Green Lights Jan. 31: Top stories this week
Don't miss a single story from the best of Callaway Climate Insights.






. . . . Welcome back to Green Lights. Here’s our roundup of the best of Callaway Climate Insights this week. David Callaway looks to Europe, where sustainable fund inflows more than doubled over the third quarter of last year. He also notes it looks like Jerome Powell and the Fed are getting aligned with the Trump administration. Michael Molinski looks at what next month’s elections in Ecuador mean for the U.S. and for China’s big push into Latin America. Have a good weekend and please subscribe.
. . . . A retreat from environmental, social and governance funds among U.S. investors after Trump was re-elected was ignored in Europe in the fourth quarter, where sustainable fund inflows more than doubled over the third quarter, according to the latest data from Morningstar. Perhaps European investors see the potential for more sustainable deals there as Trump slashes spending on former President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, which had lured away spending on European renewable deals in favor of the more subsidized American ones under Biden.
. . . . Federal Reserve chief Jerome Powell did his best this week to distance the central bank from the tsunami of politics overwhelming Washington, D.C. with the new Trump administration, but the more he denied it the more he sounded like the bank was falling in line. David Callaway writes: So, it looks to us like Powell and Trump are finally on the same page. Now, about those egg prices?
. . . . The most amazing thing about Monday’s DeepSeek scare that crushed a January rally in tech stocks was how quickly it came about, as if investors all realized at once — following exhibitions in Davos — that China is a bigger AI competitor than imagined. The only comparable shock to the market came in the opposite direction after Open AI launched ChatGPT 26 months ago.
. . . . For a country grappling with environmental issues and with a conservative party in power, next month’s elections in Ecuador could prove to be a trial for China’s big push into Latin America and the first true test for Trump to build new allies in the region, writes Michael Molinski.
. . . . Widespread outbreaks of bird flu are hitting the poultry industry hard, especially in Iowa and Georgia, according to a report from Investigate Midwest. The New York Times says about 10% of the country’s egg-laying chickens have had to be killed in the past three months to prevent the spread of avian influenza. It could take months before the supply of egg-laying chickens returns to the normal level of around 318 million, roughly the equivalent of one chicken per person.
. . . . The Doomsday Clock was set this week at 89 seconds to midnight, the closest the clock has ever been to midnight in its 78-year history. The 2025 clock time signals that the world is on a course of unprecedented risk, including from climate change. Read more from the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
More greenery . . . .
We’re stoked: Protecting offshore surf breaks can fight CO₂, climate change (Grist)
Polar population problems: Polar bears are struggling to survive as sea ice dwindles (ABC News)
Follow the money: U.S. Treasury Dept. leaves global regulatory climate change group (Reuters)
Everyone pays: Even if you haven’t had any damage from extreme weather, you’re paying for it (Earth.org)
EPA ‘deletes’ climate change: Environmental agency scrubs most mentions from its online presence (Lever)