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Could pawpaw, the US-native fruit, become the new kiwi or mango?

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Saturday, September 28, 2024

About five years ago, Matt Feyerabend, co-owner of an Arkansas ice-cream business, wanted to explore new flavors and use more native fruits, so while delivering a batch of product to a restaurant in Eureka Springs, Arkansas, he asked if anyone knew a grower of pawpaws, a tree fruit native to the United States with a flavor described as a mix between a mango and a banana.A server said her father, a veterinarian, had trees on his property. Feyerabend and his wife, Meghan, now annually purchase hundreds of pounds of the fruit from the vet and other growers and sell pawpaw ice-cream and other treats containing the fruit and its seeds.They are part of a growing industry. In recent years, people have started pawpaw festivals around the country, and in 2022, the US Department of Agriculture included the fruit in its agricultural census for the first time and reported that the country had almost 1,500 farms containing 800 acres of the fruit.Growers are trying to meet the increased demand but faced challenges this year because some trees flowered earlier than normal and were then hit by a late-season frost that destroyed some of the crop.Scientists said the unusual weather was related to the climate crisis and say that such events could create problems for growers, just as the industry in the US is taking off.Still, people in the industry remain optimistic about pawpaw’s potential because it is native to the United States and there are many varieties around the country. As such, the crop could be able to better adapt to the effects of the climate crisis than fruits like apples and peaches.“Since there are native stands of [pawpaws] all over the country, we have so much variation and lots of stuff with great fruit quality,” said Adam D’Angelo, director of research at Project Pawpaw, a company that aims to develop new varieties of the fruit. “We are able to draw upon that to make sure that we still have crops that can perform in varying conditions.”The pawpaw is the largest edible fruit native to the United States, and the crop typically ripens in the fall. It has a shelf life of just two to three days, which makes selling it harder.Universities have invested in research programs to improve propagation of the plant.Pawpaw enthusiasts have also launched festivals that have increased awareness of the fruit.D’Angelo thinks the fruit can help small farmers and the environment.“This tropical-tasting, delicious fruit that grows right here is, in some ways, displacing tropical fruit that is being shipped across the world”, which raises greater environmental and ethical concerns than something grown locally, said D’Angelo, who grew up in a family with a garden center and nursery in northern New Jersey.Feyerabend was unsure how to introduce a pawpaw flavor to Pure Joy Ice Cream customers not familiar with its taste, so he made a sorbet in which he used lime juice to “accentuate the tropical notes in the pawpaw fruit”, he said.Customers liked it.“They weren’t even super interested in what the pawpaw was. It wasn’t for any interest in tropical fruit or native fruit. They were legitimately just enjoying the flavor of it,” said Feyerabend, who went to one pawpaw festival in 2023 and plans to sell at four this year.But one of his suppliers recently had a webworm infestation damage his crop. The fruit was still usable, Feyerabend said. The farmer released wasps – rather than a pesticide spray – to attack the worms.“It’s a very valuable fruit” and “requires a fraction of the inputs of a traditional fruit crop and far less spraying”, D’Angelo said.Still, farmers in Ohio and Kentucky reported that the early flowering this year created a bitter taste.Kentucky State University, which has a pawpaw research program, lost 40% of its crop to unusual weather, said Kirk Pomper, a horticulture professor at the school. Still, he thinks that pawpaw farmers can adjust to new weather patterns by planting orchards on north-facing hillsides to slow the flowering and investing in new irrigation methods to contend with more frequent draughts, he said.“It’s just going to make it a little more challenging,” said Pomper, who has worked on the fruit for two decades.Pomper remains optimistic about the fruit’s potential because people have become more adventurous in what they eat, he said. He envisions pawpaws following a trajectory similar to fruits like the kiwi and mango, which became more popular in the United States in recent decades.“The pawpaw fits right in there with that tropical-like flavor, even though it’s grown in temperate areas,” Pomper said.People in the industry also expect entrepreneurs to find more uses for the pawpaw pulp. In addition to making ice-cream with it, Feyerabend delivered pawpaws to a local brewer who planned to make a beer with the fruit.Still even if the pawpaw market continues to grow, D’Angelo does not think people should dedicate an entire farm to the fruit.“Diversification is essential. If you have a bad year for pawpaws, you might have a great year for chestnuts, right?” D’Angelo said. “Spreading out that risk is what is going to help foster resilience in our food system and is going to help keep small farms innovating and keep them viable.”

Pawpaw, a tree fruit that can help farmers and the environment, stays resilient in face of a climate crisisAbout five years ago, Matt Feyerabend, co-owner of an Arkansas ice-cream business, wanted to explore new flavors and use more native fruits, so while delivering a batch of product to a restaurant in Eureka Springs, Arkansas, he asked if anyone knew a grower of pawpaws, a tree fruit native to the United States with a flavor described as a mix between a mango and a banana.A server said her father, a veterinarian, had trees on his property. Feyerabend and his wife, Meghan, now annually purchase hundreds of pounds of the fruit from the vet and other growers and sell pawpaw ice-cream and other treats containing the fruit and its seeds. Continue reading...

About five years ago, Matt Feyerabend, co-owner of an Arkansas ice-cream business, wanted to explore new flavors and use more native fruits, so while delivering a batch of product to a restaurant in Eureka Springs, Arkansas, he asked if anyone knew a grower of pawpaws, a tree fruit native to the United States with a flavor described as a mix between a mango and a banana.

A server said her father, a veterinarian, had trees on his property. Feyerabend and his wife, Meghan, now annually purchase hundreds of pounds of the fruit from the vet and other growers and sell pawpaw ice-cream and other treats containing the fruit and its seeds.

They are part of a growing industry. In recent years, people have started pawpaw festivals around the country, and in 2022, the US Department of Agriculture included the fruit in its agricultural census for the first time and reported that the country had almost 1,500 farms containing 800 acres of the fruit.

Growers are trying to meet the increased demand but faced challenges this year because some trees flowered earlier than normal and were then hit by a late-season frost that destroyed some of the crop.

Scientists said the unusual weather was related to the climate crisis and say that such events could create problems for growers, just as the industry in the US is taking off.

Still, people in the industry remain optimistic about pawpaw’s potential because it is native to the United States and there are many varieties around the country. As such, the crop could be able to better adapt to the effects of the climate crisis than fruits like apples and peaches.

“Since there are native stands of [pawpaws] all over the country, we have so much variation and lots of stuff with great fruit quality,” said Adam D’Angelo, director of research at Project Pawpaw, a company that aims to develop new varieties of the fruit. “We are able to draw upon that to make sure that we still have crops that can perform in varying conditions.”

The pawpaw is the largest edible fruit native to the United States, and the crop typically ripens in the fall. It has a shelf life of just two to three days, which makes selling it harder.

Universities have invested in research programs to improve propagation of the plant.

Pawpaw enthusiasts have also launched festivals that have increased awareness of the fruit.

D’Angelo thinks the fruit can help small farmers and the environment.

“This tropical-tasting, delicious fruit that grows right here is, in some ways, displacing tropical fruit that is being shipped across the world”, which raises greater environmental and ethical concerns than something grown locally, said D’Angelo, who grew up in a family with a garden center and nursery in northern New Jersey.

Feyerabend was unsure how to introduce a pawpaw flavor to Pure Joy Ice Cream customers not familiar with its taste, so he made a sorbet in which he used lime juice to “accentuate the tropical notes in the pawpaw fruit”, he said.

Customers liked it.

“They weren’t even super interested in what the pawpaw was. It wasn’t for any interest in tropical fruit or native fruit. They were legitimately just enjoying the flavor of it,” said Feyerabend, who went to one pawpaw festival in 2023 and plans to sell at four this year.

But one of his suppliers recently had a webworm infestation damage his crop. The fruit was still usable, Feyerabend said. The farmer released wasps – rather than a pesticide spray – to attack the worms.

“It’s a very valuable fruit” and “requires a fraction of the inputs of a traditional fruit crop and far less spraying”, D’Angelo said.

Still, farmers in Ohio and Kentucky reported that the early flowering this year created a bitter taste.

Kentucky State University, which has a pawpaw research program, lost 40% of its crop to unusual weather, said Kirk Pomper, a horticulture professor at the school. Still, he thinks that pawpaw farmers can adjust to new weather patterns by planting orchards on north-facing hillsides to slow the flowering and investing in new irrigation methods to contend with more frequent draughts, he said.

“It’s just going to make it a little more challenging,” said Pomper, who has worked on the fruit for two decades.

Pomper remains optimistic about the fruit’s potential because people have become more adventurous in what they eat, he said. He envisions pawpaws following a trajectory similar to fruits like the kiwi and mango, which became more popular in the United States in recent decades.

“The pawpaw fits right in there with that tropical-like flavor, even though it’s grown in temperate areas,” Pomper said.

People in the industry also expect entrepreneurs to find more uses for the pawpaw pulp. In addition to making ice-cream with it, Feyerabend delivered pawpaws to a local brewer who planned to make a beer with the fruit.

Still even if the pawpaw market continues to grow, D’Angelo does not think people should dedicate an entire farm to the fruit.

“Diversification is essential. If you have a bad year for pawpaws, you might have a great year for chestnuts, right?” D’Angelo said. “Spreading out that risk is what is going to help foster resilience in our food system and is going to help keep small farms innovating and keep them viable.”

Read the full story here.
Photos courtesy of

BP predicts higher oil and gas demand, suggesting world will not hit 2050 net zero target

Conflict in Ukraine and Middle East as well as trade tariffs are making states focus on energy securityBusiness live – latest updatesBP has raised its forecasts for oil and gas demand, suggesting global net zero target for 2050 will not be met, in the latest sign the transition to clean energy is decelerating.The energy company’s closely watched outlook report has estimated that oil use is on track to hit 83m barrels a day in 2050, a rise of 8% compared with its previous estimate of 77m barrels a day. Continue reading...

BP has raised its forecasts for oil and gas demand, suggesting global net zero target for 2050 will not be met, in the latest sign the transition to clean energy is decelerating.The energy company’s closely watched outlook report has estimated that oil use is on track to hit 83m barrels a day in 2050, a rise of 8% compared with its previous estimate of 77m barrels a day.The current trajectory of the energy transition means natural gas demand could hit 4,806 cubic metres in 2050, BP said, up 1.6% from its previous estimate of 4,729 cubic metres.In order to meet global net zero targets by 2050, the fall in oil demand would have to occur sooner and with greater intensity, dropping to about 85m barrels a day by 2035 and about 35m barrels a day by 2050, BP said.The world currently consumes about 100m barrels a day of oil.Spencer Dale, the BP chief economist, added that geopolitical tensions, such as the war in Ukraine, conflicts in the Middle East and increasing use of tariffs, had intensified demands around national energy security.“For some, it may mean reducing dependency on imported fossil fuels, and accelerating the transition to greater electrification, powered by domestic low-carbon energy,” he said. “We may start to see the emergence of ‘electrostates’.”However the report found it could also give rise to an increased preference for domestically produced rather than imported energy.It comes as the energy secretary, Ed Miliband, looks at ways the government could encourage drilling in the North Sea without breaking a manifesto promise not to grant new licences on new parts of the British sea bed.Despite rapid growth in renewable energy, oil is still forecast to remain the single largest source of primary global energy supply for most of next two decades, at 30% in 2035, down only slightly from its current share.Renewables are forecast to rise from 10% of the primary energy supply in 2023 to 15% in 2035, BP said, and are not expected to surpass oil until towards the end of the 2040s.BP also found that “the longer the energy system remains on its current pathway, the harder it will be to remain within a 2C carbon budget”, as emissions continue to rise.The carbon budget is how much CO2 can still be emitted by humanity while limiting global temperature rises to 2C. BP’s modelling has found that on the current trajectory, cumulative carbon emissions will exceed this limit by the early 2040s.skip past newsletter promotionSign up to Business TodayGet set for the working day – we'll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morningPrivacy 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“This raises the risk that an extended period of delay could increase the economic and social cost of remaining within a 2C budget,” it said.BP has attracted anger from environmental campaigners in recent months after abandoning green targets in favour of ramping up oil and gas production.The green strategy was set by its previous chief executive, Bernard Looney, who was appointed by outgoing chair Helge Lund in 2020 to transform the business into an integrated energy company. However, the transition was undermined by a rise in global oil and gas prices, as well as the shock departure of Looney in 2023.Looney’s successor, Murray Auchincloss, set out a “fundamental reset” this year after the activist hedge fund Elliott Management amassed a multibillion-pound stake in the company amid growing investor dissatisfaction over its sluggish share price.BP’s outlook predicts wind and solar power generation will meet more than 80% of the increase in electricity demand by 2035, with half of this occurring in China.The world’s second biggest economy is also its biggest source of carbon dioxide. This week Beijing announced plans to cut its emissions by between 7% and 10% of their peak by 2035, though this is well below the 30% cut that some experts have argued is necessary.

United Utilities underspent £52m on vital work in Windermere, FoI reveals

Privatised water company criticised over efforts to connect private septic tanks to mains and cut pollutionBusiness live – latest updatesThe water company United Utilities has underspent by more than £50m on vital work in Windermere, north-west England, to connect private septic tanks to the mains network and reduce sewage pollution, it can be revealed.The financial regulator, Ofwat, revealed in response to a freedom of information request that the privatised water company had been allocated £129m to connect non-mains systems – mostly septic tanks – to the mains sewer network since 2000. Continue reading...

The water company United Utilities has underspent by more than £50m on vital work in Windermere, north-west England, to connect private septic tanks to the mains network and reduce sewage pollution, it can be revealed.The financial regulator, Ofwat, revealed in response to a freedom of information request that the privatised water company had been allocated £129m to connect non-mains systems – mostly septic tanks – to the mains sewer network since 2000.The company has spent £76.7m in almost 25 years, leaving £52m unspent.Save Windermere, the campaign group that submitted the request, has mapped areas where private sewerage systems are likely to be significantly affecting the water quality. It is calling on the water company to produce a high-profile campaign to connect the septic tank properties to the mains.United Utilities pointed out it could not force property owners to sign up to the main network, but said it was involved in community outreach to encourage businesses and individuals to do so.Under section 101 (a) of the 1991 Water Industry Act, property owners can request a connection to the public sewer system if an existing private sewerage system – serving two or more premises or a locality – is causing, or is likely to cause, environmental or amenity problems.Matt Staniek, the founder and director of Save Windermere, said only one scheme had been completed in the Windermere catchment in two decades, which connected only 27 properties to the mains.He said: “There should have been far more effort to inform local communities about their right to request a mains connection. When connection studies have been carried out in the past, they should have been acted on.“Any work that doesn’t aim to connect private properties to the mains … is a smokescreen. It’s greenwash that pulls us further away from a sewage-free Windermere.”Treated and untreated sewage discharges from United Utilities facilities represent the principle source of phosphorous pollution into Windermere. The first comprehensive analysis of water quality in England’s largest lake revealed bathing water quality across most of the lake was poor throughout the summer owing to high levels of sewage pollution.As well as pollution from water company assets, sewage pollution is known to enter the lake from private septic tanks. The water company attributes 30% of phosphorus loading in the lake to non-mains drainage.skip past newsletter promotionThe planet's most important stories. Get all the week's environment news - the good, the bad and the essentialPrivacy 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 promotionMapping by Save Windermere has identified areas where targeted work could take place to connect non-mains sewerage to the mains. These include areas around the south basin of Windermere, where more than 5 miles of shoreline – including residential properties, holiday accommodations and tourism businesses – relies entirely on non-mains.A United Utilities spokesperson, said: “There are numerous ways for people and businesses to connect to the public sewerage system. As well as needing enough demand from customers in a particular area, there are additional criteria that also has to be met – including the viability of the scheme and customers being willing to pay to connect to the network and for ongoing wastewater charges.“We are currently working with communities in three areas in the catchment to drum up the necessary interest.”

Louisiana's $3B Power Upgrade for Meta Project Raises Questions About Who Should Foot the Bill

Meta is racing to construct its largest data center yet, a $10 billion facility in northeast Louisiana as big as 70 football fields and requiring more than twice the electricity of New Orleans

HOLLY RIDGE, La. (AP) — In a rural corner of Louisiana, Meta is building one of the world's largest data centers, a $10 billion behemoth as big as 70 football fields that will consume more power in a day than the entire city of New Orleans at the peak of summer.While the colossal project is impossible to miss in Richland Parish, a farming community of 20,000 residents, not everything is visible, including how much the social media giant will pay toward the more than $3 billion in new electricity infrastructure needed to power the facility. Watchdogs have warned that in the rush to capitalize on the AI-driven data center boom, some states are allowing massive tech companies to direct expensive infrastructure projects with limited oversight.Mississippi lawmakers allowed Amazon to bypass regulatory approval for energy infrastructure to serve two data centers it is spending $10 billion to build. In Indiana, a utility is proposing a data center-focused subsidiary that operates outside normal state regulations. And while Louisiana says it has added consumer safeguards, it lags behind other states in its efforts to insulate regular power consumers from data center-related costs. Mandy DeRoche, an attorney for the environmental advocacy group Earthjustice, says there is less transparency due to confidentiality agreements and rushed approvals.“You can’t follow the facts, you can’t follow the benefits or the negative impacts that could come to the service area or to the community,” DeRoche said. Private deals for public power supply Under contract with Meta, power company Entergy agreed to build three gas-powered plants that would produce 2,262 megawatts — equivalent to a fifth of Entergy's current power supply in Louisiana. The Public Service Commission approved Meta’s infrastructure plan in August after Entergy agreed to bolster protections to prevent a spike in residential rates.Nonetheless, nondisclosure agreements conceal how much Meta will pay.Consumer advocates tried but failed to compel Meta to provide sworn testimony, submit to discovery and face cross-examination during a regulatory review. Regulators reviewed Meta’s contract with Entergy, but were barred from revealing details. Meta did not address AP’s questions about transparency, while Louisiana's economic development agency and Entergy say nondisclosure agreements are standard to protect sensitive commercial data. Davante Lewis — the only one of five public service commissioners to vote against the plan — said he's still unclear how much electricity the center will use, if gas-powered plants are the most economical option nor if it will create the promised 500 jobs. “There’s certain information we should know and need to know but don’t have,” Lewis said. Additionally, Meta is exempt from paying sales tax under a 2024 Louisiana law that the state acknowledges could lead to “tens of millions of dollars or more each year” in lost revenue.Meta has agreed to fund about half the cost of building the power plants over 15 years, including cost overruns, but not maintenance and operation, said Logan Burke, executive director of the Alliance for Affordable Energy, a consumer advocacy group. Public Service Commission Jean-Paul Coussan insists there will be “very little” impact on ratepayers.But watchdogs warn Meta could pull out of or not renew its contract, leaving the public to pay for the power plants over the rest of their 30-year life span, and all grid users are expected to help pay for the $550 million transmission line serving Meta’s facility.Ari Peskoe, director of Harvard University’s Electricity Law Initiative, said tech companies should be required to pay “every penny so the public is not left holding the bag.” How is this tackled in other states? Elsewhere, tech companies are not being given such leeway. More than a dozen states have taken steps to protect households and business ratepayers from paying for rising electricity costs tied to energy-hungry data centers. Pennsylvania’s utilities commission is drafting a model rate structure to insulate customers from rising costs related to data centers. New Jersey’s utilities regulators are studying whether data centers cause “unreasonable” cost increases for other users. Oregon passed legislation this year ordering utilities regulators to develop new, and likely higher, power rates for data centers. Locals have mixed feelings Some Richland Parish residents fear a boom-and-bust cycle once construction ends. Others expect a boost in school and health care funding. Meta said it plans to invest in 1,500 megawatts of renewable energy in Louisiana and $200 million in water and road infrastructure in Richland Parish.“We don’t come from a wealthy parish and the money is much needed,” said Trae Banks, who runs a drywall business that has tripled in size since Meta arrived.In the nearby town of Delhi, Mayor Jesse Washington believes the data center will eventually have a positive impact on his community of 2,600.But for now, the construction traffic frustrates residents and property prices are skyrocketing as developers try to house thousands of construction workers. More than a dozen low-income families were evicted from a trailer park whose owners are building housing for incoming Meta workers, Washington says.“We have a lot of concerned people — they’ve put hardship on a lot of people in certain areas here," the mayor said. “I just want to see people from Delhi benefit from this.”Brook reported from New Orleans. Brook is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Photos You Should See – Sept. 2025

California’s marijuana industry gets a break under new law suspending tax hike

California's legal weed industry is still overshadowed by the larger black market. A new state law gives businesses a break by delaying a tax increase.

In summary California’s legal weed industry is still overshadowed by the larger black market. A new state law gives businesses a break by delaying a tax increase. Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday signed a bill to roll back taxes on recreational weed in an effort to give some relief to an industry that has struggled to supersede its illicit counterpart since voters legalized marijuana almost 10 years ago. The law will temporarily revert the cannabis excise tax to 15% until 2028, suspending an increase to 19% levied earlier this year. The law is meant to help dispensaries that proponents say are operating under slim margins due to being bogged down by years of overregulation. “We’re rolling back this cannabis tax hike so the legal market can continue to grow, consumers can access safe products, and our local communities see the benefits,” Newsom said in a statement, and that reducing the tax will allow legal businesses to remain competitive and boost their long-term growth. An excise tax is a levy imposed by the state before sales taxes are applied. It’s applied to the cannabis industry under a 2022 agreement between the state and marijuana companies. It replaced a different kind of fee that was supposed to raise revenue for social programs, such as child care assistance, in accordance with the 2016 ballot measure that legalized cannabis. For years, the cannabis industry has lobbied against the tax, arguing that it hurts an industry overshadowed by a thriving illicit drug market. “By stopping this misguided tax hike, the governor and Legislature chose smart policy that grows revenue by keeping the legal market viable instead of driving consumers back to dangerous, untested illicit products,” Amy O’Gorman, executive director of the California Cannabis Operators Association, said in a statement. Since its legalization, the recreational weed industry has struggled to outpace the illegal market as farmers flooded the industry and prices began to drop. Taxable cannabis sales have slowly declined since their peak in the second quarter of 2021 of more than $1.5 billion to $1.2 billion four years later, according to data from the state Department of Tax and Fee Administration. Legal sales make up about 40% of all weed consumption, according to the state Department of Cannabis Control. Several nonprofits that receive grants through the tax opposed the bill, arguing that it will threaten services for low-income children, substance abuse programs and environmental protections. In the Emerald Triangle, where the heartland of the industry lies nestled in the northern corner of the state, conservation organizations said they were disappointed in the governor and that it was a step backwards for addressing environmental degradation caused by illegal growers in years past.  “All this bill does is reduce the resources we have to remedy the harms of the illegal market,” said Alicia Hamann, executive director of Friends of the Eel River in Humboldt County. Many nonprofits supported spiking other fees in agreement with lawmakers and industry groups that the excise tax would be increased three years later, Hamann said. “It feels a little bit like a stab in the back,” she said.

World, Business Leaders Hope to Keep Momentum in Fight Against Climate Change Despite US

Hundreds of world and business leaders are gathering to keep the fight against climate change alive

NEW YORK (AP) — The U.S. government is going in the other direction. Temperatures keep rising. More extreme weather is sweeping across the world. Yet hundreds of leaders from government and business are in New York this week to keep the fight against climate change alive. Amid fracture and despair, they are emphasizing progress and hope.More than 110 world leaders will speak at a special U.N. climate summit Wednesday designed to get nations to strengthen their required — but already late — plans to wean themselves from the coal, oil and natural gas that causes climate change. Dozens of business leaders are in the city networking in various conferences aimed at greener and cleaner energy.“We’re here to power on. In the end, we either will have a livable planet or we won’t,” said Helen Clarkson, CEO of The Climate Group, kicking off New York City Climate Week and its more than 1,000 events. “It’s an uphill struggle, but we know we don’t have a choice. It’s up to us to protect what we love.”But on Monday, as leaders talked about stronger national plans and reduction in fossil fuel emissions, Climate Action Tracker, an independent group of scientists who track pledges to fight climate announced that the host nation — the United States — had the biggest backslide in history.“This is the most aggressive, comprehensive and consequential climate policy rollback the CAT has ever analyzed,” said Niklas Höhne, a New Climate Institute scientist who helps run the tracker. In much of the rest of the world, progress But non-U.S. leaders in politics and business highlighted how much of the world has switched to cleaner renewable energy, such as solar and wind, mostly because of price.“The economic case is clear,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told the Global Renewables Summit. She said 90% of new renewable projects generate power more cheaply than fossil fuels, and solar energy is now 41% cheaper than the lowest-cost fossil alternative. "So yes, the momentum is real.”Last year the world invested $2 trillion in renewable energy, twice as much as the fossil fuels that spew heat-trapping gases, several leaders said. Just 10 years ago when the world's leaders adopted the Paris climate agreement, the planet was headed to 5 degrees Celsius (9 degrees Fahrenheit) of warming above pre-industrial times. Now it's on track for 3 degrees Celsius (5.4 degrees Fahrenheit), said United Nations climate chief Simon Stiell. But it's not near the Paris goal of 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit), Stiell said."We will have inched forward so progress is being made," Stiell said. He said the unanimous consensus process of international negotiations is “difficult, but it is delivering.”But it's not enough and too slow, said Ralph Regenvanu, Vanuatu's climate change minister. His country and other small island nations and vulnerable states plan to ask the U.N. General Assembly — which goes by majority rule, not unanimity — to follow up on the International Court of Justice's ruling earlier this year that all countries must act on climate change. Vanuatu's resolution won't be proposed until after November's climate negotiations in Brazil, he said.Places such as Antigua and Barbuda are “under siege for a climate crisis we did not create,” Prime Minister Gaston Browne said of his nation, which has been hit by four Category Four and Five hurricanes in a decade. “Every degree of warming is an invoice, literally a demand sent to small islands that we cannot afford to pay."The nations of the world all were supposed to come up with new five-year plans for curbing carbon emissions by February, leading into the Brazil negotiations. But only 47 of the 195 nations — those responsible for less than a quarter of global emissions — have done so. U.N. officials said they should be submitted by the end of this month so experts can calculate how the world is doing in its emission-reduction efforts.The world's biggest emitter, China, and another top polluter, the European Union, are expected to announce their plans or rough sketches of their plans this week. The United Nations session Wednesday is designed to cajole countries to do more.Australian billionaire Andrew Forrest tried to cheer business and world leaders on Monday. “Despair is not leadership,” Forrest said. “Fear has never built anything. We’re here today to lead by your very example.”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

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