Arguments
The Trump administration is continuing it’s war on climate science. This time, instead of attacking climate science in general, as they tried (and failed) to do with the DOE Climate Working Group, they are going after the U.S. National Climate Assessment (NCA).
There was some chatter that the administration would try to write an entire new version of the NCA that would deny well-established climate science, but my guess is that they have abandoned this. The NCA is a “Highly Influential Scientific Assessment” and therefore must follow specific rules. These include rules about how to select authors, peer review, etc. Following those rules would make it impossible to produce the biased, climate-denying report that they require. And if they don’t follow the rules, they’d lose the inevitable court challenges.
So they instead, they are proposing to amend the Fifth National Climate Assessment (NCA5) by (basically) removing references to the highest emissions scenarios, RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5, which produces the most warming:
This is justified on two grounds: 1) RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 is not an expected emissions scenario and 2) it is not policy relevant. Point 1 is irrelevant since the NCA5 does not refer to it as business as usual, baseline, etc. And Point 2 is just wrong. My comment below expands on these points.
The USGCRP is presently soliciting comments. You can tell USGCRP understands their arguments are weak since they go out of their way to make it as hard as they can for people to comment on it: They’re limiting the comment window to 15 days and comment length to 3,500 words.
Below is my comment on this. If you see any errors, please leave a comment below or email me.
Scientists link fossil fuel producers to the West’s worsening water shortages
Posted on 28 September 2026 by Guest Author
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Barbara Grady
As the Western United States grapples with severe drought, leading cities to scramble for water and farmers to abandon some crops, a new scientific study has found that 122 major oil, gas, coal, and cement companies and state-owned operations are partially responsible.
The study found that climate change from all climate-warming greenhouse gas emissions over the last 70 years has resulted in a 36% decline in annual average mountain snowpacks, the major source of surface water in Western states – and that about 40% of that decline is linked to the climate pollution caused by just 122 companies.
The annual loss attributable to those 122 companies is equivalent to the amount of water held by Lake Mead, the nation’s largest reservoir, at full capacity.
The authors of the peer-reviewed paper, “Carbon emissions exacerbating the Western US water crisis,” also found that global warming from greenhouse gas emissions has led to a 13% decline in average annual streamflows from mountains to the lower-lying areas that depend on them, and to a 4.3% increase in the need for agricultural irrigation. The study attributed about half the streamflow declines and roughly half the increased need for irrigation to the warming caused by the 122 companies. In other words, those companies’ products resulted in a 6% fall in streamflows in the region, according to the study.
Nine scientists from the University of California at Merced and the Union of Concerned Scientists contributed to the study, published August 25 in the Nature magazine affiliate Communications Earth & Environment.
2026 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #39
Posted on 27 September 2026 by BaerbelW, Doug Bostrom
Stories we promoted this week, by category:
Climate Policy and Politics (8 items)
- Interview with Senator Sheldon Whitehouse: ''Call Out the Corruption Propelling the US Climate Retreat'' The Rhode Island senator, who could lead the Judiciary Committee if Democrats win in November, urges stronger messaging and a focus on Supreme Court reform. Inside Climate News, Marianne Lavelle, Sep 20, 2026.
- Whitehouse: Call Out the Corruption Propelling the US Climate Retreat The Rhode Island senator, who could lead the Judiciary Committee if Democrats win in November, urges stronger messaging and a focus on Supreme Court reform. Inside Climate News, Marianne Lavelle, Sep 20, 2026.
- Let`s Talk Climate Annual NY Times climate conference opens in difficult times for sensible climate policy. NYT > Climate and Environment, Katrin Bennhold, Sep 20, 2026.
- We Need to Stop Talking Like Climate Change Is Partisan 'People who raise awareness about climate change know that how you communicate your message matters, and there’s much to learn from them.'' TIME, Katharine Hayhoe and Dana R. Fisher, Sep 21, 2026.
- How Saudi oil scientists ended up working on the world`s most important climate reports Guardian investigation reveals fossil fuel links of IPCC authors, with experts declaring the body’s conflict of interest policy ‘not fit for purpose’ The Guardian, Damian Carrington, Eoghan Gilmartin, Silvia Lazzaris, Rita Cruz, Simon Guichard and David Haas, Sep 21, 2026.
- Effort begins to fill the void left by terminated US climate report First paper added to community collection is a roadmap for research. Ars Technica, Scott K. Johnson, Sep 22, 2026.
- The climate scientist Kate Marvel sheds light on why she left NASA this year. One of the most prominent climate scientists to resign from the federal government during the second Trump administration described the “chaotic” conditions inside NASA that led to her departure. NYT, Raymond Zhong, Sep 23, 2026.
- Trump cut their climate jobs. This secretive network found them new ones. Climate Reserve is quietly building a lifeline for America's lost climate workforce, one job at a time. Grist, Kate Yoder, Sep 24, 2026.
Climate Change Impacts (4 items)
- Losing your way of life to climate change matters — and we need a way to measure it Climate losses extend beyond property and income. Policymakers need ways to assess what people value, experience and ultimately stand to lose. Nature, Manasi Kumar, Sep 21, 2026.
- The worst El Niño in recorded history is brewing — here’s how governments must prepare From southern Africa to the Amazon, the risks are mounting and the window for action is rapidly closing. Nature, Zeke Hausfather, Sep 22, 2026.
- Scientists link fossil fuel producers to the West`s worsening water shortages A new study blames 122 companies for contributing to severe drought in the region. Yale Climate Connections, Barbara Grady, Sep 22, 2026.
- An Existential Threat to the Oil Industry Can fossil energy giants be held responsible for extreme weather? The Atlantic, Ross Andersen, Sep 23, 2026.
Skeptical Science New Research for Week #39 2026
Posted on 24 September 2026 by Doug Bostrom, Marc Kodack
Open access notables
The Increasing Incidence of Boreal and Western U.S. Forest Wildfires and Its Causes: An Overview, Wallace et al., Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society
This overview of the voluminous wildfire literature addresses the following questions: “How seriously is the current spate of wildfires impacting the boreal forests and the forests of the western United States? Is the current rate of burning of these forests unprecedented? Has it been systematically increasing over the past few decades and, if so, is it in response to human-induced global warming?” The article contains diagrams and tables based on a suite of fire-related datasets: satellite measurements of burned area, fire-related carbon emissions, aerosol optical depth, dating back to around the year 2000, and longer ground-based records of area burned by fires in the western United States. The graphics and tables reveal the remarkable extent of the forested area burned. The average area burned per year has increased by roughly a factor of three since the year 2000. The area burned by severe fires with areas > 100 km2 has been increasing more rapidly than the area burned by smaller fires. Wildfire smoke has also increased appreciably over much of North America. Forested burned area and fire-related carbon emissions are highly sensitive to measures of aridity on time scales ranging from days to decades. Aridity has increased, mainly in response to the warming trend, which is comparable in magnitude to that in climate model simulations of the response to rising greenhouse gas concentrations. The evidence presented herein supports the widely held belief that the recent increase in wildfires is mainly due to human-induced global warming.
Net Groundwater Recharge in California Occurs Primarily During Above-Average Snowpack Years, Reager et al., Geophysical Research Letters
In a new application of GRACE and GRACE-FO satellite observations, we estimate basin-scale net groundwater recharge rates for the combined Sacramento, San Joaquin, and Tulare basins encompassing California's Central Valley aquifer. Net recharge is calculated as the temporal derivative of groundwater storage anomalies and compared with precipitation and snow water equivalent over a fixed study area. Net positive recharge is rare, occurring in only six water years since 2004, and is consistently associated with years of above-average Sierra Nevada snowpack. Across the observational record, net positive recharge is observed only in years when snow water equivalent exceeds approximately 21 km3 (17 MAF; ∼121% of the 20-year mean value), with the largest recharge event coinciding with the exceptionally wet winter of water year 2023. These results suggest that above-average snowpack conditions, rather than rainfall alone, are an important enabling condition for basin-scale groundwater recharge under a warming climate.
Concurrent Eurasian Heatwaves Will Intensify Beyond the Mean Warming, Xu et al., Geophysical Research Letters
Heatwaves occurring at the same time over Europe and North China are among the most common simultaneous climate extremes in the Northern Hemisphere. These events are linked by a large-scale atmospheric circulation pattern, the British–Baikal Corridor pattern, which produces high-pressure systems over both regions simultaneously. Using a large ensemble of climate model simulations, we find that these concurrent heatwaves will become much more severe in the future. Importantly, they intensify faster than average temperature increases due to global warming. Even after accounting for background warming, temperatures during these events exceed the regional mean warming by about 0.3°C on average and by more than 0.5°C locally. Surprisingly, the reasons for this additional intensification differ between the two regions. Over North China, the atmospheric circulation pattern strengthens, bringing clearer skies and greater solar heating. Over Europe, however, the circulation pattern weakens, but heatwaves still intensify because drier soils provide less evaporative cooling. These findings challenge the common assumption that the same weather pattern amplifies heat equally wherever it occurs. They also suggest that future heat risks may be underestimated if assessments rely only on average warming, particularly when heatwaves strike multiple regions simultaneously.
Defending the status quo: The role of system justification in public opposition to ambitious climate policy and energy system change, Lloyd et al., Journal of Environmental Psychology
In recent years, environmental psychologists have argued that our field must conduct more solutions-focussed and system-level research if we want to contribute to ambitious and effective climate action. In this paper, we propose that system justification offers a promising pathway towards achieving both of these goals, and investigate its influence on three societally-impactful outcomes: support for climate policy, support for a just energy transition, and endorsement of climate delay discourses. We also test whether experimentally inducing hope could offer a solution to these proposed deleterious effects. We conduct this research in small-to-medium sized communities in Western Canada, many of which are dependent upon fossil-fuels for their continued existence, and thus strongly oppose decarbonization. Using an online survey of these communities (N = 3,400) we find that system justification consistently predicts lower support for climate policies, greater endorsement of climate delay discourses, and lower support for a just energy transition. Additionally, moderation analyses reveal that this relationship is stronger for those with greater proximity to the fossil-fuel industry, and that our hope manipulation had no effect. We explore the policy implications of these findings, arguing that policymakers should (1) aim to narratively detach the status quo from the economic system, and (2) design just transitions policies which act to maintain fossil-fuel communities’ current way of life, rather than trying to improve it. These findings extend system justification theory to three new societally-impactful outcomes; demonstrate its utility for policymaking; and highlight its potential to contribute to transformation-oriented research in environmental psychology.
From this week's government/NGO section:
Findings from a 2026 Survey of Adults Age 18 and Older, Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago and the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research
The authors found that 53% of Americans are extremely or very concerned about the environmental effects of AI, up from 41% who said the same in 2025. Younger adults ages 18-29 have become particularly concerned, increasing from 38% last year to 60% today and moving from levels similar to other age groups to the highest level of concern. Forty-seven percent of Americans think AI will do more to hurt rather than help the environment, up from 33% who said the same in 2025. The authors also explored attitudes toward climate change, energy policy, and electric vehicles (EVs). Most Americans agree that climate change is happening and is caused by human activity, a trend that has remained stable in recent years. There is a large partisan divide in these attitudes, however, with Democrats more likely than Republicans to believe climate change is occurring (92% vs. 55%) and is caused mostly by human activity (68% vs. 34%). About 2 in 3 believe that oil and gas companies, the federal government, and large businesses and corporations have a lot of responsibility to address climate change, while just 4 in 10 say the same about developing countries and individual people.
In Hottest Summer on Record, 2 in 3 Americans Say Climate Change Is Increasing Heat-Related Illnesses, Annenberg Public Policy Center, University of Pennsylvania
Nearly two-thirds of the American public say climate change is increasing the risk of respiratory diseases and heat- and insect-related illnesses. The author's survey, which was conducted Aug. 4-17, 2026, among 1,904 empaneled U.S. adults, found that 76% report that extreme outdoor heat affected their daily activities at least sometimes in the past year and 38% say poor air quality resulting from wildfire smoke did so. Extreme heat is affecting the everyday lives of most Americans. Nearly two-thirds of Americans (65%) say that climate change is increasing the risk of heat-related illnesses, respiratory diseases, and insect-borne diseases. This is unchanged from August 2025 (65%) and July 2024 (67%) but is significantly higher than 58% in November 2023. Americans generally recognize that heat waves are on the rise. Nearly two-thirds (62%) say U.S. heat waves are becoming more frequent and intense than in the past, statistically unchanged from 61% in August 2025, 65% in July 2024, and 58% in November 2023. Of the four extreme weather events measured in the survey, more Americans report that their daily activities were impacted at least sometimes by extreme outdoor heat (76%) and poor air quality resulting from wildfire smoke (38%). As one would expect, fewer say they were impacted at least sometimes by flooding (20%) and tornadoes/hurricanes (11%), since these events are less frequent.
87 articles in 46 journals by 618 contributing authors
Physical science of climate change, effects
Amplified Cloud-Phase Responses Over Global Mountain Regions Under Climate Warming, Zhang et al., AGU Advances Open Access pdf 10.1029/2026av002380
India’s power-sector emissions flat for two years due to clean-energy surge
Posted on 23 September 2026 by Guest Author
This is a re-post from Carbon Brief by Lauri Myllyvirta, lead analyst at Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) and Anubha Aggarwal, India analyst at CREA
This is the first time in more than 50 years that there has been no growth in India’s coal power over a two-year period, even as electricity demand grew overall.
At the same time, both oil and gas consumption have fallen across the nation for two years in a row, helping alleviate the shock of the Hormuz crisis.
Nevertheless, the new six-monthly analysis for Carbon Brief shows that India’s emissions grew by 3.7% year-on-year in the first half of 2026, due to increases from steel, cement and other sectors.
Other key findings for the first half of 2026 include:
- India’s power-sector emissions flatlined at 2024 levels, after a 2.2% decline in the first half of 2025 and a 2.3% rise in the same period this year.
- Clean energy met all of the 7% rise in India’s electricity demand over the two years, adding 63 terawatt hours (TWh), equivalent to the total demand of Switzerland.
- India has added 77 gigawatts (GW) of solar in this two-year period, helping meet 60% of the rise in electricity demand overall.
- While fossil-fuel generation stagnated, generators added 8.5GW of new coal capacity, leading to fewer running hours and increased costs to electricity consumers.
- CO2 emissions from oil and gas fell by 7% year-on-year, extending a reduction that began in 2025, despite higher demand for road transport fuels.
- Steel and cement emissions grew by 8% year-on-year, reaching a 23% share of India’s total CO2 in the first half of 2026.
If the pace of India’s clean-energy expansion is to continue, it will need to upgrade its electricity grid, rapidly build out energy storage and boost the flexibility of coal power.
While clean-energy expansion is covering most or all of India’s power-demand growth, the fossil-fuel industry continues to pursue major capital investments.
This includes large amounts of new coal-power capacity, ambitious plans for the conversion of coal-to-chemicals and efforts to boost domestic coking coal production for the steel sector.
While CO2 output from the power sector is flat, with oil and gas in decline, India’s emissions still went up due to the contribution from industry.
India lags behind its competitors – including most large emerging economies – when it comes to electrifying its industrial sector.
Faster progress would enable clean electricity to substitute for fossil fuels in industry, as well as for power, offering the potential for India to cut its emissions overall.
Flatlining fossils
Last year, India’s CO2 emissions from fossil fuels and cement grew at their slowest pace in two decades, according to previous analysis for Carbon Brief.
This sharp slowdown was due to rapid clean-energy growth and flat oil demand, combined with rising emissions from steel and cement.
The first half of 2026 marks a continuation of these trends.
Most strikingly, the ongoing surge in clean-energy generation means that emissions have flatlined in India’s power sector for two years, as shown in the figure below.
Power-sector CO2 was the same in the first half of 2026 as two years earlier, with a small decline in 2025 having been reversed over the same period this year.
For further details, see: About the data.
Fact brief - Does wind power require backup from fossil fuels?
Posted on 22 September 2026 by Sue Bin Park
Skeptical Science is partnering with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline.
Does wind power require backup from fossil fuels?
Most power grids still combine fossil fuels with renewables, but some already run entirely on renewable energy and offer models others could follow.
The majority of 100% renewable grids rely primarily on hydropower, though certain nations have significantly incorporated wind in their portfolios. Costa Rica and Uruguay have achieved 99-100% renewable power with around 17% and 35% coming from wind, respectively.
Several U.S. municipalities meet electricity demands using diverse portfolios of renewables, including wind. Burlington, Vermont’s 2024 supply was 99.9% renewable, mainly via hydropower, biomass, and wind; Seattle, Washington was 95% renewables powered in 2024. In Kansas and South Dakota, wind alone comprises 60% of generation.
Energy storage is also rapidly expanding as a solution to intermittency, with the U.S. ranking second globally and achieving record growth in 2025. Such combinations of renewable resources, storage, and transmission continue to enable more reliable, renewable grids.
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Sources
Climate Council 11 countries leading the charge on renewable energy
Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark Denmark #1 in share of renewables in net electricity generation for 2024 in the EU
IEA Lithuania
City of Burlington Electric Department Our Energy Portfolio
City of Seattle Power Supply and Delivery
Analysis of EIA data Share of electricity gen by wind, by state, 2025
U.S. Energy Information Administration Electricity Data Browser
U.S. Grid Energy Storage Factsheet University of Michigan
Princeton University Net-Zero America
NREL NREL Report Redefines Wind as a Grid Stabilizer, Not a Liability
Columbia Law School Sabin Center for Climate Change Law Rebutting 33 False Claims About Solar, Wind, and Electric Vehicles
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Rapid Warming in the Himalaya Exacerbates Geohazard Cascades Beyond Adaptation Limits
Posted on 21 September 2026 by Guest Author
This is a re-post from World Weather Attribution
A catastrophic rock-ice avalanche that transitioned into a debris flood in the Himalayas along the Nepal–China border on 26 August 2026 has caused widespread destruction across Nepal and neighbouring regions. In Nepal, at the time of writing (14 September 2026) the disaster has resulted in over 1,300 confirmed deaths, with only a small fraction of victims identified and returned to their families. Over 5,000 people remain missing, around 13,700 people have been rescued and more than 8,600 people have received medical treatment (NDRRMA, 2026e). About 3,400 people are currently sheltering in holding centres (NDRRMA, 2026a) and an estimated 84,270 people across 17 local levels in the six districts of Rasuwa, Nuwakot, Dhading, Gorkha, Chitwan and Tanahu are affected, with the government declaring 15 municipalities as disaster crisis-hit areas for three months (UNDP, 2026a; MOHA, 2026).
While initial reports suggested that the event may have been caused by an earthquake, later evidence indicates that the recorded seismic activity was actually linked to the rapid collapse of roughly 2 square kilometers of rock wall and glacier ice (US Geological Society Earthquake Hazards Program, August 26, 2026; Center for Hydrology and Water Resources Research, 2026). The collapsing material fell approximately 1,400 m, from around 5,150 m above sea level to the valley floor at about 3,750 m. This released a huge amount of energy and produced seismic waves that were initially detected as an earthquake-like signal.
The rock-ice avalanche then triggered a series of processes. As the ice, rock and debris moved rapidly down the mountain, friction and mechanical energy probably caused some of the glacier ice to melt, producing large amounts of meltwater (Le Page, 26 August 2026 [NewScientist]). When the avalanche reached the valley floor, it also hit buried ice, which probably melted and added more water to the debris flood.
Figure 1: Climate-sensitive processes potentially contributing to failure. Conceptual representation of the main mechanisms through which climate variability and climate change may have influenced the stability of the Rasuwa rock wall.
The resulting debris flood was therefore likely caused by several sources of water, including melting glacier ice, water stored beneath the glacier and in permafrost, ice and water carried within the debris (see fig. 1), and river water pushed ahead of the flow. A wall of water, ice, rock and sediment reached the Rasuwagadhi border, 22 km downstream, within seven minutes, moving at an average speed of 188 km per hour, and wiped out the border facilities, the town of Timure and the Syabrubesi market town within the next quarter of an hour, catching pilgrims, border staff and hydropower workers (CHWRR, 2026; Lord, 2026). Within a further half hour it was in the Trishuli valley at Betrawati, and still moving boulders and pulling multi-storey buildings into the river in Betrawati and Trishuli Bazaar far downstream (CHWRR, 2026; Lord, 2026). The flood travelled 200 km to Devghat in under seven hours, where river flow more than doubled to about 5,850 cubic metres per second, and an estimated 20 million cubic meters of excess water passed in under four hours before the flood continued into India (CHWRR, 2026; Lord, 2026). The water deposited 30.5 million cubic meters of sediment and debris along the corridor, burying agricultural fields, settlements and hydropower plants (NDRRMA, 2026d).
This mixture of water, ice, rock and sediment created a highly destructive debris flood that swept away families, homes, settlements, roads, bridges and other infrastructure along the corridor, leaving survivors stranded and cut off, many having also lost family members and everything they owned more than 35 km downstream while the water travelled much further, at Glachi, 88 km downstream the water level of the river Trishuli rose by 8.5m (Center for Land Surface Hazards, 2026). The extent of the humanitarian catastrophe is still being assessed.
Researchers from Nepal, Pakistan, the UK, Ireland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, the US, New Zealand and the Netherlands, including experts in glaciology, mountain hydrology, climate science, humanitarian aid, seismology and social science, have come together to examine the range of factors that may have contributed to this event. While the underlying geological structure controlled where and how the slope failed, longer-term warming and changing precipitation phase from snow to rain may have reduced its stability by weakening ice-filled fractures and rock–ice contacts and increasing water pressure. Climate change is thus best understood as a destabilising factor acting on a pre-existing geological predisposition, rather than the fundamental cause of the failure. Therefore, rather than conducting a conventional attribution study which is typically focused on a single, well-defined weather event, we are bringing together the available scientific knowledge on known and potential drivers, while also investigating how these drivers have changed in a warming climate.
2026 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #38
Posted on 20 September 2026 by BaerbelW, Doug Bostrom
Stories we promoted this week, by category:
Climate Change Impacts (8 articles)
- A Super El Niño Is Building. Florida`s Most Vulnerable Homes Aren`t Ready. A strong El Niño is raising the odds of an active winter storm season—and the Floridians most likely to die in a tornado live in aging manufactured homes the state can’t even count. Inside Climate News, Kate Waxman, Sep 13, 2026.
- The Atmosphere Just Set a Water Vapor Record More water vapor means more rocket fuel for extreme rain — so this record is not good news The Climate Brink, Andrew Dessler, Sep 14, 2026.
- Climate crisis likely behind devastating Nepal-Tibet floods that killed more than 1,300, first study finds Scientists say global heating was a destabilising factor in collapse of 200,000 sq metre glacier in August. The Guardian, Damien Gayle, Sep 16, 2026.
- The open houses at the edge of disaster This story is part of Betting the House, a pop-up climate newsroom bringing together independent journalists to cover climate and housing. HEATED, Emily Atkin, Sep 17, 2026.
- Climate change is making it easier for invasive species to succeed The Conversation, Nicola S. Smith & William W. L. Cheung , Sep 17, 2026.
- MIT researchers are mapping extreme weather risks - and building tools to act on them The Climate Grand Challenges “New World of Weather” project shows how modeling, planning tools, and infrastructure analysis are translating research into real-world resilience. MIT News, David Chandler, Sep 18, 2026.
- What Happens When Earth Passes 1.5 Degrees of Warming? Climate scientist Michael Mann digs into the story behind the latest numbers. Inside Climate News, Steve Curwood, Sep 19, 2026.
- Burning forests, emptying rivers, €180bn in damage: Europe`s politicians face reckoning after `summer of truth` Amid record-shattering heatwaves and popular demand for climate action, why are politicians often timid or in denial? The Guardian, Fiona Harvey, Sep 19, 2026.
Climate Policy and Politics (7 articles)
- This climate problem isn`t on the UN agenda - data centers The slow moving climate talks are struggling to address one of the world’s biggest drivers of rising energy demand. Politico, Sara Schonhardt, Sep 11, 2026.
- EPA Will Remove Carbon Dioxide Limits on Power Plants The U.S. power sector—which accounts for roughly a quarter of the country’s greenhouse gas emissions—will no longer need to abide by Biden-era federal climate pollution regulations. Eos, Grace van Deelen, Sep 14, 2026.
- Trump Administration Will Roll Back Climate Rules According to published reports, the Trump Administration will finalize rules to rollback carbon pollution standards for power plants, as soon as today. Common Dreams, Newswire Editor, Sep 14, 2026.
- Trump Doubles Down on Climate Denial With Plan to Repeal Power Plant Rules The EPA revoked limits on greenhouse gas emissions from power plants, rejecting decades of settled science to argue that they do not contribute to dangerous air pollution. Inside Climate News, Liza Gross, Sep 15, 2026.
- How does unthinkable policy become inevitable? The `Overton window` is one possible answer The Overton window seems convenient for explaining big shifts in public policy. But just how good is it? The Conversation, Joshua Black, Lecturer in Australian Political Studies, University of Canberra, Sep 15, 2026.
- What the science really says about the health and climate risks of carbon pollution The repeal of this rule is the latest in the Trump Administration’s attempts to roll back federal climate regulation. TIME, Simmone Shah, Sep 15, 2026.
- Why Germany is building an ark for U.S. climate data As researchers around the world begin work on the next U.N. climate assessment, fears are growing that the Trump administration could meddle with critical U.S. climate data. In response, scientists are preparing to transfer vast troves of that data to repositories in Germany. YaleEnvironment360, Christian Schwägerl, Sep 17, 2026.
Skeptical Science New Research for Week #38 2026
Posted on 17 September 2026 by Doug Bostrom, Marc Kodack
Open access notables
Projected amplification of global warming by warming-induced greenhouse gas emissions, Abernethy et al., Environmental Research Letters
Warming-induced emissions (WIE) of greenhouse gases from natural sources are a large amplifying feedback that most climate models do not yet represent. This absence risks systematic underestimation of projected future warming and overestimation of remaining carbon budgets. To assess the potential magnitude of these feedbacks, we derived relationships between global temperature and WIE rates from process-based model estimates across three Shared Socioeconomic Pathways, SSP1-2.6, SSP2-4.5, and SSP4-6.0. The warming-induced methane emission rate from permafrost, wetlands, freshwaters, and wildfire combined increases with temperature at an estimated 97 ± 6 Tg CH4 yr−1 °C−1 across all three scenarios, while the warming-induced carbon dioxide emission rate from permafrost and wildfire combined increases at 7 ± 1 Pg CO2 yr−1 °C−1 in SSP2-4.5 and SSP4-6.0. Using the MAGICC climate model, we projected that WIE could add 0.2 °C–0.4 °C of warming by 2100 across scenarios, split roughly equally between carbon dioxide and methane, amplifying post-2020 anthropogenic warming by 20%–30%. Combined emission sensitivity and climate response 1σ uncertainties are ±0.2 °C on the added warming and ±10%–30% on the warming amplification.
Interpreting Ensembles of Climate Projections for Impact Studies, Chandler & Brierley, Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews Climate Change
To study the potential impacts of future changes in the earth's climate, projections of these changes are required. These are usually produced using complex computer models, and are subject to many uncertainties which are often sampled using collections (“ensembles”) of model simulations. However, the sampling in any individual ensemble is incomplete and often unrepresentative. This creates challenges for users of the projections, especially when it is important to understand the range of potential impacts that can reasonably be expected. Other challenges include the presence of systematic discrepancies between the model outputs and observations of the real climate system; and the fact that it is often infeasible to work with all members of an ensemble so that an appropriate subset must be chosen. Various approaches have been suggested for addressing each of these issues: a critical review is provided here, to allow an informed choice depending on the requirements of a given application.
The emergence of climate migration research as an academic field, Kohutova et al., Frontiers in Climat
This study examines how research on climate migration has developed from a dispersed topic of academic interest into a distinct academic field. Although the links between environment and human mobility have been studied for over a century, less attention has been paid to how knowledge has been structured and institutionalized around this topic. To address this gap, the article examines how climate migration scholarship has grown, organized its scholarly community, and gained recognition from external actors. Drawing on theories of field formation, we analyse four dimensions of academic fields: differentiation from other research areas, epistemic and social coherence among scholars, their social infrastructure and legitimacy-building. The study uses a mixed-methods approach combining bibliometric analysis, document and policy review, and expert interviews. The findings show that the formation of climate migration as a research field was a cumulative process. Policy attention brought resources for more research, while a shared understanding that climate migration is driven by multiple interacting factors, not climate alone, gave scholars common ground to organize around. Expanding citations and co-authorships networks then gave the field its structure over time. However, the field formation remains uneven. The networks are geographically uneven, research is being published across hundreds of journals, and theoretical frameworks are underdeveloped. Overall, the article shows how new research topics consolidate as academic fields and argues that the label of ‘research field' is not merely descriptive because it impacts visibility, resources, and epistemic authority.
Future warming enhances rates of population increase of arthropod crop pests globally, Molina et al., Ecography
We compiled a dataset on the thermal biology of arthropod crop pests and fitted TPCs to examine the projected shifts in performance under historic and future climates relative to their thermal niches, which were examined through modelling the latitudinal variation of their population-level thermal limits. Our findings highlight that most arthropod crop pests are projected to increase their thermal potential for population growth under warming by 2050, with temperate populations retaining room to grow but tropical populations increasingly exposed to heat stress. These findings can be explained by the asymmetric variation of thermal niche limits for these intrinsic rates of population increase, since we found that lower thermal limits declined with latitude, while upper thermal limits remained constant.
From this week's government/NGO section:
Communicating about Climate and Clean Energy in an Age of Affordability, Andrea Everett, Heatmap and Embold Research
Each phase of research built on the previous one, starting with a large national survey to uncover the core values, priorities, and beliefs of three broad segments of the electorate with different views of climate change. These groups were labelled as Skeptics, Persuadables, and Persuadeds. For climate and clean energy communicators, the electorate is best understood as three distinct audiences. Persuadeds already believe in the 11 urgency of climate action and clean energy. What they lack is the conviction that their own actions matter, so the core tasks are to give them concrete, achievable things to do and to help them see that their efforts matter. Persuadables are open but unconvinced, and on the central issue of clean energy affordability they demand proof they can see close to home, rather than broad statistics or slogans. Skeptics, meanwhile, may be reachable through appeals to their values of personal freedom and energy independence, supplemented by evidence on cost and reliability, but with so few trusted messengers to make the case, clean energy remains a tough sell.
What are the top social media platforms used by each of Global Warming’s Six Americas?, Ettinger et al., Yale University and George Mason University
In Fall 2025, as part of a biannual Climate Change in the American Mind survey, the authors asked a nationally representative sample of Americans (n = 1,146) how often they visit 14 different social media platforms. They were also asked how often they hear about global warming on social media. Across Global Warming’s Six Americas, the most commonly visited social media platforms are YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram. The Alarmed hear about global warming on social media more often than other segments of the Six Americas.
94 articles in 53 journals by 625 contributing authors
Physical science of climate change, effects
Contrasting SST modes explain decadal intensification of Pacific Walker Circulation, Li et al., Atmospheric Research 10.1016/j.atmosres.2026.109338
The next water crisis is beneath our feet
Posted on 16 September 2026 by Guest Author
This is a re-post from Yale Climate Connections by Sanket Jain
Extreme heat and widespread drought related to climate change have been in the headlines this summer everywhere from Europe to the Colorado River Basin to Puerto Rico and Bangladesh. But drought is only the beginning of the problem for drinking water. Scientists say the depleted groundwater supplies that remain will warm by 2.1 degrees C globally by the end of this century – changing their chemistry and leading to contamination.
And heat is just one concern. Droughts and fluctuating rainfall patterns are also altering groundwater quality. The good news is that around the world, local and regional authorities are experimenting with ways to replenish groundwater, including methods for collecting excess rainfall or surface runoff and channeling it to replenish aquifers. The work is in early stages, but some methods already are showing promise.
Warming water, changing chemistry
As groundwater warms, dissolved gases become less soluble, while organisms underground can consume oxygen more rapidly. Because many aquifers already contain little oxygen, modest warming could make them even more oxygen-poor.
In some aquifers, this shift can mobilize naturally occurring contaminants such as arsenic, manganese, and phosphorus from surrounding rocks into groundwater, making it less safe to drink. The extra phosphorus can fuel harmful algal blooms when groundwater eventually flows into rivers and lakes. Warmer groundwater may also favor pathogens linked to waterborne diseases.
Under a stable climate, Earth gets warmer deeper underground because heat from the Earth’s core moves toward the cooler land surface, explained Barret Kurylyk, a professor of civil and resource engineering at Dalhousie University and Canada Research Chair in Coastal Water Resources.
“In the past few decades, the land surface has warmed due to climate change,” he said.
As the surface becomes warmer than shallow aquifers, the usual temperature difference reverses, causing heat to move downward toward groundwater. Movement of rain or snow downward can also transfer heat into groundwater, exacerbating the change in groundwater chemistry.
This heat transfer matters because groundwater accounts for 99% of the Earth’s liquid freshwater, provides about half the world’s drinking water, and supplies nearly 40% of the water used for irrigation. By 2100, an estimated 77-188 million people are expected to live in areas where groundwater exceeds the highest drinking-water temperature acceptable threshold adopted by any country.
The Atmosphere Just Set a Water Vapor Record
Posted on 15 September 2026 by Guest Author
This is a re-post from The Climate Brink by Andrew Dessler
A few days ago, on an atmospheric sciences mailing list, Prof. Gary Lackmann pointed out that August 2026 set a record for the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere. I thought this was right in TCB’s wheelhouse, so I’ve dug further into the numbers in this post.
What does “precipitable water” mean?
Precipitable water (abbreviated PWAT) is the water in the atmosphere that’s available to condense and fall as rain or snow. We quantify it by calculating how deep a puddle it would make if you condensed all of the water vapor in the atmosphere and rained it to the surface. The value is typically reported in millimeters.
Here is the average PWAT over the 1991–2020 period. The global average is about 24 mm, enough to make a puddle about an inch deep.
The distribution of PWAT follows the distribution of temperature. The reason is thermodynamics: the amount of water vapor that air can hold increases by roughly 7% for every degree Celsius of warming, following the Clausius–Clapeyron relation. The result is high PWAT in warm tropics and low PWAT in cold polar regions.
Factcheck: Reform UK’s 45 false or misleading claims about climate and energy
Posted on 14 September 2026 by Guest Author
This is a re-post from Carbon Brief by Josh Gabbatiss, Daisy Dunne, Molly Lempriere, Dr Simon Evans
Reform UK, led by Nigel Farage, has emerged as a major force in UK politics in recent years – pushing anti-net-zero policies, alongside vehement opposition to immigration.
The hard-right populist party is currently mired in a funding controversy and only has a handful of MPs, yet, until recently, it had been leading in national polls for more than a year.
As seen with many similar parties across Europe and beyond, a rejection of climate science is central to Reform’s ideological outlook.
Richard Tice, the party’s deputy leader, is a vocal critic of what he calls “net stupid zero” and has incorrectly blamed “the sun or volcanoes” for human-caused global warming.
As Reform’s energy spokesperson, Tice has also been clear that, if the party were ever to form a national government, it would scrap the UK’s net-zero target, support fossil-fuel expansion and tear up existing contracts for renewable energy.
While less vocal on the subject, Farage has, nevertheless, expressed climate-sceptic views and falsely blamed net-zero policies for the “deindustrialisation of Britain”.
These views draw on long-standing, inaccurate climate-sceptic narratives and are reflected in Reform’s election manifestos, its actions in local government and the opinions of many of its supporters.
Here, Carbon Brief gathers together by topic and factchecks 45 false or misleading claims made by the party’s leadership relating to climate change, renewables and net-zero.
2026 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #37
Posted on 13 September 2026 by BaerbelW, Doug Bostrom
Stories we promoted this week, by category:
Climate Change Impacts (10 articles)
- Satellite images of penguin droppings reveal impact of antarctic warming Penguin colonies are so large that their masses of excrement can be seen from space, offering scientists a useful means of studying the Antarctic birds. An analysis of 30 years of satellite images of penguin guano shows how the birds’ diets are shifting in response to warming. Yale Environment 360, Staff, Sep 06, 2026.
- Learning from the summers of 1976 and 2026 We have changed the climate in which our weather happens Climat Lab Book, Ed Hawkins, Sep 7, 2026.
- How climate change may amplify the impact of earthquakes in the Arctic Phys.org, Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres, Sep 07, 2026.
- America is losing its war against wildfire The opportunities to let wildfire do its job are being increasingly extinguished by hotter, drier conditions that last longer throughout the year. Grist, Mark Betancourt, Sep 08, 2026.
- Many People Aren`t Connecting the Dots Between Climate Change and Extreme Weather Scientific evidence has never been stronger. Why aren’t more people making the link? Inside Climate News, Kiley Price, Sep 08, 2026.
- Can an entire Arctic ecosystem evolve to adapt to the climate crisis? In the first project of its kind, scientists are trying to answer if the future of Alaska’s streams and tundra may depend not on survival of the fittest but on how species adapt together The Guardian, Gloria Dickie, Sep 09, 2026.
- We just had the hottest August, hottest summer, and hottest year to date in U.S. history NOAA data show unprecedented heat, as deepening drought, shrinking reservoirs, and a severe wildfire season underscore the growing impacts of a warming climate. Could El Niño bring some relief? Yale Climate Connections, Bob Henson, Sep 09, 2026.
- Major study to assess impacts of climate change on Scotland`s canals Scottish Canals is working with two globally renowned climate and heritage experts to assess the growing challenges posed by climate change to Scotland’s network of canals. The Herald News, Craig Williams, Sep 10, 2026.
- Climate `feedback loops` could worsen global warming by 30%, study finds Emissions of planet-heating methane and CO2 from natural sources are worsening the climate crisis, paper says The Guardian, Oliver Milman, Sep 10, 2026.
- Earth just had its hottest August on record The intensifying super El Niño, combined with global warming, is favored to make 2026 the hottest year on record, with 2027 expected to be even hotter. Yale Climate Connections, Jeff Masters and Bob Henson, Sep 10, 2026.
Climate Policy and Politics (4 articles)
- The Worst Case Is Still on the Table Why removing RCP8.5 from the National Climate Assessment would be a serious mistake The Climate Brink, Andrew Dessler, Sep 04, 2026.
- Climate experts respond to the government’s plan to amend the Fifth National Climate Assessment Climate.Us, Rebecca Lindsey, Sep 8, 2026.
- As science comes under attack at UN talks, climate movement splits over how to respond A rift over how IPCC messages are produced and turned into policy is creating tensions in the world’s most influential coalition of climate NGOs Climate Home News, Matteo Civillini, Sep 09, 2026.
- With multilateralism in crisis, what`s next for climate philanthropy? Climate philanthropy must do more than fill the gaps left by retreating governments and find new ways to support climate action in a fragmented global landscape. Climate Home News, Megan Rowling, Sep 11, 2026.
Skeptical Science New Research for Week #37 2026
Posted on 10 September 2026 by Doug Bostrom, Marc Kodack
Open access notables
Early warning signals for tipping points in complex climate systems, LIU et al., Advances in Climate Change Research
The growing risk of climate tipping events underscores the urgent need for reliable early warning signals (EWS). Here we synthesize recent advances in EWS research for climate systems, systematically categorizing available methods into three groups, namely statistical indicators, nonlinear dynamical diagnostics, and data-driven approaches, and evaluating their theoretical applicability to practical limitations. In conclusion, statistical indicators offer theoretical clarity but are sensitive to non-stationary noise, nonlinear dynamical methods provide enhanced robustness in high-dimensional settings, and network- and deep learning-based approaches show the potential for detecting diverse tipping types, particularly when integrated with physical constraints and multi-modal observations. Given these trade-offs, we advocate for three practical strategies to enhance EWS utility, including adopting ensemble frameworks that combine multiple indicators to reduce false alarms, advancing cascade EWS to capture cross-system tipping interactions, and shifting from qualitative trend warnings toward quantitative, threshold-defined predictions with quantifiable uncertainties. We also discuss supporting techniques for these strategies, including adaptive noise filtering, dimensionality reduction, satellite data integration, and physics-informed machine learning. This review provides a structured reference for method selection across climate subsystems and data regimes, and underscores that operational EWS will require sustained integration of nonlinear dynamics, Earth observation, and data science.
Countering climate misinformation with large language models: Evidence from ChatGPT, Tsang & Wang, PLOS Climate
Public support for climate action hinges on the integrity of information environments. In an online experiment, U.S. adults used ChatGPT to evaluate climate-related claims. We first conducted computational text analysis of GPT conversation logs, assessing valence, formality, bias, recency, authority cues, and semantic richness of ChatGPT’s responses using language-model based classifiers and link-level metadata. Concurrently, we measured credibility judgments for both the claims and ChatGPT’s responses through participant self-reports. Credibility perceptions were driven primarily by individual differences; greater acceptance of the scientific consensus, attention to climate change, prior familiarity with ChatGPT, and younger age predicted higher perceived credibility. Once these factors were accounted for, authority cues were associated with slightly less extreme climate attitudes, while positive valence and semantic richness correlated positively with perceived credibility. These results support transparent, unbiased, audience-tailored engagement as a pathway to strengthen responsible climate communication and help bridge the gap between scientific consensus and public understanding.
Lost in Projection: Uncertainty is Misrepresented in Climate Risk and Vulnerability Assessments, Curran et al., Risk Analysis
In practice, many climate change risk assessments fail to capture the true depth of uncertainty. Despite widespread scientific recognition of deep uncertainty (large ranges of possibility) in climate conditions, this nuance is often lost in translation to policy and planning contexts; instead, conditions are presented as single projections. This means that communities are making large-scale infrastructure investments and long-term policy commitments based on false precision, leaving them unprepared for climate surprises or potentially wasting resources and disrupting communities unnecessarily by overadapting. To examine how climate uncertainties are represented and accounted for in adaptation planning, we conducted a structured review of 39 climate risk and vulnerability assessments from across the world, using sea level rise as a case study. These documents inform policy that guides billions of dollars in infrastructure investments and shape community preparedness strategies. Our analysis reveals that only 54% of these documents correctly represent sea level rise as deeply uncertain. This issue is compounded when making decisions; 71% of decisions were made by misapplying scenarios as individual projections to plan for, rather than as a tool for exploring potential future conditions, directly contradicting their intended use. This demonstrates a gap between scientific understanding of climate uncertainty and planning practice. Addressing this gap requires improved uncertainty communication, moving beyond just quantifying uncertainty to also characterizing uncertainty. This must be done in conjunction with the support of decision makers to incorporate a stronger understanding of uncertainty into planning by using tools designed specifically for decision making in deeply uncertain environments.
From this week's government/NGO section:
How Climate Resilient Are the World’s Largest Cities?, AlphaGeo
Geography is not destiny. Cities with near-identical physical risk scores diverge by as much as 33 resilience-adjusted risk (RAJ) points depending on the adaptation measures in place — demonstrating that risk is not fixed, and that resilience is a function of policy and investment, not geography alone. South Asian megacities face a compounding crisis. Ahmedabad (RAJ 41), Hyderabad Pakistan (41), Multan (38), Dhaka (36), Kolkata (35), and Lahore (35) combine extreme physical exposure with only moderate adaptation performance. European, African, and Latin American capitals outperform. Chicago, Addis Ababa, Melbourne, Barcelona, Buenos Aires, Paris, and Nairobi all score below 14 on the RAJ scale, making them among the most resilient major cities globally. Chinese megacities are closing the gap. Beijing (50%), Tianjin (49%), Shenzhen (49%), and Shanghai (46%) lead globally on adaptation efficiency — consistently converting high physical exposure into substantially lower residual risk. Mispriced risk is concentrated in South Asia. South Asia accounts for the majority of cities where residual RAJ scores remain high and adaptation rates remain comparatively low relative to the scale of physical exposure.
Heathrow Airport expansion risks for the Climate Change Act, Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, University of Manchester
The authors examine whether a third runway at Heathrow Airport is compatible with the UK’s domestic and international legal climate change obligations, and shows how growing airport capacity before climate technologies succeed will break the UK’s carbon budget. Through an analysis of future UK aviation scenarios and reviewing the status and outlook for key technology options, the authors findings show that Heathrow expansion cannot reasonably be considered consistent with UK Government climate targets. The authors examine three questions including the level of demand implied by an expanded Heathrow Airport; whether sustainable aviation fuels (SAF) can mitigate emissions arising from any net additional demand; and if greenhouse gas removal (GGR) expansion can address remaining additional residual emissions. This assessment is within the context of the UK’s Seventh Carbon Budget, which is a legally binding limit on greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) in the period when the third runway is proposed to start operating.
92 articles in 50 journals by 638 contributing authors
Physical science of climate change, effects
Anthropogenic forcing dominates relentless westward extension of the western North Pacific subtropical high, An et al., Atmospheric Research Open Access 10.1016/j.atmosres.2026.109301
Climate Trunk - Political Economy
Posted on 9 September 2026 by BaerbelW
In April 2026 we published a guest blog post by John Lang in which he introduced his "Climate Trunk" graphics project and website. Since then, he has been adding one graphic per week and plans to keep going for about 2 years rounding out the big picture of human-caused climate change graphic by graphic. In this blog post we'll show-case the graphics related to political economy and will keep adding more as they get published.
How interests, incumbents and competing priorities shape the speed of the transition.
#5 - The New Energy Calculus
The pursuit of clean energy is no longer climate policy. It is increasingly a strategy for security, affordability, development, sovereignty and lower import bills – reshaping how governments think about energy and national interest.
From three to six
#6 - But we are less than 1% - Emissions
No country is too small to matter. Nations that each emit around 1% of global CO2 may look negligible on their own, but together they produce about 30% of the total – roughly as much as China – so if they sit it out, the maths doesn’t stack up.
Climate change is a global collective action problem. There are no neglibile emitters.
Fact brief - Does hosting wind turbines provide farmers with additional income?
Posted on 8 September 2026 by Sue Bin Park
Skeptical Science is partnering with Gigafact to produce fact briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. You can submit claims you think need checking via the tipline.
Does hosting wind turbines provide farmers with additional income?
Wind projects provide farmers with substantial economic benefits while allowing most land to remain in agricultural use.
The National Renewable Energy Laboratory estimates about 98% of land within a typical wind project remains available for farming, grazing, or other uses.
Meanwhile, farmers who host turbines can receive long-term lease payments that provide additional income and financial stability. One study found that farmers with turbines invested about twice as much in their farms, while 80% had plans for who would take over or inherit the farm, compared with 62% of farmers without turbines.
Compared with the small amount of farmland used by turbines, unmitigated climate change poses broader risks to agriculture through heat, drought, shifting pests, and reduced crop yields.
Go to full rebuttal on Skeptical Science or to the fact brief on Gigafact
This fact brief is responsive to quotes such as this one.
Sources
NREL Examining Supply-Side Options to Achieve 100% Clean Electricity by 2035
Handbook of Sustainability and Social Science Research Wind Energy and Rural Community Sustainability
Center for Rural Affairs Navigating Land Leases for Wind and Solar
IPCC Special Report on Climate Change and Land: Chapter 5
Columbia Law School Sabin Center for Climate Change Law Rebutting 33 False Claims About Solar, Wind, and Electric Vehicles
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Fixing one of climate’s worst plots
Posted on 7 September 2026 by Guest Author
This is a re-post from The Climate Brink by Andrew Dessler
This is the third and last in our series discussing the use of unadjusted data and how it overstates the warmth of the 1930s over the U.S. See part one and part two for more.
A hall of fame for bad climate plots would definitely include this one:
The plot covers the continental U.S., and it dramatically shows that temperatures in the 1930s were more extreme than those of the present period. The metric plotted, the heat wave index, is constructed as a station?average count of qualifying 4?day warm spells (mean temperature exceeds a local one?in?ten?year threshold) in each year, so higher values mean that heat waves were more frequent in that year.
It was originally published in 1999 and has gone through several iterations, with the one above from an EPA website in 2021.
Don’t take this as criticism of the original paper — it was published in 1999, after all. However, the plot has hung around long past its expiration date and has since become a staple of climate denial. I think it’s time to reconsider what the plot actually tells us.
2026 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #36
Posted on 6 September 2026 by BaerbelW, Doug Bostrom
Stories we promoted this week, by category:
Climate Change Impacts (6 articles)
- When a mountain falls: How ice and rock triggered Nepal`s catastrophic flood - and why climate change is raising the risks The Conversation, Umesh Haritashya, Aug 29, 2026.
- Climate crisis pushes French winemakers to bet on warmer future in Brittany and Normandy An important part of the French economy is chased north by climate change but successful adapatation is not a certainty. France 24, France 24 staff, Aug 31, 2026.
- Coral Reefs Are Running Out of Time to Recover, Research Finds Rising sea temperatures mean reefs don’t have enough time to bounce back between intense heat waves, a new report warns. New York Times, Quinn Glabicki, Aug 31, 2026.
- Nepal`s glacial collapse foreshadowed a future of climate disaster | Michael Mann The deluge capped a summer of extreme climate events, from deadly heatwaves to wildfires. We must take action now The Guardian, Michael Mann, Sep 01, 2026.
- UN finally admits global warming will shoot past 1.5 ºC climate limit According to a report released today by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the best the planet can hope for on its current emissions trajectory is warming of about 1.8 ºC above pre-industrial levels this century. Nature, James Dinneen, Sept 2 2026.
- Canadians should prepare for a 5 C hotter future, report warns The second edition of Canada's Changing Climate Report, a synthesis of the science on the impact of a warming planet on Canadians, confirms with greater confidence that burning fossil fuels, or what the report calls "human activities," are responsible for climate change. CBC Canada News, David Thurton, Sep 04, 2026.
Climate Science and Research (6 articles)
- How the greenhouse effect was discovered A video about the first paper detailing the greenhouse effect and examining the role of varying levels of carbon dioxide was released back in 1896. Youtube, Simon Clark, Aug 29, 2026.
- As super El Nino strengthens, study suggests that climate change is intensifying El Ninos Phys.org, Seth Borenstein, Aug 30, 2026.
- Forests didn't fare well during an ancient global warming event, offering a 'cautionary' tale about today's climate change Smithsonian Magazine, Sarah Hashemi, Aug 30, 2026.
- Explainer: The CMIP7 emissions scenarios - and how they explore future climate change Every six to seven years, climate modelling groups around the world run a coordinated set of simulations that explore how the climate could change in the future. Carbon Brief, Zeke Hausfather, Aug 31, 2026.
- EXPERT REACTION: Quick action needed as the world is set to get hotter than we hoped Rapid expert reaction to the UN's belated acknowledgement of committed overshoot of the previously agreed acceptable 1.5°C global warming threshold. Australian Science Media (scimex), Australian Science Media Centre staff, Sept 2, 2026.
- Skeptical Science New Research for Week #36 2026 Highlighted articles in our latest weekly climate research scan focus on various forms of reality-denial, purposefully for profit or as unconscious obedience to political ideology. Skeptical Science, Doug Bostrom & Marc Kodack, Sep 03, 2026.
