Leaders at the Global Climate Summit Highlight the Rising Toll of Warming “All we have to do is look outside,” one delegate said. “The sea rises, the coral dies.”

 

World leaders posed for a photo on Friday at COP30, the United Nations climate conference in Belém, Brazil.Credit...Wagner Meier/Getty Images

By David Gelles and Brad Plumer

Reporting from Belém, Brazil

In Spain, intense heat waves and floods have claimed thousands of lives in recent years. In Namibia, higher temperatures have resulted in drought and widespread hunger. And in Haiti, Hurricane Melissa, which was made more violent by global warming, last week killed more than 40 people.

World leaders shared vivid stories about the increasingly severe effects of a warming planet on Friday, the second day of the United Nations climate summit in Belém, Brazil.

“Forests are vanishing, water levels are rising and, in turn, peoples’ livelihoods are being disrupted,” Salah Jama, the deputy prime Minister of Somalia, said. “In a nutshell, we are living on a planet in crisis.”

Politicians, diplomats, scientists and business executives are gathering for the event, known as COP30, during another year of record heat and extreme weather that scientists say is being worsened by human-caused climate change.

 This week, the United Nations announced that the world was far off-track from keeping global warming well below 2 degrees Celsius, or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, compared with preindustrial levels. That was a goal that virtually every country agreed to 10 years ago as part of the Paris climate agreement.

 

Instead, with heat-trapping emissions from the burning of fossil fuels and deforestation continuing to rise, the world is on track to warm by roughly 2.8 degrees Celsius. Scientists have said that every additional fraction of a degree of warming brings greater risks from heat waves, wildfires, drought, storms and species extinction.

The United States is one of the few countries in the world not attending the summit. President Trump routinely dismisses the threats posed by climate change and is promoting fossil fuels like coal, oil and gas, while penalizing the renewable energy industry.

The environment minister of the small island nation of Tuvalu, Maina Vakafua Talia, referred to Mr. Trump directly. “Tragically, the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases has withdrawn from the Paris agreement,” he said. “Mr. President, this is a shameful disregard for the rest of the world.”

 Over more than a dozen hours of speeches, other leaders of countries around the globe focused on the very real consequences of rising temperatures.

 

“All we have to do is look outside our front doors to witness the impacts of climate change,” Kalani Kaneko, foreign minister of the Marshall Islands, said. “The sea rises, the coral dies and the fish stock leaves our shores for cooler waters.”

In Kenya, millions have been affected in recent years by cycles of extreme drought and devastating floods. “As I traveled here, we’re still searching for scores of people who went missing after a landslide affected one part of our country,” Kithure Kindiki, the Kenyan vice president, said at the summit. “Such incidents have become common.”

A street in Petit-Goâve, Haiti, last month after Hurricane Melissa. An early analysis found that climate change had made the storm worse than it otherwise would have been.Credit...Clarens Siffroy/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

 

A watering hole in the Kunene region of Namibia last month. A drought has contributed to widespread hunger in the country.Credit...Noah Tjijenda/Reuters

 

 Hallo Mustafa Al Askari, the Iraqi environment minister, spoke of the challenges facing a country where temperatures routinely approach 50 degrees Celsius, or 122 Fahrenheit.

 

 

“Water scarcity has become an existential challenge in Iraq along side waves of drought, desertification and sand and dust storms,” he said. “The crisis threatens biodiversity, agriculture and undermines the livelihoods of local communities.”

And Bernadette Arakwiye, the Rwandan environment minister, spoke of floods in 2023 that killed 130 people and inflicted $200 million in damages in 24 hours. “This was not an isolated tragedy, but another example of how much damage can be done in one single climatic event,” she said.

 At a time when international cooperation is flagging and many countries are more focused on issues like trade and energy security, officials are hoping to use the U.N. summit to direct global attention to the dangers of climate change and the benefits of switching to cleaner forms of energy.

 

“There’s a real focus in these first few days on going back to basics, that climate change is real and it matters,” said Kaysie Brown, the associate director for climate diplomacy and geopolitics at E3G, a European research and advocacy group. “That basic message can’t be taken for granted.”

In between the warnings were calls to overhaul the modern economy

Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez of Spain said his country was working with other nations to place additional taxes on premium-class air travel and the use of private jets. “This is only fair,” he said. “Everyone needs to pay their due.” He added that he hoped to stop using public funds to finance new fossil fuel projects.

Many leaders also called for rich nations to make more money available to developing countries.

“We must reform the current global financial architecture to make capital more accessible and affordable for climate action in the developing world,” Mr. Kindiki, the Kenyan vice president, said.

The pleas for more money come at a time when aid is tough to come by. The amount of financial assistance that rich nations give to poor ones to adapt to storms, heat waves and other perils of climate change dropped 7 percent in 2023, according to the United Nations Environment Program.

A charitable fund for helping poor countries recover from extreme disasters, announced years ago, has not yet raised $1 billion and is not yet operational. But on Thursday, a new fund for protecting forests that promises financial returns to countries that contribute money raised more than $5 billion.

The debate over financing also comes as the Trump administration has sought to undermine global climate policies.

Mr. Kaneko of the Marshall Islands condemned the Trump administration’s efforts to scuttle a treaty that would have limited emissions from the shipping industry.

“The behavior last month around the International Maritime Organization was shocking,” he said. “It cannot happen again.”

World leaders also used their time to talk about issues beyond climate change. As often happens in international forums, geopolitical rivalries and grievances loom over every discussion, making it more difficult for countries to reach consensus.

Shina Ansari, the Iranian vice president, assailed the attacks on her country this year by the United States and Israel.

“This act not only violates international law and constitutes war crimes, but has also caused extensive and lasting environmental destruction,” she said.

Surangel Whipps Jr., the president of Palau, and Mr. Talia of Tuvalu called on Taiwan to be more fully integrated into the United Nations process.

President Xiomara Castro of Honduras took aim at Israel on Thursday, the first day of the summit. “Genocide against the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip cannot go unpunished,” she said.

Edgars Rinkevics, the president of Latvia, spoke out against President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia on Thursday. “Russia’s aggression against Ukraine seeks to reshape the global order through conflict,” he said. “It takes human lives and inflicts harm on nature for no good reason.”

And Gustavo Petro, Colombia’s president, on Thursday criticized the Trump administration’s military buildup in the Caribbean. “We have the threat of invasion,” he said. “Invading Venezuela, or maybe threats to invade Colombia, invade Cuba.”

Amazon lakes hit ‘unbearable’ hot-tub temperatures amid mass die-offs of pink river dolphins – study

An Amazon river dolphin in the Rio Negro, in Brazil’s Amazonas state, where more than 150 dolphins died in a heatwave in 2023. Photograph: Gabrielle Therin-Weise/Getty Images

 

Droughts and heatwaves causing water in some areas to reach 41C, killing fish and endangered dolphins, say researchers

Amazonian lakes are being transformed into simmering basins hotter than spa baths as severe heatwaves and drought grip the region, research shows.

The temperature of one lake exceeded 40C (104F) as water levels plummeted under intense sunlight and cloudless skies. The extreme heat triggered mass die-offs among endangered Amazon river dolphins and fish, which cannot survive in such high temperatures.

The shallow waters of Lake Tefé, which were only two metres deep, reached 41C – warmer than an average spa bath. “We couldn’t even put our fingers in the water. It was really hot, not just in the top bit, but right down to the bottom,” said the lead researcher, Ayan Fleischmann, from the Mamirauá Institute for Sustainable Development. “You put your finger in and remove it instantaneously, it’s unbearable.”

Floating carcasses of up to 200 river dolphins washed up over a six-week period around September 2023. No one in the region had seen this happen over the past century, said Fleischmann. “It was completely surreal and really scary.”

This incident led them to look at other water bodies across the Amazon region. Half of the 10 lakes investigated experienced exceptionally high daytime water temperatures above 37C, according to the study, published in the journal Science.

A satellite image from August 2024 of Lake Tefé in Brazil’s Amazonas state, showing sandbanks exposed because of severe droughts. Photograph: European Union/Copernicus Sentinel-2/Reuters

Researchers analysed water temperatures from central Amazonian lakes during the drought of 2023, which was followed by another extreme drought late last year, with new record-breaking low-water levels and severe heating of the lakes. On average Lake Tefé reaches 30C in the hottest months, but in 2024, it hit 40C.

Amazon lakes have been warming by 0.3 to 0.8C each decade over the past 30 or so years – rates higher than the global average, researchers found. At the same time, they are shrinking. During the 2024 drought Lake Tefé lost about 75% of its surface area and Lake Badajós shrank by 90%.

 

Adrian Barnett, senior lecturer in behavioural ecology at the University of Greenwich, who was not involved in the research, said: “The paper shows the extraordinary impacts climate change is having, even on such huge ecosystems as the Amazon, and that these are not restricted to the forests, but the aquatic realm as well.”

“A 10C increase in water temperature is unparalleled,” he said. “The volume of energy needed to achieve this in such huge volumes of water is jaw-dropping.”

Most fish, and the dolphins and manatees, normally breed in the low-water season, said Barnett said, adding that it was likely that 2023 would have been a disastrous year reproductively for most species. “If this happens repeatedly, then their populations and those of the species that are connected to them ecologically, will decline severely.”

There are few local solutions to this problem, according to Barnett. “Something that’s happening at such a huge scale really requires a systems approach and that means attacking the root cause of the problem, which is fossil fuel emissions and the causes of global warming itself,” he said.

A tropical forest funding crunch

French President Emmanuel Macron and Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva at the COP30 Leaders Summit. Photographer: Dado Galdieri/Bloomberg

 

 World leaders are set to meet for day two of a summit in Brazil to discuss their climate commitments. The meeting is a setup for the main event: COP30, which kicks off Monday and will draw thousands of delegates to the Amazon for two weeks of negotiations.

 

A $5 billion start

By Daniel Carvalho and Dayanne Sousa Brazil’s main plan to protect the Amazon rainforest, the centerpiece of its COP30 climate agenda, is moving ahead — with Norway playing a key role in its launch, though initial funding falls well short of expectations. The Tropical Forest Forever Facility, or TFFF, designed to support the conservation of endangered forests worldwide, will receive around $5 billion in pledged contributions — far short of its $25 billion target. Norway and France have agreed to join Brazil in investing in the fund, while Germany will announce its contribution on Friday, Brazilian ministers said on Thursday. “It is an unprecedented initiative,” President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said earlier at the launch of the fund in the Amazonian city of Belém. “Forests are worth far more standing than felled.”   The new fund could play a pivotal role in forest protection as the current climate policies and green finance remain insufficient to address the magnitude of the global challenge, said Lula, who is presiding over this year’s United Nations climate summit. The TFFF is Brazil’s signature initiative at COP30, with initial ambitions for pledges of $25 billion that could be leveraged to create a $125 billion vehicle aimed at preserving tropical forests. Finance Minister Fernando Haddad said at the Bloomberg Green at COP30 conference in São Paulo on Tuesday that he believed the fund may raise $10 billion by next year. The funds will be placed in a diversified portfolio designed both to repay investors and to reward countries for conserving their forests. Under the plan, nations will receive a fee for every hectare of forest conserved. Brazil, Colombia, Indonesia and the Democratic Republic of Congo are among the countries that would benefit most. “We achieved over 50% of what we had imagined for the end of next year, and we will keep working,” said Haddad in Belém. “The initial investment that’s being done is auspicious. You can anticipate that, after this first investment that we will have a very good start.” Fernando Haddad Photographer: Jonne Roriz/Bloomberg   Norway pledged about $3 billion in loans over 10 years, which will be disbursed through 2035 and must be repaid by 2075, according to a government statement on Thursday. The funding comes with conditions: the TFFF needs to secure at least 100 billion Norwegian kroner ($9.8 billion) from other donors by 2026; Norway won’t provide more than 20% of the total financing; and the funding model must be sustainable and maintain an acceptable level of risk. Over 50 countries have endorsed the declaration of support for the launch of the fund. Other countries that haven’t announced investments are still engaged in conversations, including China, the Netherlands and the United Arab Emirates, according to Haddad. Brazil’s efforts to convince developed countries to invest in the fund were made difficult at a moment when potential investors face budget constraints. The absence of an announcement of investment from the UK, for example, was noticeable in a time when the country is trying to tackle its surging debt burden. The fund uses a blended finance model, seeking to invest its assets to generate a higher return than what it owes investors, and then using the difference to fund rainforest preservation. That “spread is not a money faucet, but a risk premium,” BloombergNEF analysts wrote in a factbook about biodiversity finance published Thursday. “Poor performance of emerging market assets, which face a diverse host of economic and political risks, will not only nullify forest payments, but also see development finance absorb private investor losses.”

The deadly dust storms sweeping across the world

Dust storms are becoming more common globally, harming the health of millions of people. Now, scientists are racing to keep the dirt on the ground.

 by Erin Vivid Riley

 

"I couldn't see more than 50ft [15m] ahead," says Dave Dubois. "It was a once-in-a-decade type of storm."

In the spring of 2025, Dave Dubois, New Mexico State's climatologist, drove to a weather station a few hours north from his home in Las Cruces, a town on the edge of the Chihuahuan Desert in southern New Mexico. On the way, he passed the blistering sand dunes of White Sands National Park and the UFO hotbed of Roswell. While performing routine maintenance on a monitoring sensor, a powerful cloud of dust descended. The lack of visibility led to a terrifying pile-up on a major interstate, causing several injuries.

In the first three months of 2025, New Mexico saw 50 dust storms, with 18 March being the dustiest day on record. Accompanied by wildfires and wind gusts in excess of 70mph (113 km/h), the skies darkened as the "dusty inferno" spread across America.

Despite being sandwiched between Arizona and Texas, two states prone to dust storms, New Mexico sees fewer high-intensity events. But when intense winds blow across land parched by 25 years of climate change-amplified drought, "you have the perfect recipe," says Dubois.

 

The entire universe is made of dust, and it's always travelling, from star to star, from the sky to Earth, from Africa to the Amazon – Daniel Tong

The Chihuahan Desert event was triggered by a mid-latitude cyclone, a low-pressure storm system responsible for most of the severe weather events experienced at the ground level. The fallout from this dust storm extended across a huge area, with dirty rain reportedly falling as far away as Wisconsin and North Carolina. The cyclone also spawned dust storms in the greater southwest and southern Plains regions, tornadoes in the Southeast, wildfires in the South, blizzards in the Midwest, and heavy rains in the Northeast.

Similar to other extreme weather events, dust and sand storms are becoming more common. These events, exacerbated by climate change, whip up soil, sand and other particulates into veils of dirt that are often disruptive and sometimes deadly. They impact us in surprising ways, from affecting our health through the spread of diseases, such as meningitis, to influencing nature's water cycles, accelerating snowmelt by blanketing snow and causing it to thaw faster.

 Blinding dust can quickly reduce visibility, causing deadly traffic accidents (Credit: Alamy)

 Dust storms are a natural – and to an extent, beneficial – part of the Earth's climate and weather system, acting as a fertiliser for marine ecosystems. "The entire universe is made of dust, and it's always travelling, from star to star, from the sky to Earth, from Africa to the Amazon," says Daniel Tong, associate professor and atmospheric scientist at George Mason University in the US.

 

"People think that dust is just a part of the environment, part of the natural process," says Tong. "But it has a greater impact on the economy and public health than some better-known weather and climate disasters."

The race is now on to better understand these extreme weather events – and prevent some of them from happening.

The frequency of large dust storms in the southwestern US more than doubled from 1990 to 2011, according to a Noaa-led study. The same trend is apparent globally. The UN Environment Programme says in some areas desert dust increased twofold during the 20th Century. 

Many such areas are in the Middle East and North Africa, home to the Arabian and Sahara deserts. Although sand storms are typically limited to desert regions, climate experts say these areas are expanding due to increasing drought and desertification. Scientists estimate that the Sahara Desert, for example, has expanded by up to 18% over the past century.

The reach of these events is enormous. When the warm, dry Harmattan winds that blow over West Africa and the southwestern Sahara pick up between November and April, they transport desert dust as far as the Caribbean on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. Though the winds are a natural seasonal occurrence, desertification means they are able to move ever-growing quantities of dust. This past winter saw an increase, both in frequency and intensity, of Saharan dust storms across Europe and Latin America.

In March 2025, Dust streamed northeast across Texas and Oklahoma behind a line of thunderstorms (Credit: Nasa)

During a single week in April 2025, these storms left more than 1,000 people in central and southern Iraq suffering from respiratory issues. Similar storms that same month also prompted the cancellation of more than a thousand flights across both India and China. There were also cases of dust-pigmented "blood rain" in central Europe. 

According to the World Health Organization, 330 million people are exposed to particles transported by wind every day. Dust comprises some 40% of the aerosols, or tiny airborne particles, present in the lowest layer of Earth's atmosphere.

When people inhale these tiny grains, they can experience respiratory problems, such as asthma and pneumonia. Particulates can even cause severe heart and brain disease if they enter the bloodstream. A 2020 assessment linked a 15% increase in fine dust particle concentrations to a 24% increase in infant mortality rates across much of Africa.

Dust particles have also been found to carry diseases. In Sub-Saharan Africa's so-called "meningitis belt", which stretches from Senegal to Ethiopia, researchers have linked outbreaks of the disease's most dangerous form, a bacterial brain infection, with dusty and dry conditions. 

 

The mystery of 'valley fever' 

In the US, Tong and other researchers have also linked cases of "valley fever", an infection caused by a soil-dwelling fungus, to wind-borne dust particles. The fungus is most common to the southwestern US though it also exists in parts of Mexico as well as Central and South America. Exposure can cause symptoms of pneumonia. There are, on average, 10,000-20,000 reported cases of valley fever, and 200 deaths from the disease, in the US annually.

Scientists consider valley fever something of a mystery. "Previously, we thought it only lived in dry climates like Arizona, but a few years ago, it was found in the state of Washington," says Tong. "We don't know how widespread the fungus is, all the ways it's transmitted, or who is more susceptible."

In January, Tong and colleagues at the University of Texas at El Paso and the US Department of Agriculture, published a study that described the enormous economic toll of dust and wind storms. In compiling the cost across sectors such as agriculture and transportation, the researchers found that these events cost Americans $154bn (£115.5bn) each year.

"We were surprised to find that dust storms are actually more costly than other so-called billion-dollar climate disasters," says Tong. He highlighted the impact that dust can have on solar panels and wind turbines due to the fact that workers must frequently remove build-ups of grime from these installations. The paper by Tong and his colleagues also cited dust storms' economic impact on healthcare, estimating that valley fever alone results in about $2.7bn (£2bn) a year in medical costs.

 

There is also a risk that dust storms could worsen the effects of climate change. Snow and ice usually reflect between 50-90% of the solar radiation. However, when covered in dust or sand, they absorb more light and heat from the sun. A 2017 study found that the speed and volume of snowmelt runoff from the Rocky Mountains to the Colorado River is more impacted by dust than by rising spring temperatures. 

Climate change-fuelled drought, declining water resources, and harmful agricultural practices, such as overgrazing and tilling, play a critical role in driving an increase in dust storms. Tilling, for example, requires churning the top layer of soil to prepare it for a new crop. But this severs the soil's bonds and, during prolonged dry weather, turns it to dust.

 A dust storm sweeps over downtown Phoenix, Arizona (Credit: Alamy)

Excessive tilling was one cause of the 1930s Dust Bowl, a catastrophic period of severe dust storms in the US that transformed the country's heartland from a breadbasket to an arid and drought-stricken expanse. A 2021 paper estimates that more than one-third of the Corn Belt, a region of 30 million acres (12 million hectares) across the US Midwest, has lost much of its nutrient-rich topsoil due to erosion caused by tillage of the land.

In the decades since, less obtrusive farming approaches, referred to as conservation tillage, have gained popularity. This includes no-till farming, which involves planting directly into undisturbed soil. According to the US Department of Agriculture, nearly 87% of the country's farmland now employs some kind of conservation tillage, though continuous no-till – considered the best practice to combat erosion – accounts for only one-third of this total.

 

As for dust-prone areas that aren't farmland, reversing erosion often means working with landowners who may have conflicting priorities, as ecologists working in one of the nation's hot spots for dust-fatalities are finding.

Re-greening the land

In New Mexico's southwestern corner, not far from where Dubois encountered the spring storm, is Lordsburg Playa. The dry lake bed, once verdant ranching land, is now a source of dust storms in the Chihuahuan Desert. The 60 mile (97km) long playa has endured so much overgrazing, erosion and stretches of drought that even when rain does fall, the ground doesn't absorb it.

Since 2020, a group of ecologists have been gently treating a parcel of the playa so that it does accept water when it comes. The process involves using a specialised plow that loosens compact ground beneath the topsoil without disturbing its structure. A tool then releases a mix of native seeds, while an attached imprinter, or metal roller, creates deep depressions in the soil to capture water. 

Led by the New Mexico Department of Transportation (NMDOT), the team has treated a third of the 3,000-acre (1,214 hectares) area that's responsible for the most dust emissions impacting Interstate-10 (I-10). The highway is one of the country's main east-west arteries, with approximately 15,000 vehicles crossing the playa every day. Dust storms have caused at least 41 deaths along this stretch since 1967.

In addition to revegetation, NMDOT has also proposed treating a half-mile buffer zone along both sides of I-10 with proven measures, from adding check dams to stop sediment movement to creating large imprints to catch rainfall.

In New Mexico ecologists hope to reverse desertification (Credit: NMDOT Environmental)

In June, researchers at the University of Texas at El Paso conducted an analysis of 1,200 acres (486 hectares) that were plowed, imprinted and seeded in June 2022. Using satellite imagery, they compared the change in growth before treatment and three years later. The treated area saw a 41% increase in vegetation cover compared to a 4% increase in non-treated, grazed sections. Whether this vegetation growth has resulted in fewer dust storms, however, is yet to be determined.

In a separate study from March, researchers found that most growth occurred from seeds that were in the soil prior to the seeding. "They were simply waiting for the right conditions to germinate," says William Hutchinson, the roadside and community design manager for the Environmental Bureau at NMDOT. "Maybe we don't need to put seed down, which is expensive, and instead let nature take its way." 

The project's parcel is split among private landowners, the Bureau of Land Management, and the State Land Office. While the efficacy of the approach is clear, the politics in implementing it is less so, says Hutchinson. For the NMDOT, long-term mitigation means protecting revegetated areas from disturbance. For the other agencies, keeping the areas multi-use, per their mandates to maintain the land's commercial viability, means allowing cattle to graze on the growth that remains.

The recent analysis of vegetation cover also measured a third category – an untreated area protected from grazing – and found a 22% increase in vegetation cover, demonstrating the significant impact that cattle has on growth. The Bureau of Land Management is considering issuing conservation leases to NMDOT, which would allow the transportation agency to purchase certain plots for restoration and exclude grazing. 

 

"We are trying to balance the need to address a public health emergency with the need for, you know, 500 cows grazing out there," says Hutchinson about the dust-related fatalities on the I-10. "What's more important?"

Managing each source of dust will require navigating a distinct set of challenges. But most experts agree that these events becoming more common is a climate threat on par with wildfires, hurricanes and floods – and requires the same investment in mitigation.

William criticises Amazon deforestation crime in Brazil visit

 

Daniela Relph,Royal correspondent, Rio de Janeiro and

Hafsa Khalil

 

 

The Prince of Wales has criticised criminals involved in the deforestation in the Amazon rainforest, during a speech in Rio de Janeiro.

William was speaking at the United for Wildlife conference on Tuesday as part of his royal visit to Brazil.

"In the past year alone, over 1.7 million hectares of the Amazon were cleared across this region... much of which is driven by illicit activity," he told the audience.

Earlier, William visited the small Brazilian island of Paqueta - home to a population of just 4,000 - where he was greeted by dozens of people and given a baby to hold.

 

After a first day consisting of an official welcome with football in the Maracana Stadium and barefoot beach volleyball on Copacabana, the future king's second day in Brazil - and reason for visiting - was focused on the environment.

Hollywood star Leonardo Di Caprio recorded a video message at the summit, urging world leaders meeting in Brazil to "unite with courage and ambition".

Tuesday's wildlife summit organised by William - the first of its kind - highlighted the damage caused by environmental crime, and the prince announced a new fund for wildlife rangers.

William described Latin America as a "global leader in biodiversity and environmental conservation".

He criticised deforestation linked to criminal gangs, saying: "This crime fuels violence and corruption, distorts legitimate economies, and negatively impacts the livelihoods of millions."

But he ended on an optimistic note: "We must stand alongside those who everyday are standing up and defending nature.

"We must recognise and celebrate these protectors, not just in words but through our actions. And we must act together."

Prince William is in Brazil to present the Earthshot Prize, the annual award from the charity he set up, on Wednesday.

He is also scheduled to give a speech at COP30, the UN's annual climate meeting where governments discuss how to limit and prepare for further climate change, the following day.

Many of Paqueta's residents came to see the prince and grab a photo with him

Earlier on Tuesday he was taken by a Brazilian navy boat to the island of Paqueta, known for producing the West Ham and Brazil footballer, Lucas Paqueta.

During a walkabout in the harbour, 10-month-old Joaquim Monteiro was thrust into his arms.

"Mustn't drop him," joked the father of three as he gave Joaquim a cuddle before handing him back to his grandparents.

Andre Luis Junior, the baby's cousin and a teacher, said: "We are so happy he chose this very small island.

"We're very unique in the heart of Rio. Very quiet. We love that he chose to come here. The kids in school were so excited today."

Ten-month-old Joaquim Monteiro was thrust into the prince's arms

Just an hour away from Rio de Janeiro by boat, Paqueta is an escape from the intensity of the city.

Cars are not allowed on the island with all travel is done on foot, by car or in carriages.

The pace of life is slow but the biodiversity of the region is rich.

Back on the water, the prince was taken by boat into Guanabara Bay and shown the mangroves.

The trees and shrubs which make up the mangroves are a protected area of natural beauty that has been replanted following deforestation.

Their benefits are vast, from storing carbon to acting as buffer zones in stormy weather.

But they need conserving.

Prince William was part of that conservation work planting saplings in the bay to ensure the survival of the mangroves.

"I hope they grow well, " Prince William said. "Next time I come all this will all be mangroves."

Prince William planted new trees during a visit to the mangrove area

While on Paqueta, the future king also spoke to local residents, with retired lawyer Glaucia Martinez, 60, saying he asked her about Paqueta.

"I said that it's safe, it's charming, and it's a good place to live," she said, adding that they all "live in peace".

"People here, they are good, good people, you know, honest people," she told the prince, before expressing her love for the Princess of Wales.

"And I said that I love Kate."

Paqueta's mayor Rodrigo Toledo said it was "very important " for the prince to visit because the island is "totally dedicated to environmental protection and we know that Prince William has dedicated his life to this agenda".

What is COP30 and why does it matter for climate change?

The Earthshot Prize Awards Ceremony will be held in Rio's futuristic Museum of Tomorrow. Kylie Minogue and Shawn Mendes will perform at the event on Wednesday evening.

Five projects will each win a million pound prize for their environmental innovations. The shortlist includes the city of Guangzhou in China and its electric public transport network and Lagos Fashion Week in Nigeria, nominated for its work reshaping the fashion industry.

Sugarloaf selfies as William begins Brazil visit

Environment prize nominees 'heroes of our time', says William

Prince William will be concluding his Brazil visit with his COP30 appearance in Belem, in the Amazon rainforest.

It marks the first time he has travelled internationally for a COP summit, with his father, King Charles III, having previously paved the way for the royals.

The prince accompanied his father to the summit when it was held in Glasgow in 2021, two weeks after the first Earthshot Prize.

The prize annually awards a £1m grant in five different categories for projects that aim to repair the world's climate - and the prince has committed himself to it for 10 years, with Rio marking a halfway point for the venture.

Prince William's visit to Brazil is the most significant royal engagement he will make this year, and is the first official visit since the crisis surrounding his uncle Andrew.

Amazônia bate limite de 1,5ºC acima da temperatura média pela primeira vez

 

Floresta amazônica em chamas em Lábrea (AM) Imagem: Bruno Kelly - 4.set.2024/Reuters

Carlos Madeiro Colunista do UOL

 

 A temperatura da Amazônia brasileira em 2024 ficou 1,5ºC acima da média dos últimos 40 anos. O número é recorde e chega a um limite que nunca deveria ser atingido, segundo o Acordo de Paris. Os dados são da rede MapBiomas, que divulgou hoje uma linha do tempo desde 1985.

No ano passado, a temperatura média na Amazônia brasileira foi de 27,1ºC, a maior já registrada pela rede. A média histórica do bioma entre 1985 e 2024 é de 25,6ºC

A Amazônia também se destaca na análise por estados: o maior aumento de temperatura em 2024 foi registrado em Roraima: 2°C acima da média. Amazonas e Mato Grosso do Sul vêm em seguida, ambos com alta de 1,7ºC.

O recorde, alertam os cientistas, é apenas o primeiro marco de um problema que vem ocorrendo nos últimos anos e que tende a seguir piorando —ao menos em curto prazo. Segundo os dados, a temperatura média da Amazônia vem aumentando 0,29°C por década.

Os dados apontam que, desde 1985, a Amazônia perdeu 52 milhões de hectares (-13%) de área vegetação nativa, o que impulsionou uma alta na temperatura de, em média, 1,2ºC em 40 anos

 

Chuvas diminuem

O desmatamento e o aumento da temperatura estão mudando também o ciclo de precipitações. Em 2024, choveu 20% a menos que a média histórica na Amazônia, um segundo ano seguido de seca

 O bioma, historicamente, é o mais chuvoso do país, com uma média 2.215 mm ao ano. Em 2024, choveu apenas 1.767 mm. A redução, porém, não é homogênea: em algumas regiões a precipitação foi de 1.000 mm a menos.

Anos com mais chuva na Amazônia (1985-2024):

    1989 - 2.455 mm
    1985 - 2.429 mm
    1988 - 2.418 mm
    2000 e 2009 - 2.416 mm

Anos com menos chuva:

    1997 - 1.969
    2015 - 1.940
    1992 - 1.932
    2024 - 1.768
    2023 - 1.751

Com a diminuição das chuvas, aumentou a área queimada na Amazônia, que atingiu 15,6 milhões de hectares no bioma em 2024

 Os anos de 2023 e 2024 tiveram forte influência do fenômeno do El Niño, que favorece a ocorrência de seca e altas temperaturas na Amazônia, diz a pesquisadora Luciana Rizzo, do MapBiomas Atmosfera. "Mas não se trata de um valor isolado de temperatura acima da média. A temperatura está crescendo sistematicamente ao longo dos últimos 40 anos, e a estação seca da Amazônia está ficando mais longa", diz

Grande vazante do rio Negro em São Gabriel da Cachoeira (AM) Imagem: Ray Baniwa/Rede Wayur

" Isso coloca uma forte pressão sobre os ecossistemas. Temperaturas mais altas e eventos extremos de seca ameaçam a resiliência da floresta e seus serviços ecossistêmicos, como a remoção de carbono pela fotossíntese e dos rios voadores que contribuem para as chuvas no centro do país. "
Luciana Rizzo

Outros biomas também aquecem

Entre todos os biomas brasileiros, o Pantanal foi o que registrou em 2024 a maior alta em relação à média: 1,8°C acima.

A situação preocupa porque o bioma é o que mais vem aquecendo ao longo dos últimos 40 anos, com média de 0,47°C a mais por década. O Pampa é o que menos sofre, mas mesmo assim vem tendo altas de 0,14°C por década

 

"Estes aumentos de temperatura têm impactos significativos em todos os biomas brasileiros. A redução de precipitação também tem efeitos importantes, especialmente na Amazônia e no Pantanal", diz Paulo Artaxo, da plataforma MapBiomas Atmosfera

Alaska's permafrost meltdown

 

 

The Arctic has warmed four times faster than anywhere else on the planet, and today’s newsletter takes you to Alaska for a firsthand view. There, researchers are racing to understand what’s happening to permafrost and the 1.4 trillion tons of carbon it stores. Nothing less than the fate of the climate hangs in the balance.

 

Extreme science on top of the world

By Danielle Bochove On the last day of August, as the High North summer tips to autumn, I found myself balancing on the gunnels of a 10-foot inflatable Achilles raft bouncing across whitecaps scudding the Beaufort Sea. The temperature was barely above freezing, the sun fickle.  It's a short ride but the only dry way to get me, lacking hip-waders, to a waterlogged patch of tundra beside one of Hilcorp Alaska’s massive oil pads where the team of scientists from Woods Hole, Massachusetts, I’ve embedded with will be gathering data all week. (The boat serves another purpose, which I’ll get to.) Doing climate research under the shadow of an oil rig is ironic, to say the least, but in this part of the world, there’s no other option. Alaska's Prudhoe Bay oil fields are the largest in North America. Once you travel north to Deadhorse — a "town" that exists solely to serve the vast oil production complex — it’s the end of the road unless you can get permission from one of the oil companies to access the land they lease on the edge of the Arctic Ocean for fossil fuel extraction.

The scientists take a soil sample at the edge of a Beaufort Sea lagoon. Photographer: Nathaniel Wilder   The work on this scientific project is multifaceted, but the common denominator is saltwater. As sea levels rise and storms get more violent, the ocean is washing over the tundra with increasing frequency. The team is studying knock-on effects, including the impact that inundation may be having on permafrost. The frozen layer of mineral soil, rock and undecomposed organic material stretches across millions of acres and contains roughly 1.4 trillion tons of carbon. Understanding how fast it’s thawing is key to gauging how much previously frozen carbon is being released into the atmosphere, and ultimately the state of the global carbon budget. The days were long — we were up at 6 a.m. and often couldn’t make it back to camp before the kitchen closed — but the scientists stayed deeply focused on their work. In fact, they were so intense I found myself doubting whether any of them would even notice if one of the polar bears in the area wandered by. I learned about their experiments, but I also learned that scanning the horizon for polar bears 10 hours a day strains the eyes as well as the nerves. I felt better when the project lead, Julia Guimond, told me she has polar bear dreams before every expedition — and worse when the team’s veteran, Jim McClelland, said that’s because two years ago, a polar bear pawed through their equipment while they ran and escaped in the boat. (In addition to transporting reporters, it serves as a bear escape vehicle.)  Happily, this trip was bear-free. Julia Guimond pulls a stake from a Beaufort Sea lagoon. Photographer: Nathaniel Wilder   Among the many images indelibly etched in my memory is one of Guimond plunging her shoulders beneath the frigid water of No Point Creek, feeling for the underwater equipment she installed back in July. With her orange toque and dripping bare arms, she looked like a character on some yet-to-be-created Alaska reality TV show. It might not be a bad backup plan. The state of scientific funding in the US is dire right now, with widespread cuts by the Trump administration. The stakes are particularly high for Alina Spera and Liz Elmstrom, the younger postdoctoral researchers on this trip, whose careers depend on landing funding that can act as a launchpad for their own research. “It’s not the easiest career path,” Elmstrom told me one evening, but there’s no work that makes her happier. On our last day in the field, it’s not hard to see why. The sun came out, coats came off, and with the bulk of the work done, we paused to marvel at the weather. I took my first five-minute ‘’tundra nap” and we all enjoyed a packed lunch on the beach. Noticing that his fingers are clean after being caked in grime from gathering core samples, McClelland deadpanned, “I likely ate some 1000-year-old dirt.” It’s a moment of levity before one last afternoon push. And then it’s time to pack the samples in coolers, load them on trucks and scrub the boat. The contents of those coolers are now back in Massachusetts, undergoing months of analysis. As more pieces of the permafrost carbon sink puzzle are filled in, the magnitude of the challenge the world faces will become clear. If more of this vast store of carbon starts to leak into the atmosphere, the climate will heat up to still more dangerous levels. And the permafrost is just one natural carbon sink within the vast carbon budget. Follow our series looking at the entire system in the coming months, starting with this one.