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U.S. President Donald Trump addresses the World Economic Forum's annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland, via videoconference on Thursday.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 27, 2025

The Davos ‘vibe shift’ is no surprise

This year, Davos was different. Significant slices of corporate America have been divesting themselves of the world-saving ideals that Davos is built on.
Though vegan restaurants have been on the upswing since 2017, Japanese vegans still lack a wide variety of options.
ENVIRONMENT / Sustainability / OUR PLANET
Jan 29, 2025

In meat- and fish-loving Japan, veganism is making a comeback

Tourism, climate goals and animal rights concerns are sparking a plant-based renaissance in a country famous for sushi and pork ramen.
Rock patterns formed by crystalized minerals along the Dead Sea shore near Kibbutz Ein Gedi in eastern Israel on Dec. 30. The Dead Sea, nestled where Israeli, Jordanian and Palestinian territory meet, has famously been dying for years.
ENVIRONMENT
Jan 29, 2025

Dead Sea an 'ecological disaster,' but no one can agree how to fix it

Tackling cross-border environmental issues is no longer a priority for governments in the region.
Sea turtles in Amami Oshima, Kagoshima Prefecture. Their nesting activity has continued to decline in recent years.
JAPAN / Science & Health
Jan 30, 2025

Amami Oshima sea turtle nesting declines to second-lowest level

Scientists believe declining populations may be a key factor and have warned that a long-term analysis is needed to assess the situation.
An Iranian couple sits in a park facing the Milad Tower in Tehran on Dec. 27.
ENVIRONMENT
Feb 3, 2025

Vanishing mountains: Winter air pollution smothers Iran

Iran's capital Tehran frequently ranks among the world's most polluted cities, says Swiss-based air quality monitoring company IQAir.
Cows graze in a deforested pasture in Brazil's Amazon located in the municipality of Itapua do Oeste, Rondonia state, Brazil, in 2020.
ENVIRONMENT / Sustainability
Feb 3, 2025

Brazil's carbon trade takes off, but agribusiness escapes scrutiny

The regulation is still expected to bring legal security and foster carbon projects that protect the Amazon against pressure from the agribusiness sector.
Soaring costs in recent years have upended the investment plans of offshore wind developers globally.
ENVIRONMENT / Energy
Feb 3, 2025

Mitsubishi reviews Japanese offshore wind after economic changes

Soaring costs in recent years have upended the investment plans of offshore wind developers globally.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) headquarters in Washington in 2023. Groups with EPA grants say they have been unable to access funds from the agency.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Feb 5, 2025

Trump’s freeze on climate money sows fear and confusion

A federal judge temporarily blocked the spending pause days later but uncertainty persists, with the full impact of the disruption still coming into view.
President Donald Trump shows a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) forecast track of Hurricane Dorian that was altered with a black marker in Washington on Sept. 4, 2019.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Feb 11, 2025

NOAA told to make list of climate-related grants, setting off fears

Staff members were given a list and told to identify which could be "potentially impacted” by one of U.S. President Donald Trump’s executive orders.
U.S. President Donald Trump holds a signed executive order in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington on Monday.
WORLD / Politics
Feb 12, 2025

As Trump hits delete, the race is on to save LGBTQ+ and climate data

Thousands of U.S. government web pages are being altered or deleted following a slew of executive orders from President Donald Trump.
All Nippon Airways aircraft at Haneda Airport in Tokyo in August 2024. ANA has staked a lot on greener kinds of jet fuel, with 70% of the emissions reductions under its net-zero emissions plan coming from them.
ENVIRONMENT / Sustainability / OUR PLANET
Feb 16, 2025

Sky not the only limit for JAL and ANA’s climate goals

The airlines' similar but different carbon neutrality plans highlight the difficulty of decarbonization, especially as the sector is now growing again.
The government has made a shift toward nuclear amid predictions of higher electricity demand stemming from semiconductor production and data centers for AI in the decades to come.
JAPAN / Politics
Feb 18, 2025

Japan backs nuclear power in climate plan criticized as insufficient

The government is targeting emissions cuts of 60% by fiscal 2035, but environmental groups and businesses have called for more ambition.
Entomal Biotech Sdn Bhd CCO Yanni Ching with samples of BSF dried larvae and frass.
ENVIRONMENT / Sustainability
Feb 28, 2025

Turning waste into wealth with insect-based biotech

Entomal has treated over 22.5 tons of food waste to date, preventing roughly 55 tons of carbon emissions.
People ride in cable cars over the Chandragiri hilltop on the outskirts of Kathmandu on Feb. 3.
ASIA PACIFIC
Feb 24, 2025

Nepal community fights to save sacred forests from cable cars

Five cable car projects have opened in the past two years — and 10 more are under development, according to government figures.
U.S. government scientists participating in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change were issued a stop-work order from the Trump administration, according to media reports.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Feb 24, 2025

Trump creates uncertainty for world’s most cited climate report

The U.S. absence comes amid broader cuts to research funding and a retreat from climate diplomacy under the Trump administration.
A town hall meeting with residents of Okuma, Fukushima Prefecture, one of the municipalities evacuated in the aftermath of the nuclear accident at the Fukushima No. 1 power plant. More dialogue is needed to foster truly participatory energy democracy in Japan.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Mar 10, 2025

Japan needs collective public support to reach its nuclear goals

Over a decade after 3/11, Japan has the chance to foster truly participatory energy democracy by engaging its civic environmental organizations in nuclear policymaking processes.
A worker adjusts an anti-smog dust suppression sprayer installed at a construction site in Lahore on Feb. 17. Tens of millions of Pakistanis spent at least four months breathing toxic air pollution 20 times above safe levels, in the worst winter smog season for several years.
ASIA PACIFIC / Science & Health
Mar 12, 2025

'Really suffocating': Pakistan emerges from record smog season

Pakistan regularly ranks among the world's most polluted countries, with Lahore often the most polluted megacity between November and February.
A red panda at the central zoo in Lalitpur, on the outskirts of Kathmandu
ENVIRONMENT / Wildlife
Mar 14, 2025

Nepal community efforts revive red panda population

Conservationists say educational outreach and sustainable livelihood programs helped improve the effectiveness of Nepal's conservation efforts.
Bleached and dead coral around Lizard Island on the Great Barrier Reef, located 270 kilometers north of the city of Cairns, Australia, on April 5, 2024
ENVIRONMENT / Earth science
Mar 17, 2025

From oil spills to new species: How tech reveals the ocean

New technologies are helping to reveal hidden oil spills, speed up the discovery of new species and uncover the impact of light pollution.
Saul Luciano Lliuya in his home in Huaraz, Peru, on March 2. Lliuya is pursuing a lawsuit against German energy utility RWE, whose emissions he says have contributed to the melting of Andean glaciers, swelling a lake above his hometown to dangerous levels.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Mar 18, 2025

Facing glacial melt-water flood risk, Peruvian farmer tests global climate law

Lawyers in the case say German energy firm RWE is responsible for 0.5% of global emissions, so should pay 0.5% of the costs for a local $3.5 million flood defense project.
The buildings sector consumes 32% of the world's energy and contributes 34% of CO2 emissions.
ENVIRONMENT / Sustainability
Mar 18, 2025

'More and faster': U.N. calls to shrink buildings' carbon footprint

CO2 emissions from the building sector rose around 5% in the last decade when they should have fallen 28%, according to a new report.
Ice is seen on the Pastoruri glacier in the Peruvian Andes, Peru, in May 2024.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Mar 21, 2025

World's glaciers are losing record ice as global temperatures climb, U.N. says

Glaciers are disappearing faster than ever, with the last three-year period seeing the largest glacial mass loss on record.
Climate change mitigation demands collective action from all levels of society, not just billionaires with private jets, as systemic change is necessary for meaningful progress.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 21, 2025

Billionaire’s private jet angst won’t save the world

Data center emissions in the U.S. already rival those of the domestic airline industry and are growing far quicker.
Demonstrators hold signs near the White House as they protest against the Dakota Access Pipeline in 2017.
ENVIRONMENT
Mar 22, 2025

What the $660 million Greenpeace verdict means for U.S. activism

Legal experts warn the decision could significantly deter other environmental groups from protesting oil and gas companies around the U.S.
 Whales sense their surroundings largely through sound and create complex vocalizations, or songs, when they’re searching for mates and food.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Mar 22, 2025

Why we should worry when whales stop singing

A new study has found that whale songs can act as a barometer for the effects of climate change on ocean ecosystems.
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba pose for photos before their joint news conference at the Akasaka Palace state guest house in Tokyo on Wednesday.
JAPAN / Politics
Mar 27, 2025

Brazilian leader's Tokyo visit lifts ties to new heights

The two leaders have adopted a five-year action plan and a flurry of agreements as the countries mark their 130th anniversary year of diplomatic relations.
Kimio Hanawa (left), an honorary professor at Tohoku University and chair of the Meteorological Agency’s climate change advisory panel, expressed concern over rapid warming at a news conference on Wednesday in Tokyo.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Mar 27, 2025

Without new countermeasures, Japan’s temperature could rise 4.5 C by 2100

The warmer surface temperature would lead to 17.5 more extremely hot days per year and 46.2 fewer winter days, according to the Meteorological Agency and other institutions.
Takumi Fukuda of Japan's Fisheries Agency
JAPAN
Mar 28, 2025

Japan and others agree to cut saury catch quota by 10%

The decrease reflects low catches linked to overfishing and changes in the marine environment.
Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore speaks during a news conference in Paris on Saturday.
ENVIRONMENT / Sustainability
Mar 30, 2025

Trump can't stop 'sustainability revolution': Al Gore

Gore also condemned the administration's treatment of universities and student activists, but said the tide is turning.
An artificial glacier built by local residents during the winter to conserve water for the summer at Pari village in the Kharmang district of Pakistan's mountainous Gilgit-Baltistan region are seen on March 18. At the foot of Pakistan's impossibly high mountains whitened by frost all year round, farmers grappling with a lack of water have created their own ice towers. The ice forms in the shape of cones that resemble Buddhist stupas, and act as a storage system — steadily melting throughout spring, when temperatures rise.
ENVIRONMENT / Sustainability
Apr 6, 2025

Artificial glaciers boost water supply in northern Pakistan

Warmer winters as a result of climate change has reduced the snowfall and subsequent seasonal snowmelt that feeds the valleys of Gilgit-Baltistan.

Longform

A small shrine perched atop rocks braves the waves hitting the shoreline during a storm in Shimoda, Shizuoka Prefecture. The area is under threat of a possible 31-meter-high tsunami if an earthquake strikes the nearby Nankai Trough.
If the 'Big One' hits, this city could face a 31-meter-high tsunami