Green Lights Jan. 12: Top stories this week
Don't miss a single story of the best from Callaway Climate Insights.
. . . . Welcome to our first Green Lights edition of 2024. Here’s our weekly roundup of the best of Callaway Climate Insights. This week, California’s emissions disclosure rules hit a speed money bump, global temps hit an ominous record, and although the world’s renewable capacity hits new highs, more coal is still being burned. Here are the highlights in a simple and convenient format that makes it easy for our readers. It’s also easy to subscribe.
. . . . Two ominous reports this week spell out just how bad 2024 will be for the climate, and will all but ensure sovereign debt markets enter a new era of debt forgiveness as financial markets suffer for government inaction, writes David Callaway. Wall Street will bear the brunt of government inaction as it has many times before. The time for creative debt deals, as with the 1.5°C world, has arrived. In the meantime, see the forecast for next week, above. That’s a polar vortex. Brrr.
. . . . California Dreamin’: Gov. Gavin Newsom made global headlines when he signed two new laws requiring big companies to disclose their greenhouse gas emissions and climate change risks. But a budget crisis in the Golden State has brought those plans to a screeching, if temporary, halt.
. . . . The negative political attention tied to ESG investing in the past couple of years might actually be bringing more investors around to look at the downtrodden sector, writes Mark Hulbert. Using a theory that ties stock performance to a company’s cost of capital, Hulbert explains not only why oil and gas stocks have outperformed the past few years but why renewable energy shares might be poised for a rebound as well. And what does this have to do with Barbra Streisand?
. . . . Like its compatriot Toyota, Honda has been late to the EV game, writes Matthew Diebel. But now the Japanese giant — which was first to the market with a hybrid — is playing catch-up. As revealed at the CES event in Las Vegas, here’s what they have in mind.
. . . . Good news, bad news. The good is that green energy grew at a record pace last year; the bad is that it is not fast enough to meet climate change targets. But there are other factors: China, for instance, is racing ahead with renewables but at the same time burning more coal.
. . . . Faster cash, fewer choices: EV tax credits and other incentives and rebates have been a boon to would-be buyers of pricey electric vehicles, slicing as much as $15,000 off the cost of a new car, truck or SUV. But what the Inflation Reduction Act giveth, it also taketh away.
. . . . Blue and green: The new Aquatics Centre for the 2024 summer Olympic Games in Paris will be low-carbon, and all the materials will be bio-based or recycled. With a 5,000-square-meter roof covered with photovoltaic panels, it will be one of France’s largest urban solar farms and supply all the energy the facility needs.
More greenery . . . .
It was drought that killed the beast: Largest great ape to ever live went extinct because of climate change (ABC News)
Ski season risk: Will avalanches in California worsen with climate change? (CalMatters)
Used car deal? Hertz’s EV business gets wrecked (Climate Crisis 247)
Inside the petrostate: Tackling climate change in the birthplace of oil (New York Times)
OSU researchers have a plan to fight climate change: Educate more girls, eat less meat (The Oregonian)