Climate Change

"It's been more than a year since Boston Common Asset Management published a report on the financial sector's response to the climate change crisis. While it may not seem readily apparent how an industry with relatively low emissions from its own operations could be at risk, such a perspective fails to take into account the importance of Scope 3 emissions; specifically, in the case of banks, the emissions from their lending and underwriting portfolios."

"Recent scientific discoveries show that the Amazon rainforest might control the climate for much of South America. The theory could mean even more disastrous ramifications for the fragile ecosystem if deforestation continues unabated." Besides being an engine for removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, the rainforest seems to pump a "river" of moisture through the atmosphere that is larger than the Amazon itself.

"Without the right policies to keep the poor safe from extreme weather and rising seas, climate change could drive over 100 million more people into poverty by 2030, the World Bank said on Sunday."

"Peabody Energy, the world’s biggest private coal company, has agreed to make more robust disclosures to its investors about the financial risks it faces from future government policies and regulations related to climate change and other environmental issues that could reduce demand for its product."

"The last great epidemic of Vibrio cholerae to hit Africa and the Middle East occurred from 1997 to 1998. Over 200,000 people were afflicted and some 8,000 killed as the disease spread from southern Mozambique all the way up to the Horn of Africa and into the Middle East. Now cholera is back. And this time it could be much worse."
 

"The muzzles are coming off for [Canadian] federal scientists. For years, scientists who worked for the federal government were silenced by strict rules that made them seek departmental approval before speaking to the press. On Friday, Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development Navdeep Bains said that scientists are free to speak to the media about their work."

"President Obama announced on Friday that he had rejected the request from a Canadian company to build the Keystone XL oil pipeline, ending a seven-year review that had become a symbol of the debate over his climate policies."

"Did climate change cause that heat wave? That hurricane? That drought? A new collection of studies examined extreme weather events last year, including drought, floods and storms, to look for signs that climate change was a cause or contributor — and found mixed results."

"Details of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) deal were released Thursday, potentially setting off another round of debate on the controversial agreement involving one dozen nations."

"The opening of an investigation of Exxon Mobil by the New York attorney general’s office into the company’s record on climate change may well spur legal inquiries into other oil companies, according to legal and climate experts, although successful prosecutions are far from assured."