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Mark Gongloff
A truck drives through a flooded street in the aftermath of Hurricane Milton in South Daytona, Florida, on Friday.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Oct 10, 2024
Hurricane Milton shows there’s no ‘normal’ storm season
It may be hard to believe, but about a month ago, people were calling this year’s hurricane season a bust.
The destruction left behind by the Borel Fire near Lake Isabella, California, on July 29
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 13, 2024
Wildfires are getting weirder. Case in point: 'firenados.'
Sometimes fire thunderstorms even create their own lightning, which spawns new blazes miles away.
For hundreds of thousands of people around the world every year, heat is deadly. In the U.S., it takes more lives than hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes or floods.
COMMENTARY
Jun 20, 2024
Heat waves are deadlier than hurricanes. Make them ‘disasters.’
For hundreds of thousands of people around the world every year, heat is deadly. In the U.S., it takes more lives than hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes or floods.
After just 1.3 degrees Celsius of warming above preindustrial levels, the countries with the most refugees, asylum-seekers, and displaced people are already among those hardest hit by climate change.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 16, 2024
It’s far cheaper to help migrants before they leave home
As global temperatures rise, so will the frequency of heat waves, droughts, floods, pandemics, natural disasters, food and water shortages and conflicts over resources.
As mind-numbingly big as the clean-energy price tag may be, it’s actually a bargain compared with the potential economic destruction of unabated climate change.
COMMENTARY / World
May 31, 2024
$215 trillion to save the planet is a bargain
And as mind-numbingly big as $215 trillion may be, it’s actually a bargain compared with the potential economic destruction of unabated climate change.
Climate change, with its natural disasters, is putting nuclear facilities and weapons complexes at risk.
COMMENTARY
Apr 4, 2024
Climate change and nuclear waste are a toxic stew
Nuclear power could be a crucial part of a clean-energy transition, but not if it comes with a high risk of multiple Fukushima-like catastrophes.
Then-U.S. President Donald Trump holds up a presidential permit for energy development that he signed during a tour of an oil rig in Midland, Texas, in July 2020.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 1, 2024
How the planet could survive another Trump term
In his first term, Trump pulled the U.S. out of the 2015 Paris climate agreement, rolled back environmental regulations, unleashed gas drilling and more.
Climate activists demand that the World Bank stop fossil fuel financing on the first day of the annual meeting of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in Marrakech, Morocco, on Oct. 9.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 27, 2023
Telling countries not to be poor is bad climate advice
As developing nations bear the brunt of the costs of climate change; the world's richer states need to pay up.
The Inflation Reduction Act’s tax breaks for clean energy will help mitigate climate change but they will not meet the 2050 net-zero carbon goal.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 17, 2023
Biden’s climate bill was too tame
U.S. President Biden and the Democratic Party's Inflation Reduction Act was too tame on fixing the climate.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 28, 2023
A little panic might be in order amid global heat records
Soaring temperatures this spring should spur governments to finally live up to their pledges to curb the use of fossil fuels
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
May 26, 2023
What Exxon won’t tell you about climate costs
Society might be willing to make sacrifices if it meant avoiding even worse damage from global warming.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 25, 2023
The carbon offset market keeps growing, unfortunately
The giant forestry company Weyerhaeuser's embrace of emissions credits might do more for profits than for the planet.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 25, 2023
The coming El Nino could be a glimpse of a grim future
A temporary spike in temperatures next year because of the El Nino weather pattern might motivate the world to curb carbon emissions.

Longform

The National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation in Tokyo is a popular place to foster curiosity in the natural sciences.
Can Japan's scientific community rebound from a Nobel nosedive?