels.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

The Esmeralda 7 solar project, a collection of proposed solar farms and batteries that would encompass tens of thousands of acres of federal public lands in western Nevada, appears to be moving towards the end of its federal permitting process.

The farms developed by NextEra, Invenergy, Arevia, ConnectGen, and others together would add up to 6,200 megawatts of solar generation capacity, making it the largest solar project in already solar-rich Nevada.

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Sparks

Trump Tries to Kill New York’s Empire Wind Project

For the first time, his administration targets an offshore wind project already under construction.

Wind turbines.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

The Trump administration will try to stop work on Empire Wind, an offshore wind project by Equinor south of Long Island that was going through active construction, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum posted to X on Wednesday.

Burgum announced that he directed the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to “halt all construction activities on the Empire Wind Project until further review of information that suggests the Biden administration rushed through its approval without sufficient analysis.”

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Sparks

Republicans Asked For an Offshore Wind Exposé. They Got a Letdown Instead.

“NOAA Fisheries does not anticipate any death or serious injury to whales from offshore wind related actions.”

Offshore wind.
Heatmap Illustration/Getty Images

A group of Republican lawmakers were hoping a new report released Monday would give them fresh ammunition in their fight against offshore wind development. Instead, they got … pretty much nothing. But they’re milking it anyway.

The report in question originated with a spate of whale deaths in early 2023. Though the deaths had no known connection to the nascent industry, they fueled a GOP campaign to shut down the renewable energy revolution that was taking place up and down the East Coast. New Jersey Congressman Chris Smith joined with three of his colleagues to solicit the Government Accountability Office to launch an investigation into the impacts of offshore wind on the environment, maritime safety, military operations, commercial fishing, and other concerns.

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