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See how ice has vanished from northern lakes after record warm winter

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Friday, March 22, 2024

Lakes from Minnesota to Maine are usually still frozen over at this time of year, as signs of spring slowly emerge across the country’s northern tier.Instead, the ice is breaking up or is already gone on many lakes with more than a century of records. So-called ice-out — when waters become navigable for boats again — is happening earlier than ever witnessed. Ice cover in mid-March of each year Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.   Graphic shows satellite images that were available on dates close to March 15, and are different for each year. The earliest was captured on March 9 and the latest on March 21. Ice cover in mid-March of each year Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.   Graphic shows satellite images that were available on dates close to March 15, and are different for each year. The earliest was captured on March 9 and the latest on March 21. Ice cover in mid-March of each year Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.   Graphic shows satellite images that were available on dates close to March 15, and are different for each year. The earliest was captured on March 9 and the latest on March 21. Ice cover in mid-March of each year Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.   Graphic shows satellite images that were available on dates close to March 15, and are different for each year. The earliest was captured on March 9 and the latest on March 21. It’s a vivid sign that winters are warming faster than any other season across what is usually the frigid North. Declining snowfall and ice cover serve as both symptom and driver of that trend, in a feedback loop that is having stark effects in communities that thrive on harsh winters.“It’s a little bit unsettling,” said Chris O’Brien, a Wisconsin native who now serves as a marketing coordinator for Fresh Water, an environmental nonprofit in the Twin Cities.During Wisconsin’s annual 16-day sturgeon spearing season on Lake Winnebago in February, the northern half of its waters were free of ice, said Wayne Schumacher, a Fond du Lac resident and spearing enthusiast. And where there was solid ice, sturgeon hunters could only get out on the lake on foot or in ATVs, but not by car or truck, as usual. Their harvest fell well short of annual conservation limits by the season’s end Feb. 25.And then a few days later, he said, the lake’s ice broke up.While it’s normal for ice to cover lakes around Wisconsin for 100 days or more each winter, this year, it didn’t stick around for half that long during what residents called a lost winter, or the winter that never was.“It just seems like we’re not getting the winters that we used to get,” Schumacher said.Data on the onset of lake ice season is spotty, said Pete Boulay, a climatologist with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, because waters often ice over in fits and starts as temperatures fluctuate from fall into winter. But its disappearance is hard to miss, so records are thorough. On many of Minnesota’s thousands of lakes, ice-out records go back as far as the 1860s or 1870s.“Ice-out is so dramatic,” Boulay said.And the data show that this year’s ice-out is even more dramatic.“In a normal-ish year, the last week of March is when we start thinking about ice out,” Boulay said. “We already have hundreds of lakes that are free of ice.” Ice cover in mid-March of each year Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.   Graphic shows satellite images that were available on dates close to March 15, and are different for each year. The earliest was captured on March 9 and the latest on March 21. Ice cover in mid-March of each year Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.   Graphic shows satellite images that were available on dates close to March 15, and are different for each year. The earliest was captured on March 9 and the latest on March 21. Ice cover in mid-March of each year Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.   Graphic shows satellite images that were available on dates close to March 15, and are different for each year. The earliest was captured on March 9 and the latest on March 21. Ice cover in mid-March of each year Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.   Graphic shows satellite images that were available on dates close to March 15, and are different for each year. The earliest was captured on March 9 and the latest on March 21. On Clear Lake, about 45 miles northwest of Minneapolis, ice-out came March 1, about a month earlier than average and the earliest in records that go back to 1874. In the Twin Cities region, the ice-out on Lake Minnetonka came about as early: Instead of a typical April 13 ice-out, it came March 13.Ice-out arrived March 8, five weeks earlier than usual, on White Bear Lake, just north of St. Paul, the earliest since record-keeping there began in 1928.The same day, the ice broke up on Lake Osakis, 110 miles northwest of the Twin Cities. It set a record for a lake where ice records go back to 1867. The median ice-out date over those 156 years: April 19, six weeks later.It is perhaps the clearest sign of what was a record-warm winter across the contiguous United States and for the Northern Hemisphere, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The warmth was the most dramatic across regions that are typically the coldest, setting records for the mildest winters on record in eight states across the Upper Midwest, Great Lakes and Northeast.Such a pattern is to be expected during episodes of El Niño, the global climate pattern tied to warmer-than-normal Pacific Ocean waters. Among its domino effects around the world is a tendency toward milder winters for the Upper Midwest.But the rise in average global temperatures because of human-caused climate change is helping to compound the trend. Ice cover in mid-March of each year Satallite image is not available for this area on the same day Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.   Map display satellite imagery taken on the closest to March 15th, depending on each year availability. The earliest was captured on March 8th and the latest on March 19th Ice cover in mid-March of each year Satallite image is not available for this area on the same day Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.   Map display satellite imagery taken on the closest to March 15th, depending on each year availability. The earliest was captured on March 8th and the latest on March 19th Ice cover in mid-March of each year Satallite image is not available for this area on the same day Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.   Map display satellite imagery taken on the closest to March 15th, depending on each year availability. The earliest was captured on March 8th and the latest on March 19th Ice cover in mid-March of each year Satallite image is not available for this area on the same day Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.   Map display satellite imagery taken on the closest to March 15th, depending on each year availability. The earliest was captured on March 8th and the latest on March 19th There never was much of an ice cover on Lake Winnipesaukee, N.H., this winter, and as dramatic as it was, it only punctuated what feels like a years-long trend, said Pat Tarpey, president of a nonprofit that protects the lake’s health. Ice fishing derbies and pond hockey tournaments that were once common have been canceled or moved to smaller lakes, and more winter precipitation is falling as rain, not just snow, she said.Winnipesaukee has historically seen ice-outs toward the middle or end of April, but this year, aerial observations revealed its arrival Sunday. It was a day earlier than the previous record-setting ice-out, in 2016. In each of the past four years, ice-out has arrived no later than April 8.And besides disappearing earlier, the ice has been taking longer to form.“Ice-out was almost an anticlimax this year because there was barely any ice-in,” said Al Posnack, a volunteer with the Lake Winnipesaukee Sailing Association.That was the case across the Great Lakes as well. Ice cover did not start spreading across the system until mid-January, and peaked for the season only a few weeks later, covering about 16 percent of the lakes’ surface. In an average year, ice covers about 40 percent of the lakes well into March.Spring’s earlier arrival may be good news for lakeside residents eager to open up their cabins for the season, or for those whose property may only be accessible by boat, Tarpey said.But it also brings worries of waters too warm for many marine species, and a thriving environment for toxic algae blooms, she said. Last year, two such blooms prompted health advisories on Lake Winnipesaukee, one of them in late October, much later than normal, she said.“We’re concerned that in the coming season, we’re going to see a lot more,” Tarpey said.Though spring has arrived, the cold isn’t gone just yet, however. Snow is forecast across the country’s northern tier in the coming days, from Montana to Maine. It won’t be enough to bring ice cover back to lakes, but it’s at least a reminder of what’s normal in those parts of the country, Posnack said.“All of a sudden we have a wake up call that spring never comes this early in New Hampshire,” he said.

From Minnesota to Maine, lakes are usually still frozen over. This year, the ice is already gone in many places, and earlier than ever.

Lakes from Minnesota to Maine are usually still frozen over at this time of year, as signs of spring slowly emerge across the country’s northern tier.

Instead, the ice is breaking up or is already gone on many lakes with more than a century of records. So-called ice-out — when waters become navigable for boats again — is happening earlier than ever witnessed.

Ice cover in mid-March of each year

Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.

 

Graphic shows satellite images that were available on dates close to March 15, and are different for each year. The earliest was captured on March 9 and the latest on March 21.

Ice cover in mid-March of each year

Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.

 

Graphic shows satellite images that were available on dates close to March 15, and are different for each year. The earliest was captured on March 9 and the latest on March 21.

Ice cover in mid-March of each year

Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.

 

Graphic shows satellite images that were available on dates close to March 15, and are different for each year. The earliest was captured on March 9 and the latest on March 21.

Ice cover in mid-March of each year

Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.

 

Graphic shows satellite images that were available on dates close to March 15, and are different for each year. The earliest was captured on March 9 and the latest on March 21.

It’s a vivid sign that winters are warming faster than any other season across what is usually the frigid North. Declining snowfall and ice cover serve as both symptom and driver of that trend, in a feedback loop that is having stark effects in communities that thrive on harsh winters.

“It’s a little bit unsettling,” said Chris O’Brien, a Wisconsin native who now serves as a marketing coordinator for Fresh Water, an environmental nonprofit in the Twin Cities.

During Wisconsin’s annual 16-day sturgeon spearing season on Lake Winnebago in February, the northern half of its waters were free of ice, said Wayne Schumacher, a Fond du Lac resident and spearing enthusiast. And where there was solid ice, sturgeon hunters could only get out on the lake on foot or in ATVs, but not by car or truck, as usual. Their harvest fell well short of annual conservation limits by the season’s end Feb. 25.

And then a few days later, he said, the lake’s ice broke up.

While it’s normal for ice to cover lakes around Wisconsin for 100 days or more each winter, this year, it didn’t stick around for half that long during what residents called a lost winter, or the winter that never was.

“It just seems like we’re not getting the winters that we used to get,” Schumacher said.

Data on the onset of lake ice season is spotty, said Pete Boulay, a climatologist with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, because waters often ice over in fits and starts as temperatures fluctuate from fall into winter. But its disappearance is hard to miss, so records are thorough. On many of Minnesota’s thousands of lakes, ice-out records go back as far as the 1860s or 1870s.

“Ice-out is so dramatic,” Boulay said.

And the data show that this year’s ice-out is even more dramatic.

“In a normal-ish year, the last week of March is when we start thinking about ice out,” Boulay said. “We already have hundreds of lakes that are free of ice.”

Ice cover in mid-March of each year

Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.

 

Graphic shows satellite images that were available on dates close to March 15, and are different for each year. The earliest was captured on March 9 and the latest on March 21.

Ice cover in mid-March of each year

Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.

 

Graphic shows satellite images that were available on dates close to March 15, and are different for each year. The earliest was captured on March 9 and the latest on March 21.

Ice cover in mid-March of each year

Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.

 

Graphic shows satellite images that were available on dates close to March 15, and are different for each year. The earliest was captured on March 9 and the latest on March 21.

Ice cover in mid-March of each year

Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.

 

Graphic shows satellite images that were available on dates close to March 15, and are different for each year. The earliest was captured on March 9 and the latest on March 21.

On Clear Lake, about 45 miles northwest of Minneapolis, ice-out came March 1, about a month earlier than average and the earliest in records that go back to 1874. In the Twin Cities region, the ice-out on Lake Minnetonka came about as early: Instead of a typical April 13 ice-out, it came March 13.

Ice-out arrived March 8, five weeks earlier than usual, on White Bear Lake, just north of St. Paul, the earliest since record-keeping there began in 1928.

The same day, the ice broke up on Lake Osakis, 110 miles northwest of the Twin Cities. It set a record for a lake where ice records go back to 1867. The median ice-out date over those 156 years: April 19, six weeks later.

It is perhaps the clearest sign of what was a record-warm winter across the contiguous United States and for the Northern Hemisphere, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The warmth was the most dramatic across regions that are typically the coldest, setting records for the mildest winters on record in eight states across the Upper Midwest, Great Lakes and Northeast.

Such a pattern is to be expected during episodes of El Niño, the global climate pattern tied to warmer-than-normal Pacific Ocean waters. Among its domino effects around the world is a tendency toward milder winters for the Upper Midwest.

But the rise in average global temperatures because of human-caused climate change is helping to compound the trend.

Ice cover in mid-March of each year

Satallite image is not available for this area on the same day

Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.

 

Map display satellite imagery taken on the closest to March 15th, depending on each year availability. The earliest was captured on March 8th and the latest on March 19th

Ice cover in mid-March of each year

Satallite image is not available for this area on the same day

Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.

 

Map display satellite imagery taken on the closest to March 15th, depending on each year availability. The earliest was captured on March 8th and the latest on March 19th

Ice cover in mid-March of each year

Satallite image is not available for this area on the same day

Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.

 

Map display satellite imagery taken on the closest to March 15th, depending on each year availability. The earliest was captured on March 8th and the latest on March 19th

Ice cover in mid-March of each year

Satallite image is not available for this area on the same day

Source: Sentinel Hub, European Space Agency.

 

Map display satellite imagery taken on the closest to March 15th, depending on each year availability. The earliest was captured on March 8th and the latest on March 19th

There never was much of an ice cover on Lake Winnipesaukee, N.H., this winter, and as dramatic as it was, it only punctuated what feels like a years-long trend, said Pat Tarpey, president of a nonprofit that protects the lake’s health. Ice fishing derbies and pond hockey tournaments that were once common have been canceled or moved to smaller lakes, and more winter precipitation is falling as rain, not just snow, she said.

Winnipesaukee has historically seen ice-outs toward the middle or end of April, but this year, aerial observations revealed its arrival Sunday. It was a day earlier than the previous record-setting ice-out, in 2016. In each of the past four years, ice-out has arrived no later than April 8.

And besides disappearing earlier, the ice has been taking longer to form.

“Ice-out was almost an anticlimax this year because there was barely any ice-in,” said Al Posnack, a volunteer with the Lake Winnipesaukee Sailing Association.

That was the case across the Great Lakes as well. Ice cover did not start spreading across the system until mid-January, and peaked for the season only a few weeks later, covering about 16 percent of the lakes’ surface. In an average year, ice covers about 40 percent of the lakes well into March.

Spring’s earlier arrival may be good news for lakeside residents eager to open up their cabins for the season, or for those whose property may only be accessible by boat, Tarpey said.

But it also brings worries of waters too warm for many marine species, and a thriving environment for toxic algae blooms, she said. Last year, two such blooms prompted health advisories on Lake Winnipesaukee, one of them in late October, much later than normal, she said.

“We’re concerned that in the coming season, we’re going to see a lot more,” Tarpey said.

Though spring has arrived, the cold isn’t gone just yet, however. Snow is forecast across the country’s northern tier in the coming days, from Montana to Maine. It won’t be enough to bring ice cover back to lakes, but it’s at least a reminder of what’s normal in those parts of the country, Posnack said.

“All of a sudden we have a wake up call that spring never comes this early in New Hampshire,” he said.

Read the full story here.
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Meet Manhattan’s first housing co-op to electrify heating and cooling

Canary Media’s “ Electrified Life ” column shares real-world tales, tips, and insights to demystify what individuals can do to shift their homes and lives to clean electric power. At 420 East 51st St., nestled in the Midtown East neighborhood of Manhattan, a 13-story beige brick building sits among a handful of…

Canary Media’s ​“Electrified Life” column shares real-world tales, tips, and insights to demystify what individuals can do to shift their homes and lives to clean electric power.  At 420 East 51st St., nestled in the Midtown East neighborhood of Manhattan, a 13-story beige brick building sits among a handful of other hulking structures. Its tidy facade doesn’t particularly stand out. Nor does its height. In fact, from the street it’s impossible to see what makes the cooperatively owned 1962 building unique among most other apartment properties in New York City: Its residents opted to fully electrify the heating and cooling system. The co-op board decided in 2023 to swap out the structure’s original fossil-fuel steam system for large-scale electric heat pumps that provide space heating, cooling, and water heating. Utility and state incentives covered a whopping one-third of the $2.9 million project’s cost. The move, which the seven-member board approved unanimously, puts the co-op well ahead of the curve in complying with Local Law 97, the city’s landmark legislation limiting CO2 emissions from buildings larger than 25,000 square feet. Owners of buildings that overshoot carbon thresholds face financial penalties. The law’s first reporting deadline is May 1, and the 110-unit co-op has hit its emissions reduction targets far ahead of schedule. With the upgrades completed last September, it’ll avoid triggering penalties through 2049. Also known as 420 Beekman Hill, the edifice is among the first multifamily structures in Manhattan to switch to all-electric heating, cooling, and water heating. It also appears to be the first co-op to do so, according to staff at NYC Accelerator, a building decarbonization initiative run by the Mayor’s Office of Climate and Environmental Justice. The retrofit provides a model for the work that will need to happen in buildings around the country in order to achieve climate goals and comply with laws similar to Local Law 97, said Cliff Majersik, senior advisor at the nonprofit Institute for Market Transformation. The co-op had originally relied on the local utility Con Edison’s district steam system, which is primarily fed by fossil gas and some fuel oil. The retrofit design team weaned the building off that piped steam, solving a problem that still bedevils building owners connected to the hundreds of steam loops operating across the country, including in Cleveland, Chicago, and Philadelphia. “Getting off steam is the most challenging transition,” explained Ted Tiffany, senior technical lead at the Building Decarbonization Coalition, who added that he was really excited the Beekman Hill project popped up on his radar. ​“This gives us an example” for how buildings on steam can go electric cost effectively and in a way that doesn’t disrupt tenants’ lives, he said. A heat pump solution for NYC buildings and beyond The vanguard achievement in the Empire City comes as four states and 10 other locales have passed their own laws to rein in emissions from existing buildings, and more than 30 other jurisdictions have committed to adopting similar rules, known as building performance standards. New York City’s policy was among the first such laws to be passed in the U.S. Under Local Law 97, 92% of buildings are expected to meet emissions standards within this first compliance period, which runs from 2024 to 2029, according to the nonprofit Urban Green Council. But getting buildings to make the deeper cuts needed to cumulatively slash emissions 40% by 2030 will take a lot more action. NYC Accelerator, which helped on the Beekman Hill retrofit, exists to support city building owners with free resources, training, and one-on-one guidance to complete decarbonization projects. “What we’re seeing most of all is that these [retrofits] are complex and sometimes difficult,” said Elijah Hutchinson, executive director of the Mayor’s Office of Climate and Environmental Justice. ​“You do need to hand-hold and get to people very early.”

Santos wins final approval for Barossa gas project as environment advocates condemn ‘climate bomb’

Energy giant to start production off Northern Territory coast at development projected to add more than 270m tonnes of CO2 to atmosphereElection 2025 live updates: Australia federal election campaignGet Guardian Australia environment editor Adam Morton’s Clear Air column as an emailSantos has received federal approval to commence production from its Barossa offshore gasfield off the coast of the Northern Territory.The National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Management Authority (Nopsema) decided to accept the environment plan for the project’s production operations. It marks the final approval required for the project, clearing the way for the gas giant to extract and pipe the gas to Darwin.Get Guardian Australia environment editor Adam Morton’s Clear Air column as an email Continue reading...

Santos has received federal approval to commence production from its Barossa offshore gas field off the coast of the Northern Territory.The National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Management Authority (Nopsema) decided to accept the environment plan for the project’s production operations. It marks the final approval required for the project, clearing the way for the gas giant to extract and pipe the gas to Darwin.The Barossa field is known for its 18% carbon dioxide content, which is a higher concentration than other Australian gas fields.The development is projected to add more than 270m tonnes of heat-trapping CO2 to the atmosphere over its life once the gas is sold and burnt overseas.“This is Australia’s dirtiest gas project and it should never have been given the green light,” said Gavan McFadzean, the Australian Conservation Foundation’s climate change and clean energy program manager.“Barossa is a massive climate bomb that will produce more climate pollution than usable gas.”McFadzean said despite repeated requests by ACF, Santos had not properly explained how the project would comply with Australia’s safeguard mechanism or provided a “proper assessment of how the greenhouse gas emissions from Barossa will affect Australia’s environment”.“Barossa remains on track for first gas in the third quarter of 2025 and within cost guidance,” a Santos spokesperson said in a statement provided to Guardian Australia on Tuesday.Barossa field, Middle Arm Sustainable Development Precinct and Beetaloo sub basin Composite: Guardian graphic/Guardian graphic/Department of Industry, Science and Resources/Northern Territory Government/NOPSEMAKirsty Howey, executive director of the Environment Centre NT, said: “It is unfathomable that it has been approved in 2025, when the climate science is clear that we can have no new fossil fuel projects if we are to avoid dangerous global warming”.“This approval, in the middle of an election campaign, just goes to show the failure of climate policy in Australia to ensure the necessary phase-out of fossil fuels,” she said.“If Barossa was a litmus test for the reformed Safeguard Mechanism, that policy has failed,” she said.The Greens environment spokesperson, Sarah Hanson-Young, said if Labor was reelected at the forthcoming election, the Greens would be “essential” in the new parliament to “ensure real action is taken to address the climate crisis”.“If the Albanese government wanted to, they could have worked with the Greens in this parliament to stop climate bombs like Barossa by putting a climate trigger in our environment laws,” she said.“Instead, on the eve of an election, Santos has been given the green-light to produce some of the dirtiest gas in Australia.”Guardian Australia sought comment from Labor.Approval of the production plan follows legal challenges to other components of the Barossa project, including unsuccessful proceedings related to submerged cultural heritage that were launched by the Environmental Defenders Office on behalf of three Tiwi Island claimants, over a proposed export pipeline.The federal court ordered the EDO to pay Santos’s full legal costs late last year.

How Pope Francis Helped Inspire the Global Movement Against Climate Change

Francis framed climate change as an urgent spiritual issue and helped push the world to take action.

In a shift for the Roman Catholic Church, Pope Francis, who died on Monday at 88, was a strong and vocal environmental advocate and used his papacy to help inspire global efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions. He framed climate change as a spiritual issue, emphasizing the connections between global warming, poverty and social upheaval throughout his 12-year leadership.Within the church, taking such a stance was seen by some as unnecessarily injecting politics into church matters. For environmentalists, the support of Francis was immensely meaningful.In 2015, he penned the first-ever papal encyclical focused solely on the environment. In “Laudato Si,” a sprawling call to action, the pope recognized climate change as both a social and environmental crisis, and emphasized that its greatest consequences were shouldered by the poor.That year, when 195 nations agreed to the landmark Paris Agreement, a global pact against climate change, at least 10 world leaders made specific reference to the pope’s words during their addresses to the United Nations climate conference.“Before Pope Francis, climate change was seen either as a political issue or a scientific issue. What his encyclical did was frame it as a spiritual issue,” said Father James Martin, a Jesuit priest and the editor at large of America Media, a media company with a Catholic perspective.“He really started from the standpoint that God had created the universe, had created the world and that this was a responsibility of ours — to care for it,” Father Martin said.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe.

Activate climate’s ‘silent majority’ to supercharge action, experts say

Making concerned people aware their views are far from alone could unlock the change so urgently needed‘Spiral of silence’: climate action is very popular, so why don’t people realise it?The Guardian is joining forces with dozens of newsrooms around the world to launch the 89 Percent Project—and highlight the fact that the vast majority of the world’s population wants climate action. Read moreA huge 89% majority of the world’s people want stronger action to fight the climate crisis but feel they are trapped in a self-fulfilling “spiral of silence” because they mistakenly believe they are in a minority, research suggests.Making people aware that their pro-climate view is, in fact, by far the majority could unlock a social tipping point and push leaders into the climate action so urgently needed, experts say. Continue reading...

A huge 89% majority of the world’s people want stronger action to fight the climate crisis but feel they are trapped in a self-fulfilling “spiral of silence” because they mistakenly believe they are in a minority, research suggests.Making people aware that their pro-climate view is, in fact, by far the majority could unlock a social tipping point and push leaders into the climate action so urgently needed, experts say.The data comes from a global survey that interviewed 130,000 people across 125 countries and found 89% thought their national government “should do more to fight global warming”.It also asked people if they would “contribute 1% of their household income every month to fight global warming” and what proportion of their fellow citizens they thought would do the same. In almost all countries, people believed only a minority of their fellow citizens would be willing to contribute. In reality, the opposite was true: more than 50% of citizens were willing to contribute in all but a few nations.The global average of those willing to contribute was 69%. But the percentage that people thought would be willing was 43%. The gap between perception and reality was as high as 40 percentage points in some countries, from Greece to Gabon.Further analysis of the survey data for the Guardian showed that public backing for climate action was as strong among the G20 member countries as in the rest of the world. These states, including the US, China, Saudi Arabia, UK and Australia, are responsible for 77% of global carbon emissions.“One of the most powerful forms of climate communication is just telling people that a majority of other people think climate change is happening, human-caused, a serious problem and a priority for action,” said Prof Anthony Leiserowitz at Yale University in the US.Prof Cynthia Frantz, at Oberlin College in the US, said. “Currently, worrying about climate change is something people are largely doing in the privacy of their own minds – we are locked in a self-fulfilling spiral of silence.”Dr Niall McLoughlin, at the Climate Barometer research group in the UK, said: “If you were to unlock the perception gaps, that could move us closer to a social tipping point amongst the public on climate issues.”The existence of a silent climate majority across the planet is supported by several separate analyses. Other studies demonstrate a clear global appetite for action, from citizens of rich nations strongly supporting financial support (pdf) for poorer vulnerable countries and even those in petrostates backing a phase-out of coal, oil and gas. A decades-long campaign of misinformation by the fossil fuel industry is a key reason the climate majority has been suppressed, researchers said.Prof Teodora Boneva, at the University of Bonn, Germany, who was part of the team behind the 125-nation survey, said: “The world is united in its judgment about climate change and the need to act. Our results suggest a concerted effort to correct these misperceptions could be powerful intervention, yielding large, positive effects.”The 125 countries in the survey account for 96% of the world’s carbon emissions, and the results were published in the journal Nature Climate Change. People in China, the world’s biggest polluter, were among the most concerned, with 97% saying its government should do more to fight climate change and four out of five willing to give 1% of their income. Brazil, Portugal, and Sri Lanka also ranked highly.The world’s second biggest polluter, the US, was near the bottom, but 74% of its citizens still said its government should do more, while 48% were willing to contribute. New Zealand, Norway and Russia were also relatively low-scoring.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 info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.after newsletter promotionResearch has also found that politicians suffer from serious misperceptions. In the UK, MPs vastly underestimated public support for onshore windfarms. In the US, almost 80% of congressional staffers underestimated people’s support for limits on carbon emissions, sometimes by more than 50 percentage points.“Perception gaps can have real consequences – they could mean that climate policies are not as ambitious as the public sentiment,” said McLoughlin.Substantial evidence exists that correcting mistaken beliefs about the views of others can change people’s views on many subjects, from opinions on immigrants and violence against women, to environmental topics such as saving energy. This is because people are instinctively drawn to majority views and are also more likely to do something if they think others are doing it too.“People deeply understand we are in a climate emergency,” said Cassie Flynn, at the UN Development Programme, whose People’s Climate Vote in 2024 found 80% of people wanted stronger climate action from their countries. “They want world leaders to be bold, because they are living it day to day. World leaders should look at this data as a resounding call for them to rise to the challenge.”This story is part of The 89 Percent Project, an initiative of the global journalism collaboration Covering Climate Now

Pope Francis hailed as ‘unflinching global champion’ on climate crisis

Officials and campaigners from around world pay tribute to pontiff who put environment at heart of his papacyPope Francis, groundbreaking Jesuit pontiff, dies aged 88He declared destroying the environment a sin, warned that humanity was turning the glorious creation of God into a “polluted wasteland full of debris, desolation and filth”, and located the cause of the climate crisis in people’s “selfish and boundless thirst for power”.The messages Pope Francis delivered on the climate and environmental crises were forceful and direct. He called the leaders of fossil fuel companies into the Vatican to hold them to account; declared a global climate emergency, in 2019; and in his final months, held a conference on “the economics of the common good”. Continue reading...

He declared destroying the environment a sin, warned that humanity was turning the glorious creation of God into a “polluted wasteland full of debris, desolation and filth”, and located the cause of the climate crisis in people’s “selfish and boundless thirst for power”.The messages Pope Francis delivered on the climate and environmental crises were forceful and direct. He called the leaders of fossil fuel companies into the Vatican to hold them to account; declared a global climate emergency, in 2019; and in his final months, held a conference on “the economics of the common good”.Simon Stiell, the UN’s top official on the climate, paid tribute: “Pope Francis has been a towering figure of human dignity, and an unflinching global champion of climate action as a vital means to deliver it. Through his tireless advocacy, [he] reminded us there can be no shared prosperity until we make peace with nature and protect the most vulnerable, as pollution and environmental destruction bring our planet close to ‘breaking point’.”Laurence Tubiana, chief of the European Climate Foundation and one of the architects of the 2015 Paris agreement, wrote on social media that Pope Francis had been an ‘important voice’: “By clearly setting out the causes of the crisis we are experiencing, [he] reminded us who the fight against the climate crisis is aimed at: humanity as a whole.”The prime minister of Barbados, Mia Mottley, said Pope Francis was “beacon of global moral strategic leadership” who had guided and inspired her through the “dark and desolate days” of the Covid pandemic. Describing him as her hero, she recalled spending time with him late last year, where he reinforced in her “the importance of always aligning our hearts, our heads, and our hands with our faith – to see, hear, and feel all people, so that we may help them, and to protect our planet. “His voice comforted and inspired many. His hands led him to places where others dared not go, and his heart knew no boundaries. His humour and his laughter were not only infectious but calming. Let us, each and every day, see, hear, and feel people – to fight the globalisation of indifference.”After his appointment in March 2013, Francis quickly took up the climate and environment as key themes of his papacy. “If we destroy creation, creation will destroy us,” he warned an audience in Rome in May 2014, the year before the Paris agreement was signed. “Never forget this.”His predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, had taken steps to green the Vatican with solar panels, and spoken of the sinfulness of environmental destruction. But Francis went further, with a landmark encyclical in 2015. Laudato Si’, translated as Praise Be to You, set out in 180 pages his vision of “climate change [as] a global problem with grave implications: environmental, social, economic, political”, and warned of the “grave social debt” owed by the rich to the poor, because of it.Pope Francis, pictured here in Colombo, Sri Lanka, in 2015, and who has died at the age of 88, was viewed by many as a champion of climate action. Photograph: Ettore Ferrari/EPA“This is his signature teaching,” said Austen Ivereigh, a papal biographer, at the time of the publication. “Francis has made it not just safe to be Catholic and green; he’s made it obligatory.”“Laudato Si’ was a wonderful achievement and vision – an environmentalism of hope and justice that profoundly resonated,” said Edward Davey, head of the UK office of the World Resources Institute.This was followed by a fresh encyclical, Laudate Deum, in October 2023, with even starker warnings, that humanity was taking the Earth “to breaking point”.Part of what made Francis’s words stand out was their clear focus on the social justice aspects of the climate crisis. St Francis of Assisi, the 13th-century Italian friar from whom Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio of Argentina took his papal name, was known for living among the poor and in close harmony with nature.As Pope, Francis seemed equally determined to bring the two together. “We have to hear both the cry of the Earth, and the cry of the poor,” he wrote in Laudato Si.Mark Watts, executive director of the C40 Cities group of mayors supporting climate action, said: “He established for a worldwide audience that the climate crisis is not just an environmental challenge but a profound social and ethical issue, exacerbated by greed and short-term profit seeking, disproportionately affecting the world’s most marginalised communities. His leadership highlighted how inequality and the climate crisis are inextricably linked, mobilising community-led climate action.”In Laudate Deum, Francis called for “a broad change in the irresponsible lifestyle connected with the western model”, and defended protesters, writing: “The actions of groups negatively portrayed as ‘radicalised’ … are filling a space left empty by society as a whole, which ought to exercise a healthy ‘pressure’, since every family ought to realise that the future of their children is at stake.”He was regarded by some as too radical himself – as he noted: “[I have been] obliged to make these clarifications, which may appear obvious, because of certain dismissive and scarcely reasonable opinions that I encounter, even within the Catholic church.”This year’s UN climate summit, Cop30, will be held in Brazil, in November, and campaigners had been hoping that, despite his increasing frailty, the first ever Latin American pontiff might be able to make it. Few figures of such authority have staked their reputation on the climate crisis, and fewer still have so publicly yoked together social justice with the environment.Stiell said: “His message will live on: humanity is community. And when any one community is abandoned – to poverty, starvation, climate disasters and injustice – all of humanity is deeply diminished, materially and morally, in equal measure.”

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