Tag - climate-change

 
 

CLIMATE CHANGE

Graphite, now deemed an essential mineral by the U.S., is the single biggest ingredient by weight in the batteries that go into electric vehicles and the power grid. It is also used in a variety of defense applications.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 8, 2023
Biden deploys Pentagon to beat climate change and China
A $37.5 million grant to Graphite One acts as a relaxed form of venture capital as the White House supports nascent parts of the domestic cleantech supply chain.
As synonymous with summer as fireworks and sweltering temperatures, mosquitoes are ubiquitous in Japan. However, will rising temperatures lead more dangerous species of the bug to call Japan home?
ENVIRONMENT / Wildlife / Longform
Aug 7, 2023
The mosquito: Summer’s unwelcome little bloodsucker
An outbreak of dengue in Yoyogi Park nine years ago could be a sign of things to come if the wrong mosquito makes it into Japan.
A highway runs through Saudi Arabia's arid landscape. A new horticulture project marks the biggest food-tech investment for the country, whose extreme summer temperatures have long left it reliant on food imports.
WORLD
Aug 7, 2023
Saudi city of future enlists Dutch help to grow crops in desert
The Netherlands is now the world’s second-largest agricultural exporter after the U.S., despite being one of Europe’s smallest nations.
Researchers have developed a new method to analyze climate history and their findings align with current climate models.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 6, 2023
Science offers closer look at the Medieval Warming Period
Medieval Warming Period saw a population boom in Europe and the collapse of civilizations in the Americas
An installation for The North Face Moon Parka, which uses a Spiber-produced protein material
ENVIRONMENT / Sustainability / OUR PLANET
Aug 6, 2023
A Japanese startup is using biotech to ‘brew’ greener fashion
Fashion has a huge environmental impact, and Spiber thinks its products can help curb the industry's footprint.
People use umbrellas and parasols to seek relief from soaring temperatures while waiting to cross a street outside Tokyo's Shinjuku Station last week.
JAPAN / Science & Health
Aug 5, 2023
Japan marks hottest day of year as mercury hits 40 C
The record temperature was marked in Date, Fukushima Prefecture, as a heat wave continues to scorch much of the country.
A man makes his way through a flooded road after the rains and floods brought by remnants of Typhoon Doksuri, in Zhuozhou, Hebei province, China, on Thursday.
ASIA PACIFIC
Aug 4, 2023
China’s ‘sponge cities’ are not built for extreme flood events
China has invested billions of dollars in recent years to protect against extreme rainfall after a 2012 flood in Beijing killed 79 people.
The Keppel Marina East Desalination Plant in Singapore on July 21. Public Utilities Board, which is responsible for Singapore's water management, has a long-term goal of reducing the energy use of water desalination to 1 killowatt-hours per 1,000 liters.
ENVIRONMENT
Aug 3, 2023
Singapore is building the technology it needs for new climate era
Building renewables like solar and wind requires a lot of land, one thing Singapore doesn’t have.
AIRism clothing on display at Uniqlo 5th Avenue in New York on Monday
BUSINESS
Aug 2, 2023
Garment-makers bet on 'cooling' fabrics as temperatures rise
With widespread heat waves, and inflation-weary consumers prioritizing essentials, retailers are pursuing sales by marketing "cooling" garments.
While the pace of deploying clean-energy solutions is faster than it has ever been, with climate change, the world overall is racing in the wrong direction.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 1, 2023
What the climate fight is really about
Now that a future of higher average global temperatures is inevitable, managing the problem well requires that we cut off the tail end of the extreme-weather distribution.
JAPAN
Aug 1, 2023
July in Japan saw second-highest number of days over 35 C for the month
Temperatures above 35 C were recorded at 2,435 locations, with climate change and El Nino contributing to scorching heat.
The towers of Canary Wharf, in London, occupied by several major international banks, seen from Greenwich Park in the city
BUSINESS
Jul 31, 2023
Banks voted to limit accounting of capital market emissions
The plan to keep carbon emissions linked to bond and stock sales out of banks' footprints came after wrangling over the issue delayed new standards.
An apartment building construction site in Sumida Ward, Tokyo, on July 19. Officials at Daito Trust Construction, which oversees the building project, say heatstroke dangers are a top concern given their aging workforce.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change / OUR PLANET
Jul 30, 2023
In Japan, extreme heat and an aging population are a deadly mix
Heat waves combined with high humidity are weighing particularly heavily on the nation’s 36 million people age 65 and over, who are at much greater risk of severe illness and death.
A woman in Vatican City on July 19 during a heat wave. Projecting temperatures is inherently imprecise because modern humans have never experienced such extremes.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Jul 29, 2023
An overheating planet requires extreme climate solutions
Projections say warming will only get worse, but humans exert control over planet-warming pollution and can change these models’ trajectories.
A woman walks on the bottom of a dried pond on a hot day in Mauharia, India, in May 2022.
ENVIRONMENT
Jul 29, 2023
Warming world 'brutalizes' women as heat waves deepen gender divide
The impacts of rising heat are disproportionately dangerous and costly to women — be it at home or on the job — according to a new report.
Pedestrians hold umbrellas for protection from the sun during a heat wave in New York on Thursday.
ENVIRONMENT
Jul 28, 2023
July set to be world's hottest month on record
We may have to go back thousands if not tens of thousands of years to find similarly warm conditions on our planet.
Danish ambassador Peter Taksoe-Jensen hopes for a "ketchup effect" in the development of Japan's offshore wind potential.
ENVIRONMENT
Jul 27, 2023
Unlocking Japan's offshore wind potential requires change in mindset
While Japan has made progress in expanding its offshore wind power, Denmark’s ambassador to Japan says that the pace of change is still too slow.
A man catches a fish along the bank overlooking the Singapore skyline shrouded by haze in 2015.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Jul 27, 2023
As El Nino fuels fire risk, Southeast Asia faces haze crisis
Officials met in Singapore last month, where they vowed to work together to monitor fires and curb pollution.
A helicopter sprays water over a fire on the southern part of the Greek island of Rhodes on Tuesday. Wildfires have been raging in Greece amid scorching temperatures, forcing mass evacuations in several tourist spots including on the islands of Rhodes and Corfu.
WORLD
Jul 26, 2023
Wildfires bring death and destruction to Mediterranean
Greece has been particularly hard hit, with authorities evacuating more than 20,000 people in recent days from homes and resorts in the south of the holiday island of Rhodes.
Visitors crowd around a water fountain during a heat wave in Rome, Italy, on July 17.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change
Jul 25, 2023
Climate change role in July heat waves 'overwhelming,' scientists say
Extreme weather has caused havoc across the planet this month, with record-breaking temperatures causing forest fires, water shortages and more hospital admissions.

Longform

Mamoru Iwai, stationmaster of Keisei Ueno Station, says that, other than earthquake-proofing, the former Hakubutsukan-Dobutsuen (Museum-Zoo) Station has remained untouched.
Inside Tokyo's 'phantom' stations — and the stories they tell