Omnibus I, EU backtracks on sustainability
On Tuesday, 16 December, the European Parliament definitively approved the Omnibus I package with 428 votes in favour, 218 against and 17 abstentions, thus confirming the agreement reached on 9 Dece...
The Paris Climate Agreement marks its first ten years
Ten years ago, the Paris Agreement united the world in the fight against climate change at the 21st United Nations Climate Change Conference. With this historic agreement, 195 countries pledged to t...
Earth may be in crisis, but we can still choose our future: UNEP GEO-7
In one of Africa's major cities, Nairobi, Kenya, the seventh session of the United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA-7) is being held in early December. In this context, UNEP has published the new&...
Building an African Early Warning System “from the ground up”
In 2018, only 40 percent of Africa’s population had access to Early Warning Systems (EWS), resulting in poor advance notice to hazards from natural phenomena, and thus to greater losses. Howev...
A valuable COP for undervalued wetlands
COP30 in Brazil is done and dusted. As always, the outcome was mixed with many crying “too little, too slow”, while others pointed to potentially significant progress woven into the fina...
NextChem launches sustainability-linked finance plan to boost decarbonisation
MAIRE announced that NEXTCHEM has launched its first Sustainability-Linked Financing Framework, a strategic move designed to anchor financial activities to measurable sustainability targets. The &ld...
Soil: over 70% of all countries underestimate its importance in mitigation strategies
Much is often said – and even more so these days, with COP30 underway in Belém, Brazil – about reducing emissions, mitigating and absorbing CO₂. Much less often, however, is it ...
The climate crisis exacerbates inequalities, especially for women and girls
Walking for hours in the sun to fetch water. Giving birth without medical assistance because the clinic is unreachable after a flood. Giving up contraception as it is too expensive, while the family...
COP30’s local legacy: Cities will make or break the climate fight
As ICLEI’s Regional Director for Europe, I am often asked why we invest so much effort in global climate negotiations. Why does an organisation of cities and regions engage so deeply in p...
From offshore to onshore: Europe expands carbon storage with nature-inspired tech
For the first time, Europe will bury its carbon not beneath the sea, but under its own soil, heralding a new chapter in the continent’s fight against climate change. On 30 April 2025, the EU i...
COP30, awaiting a negotiation reform
COP30 comes to an end as a mirror of the current times. Multilateral cooperation on climate change barely survives, notwithstanding geopolitical tensions. Growing are the divisions between countries...
Climate finance at COP30: how to leverage $1.3 trillion by 2035
During the climate summit in Brazil, the focus shifted back to climate finance: without adequate resources, making progress on adaptation, mitigation and combating global warming is difficult, parti...
Ukraine demands $43 billion from Russia for environmental damage caused by the war
No silence is more haunting than the one following an explosion. It does not only concern what war takes away from human life, but also what it takes away from nature: forests turned to ash, fields ...
Animal testing: Nearly 400,000 fish used in EU chemical tests
A total of 382,000 fish have been used in completed, ongoing and pending tests required under the European REACH regulation (Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals) to ...
Elizabeth A. Koch: “Who is missing from the rooms of water diplomacy?”
For much of modern history, water diplomacy has been a predominantly male domain. From engineers, hydrologists, and agronomists designing irrigation systems to the “hydro-bureaucrats” ma...
UNEP: “Recognising ecocide as war crime or crime against humanity”
Dead lands do not forget. They record each bomb, each contaminant, each burned hectare like a new geological layer of violence. They are the most accurate archives of war, much more reliable than mi...
COP30, climate change and forced migration in Latin America
Climate change not only destroys territories and ecosystems — it deepens historical inequalities and forces millions of people to move. In Latin America and the Caribbean, where structural pov...
COP30, how does the future look for the negotiations?
Climate negotiations are celebrating their 30th anniversary, with the start of the COP in Belém, Brazil, today, Monday 10 November. For the first time in years, I will be following a UNF...
Tropical Forest Forever Fund: the controversial Brazilian project at the core of COP30
It is Lula's crowning achievement, his political legacy for the Amazon: a mega forest fund, the first of its kind, superior to any previous initiative, including the REDD+ carbon credit mechanism. I...
From promises to action: COP30 must deliver where others have fallen short
When world leaders meet this November in Belém, deep in the heart of the Amazon, for the 30th UN Climate Conference (COP30), they will stand at a crossroads. Ten years after the Paris Agreeme...