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To tackle dangerous global warming, countries have started to clean up their power plants and cars. That’s one big takeaway from a new, detailed forecast of global greenhouse gas emissions published Thursday by the Rhodium Group, a research firm. Overall, the report estimates that the world is currently on track to heat up roughly 2.8 degrees Celsius, or 5 degrees Fahrenheit, above preindustrial levels by 2100. Many world leaders and scientists consider that much warming to be perilous. Trying to predict emissions so far out in the future is inherently difficult, but the forecast offers a rough guide to where countries appear poised to make progress on climate change in the years ahead — and where they are still struggling.

☆ Nations Are Getting Serious About Climate Action. Just Not Serious Enough.
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-20 | by ( Brad Plumer | More About Brad Plumer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Under the Paris Agreement, world leaders vowed to hold global warming to “well below” 2 degrees Celsius, and preferably closer to 1.5 degrees Celsius, in order to limit the risks from climate catastrophes. The planet has already warmed roughly 1.2 degrees Celsius. To stay below 2 degrees Celsius, global emissions would need to fall roughly 29 percent between now and 2030. To stay at 1.5 degrees, global emissions would need to fall about 43 percent. Earth will keep getting hotter and temperature records will keep getting shattered, scientists say, until countries manage to reduce their emissions down to nearly zero.

Persons: don’t, they’ve, ”, Anne Olhoff Locations: Paris, Denmark

☆ In a U.S. First, a Commercial Plant Starts Pulling Carbon From the Air
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-09 | by ( Brad Plumer | More About Brad Plumer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In an open-air warehouse in California’s Central Valley, 40-foot-tall racks hold hundreds of trays filled with a white powder that turns crusty as it absorbs carbon dioxide from the sky. The start-up that built the facility, Heirloom Carbon Technologies, calls it the first commercial plant in the United States to use direct air capture, which involves vacuuming greenhouse gases from the atmosphere. Heirloom will take the carbon dioxide it pulls from the air and have the gas sealed permanently in concrete, where it can’t heat the planet. Microsoft has already signed a deal with Heirloom to remove 315,000 tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. The plant can absorb a maximum of 1,000 tons of carbon dioxide per year, equal to the exhaust from about 200 cars.

Organizations: Carbon, Microsoft Locations: Central Valley, United States, Iceland, Tracy , Calif

A developer of small nuclear reactors announced on Wednesday that it was canceling a project that had been widely expected to usher in a new wave of power plants. NuScale Power, a company in Portland, Ore., said it lacked enough subscribers to advance the Carbon-Free Power Project, which had been expected to deliver six of the company’s 77-megawatt reactors. The Carbon-Free Power Project was the result of an agreement between NuScale and Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems, which supplies electricity to public power providers in seven Western states, including California. “This decision is very disappointing given the years of pioneering hard work,” said Mason Baker, chief executive of Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems. “We are working closely with NuScale and the U.S. Department of Energy on next steps to wind the project down.”

Persons: NuScale, ”, Mason Baker Organizations: Power, Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems, U.S . Department of Energy Locations: Portland ,, Idaho, NuScale, Utah, California

☆ Biden Administration Approves Biggest Offshore Wind Farm Yet, in Virginia
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-31 | by ( Brad Plumer | More About Brad Plumer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The Interior Department on Tuesday approved a plan to install up to 176 giant wind turbines off the coast of Virginia, clearing the way for what would be the nation’s largest offshore wind farm yet. The Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind project, to be built by Dominion Energy, is the fifth commercial-scale offshore wind project approved by the Biden administration. The decision comes at a perilous time for the offshore wind industry. To fight climate change, the Biden administration wants to install 30 gigawatts of offshore wind power in the United States by 2030. In New York, the developers of four proposed offshore wind farms recently asked the state for more money before moving forward.

Persons: Biden Organizations: Interior Department, Dominion Energy, Commonwealth, York Locations: Virginia, United States, Pacific, Massachusetts, New York

☆ Energy Dept. Pours Billions into Power Grids but Warns It’s Not Enough
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-30 | by ( Brad Plumer | More About Brad Plumer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The Energy Department on Monday announced $1.3 billion to help build three large power lines across six states, part of a new gusher of money from Washington to upgrade America’s electric grids so they can handle more wind and solar power and better tolerate extreme weather. In a major report published the same day, the Energy Department said that the nation’s vast network of transmission lines may need to expand by two-thirds or more by 2035 to meet President Biden’s goals to power the country with clean energy. That would help slash carbon dioxide emitted by gas and coal-fired electric plants — pollution that is heating the planet. “We need to seriously build out transmission,” Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said. The nation’s electric system is divided into a patchwork of regions, each overseen by different operators.

Persons: Biden’s, Jennifer Granholm Organizations: Energy Department, ” Locations: Washington

☆ Energy Agency Sees Peaks in Global Oil, Coal and Gas Demand By 2030
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-24 | by ( Brad Plumer | More About Brad Plumer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

If that all came to pass, oil and gas demand would most likely plateau at slightly above today’s levels for the next three decades, expanding in developing countries and shrinking in advanced economies. “The transition to clean energy is happening worldwide and it’s unstoppable,” said Fatih Birol, executive director of the International Energy Agency. After Mr. Birol first suggested the possibility in September, the oil cartel OPEC warned that such forecasts were highly uncertain and could lead countries and companies to underinvest in oil and gas drilling. If demand for fossil fuels did not fall as expected, the cartel said, the lack of supply could lead to “energy chaos.”OPEC issued its own outlook last year projecting that global demand for oil and natural gas would keep rising until 2045. “I have a gentle suggestion to oil executives, they only talk among themselves,” Mr. Birol said in an interview.

Persons: ”, Fatih Birol, “ It’s, ’ it’s, ’ —, Birol, “, ” Mr, — Organizations: International Energy Agency, OPEC

☆ Peak Oil Is Near, Energy Agency Says, but Climate Change Is Far From Solved
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-26 | by ( Brad Plumer | More About Brad Plumer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In a new report, the International Energy Agency issued an updated road map of what it would take to slash the world’s energy-related greenhouse gas emissions to nearly zero by 2050. The agency laid out its first version of the road map in 2021 and said at the time that immediate action was needed to hit that target. On the one hand, global investment in low-emissions energy has increased roughly 40 percent, reaching $1.8 trillion this year. And the rapid expansion of solar power and electric vehicles has largely been in line with what that earlier report recommended, particularly in places like China, the United States and Europe. But the world can’t solve climate change with solar power and batteries alone, the new report warns.

Organizations: International Energy Agency Locations: China, United States, Europe

☆ Climate Report Card Says Countries Are Trying, but Urgently Need Improvement
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-08 | by ( Brad Plumer | More About Brad Plumer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Eight years after world leaders approved a landmark agreement in Paris to fight climate change, countries have made only limited progress in staving off the most dangerous effects of global warming, according to the first official report card on the global climate treaty. Many of the worst-case climate change scenarios that were much feared in the early 2010s look far less likely today, the report said. The authors partly credit the 2015 Paris Agreement, under which, for the first time, almost every country agreed to submit a voluntary plan to curb its own planet-warming emissions. Under the Paris Agreement, countries vowed to limit the rise in average global temperatures to “well below” 2 degrees Celsius, or 3.6 Fahrenheit, above preindustrial levels and make a good-faith effort to stay at 1.5 degrees Celsius. Earth has already heated up roughly 1.2 degrees Celsius since preindustrial times.

Locations: Paris, staving, United States, South Africa

☆ The Race to Unlock a Vast Source of Clean Energy Beneath Our Feet
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-28 | by ( Brad Plumer | More About Brad Plumer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

It was a drilling rig, of all things, transplanted from the oil fields of North Dakota. But the softly whirring rig wasn’t searching for fossil fuels. Mr. Latimer’s company, Fervo Energy, is part of an ambitious effort to unlock vast amounts of geothermal energy from Earth’s hot interior, a source of renewable power that could help displace fossil fuels that are dangerously warming the planet. “There’s a virtually unlimited resource down there if we can get at it,” said Mr. Latimer. “Geothermal doesn’t use much land, it doesn’t produce emissions, it can complement wind and solar power.

Persons: Tim Latimer gazed, ”, Latimer Organizations: Fervo Locations: Utah, North Dakota, “

☆ A Bottleneck on the Grid Threatens Clean Energy. New Rules Aim to Help.
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-27 | by ( Brad Plumer | More About Brad Plumer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Federal regulators on Thursday approved new rules to speed up the process for connecting wind and solar projects to the electric grid, in an attempt to reduce the growing delays that have become one of the biggest obstacles to building renewable energy in the United States. Energy companies are investing hundreds of billions of dollars in wind farms, solar arrays and batteries, spurred on by federal tax breaks and falling costs. But these projects face a severe bottleneck: It is getting harder and taking longer to connect new power plants to the power lines that carry electricity to homes and businesses. More than 10,000 energy projects — mostly wind, solar and batteries — were seeking permission to connect to electric grids at the end of 2022, up from 5,600 two years earlier. The new rules by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which oversees electricity markets, aim to streamline that approval process, known as the interconnection queue.

Organizations: United States . Energy, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Locations: United States

☆ Heat Records Fall Around the Globe as Earth Warms, Fast
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-06 | by ( Brad Plumer | More About Brad Plumer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

On Tuesday, global average temperatures rose to a new high of 62.9 degrees Fahrenheit. But, he added, there may be other factors layered on top of human-caused warming that have helped drive temperatures up so dramatically in recent months. For instance, a cyclical phenomenon in the Pacific Ocean known as the El Niño-Southern Oscillation causes year-to-year fluctuations by shifting heat in and out of deeper ocean layers. Global surface temperatures tend to be somewhat cooler during La Niña years and somewhat hotter during El Niño years. “A big reason we’re seeing so many records shattered is that we’re transitioning out of an unusually long three-year La Niña, which suppressed temperatures a bit, and into a strong El Niño,” Dr. Hausfather said.

Persons: Zeke Hausfather, El, “, Hausfather Organizations: Service, Berkeley, Southern

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