Alaskan River Reaches Record High From Melting Glacier. An overflowing glacial lake caused a surge in the Mendenhall River on Wednesday, prompting flood alerts and evacuations in Juneau.

 

A timelapse view from cameras monitored by the U.S.G.S. of the Suicide Basin before the glacial lake outburst flooding from the Mendenhall Glacier, in Juneau, Alaska, covering a period from July 21 to Aug. 13.CreditCredit...U.S.G.S.

 

By Raymond Zhong

 

An overflowing glacial lake north of Juneau, Alaska, caused the Mendenhall River to surge to a record height on Wednesday, flooding homes and streets in parts of the state capital, which has a population of more than 30,000.

Such floods have been a recurring problem in Juneau since 2011, but recent years have seen record-setting surges as rising temperatures cause glaciers in the area to melt more rapidly. Alaska has warmed faster than the global average, and the fastest of any state, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

Flooding last August from the same glacial lake inundated several hundred homes in Juneau with four to six feet of water, although no deaths or injuries were reported. The city put up a temporary levee along the river in response. Residents this week were urged to evacuate ahead of the latest round of high water.

Here’s what to know about these floods.

What’s a glacial lake outburst flood, or GLOF?

As glaciers melt, they tend to retreat uphill, leaving an empty bowl at the bottom of the valley where the ice once sat. Meltwater from the glacier starts pooling in this bowl, and over time a lake forms.

 But the sides of the lake are fragile. They might be formed of loose dirt and rock or ice. If one day an avalanche or a landslide occurs, or a piece of a nearby cliff plunges into the water, the disturbance can cause the sides of the lake to collapse. In a flash, most of the lake’s water might cascade down the valley, threatening towns and cities below.

 

Glacial lake outburst floods can be catastrophic because, by the time the water reaches downstream settlements, it has picked up huge amounts of sediment and boulders along the way, turning it into a thick slurry that can knock down buildings.

In 2023, a GLOF in northern India killed at least 55 people and destroyed a hydropower dam. All in all, 15 million people around the world live within 50 kilometers, or 31 miles, of a glacial lake and less than a kilometer from the potential path of a GLOF, scientists estimated in a 2023 study.

How common are they in Alaska?

The glacial lake that is overflowing this week in Alaska sits at the foot of the Suicide Glacier, an ice mass north of Juneau. Decades ago, the Suicide Glacier flowed into a much larger river of ice, the Mendenhall Glacier. But as the Suicide melts and shrinks, a steep gap has opened up between it and the Mendenhall. This gap is now called Suicide Basin.

(Experts have proposed renaming Suicide Basin to Kʼóox Ḵaadí Basin, which in the Tlingit language translates to “Marten’s Slide Basin.” A marten is a lithe, weasel-like animal found in the area.)

Snowmelt and rain accumulate in the basin, and when the water is high enough, it starts draining through cracks in the Mendenhall Glacier before flooding the Mendenhall River.

The first time this happened was in July 2011, and it took downstream communities by surprise. The basin has since filled and drained at least 39 times, according to the National Weather Service. Early Wednesday, as the basin drained once more, the Mendenhall River peaked at a height of 16.65 feet, exceeding a record set last year.

The glaciers in this region are part of the Juneau Ice Field, a sprawling area of interconnected ice that is melting twice as quickly as it did before 2010, scientists reported last year. More of the area’s glaciers are detaching from one another, the researchers also found, which can lead to the formation of lakes like Suicide Basin.

Accelerated melting is producing more water to fill these lakes and hence more water that eventually floods neighborhoods downstream, said Bob McNabb, a glaciologist at Ulster University who has studied the Juneau Ice Field. “As you get more and more melting coming down, that will fill up the basin a bit more each time,” Dr. McNabb said.

How is climate change affecting GLOFs?

The world’s high mountains are warming more quickly than Earth as a whole. That is causing thousands of glaciers to shrink and new lakes to form beneath them. Since 1990, the number, area and volume of glacial lakes around the world have all grown by roughly 50 percent, scientists estimated in a 2020 study.

But bigger lakes don’t directly translate into greater GLOF hazards. Each glacial lake and valley has distinct features that influence how likely it is to burst, and what the consequences would be if it did. So predicting future flood risks is “very complex,” Dr. McNabb said.

In the Mendenhall Valley, for instance, rising temperatures are the reason the Suicide Glacier has withered away and Suicide Basin has formed. But as the planet warms further, the Mendenhall Glacier might melt by so much that the flood threat actually decreases. The reason? There would no longer be enough ice at the side of Suicide Basin to trap large amounts of meltwater. Instead, the water would just empty into the valley gradually.

Scientists in Alaska have predicted that this could come to pass within the next decade or two. Until then, the people of Juneau will continue to live with the dangers from the warming landscape just a few miles to their north.

New York energy company ramps up disconnections as it seeks 11% price hike. Con Edison, city’s monopoly utility, cut off 88,000 households in first half of 2025 as climate crisis drives extreme temperatures

 

A man transports an air conditioner on a bicycle during a heat wave in New York on 24 June 2025. Photograph: Selcuk Acar/Anadolu via Getty Images

by Nina Lakhani

An energy company seeking to hike utility bills in New York City by 11% disconnected more than 88,000 households during the first six months of 2025, signaling a crackdown on families struggling to cover rising energy costs even as the climate crisis drives extreme temperatures.

Con Edison, the monopoly utility that provides electricity to 3.6m homes across the country’s largest city and neighboring Westchester county, disconnected almost 2.5% of all its customers between January and June this year – triple the total number of families left without power in 2024. One in five disconnected homes remain without power for at least a week.

The utility shut off 16,327 households in the month leading up to 25 June. New York was hit by its first heatwave between 23 and 25 June, breaking daytime and night-time records in Central Park and driving a surge in emergency room visits.

A construction crew from a ConEdison electric repair team continues road work in the Chinatown neighborhood of New York on 15 February 2025. Photograph: Robert Nickelsberg/Getty Images

New York is among the most expensive places for electricity, with families shouldering above-inflation price hikes in recent years on top of unaffordable housing and the broader cost of living crisis stemming from the Covid pandemic.

Heat-related deaths account for about 3% of all fatalities from May through September, making New York the second deadliest city for heat after Phoenix, Arizona.

 

In the past five years, more than 40% of New Yorkers have fallen into arrears, and 23% of households were disconnected at least once – leaving families without access to a fridge, internet, cooking facilities and heat or cooling until they can find the money to pay for reconnection.

Black and Latino New Yorkers are more than twice as likely as white residents to fall behind, and almost eight times more likely to have a utility shutoff, according to the 2024 Poverty Tracker/Robin Hood report on energy insecurity.

“Disconnection is an effective cost recovery strategy but it’s also completely inhumane. It’s traumatizing for families and costs some people their lives,” said Diana Hernandez, co-author of the report and associate professor of sociomedical sciences at Columbia University.

“People want to pay their bills but they are unaffordable for too many families.”

People walk across the Brooklyn Bridge on a day where the heat index is expected to top 100 degrees Fahrenheit in New York on 25 July 2025. Photograph: Spencer Platt/Getty Images

Almost 16% of New York homes – one in six Con Edison residential customers – were behind on their energy bills at the end of 2024, with debts totaling $948m, according to data submitted by the utility to the state regulator.

But as Con Edison ramped up disconnections over the past six months, the debt fell to $840m by the end of June with 12.5% of New Yorkers now behind on their bills.

At the current rate, Con Edison could disconnect 150,000 households by the end of the year, the highest number by any utility in the country, according to Mark Wolfe, an energy economist.

“Energy is unaffordable so people fall behind. The disconnection numbers show that Con Edison is aggressively cracking down, and life is going to become harder for poor people in New York,” said Wolfe, executive director of the National Energy Assistance Directors Association (Neada).

Researchers at Neada, the organization for state directors of the federally funded Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (Liheap), collated the debt and disconnection figures submitted to the New York Public Services Commission, the regulator.

There is no demographic breakdown but people of color, households with children, renters in small buildings, and people with pre-existing medical conditions who rely on electronic devices such as oxygen dispensers, as well as Bronx residents are all more likely to experience energy poverty and therefore a disconnection, the 2024 Robin Hood report found.

A Con Edison spokesperson said: “Termination of service is a last resort, and we do so only after extensive outreach and exhausting all other options … nearly two-thirds of residential customers in arrears are on payment plans. It is essential that our customers pay their bills to maintain safe service and the most reliable system in the nation.”

Most customers were reconnected within 24 hours and 80% within a week, the spokesperson added.

A woman uses a fan to cool off on a day where the heat index is expected to top 100 degrees Fahrenheit in New York on 25 July 2025. Photograph: Spencer Platt/Getty Images

Nationwide, an estimated one in three households experience energy poverty – the inability to access sufficient amounts of electricity and other energy sources due to financial hardship. Low-income households, people of color and states with the fewest social safety nets are disproportionately affected, and millions of families are regularly forced to ration food, medicines, energy and other essentials

Across New York state – and the country – a patchwork of regulations prevent some households from being shut off on very hot or cold days, but millions are not protected at all.

New York, like much of the US, is susceptible to extreme highs and low temperatures, and the climate crisis is driving more frequent and more intense heatwaves.

The number of heat deaths has been rising over the past decade, and on average 525 people in New York City die prematurely each year for heat-related reasons – the vast majority due to the impact high temperatures and humidity have on existing medical conditions, according to the latest figures from the city’s department of public health.

Heat kills twice Black New Yorkers at twice the rate of white residents due to past and current structural racism that creates economic, healthcare, housing, energy and other systems that benefit white people and disadvantage people of color, the report found.

 Most deaths occur in homes without access to a functioning air conditioning. Citywide, 11% of New Yorkers do not have air conditioners at home but the rate is much higher in low-income communities of color. One study found that a fifth of renters do not use their air conditioner due to cost.

And while protections have improved in recent years, it has not been enough to shield families hit hardest by rising energy prices, rents and inflation – or the increasingly brutal heat and humidity.

According to its website, Con Edison currently suspends disconnections on the hottest and coldest days based on forecasts from the National Weather Service. In the summer, the utility will not disconnect a family the day of or day before the heat index – what the temperature feels like when humidity is taken into account – is forecast to hit 90F (32.2C) at Central Park – one of the shadiest parts of the city. It also suspends disconnections for two days after a 90F heat index day.

Yet temperatures in some neighborhoods in the Bronx and upper Manhattan, where there are fewer trees, less access to air conditioning, more Black and Latino residents, and most heat deaths, exceed Central Park by 6 to 8 degrees due to the heat island effect, according to one study from 2022.

Energy poverty is a chronic problem for many New Yorkers.

A ConEdison van in the Bronx borough of New York on 20 July 2019. Photograph: David Dee Delgado/Bloomberg via Getty Images

New York state is the largest recipient of Liheap, the chronically underfunded bipartisan federal program that helped about 6m households keep on top of energy bills last year – and which narrowly survived being cut completely from Trump’s 2026 budget.

In fiscal year 2024-25, New York received $379m (almost 10%) of the total Liheap fund, and Governor Kathy Hochul invested an additional $35m to supplement support for heating bills in January after Liheap money ran out with months of winter still to go.

In the summer, the Liheap program only covers the cost of an air conditioning unit and installation for qualifying low-income households in New York – not energy bills. A city program can provide a means-tested loan for working families in arrears.

Disconnections declined during the pandemic thanks to a statewide moratorium and debt forgiveness schemes, as well as child tax credits and a boost to food stamps among other federal programs that helped lift millions of Americans out of poverty. But the Covid-era social safety programs have now all been terminated, and recent focus groups conducted by Hernandez and her colleagues found people still struggling to recover and rationing energy use because they were so concerned about rising bills.

“The city has got better at advocating for households disproportionately impacted by disconnections but it’s a drop in the bucket of where it should be,” said Hernandez, the energy justice expert. “The 88,000 households disconnected are people who have done everything to get the money and still couldn’t get caught up. It illustrates families have been left completely exposed.”

Yet energy costs are about to get even higher in New York.

People cool off at a fire hydrant in New York on 25 June 2025. Photograph: Charly Triballeau/AFP/Getty Images

Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act will make electricity production more expensive, leading to residents paying $140 a year on average more by 2030, according to analysis by Energy Innovation. The bill also slashes benefits such as Snap (food stamps) and Medicaid, which will put further pressure on millions of families.

Meanwhile, Con Edison is under fire from city and state politicians including Hochul and the city comptroller (chief finance officer) and former mayoral candidate, Brad Lander, for requesting a rate hike of 11% for electricity and 13% for gas, which the regulator is currently considering. Con Ed’s proposed electricity rate hike could raise the average household bill by $372 next year. (The utility provides gas to 1.1m homes.)

“The combination of rising temperatures, rising electricity rates, the possible termination of the federal Liheap program, and this increase in shutoffs by Con Ed risks dramatically increasing heat-related illness and deaths for New Yorkers,” Lander told the Guardian.

“There needs to be strategies in place so that people will pay their bills – but to punish people who are poor by cutting off their electricity ever, but especially in extreme heat or wintertime, is inhumane. It is a form of debtors’ prison.”

Con Edison said it provided $311m in bill discounts to income-eligible customers last year, and the regulator (PSC) recently expanded the Energy Affordability Program to help more vulnerable residents.

Eastern US swelters from heatwave as high temperatures affect half of country. Heat and humidity are stretching east from the Mississippi River valley, and some areas could see heat indices of 120F

A young boy plays in the splash fountain at the Christian Science Plaza in Boston, Massachusetts, on 16 July 2025. Photograph: Cj Gunther/EPA

 

 by Marina Dunbar

The eastern half of the US is facing a significant heatwave, with more than 185 million people under warnings due to intense and widespread heat conditions on Monday.

The south-east is likely to endure the most dangerous temperatures as the extreme heat spread across the region on Monday, spanning from the Carolinas through Florida. In these areas, heat index values (how hot it feels once humidity is accounted for) are forecast to range between 105 and 113F (40.5 to 45C).

Some locations in Mississippi and Louisiana face an even greater threat, with the heat index possibly soaring as high as 120F (49C).

Meanwhile, the midwest isn’t escaping the heat. Conditions there remain hazardous into Monday and Tuesday, after a weekend in which temperatures felt as if they were between 97 and 111F (36 to 44C) in areas from Lincoln, Nebraska, north to Minneapolis.

 

Cities such as Des Moines, St Louis, Memphis, New Orleans, Jacksonville and Raleigh are under extreme heat warnings. In these locations, temperatures will climb into the mid-90s and low 100s, with heat indices potentially reaching 110 to 115F.

The most dangerous conditions, classified as level 4 out of 4 on the heat risk scale, encompass much of Florida and extend north into Georgia and the Carolinas. A broader level 3 zone stretches from the eastern plains through the midwest and into the mid-Atlantic. This follows a weekend already dominated by extreme temperatures.

 

Tampa experienced an unprecedented milestone on Sunday when it reached 100F (37.8C). Other cities also broke daily temperature records, and more are expected to follow suit.

The dangerous heat and humidity are expected to persist through midweek, affecting major metropolitan areas including St Louis, Memphis, Charlotte, Savannah, Tampa and Jackson, Mississippi. Actual air temperatures will climb into the upper 90s and low 100s, while heat index readings are expected to remain between 105 and 115F for several days due to high tropical moisture.

Relief will be hard to find, even during the night. Overnight and early morning temperatures are forecast to dip only into the 70s or above, keeping conditions uncomfortable around the clock.

However, a cold front moving in later this week is expected to bring a drop in temperatures across the eastern US, offering a much-needed break from the extreme heat by the weekend.

Elsewhere, triple-digit temperatures will dominate the central US. The combination of soaring heat and dense humidity in the Mississippi River valley and central plains could make conditions especially hazardous, with some areas possibly seeing the heat index reach 120F.

 

Data suggests that there are more than 1,300 deaths per year in the US due to extreme heat, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. While no one single weather event can be blamed on the global climate crisis, the warming world is experiencing a greater frequency of extreme weather incidents.

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa), excessive heat is already the leading cause of weather-related deaths in the US, and the problem is only intensifying. For vulnerable populations, such as migrants, prisoners or schoolchildren in under-cooled buildings, the burden of rising temperatures is compounded.

Despite the increasingly crucial need to find solutions for the rising temperatures, many US agencies are currently understaffed due to cuts from the Trump administration and the so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge).

Federal science agencies such as Noaa are now operating at reduced capacity despite the outsized weather threats. Hundreds of meteorologists have left the National Weather Service in recent months, and several offices, including Houston, have had to scale back the services they provide.

 

Desperate search for girls swept away at summer camp after dozens killed in floods. At least 27 people have died and 27 girls who were at a Christian summer camp are missing

 

Rescue workers along the Guadalupe River in the wake of flooding event in Kerrville, Texas. Photograph: San Antonio Express-News/Express-News/ZUMA Press Wire/Shutterstock

 Theguardian

Twenty-seven people confirmed dead in Texas

Twenty seven people are confirmed dead after flooding in Texas.

Eighteen are adults and nine are children, an official from Kerr County said.

“We are working hard to locate anyone who is still missing and ensure they are safe,” Kerr County Sheriff Larry Leitha said.

Some 850 people have been rescued so far.

 

As the World Warms, Extreme Rain Is Becoming Even More Extreme

Even in places, like Central Texas, with a long history of floods, human-caused warming is creating the conditions for more frequent and severe deluges.

A person overlooks flooding at the Guadalupe River in Kerrville, Texas, on Saturday.Credit...Ronaldo Schemidt/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

 

By Raymond Zhong

Colossal bursts of rain like the ones that caused the deadly flooding in Texas are becoming more frequent and intense around the globe as the burning of fossil fuels heats the planet, scientists say.

Warm air holds more moisture than cool air, and as temperatures rise, storms can produce bigger downpours. When met on the ground with outdated infrastructure or inadequate warning systems, the results can be catastrophic.

These were the ingredients for tragedy in Texas, a state that is well acquainted with weather extremes of all kinds: high heat and deep cold, deluges and droughts, tornadoes and hurricanes, hail and snow. Indeed, the Hill Country, the part of the state where the Guadalupe River swelled on Friday, is sometimes called “flash flood alley” for how at risk it is to seemingly out-of-nowhere surges of water.

Humid air blows into the area from two main sources, the Gulf of Mexico and the tropical Pacific Ocean. When this air collides with cool air drifting down across the Great Plains, severe storms can erupt. The hilly terrain and steep canyons quickly funnel the rain into river valleys, transforming lazy streams into roaring cascades.

In parts of Texas that were flooded on Friday, the quantities of rain that poured down in a six-hour stretch were so great that they had less than a tenth of 1 percent chance of falling there in any given year, according to data analyzed by Russ Schumacher, a professor of atmospheric science at Colorado State University.

 

The Guadalupe River rose from three feet to 34 feet in about 90 minutes, according to data from a river gauge near the town of Comfort, Texas. The volume of water exploded from 95 cubic feet per second to 166,000 cubic feet per second.

And the warming climate is creating the conditions in Texas for more of these sharp, deadly deluges.

In the eastern part of the state, the number of days per year with at least two inches of rain or snow has increased by 20 percent since 1900, according to the most recent National Climate Assessment, the federal government’s flagship report on how global warming is affecting the United States. Across Texas, the intensity of extreme rain could increase another 10 percent by 2036, according to a report last year by John Nielsen-Gammon, the Texas state climatologist.

To understand patterns of heavy rain at a more local level, communities and officials rely on data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The agency has for decades published nationwide estimates of the probabilities of various precipitation events — that is, a certain number of inches falling in a particular location over a given amount of time, from five minutes to 24 hours to 60 days.

Engineers use NOAA’s estimates to design storm drains and culverts. City planners use them to guide development and regulations in flood-prone areas.

NOAA’s next updates to the estimates are scheduled to be released starting next year. For the first time, they are expected to include projections of how extreme precipitation will evolve as the climate changes, in order to help officials plan further ahead.

But in recent months, the Trump administration has cut staff at the agency and at the National Weather Service, which sits within NOAA. The administration has also dismissed the hundreds of experts who had been compiling the next edition of the National Climate Assessment, which was scheduled to come out in 2028. And it is proposing deep cuts to NOAA’s 2026 budget, including eliminating the office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research, which conducts and coordinates climate research.

More than 150 fall ill from extreme heat at New Jersey graduations. A ‘mass casualty incident’ as temperatures soar to upper 90s fahrenheit in the region

Hinchliffe Stadium in Paterson, New Jersey. Photograph: Bruce Bennett/Getty Images

 by Edward Helmore

More than 150 people fell ill with heat at an outdoor high school graduation ceremony in New Jersey on Monday – and the fire chief of the city of Paterson declared “a mass casualty incident” due to the overwhelming number of those who needed emergency treatment.

The incident happened as students from several local schools in the city gathered at Hinchliffe Stadium to hear their names read out as graduates. Paterson’s fire department said about 50 people were evaluated, and nine were sent to a local hospital from the stadium.

During a second ceremony at the stadium, about 100 people ended up needing treatment – and seven were hospitalized. The Paterson mayor, André Sayegh, declared a state of emergency due to the high heat and canceled all recreational activities “until further notice”.

 

Temperatures in the region have soared in recent days, registering in the upper 90s fahrenheit. But the humidity pushes heat indexes to 107F (42C). In all, 150 million people have been under heat alerts from Maine to eastern Texas.

The brutal temperatures stem from a so-called heat dome, which is when high pressure from Earth’s atmosphere compresses warm air and pushes it down to the surface. They have been increasingly common in the US in recent years because of rising global temperatures being spurred by Earth’s ongoing climate emergency.

Temperatures in New York City on Tuesday inspired the attorney general, Letitia James, to predict that the heat could benefit the progressive candidate Zohran Mamdani, who is running in the Big Apple’s closely watched Democratic mayoral primary.

“Mother Nature will have the last word,” James said. Taking an overt dig at Mamdani’s rival Andrew Cuomo, who resigned as New York governor amid accusations of sexually harassing women, James added: “She represents women scorned.

“How ironic.”

In the north-eastern US, several heat records look set to fall as temperatures in some locations are predicted to reach 110F. “Significant and dangerous heat continues today, with potentially some of the hottest temperatures in over a decade in some locations,” the weather service Accuweather said on Tuesday.

The national Storm Prediction Center says all areas of New Jersey have a “marginal” risk of seeing severe thunderstorms with small hail and damaging winds on Wednesday. That could bring a reprieve from the temperatures while giving residents other weather perils to worry about.

 

 

Tens of millions in US face dangerously hot weather in rare June heatwave. Much of country from Minnesota to Maine under heat advisory as temperatures expected to pass 100F this week

Man uses a portable fan as he tries to stay cool in Busch Stadium before a baseball game between the St Louis Cardinals and the Cincinnati Reds on Saturday. Photograph: Jeff Roberson/AP

 Associated Press

 Tens of millions of people across the midwest and east braced on Sunday for another sweltering day of dangerously hot temperatures as a rare June heatwave continued to grip parts of the US.

Most of the north-eastern quadrant of the country from Minnesota to Maine was under some type of heat advisory on Sunday. So were parts of Arkansas, Tennessee, Louisiana and Mississippi.

The temperature had already reached 80F (26.6C) in the Chicago area by 7.30am on Sunday, according to the National Weather Service. Forecasts called for heat indices of between 100 and 105F.

The heat index in Pittsburgh was expected to top 105F. The temperature in Columbus, Ohio, was 77F at 8.30am. Highs there were expected to reach 97F with a heat index around 104F.

 

Forecasts called for a heat index of 100F in Philadelphia on Sunday, with a 108F heat index on Monday.

The city’s public health department declared a heat emergency starting at noon on Sunday and ending on Wednesday evening. Officials directed residents to air-conditioned libraries, community centers and other locations, and set up a “heat line” staffed by medical professionals to discuss conditions and illnesses made worse by the heat. At Lincoln Financial Field, officials said each fan attending Sunday’s Fifa World Cup match would be allowed to bring in one 20oz plastic bottle of water.

Forecasters warned the heat index in Cromwell, Connecticut, would reach 105F on Sunday, which could make life brutal for golfers Tommy Fleetwood and Keegan Bradley as they compete during the final round of the Travelers Championship.

Elly De La Cruz, a Cincinnati Reds shortstop playing against the Cardinals in St Louis, and Trent Thornton, a Seattle Mariners reliever facing the Cubs in Chicago, got sick on Saturday while playing in the extreme heat.

 

Sunday marked the second straight day of extreme heat across the midwest and east coast. Heat indices on Saturday hit 103F in Chicago and 101F in Madison, Wisconsin, turning that city’s annual naked bike ride into a sticky and sweaty affair.

Lynn Watkins, 53, is the director of Sacred Hearts daycare in Sun Prairie, a Madison suburb. She said that she tried to sit outside on Saturday to grill but it was so hot she had to go inside. She plans to cancel all outdoor activities at the daycare on Monday with highs around 93F forecast.

“I can’t stand being outside when it’s like this,” she said. “I just want to sit in my air conditioning.”

Minneapolis baked under a heat index of 106F. The actual temperature was 96F, which broke the previous record for the date of 95F set in 1910, according to the weather service.

 

The heat is expected to persist into the coming week, with the hottest temperatures shifting eastward. New York City is expected to see highs around 95F on Monday and Tuesday. Boston is on track for highs approaching 100F on Tuesday, and temperatures in Washington DC were expected to hit 100F on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Meteorologists say a phenomenon known as a heat dome, a large area of high pressure in the upper atmosphere that traps heat and humidity, is responsible for the extreme temperatures.

Mark Gehring, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Sullivan, Wisconsin, said this level of heat is not uncommon during the summer months in the US, although it usually takes hold in mid-July or early August. The most unusual facet of this heatwave is the sheer amount of territory sweltering under it, he said.

“It’s basically everywhere east of the Rockies,” he said, referring to the Rocky Mountains. “That is unusual, to have this massive area of high dewpoints and heat.”

 

 

Por que o Brasil ainda aposta em termelétricas. Entre a justificativa de segurança energética e o lobby do gás e do carvão, país mantém usinas que emitem mais gases do efeito estufa que a cidade de São Paulo.

 

Para pesquisador, interesses econômicos estão por trás de grande parte das termelétricas

 Maurício Frighetto

 

Uma audiência pública sobre a instalação de uma termelétrica a gás natural em Samambaia (DF), a cerca de 35 quilômetros da praça dos Três Poderes, foi suspensa pela Justiça em março porque a população não teve tempo hábil para ser informada. Um mês antes, duas empresas desistiram de construir uma usina a carvão em Candiota e Hulha Negra, no Rio Grande do Sul, após o empreendimento ser questionado judicialmente.

Os dois casos geram intensos debates sobre os impactos ambientais locais desses empreendimentos e sobre a emissão de gases de efeito estufa, responsáveis pelo aquecimento global. E reforçam o questionamento: por que o Brasil ainda investe em termelétricas movidas a combustíveis fósseis, como gás natural e carvão, em plena crise climática?

O principal argumento a favor das termelétricas é a segurança energética. Ou seja, elas poderiam ser acionadas a qualquer momento, independentemente das condições climáticas, como possível falta de água, vento ou sol. Essa foi a justificativa usada pelo Ministério de Minas e Energia (MME) durante o lançamento do Plano Decenal de Expansão de Energia 2034 na defesa do "fortalecimento da geração termelétrica".

Um estudo publicado em dezembro pela ONG Instituto de Energia e Meio Ambiente (IEMA) mostrou que as 67 termelétricas fósseis conectadas ao Sistema Interligado Nacional (SIN) emitiram, em 2023, 17,9 milhões de toneladas de gás carbônico (CO₂), o principal responsável pelo aquecimento global.

Para se ter uma ideia da magnitude dessas emissões, alertou a pesquisadora do IEMA, Raíssa Gomes, as termelétricas fósseis lançaram na atmosfera mais gás carbônico do que o município de São Paulo. Segundo dados do Sistema de Estimativas de Emissões e Remoções de Gases de Efeito Estufa (SEEG), os paulistanos foram responsáveis por emitir 14,5 milhões de toneladas do gás em 2023.

"Ou seja, apenas as térmicas fósseis do SIN emitiram mais gases de efeito estufa do que a maior cidade do país, com seus mais de 11 milhões de habitantes e intensa atividade econômica", comparou a pesquisadora.

Entre lobbies e jabutis

Para o físico especializado em mudanças climáticas e pesquisador do Instituto ClimaInfo, Shigueo Watanabe Jr, outras alternativas poderiam reduzir a necessidade das termelétricas, como a "repotencialização das hidrelétricas". "A maior parte das hidrelétricas do Sudeste foram construídas na década de 1970, 1980. Mas hoje a situação é diferente. Se você trocar as turbinas, tem um ganho potencial de energia e de potência sem mexer na altura do reservatório, sem mexer em nada da parte física", disse.

Além disso, segundo o especialista, também há previsibilidade em relação ao vento e ao sol. "Se eu fosse um planejador energético, estaria muito mais preocupado com o preço do gás. A Rússia invade a Ucrânia, e o preço do gás dispara. Aí o Catar fala assim: 'Não, tá muito alto, eu vou bombar mais gás, o preço do gás cai.' É totalmente imprevisível", avaliou.

Para o pesquisador, os interesses econômicos estão por trás de grande parte das termelétricas. "Existe um lobby muito forte para alavancar mais ainda o gás natural. Toda vez que você tem alguma obra de uma termelétrica, há vários interesses políticos e econômicos e um lobby muito forte dentro do Congresso e dentro dos ministérios para poder ter mais gás, mais termelétrica."

 

Esse lobby pode ser visto em dois jabutis colocados em leis na área de energia – o termo é usado para designar um apêndice incluído em um projeto que trata de tema diferente do assunto principal. Em 2021, o Congresso Nacional aprovou uma lei que viabilizou a privatização da Eletrobras. Mas os congressistas colocaram no texto a obrigação da contratação de 8 gigawatt (GW) de eletricidade das termelétricas a gás natural sem infraestrutura de distribuição.

Já no projeto de lei que discutiu o marco legal para a geração de energia eólica offshore (em alto mar), os parlamentares acrescentaram a obrigação de contratar 4,25 GW de usinas termelétricas a gás natural. Eles também prorrogaram os contratos das usinas a carvão de 2040 para 2050. Em janeiro, o presidente Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva sancionou o projeto, mas vetou os jabutis, alegando que iam na contramão da lei sancionada, por serem matrizes mais poluidoras, caras e ineficientes. O Congresso ainda pode derrubar os vetos presidenciais.

 

Crise de 2001

A história das termelétricas atuais está relacionada com a crise de 2001, quando houve forte escassez de chuva, comprometendo os reservatórios de água das usinas hidrelétricas e o fornecimento de energia. "A maior parte das termelétricas que estão em operação hoje vieram do apagão que teve no governo Fernando Henrique. Eles criaram um programa prioritário de térmicas, que era basicamente térmicas a gás. Naquela época já se falava em aquecimento global, mas nada parecido com o que se fala hoje", lembrou Watanabe Jr.

De acordo com Raíssa Gomes, com a expansão das fontes renováveis como a solar e a eólica, há uma transição em curso para que as térmicas fósseis operem cada vez mais de forma pontual, apenas em períodos de maior demanda ou baixa geração renovável. "Essa transição é fundamental, pois as termelétricas fósseis, ao contrário das fontes renováveis, são altamente emissoras de gases de efeito estufa e de emissões atmosféricas locais como óxidos de nitrogênio, enxofre, monóxido de carbono e material particulado."

Além disso, segundo a pesquisadora, dependendo do sistema de resfriamento adotado, as usinas podem ter um elevado consumo de água, o que agrava a pressão sobre os recursos hídricos. "Soma-se a isso o fato de que a geração térmica, especialmente com combustíveis fósseis, tende a ser mais cara, contribuindo para o aumento nas tarifas de energia elétrica."

A questão climática no licenciamento

A Usina Nova Seival, projetada para ser instalada em Candiota e Hulha Negra, no Rio Grande do Sul, consumiria cerca de 12,6 mil toneladas de carvão por dia. Além disso, usaria água equivalente ao consumo diário de um município de 230 mil habitantes.

Repotencialização das atuais hidrelétricas é uma alternativa às termelétricas

Organizações como o Instituto Gaúcho de Estudos Ambientais (InGá) e a Associação Gaúcha de Proteção ao Ambiente Natural (Agapan) entraram com uma ação na Justiça fazendo uma série de questionamentos: solicitaram audiências públicas, mostraram inconsistências nos estudos e pediram a suspensão do licenciamento ambiental.

Em fevereiro, a Energia da Campanha Ltda e a Copelmi Mineração Ltda desistiram do empreendimento. Mesmo assim, o Tribunal Regional Federal da 4ª Região (TRF-4) confirmou um pedido das entidades: que o Instituto Brasileiro do Meio Ambiente e dos Recursos Naturais Renováveis (Ibama) considere os impactos climáticos nos próximos licenciamentos ambientais.

"A decisão inclui o componente climático no licenciamento ambiental de termelétricas no Rio Grande do Sul. Ela determina e obriga que, a partir de agora, isso seja sempre observado pelo Ibama. Isso significa a inclusão das diretrizes da Política Nacional da Mudança do Clima e da Política Gaúcha da Mudança do Clima", explicou o advogado da InGá e Agapan, Marcelo Mossmann.

Para a pesquisadora do IEMA, Raíssa Gomes, é fundamental a avaliação das emissões de gases de efeito estufa das usinas termelétricas. "No entanto, esta análise não pode ocorrer isoladamente e tão somente no licenciamento ambiental. É essencial que se realize uma avaliação ambiental estratégica (AAE), que incorpore também aspectos locacionais – como a qualidade do ar, a capacidade de monitoramento ambiental e a disponibilidade hídrica – além de critérios socioambientais."

A pesquisadora também chamou a atenção para o número crescente de projetos de termelétricas em processo de licenciamento ambiental no país. "Estima-se que existam cerca de cem empreendimentos em diferentes fases de tramitação, sinalizando o interesse dos investidores em disputar futuros leilões. No entanto, os leilões anteriores já demonstraram falhas importantes na seleção de projetos, como a habilitação de usinas sem a licença ambiental prévia, que é um requisito mínimo para participação.

Brazil activists decry green rollbacks as senate passes ‘devastation bill’. Legislation would dismantle regulations in farming, mining and energy, increasing risk of widespread destruction

 

A sawmill in Paragominas, Brazil. The bill is expected to pass without resistance in the conservative chamber packed with agribusiness lobby supporters. Photograph: Pulsar Imagens/Alamy

Constance Malleret in Rio de Janeiro

 

 

Environmental activists in Brazil have decried a dramatic rollback of environmental safeguards after the senate approved a bill that would dismantle licensing processes and increase the risk of widespread destruction.

The upper house passed the so-called “devastation bill” with 54 votes to 13 late on Wednesday, paving the way for projects ranging from mining and infrastructure to energy and farming to receive regulatory approval with little to no environmental oversight.

The bill now returns to the lower house for final approval. No date has been set for a vote there, but it is expected to pass without resistance in the conservative chamber packed with agribusiness lobby supporters.

The initiative proposes overhauling Brazil’s rigorous environmental licensing procedures to make the system simpler and more efficient. But it has been condemned by climate activists and policymakers as a historical setback that ignores the reality of the climate crisis and flies in the face of Brazil’s commitments to combatting climate change.

 

“It’s like getting rid of the brakes in a moving vehicle,” said Natalie Unterstell, the president of the Instituto Talanoa climate policy thinktank. She said the bill jeopardises Brazil’s commitments of eradicating deforestation by 2030 and reaching net zero by 2050.

The proposed legislation would allow some projects to renew permits through a self-declaration process and loosen requirements for high-impact ventures such as mining, allowing potentially harmful developments to move forward without serious considerations of their impacts on things like water reservoirs, deforestation or local communities.

 

“Most licensing procedures will become a push of a button without an environmental study or environmental impact assessment,” said Suely Araújo, the public policy coordinator at the Climate Observatory network of NGOs.

The Socio-Environmental Institute (ISA), a civil society organisation, said the proposal would dismantle a system of environmental protections that was built over decades, and do away with conditions that require companies to adopt prevention, mitigation and compensation measures, thus increasing the risk of destruction and conflict in rural areas.

The ISA calculated that the approval of the law would directly threaten more than 3,000 protected areas, including land occupied by Indigenous people and Afro-descendant quilombola communities, and put 18m hectares (44.5m acres) of forest at risk. “The bill represents a collapse foretold,” the ISA said.

The bill’s progress through congress has attracted particular dismay as Brazil is preparing to host the Cop30 climate conference in the Amazon in November. The government has said that it wants this year’s summit to be one of action, but this attempt to dismantle environmental protections undermines the country’s credibility, said Unterstell.

“It sends the wrong signal at the wrong time,” she said.

Environment minister Marina Silva described the approval of the bill as a “death blow” to Brazil’s climate efforts, but other members of Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s government had previously expressed support for the measure, saying it would help attract investment.

Although Lula has been successful in reducing deforestation, which fell by 32% across the country last year according to MapBiomas, he has disappointed the climate movement in other areas, particularly with his stance on oil exploration.

One of the amendments introduced by the senate would notably speed up permits for projects deemed a government priority. Pro-oil senators hope this could benefit controversial exploration projects near the mouth of the Amazon river, a new oil frontier where the state-controlled oil company Petrobras has so far been unsuccessful in its endeavour to obtain drilling permits from the environmental watchdog Ibama.

EU’s ‘chocolate crisis’ worsened by climate breakdown, researchers warn. Cocoa one of six commodities vulnerable to environmental threats in ‘extremely worrying picture’ for food resilience

Most of the EU’s cocoa imports come from west African countries facing overlapping climate and biodiversity risks. Photograph: Sodiq Adelakun/Reuters

 

Ajit Niranjan Europe environment correspondent

 

 

Climate breakdown and wildlife loss are deepening the EU’s “chocolate crisis”, a report has argued, with cocoa one of six key commodities to come mostly from countries vulnerable to environmental threats.

More than two-thirds of the cocoa, coffee, soy, rice, wheat and maize brought into the EU in 2023 came from countries that are not well prepared for climate change, according to the UK consultants Foresight Transitions.

For three of the commodities – cocoa, wheat and maize – two-thirds of imports came from countries whose biodiversity was deemed not to be intact, the analysis found.

The researchers said the damage to food production by climate breakdown was made worse by a decline in biodiversity that has left farms less resilient.

 

“These aren’t just abstract threats,” said the lead author of the report, Camilla Hyslop. “They are already playing out in ways that negatively affect businesses and jobs, as well as the availability and price of food for consumers, and they are only getting worse.”

The researchers mapped trade data from Eurostat on to two rankings of environmental security to assess the level of exposure for three staple foods and three critical inputs into the EU’s food system.

They used a ranking of climate readiness from the Notre Dame Global Adaptation Index, which combines a country’s vulnerability to climate damages with its access to financial and institutional support, and a ranking of biodiversity intactness from the UK Natural History Museum, which compares the current abundance of wild species to pre-modern levels.

They found the majority of imports came from countries they ranked “low-medium” on the climate scale and “low-medium” or “medium” on the biodiversity scale.

 

Some food products were particularly exposed. The EU imported 90% of its maize from countries with low-medium climate readiness and 67% from countries with medium or lower biodiversity intactness, the report found.

For cocoa, a key ingredient in the chocolate industry that Europe does not grow itself, the import exposure was 96.5% for climate preparedness and 77% on the biodiversity scale, the report found.

The industry is already struggling with rises in the price of sugar, driven in part by extreme weather events, and supply shortages of cocoa. Most of its cocoa comes from west African countries facing overlapping climate and biodiversity risks.

The report, which was commissioned by the European Climate Foundation, argued that large chocolate manufacturers should invest in climate adaptation and biodiversity protection in cocoa-growing countries.

“This is not an act of altruism or ESG [sustainable finance], but rather a vital derisking exercise for supply chains,” the authors wrote. “Ensuring farmers are in their supply chains paid a fair price for their produce would allow them to invest in the resilience of their own farms.”

 

Paul Behrens, an environmental researcher at the University of Oxford and author of a textbook on food and sustainability, who was not involved in the research, said the findings painted an “extremely worrying picture” for food resilience.

“Policymakers like to think of the EU as food-secure because it produces quite a lot of its own food,” he said. “But what this report shows is that the EU is vulnerable to climate and biodiversity risks in some vital food supply chains.”

The report found coffee, rice and soy had fewer risks overall but noted hotspots of concern. Uganda, which provided 10% of the EU’s coffee in 2023, had low climate preparedness and low-medium biodiversity intactness, the report found.

Joseph Nkandu, founder of the National Union of Coffee Agribusinesses and Farm Enterprises in Uganda, called for more access to international climate finance to help farmers become more resilient in the face of worsening weather.

“The weather in Uganda is no longer predictable,” he said. “Heatwaves, prolonged dry spells and erratic rains are withering our coffee bushes and damaging production.”

Marco Springmann, a food researcher at the University of Oxford, who was not involved in the research, said a shift to healthier and more sustainable diets would be needed for food systems to withstand climate shocks.

“About a third of grains and basically all imported soy is used to feed animals,” he said. “Aiming to make those supply chains more resilient therefore misses the point that this supports the very products that are to a large degree responsible for what is being tried to protect from.”