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The climate crisis is not a distant threat; it's happening right now and affecting what matters most to us. Hurricanes intensified by a warming planet and drought-fueled wildfires are destroying our communities. Rising seas and flooding are swallowing our homes. And record-breaking heat waves are reshaping our way of life. The good news is we know how to turn the tide and avoid the worst possible outcomes. However, understanding what needs to be done can be confusing due to a constant stream of climate updates, scientific findings, and critical decisions that are shaping our future. That's why the ABC News...

Samples drilled from deep beneath the sea have revealed just how much global sea levels changed following the last ice age. Melting ice caps in North America, Antarctica and Europe caused sea levels to rise quickly as temperatures warmed after the last ice age. But researchers have lacked robust geological data from this period, so how much sea levels climbed was unknown. Now, new geological data show that sea levels rose about 125 feet (38 meters) between 11,000 and 3,000 years ago, according to a study published March 19 in the journal Nature. The findings could help scientists and policymakers...

All 19 of the world's glacier regions experienced a net loss of mass in 2024 for the third consecutive year, the United Nations said on Friday, warning that saving the planet's glaciers was now a matter of "survival". Five of the last six years have seen the most rapid glacier retreat on record, the UN's World Meteorological Organization said, on the inaugural World Day for Glaciers. "Preservation of glaciers is a not just an environmental, economic and societal necessity: it's a matter of survival," said WMO chief Celeste Saulo. Beyond the continental ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica, more than...

BREMEN, Maine (AP) — Commercial fishermen and seafood processors looking to switch to new, lower-carbon emission systems say the federal funding they relied on for this work is either frozen or unavailable due to significant budget cuts promoted by President Donald Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency. The changes are designed to replace old diesel-burning engines and outdated at-sea cooling systems and are touted by environmentalists as a way to reduce seafood’s carbon footprint. Decarbonization of the fishing fleet has been a target of environmental activists in recent years. That is far less than agriculture, but still a significant piece of...

Last year was the hottest year on record, the top 10 hottest years were all in the past decade and planet-heating carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere are at an 800,000-year high, a report Wednesday said. In its annual State of the Climate report, the World Meteorological Organization laid bare all the markings of an increasingly warming world with oceans at record high temperatures, sea levels rising and glaciers retreating at record speed. “Our planet is issuing more distress signals,” said António Guterres, United Nations Secretary-General. The report attributed the heating to human activity — like the burning of coal,...

… Oregon transportation officials say that without more funding, residents like (Timothy) Taylor could see further declines in the quality of roads, highways and bridges starting this year. But revenues from gas taxes paid by drivers at the pump are projected to decrease as more people adopt electric and fuel-efficient cars, forcing officials to look for new ways to fund transportation infrastructure. States with aggressive climate goals like Oregon are facing a conundrum: EVs can help reduce emissions in the transportation sector, the nation’s largest source of greenhouse gas emissions, but they also mean less gas tax revenue in government...

Shares in Chinese EV giant BYD surged to a record high Tuesday after it unveiled new battery technology it says can charge a vehicle in the same time it takes to fill up a petrol car. The company said the battery and charging system, called "Super e-Platform", boasted peak speeds of 1,000 kW, allowing cars to travel up to 470 kilometres (292 miles) after being plugged in for just five minutes.

The electric buses in question were made by a company called Proterra, which went bankrupt two years ago.. A city in Washington is selling nearly half of its electric bus fleet following reliability issues and difficulty getting replacement parts. The Everett City Council voted earlier this week to sell nine of the electric buses, of which only four are in service right now, because of reliability issues, including critical sensors and components that have been failing since they went into service. The city is now looking to purchase retrofitted diesel buses so there are no gaps in service. According to...

Across the globe more and more Sports Utility Vehicles (SUVs) are being spotted on – and off – the roads. This is despite predictions from the United Nations of an inevitable pivot towards smaller and more environmentally friendly vehicles because of the urgency of the climate crisis and the rising cost of living. That pivot has not materialised: globally, 54% of the cars sold in 2024 were SUVs, including petrol, diesel, hybrids and electric makes. Of the SUVs which are now on the road – both new and older models – 95% are burning fossil fuels, according to the International...

What hope now for avoiding catastrophic climate change? As all of the data on emissions, atmospheric carbon dioxide levels, and global warming point emphatically in the wrong direction, returning president Donald Trump has given the call to “drill, baby, drill”—a pledge to fast-track new fossil fuel projects and ramp up production. One presumes it’s an order that the world’s oil and gas giants, already backsliding from their previous commitments to transition to green energy, will be only too happy to heed. Against this backdrop, the dark premonitions that haunt the minds of those persuaded by the scientific consensus on climate...

"The Arctic is changing faster than anywhere else on the planet, so the question we’re trying to ask here is: Is the Arctic going to change fast, or really fast?" NASA's most ambitious Arctic voyage to date has revealed surprisingly high concentrations of ice particles in clouds over Greenland, a clue that may help explain why Arctic ice is melting even faster than predicted. "The Arctic is changing faster than anywhere else on the planet, so the question we're trying to ask here is: Is the Arctic going to change fast — or really fast?" Patrick Taylor, the deputy science...

The Trump administration is planning to cancel its lease at a government laboratory in Hawaii, a site where scientists support key observations of surging greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere, according to a list obtained by Democratic members of Congress and shared with The Washington Post. The Global Monitoring Laboratory in Hilo, Hawaii, is on a list of dozens of National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration facilities whose leases are set to expire later this year. The lab is connected to the Mauna Loa Observatory, where scientists gather data from atop a volcano to produce the famed Keeling Curve, a chart on...

The Environmental Protection Agency's plan to repeal or weaken more than two dozen regulations could deliver a direct blow to California policies on air and water quality standards, electric vehicle initiatives and efforts to curb planet-harming greenhouse gas emissions. The changes announced this week are geared toward rolling back trillions of dollars in regulatory costs and hidden taxes on U.S. families, according to President Trump's new EPA administrator Lee Zeldin, who described the action on Wednesday as "the largest deregulatory announcement in U.S. history." "This isn't just a step backward — it's a wrecking ball aimed at decades of progress,"...

Last year saw an “unexpected” amount of sea level rise around the world, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration said Thursday. An analysis led by the agency found that the rate of rise was nearly a quarter of an inch per year, compared to an expected rate of 0.17 inches. That’s a concerning statistic considering the hazards rising sea levels bring, including sending potentially deadly storm surge farther inland, threatening urban infrastructure, eroding coastlines and disrupting ecosystems, and resulting in more frequent high-tide flooding. “The rise we saw in 2024 was higher than we expected,” Josh Willis, a sea level...

Sebago, Maine — You know you're in Maine when the pancakes come hot off a 100-year-old wood stove. But drill into Alan Greene's eighth-generation maple syrup operation in the town of Sebago, and you'll find it doesn't run as smoothly as it used to. "The last 10 years, we are definitely becoming warmer earlier," said Greene, who runs Greene Maple Farms. "We're not getting the cold and the gradual warm-up. We're getting warm-up, warm-up, warm-up, with deep freezes in between." It's been a cold winter in Maine so far this year. But across the country, over time, climate change has...

There’s a famous quotation about the town of Bến Tre, a Viet Cong stronghold, that was at the center of the Tet Offensive. According to Peter Arnett, an unnamed major told him “It became necessary to destroy the town to save it.” That quotation may not be real, but what is real is the news that Brazil is destroying tens of thousands of acres of rainforest to prepare for the upcoming COP30 climate summit, which will be held this November in Belém. Apparently, they have to destroy the rainforest, so that the climatistas can save it. Even the pro-climate change...

(NEXSTAR) — It may be hard to think about sweltering temperatures in early March, but the National Weather Service (NWS) is already rolling out changes to the weather alerts used to inform the public of the dangers of impending heat. Americans may be familiar with “Excessive Heat Watches” and “Excessive Heat Warnings,” issued when potentially dangerous heat conditions are in the forecast. Starting this month, those alerts will be no more — sort of. Like it did with wind chill alerts in fall, the NWS is adjusting the names of its heat watch and warning alert. Instead, dangerous heat conditions...

Climate change is already causing all sorts of problems on Earth, but soon it will be making a mess in orbit around the planet too, a new study finds. Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology calculated that as global warming caused by burning of coal, oil, gas continues, it may reduce the available space for satellites in low Earth orbit by anywhere from one-third to 82% by the end of the century, depending on how much carbon pollution is spewed. That’s because space will become more littered with debris as climate change lessens nature’s way of cleaning it up....

As the Pentagon and Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency set their sights on climate-related programs at the Defense Department, officials and experts are warning that slashing them could put US troops and military operations at risk, both in the near and long term. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and other senior Pentagon officials have pointed to climate programs as a prime example of wasteful spending in the military. Hegseth told reporters in Germany in February that the Pentagon is “not in the business of climate change.” But some officials and experts argue such thinking is short-sighted. “I think they’re...

Carolyn Jones never thought it was controversial to herd her cattle to different parts of her 200-acre ranch in northeastern Mississippi to give the grass time to grow back between grazing. “This is really simple stuff we have been doing since the beginning of time,” said Jones, a lifelong farmer and the head of the nonprofit Mississippi Minority Farmers Alliance. About 40 percent of U.S. cattle ranchers already use this technique. It helps ranchers keep their grass healthier, but it also helps the environment. Last year, the Alliance won a USDA contract to educate other farmers about these long-standing conservation...