location: Global

location: Global

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Electrochemical removal of ocean CO2 offers potential — and concerns
- Stripping seawater of carbon dioxide via electrochemical processes — thereby prompting oceans to draw down more greenhouse gas from the atmosphere — is a geoengineering approach under consideration for largescale CO2 removal. Several startups and existing companies are planning projects at various scales.
- Once removed from seawater, captured carbon dioxide can be stored geologically or used commercially by industry. Another electrochemical method returns alkaline seawater to the oceans, causing increased carbon dioxide absorption over time.
- In theory, these techniques could aid in carbon emission storage. But experts warn that as some companies rush to commercialize the tech and sell carbon credits, significant knowledge gaps remain, with potential ecological harm needing to be determined.
- Achieving the scale required to make a dent in climate change would require deploying huge numbers of electrochemical plants globally — a costly and environmentally risky scenario deemed unfeasible by some. One problem: the harm posed by scale-up isn’t easy to assess with modeling and small-scale projects.

Most large banks failing to consider Indigenous rights
- A new report by finance watchdog BankTrack evaluated the policies and practices of 50 major banks and found that most are failing to fully implement adequate safeguards in line with U.N. human rights principles.
- The 2024 report included three new criteria centered around the rights of human rights defenders and Indigenous peoples and the right to a healthy environment; the majority of banks did not explicitly acknowledge environmental rights are human rights and all failed in due diligence around Indigenous peoples’ free, prior and informed consent.
- The report found that small progress has been made in the last two years as banks improve policies and processes for managing human rights.
- The authors say stronger human rights due diligence laws could be a game changer in driving corporate respect for human rights.

Next-gen geothermal offers circular promise, but needs care and caution
- Enhanced geothermal systems (EGS) and other next-generation geothermal tech show promise as a relatively clean, reliable renewable energy source for a post-fossil fuels future.
- Next-gen geothermal uses a variety of engineering techniques, including hydraulic fracturing borrowed from the oil and gas drilling industry, to create conditions for successful subsurface energy production beyond traditional locations, such as hot springs.
- Enhanced geothermal’s promise of a reliable source of power is huge around the globe, but so far has barely been tapped, say experts. Companies are starting to develop commercial-scale projects, aiming to harness this potential.
- But next-gen geothermal is not without risk. There are concerns, for example, that this tech can induce seismicity. In the past decade, earthquakes shut down two EGS projects in South Korea and Switzerland. Yet, experts say this concern and other environmental impacts, such as pollution, can be controlled and mitigated.

Renewables won’t save us from climate catastrophe, experts warn; what will?
- Demand for renewable energy, particularly solar panels, is growing at an exponential rate. But the shift to solar, wind, EVs and other sustainable tech solutions has sparked an environmentally destructive mining boom and is itself carbon intensive.
- And even as renewables boom, we’re burning more fossil fuels than ever, setting another record for emissions in 2023. So it appears high tech alone can’t save the world from catastrophic climate change; only massive cuts in fossil fuels can do that, say experts. But even addressing the climate change planetary boundary isn’t enough.
- Five other planetary boundaries are in the danger zone, though solutions exist to reverse these negative environmental trends, say analysts. But for those solutions to happen, governments must shift trillions of dollars in “perverse subsidies” (that support fossil fuels and do environmental harm) to renewable energy.
- Without real, drastic, decisive action now, the sixth great mass extinction could be unstoppable and doom modern life as we know it. Still, there’s another way forward: Learn from Indigenous cultures, with their willingness and ability to integrate into the biosphere, and to humbly turn away from greed and overconsumption.

Direct air capture climate solution faces harsh criticism, steep challenges
- Direct air capture — geoengineering technology that draws carbon dioxide from the air, allowing it to be stored in geologic formations or used by industry — is being heavily hyped as a climate solution.
- But as direct air capture (DAC) pilot projects an startups grow in number around the world, fueled by investment and government funding in the U.S. and elsewhere, this proposed climate solution is becoming ever more divisive.
- Critics paint DAC as a costly, ineffective distraction from drastically slashing fossil fuel extraction and emissions. The use of captured carbon by the fossil fuel industry to squeeze ever more oil from wells comes in for particularly sharp criticism.
- Though carbon dioxide removal (CDR) may be needed to help limit the worst impacts of global warming, experts say betting on direct air capture is riddled with challenges of cost and scale. Two hurdles: sourcing sufficient renewables to power DAC facilities, and minimizing carbon-intensive DAC infrastructure.

Deadlocked plastic treaty talks will lead to renewed negotiations in 2025
- In 2022, U.N. negotiators set a timetable to finalize a global plastics treaty by the end of 2024.
- That hope was dashed on Dec. 1 at the United Nations summit in Busan, South Korea, as a few oil petrostates and plastic-producing nations (seeking a voluntary treaty focused on waste reduction) blocked 100-plus higher-ambition nations (seeking a binding treaty with limits on plastic production).
- However, many parties feel that a strong agreement can still be reached, and say there’s good reason for hope: In Busan, participating nations agreed to a 22-page “Chair’s Text” for the treaty that will serve as the starting point for negotiations at a resumed session in 2025, perhaps as early as May.
- But much remains to be worked out, especially concerning limits on plastic production, proposed bans on some toxic chemicals used in plastics, a phaseout of some single-use plastic products, and more. A key sticking point is the question of who will pay for the treaty’s implementation and ongoing enforcement.

‘We have incredible & applicable solutions’: Interview with Peter Houlihan of XPRIZE
- XPRIZE Rainforest, a $10 million competition to come up with autonomous rainforest monitoring technology, wrapped up earlier this year.
- Four winners were announced in November for their work in combining cutting-edge technology and Indigenous knowledge to monitor a 100-hectare (250-acre) plot in the Amazon Rainforest within 24 hours.
- XPRIZE Foundation, the nonprofit organization that organized the competition, is now collaborating with governments and universities around the world to help scale up the technologies and deploy them for rainforest monitoring.

Satellites and lidar get AI boost to count forest carbon stock worldwide
- A newly launched tool combines satellite images, lidar data and artificial intelligence to estimate carbon stored in forests around the world.
- The Forest Carbon Monitoring tool, developed by Earth-imaging company Planet, trained an AI model using the organization’s archival satellite data and globally available lidar data.
- The model is now being used in conservation efforts as well as in the voluntary carbon market.

How conservation photographer Cristina Mittermeier uses visual storytelling to inspire action
- Cristina Mittermeier, a pioneer in conservation photography, blends art and advocacy to inspire action and amplify often-overlooked voices, particularly Indigenous communities and unsung conservation heroes. Her work emphasizes optimism and solutions over despair.
- Raised in Mexico with a love for nature, Mittermeier transitioned from marine biology to photography after witnessing the devastating impacts of industrial fishing, realizing that visual storytelling could bridge the gap between scientific data and public emotion.
- In a December 2024 exchange with Mongabay founder Rhett A. Butler, Mittermeier shared her philosophy of “enoughness,” advocating for conservation approaches rooted in inclusivity and honoring Indigenous stewardship as a cornerstone of biodiversity protection.
- Through projects like Hope and her organization SeaLegacy, Mittermeier uses her photography as “visual medicine” to galvanize action, spotlight small victories, and inspire youth to reshape humanity’s relationship with the natural world.

Trees live out their lives in surprising ways, massive new study finds
- Trees have more complex life histories than previously thought, which scientists must consider to forecast greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and plan conservation efforts.
- Researchers assembled a dataset of 3.2 million tree measurements, covering more than 1,000 species across North and South America.
- Four “growth strategy” groups emerged, ranging from species that live fast and die young to those that live slow and die old.
- Carbon forecasts should take a more nuanced look at how long carbon is stored in this wide variety of trees, the scientists recommend.

Storing CO2 in rock: Carbon mineralization holds climate promise but needs scale-up
- Carbon mineralization is a process by which gaseous carbon dioxide reacts chemically with certain rock types and transforms into solid carbonate minerals. This natural process is an essential part of the long carbon cycle, which has helped regulate Earth’s temperature for millions of years.
- Mimicking this natural process, subsurface mineralization is a human-induced carbon storage technology, with CO₂ injected directly into in-situ basalt, peridotite and other rock types to accelerate mineralization. In 2012, Iceland’s CarbFix project first demonstrated subsurface mineralization and has stored more than 100,000 metric tons of CO₂ since then.
- Proponents say the technology is safe, verifiable and offers rapid permanent CO₂ storage, giving this sequestration method advantages over other options such as reforestation (where forests can be cut or burn) or conventional geologic storage in sedimentary basins (which requires long-term monitoring for leaks).
- Interest in subsurface carbon mineralization is growing: expanding in Iceland, with test projects in the U.S. and Oman, and others recently announced. But investment in field pilots is needed, plus regulatory and policy support, for scale-up. Unlike other geoengineering methods, this technique seems to pose few environmental problems.

How are mangrove restoration projects doing?: Interview with Tom Worthington
- A new tool aims to help managers of mangrove restoration projects track their progress and measure final outcomes against initial goals.
- The Mangrove Restoration Tracker Tool was developed by the University of Cambridge, WWF and the Global Mangrove Alliance in a bid to streamline global data on mangrove restoration projects around the world.
- Mangroves are crucial ecosystems that serve as carbon sinks and act as a buffer against coastal erosion; however, they’re threatened by deforestation as well as by the impacts of global warming.

Climate financing should come from oil and gas ‘super’ profits, study says
- Oil and gas companies have the ability to become a significant source of climate financing, a new study in Climate Policy argues.
- The study looked at oil and gas profits from 2022, when the Russian invasion of Ukraine spiked energy prices across the globe, boosting realized companies’ earnings by 65%, or around $495 billion.
- If governments had imposed an additional 30% tax on the profits of private oil and gas companies, it would have raised $147 billion, the study said.
- Climate financing was the focus of the COP 29 climate conference, which only managed to come up with $300 billion in annual support for developing countries.

Just energy transition reports urge care in surge to reach global renewable energy goals
- Nearly 100 Indigenous representatives agreed on a first-ever document to define what a just energy transition is from an Indigenous perspective, with eleven principles to make the transition fair and equitable.
- Another report highlights approaches for fair co-ownership models and negotiations between Indigenous communities and corporations in instances where communities agree to projects on their lands.
- To meet renewable energy goals, there will need to be an increase in mining for critical minerals that power renewable energy technologies, many of which are on Indigenous lands, say analysts.
- A researcher has proposed additional solutions to meet the growing demand while respecting the principles around a just energy transition, including a framework to track mineral needs and which mines truly serve climate purposes.

Land use change impacting seven planetary boundaries, solutions urgent, say scientists
- A new scientific report lays bare the stark impacts of land-system change and land degradation on planetary health, while also offering solutions to these problems. The report was published on the eve of the 16th session of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification, running Dec. 2-13 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
- Seven of nine planetary boundaries are now adversely impacted by unsustainable land use and other land practices, the report finds. Six of those boundaries are already transgressed, having moved beyond their safe operating space for humanity and into the high-risk zone.
- Scientists warn that the seriously degraded land use boundary, interacting with the other transgressed planetary boundaries, could result in a domino-effect that may rapidly push Earth systems past dangerous and irreversible tipping points, threatening life as we know it.
- Unsustainable agricultural practices are a leading driver of land use degradation globally, responsible for vast amounts of greenhouse gas emissions, the majority of deforestation and freshwater use. Urgent measures are needed to restore ecosystems, shift to sustainable agriculture, and prevent further degradation.

Using science to fight deforestation: Interview with World Forest ID’s Jade Saunders & Andrew Lowe
- World Forest ID, a nonprofit consortium of research organizations, uses chemical and genetic profiling techniques to trace timber to the location where it was grown and harvested.
- The technique has been used to locate the origin of wood in the European Union and to keep a check on the import of products made with sanctioned Russian timber.
- The organization is now working to expand its database to include soy, cocoa and coffee to be able to use its technique when the European Union Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) comes into effect.

Why is a landscape approach needed for funding the global environmental agenda? (commentary)
- This commentary by Robert Nasi, Chief Operating Officer of CIFOR-ICRAF and a leading forest ecologist, and Aida Greenbury, a sustainability expert and environmental advocate, explores the inefficiencies of fragmented environmental governance under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), and the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD).
- The authors argue that separating these conventions perpetuates administrative inefficiencies, competition for resources, and project fragmentation, hindering the ability to address interconnected crises such as climate change, biodiversity loss, and land degradation holistically.
- They call for a unified funding mechanism and governance structure to streamline efforts, reduce redundancies, and facilitate multi-benefit projects, emphasizing the urgent need for systemic change to effectively tackle the environmental challenges threatening Earth’s future.
- This article is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily Mongabay.

Citizen scientists can boost IUCN species assessments, but need better guidance from ecologists
- More than 100,000 Australian citizen scientists are contributing crucial biodiversity data about species at risk, helping improve conservation efforts in ways that can enhance IUCN Red List decisions.
- Citizen science projects like Fungimap and FrogID showcase how such observations have influenced threat assessments and conservation outcomes.
- Researchers stress the need for clear goals, standardized protocols, and expert oversight to maximize the impact of citizen science.

Thousands of chemicals from food packaging found in humans, a major study reveals
- Food packaging, serving, and processing materials contain 14,402 known chemicals that people might consume, but the full extent of human exposure was not clear.
- Researchers found evidence for 3,601 of these chemicals in humans from a survey of biomedical databases. More than 100 such chemicals are highly hazardous, or their danger is unknown.
- Policymakers should restrict the food manufacturing industry from using these hazardous materials in items that contact food, the authors recommend.

Plastic pollution pushing Earth past all nine planetary boundaries: Report
- As final negotiations for an international plastics treaty get underway this week in Busan, South Korea, scientists warn that the global plastics crisis is far more dangerous than previously thought.
- In a research article published in November, an international group of researchers found that plastics pollution is helping to destabilize and threaten all nine planetary boundaries, putting the “safe operating space for humanity” at risk.
- The report documents serious impacts all along the petrochemical plastics supply chain — from extraction through production to use and disposal. Start with the climate change planetary boundary: Plastic production is already responsible for 12% of total oil demand. It could account for half of global oil consumption by 2050.
- Besides climate change, plastics cause increased harm to biosphere integrity and impact freshwater change, land system change, atmospheric aerosol loading (air pollution), ocean acidification, stratospheric ozone depletion and more. The report urges urgent action to regulate plastic production and disposal.

Huge deforested areas in the tropics could regenerate naturally, study finds
- A new study shows that 215 million hectares (531 million acres) of degraded and deforested land in the tropics could regenerate naturally.
- The researchers developed a model based on satellite images of where forest had regrown, using machine learning to filter out places where humans had planted trees.
- The analysis also incorporated a range of biophysical variables, such as rainfall, fire frequency, and the distance from the edge of standing forest.
- While natural regeneration could be cost-effective, scientists also say the permanence of regrown forests is critically important to the benefits it can provide to biodiversity and the climate.

Cities are climate solution leaders: Interview with Vancouver’s Gregor Robertson
- 2024 will likely be the hottest year on record, surpassing the heat record set in 2023. The resulting extreme heat waves, floods, droughts and wildfires took a terrible toll in death, global suffering and economic loss.
- The biggest climate change impacts have by far been in the world’s cities. And the world’s cities have responded proactively, becoming climate solution leaders, even as national governments have dragged their feet for nearly three decades.
- If nations and investment banks offered billions in financing to boost climate work now underway in cities, that effort could then be vastly scaled up, said Gregor Robertson, former mayor of Vancouver, Canada, and a special envoy to the Coalition for High Ambition Multilevel Partnerships. This is an exclusive Mongabay interview.

Let’s rethink debt-for-nature swaps toward greater sustainability & integrity (commentary)
- Debt-for-nature swaps are financial mechanisms that allow countries to reduce their debt burdens in exchange for committing to environmental conservation: Ecuador’s marine conservation program benefited greatly from this kind of agreement recently.
- These are powerful tools, but to fully unlock their potential, we must rethink their structure and governance, a new op-ed argues. A more inclusive, transparent, and robust framework is needed—one built on the principles of Global Public Investment, which places equity and shared responsibility at the heart of climate and biodiversity finance.
- “Let’s turn the potential of debt-for-nature swaps into a powerful force for change, unleashing the transformative power of finance to build a sustainable and just future for all,” the authors write.
- This article is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily Mongabay.

Help farmers adopt agroecology to protect biodiversity and climate (commentary)
- In light of the COP16 biodiversity talks and the COP29 climate negotiations, governments and development partners should incentivize & invest in ways to help farmers scale up agroecological, regenerative and nature-based solutions, a new op-ed argues.
- Agroecology is a key climate solution according to the IPCC, and mobilizing greater investment is necessary to help farmers and Indigenous people to gain the right skills and help cover costs related to the certification and verification of their products.
- “Market-based incentives, such as premium prices for sustainably produced commodities, as well as non-market incentives, such as membership in farmer groups and valuable extension services, are needed to overcome the risk aversion associated with embracing new production systems,” writes the author.
- This article is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily Mongabay.

Microplastics are sickening and killing wildlife, disrupting Earth systems
- Animals across the spectrum of life are eating, breathing and ingesting plastics that leach toxic chemicals and have been shown to alter the function of organs and even cells in humans. Petroleum products — mostly oil and natural gas — are plastic’s base ingredient.
- As plastic breaks down to micro and nano size, it easily enters the bodies of all living things. It takes 500-1,000 years for plastic to break down, and scientists now question whether it ever fully degrades.
- Health studies on wildlife are extremely difficult and costly, but plastics are thought to threaten living thing, from zooplankton, insects, rodents, rhinos and frogs to clams, whales, snakes, wildcats and a host of migratory animals.
- Next week, the world’s nations meet to hopefully finalize a U.N. plastics treaty. After a brief unexplained policy flip-flop, the Biden administration continues siding with Russia, Iran and other fossil fuel-producing nations, and with the petrochemical industry, in opposing binding regulations limiting global plastics production.

Five-year rainforest tech competition culminates with four winners
- Limelight Rainforest, a team of ecologists, robotics engineers and Indigenous scientists, has won first place in a $10 million rainforest tech competition.
- At the finals in Brazil in July, the team deployed canopy rafts, drones and artificial intelligence models to identify and detect the highest amount of biodiversity from a forest plot within 24 hours.
- Three other teams were also recognized for their work in developing tech solutions to monitor rainforests around the world.
- The five-year XPRIZE Rainforest competition was launched in 2019 to identify solutions to automate rainforest monitoring.

The plastics crisis is now a global human health crisis, experts say
- Plastics can contain thousands of different chemicals, many of them linked to cancer and reproductive harm, and many never tested for safety.
- Multiple studies are now finding these chemicals, along with microplastics, throughout the human body, raising alarm among scientists about widespread health effects, including reduced fertility and increased obesity.
- Research points to a correlation between the presence of microplastics and endocrine disrupting plasticizers in the human body and a variety of serious maladies, but tracing a direct causal line is very difficult given the complexity and number of plastics and the industry’s lack of transparency regarding its products.
- Many scientists and nations are calling for a binding plastics treaty to limit global plastic production. But this week the U.S. took a weaker position; it now supports a policy in which nations set their own voluntary targets for reducing production. Negotiations to determine the final treaty language begin at a UN summit in Busan, Korea, running Nov. 25 – Dec. 1.

Biodiversity credit approaches multiply as concerns cloud confidence
- In recent years, biodiversity credit projects and the methods to calculate their value have proliferated, seen by some as a way to finance the $700 billion gap in conservation funding identified in the 2022 Global Biodiversity Framework.
- Credits involve payment for measurable outcomes beneficial to nature, ranging from increases in species diversity at a site to securing land rights for Indigenous communities.
- Critics of biodiversity credits have voiced concerns about comparing outcomes across ecosystems, especially if buyers will use the credits for offsetting. They also say focusing on biodiversity credits is a distraction.
- Proponents argue for bolstering biodiversity credit integrity and confidence in the markets to boost demand. Projections by the World Economic Forum suggest the market could reach $7 billion by 2030, though less than $2 million in credits have been sold so far.

Mapping ‘gloop and mud’ sheds light on seabed carbon storage
- Two new reports showing the extent of carbon storage in the marine sediments around the coasts of Canada and the U.K. are helping to build the case for greater protection of the seabed, as part of efforts to mitigate climate change.
- They also highlight some of the threats to this underwater carbon sink, particularly sediment disturbance caused by bottom trawling, a fishing method.
- A new project funded by the U.K.’s Natural Environment Research Council is set to investigate whether or not continued disturbance poses the risk of turning the seabed into a source of CO₂.

Shipping emissions reduction sheds light on marine cloud geoengineering
- Unprecedented marine heat waves in the North Atlantic have been driven in part by a recent drop in shipping emissions, leading to a reduction in highly reflective marine clouds that had previously masked some of the warming from humanity’s greenhouse gas emissions, studies find.
- New limits on sulfur dioxide emissions from shipping, introduced by the International Maritime Organization in 2020, created an inadvertent “natural experiment” that is helping to improve models of the interaction between atmospheric aerosols, clouds and climate.
- The sulfur dioxide emissions reduction also provides the clearest test to date of marine cloud brightening (MCB) — a controversial geoengineering approach proposed to mitigate climate change. It shows that to be effective and avoid a dangerous termination shock, MCB would need to be continuous and sustained.
- Reducing atmospheric aerosol pollution has major benefits for human health, but will also inevitably lead to an unmasking of more dangerous climate warming. This means that improvements in air quality must simultaneously be coupled with decarbonization, experts say.

COP29: With public climate finance shortfall, is investment capital a way forward?
- The many years of international delay on climate action — paralleled by year-after-year of rising emissions and record climate disasters — has greatly increased the price tag on preventing a global climate catastrophe. Today, experts estimate addressing the climate emergency will cost trillions of dollars.
- But who should pay, and how much? This question is expected to top the agenda at COP29, the climate summit, starting Nov. 11 in Baku, Azerbaijan, possibly leading to a new, more ambitious financial target to provide crucial funds to developing countries.
- While wealthy nations are known for pledging large sums to support the alternative energy transition, climate adaptation, and loss and damage, those nations controversially are also known for falling far short on fulfilling those pledges. Wealthy countries reportedly mobilized $115.9 billion for climate action in 2022, still not close to enough.
- Now stepping up are The World Bank, International Monetary Fund, regional development banks, and private financial institutions, who say they stand ready to invest far more (with significant caveats) than G-20 nations ever contributed. How this investing will work, and how fast, remains to be seen, with some distrustful of investment capital’s profit motives.

What Indigenous leaders want from the COP29 U.N. climate conference
- As COP29 runs Nov. 11-22 in Baku, Azerbaijan, Indigenous leaders look ahead to show their strong participation, although many leaders are setting their sights on this conference to prepare better for the next COP.
- With a package of new funds introduced this year, Indigenous leaders whom Mongabay spoke with plan to push negotiations for improved access to direct funds to fight the harsh impacts of climate change.
- Along with improved access to funds, the leaders say they seek ambitious commitments to the loss and damage fund, a just energy transition and carbon market regulations.

U.S. policy experts confident of future climate action despite Trump election
- In 2015, the world came together to achieve the landmark Paris climate agreement. But in 2016, Donald Trump’s ascendency to the U.S. presidency stunned the world, as he promised to withdrew the U.S. from the Paris accord and moved to disrupt action on climate change.
- The Biden administration worked to reverse that damage, with the U.S. again taking a leadership role in global climate summits and passing the Inflation Reduction Act, one of the most ambitious U.S. laws ever to combat global warming and boost the post-carbon economy.
- Now, with Trump elected again, the world stands ready for his climate denialism, and his likely withdrawal of the U.S. for a second time from the Paris Agreement. Global momentum is expected to continue unabated, with alternative energy thriving, Brazil hosting COP30 in 2025, and China and the EU doubling down on climate action.
- In the U.S., “Just as we did during the last Trump administration, we are going to put a focus on our work with cities and with states and many private-sector leaders who stood tall then and stand tall now,” said Gina McCarthy, EPA administrator during Barack Obama’s second term, and managing co-chair of America Is All In, an NGO.

How the oceans fared at the COP16 biodiversity conference in Colombia
- The United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity summit (COP16) took place in Cali, Colombia, from Oct. 21 to Nov. 2.
- Several oceans-related decisions, as well as the formal inclusion of Indigenous peoples and local communities in negotiations going forward, were bright spots at the summit, observers said.
- A key development for the ocean was the agreement, culminating eight years of negotiations, on a protocol for identifying unique areas of the high seas, the two-thirds of the world’s oceans that are international waters, for protection.
- Other important developments included the announcement of new marine protected areas and new funding for ocean conservation.

Will ‘Trump Part II’ be the wakeup call needed toward more effective conservation? (commentary)
- Conservation has always been an uphill battle but this has never deterred conservationists from continuing to struggle to make a difference, even if their strategies have not halted the extinction crisis. The momentum coming out of the recent global biodiversity conference in Colombia, despite its shortcomings, was badly needed to push on.
- And then Trump was re-elected as US President. Is this at last the wake-up call the conservation sector needs to realize that radical change is required?
- “Now [we] we can say it even more bluntly: conservation has never truly addressed the fundamental power structures that lead to biodiversity loss. And it let itself believe that under Biden it could go back to doing what it had always done: expand protected areas and work with business-as-usual economic interests,” a new op-ed says in arguing for a more radical approach.
- This article is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily Mongabay.

Tracking footprints to monitor wildlife: Interview with WildTrack’s Zoe Jewell
- WildTrack, a U.S.-based nonprofit, uses footprints as a noninvasive way of identifying and tracking wildlife.
- The organization has developed an artificial intelligence model that can identify 17 species, including rhinos, lions, leopards and polar bears.
- The footprint identification model has been used to identify the home range of fishers in California, support antipoaching efforts in Botswana, and understand human-wildlife conflict in South America.

What was achieved, and not, for Indigenous and local leaders at COP16
- Although some outcomes of this year’s U.N. biodiversity conference, or COP16, were viewed by some as historic achievements for Indigenous and Afro-descendent peoples, many groups were left disappointed.
- One of the most significant wins was the acknowledgment of Afro-descendants as essential actors in the care and protection of biodiversity, the decision on Article 8(j), and the adoption of the ‘Cali Fund.’
- However, many were disappointed by the failure to reach a consensus on resource mobilization, direct funding for Indigenous peoples and local communities and the lack of progress on the monitoring framework to achieve targets and goals to restore nature.
- Mongabay spoke with several Indigenous delegates attending the conference to gauge their thoughts on the conference.

Atmospheric methane removal: A promising but challenging climate solution
- Methane is currently responsible for about one-third of global warming. This greenhouse gas is about 80 times more potent than carbon dioxide in terms of its ability to heat up the climate system, though methane molecules only persist in the atmosphere for seven to 12 years before breaking down.
- Methane emissions are a major cause for concern, as they’ve been increasing at record speeds the past five years. At least two-thirds of annual methane emissions now come from human activities, including livestock, agriculture, fossil fuels, and landfills and other waste. Climate change is also increasing methane releases.
- Removing atmospheric methane is a tempting prospect as a climate change-curbing strategy. Multiple geoengineering approaches are being considered, but research remains limited and largely theoretical, while environmental impacts largely remain unknown and underexplored.
- Researchers say methane removal technologies, such as the iron salt method, should be investigated to break down atmospheric methane molecules. But scientists interviewed for this story repeatedly emphasized the most urgent need is to simultaneously make rapid deep cuts to human-caused methane emissions.

Do forest conservation pledges work? (commentary)
- The New York Declaration on Forests was agreed with great hope 10 years ago, but the world missed its 2020 target and is off track to end deforestation by 2030. Does this mean that forest pledges don’t work?
- It would be naive to expect pledges like it to quickly resolve decades long economic and political battles over land: their effect is limited without changes to forest funding, because forest clearance is usually driven by economic calculation.
- “The NYDF has not made history, but it did help redirect attention in a distracted world and create a benchmark for progress. Without it and the Glasgow Declaration, there would be less support for the many communities and institutions who are helping protect the two thirds of remaining tropical forests which are still standing,” a new op-ed states.
- This article is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily Mongabay.

New standard for ethical palm oil faces backlash before it’s even issued
- The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) is expected to issue a new standard for its member companies to abide by when it holds its annual general meeting next week.
- The new standard, an update to the existing guidelines issued in 2018, brings improvements in environmental and social safeguards, according to the RSPO.
- But advocacy groups say it introduces loopholes that could allow for greater forest loss, including a new definition of what constitutes high-carbon stock forests, a dispensation for deforestation on Indigenous lands, and allowing deforestation as long as it’s compensated for.
- The RSPO has refuted these interpretations, saying the new standard is designed to be even more stringent than the current one and that undoing the progress it’s made would be “ill-advised.”

U.S. toughens stance on plastics production in run-up to key treaty summit
- The United States has revised its position regarding ongoing U.N. plastics treaty negotiations. The U.S. originally wanted a treaty based on voluntary nation-by-nation compliance, with the emphasis on improved plastics recycling and reuse. The new U.S. position recognizes the need to regulate plastics over their entire life cycle, including production.
- Analysts say the shift in U.S. position could help soften the positions of China, Russia, India and Saudi Arabia, nations that have vigorously opposed efforts to regulate production. All of these nations are major petrochemical and/or oil producers.
- The U.N. Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on Plastic Pollution is set to meet from Nov. 25-Dec. 1 in Busan, South Korea, where it plans to finalize treaty language. However, failing this, the treaty talks might continue next year.
- The U.S. election throws doubt on what the nation’s final position might be after the treaty language is finalized. It seems likely that a Kamala Harris administration would press for treaty ratification, while a Donald Trump administration could try to derail a final agreement (as was the case with the Paris climate agreement), especially if it regulates plastics production.

COP16 biodiversity meeting recap: Progress made, but finance lags
- The COP16 biodiversity summit ended on a mixed note. Delegates from 177 nations agreed to language saying that companies “should” pay conservation fees for genetic digital sequence information (DSI) from which they profit. Corporate lobbyists ensured this measure was voluntary, but tropical nations could build DSI fees into their laws.
- COP16 delegates also agreed to give Indigenous peoples and local communities a place at the negotiating table regarding conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity, with “fair and equitable” sharing of benefits.
- Oceans got a boost as a coalition of 11 philanthropies pledged $51.7 million to identify and expand marine protected areas in open oceans. The new Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF) also moved toward launch. This novel funding mechanism could offer an estimated $4 billion annually to 70 tropical nations.
- NGOs and large philanthropies identified obstacles that must be cleared to redirect $1.7 trillion in national subsidies that now annually harm biodiversity. On the down side, COP16 utterly missed addressing the failure of wealthy nations to keep financial pledges to protect nature with $20 billion by 2025 and $200 billion by 2030.

COP16: ‘A fund unlike any other’ will pay tropical nations to save forests
- For years now, the world’s wealthiest nations have pledged billions to tropical nations to help them afford to conserve their native forests — an effort that benefits the entire world, especially for the carbon storage those tropical forests provide, as the climate crisis deepens.
- But those investment promises by donors have again and again failed to fully materialize. Today, the total funding shortfall for the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals is in the trillions of dollars.
- This week, a new funding mechanism which is about to launch was greeted with great fanfare at the COP16 biodiversity summit in Colombia. TFFF, the Tropical Forest Forever Facility, is designed to be “a fund unlike any other.”
- The fund’s innovative design is structured to deliver $4 billion year-after-year to tropical nations to incentivize those countries to keep their native forests standing. The fund’s manager will be independent of governments and investors, and may involve Indigenous groups and local communities to help manage intact tropical forests

Inclusive tracking and recognition of area-based conservation helps people & planet (commentary)
- The world needs to embrace an inclusive approach to recognizing and tracking area-based conservation, a new op-ed by a group of researchers argues.
- Momentum has been growing around establishing and tracking protected areas (PAs) and Other Effective area-based Conservation Measures (OECMs) to achieve 30×30 conservation goals, but a wide variety of such efforts occur beyond these, and are underrepresented in global databases: the authors found >40% of the land in Amazon countries is governed with conservation potential or intention, a significantly larger percentage than is reported in the official database.
- “We advise researchers, donors, and decision-makers to consider and inventory a broader scope of area-based conservation and more diverse actors than they currently do. This approach can enhance research, conservation planning, funding allocation, and program strategies to achieve national conservation targets,” the researchers write.
- This article is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily Mongabay.

‘Glimmers of promise’ for 30×30 goal as UN report calls for boosted efforts
- A new report reveals that 17.6% of terrestrial areas and 8.4% of marine areas are now under protection, ahead of a 2030 deadline to protect 30% of lands and waters.
- The report comes as countries gather in Cali, Colombia, for the United Nations Biodiversity Conference (COP16) to discuss how to turn global conservation targets into national actions.
- One solution may be recognizing Indigenous peoples’ and local communities’ territories, which cover at least 13.6% of global terrestrial areas, but this must happen with consent and respect for self-determined governance systems.
- While more than two-thirds of Key Biodiversity Areas are either partially or fully protected, significant gaps remain in ecological connectivity, with only 8.52% of land both protected and connected.

Calls for caution as enhanced rock weathering shows carbon capture promise
- Natural rock weathering is a fundamental part of Earth’s carbon cycle but occurs over thousands of years. Enhancing this cycle by spreading fine volcanic rock on agricultural land is a form of geoengineering that could speed up this process and permanently lock away carbon dioxide within decades.
- Startups and research programs are underway across the globe to explore the effectiveness and risks of this climate solution. Spreading rocks such as basalt can sequester carbon and benefit soils, with some studies showing crop yield increases.
- If scaled up, enhanced rock weathering could store gigaton levels of carbon in the future, according to early research. But myriad challenges and uncertainties remain, not least of which is how to accurately calculate and verify how much carbon is being stored, and for how long.
- Some companies are already pushing ahead with deployment, with the idea of profiting from carbon credits, but experts caution that long-term studies are needed to ensure the technique’s efficacy, sustainability and environmental safety.

Action against forest biomass subsidies gains momentum at COP16
- Forest advocates have long warned that burning forest biomass to make energy — touted as a climate solution by the forestry industry — releases more carbon emissions than coal does per unit of electricity generated. They’ve argued that cutting trees to turn them into wood pellets degrades forest carbon stores and biodiversity.
- This week those arguments are finally being heard at the COP16 biodiversity summit in Cali, Colombia. Also being seriously considered are the “perverse subsidies” offered to the forestry industry by national governments to convert forests into wood pellets, and to biomass power plants that burn those pellets.
- These issues have not achieved such a high level of official notice before at a UN summit and could result in the question of forest biomass subsidies being raised at the COP29 climate meeting next month in Baku, Azerbaijan.
- The illogic of forest biomass burning was especially noted by Barry Gardiner, a UK member of Parliament who objects to huge taxpayer subsidies paid to Drax, a British biomass power plant operator. “That’s $9 billion in public money spent making our air pollution and our carbon emissions worse,” while razing forests.

Satellite firm Planet’s ‘biodiversity subscription’ aims to make tech accessible
- A new initiative by Earth-imaging company Planet gives conservation organizations in biodiversity hotspots access to high-resolution, high-frequency satellite data.
- As part of Project Centinela, eight entities have received access to satellite data and analysis tools to help them track and monitor biodiversity in places including Bolivia, Costa Rica, Indonesia and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
- The organizations will have access to the data for three years as part of what Planet calls a “biodiversity subscription.”
- Planet aims to partner with 50 organizations around the world over the next three years as part of the initiative.

Startups replace plastics with mushrooms in the seafood industry
- A handful of startups in the U.S., Europe and Asia are helping the seafood industry fight plastic pollution by creating equipment made from fungi.
- Efforts are currently focused on replacing plastic foam, a polluting component of numerous elements of the seafood supply chain, with mycelium, the root-like structure of fungi.
- A company in Maine makes mycelium-based buoys for the aquaculture industry, for example.
- Elsewhere, projects are seeking to create biodegradable mycelium-based coolers for transporting fish.

At COP16, the ocean needs action, not more promises (commentary)
- As delegates to COP16 debate conservation measures like 30×30 initiatives, a new op-ed by the environment director of Bloomberg Philanthropies, Antha Williams, and the founder of Pristine Seas, Dr. Enric Sala, says that protecting our ocean is more than a conservation measure — it’s a lifeline.
- Well-managed and highly protected marine areas (MPAs) help restore ecosystems, ensuring food security and livelihoods for the billions who depend on them, but a new analysis shows that only 8.3% of the world’s ocean is protected in this way, and that most MPAs are either protected weakly or in name only.
- “Ocean protection has never been more urgent. As leaders gather in Cali, they must ensure that ‘protecting our ocean’ means truly protecting it. The 30×30 target will only be meaningful if we protect areas effectively — not just on paper,” they argue.
- This article is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily Mongabay.

Global biodiversity financiers strategize at COP16 to end ‘perverse subsidies’
- COP16, the U.N. biodiversity summit in Colombia, is entering its second week. Without the presence of fossil fuel company lobbyists to stall progress, participants are moving fast and developing plans to end “perverse subsidies” gifted by national governments to fossil fuel companies and other sectors to the tune of $1.7 trillion annually.
- Instead, those subsidies would be repurposed to protect nature and the climate. COP16 participants aim to achieve this goal by immediate implementation of Target 18 of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework approved by 196 nations at the COP15 biodiversity summit in Montreal in 2022. Target 18 reads:
- “Identify by 2025, and eliminate, phase out and reform incentives, including subsidies, harmful for biodiversity, in a proportionate, just, fair, effective and equitable way, while substantially and progressively reducing them by at least $500 billion per year by 2030… and scale up positive incentives for the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity.”
- No one at COP16 has illusions about the challenge of shifting the flood of government and banking money away from big oil, gas and coal. But the alternative outlined in a just-released U.N. report offers little choice: Without drastic measures to conserve nature and stop global heating, we’re headed for a disastrous 2.6° Celsius (4.7° Fahrenheit) temperature rise by 2100, or worse.

50 years of geographic insight: In interview with Jack Dangermond on Esri’s journey and the future of GIS
- The digital mapping platforms developed by Esri, including ArcGIS, have revolutionized conservation and environmental planning, management and policymaking. Esri co-founder Jack Dangermond calls geographic information systems (GIS) “a sort of intelligent nervous system for our planet at a time when humanity desperately needs one to address the environmental and humanitarian crises at hand.”
- He credits Esri’s success to a sustainable trajectory of heavy investment in R&D, not being beholden to outside investors, and providing discounted and free use of its software to environmental nonprofits.
- In this interview with Mongabay founder and CEO Rhett A. Butler, Dangermond says that technology, amid the current fractured political climate, should be employed to encourage understanding rather than dwell on divisions.
- The text of the interview has been edited for clarity and flow.

Protecting coral reefs boosts fish numbers by 10%: Study
- New research has found that the protection of coral reefs has boosted the amount of fish they harbor by around 10%.
- The study used survey data from about 2,600 reefs with varying levels of protection from overfishing.
- The team then built a statistical model to predict what would have happened if all reefs had not been protected, and the biomass, or collective weight of the resident fish, dropped by more than 10%.
- The scientists note their findings demonstrate that protections like marine protected areas are working and that greater coverage could lead to even more gains in fish biomass.

If all life mattered, what would decision-making look like? (Analysis)
- Across the world, Indigenous and other communities embedded in nature have articulated, as part their resistance to external domination, an inseparability of nature from all human activity.
- The authors say these worldviews challenge a dominant strand of Western thinking: that humans alone are possessed of rights and that other species exist only for human use.
- As Indigenous leaders at the COP16 U.N. biodiversity conference underline the need for humanity to live at peace with nature, the authors say people who live in urban-industrial contexts alienated from the rest of nature need to understand the principles of traditional governance systems, and support communities in strengthening them. However, they say, we should also bring in changes to deal with the internal inequities or weaknesses of these systems.
- This article is an analysis. The views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily of Mongabay.

Carbon markets must recognize Indigenous ‘high forest, low deforestation’ areas (commentary)
- “We have lived in and safeguarded our forests for generations, helping maintain biodiverse ecosystems designated as high forest, low deforestation (HFLD) areas, which are regions with historically low deforestation,” two Indigenous leaders write in a new op-ed.
- Carbon markets have mostly focused on areas with pre-existing deforestation, but communities like these with historically low deforestation need financing to support their conservation work, too, so shouldn’t HFLD regions get better access to the voluntary carbon market?
- “For too long, Indigenous and local communities who have preserved forests without compensation have been excluded from financial benefits linked to forest conservation. This is not just an environmental issue, but a matter of climate justice,” they argue.
- This article is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily Mongabay.

Here’s how to reform multilateral funding to get more money directly to communities (commentary)
- Although 17% of all forest carbon and 39% of global lands in good ecological condition are managed or governed by Indigenous Peoples, just a tiny fraction of climate and biodiversity financing gets directed to them. Most of the funding seems to evaporate in webs of institutions before reaching communities.
- To meet biodiversity and climate goals, a deeper transformation in partnerships between multilateral funders and Indigenous Peoples and local communities is urgently needed.
- The authors say this includes not only simplified application processes, alignment of funding priorities with community needs, and more responsive, flexible long-term support that directly reaches Indigenous and local communities, but also cultural transformation.
- This article is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily of Mongabay.

Botanical gardens play key role in biodiversity & climate conventions (commentary)
- “As world leaders and scientific institutions from across the globe gather to discuss the biodiversity crisis at COP16 and climate change at COP29 this fall, it’s critical that they do not neglect the important work that is already being done by one of the world’s key stewards of nature – botanical gardens,” a new op-ed argues.
- Botanical gardens have an important role to play in the overall effort to combat the dual climate and biodiversity crises and can offer important solutions, but they are often underutilized, despite housing a wide array of experts on plants and fungi.
- “At the rate the planet is warming, there is no time to leave their untapped potential behind,” writes the CEO of The New York Botanical Garden.
- This article is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily Mongabay.

Indigenous territories & peoples are key to achieving COP16’s 30×30 target (commentary)
- It is just a few days until the beginning of COP16 when countries worldwide will meet to discuss biodiversity protection in Cali, Colombia.
- These discussions cannot happen without considering the role of Indigenous communities in protecting biodiversity and thriving ecosystems, argues a new op-ed by the Solomon Islands Minister for Environment and Colombia’s Technical Secretary at the National Commission of Indigenous Territories.
- “We Indigenous peoples are the best protectors of the environment, and against all odds, we are resisting colonial processes and threats…The negotiators at COP16 must ensure full, effective, and equitable inclusion of Indigenous peoples,” they argue.
- This article is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily Mongabay.

Delay of EU Deforestation Regulation may ‘be excuse to gut law,’ activists fear
- In a surprise move, the European Commission has proposed a 12-month delay in implementation of the EU’s groundbreaking deforestation law, which was slated to go into effect in January 2025.
- The European Parliament still needs to approve the delay, but is expected to do so. The law is meant to regulate global deforestation caused by a range of commodities from soy to coffee, cattle, cocoa, palm oil, rubber and wood products, including industrial-scale wood pellets burned to make energy.
- Commodity companies, including those in the pellet industry, say the law’s certification requirements are onerous and the 2025 start date is too soon for compliance. The industries are supported by commodities-producing nations such as Brazil, Indonesia and the United States (a primary source of wood pellets).
- Forest campaigners, including those opposing tree harvests for wood pellets, fear that delay of the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) will offer commodity companies and exporting nations time to water down the law meant to protect native forests, carbon storage and biodiversity, and delay the worst climate change impacts.

What Indigenous leaders want from the COP16 U.N. biodiversity conference
- From Oct. 21 to Nov. 1, about 770 Indigenous leaders from around the world are registered to gather at the U.N. biodiversity conference, or COP16, to advocate for the recognition of Indigenous rights as part of the solution to the Earth’s biodiversity crisis.
- Mongabay spoke with several Indigenous delegates attending the conference to gauge what they’re looking for going into the conference.
- The main topics on their agenda include the development of reporting and monitoring mechanisms to ensure Indigenous and traditional peoples’ rights are not neglected in the race to achieve the goals of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF).
- Leaders from Guatemala, Colombia, Peru and other countries also plan to push for the creation of a program of work on Article 8(j) and its provisions, direct access to funding and the recognition and titling of Indigenous and local community lands.

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