Climate253
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Climate News Roundup: Week of 8/07
Climate Bonds to Fund Clean Energy Development, While Providing Fixed Income, Sustainable Business, Aug 9 In 2009, an international think tank decided the global bond market could play a central role in financing clean energy projects, while providing attractive fixed income returns to investors. The International Network for Sustainable Financial Markets launched the Climate Bonds Initiative to foster…
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Atmospheric Scientists Win Early Career Awards
Two scientists at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory have been recognized for early-career achievement in the atmospheric sciences by the American Geophysical Union (AGU), the world’s largest earth-sciences organization. Tiffany Shaw, 31, is a physicist who uses computer models and mathematical equations to study the basic dynamics of the atmosphere and climate, for instance, how the jet…
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Climate Underpinnings of East Africa Drought
Watch a video interview of climate scientist Brad Lyon on the conditions leading up to the ongoing drought in East Africa. He says there’s a chance of La Niña forming later in the year, which could have devastating consequences for a region already plagued by widespread famine.
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End of the Line – Good Byes to a Great Field Season in Peru
After more than six weeks trawling the Peruvian Andes in search of palaeoclimate clues, our field team is visiting the last site, a potential calibration sites near Coropuna. The objective of that ongoing work is to refine the cosmogenic surface-exposure method for the tropics, thereby improving the precision of new and existing datasets.
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Climate News Round Up: Week of 8/1
Obstacles to Capturing Carbon Gas, NYTimes, July 31 Carbon capture and sequestration is a technology that traps carbon dioxide and stores it, usually underground in a geological formation. The process, already used by oil and natural gas companies, presents the opportunity for capturing CO2 from power plants and other sources of carbon emissions as a…
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Have We Crossed the 9 Planetary Boundaries?
“The world needs to awaken itself to the looming catastrophe of global warming,” said Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute, at a recent meeting in Muscat. “We must provide a safe operating space where vested interest and lobby-driven policies will not see the world marching into disaster.”
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The Abatement Gap
Results of a recent modeling exercise by the Columbia Climate Center in a collaborative project with Deutsche Bank Climate Change Advisors indicate that the combined impact of more than 350 energy and emissions policies in place across the world fails to reach, by 2020, an emission trajectory consistent with stabilizing atmospheric levels of CO2 at…
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The Less Thirsty Cars of the Future
Good news for clean air and water: President Obama unveiled an agreement last week to raise the bar on fuel economy by 2025.
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The Role of Drought in the Horn of Africa Famine
Let’s get this out of the way. The current famine in the Horn of Africa isn’t caused by drought. Rather, a complex mix of societal and political factors created a dangerous situation. The worst drought in 60 years (pdf) is what pushed that situation over the edge into a humanitarian crisis. However, just as these…
COP31, the 2026 United Nations Climate Change Conference, aims to advance dialogue, strengthen consensus, and accelerate climate action on a global scale. From November 9–20, 2026 in Antalya, Türkiye, heads of state, ministers, scientists, business leaders, and civil society will gather to advance efforts in emission targets, climate finance, and adaptation and resilience. Once again, our experts, students, and global thought leaders from Columbia Climate School and across Columbia University are contributing to key events, sharing insights, and helping shape the dialogue toward ambitious, science-based solutions. Learn More