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Climate change and pollution threaten Europe's resources, EU warns

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Monday, September 29, 2025

Climate change and environmental degradation pose a direct threat to the natural resources that Europe needs for its economic security, the EU's environmental agency said on Monday.

Climate change and environmental degradation pose a direct threat to the natural resources that Europe needs for its economic security, the EU's environmental agency said on Monday.



Climate change and environmental degradation pose a direct threat to the natural resources that Europe needs for its economic security, the EU's environmental agency said on Monday.
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Turkey argues both countries can win from drawn-out contest with Australia over Cop31 hosting rights

Exclusive: Turkey’s climate minister says country is working on ‘innovative solutions’ as Labor privately downplays expectations impasse can be brokenSign up for climate and environment editor Adam Morton’s free Clear Air newsletter hereTurkey says it is pursuing “innovative solutions” in the race with Australia to host the Cop31 UN climate talks, arguing both countries can win from drawn-out negotiations over next year’s summit.After talks with the climate change and energy minister, Chris Bowen, on the sidelines of the UN general assembly in New York last week, Turkey’s climate minister, Murat Kurum, said he was optimistic about a resolution.Sign up to get climate and environment editor Adam Morton’s Clear Air column as a free newsletter Continue reading...

Turkey says it is pursuing “innovative solutions” in the race with Australia to host the Cop31 UN climate talks, arguing both countries can win from drawn-out negotiations over next year’s summit.After talks with the climate change and energy minister, Chris Bowen, on the sidelines of the UN general assembly in New York last week, Turkey’s climate minister, Murat Kurum, said he was optimistic about a resolution.Azerbaijan’s Cop29 president, Mukhtar Babayev, has helped moderate some of the discussions.“We respect Australia’s candidacy,” Kurum told Guardian Australia.“Since 2023, we have been examining options with my esteemed counterpart and friend, Chris Bowen, and our teams.“We believe that we can achieve a success based on historical ties where both countries win. With the support of the UN Climate Secretariat, we are working on innovative solutions in the procedures.”The Albanese government has privately downplayed expectations Australia will win the bid due to Turkey’s desire to stay in the race. If neither party withdraws before Cop30 ends in November, hosting rights automatically revert to Bonn in Germany.It is unclear how the impasse will be resolved, or what the new solutions could be.In 2019, then UK prime minister Boris Johnson used a package of incentives to convince Turkey to pull out of the bidding contest for Cop26, including promising to back its candidates in other international events and to push countries on reclassifying Turkey under the UN convention for climate aid.Johnson also reportedly agreed to support Turkey’s bid to host Cop31. Keir Starmer’s Labour government has since publicly backed Australia’s bid.Anthony Albanese’s efforts to meet the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, in New York failed, and the government has ruled out using taxpayer funds to effectively buy off the opposition.Turkey’s first lady, Emine Erdoğan, is considered a key player in her country’s bid. A longtime environmental campaigner, she is reportedly eager for Turkey to host the summit in Antalya, the resort city where world leaders met for the 2015 G20 summit.Australia wants delegates to meet in Adelaide, in a partnership with Pacific Island nations.Kurum said Turkey planned to officially submit its nationally determined contribution to carbon emission reductions and “successfully complete consultations for Cop31” before this year’s summit in Belém, Brazil.skip past newsletter promotionSign up to Clear Air AustraliaAdam Morton brings you incisive analysis about the politics and impact of the climate crisisPrivacy Notice: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. If you do not have an account, we will create a guest account for you on theguardian.com to send you this newsletter. You can complete full registration at any time. For more information about how we use your data see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.after newsletter promotion“We are ready to demonstrate real, participatory, fair, and effective leadership in the fight against the climate crisis,” he said.Kurum said Turkey had a very strong vision for hosting in 2026.“Our goal is to create a bridge that strengthens climate action and leaves no one behind.“We are aiming for a global Cop presidency, not just a regional one. We believe that hosting the Cop presidency in our country would also be an opportunity for the world.”Bowen said the Albanese government respected Turkey’s desire to host the event.“While there is strong support for Australia and the Pacific’s bid, the process requires consensus, and so we remain in discussions with Türkiye towards a mutually acceptable outcome, in consultation with our Pacific family,” he said.Bowen and Albanese have declined to discuss the status of negotiations with Turkey in recent weeks, other than to say they remained a work in progress. Both describe Australia’s support among partner countries as overwhelming. Australia has at least 23 votes among the critical 28-country Western European and Others group whose turn it is to host the summit.Guardian Australia revealed last week Bowen had appeared with Emine Erdoğan at a major environment event. She hosted dignitaries at the Zero Waste Blue exhibition on New York’s upper east side.

Climate
Energy
Government

Incredible Journeys: Migratory Sharks on the Move

Even as scientists rush to identify the migratory paths of some endangered shark species to help better protect them, climate change and other threats shift this behavior, adding urgency to the research. The post Incredible Journeys: Migratory Sharks on the Move appeared first on The Revelator.

Migration: Many animal species do it — from tiny zooplankton to enormous whales —   moving over every continent and through all oceans, from north to south, south to north, Europe to Asia, and Asia to Africa. This movement by individual animals in response to season or life stage typically involves substantial numbers and vast distances. Recent studies give scientists a better understanding of migrations at the species and population levels and reveal implications for conservation. This series focuses on a few particular species, what we’re learning about their migrations, and how that knowledge may help us protect them. We start with a group of species many people may not realize migrate: sharks. In April 2025 researchers tagged a 7-foot male scalloped hammerhead shark they dubbed Webbkinfield off Port Aransas, Texas. Over the next four months, the scientists watched, fascinated, as Webbkinfield pinballed around just off the continental shelf. He didn’t wander far on the map but swam almost 2,000 miles. Less of a homebody, a male shortfin mako named Pico was tagged in March 2018 off the Texas coast and traveled more than 21,000 miles by August 2020. His journeys took him up to Massachusetts and back. Twice. Scientists are learning that some sharks get around more — a lot more — than others. A silky shark tagged June 18, 2021, in the Galápagos Marine Reserve had swum more than 1,000 miles west into the open ocean by Sept. 20; another tagged that February traveled more than 8,000 miles into the big blue and back. Others milled around the reserve, with a few making short forays to the Central or South American coast. Silky shark satellite tagging in the Galapagos. Photo: Pelayo Salinas, used with permission. This research on when and where marine animals move is critical to efforts to protect them, says Yannis Papastamatiou, an associate professor in Florida International University’s Institute of Environment. “Conservation is expensive, so we need to know when, where, and how to apply actions,” he says. Papastamatiou is one of the more than 350 contributing authors of a recent study in the journal Science that aims to tackle part of that challenge. The study examined data on migration patterns of more than 100 large-bodied marine vertebrate species, including several sharks. One of the study’s biggest revelations: On average, data showed, the tracked animals spent just 13% of their time inside existing marine protected areas. That suggests a pressing need to protect more ocean habitats and figure out the best areas to protect. Some efforts along these lines are already underway. For example, in 2022 the nations that are parties to the United Nations Convention on Biodiversity adopted the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, which set a goal to protect, conserve, and manage at least 30% of the world’s oceans. But Papastamatiou stresses that it needs to be the right 30%. “A lot of these animals move over very large areas, and it is not feasible to protect all of those.” Research on three shark species help illustrate the challenges ahead, as well as what we still need to understand about shark migration. Shortfin Mako Mako shark populations have plummeted due to commercial and recreational fishing, which is they they’re listed on Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade on Endangered Species, which puts limits on their commercial exploitation. Makos are an apex predator found in tropical and temperate waters around the world, but until recently little was known about their movements and, therefore, where to protect them. But earlier this year, a genetic study identified two distinct mako populations in the North and South Atlantic, according to co-author Mahmood Shivji of the Save Our Seas Foundation Shark Research Center at Nova Southeastern University, Florida. Females appear to stick to their respective populations, but males contribute genetically to both, which means they move between them. Such intermixing helps maintain genetic diversity, Shivji points out, giving the species a better chance to adapt to environmental changes. This new information builds on a 2021 tagging study by the Harte Research Institute at Texas A&M University Corpus Christi (which included Pico) that showed makos spend more time in the northwestern Gulf of Mexico than expected. Another found that some stay in the Gulf year-round. “We thought makos were seasonal in the Gulf from looking at catch data,” said Kesley Banks, an associate research scientist at the institute and an author on both papers. “We assumed they left in the summer and that isn’t the case. With both these studies, we see that they stay in the Gulf all year.” Not all of them, though. In addition to Pico’s summer sojourns up the Atlantic coast, another male traveled thousands of miles to and around the Caribbean. Mako sharks tagged in the Atlantic by Shivji and his colleagues have not been tracked to the western Gulf, though, according to Banks. These findings highlight how much movement patterns vary even within a species and make it clear that highly migratory animals must be managed at a large scale, not just on the local level. Those two meandering makos from the Gulf, for example, passed through at least 12 jurisdictional boundaries, representing different levels of fishing pressure and a variety of regulations. Scalloped Hammerheads Critically endangered scalloped hammerhead sharks are another highly migratory species experiencing intense overfishing and rapidly diminishing numbers. Every year hundreds of these hammerheads, mostly females, gather around protected areas near the Galápagos Islands. It isn’t clear where they migrate from, though, or whether the same individuals return every year. To find out, the Florida Shark Research Center spent five years conducting biopsies collected from the aggregation. They’re currently analyzing the samples, with plans to publish results in mid-2026. Researcher about to deploy a satellite tag on a scalloped hammerhead. Photo: Mark Wong, used with permission. But we already know a few things about their behavior. “The sharks aggregate during daytime and disappear at night,” probably to feed, says Shivji, who is leading the study. The researchers suspect many of the females are pregnant based on their size, and tracks show some moving from the aggregation to recently discovered nursery areas near the mainland. Others have gone westward far into the Pacific, although their tags didn’t last long enough to show whether those individuals turned around and came back. This study could help make the case that the paths the sharks travel between existing protected areas also need protection. “Their migrations to the aggregation area put them at risk,” Shivji says. Silky Sharks Considered “vulnerable to extinction” by the IUCN, silky sharks get their name from the sheen created by densely packed dermal denticles — the tooth-like structures that make up shark skin. Once one of the most abundant shark species, they are heavily fished for their fins. Silky sharks aggregate around Cocos Island in Costa Rica and the Galápagos Marine Reserve. Individuals tagged there by Shivji’s team mostly remained close by, not venturing far outside the Reserve. But some were tracked far into unprotected international waters, with the data indicating they faced fishing pressure on as much as 50% of their journeys. Shivji and colleagues also have tagged silky sharks in Revillagigedo National Park, part of a network of protected areas in Mexico’s Eastern Tropical Pacific (and a UNESCO World Heritage Center). Those, too, traveled well outside the protected area, with two known to have been captured. One question answered by this work could be whether the Galápagos and Mexico populations mix and if so, whether their travel routes that can be protected. More to Learn Researchers have learned a lot about shark migrations in the past few decades thanks in part to improved and more commonplace tools. Tags are more advanced, for example, providing near real-time tracking via satellites for longer periods of time thanks to protective paint and better batteries. Even so, findings have only scratched the surface. The movements of many species remain a mystery, as does the variation in migration behaviors within a species. “People like to describe migration as a population-level reaction, where everybody leaves at same time, all go here, and all come back at the same time,” Papastamatiou says. “But we have started to see it is a proportion of animals that perform a migration, with a mix of animals that migrate or are residential. It is important to ask what determines who migrates and who remains? There has to be some selective reason for it.” Studies have shown sex differences in migratory patterns of some shark species, such as females seeming more likely to migrate than males and pregnant females more likely to migrate than nonpregnant ones. A Moving Target Even as scientists are learning shark migration patterns, those patterns may be changing. Another paper on which Shivji is a co-author found mako migrations responding to increasing water temperatures and the decreased dissolved oxygen content that results. Because makos have the highest metabolic rate of any shark, low oxygen levels effectively restrict their range. “People focus on water temperature with climate change, but dissolved oxygen should be as big a concern,” Shivji said. Other research has concluded that elevated sea-surface temperatures could cause sharks to delay their departure for summer habitats. That may already be happening; from 2011 to 2021, researchers at Florida Atlantic University saw blacktip shark populations off the state’s coast decrease to one-tenth of their initial abundance. “In 2011 it was common to see over 10,000 sharks on a single aerial survey flight along Palm Beach County,” FAU professor Stephen Kajiura wrote in an email. “By 2021, we barely saw 1,000, despite increasing the number of flights in later years. The sharks were shifting northward. During that time, the average winter water temperature had increased by 1 degree C. That is a dramatic shift in just a decade.” Such changes in the behavior of major predators have wide-ranging effects on local ecosystems. For example, fewer sharks preying on groupers and snappers could increase their numbers, and those fish would eat more of the smaller fish. Reducing the number of smaller fish could increase that of other creatures down the food web, in turn causing changes to their prey. Down at the bottom of the chain, a decline in species that eat blue-green algae could increase toxic algae blooms. In addition to protected areas, mitigation strategies also must account for changes in movement patterns. For example, a shift in timing of the arrival of a species to an aggregation could necessitate altering existing fishing limits. Enforcement is also key — and already inadequate. “Law enforcement is stretched out. We need more funding and more people,” said Banks. “But we also need the research to know where to send people, to narrow down where enforcement should be.” Toward that goal, she and other scientists plan to continue tagging sharks. “I’m waiting on tags in the mail right now,” Banks says. “Shark science is in its infancy, we are just now learning where they’re going and making new discoveries.” “There are still species that we don’t know much about,” Papastamatiou says. “And even those we do know about, we can’t stop studying them because they can change.” Previously in The Revelator: Trump vs. Birds: Proposed Budget Eliminates Critical Research Programs The post Incredible Journeys: Migratory Sharks on the Move appeared first on The Revelator.

Climate
Animals
Extinction

Some Air Travelers Bothered by Their Flight's Emissions Turn to Carbon Offsets. Do They Work?

Air travel results in a lot of planet-warming emissions, but it's also sometimes necessary

So you're booking your flight, and just when you're about to check out, the airline asks if you'd like to pay a little something to offset your share of the flight's pollution. Or, maybe you're an environmentally minded person, and you've heard you can buy these things called carbon offsets.Are they worth it? Let's explore. Why planes are so pollutive Jet engines burn fossil fuels, releasing planet-warming gases into the atmosphere. They also release water vapor, which turns into long, thin clouds called contrails that trap heat instead of letting it escape to space — additional warming that isn't typically included in a flight's emissions, said Diane Vitry, aviation director at a clean energy advocacy organization called the European Federation for Transport and Environment.Reducing emissions from air travel is difficult. Batteries weigh too much and provide too little power for long flights. Sustainable aviation fuel — biofuels made from things like corn, oil seeds and algae that can be mixed with jet fuel — is currently more expensive than traditional fuel and lacking sufficient supply to be in wide use.“Aviation is the problem child,” Vitry said. “Aviation and shipping are not decarbonizing, and definitely not fast enough.”That's where carbon offsets come in.A carbon offset is a certificate or a permit to emit planet-warming gases. It's connected to something that stores or reduces carbon emissions — for example, planting trees, or funding renewable energy.The idea is that the program or action offsets your pollutive action. You drive a car that pollutes a certain amount, you buy a carbon offset that leads to the planting of a tree that sequesters the same amount, and bam: the pollutive action (driving) is offset (tree planting).They've gotten popular enough that there's an entire marketplace that connects people and companies wanting to reduce their impacts with other companies that promise to do so.Vitry doesn't think so. She calls them a fake climate solution.“Unfortunately, it is not what is going to solve aviation’s climate problem,” she said. “You can’t clear your climate conscience with an offset.”Sure, you can plant a tree, but Vitry said that doesn’t stop your flight's emissions from entering the atmosphere. The tree may eventually absorb an equivalent amount of emissions. Or it may die. Or it may be sold as an offset multiple times by an unscrupulous company, meaning the tree can't possible absorb all the emissions it's supposed to.Barbara Haya, director of the Berkeley Carbon Trading Project, has studied carbon offsets for more than 20 years. She said some offset schemes are overcounted by 10 to 13 times their actual value.“There’s so much over-crediting on the offset market, so many credits that either don’t represent any emissions reductions at all or represent just a small fraction of what they claim,” Haya said.She said that’s partly because the voluntary offset market is largely unregulated, and it’s really difficult to measure offsets. The other problem is everyone involved benefits from over-exaggerating the benefits of offsets. “The buyer of the credit wants the cheap credits, the seller of the credits wants to get more credits for the same activity and the third party verifier is hired by the project developer, so has a conflict of interest to be lenient,” Haya said.Jodi Manning, chief executive of the carbon offset nonprofit Cool Effect, said consumers should beware of offset programs that don't say clearly which project will benefit from your purchase or how much of your money is going to a project. But she said “high-quality” carbon credits can play an important role where emissions are unavoidable.Manning said offsets have to be permanent, transparent, and unable to exist without the offset funding. “When carbon is done correctly, it can provide a credible, immediate way to account for the emissions that travelers cannot otherwise reduce. We all create emissions at some point and it is certainly better to take action to compensate for it than to do nothing,” she said.Several airlines that offer offsets did not respond to requests from AP to talk about their use. One that did, Southwest Airlines, said in a statement that it does not plan to rely on carbon offsets to help it reach a goal of net zero emissions by 2050. What are you some other options for offsetting your air travel? Fly less, take the train if you can, and pack light, Manning said.Instead of buying carbon offsets, Haya said she donates $1,000 to an organization she cares about on the rare occasion she flies for work or family visits. "We have an ethical obligation not to fly unless we really have to," she said.The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Photos You Should See – Sept. 2025

Climate
Energy
Pollution

Climate Change and Pollution Threaten Europe's Resources, EU Warns

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) -Climate change and environmental degradation pose a direct threat to the natural resources that Europe needs for its economic...

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) -Climate change and environmental degradation pose a direct threat to the natural resources that Europe needs for its economic security, the EU's environmental agency said on Monday.The European Environment Agency said biodiversity in Europe is declining due to unsustainable production and consumption, especially in the food system.Due to over-exploitation of natural resources, pollution and invasive alien species, more than 80% of protected habitats are in a poor or bad state, it said, while water resources are also under severe pressure.EUROPE'S FASTEST-WARMING CONTINENT"The degradation of our natural world jeopardises the European way of life," the agency said in its report: "Europe's environment 2025"."Europe is critically dependent on natural resources for economic security, to which climate change and environmental degradation pose a direct threat."Europe is the world's fastest-warming continent and is experiencing worsening droughts and other extreme weather events.But governments are grappling with other priorities including industrial competitiveness, and negotiations on EU climate targets have stoked divisions between richer and poorer countries.EU countries last week confirmed that the bloc will miss a global deadline to set new emissions-cutting targets due to divisions over the plans among EU governments.TIME RUNNING OUT, AGENCY SAYS"The window for meaningful action is narrowing, and the consequences of delay are becoming more tangible," executive director Leena Yla-Mononen said."We are approaching tipping points - not only in ecosystems, but also in the social and economic systems that underpin our societies."(Reporting by Bart Meijer. Editing by Mark Potter)Copyright 2025 Thomson Reuters.Photos You Should See – Sept. 2025

Climate
Pollution
Resources

‘Climate Tech’ is a meaningless buzzword. Let’s do this instead

“Climate tech” isn’t a thing. It has shifted in recent years from a category to define clean energy companies to an umbrella phrase that loses meaning the more we use it. Granted, the term is everywhere: inserted into VC pitch decks, plastered on billboards along highways from San Francisco to Austin to Boston, wedged into government policy papers, and featured prominently on conference agendas. Media properties from CNBC to GreenBiz rely on it as a traffic-driving category. And there’s a reason why. A changing climate is the most complex and vast challenge and opportunity confronting our society today. That also means we can’t afford ambiguity. We need accountability. We need progress. We need to reengineer infrastructure with advanced tech that future-proofs as it solves urgent and complex problems. Now.  Which means we need precision. And we need to acknowledge that infrastructure and markets that have served us for so long are failing—and in need of rebuilding to anticipate and meet future challenges. Our world is in desperate need of solutions tied to specific applications and impact across energy tech, waste tech, food tech, and carbon tech. We need solutions that advance specific areas of deeply specialized work with distinct metrics and challenges like energy storage, batteries, food security, and sustainable fuel development. And, we need talent trained and sharpened to tackle these specific problems. Ambiguity is the enemy of progress Progress requires clarity. Energy technology is a distinct thing. Waste technology is a distinct thing. Transportation technology, energy storage, agriculture and food sustainability, carbon removal—these are specific categories with definable challenges and measurable outcomes. Each is firmly tied to infrastructure and requires dedicated engineering, specialized expertise, and different pools of capital. For example, grid storage is not a “climate tech” problem—it’s a specific energy challenge with concrete metrics: cost per kilowatt-hour, storage capacity, duration, and efficiency. Grid storage is about optimizing supply and demand, the outcome of which is a financial, political, and engineering goal, not a moral imperative. We must connect the promise and hype of AI-powered software solutions to their physical applications in the real world. Why? Because solving these big, specific problems requires more than computation behind a screen. Realizing the promise of AI to transform and improve is only possible if it enters the physical realm and changes the mechanics of existing ways of doing things. Calling the solutions to these problems “climate tech” is a disservice to the work because it no longer adequately captures the scale and range of what’s required. Breaking “climate tech” down to drive breakthroughs We need to build and invest in technologies that are better, faster, cheaper than what came before and solve real problems—rather than loaded words that offer environmental promise and not much else.  The trajectory of biotech offers a solid framework. Rather than lumping everything under a term like “health tech,” industry pioneers stood up clearly defined categories, including: immunotherapy, CRISPR, mRNA vaccine development, oncology, longevity, and so on. Each domain pursued a specific set of problems and attracted talent and capital to solve them. The result? Breakthroughs.  Whether we realize it or not, software also focused in recent years, which has helped to accelerate progress. Information technology gave way to specific technical disciplines like cybersecurity, cloud computing, and enterprise tools. Category focus allowed companies to gain market share and differentiate with customer experience and accountability front-and-center. It’s time that “climate tech” undergoes the same level of rigorous redefinition. And it’s not just because we’re approaching critical climate “tipping points” (which we are). It’s because the economic opportunity cost of not acting is too great. The future of American communities and industries from agriculture to manufacturing rests on our ability to effectively seize the opportunities in front of us and reengineer them.  Everything needs to be built for the future with engineering precision and a specific problem in mind to solve. We need infrastructure and hardware solutions to solve focused problems like recycling plastic for manufacturing, rendering cement carbon-neutral, electrifying freight transport, rethinking protein production, and removing carbon at scale. We cannot grow the economy in the future without approaching all tech as climate tech.  For example, the investment firm I cofounded, Incite, invested in Monarch, a startup with a fleet of AI-powered electric vehicles and tech solutions that work for agricultural clients ranging from dairy farmers to municipalities to winemakers. Monarch recently shipped MonarchOne™, an end-to-end physical AI platform for OEMs to more efficiently manage work and use data to influence operations across environments. Monarch isn’t a “climate tech” company. It’s an AI and robotics company with clear environmental benefits. Working toward a post-”climate tech” world “Climate tech” served its purpose as an initial rallying cry. It placed an urgent crisis squarely on the map of capital markets, boardrooms, and policy agendas. It made innovation to help us take care of our planet inevitable. Totally unsurprisingly, however, grouping a product or tech into the vague category enables more greenwashing and ambiguity when what we need is progress, focus, and accountability. In order to scale up the grid, add resilience to infrastructure, and prevent the housing market from insurance collapse, we need to retire not just the language but the entire categorization of “climate tech” completely. We must dismantle the umbrella term into specific, infrastructure-centered areas in need of urgent work.  Let’s refine our language. Words matter.  Tech is crucial to curbing negative environmental impacts. But the utility of “climate tech” is running on fumes. Let’s stop pretending it’s still a thing—and seize the opportunity to build and invest in the physical infrastructure, software, apps, and technologies that will power economic opportunities and enrich life around the world.

“Climate tech” isn’t a thing. It has shifted in recent years from a category to define clean energy companies to an umbrella phrase that loses meaning the more we use it. Granted, the term is everywhere: inserted into VC pitch decks, plastered on billboards along highways from San Francisco to Austin to Boston, wedged into government policy papers, and featured prominently on conference agendas. Media properties from CNBC to GreenBiz rely on it as a traffic-driving category. And there’s a reason why. A changing climate is the most complex and vast challenge and opportunity confronting our society today. That also means we can’t afford ambiguity. We need accountability. We need progress. We need to reengineer infrastructure with advanced tech that future-proofs as it solves urgent and complex problems. Now.  Which means we need precision. And we need to acknowledge that infrastructure and markets that have served us for so long are failing—and in need of rebuilding to anticipate and meet future challenges. Our world is in desperate need of solutions tied to specific applications and impact across energy tech, waste tech, food tech, and carbon tech. We need solutions that advance specific areas of deeply specialized work with distinct metrics and challenges like energy storage, batteries, food security, and sustainable fuel development. And, we need talent trained and sharpened to tackle these specific problems. Ambiguity is the enemy of progress Progress requires clarity. Energy technology is a distinct thing. Waste technology is a distinct thing. Transportation technology, energy storage, agriculture and food sustainability, carbon removal—these are specific categories with definable challenges and measurable outcomes. Each is firmly tied to infrastructure and requires dedicated engineering, specialized expertise, and different pools of capital. For example, grid storage is not a “climate tech” problem—it’s a specific energy challenge with concrete metrics: cost per kilowatt-hour, storage capacity, duration, and efficiency. Grid storage is about optimizing supply and demand, the outcome of which is a financial, political, and engineering goal, not a moral imperative. We must connect the promise and hype of AI-powered software solutions to their physical applications in the real world. Why? Because solving these big, specific problems requires more than computation behind a screen. Realizing the promise of AI to transform and improve is only possible if it enters the physical realm and changes the mechanics of existing ways of doing things. Calling the solutions to these problems “climate tech” is a disservice to the work because it no longer adequately captures the scale and range of what’s required. Breaking “climate tech” down to drive breakthroughs We need to build and invest in technologies that are better, faster, cheaper than what came before and solve real problems—rather than loaded words that offer environmental promise and not much else.  The trajectory of biotech offers a solid framework. Rather than lumping everything under a term like “health tech,” industry pioneers stood up clearly defined categories, including: immunotherapy, CRISPR, mRNA vaccine development, oncology, longevity, and so on. Each domain pursued a specific set of problems and attracted talent and capital to solve them. The result? Breakthroughs.  Whether we realize it or not, software also focused in recent years, which has helped to accelerate progress. Information technology gave way to specific technical disciplines like cybersecurity, cloud computing, and enterprise tools. Category focus allowed companies to gain market share and differentiate with customer experience and accountability front-and-center. It’s time that “climate tech” undergoes the same level of rigorous redefinition. And it’s not just because we’re approaching critical climate “tipping points” (which we are). It’s because the economic opportunity cost of not acting is too great. The future of American communities and industries from agriculture to manufacturing rests on our ability to effectively seize the opportunities in front of us and reengineer them.  Everything needs to be built for the future with engineering precision and a specific problem in mind to solve. We need infrastructure and hardware solutions to solve focused problems like recycling plastic for manufacturing, rendering cement carbon-neutral, electrifying freight transport, rethinking protein production, and removing carbon at scale. We cannot grow the economy in the future without approaching all tech as climate tech.  For example, the investment firm I cofounded, Incite, invested in Monarch, a startup with a fleet of AI-powered electric vehicles and tech solutions that work for agricultural clients ranging from dairy farmers to municipalities to winemakers. Monarch recently shipped MonarchOne™, an end-to-end physical AI platform for OEMs to more efficiently manage work and use data to influence operations across environments. Monarch isn’t a “climate tech” company. It’s an AI and robotics company with clear environmental benefits. Working toward a post-”climate tech” world “Climate tech” served its purpose as an initial rallying cry. It placed an urgent crisis squarely on the map of capital markets, boardrooms, and policy agendas. It made innovation to help us take care of our planet inevitable. Totally unsurprisingly, however, grouping a product or tech into the vague category enables more greenwashing and ambiguity when what we need is progress, focus, and accountability. In order to scale up the grid, add resilience to infrastructure, and prevent the housing market from insurance collapse, we need to retire not just the language but the entire categorization of “climate tech” completely. We must dismantle the umbrella term into specific, infrastructure-centered areas in need of urgent work.  Let’s refine our language. Words matter.  Tech is crucial to curbing negative environmental impacts. But the utility of “climate tech” is running on fumes. Let’s stop pretending it’s still a thing—and seize the opportunity to build and invest in the physical infrastructure, software, apps, and technologies that will power economic opportunities and enrich life around the world.

Climate
Agriculture
Energy

Suggested Viewing

THE SPRAYER

In the land occupied with the sprayers army, no one has the right to grow any kind of plants either in public or private. So many of the people and soldiers do not even know how a plant grows or looks like, until one day one of the soldiers finds a seed buried deep down in the dust and his curiosity is just the beginning of something extraordinary, something big, something revolutionary.

Plants
CO2
Animation

Total Disaster

Armed with realistic bird puppets, trickster environmental activists pretend to be oil company Total—staging a satirical press conference to introduce "RéHabitat," a program to rescue animals from the East African Oil Pipeline by relocating them to “more sustainable” habitats. Using humor and mischief, they expose a deadly ecological disaster in a zany effort to help #StopEACOP.

Activism
Energy
Animals

Capturing The Fire

When Louise Coghill saw the first plume of smoke begin to rise behind her parents property, she could never have predicted that in less than four hours, it would become a wall of flames, swallowing everything in its path. A photographer by trade, Louise has travelled the world documenting everything from the nomadic wanderers of Mongolia, to base life at Mount Everest. Capturing the extraordinary comes naturally to Louise, so when her family home in the semi-rural Western Australian town of Gidgegannup became engulfed in flames, her first instinct wasn’t to take shelter, it was to pick up her camera.

Conservation
Climate
Nature

Eating the Future

Bafta-winner Mia McKenna-Bruce voices an eco-investigator who is traumatised by her work accessing factory farms and documenting animal abuses undercover. Terrified of a future of climate apocalypse, she embarks on a journey into the food systems that shape our planet, to look for hope.

Activism
Climate
Food

Heimat - Requiem For The World As We Know It

Four theater-makers from Belgium travel to the melting glaciers on Greenland. Their goal: to play a new composed requiem and say goodbye to the world as we know it.

Music
Culture
Climate

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