Looking to recap everything green and good that happened this past month? Don’t worry, we’ve got you! From electing a female climate scientist as President to harmful gases destroying ozone layer falling faster than expected, we’re giving you the scoop on 10 of the weird and wonderful things that happened around the world in June or so.
- Mexico Elected a Female Climate Scientist as President
At 61 years old, Claudia Sheinbaum arguably possesses the most extensive climate science background of any political leader in history. After completing her doctoral studies in California, focusing on building emissions and the environmental impact of Mexico City’s transportation sector, Sheinbaum joined the faculty at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. She contributed to significant reports by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in 2007 and 2014, efforts recognised with a Nobel Prize for fostering an informed consensus on the link between human activities and global warming.
Sheinbaum’s expertise is particularly timely as her country’s capital, Mexico City, grapples with an intense heatwave causing unusual phenomena like monkeys falling from trees. Globally, each of the past 12 months has set new temperature records, while ocean surface temperatures are also hitting unprecedented highs. Her track record in politics strongly suggests she will take decisive action on climate issues.
- Future impact of proposed fossil fuel projects must be assessed, UK court rules
The Supreme Court in London has ruled that the climate impact of burning coal, oil, and gas must be considered when deciding whether to approve projects. This landmark judgment, delivered on Thursday, sets a significant precedent on whether the future greenhouse gas emissions from a fossil fuel project should be taken into account.
Campaigners celebrated the ruling as a “huge win in the fight for a livable climate” and noted that it strengthens several other domestic lawsuits challenging fossil fuel extraction.
The case was brought by campaigner Sarah Finch, who contested Surrey County Council’s decision to extend planning permission for an oil drilling well at Horse Hill, in the Weald. Finch argued that the council should have considered the greenhouse gas emissions from using the oil, known as “scope 3” or downstream emissions, when assessing the environmental impacts of the project, rather than just the emissions from the drilling site itself. The council maintained that it had the discretion to determine the full impact of a project.
Although lower courts were not supportive of Finch’s arguments, the majority of the Supreme Court found it “plain” that the combustion emissions from an oil project are part of its overall environmental effects.
- EU approves law to hit gas imports with methane emissions limit
Recently, European Union countries approved the imposition of methane emissions limits on oil and gas imports starting in 2030, urging international suppliers to reduce leaks of this potent greenhouse gas. Methane, the primary component of natural gas used in power plants and home heating, is the second-largest contributor to climate change after carbon dioxide. It exacerbates global warming when it escapes from leaky oil and gas pipelines and infrastructure.
At a meeting in Brussels, EU ministers gave their final approval to the policy, allowing it to enter into force. Hungary was the only country to vote against it. Beginning in 2030, the EU will enforce “maximum methane intensity values” on fossil fuels sold in the European market. The European Commission will establish the specific methane limits by that date. Importers who exceed these limits may face financial penalties.
- Researchers Develop a Plastic That Digests Itself
Researchers at the University of California, San Diego, have developed a type of biodegradable plastic that begins to decompose upon contact with soil or compost.
This innovative plastic, a thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU), is commonly used in products like memory foam, cushions, floor mats, and shoes. The new TPU variant includes spores of Bacillus subtilis, which remain dormant until the plastic reaches compost. There, the bacteria activate and start breaking down the plastic.
“It’s an inherent property of these bacteria,” explained Jon Pokorski, a co-author of the study and a nanoengineering professor at UC San Diego’s Jacobs School of Engineering. “We tested several strains to determine their ability to use TPUs as a sole carbon source and selected the most effective one.”
The research team combined the bacteria with the TPU in a plastic extruder, melting and mixing the materials to create the biodegradable plastic.
- White House Launches National Strategy to Combat Food Waste
In a groundbreaking move, the Biden administration has unveiled a comprehensive national strategy to tackle the significant issue of food waste in the United States. This initiative, the first of its kind at the national level, aims to reduce the vast quantities of edible food that end up in landfills each year.
Approximately 30% of the U.S. food supply goes uneaten and is discarded, making food the largest type of waste in the country’s landfills and incinerators. The decomposition of this food not only takes up valuable landfill space but also produces greenhouse gases equivalent to the emissions from several coal-fired power plants annually.
The new strategy employs various approaches to address this problem. Key components include encouraging businesses and individuals to minimise waste, investing in research to extend the shelf life of perishable items, improving food donation systems, and converting food scraps into valuable resources such as compost, biogas, and animal feed.
- Wealthy nations finally meet $100 billion climate aid goal
Following the breakdown of negotiations at the 2009 United Nations climate conference in Copenhagen, wealthy nations, led by the United States, committed to providing developing countries with $100 billion annually in climate-related aid by 2020. This funding aimed to alleviate tensions between the affluent countries, which have historically contributed the most to climate change, and the poorer nations disproportionately affected by its consequences. However, the wealthy countries failed to meet this target in both 2020 and 2021, exacerbating mistrust and hindering progress during the annual United Nations climate conferences, known as COP.
A new report from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) confirms what the organisation had suspected just before last year’s COP28: wealthy nations finally surpassed the $100 billion goal in 2022. Although they were two years late in fulfilling their promise, rich countries contributed nearly $116 billion in climate aid to developing countries in 2022, according to the latest data available. This additional funding helps to address the approximately $27 billion shortfall from the previous two years when the $100 billion target was not met.
- Yup. There’s now a way to recycle cement
Researchers from the University of Cambridge have developed a groundbreaking method to produce very low-emission concrete at scale, potentially revolutionising the path to net zero.
Described by the researchers as “an absolute miracle,” this method utilises electrically-powered arc furnaces, commonly used for steel recycling, to simultaneously recycle cement, the carbon-intensive component of concrete.
Concrete, the second-most-used material on the planet after water, accounts for approximately 7.5% of global anthropogenic CO2 emissions. Finding a scalable, cost-effective way to reduce concrete emissions while meeting global demand is one of the world’s most significant decarbonization challenges.
The Cambridge team discovered that used cement can effectively replace lime flux in steel recycling, which is traditionally used to remove impurities and typically ends up as waste known as slag. By substituting lime with used cement, the end product is recycled cement that can be used to produce new concrete.
- US government outlines federal guidelines for carbon offsetting
The US government guidelines stipulate that carbon credits and the activities generating them must be:
- Dependent on the company’s contribution, meaning they would not occur without it.
- Issued only once, preventing double-counting.
- Quantifiable.
- Effective at keeping emissions out of the atmosphere for a specified period.
Additionally, the guidelines emphasise that voluntary carbon markets (VCMs) should:
- Avoid causing environmental and social harm.
- Require corporate buyers to prioritize emissions reductions within their own value chains.
- Mandate public disclosure of the nature of their purchased and retired credits, ensuring that public claims are only made for credits meeting high standards.
- Encourage contributions to efforts that improve market integrity and facilitate efficient market participation, including reducing transaction costs.
- A CalTech spinoff uses limestone to turn cargo ship exhaust into safe ocean salts
Thousands of cargo ships, which deliver everything from jeans to cars, emit around a billion metric tons of CO2 each year. While cleaner shipping fuels and innovations like modern sails are promising, they will take time to scale up. However, a startup called Calcarea is working on a faster solution. Calcarea captures CO2 from a ship’s exhaust and converts it into salty water that can be safely returned to the ocean as the ship sails.
This technology, developed from research at CalTech, mimics a natural process. “This is the buffering reaction that the Earth has used for billions of years to deal with volcanic CO2 entering the atmosphere,” explains CalTech professor and Calcarea co-founder Jess Adkins.
The CO2 is converted into calcium and bicarbonate, preventing it from escaping back into the atmosphere. The end product can be released into the ocean, eliminating the need for extra storage space for captured CO2. Since the process occurs in a reactor, it is possible to monitor how much CO2 is converted. About 90% of the CO2 can be removed from the ship’s exhaust, with around half converted to bicarbonate. The rest enters the ocean as CO2, where it will likely be converted through natural processes. Additionally, the system removes sulphur, another pollutant, producing water that is much less acidic and contains fewer contaminants compared to existing sulphur scrubbers.
- Harmful gases destroying ozone layer falling faster than expected
International efforts to protect the ozone layer have been hailed as a “huge global success” by scientists, following the revelation that harmful atmospheric gases are declining faster than anticipated. The Montreal Protocol, signed in 1987, aimed to phase out ozone-depleting substances commonly found in refrigeration, air conditioning, and aerosol sprays.
A recent study discovered that atmospheric levels of hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs), gases that significantly damage the ozone layer, peaked in 2021, five years earlier than projected. “This has been a huge global success. We’re seeing that things are going in the right direction,” said Luke Western, the study’s lead author from the University of Bristol.
The most harmful chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) were eliminated by 2010 to protect the ozone layer, which shields life on Earth from the Sun’s harmful ultraviolet rays. The HCFC chemicals that replaced CFCs are expected to be completely phased out by 2040.
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FEATURED IMAGE: Eneas de Troya/Flickr
