Global warming, climate change, all these things are just a dream come true for politicians. I deal with evidence and not with frightening computer models because the seeker after truth does not put his faith in any consensus. The road to the truth is long and hard, but this is the road we must follow. People who describe the unprecedented comfort and ease of modern life as a climate disaster, in my opinion have no idea what a real problem is.
“Currently, in many car markets, an electric car is more expensive to purchase upfront than a comparable gasoline- or diesel-powered model, which tends to be the biggest consideration for most consumers.” (New York Times, August 18, 2026, below)
“Currently, in many car markets, an electric car is more expensive to purchase upfront than a comparable gasoline- or diesel-powered model, which tends to be the biggest consideration for most consumers.” (New York Times, August 18, 2026, below)
The statistic of increasing global sales of electric vehicles (EVs) is often cited as if consumers in an open, free market prefer EVs to internal combustion engines. A careful reading of a recent New York Times article, “The Gulf Oil Shock Is Pushing E.V. Sales to New Heights Globally” (August 18, 2026), supports the counter-thesis that EV sales are driven by special government favor. Here-today-gone-tomorrow EV subsidies (as in the U.S.) raise the question of sustainability. From a government-neutral, consumer-first perspective, EVs are not sustainable.
“Electric car sales are on track to hit record highs this year,” begin Mira Rojanasakul and Brad Plumer, “with 29 percent of all new cars purchased around the world expected to be either purely battery-powered models or plug-in hybrids,” versus four percent in 2020. Continuing:
What makes the surge in electric car sales especially striking is that E.V. purchases have actually declined this year in both China and the United States, the world’s two largest automobile markets. In China, which accounts for roughly half of all E.V. sales worldwide, a weakening economy and reduction in government subsidies led to a drop in overall purchases this year…. China still has roughly as many electric vehicles on the road as the rest of the world combined, a trend that has noticeably curtailed the nation’s oil use.”
China is losing money on its “green” buildout, solar and EVs, the authors could have added. Continuing:
The United States also saw a dip in sales this spring after Republicans in Congress phased out a $7,500 tax credit for electric cars last year. The Biden administration had pushed to expand the credit to help fight climate change, since electric vehicles produce fewer emissions than their gasoline- or diesel-powered counterparts.”
Yes, like the rooftop solar industry, the domestic EV industry has all but crashed with the reduction of special government favor. Expect the same if the ITC and PTC tax credits expire as they are set to do at the end of next year.
The “good news” of EVs is government subsidies and mandates in other countries of the world. The authors state:
More than a dozen governments have also announced new policies to encourage electric vehicle adoption since the conflict began, as countries have sought to curb their imports of expensive oil. Ireland and the Netherlands introduced programs to encourage drivers to trade in their older combustion-engine vehicles for electric models. Chile provided incentives for buses and taxis to go electric. Spain extended electric vehicle tax credits for consumers. China has set new goals to electrify its trucks.
Back to reality:
Currently, in many car markets, an electric car is more expensive to purchase upfront than a comparable gasoline- or diesel-powered model, which tends to be the biggest consideration for most consumers.
California EVs a Government Play
An unsigned editorial in the Wall Street Journal last year, “Newsom Tells a Tesla Truth,” made the same point for California. “Speaking at a Clinton Global Initiative event last week,” the editorial began,
Mr. Newsom boasted that “there is no Elon Musk, there’s no Tesla without California’s regulatory framework, period, full stop. It wouldn’t exist.” …. Newsom is right that California’s EV mandate and subsidies gave Tesla a financial spark. Sacramento dangled thousands of state dollars in subsidies for the affluent to buy Teslas. The state also awarded Tesla a sales-tax exemption worth hundreds of millions of dollars in return for making cars in the state.
More valuable have been the regulatory credits that Tesla has received and sold to other auto makers to comply with the state’s EV mandate. Tesla didn’t turn an annual profit until 2020—17 years after its launch and sales of regulatory credits gave it cash to expand. Last year Tesla made $2.8 billion from credit sales, accounting for more than a third of its profit.
The editorial continued:
California’s EV mandate is effectively an income transfer from auto makers that produce mostly gas-powered cars to Tesla, which accounted for roughly half of the state’s sales last year. If Mr. Newsom is angry that state regulation has padded Tesla’s profits, he could let the $1.4 trillion company sink or swim on its own without mandates or subsidies.
Conclusion
Consumers support electric transport with golf carts and, increasingly, bikes. Electrification in place of oil-firing is also increasingly prevalent with lawn mowers, leaf blowers, and other micro-applications. But not for cars (outside of subsidies), and more so for trucks, ships, trains, and planes.
With government neutral, “deep decarbonization” dies on the vine. The major retreat of U.S. automakers after losses estimated at $50 billion, led by Stellantis (Chrysler, Dodge, Ram, et al.) and Ford, was a monumental mistake. So much for Net Zero on the transportation front.
The Liangzhu culture (Chinese: 良渚文化; c. 3300- 2300 BCE) was a late Neolithic society in the Yangtze River Delta of eastern China (primarily modern Zhejiang, Jiangsu, and Shanghai provinces). It is widely regarded as one of East Asia’s earliest complexes, state- level societies and a key contributor to the origins of Chinese civilization.
The climate was generally warm and humid, with average annual temperatures around 15- 16°C and precipitation of roughly 1,000- 1,400 mm, concentrated in summer. The landscape consisted of freshwater wetlands, river networks, and coastal plains that were highly susceptible to seasonal flooding, typhoons, and changes in sea level or river discharge.
AI generated by Grok
The Liangzhu culture (Chinese: 良渚文化; c. 3300- 2300 BCE) was a late Neolithic society in the Yangtze River Delta of eastern China (primarily modern Zhejiang, Jiangsu, and Shanghai provinces). It is widely regarded as one of East Asia’s earliest complexes, state- level societies and a key contributor to the origins of Chinese civilization.
Key Features
Urban center: The main site, Liangzhu Ancient City (near present- day Hangzhou), was a large, planned settlement covering roughly 290- 300 hectares within city walls (with outer areas expanding further). It featured a massive artificial earthen platform (Mojiaoshan, about 30 hectares) that supported palace complexes, residential zones, workshops, and cemeteries. Most transport was by boat through canals.
Advanced water management: One of the world’s earliest large- scale hydraulic systems included numerous earthen dams, levees, and reservoirs (high- dam and low- dam systems) for flood control, irrigation, and water storage. These controlled vast areas and supported intensive wet- rice agriculture.
Social complexity and jade culture: Highly stratified society. Elite tombs (e.g., at Fanshan and Yaoshan) contained elaborate jade artifacts, iconic cong tubes (square outer form with circular inner hole), bi discs, axes (yue), and other ritual objects with deity/animal motifs,while commoner burials had simpler pottery. Jade production, silk, lacquer, and ivory indicate specialized craftsmanship and a unified belief system.
Economy and influence: Based on rice farming with surplus storage, supplemented by other resources. Its cultural influence extended widely across the region.
The Archaeological Ruins of Liangzhu City were inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2019 for representing an early regional state with rice agriculture, social differentiation, urban planning, and a sophisticated belief system expressed through jade.
Decline and Climate Connection
The culture flourished around 2500 BCE but largely disappeared from the Taihu Lake area after about 2300 BCE. Recent research (including speleothem records) indicates the ancient city was abandoned during a short, anomalously wet period of intense flooding and inundation between roughly 4345- 4324 years ago. This followed earlier drier conditions (including a possible megadrought phase). The broader hydroclimatic instability around 4300- 3000 years ago has been linked to changes in the East Asian monsoon and increased ENSO variability.
Some scholars connect this timing to the wider 4.2 ka event (the aridification episode around 2200 BCE that affected multiple Old World civilizations), though evidence for Liangzhu specifically emphasizes flooding after drought phases rather than pure aridification. Later Neolithic cultures in the region were less complex.
In short, Liangzhu stands out as a sophisticated prehistoric urban civilization with impressive engineering and artistry that thrived for about a millennium before climate- driven environmental crises led to its rapid decline.
The Liangzhu culture (c. 3300- 2300 BCE) developed in the low- lying Yangtze River Delta and Taihu Lake plain of eastern China, a subtropical region strongly influenced by the East Asian summer monsoon. The climate was generally warm and humid, with average annual temperatures around 15- 16°C and precipitation of roughly 1,000- 1,400 mm, concentrated in summer. The landscape consisted of freshwater wetlands, river networks, and coastal plains that were highly susceptible to seasonal flooding, typhoons, and changes in sea level or river discharge.
Environmental Setting and Human Adaptation
During the culture’s rise, the area shifted from more brackish/tidal conditions to stable freshwater wetlands as post- glacial sea- level rise slowed and coastal progradation advanced. This created favorable conditions for intensive wet- rice agriculture.
Liangzhu society responded with one of the world’s earliest large- scale hydraulic engineering systems. Beginning around 5300- 4700 years ago, people built extensive earthen dams, levees, and reservoirs (both high-dam systems in the hills and low- dam systems on the plain). These controlled water flow across thousands of hectares for flood mitigation, irrigation, and storage, supporting large-scale rice farming, urban construction (including the walled Liangzhu Ancient City with its massive earthen platforms), and population growth. The infrastructure allowed the culture to thrive despite strong seasonal rainfall variability and the risks of a low- lying delta environment.
Climate Change and Collapse
Paleoclimate records (especially high- resolution speleothem data from nearby caves) show that the culture’s emergence coincided with a relatively drier interval. Dam construction appears to have paused or ended around a megadrought phase near 4420 years ago- the driest period in the culture’s history.
The decisive crisis came later: between approximately 4345 and 4324 years ago (± about 30 years), an anomalously intense wet period of heavy monsoon rains caused large- scale flooding and inundation.
Even the sophisticated dams and canals could not handle the volume of water from the Yangtze and its tributaries. This led to the rapid abandonment of Liangzhu Ancient City and the collapse of the culture around 4300 years ago. Some studies also point to relative sea- level rise and marine transgression contributing to coastal flooding, salinization, and the deposition of distinctive yellowish silty sediments over cultural layers.
These hydroclimatic shifts (drier phases alternating with extreme wet pulses) have been linked to increasing El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) frequency against a background of weakening Northern Hemisphere summer insolation.
After the Liangzhu collapse, successor cultures in the region were less complex, and a subsequent extended arid period beginning around 4000 years ago further disrupted remaining Neolithic societies in the Yangtze Delta.
In summary, Liangzhu represents a remarkable adaptation to a dynamic, monsoon- dominated wetland environment through advanced water management. Ultimately, extreme climate variability, particularly catastrophic flooding after drier intervals, overwhelmed these systems and contributed decisively to the culture’s end, illustrating both the ingenuity and vulnerability of early complex societies in coastal delta settings.
The Liangzhu culture (c. 3300- 2300 BCE) in China’s Yangtze River Delta collapsed around 4300 years ago, and researchers have frequently discussed this timing in relation to the 4.2 ka event (the global aridification and megadrought episode centered near 4200 years before present, or roughly 2200 BCE).
Timing and Proposed Link
The 4.2 ka event is defined primarily by prolonged drought and cooling in many Northern Hemisphere and Asian regions. It has been hypothesized as a contributing factor in the decline of several societies, including the Akkadian Empire, Egypt’s Old Kingdom, and the Liangzhu culture in the lower Yangtze area.
For Liangzhu specifically:
High- resolution speleothem records show a relatively drier interval during much of the culture’s later phase, including a notable megadrought around 4420 years ago (the driest period in its history). Dam construction appears to have slowed or stopped around this time.
The decisive collapse of the main city and culture occurred slightly earlier than the classic 4.2 ka peak, during a short but extreme wet pulse of heavy monsoon rains between approximately 4345 and 4324 years ago (± ~30 years). This caused catastrophic flooding and inundation that overwhelmed the sophisticated system of dams, canals, and reservoirs, forcing abandonment.
After the collapse, an extended period of aridity began around 4000 years ago, which further disrupted successor Neolithic cultures in the Yangtze Delta.
Scientific Interpretation
The connection is therefore indirect but meaningful within a broader pattern of hydroclimatic instability. Researchers attribute the major changes between ~4300 and 3000 years ago to increased frequency of El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) events combined with a long- term weakening of Northern Hemisphere summer insolation, which disrupted the East Asian summer monsoon. These shifts produced alternating droughts and extreme floods in the low-lying, monsoon- sensitive Yangtze Delta, conditions that the Liangzhu hydraulic infrastructure ultimately could not fully withstand.
Some studies place Liangzhu’s end within the wider climatic upheavals associated with the 4.2 ka event (or its regional expression), while others emphasize that the immediate cause was flooding rather than pure aridification. Evidence of marine transgression or relative sea- level rise in the delta around the same period is also cited as a contributing factor in some research.
In short, while the classic 4.2 ka signal is one of drought, the Liangzhu case illustrates how the same era of global climatic reorganization manifested regionally as extreme monsoon variability, first drier phases that stressed the system, then catastrophic flooding that precipitated the rapid abandonment of East Asia’s earliest known large urban complex and state-level society.
The Guardian claims in ‘Planetary boundaries’ necessary for flourishing of life have been massively breached, scientists warn, that seven of nine supposed “planetary boundaries” necessary for life to flourish have been breached, leaving Earth outside a “safe operating space” as “climate disaster looms.” This is grossly misleading.
The first problem is that planetary boundaries are not physical tripwires beyond which humans suddenly cannot flourish. The framework was created to define a precautionary “safe operating space” based on selected Earth-system processes.
The Guardian claims in ‘Planetary boundaries’ necessary for flourishing of life have been massively breached, scientists warn, that seven of nine supposed “planetary boundaries” necessary for life to flourish have been breached, leaving Earth outside a “safe operating space” as “climate disaster looms.” This is grossly misleading. Real-world measures of human and ecological welfare show a planet on which human population, life expectancy, agricultural production, protection from natural disasters, and even global vegetation have increased dramatically during the very period in which The Guardian says conditions for flourishing have been collapsing.
There are legitimate environmental problems involving pollution, habitat destruction, species loss, and land use. Those deserve serious discussion. But The Guardian does something quite different. It bundles a collection of environmental indicators into a conceptual framework called “planetary boundaries,” labels seven of them breached, and leaps from that to rhetoric about deteriorating “planetary life support systems” and the world “standing on the edge of the abyss.”
The first problem is that planetary boundaries are not physical tripwires beyond which humans suddenly cannot flourish. The framework was created to define a precautionary “safe operating space” based on selected Earth-system processes. Even the scientific literature describes it as a framework based on an evolving understanding of Earth-system resilience, not a set of experimentally demonstrated points beyond which human civilization ceases to prosper.
If seven of nine conditions necessary for human flourishing have been “massively breached,” as The Guardian’s headline announces, an obvious question follows: Where is the corresponding collapse in human flourishing?
Let’s start with food.
The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization reports that global cereal production increased 27 percent from 2010 to 2024, reaching 3.1 billion tons, with the increase driven primarily by improved yields. Oil crop production increased 50 percent during the same period. Climate Realism has repeatedly documented the same inconvenient trend: yields for major crops such as corn, wheat, soybeans, and rice have risen substantially during the period of modern warming.
That is a strange-looking collapse of Earth’s “life support systems.”
Then there is something The Guardian has repeatedly been reluctant to give its proper weight: carbon dioxide is plant food. Satellite observations show substantial global greening. NASA reported that between one-quarter and one-half of Earth’s vegetated land experienced significant greening from 1982 to 2015, with CO₂ fertilization identified as the dominant driver in the associated study. Climate at a Glance summarizes the extensive evidence for this global greening as well.
Apparently, nobody informed the plants that Earth’s life support system is failing.
Human beings seem equally reluctant to follow The Guardian’s script.
According to the Federal Reserve, global life expectancy rose from about 51 years in 1960 to more than 73 years in 2024. The United Nations estimated the world’s population at approximately 8.2 billion people in 2024, after decades of enormous population growth. Population growth certainly creates environmental challenges of its own, but it is difficult to reconcile longer lives supporting billions more people with the breathless suggestion that Earth’s ability to support human flourishing is disintegrating before our eyes.
Extreme weather mortality tells an even more embarrassing story.
Climate at a Glancereports that deaths from weather-related disasters have fallen by more than 99 percent during the past century, based on international disaster data. Humanity has become vastly better at protecting itself through forecasting, infrastructure, communications, transportation, medicine, air conditioning, heating, irrigation, engineering, and abundant energy.
The temperature mortality evidence is particularly awkward for the climate catastrophe narrative. A massive 2021 study in The Lancet Planetary Health, using data from 750 locations in 43 countries, estimated that cold-related mortality vastly exceeded heat-related mortality. From 2000 to 2019, declining cold mortality more than offset increasing heat mortality, producing a net reduction in the overall temperature-related mortality ratio. Climate Realism has repeatedly pointed out this inconvenient fact when media outlets portray warming as an unambiguous mortality catastrophe.
The Guardian’s treatment of extreme weather is equally revealing. It points to recent floods, European wildfires, U.S. summer temperatures, and the Tibet-Nepal flood as evidence that the planet is “out of balance.”
That is not a climate trend analysis. It is a collection of frightening anecdotes.
Climate Realism and Climate at a Glance have repeatedly examined claims involving hurricanes, floods, drought, wildfires, heat waves, and other extremes. The observational records do not support treating every destructive weather event as evidence that the planet has crossed some generalized threshold into catastrophe.
The Guardian even resurrects the familiar Amazon tipping-point scenario, warning that there is a “chance” the rainforest could transform into savanna, with severe worldwide consequences. Notice the language: there could be a tipping point that could produce disastrous consequences. This is speculation about a possible future outcome being placed alongside actual present-day disasters to create the impression that the feared future has already arrived.
This is the fundamental problem with the article. The Guardian substitutes an abstract index of environmental pressures for actual measurements of human welfare, then treats the former as more meaningful than the latter.
If humanity were truly losing the environmental conditions necessary to flourish, one might reasonably expect human flourishing to be deteriorating. Instead, the broad historical direction has been longer lives, vastly greater food production, sharply lower vulnerability to weather disasters, and the capacity to sustain billions more people.
None of that proves environmental problems do not exist. It does demonstrate how absurd it is to wave away enormous improvements in observable human welfare while declaring that Earth’s ability to support human civilization has been “massively breached.”
The Guardian is no longer merely reporting environmental risks here. It is peddling fear. Phrases such as “climate disaster looms,” “worst levels ever recorded,” and “standing on the edge of the abyss” are the vocabulary of catastrophe marketing, not sober scientific journalism.
A newspaper genuinely interested in whether humanity is flourishing would examine how humans are actually doing. The Guardian largely avoids that evidence because it wrecks the story it wants to tell.
The planet faces environmental challenges. Humanity should address genuine problems with evidence, technology, adaptation, conservation, and sound policy. But declaring the planetary life support system to be approaching the abyss while people are living longer, producing more food, surviving natural disasters at vastly higher rates, and inhabiting a demonstrably greener planet is not serious analysis.
It is apocalypse journalism, and The Guardian has once again confused frightening its readers with informing them.
The Sacred City of Caral- Supe (also linked to the broader Caral- Supe or Norte Chico civilization) in Peru’s Supe Valley features monumental platform pyramids and other architecture dating to roughly 2600 B.C. (with the wider culture spanning approximately 3000- 1800 B.C.), making it contemporaneous with, and in some assessments as old as or older than, the earliest Egyptian pyramid, the Step Pyramid of Djoser at Saqqara (around 2630 B.C.).
The Sacred City of Caral- Supe sits in an extremely arid desert environment on a dry terrace overlooking the green Supe River valley in north- central coastal Peru (about 125- 200 km north of Lima and roughly 20 km inland from the Pacific).
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The Sacred City of Caral- Supe (also linked to the broader Caral- Supe or Norte Chico civilization) in Peru’s Supe Valley features monumental platform pyramids and other architecture dating to roughly 2600 B.C. (with the wider culture spanning approximately 3000- 1800 B.C.), making it contemporaneous with, and in some assessments as old as or older than, the earliest Egyptian pyramid, the Step Pyramid of Djoser at Saqqara (around 2630 B.C.).
Caral is widely recognized as the oldest known urban center and complex civilization in the Americas (and one of the earliest independent centers of civilization worldwide). Key points include:
Scale and features: The main site covers hundreds of hectares (often cited around 150- 626 hectares depending on measurement) and includes six major pyramidal platform mounds, sunken circular plazas, residential areas, and staircases. The largest, the Pirámide Mayor (Great Pyramid), has a base roughly the size of several football fields and rises tens of feet (estimates vary around 60- 100 feet or 18- 30 m depending on the measurement and remaining height).
Dating: Radiocarbon dates from organic materials (such as reed bags used in construction, known as shicra) confirm construction and occupation in the late 3rd millennium B.C., with some activity earlier. The civilization developed without ceramics, metal tools, or clear evidence of writing in the conventional sense, yet produced sophisticated monumental architecture, irrigation agriculture, textile technology, and possible early record- keeping systems.
Context: It arose independently in the arid coastal valleys north of Lima, relying on a mix of irrigated farming (notably cotton) and marine resources. Unlike many later Andean societies, evidence points to relatively peaceful organization focused on ceremony, trade, and communal labor rather than fortifications or widespread weaponry. The site and related settlements influenced later Andean cultural traditions.
Recognition: Excavations led by Peruvian archaeologist Ruth Shady Solís (starting in the 1990s) established its antiquity through radiocarbon dating published around 2001. It became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2009 as an exceptionally well- preserved example of Late Archaic architecture and urban planning in the Americas.
This challenges older assumptions that complex societies in the Americas developed much later. The Caral- Supe culture declined around 1800 B.C., possibly linked to environmental changes such as drought or shifts in coastal resources, though related settlements continued in adapted forms.
The Sacred City of Caral- Supe sits in an extremely arid desert environment on a dry terrace overlooking the green Supe River valley in north- central coastal Peru (about 125- 200 km north of Lima and roughly 20 km inland from the Pacific).
Local Climate and Environment
The region experiences very low rainfall, typically just a few centimeters per year, due to dual rain shadows created by the Andes Mountains to the east and Pacific trade winds. Strong daily winds, intense year- round sunshine, and dry conditions dominate. The Supe River is seasonal (mainly flowing November- April from Andean snowmelt and runoff), so surface water is limited.
Despite the aridity, the valley floor is fertile when irrigated. The site’s elevated desert terrace provided geological stability (helpful against earthquakes common in the region) and protection from river flooding while preserving riverside vegetation as a natural buffer.
How the Caral- Supe People Adapted
The civilization thrived for over a millennium (roughly 3000- 1800 BCE) through sophisticated water management and a mixed economy:
Irrigation canals drew from the Supe River and groundwater springs (linked to highland amuna systems and aquifers) to support agriculture on valley bottoms, terraces, and some plateau areas.
Key crops included cotton (important for textiles and trade), squash, beans, sweet potato, chili peppers, fruits (such as guava and pacay), and limited other foods.
Protein came almost entirely from the sea, especially anchovies and shellfish, gathered along the nearby coast and dried and salted using sun and wind for preservation and trade.
They managed the entire Supe basin as a unit and selected the “capital zone” for its aquifer, sunshine, low rainfall, moderate winds, and strategic position linking coast, highlands, and even distant trade networks.
These adaptations supported monumental construction (platform pyramids, sunken plazas) without ceramics or metal tools in a challenging desert setting. The dry climate also helped preserve the ruins exceptionally well after abandonment.
Climate Challenges and Responses
The society faced significant environmental stresses from El Niño- Southern Oscillation (ENSO) events, including flooding, sediment deposition that formed beach ridges, sand dune encroachment on farmland, rising groundwater turning fields into marshes, and disruptions to coastal fisheries.
A particularly severe prolonged drought around 4,200 years ago (≈2200 BCE), linked by researchers to the global “4.2 ka” megadrought event that also affected Mesopotamia, the Indus Valley, and other regions, caused crop failure, famine, and the abandonment of Caral’s urban centers. Some accounts describe it lasting on the order of a century.
Rather than collapsing through violence, populations adapted by relocating to nearby sites such as Vichama (closer to the coast, emphasizing fishing and the Huaura Valley) and Peñico (further inland in the Supe Valley). They carried forward architectural styles (pyramids and plazas), ceremonial practices, and social organization. At Vichama, temple friezes depict emaciated famine victims alongside symbols of renewal, pregnant women, large fish, dancers, and a lightning- struck toad (associated with water and rain), interpreted as a deliberate record and warning about the climate crisis for future generations.
In short, Caral- Supe demonstrates both remarkable resilience in an arid coastal desert through irrigation, marine resources, and water management, and a non- violent adaptive response to major climate shifts that ultimately led to the relocation of its main centers.
The “4.2 ka” (or 4.2- kiloyear) event refers to a major aridification (long-term drought) episode centered around 4,200 years before present, roughly 2200 BCE. It is considered one of the most severe climate shifts of the Holocene epoch and marks the formal start of the current Meghalayan Age in the geological timescale.
It most strongly affected parts of the Northern Hemisphere, North Africa, the Middle East, the Arabian Peninsula, the Indian subcontinent, and areas of East Asia. Proposed impacts include contributing to the collapse or major disruption of the Akkadian Empire in Mesopotamia, Egypt’s Old Kingdom, and the Liangzhu culture in China, among others. Proxy records (speleothems, lake sediments, ice cores, dust layers) show prolonged drying lasting decades to a few centuries in these regions. Causes are still debated and may involve a slowdown of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), shifts in the Intertropical Convergence Zone, changes in monsoon systems, and possible links to El Niño- Southern Oscillation (ENSO) variability.
It’s truly global character remains contested. While some researchers argue for widespread effects reaching the Americas (including western South America), many paleoclimatologists find the evidence outside the Mediterranean- West Asia- South Asia core region weaker or inconsistent, with some areas experiencing wetter rather than drier conditions.
Connection to the Sacred City of Caral- Supe
Archaeological work led by Peruvian researcher Ruth Shady links a severe local drought around 2200 BCE at Caral- Supe (and the broader Norte Chico/Caral- Supe civilization) to this timeframe. The drought disrupted irrigation- dependent agriculture in the arid Supe Valley, leading to crop failure, famine, and the abandonment of the main urban center.
Rather than a total societal collapse, populations appear to have adapted by relocating:
To Vichama (closer to the Pacific coast, emphasizing marine resources and the Huaura Valley).
To Peñico (further inland in the Supe Valley).
These new settlements retained key Caral architectural features (platform mounds/pyramids and sunken plazas) and ceremonial practices. At Vichama, temple friezes depict emaciated famine victims alongside symbols of renewal, pregnant women, large fish, dancers, and a lightning- struck toad (associated with water/rain), interpreted as a deliberate visual record and warning about the climate crisis.
In summary, the Sacred City of Caral- Supe provides a well- documented New World case in which a severe drought near 2200 BCE, potentially part of the wider 4.2 ka event, prompted urban abandonment and adaptive relocation while cultural continuity was maintained.
On August 9, Save Long Beach Island (LBI), an organization based in New Jersey and founded in 2021 for purpose of fighting offshore wind, announced its intention to file a lawsuit against U.S. Department of Commerce (DOC).
NOAA denied the petition on July 22 after Save LBI filed suit to compel the agency to follow the Endangered Species Act’s (ESA) 90-day review standard for acting on petitions. ‘The new legal notification from Save LBI is modest in scope in that it simply asks NOAA to reconsider its prior decision to turn down the petition.
The NRDC and Sierra Club, along with many other environmental activist groups, have a history of opposing military exercises they view as harmful to whales and other marine life. But as Save LBI points out, both groups support offshore wind despite a growing body of evidence that shows the projects harm whales.
The clock is ticking on a decision to join litigation that would ban offshore wind to save the whales.
In a strange twist, the largest, most well-funded environmental advocacy groups have thus far declined to join a growing effort to protect an endangered whale species. This has left grassroots conservationists flummoxed. There is still time for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), the Sierra Club, and others to jump in, but the clock is ticking on pending litigation.
On August 9, Save Long Beach Island (LBI), an organization based in New Jersey and founded in 2021 for purpose of fighting offshore wind, announced its intention to file a lawsuit against U.S. Department of Commerce (DOC). Save LBI is calling on the department to have its National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) revisit a 16-month-old petition to designate a critical habitat along the East Coast for the benefit of the North Atlantic right whale. The petition also asks NOAA to exclude wind complexes from the migratory critical habitat Save LBI seeks to establish.
Wind or Whales?
NOAA denied the petition on July 22 after Save LBI filed suit to compel the agency to follow the Endangered Species Act’s (ESA) 90-day review standard for acting on petitions. ‘The new legal notification from Save LBI is modest in scope in that it simply asks NOAA to reconsider its prior decision to turn down the petition. However, it does come with a sense of urgency since NOAA figures show the whale species is down to a sparse population of about 380 with just an estimated 70 females that are reproductively active.
As part of its petition, Save LBI also asked the Department of Interior to conduct an analysis of underwater noise from offshore wind to determine what kind of impact those projects might have on the whales’ migration.
Bob Stern, the president of Save LBI, has followed up on previous correspondence addressed to the NRDC, Sierra Club, and more than a dozen other groups in July 2025.
Neither the NRDC nor the Sierra Club have responded to any of Save LBI’s correspondence. Stern told Restoration News that Save LBI received “very little response” from other long established environmental outfits with one notable exception. Stern says the Center for Biological Diversity, an environmental advocacy group based in Arizona, did provide Save LBI with a favorable response indicating it would support the petition.
Abandoning Their Pro-Whale History
The NRDC and Sierra Club, along with many other environmental activist groups, have a history of opposing military exercises they view as harmful to whales and other marine life. But as Save LBI points out, both groups support offshore wind despite a growing body of evidence that shows the projects harm whales. Save LBI has released detailed studies that showthe construction and potential implementation of offshore wind have already caused whale fatalities migrating up and down the East Coast.
Stern explained to Restoration News why time is a factor for the NRDC and the Sierra Club if they want to protect whales from offshore wind.
“Regarding our lawsuit on the NARW [North Atlantic right whale] migration corridor petition, the filing of our intent to sue starts a 60-day clock by which NOAA has to either agree to reconsider the petition or continue to deny it,” Stern said. “If they continue to deny it, which is the likely course, then we will go back to the Court to ask a judge to compel them to consider it, how long that will take I cannot tell. If they agree to consider then they have a year to do a rule-making and based on that make a decision.”
Restoration News sent media inquiries to NRDC and the Sierra Club asking their media representatives if the advocacy groups would join in the litigation to protect the right whale, and whether they would make a decision on Save LBI’s litigation during the 60-day time frame Stern referenced. Neither group responded.
Save LBI has about 10,000 core members and 100,000 online supporters including homeowners, business owners, and other residents who have united in opposing offshore wind, which they view as harmful to whales and other marine life. The most recent tax filings show Save LBI has just over a million dollars in assets. By comparison, the NRDC sits on almost $660 million in assets and more than 3 million members, while the Sierra Club has $152 million in assets and more than 3.8 million members.
In his latest letter to the NRDC, Sierra Club, and others, Stern makes the point that Save LBI’s efforts to protect whales is consistent with the stated missions of the largest environmental advocacy groups.
Stern wrote:
If your organization has already considered this issue and determined that participation would not be appropriate, we would appreciate understanding your reasoning. Your organization has consistently articulated a mission of defending whales and their habitats; silence on this issue, which goes to the heart of that mission as we understand it, is puzzling to us.
Suspected Foreign Agents Sue U.S. Navy
The NRDC was involved in a high-profile lawsuit against the U.S. Navy that went to the U.S. Supreme Court in 2008. In Winter v NRDC, the environmental activist group argued that naval sonar exercises were harmful to whales and other marine mammals. But the high court in a 5-4 decision ruled against the NRDC and said that the plaintiffs needed to demonstrate an irreparable harm to marine life was likely and not just possible. In his majority opinion, Chief Justice John Roberts determined that Navy’s need to conduct realistic training with active sonar far outweighed the specious concerns raised by the NRDC. That’s because, as the chief justice explained, the Navy must have the ability to respond to the growing threat of enemy submarines.
Despite setbacks in court, the largest environmental groups remain united in opposition to certain military exercises for the ostensible purpose of protecting sea life. For instance, the Sierra Club, says on its website that “some forms of ocean military testing produce powerful noises capable of harming and killing marine mammals and adversely disrupting behavior.” In April, the Sierra Club joined with other green groups in litigation against the Trump administration to restore ESA protections for the Rice’s Whale and other species in the Gulf of Mexico. The administration says an exemption to the ESA was needed to allow oil and gas drilling to proceed in the region for national security reasons. But the Sierra Club and its co-litigants are making the case that the national security concerns are not valid and that the oil and gas activities could harm Rice’s Whale along with other species.
This would help explain why groups like the NRDC and Sierra Club prioritize offshore wind over vulnerable whale populations. Both groups have also been the focus of congressional probes into potential violations of the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA). The restrictions green groups seek to impose on U.S. military testing could redound to benefit of Russia and China and raise questions about the sincerity of their environmental efforts.
Stern, an engineer who previously managed environmental reviews for the U.S Department of Energy, wants the NRDC, the Sierra Club, and others to produce evidence (if they have it) showing that the long-term climate benefits of offshore wind “outweigh and justify” near-term risks to the right whale. He also makes the point that Save LBI’s own assessments show the climate benefits of offshore wind would be “minute” and accrue over the span of several centuries. At the same time, the conservation group’s offshore wind studies show the damage to the environment and the whales would be immediate and severe. Even so, Save LBI invites the NRDC and Sierra Club to produce competing evidence.
Stern wrote:
If you have scientific evidence, modeling, or peer-reviewed analyses that demonstrate that operation noise from full-scale wind complexes will not pose a significant behavioral or physiological risk to North Atlantic right whales, we would welcome the opportunity to see it. Conversely, if our concerns are valid and these complexes are built and operating at scale, any resulting harm to this critically endangered species may be irreversible. Given the right whale’s precarious status, we believe we are at a pivotal juncture: decisions made now could determine whether these species survive.
Save LBI’s conservation efforts on behalf of whales may be for all the marbles. Environmental advocacy groups that have been in operation for decades now appear poised to advance offshore wind projects that put whales not just in danger put on a path to extinction.
Beyond Hypocrisy
Bonner Cohen, a senior fellow with the National Center for Public Policy Research, told Restoration News that he expects the big green groups to drop the mask and show their true colors.
The deafening silence from NRDC and the Sierra Club on the threat to endangered Atlantic right whales posed by offshore wind turbines reflects these organizations’ real commitment to protecting wildlife. Their sympathies clearly lie with propping up what we hope are the remnants of America’s misbegotten transition to green energy, and not with the ocean-borne creatures getting in the way. The word ‘hypocrisy’ doesn’t begin to capture what’s going on here. There are funds to be raised from deep-pocketed anti-fossil-fuel interests—foreign and domestic. Keeping the climate narrative alive—no matter the cost to marine life or to ocean-front communities—is what this game is all about.
If NOAA decides once again to reject Save LBI’s petition, the New Jersey conservationists will most certainly file suit to reverse that decision. They may have also have an ace in the hole in the form of President Donald Trump. In the press release announcing its intention to sue the Commerce Department, Stern says his group is “perplexed” by the department’s position because the petition to ban offshore wind is in line with Trump’s own stated objectives.
Save LBI has written to the president asking him to intervene. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick may want to call his office.
A recent post by Just The News reports that a new Congressional Budget office (CBO) report estimates that modest future warming will avoid millions of temperature-related deaths, because the decrease in very cold days will result in fewer hospitalizations. This tracks with other research, and it is very good that the CBO and Just the News are acknowledging this fact.
A recent post by Just The News reports that a new Congressional Budget office (CBO) report estimates that modest future warming will avoid millions of temperature-related deaths, because the decrease in very cold days will result in fewer hospitalizations. This tracks with other research, and it is very good that the CBO and Just the News are acknowledging this fact.
In “Global warming will result in 2.5 million fewer elderly deaths over the next 50 years: report,” journalist Kevin Killough explains the CBO report predicts that warming will “reduce emergency room visits and spending in cooler regions, increase both outcomes in regions with moderate climates, and increase emergency room visits but reduce spending in the hottest regions.”
One thing that makes this report, and the Just The News piece covering it, different than other times the media has reported on temperature-related deaths is that they acknowledge that adaptation and technology will assist in reducing them. A great point—seeing as data show deaths from extreme weather of any kind have dropped by 99 percent since the 1920s. Much of this is because of technology like air conditioning, central heating, and improvements to medical technology and expanded access to that care.
The CBO report, refreshingly, uses modelled scenarios that are “intermediate” like SSP2-4.5, with the high emissions scenario modelled by SSP3-7.0, rather than the impossible RCP8.5. The report explains that the “reduction in deaths is driven by warmer regions, which will experience fewer cold days and are projected to further adapt to hot days as their average climate gets hotter.”
Their estimate says that even without adaptations to temperature shifts, “the direction of the changes in outcomes would largely be the same, but their magnitudes would differ.” (See figure below)
Over and over, the mainstream media has hyped studies that predict larger numbers of heat-related deaths in the future, while downplaying the impact that modest warming has already had on reducing cold-related deaths. As Climate Realism has pointed out numerous times, and Climate At A Glance: Temperature Related Deaths illustrates with data, the number of lives saved as cold deaths decline vastly outnumber any increase in heat-related deaths. Net mortality is reduced amid modest warming, not increased. (See figure below) One study found that although approximately 600,000 people die of heat globally every year, 4.5 million die from cold.
It is not news to any readers of Climate Realism that deaths of the elderly are actually projected to decrease over the next few decades, but it is very important that Just The News publicized the CBO report.
Many people are not aware of any good news at all when it comes to the weather, being fed mostly alarmist propaganda from major outlets. It is also impressive that a government agency, even one under a Republican administration, is willing to publish an entire report demonstrating that climate-related issues are multifaceted.
A Yale-led study finds that agricultural liming (adding crushed limestone) in the Mississippi River Basin has acted as a net carbon sink, removing more CO₂ than it emits.
Silicate weathering is the natural chemical breakdown of silicate minerals (e.g., those in basalt, olivine, or other igneous rocks) by carbonic acid formed when atmospheric CO₂ dissolves in water.
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A Yale- led study finds that agricultural liming (adding crushed limestone) in the Mississippi River Basin has acted as a net carbon sink, removing more CO₂ than it emits.
The practice, long used by farmers to raise soil pH, reduce acidity, and boost crop yields, covers a vast region: the Mississippi River Basin spans about 41% of the contiguous U.S. and includes roughly 65% of U.S. cropland.
Researchers, led by geochemist Tim Jesper Suhrhoff (Yale Center for Natural Carbon Capture), analyzed more than a century of data (roughly 1900- 2015) on river chemistry, fertilizer use, atmospheric pollution, and liming rates, combined with geochemical modeling.
Conventional accounting (including IPCC guidelines) treats liming as a CO₂ source because the carbon in limestone can be released as CO₂ when it reacts with strong acids in soil.
The new work argues this is incomplete: soil acidity from nitrogen fertilizers and fossil- fuel pollution is the main driver of those emissions. Without liming, the acids would still react with natural soil alkalinity and release CO₂.
In the presence of liming, much of the reaction instead forms bicarbonate that is exported by rivers (including the Mississippi) and can ultimately sequester carbon in the ocean for long periods. Compared with a no- liming scenario, liming in the basin removed an estimated 300- 400 million tonnes of CO₂.
Efficacy has improved since the 1930s as liming rates rose; current removal is estimated at about 75% of the theoretical maximum.
The study (published in Nature) concludes that liming aligns climate benefits with agronomic ones (higher yields, potentially lower nitrous- oxide emissions). It suggests policy and emissions inventories should attribute emissions to acid inputs rather than to liming itself, and that strategies such as adding silicate rock first to neutralize acidity could further enhance carbon removal.
The linked phys.org article appears to cover this same research (the URL slug matches the topic and timing). Related earlier work from the Yale group has also highlighted liming’s dual role in soil management and carbon cycling.
Silicate weathering is the natural chemical breakdown of silicate minerals (e.g., those in basalt, olivine, or other igneous rocks) by carbonic acid formed when atmospheric CO₂ dissolves in water.
The simplified reaction consumes CO₂ and produces bicarbonate ions (HCO₃⁻) plus dissolved cations such as Ca²⁺, Mg²⁺, K⁺, and Si:
(Similar reactions occur for magnesium and other silicates.) The bicarbonate is ultimately transported to rivers and oceans, where the carbon can remain sequestered for thousands to hundreds of thousands of years. Natural silicate weathering already removes roughly 0.5 Gt CO₂ per year globally; enhanced rock weathering (ERW) accelerates it by crushing silicate rocks into fine powder and spreading them on soils (especially agricultural land).
ERW converts atmospheric CO₂ into stable bicarbonate that is stored in groundwater and the ocean on intergenerational to geological timescales.
Field trials (e.g., U.S. Corn Belt maize-soybean rotations) have measured cumulative CDR potentials of ~10.5 t CO₂ ha⁻¹ over four years at application rates of ~50 t ha⁻¹ yr⁻¹ of basalt.
Modeling studies project that widespread deployment on U.S. farmland could deliver 0.16–0.30 Gt CO₂ yr⁻¹ by 2050 (rising further by 2070), and global estimates often fall in the 0.5–2 Gt CO₂ yr⁻¹ range under ambitious scenarios (after accounting for mining, grinding, and transport emissions).
Unlike carbonate liming (which can release some of its own carbon under acidic conditions), pure silicate minerals contain no carbon of their own, so the alkalinity they generate is more fully atmospheric in origin. Silicates can therefore act as a clearer net sink and are sometimes proposed as a complement or partial replacement for agricultural lime.
Agronomic and soil- health co -benefits
Soil pH regulation: Silicate dissolution neutralizes acidity, raising pH in a manner similar to traditional liming. This improves nutrient availability, reduces aluminum toxicity, and supports healthier microbial communities.
Nutrient release: Weathering supplies plant- available calcium, magnesium, potassium, phosphorus, silicon, and micronutrients. Field studies show elevated concentrations of these elements in soil and crops, partially offsetting the need for synthetic fertilizers.
Crop yield increases: Trials report 12- 16% higher maize and soybean yields, with similar gains for other crops (e.g., sugarcane, miscanthus). Silicon uptake can also strengthen plant tissues, improving resistance to pests, pathogens, and drought.
Reduced nitrous oxide (N₂O) emissions: Better soil conditions and higher pH can lower emissions of this potent greenhouse gas, improving the overall greenhouse- gas balance of ERW by tens of percent in some simulations.
Additional ecosystem effects: Higher silicon in runoff can favor diatoms over harmful algal blooms (reducing eutrophication risk). Downstream alkalinity can help buffer ocean acidification. Some studies also note modest reductions in surface ozone in agricultural regions, which further supports yields.
Relation to the Mississippi River Basin and liming context
In the recent Nature study on agricultural liming, the authors note that silicates are already used for pH management and have attracted strong interest as enhanced- weathering feedstocks. Because silicates do not carry their own carbonate carbon, they avoid some of the accounting complexities of limestone while still providing the same agronomic benefits (pH correction and nutrient release). Modeling and field work in the U.S. Midwest (including the Corn Belt portion of the Mississippi basin) indicate that combining or sequencing silicate and carbonate amendments could optimize both yield and long- term carbon removal.
Practical considerations
Benefits are greatest in warm, wet, acidic soils with active biological communities (roots and microbes accelerate dissolution). Application rates of tens of tonnes per hectare are typical. Life- cycle emissions from grinding and transport must be minimized (renewable energy helps), and potential release of trace metals is monitored; well- chosen basalts generally show low risk in trials. Measurement, reporting, and verification of the actual CDR remain active research areas because of soil heterogeneity and time lags.
In short, silicate weathering (especially when enhanced on farmland) offers durable carbon removal while delivering direct benefits to soil fertility, crop productivity, and other greenhouse- gas reductions, aligning climate action with existing agricultural practices.
Agricultural liming is a carbon sink in the Mississippi River Basin
Application of carbonate minerals (limestone or dolomite) to farmland, agricultural liming, is a long-established practice that counters soil acidification and boosts crop yields. Conventional greenhouse- gas accounting treats it as a net source of agricultural CO₂ emissions.
Using century-scale records of liming rates and anthropogenic acidity inputs across the Mississippi River Basin (MRB), the authors show that liming has instead acted as a net carbon sink over the past century. River alkalinity flux records indicate that roughly 90% of the ideal CO₂- removal potential of the lime applied since 1900 (≈ 0.44 Gt CO₂) has been realized at the catchment scale. A multi- decadal time lag occurs because of soil cation- exchange processes and solute transport. Reactive- transport modelling corroborates this: an initial emissions pulse (from neutralizing existing soil acidity pools) is followed by net CO₂ removal.
Current accounting frameworks use an incomplete counterfactual, they attribute emissions to the lime itself rather than to the anthropogenic strong acids (from fertilizers and fossil- fuel pollution) that drive CO₂ release. When evaluated against the proper counterfactual (acidity inputs without liming), liming is a net sink on decade- to- century timescales. The results imply that optimized soil- pH management can simultaneously cut agricultural greenhouse- gas emissions, raise yields, and improve soil health.
Key scientific points from the paper
Chemical basis of the conventional view At low soil pH, carbonate dissolution releases CO₂:
IPCC default methods essentially treat the carbon in applied lime as emitted; U.S. inventories use a lower emission factor (~50%).
Revised framework The dominant driver of CO₂ release is the input of strong acids (nitric and sulfuric) from nitrogen fertilizers, manure, soil- organic- nitrogen mineralization, biological nitrogen fixation, and atmospheric deposition of SO₂/NOₓ oxidation products. These acids titrate existing alkalinity (bicarbonate) and force CO₂ out of the system regardless of whether lime is added. Adding lime supplies alkalinity that can form bicarbonate, which is exported downstream and ultimately sequesters atmospheric carbon.
Mississippi River Basin as the study system The MRB covers ~41% of the contiguous U.S. land area and ~65% of its cropland, receives most U.S. agricultural lime, and has well-documented river chemistry. The authors compiled spatially explicit, century-long time series of acidity inputs (fertilizer/manure oxidation, atmospheric deposition, etc.) and lime additions. Cumulative acidity has exceeded lime- derived alkalinity by ~20 Tmol by 2015, but the excess is concentrated outside intensively limed Corn- Belt croplands.
Evidence for net sink
Empirical river alkalinity fluxes.
Gridded reactive- transport modelling (SCEPTER) comparing “acidity- only” vs. “acidity and lime” scenarios. Both approaches show that, after an early emissions pulse, liming produces a cumulative carbon sink on the order of hundreds of millions of tonnes of CO₂.
Implications Emissions inventories and climate policy should attribute CO₂ release to acidity inputs rather than to liming. Better -aligned pH management (including possible pre- treatment with silicate rocks) can deliver agronomic benefits while contributing to carbon- dioxide removal.
The paper is open- access; a PDF download link is available on the Nature page. Authors include researchers affiliated with Yale (among others).
Application of carbonate minerals to arable lands, known as agricultural liming, is a long-standing practice for counteracting soil acidification1,2,3. Although liming boosts crop yields4, it is also considered a source of agricultural carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions5. Here we show, using century-scale records of agricultural liming and anthropogenic acidity inputs for the Mississippi River Basin, that agricultural liming has acted as a net carbon sink over the past century. Records of river alkalinity fluxes suggest that approximately 90% of the ideal CO2 removal potential of agricultural lime added since 1900 (approximately 0.44 GtCO2) has been realized at the catchment scale, with a decadal-scale time lag owing to soil cation exchange and solute transport. These results are consistent with reactive transport modelling of soil cation throughput, which indicates that net CO2 removal emerges after an initial emissions pulse associated with neutralization of soil acidity pools. Current accounting frameworks implicitly apply an incomplete counterfactual, attributing CO2 emissions to lime addition rather than to the anthropogenic acidity inputs that drive CO2 release. Evaluated against the counterfactual of anthropogenic acidity inputs, agricultural liming represents a net carbon sink in the Mississippi River Basin on decade-to-century timescales. These results suggest that optimized soil pH management can reduce agricultural greenhouse gas emissions while simultaneously improving crop yields and soil health.
In what may be a world record for turnaround time, the litigation has already begun over the recent rescission by EPA of its carbon emission standards for fossil-fuel fired power plants.
For example, we have this from Georges Benjamin of the APHA:
“Clean air is a basic human right. Power plant pollution threatens the health of millions of Americans and fuels climate change, worsening extreme heat, poor air quality and other serious health risks. . . .”
Or this from Harold Wimmer of the American Lung Association:
“Emissions from power plants drive climate change, and climate change is a health emergency. . . .”
In what may be a world record for turnaround time, the litigation has already begun over the recent rescission by EPA of its carbon emission standards for fossil-fuel fired power plants.
As reported here on September 17, on that date the EPA finalized its rescission of what were called its “Carbon Pollution Standards” for electric power plants. (EPA’s September 17 action did not rescind all of the Carbon Pollution Standards for power plants, but only those for existing power plants and major overhauls of existing plants; the standards for new plants remain in effect for now, although in its rescission action EPA gave strong hints that those will also soon be ended.). By the end of that very day, September 17, a Petition had been filed in the DC Circuit seeking review of the regulatory action. Here is a copy of the Petition. The Petitioners are the American Lung Association, American Public Health Association, Clean Air Council, Clean Wisconsin, the Environmental Defense Fund, and the Natural Resources Defense Council.
The Petition is a short two-page document that simply asks for “review” of EPA’s action, and does not say anything about the grounds for the request. To learn the basis for the request, we must look to the press releases issued by the various petitioning organizations. Those contain statements from representatives of the Petitioners, mostly about imaginary threats to “health” from this thing they call “climate pollution.” But one thing that none of the Petitioners’ representatives do in their statements is address the grounds set forth by EPA for the rescission.
Here is a copy of the Press Release issued on September 17 by the Environmental Defense Fund. It contains quotations from representatives of EDF, of the Natural Resources Defense Council, of the American Public Health Association, of the American Lung Association and of Clean Wisconsin about the supposed importance of keeping the rules in place. For example, we have this from Georges Benjamin of the APHA:
“Clean air is a basic human right. Power plant pollution threatens the health of millions of Americans and fuels climate change, worsening extreme heat, poor air quality and other serious health risks. . . .”
Or this from Harold Wimmer of the American Lung Association:
“Emissions from power plants drive climate change, and climate change is a health emergency. . . .”
But OK guys, the issue raised by EPA’s rescission is that the proposed technological fix in the Biden-era rule, namely 90% carbon capture and sequestration (CCS), “has not been adequately demonstrated, the costs of 90 percent CCS are not reasonable, and the associated degree of emission limitation is not achievable.” None of the Petitioners address any of those questions in their statements.
Compared to other environmental litigations that involve highly abstract or theoretical questions, this one looks to turn on easily available concrete evidence. Is there a functioning, economical power plant with CCS that can be easily replicated throughout the electrical system? If so, the Petitioners can just point to it. Even better, they could offer to build such plants wherever needed.
However, that may not be so easy. When the Biden EPA proposed its “Carbon Pollution Standards” as a regulation in 2023, many commenters pointed out the infeasibility and high cost of the CCS approach. Two of the most thorough and sophisticated comments were submitted by groups of red states led by Ohio and West Virginia. This is from the Ohio comment at page 4:
A study of 263 carbon-capture-and-sequestration projects undertaken between 1995 and 2018 found that the majority failed and 78% of the largest projects were cancelled or put on hold. After the study was published in May 2021, the only other coal plant with a carbon-capture-and-sequestration attachment in the world, Petra Nova, shuttered after facing 367 outages in its three years of operation.
The West Virginia comment went into great technical detail about the problems and feasibility issues with CCS. Among other things, West Virginia (at pages 24-25) cited a study that concluded that because a CCS system uses a substantial fraction of the energy output of a plant, it will inherently cause a dramatic reduction in the plant’s efficiency:
Take efficiency to start. CCS units run on power, too. An owner can get that power from the plant itself. But this approach makes the plant less efficient by increasing its “parasitic load”—and CCS more than triples combustion turbines’ normal parasitic load. . . . This is the cause the Wyoming study analyzed that showed installing CCS technology would devastate plants’ heat rates and lower net plant efficiency by 36%.
And when you must burn dramatically more fuel to get the same amount of usable electricity, you inherently increase the emissions of all other pollutants that come from burning fuel (from West Virginia comment, page 27):
Nearly a decade ago, the European Union’s European Environmental Agency released a study finding that CCS would increase “direct emissions of NOx and PM” by nearly a half and a third, respectively, because of additional fuel burned, and increase “direct NH3 emissions” “significantly” because of “the assumed degradation of the amine-based solvent.”
And how about the chemicals that are used to remove the CO2 from the emissions stream? Again, from the West Virginia comment on the Biden rules (page 27):
The Proposed Rule would force utilities to adopt and communities to accept all aspects of CCS technology without fully understanding the ramifications. For example, the environmental and health effects of CANSOLV—the leading amine-based and EPA-recommended CCS solvent, 88 Fed. Reg. at 33,291—appear unknown; leading CANSOLV studies over the past decade don’t discuss its impact.
The questions of feasibility and cost of CCS systems for fossil fuel power plants are things where expert testimony is inherently unsatisfactory. If this technology is feasible and economical, then build it and prove it.
Unfortunately, the Petitioners in this case have little to no interest in maintaining a functioning electricity system.
Heat waves over land worldwide are beginning earlier, ending later, and occurring over longer seasons, while the first heat wave of the season has recently shifted toward faster onset, according to a new study published in Nature Climate Change.
Heatwave early warning systems (HEWS or HHWS, heat- health warning systems) are integrated tools that monitor, forecast, and communicate dangerous heat conditions so governments, health services, communities, and individuals can take timely protective action. They form a core part of broader Heat- Health Action Plans (HHAPs) and multi-hazard early warning frameworks.
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Heat waves over land worldwide are beginning earlier, ending later, and occurring over longer seasons, while the first heat wave of the season has recently shifted toward faster onset, according to a new study published in Nature Climate Change.
The research was led by scientists from the South China Botanical Garden (SCBG) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. They analyzed global climate data from 1979 to 2023, focusing on seasonal heatwave onset and end dates, the length of the heatwave season, and the onset speed of the first heatwave each season.
Key findings
On average, the first heatwave of the season began 3.29 days earlier per decade, while the last one ended 5.41 days later per decade. This extended the overall heatwave season by 8.71 days per decade.
Over the full ~45- year period, this translates to the first heatwave advancing by about two weeks, the last occurring roughly 24 days later, and the season lengthening by about 39 days.
Trends were widespread: ~72% of global land areas showed earlier onset, ~79.6% later end dates, and ~92.1% longer seasons. Changes were generally greater in drylands.
From 2001 to 2023, the share of rapid-onset first heatwaves (classified by how quickly temperature peaks within the event) increased significantly in heatwave- affected land areas.
Longer heatwave seasons are also increasing crop exposure to extreme heat during sensitive growth stages (e.g., flowering and silking). From 2001- 2023 versus 1979- 2000, the proportion of crop areas affected rose by 1.6- 13.3% for several major crops, with exposure expanding into earlier and later developmental stages.
Implications
Lead and corresponding author Xu Wenfang noted that prior work has mainly examined whether heatwaves are becoming more frequent, stronger, and longer. This study highlights that timing and development speed are also shifting. Earlier arrival and faster intensification can leave societies and ecosystems with even less time to prepare and adapt.
The authors suggest incorporating heatwave onset/end timing and the speed of the first seasonal event into monitoring, early- warning systems, and risk assessments. This could improve strategies for public health, agriculture, ecosystem management, and energy supply.
This aligns with the phys.org headline snippet (“Heat waves on land start earlier and develop faster, global analysis reveals”) and related recent coverage of expanding heat seasons and stress.
Heatwave early warning systems (HEWS or HHWS, heat- health warning systems) are integrated tools that monitor, forecast, and communicate dangerous heat conditions so governments, health services, communities, and individuals can take timely protective action. They form a core part of broader Heat- Health Action Plans (HHAPs) and multi- hazard early warning frameworks.
Core Components (Four Pillars of Early Warning Systems)
Risk knowledge: Understanding who is vulnerable (elderly, children, outdoor workers, people with chronic illnesses, low- income groups), where risks are highest (urban heat islands, drylands), and how heat interacts with factors like humidity, air quality, and socioeconomic conditions.
Detection, monitoring, and forecasting: Using meteorological data and models to identify upcoming heat events.
Warning dissemination and communication: Clear, actionable alerts delivered through multiple channels (media, apps, SMS, sirens, community networks).
Preparedness and response: Pre- planned actions such as opening cooling centres, adjusting work schedules, activating health surveillance, and public messaging.
How They Work
Most systems rely on temperature thresholds (maximum/minimum air temperature sustained for a set number of days), often adjusted for local climate and acclimatization. More advanced ones incorporate:
Thermal indices (e.g., Heat Index, Wet Bulb Globe Temperature/WBGT, Excess Heat Factor) that account for humidity, wind, and radiation.
Health-impact thresholds based on mortality/morbidity relationships.
Lead times typically of 2- 7 days; some systems provide earlier probabilistic outlooks (week 2 or sub-seasonal).
Examples of operational systems:
United States (NWS HeatRisk): Colour- numeric index based on unusual heat for the location and date; available up to 7 days ahead; expanded nationwide. Complements traditional Excessive Heat Warnings/Advisories.
Australia: Excess Heat Factor (EHF) metric; aligned with the national Australian Warning System (Advice → Watch and Act → Emergency Warning). Bureau of Meteorology provides multi-day lead times.
Europe: National systems in France (vigilance levels), Germany (biometeorological), Italy (city-specific impact- based), Spain, and others, often linked to health agencies.
India: India Meteorological Department (IMD) heatwave forecasts (now 4- 5 days ahead under Mission Mausam); many states have Heat Action Plans with GIS-based mapping and colour- coded alerts.
South Korea: Newer multi- tier system including emergency alerts at high perceived temperatures.
Other regions: Expanding in Africa (e.g., Senegal, Burkina Faso), Asia, and Latin America, though coverage remains uneven. preparecenter.org
A 2023 WMO survey found that about 54% of National Meteorological and Hydrological Services issue some form of extreme heat warning. Most are simple temperature-based; fewer use advanced thermal or intensity metrics.
Effectiveness
Evidence shows HEWS can reduce mortality and morbidity when well- designed and linked to action:
France’s system (post- 2003) is credited with saving thousands of lives in later events.
Studies report lower ambulance calls and deaths on alert days versus non- alert heat periods.
Scaling up heat- health warning systems globally could prevent nearly 100,000 deaths annually (WHO/WMO estimates).
Effectiveness depends on accurate forecasts, clear communication, public trust/perception of risk, and the ability of vulnerable groups to act (e.g., access to cooling, ability to stay indoors). Barriers include cost of air conditioning, outdoor work necessities, and heat normalization in some cultures.
Current Limitations and Challenges
Uneven global coverage: Many low- and middle- income countries, especially in Africa and parts of Asia, still lack robust systems.
Metric and threshold issues: Heavy reliance on air temperature alone; thresholds often not regularly updated for a warming climate or local health data.
Communication gaps: Warnings may use technical language, focus on temperature rather than impacts/actions, or fail to reach the most vulnerable.
Action gaps: Warnings are not always linked to pre- agreed, funded response plans; cross- sector coordination (health, energy, labour, agriculture) can be weak.
Forecast skill: Reliable at 1- 7 days in many regions; sub- seasonal (weeks ahead) skill is improving but variable. Onset timing and rapid intensification remain harder to predict precisely.
Limited attention to timing and onset speed: Most systems focus on intensity, duration, and frequency. The September 2026 Nature Climate Change study (“Earlier and faster heatwave onset on land under a warming climate”) shows heatwaves are starting ~3.3 days earlier and ending ~5.4 days later per decade, with seasons lengthening and a recent shift toward faster- onset events (especially in drylands). The authors explicitly call for incorporating timing and onset speed into early- warning systems and risk assessments, as earlier and faster events reduce preparation time.
Recent Developments and Future Directions
WHO and WMO guidance: Original 2015 guidance on Heatwaves and Health is being updated (new version expected around 2026); second edition of Heat- Health Action Plans guidance (2026) emphasizes graded, health- linked thresholds and integration with broader plans.
AI and higher- resolution modelling: Efforts in India (IISc– IMD), China (“MAZU” AI multi- hazard system), and elsewhere to improve localised, impact- based forecasts.
Sub- seasonal to seasonal outlooks: Growing use for earlier preparedness (e.g., resource pre- positioning).
Biodiversity and multi- sector systems: Emerging tools for ecosystem heat warnings; stronger links to agriculture, energy, and labour.
Global initiatives: UN Early Warnings for All (EW4All) aims for universal multi- hazard coverage by 2027; heat is a priority area.
Zurich Climate Resilience Alliance / Red Cross reports (2026) highlight rapid expansion but stress the need for better risk knowledge, refined metrics, inclusive communication, and ensuring warnings trigger real action.
In summary, heatwave early warning systems are expanding and demonstrably save lives, but significant gaps remain in coverage, sophistication (especially health- impact and multi- factor metrics), communication, and response linkage. With heatwaves arriving earlier and intensifying faster, systems that currently emphasise intensity and duration will need to better capture seasonal timing and rapid- onset characteristics to maintain effectiveness. Strengthening the full end- to- end chain, from forecasting to last-mile action, remains the priority.
Earlier and faster heatwave onset on land under a warming climate
Heatwaves threaten ecosystems and societies. While previous studies have focused on frequency, intensity, and duration, long- term changes in timing, onset, ending, and season length, have been poorly understood.
The authors analysed global changes in these metrics and in onset- speed type from 1979 to 2023. Globally:
Heatwave onset advanced by 3.29 ± 0.12 days per decade.
Ending was delayed by 5.41 ± 0.12 days per decade.
The heatwave season lengthened by 8.71 ± 0.17 days per decade.
Trends toward earlier onset, later ending, and longer seasons covered 72.0%, 79.6%, and 92.1% of global land, respectively (statistically significant across 13.4%, 20.3%, and 34.4%). A recent shift toward faster heatwave onset was also observed. Drylands experienced more pronounced timing shifts than humid regions.
These results highlight the need to incorporate heatwave timing into early- warning systems, risk assessments, and proactive adaptation strategies under climate change.
Additional details from the paper
Data sources include ERA5, Berkeley Earth, JRA-3Q, TerraClimate, MODIS land cover, and crop phenology datasets. Processed data and code are available via Figshare.
Figures illustrate heatwave detection and onset- speed classification, temporal/spatial trends in timing metrics, patterns of first- heatwave onset- speed types, and correlations with conventional heatwave metrics (frequency, intensity, duration).
The work builds on prior research showing increases in heatwave frequency, intensity, and duration, while adding the critical dimension of seasonal timing and development speed.
This is the peer- reviewed study underlying the phys.org and press- release coverage from earlier today. The abstract matches the reported numbers exactly. Full- text access is subscription- or institution- based.
Heatwaves threaten ecosystems and societies. Previous studies have examined their frequency, intensity and duration, whereas long-term changes in heatwave timing—including onset, ending and season length—remain poorly understood, limiting our ability to anticipate heat-related risks. Here we analyse global changes in these metrics and onset-speed type from 1979 to 2023. Globally, heatwave onset advanced by 3.29 ± 0.12 days per decade, ending was delayed by 5.41 ± 0.12 days per decade and the heatwave season lengthened by 8.71 ± 0.17 days per decade. Trends towards earlier onset, later ending and longer heatwave seasons covered 72.0%, 79.6% and 92.1% of global land, respectively, with statistically significant trends across 13.4%, 20.3% and 34.4%. A recent shift towards faster heatwave onset was observed. Drylands experienced more pronounced timing shifts than humid regions. These findings highlight the need to incorporate heatwave timing into early-warning systems, risk assessments and proactive adaptation under climate change.
Nepal Foreign Minister Shisir Khanal connects the August 26 flood to the popular narrative that industrial emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) cause dangerous atmospheric warming and the melting of mountain glaciers, which, so the logic goes, produces floods like the one that killed his countrymen.
Asian neighbors and Western countries demonized for “climate failings” have supported Nepal’s building of high-voltage lines, tunnels, bridges, vehicles, and other blessings of modernity.
Nepal Foreign Minister Shisir Khanal’s request for a foreign response to his country’s disastrous Himalayan flood would be better made as an appeal to the charitable instincts of people than as a demand for compensation from climate sinners.
Khanal connects the August 26 flood to the popular narrative that industrial emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) cause dangerous atmospheric warming and the melting of mountain glaciers, which, so the logic goes, produces floods like the one that killed his countrymen. “Climate justice” reasoning is that industrialized countries such as neighboring India and China bear more responsibility for the disaster than does Nepal, whose per capita income ranking is less than five on a global scale of 1-100.
Khanal’s framing begins with a vacuous political claim that someone else must pay and ignores realities of the physical world, adopting the false premise that CO2 emissions have made weather worse. He apparently embraces the notion that computer models can assign a dollar value to damages inflicted by increases in the destructiveness of natural disasters. For the foreign minister, an apocalyptic narrative used for a decade to advance net-zero policy is an observed fact rather than an implausibly extreme scenario treated as destiny.
A century of observations shows no CO2-driven march toward more heat waves, hurricanes, droughts, and wildfires. Many of those hazards peaked in earlier decades or have declined. Record U.S. heat still belongs to the 1930s. Hurricane activity has not followed the alarmist script. Wildfire intensity is inseparable from fuel loads and land management.
A report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine that “quantifies climate damages” merely assumes worsening weather with rising CO2without even attempting to establish a link. The National Academies uses computer-generated models of a world with no industrial CO2 emissions to divine how much milder the weather would be. That is a fabrication for use in a liability case, not a finding of fact.
Studies that purportedly attribute worsening weather to emissions have multiplied because “climate scientists” have been rewarded with research grants, not because physics demonstrates evidence of a connection. Saying the Nepal flood would have been milder on a planet without industrial CO₂ is not evidence that floods have grown more common or more destructive.
Once those exercises are treated as proof of causation, Nepal’s Khanal would say, energy producers “whose historical contribution to greenhouse gases is much bigger than ours” are to be made defendants in civil courts facing billions of dollars in liabilities. This demagoguery makes villains of businesses whose products – coal, oil, and natural gas – have powered electric grids, transportation systems, and factories that have lifted living standards worldwide. The fertilizers and medicines derived from these hydrocarbon feedstocks nourish and enhance the health of billions.
Nepal’s own development depends on fossil fuels. Transport runs on imported diesel and gasoline. Cooking and industry use liquefied petroleum gas and coal. Coal is necessary for production of cement, which is integral to the infrastructure of the country’s hydroelectric system and highways.
Asian neighbors and Western countries demonized for “climate failings” have supported Nepal’s building of high-voltage lines, tunnels, bridges, vehicles, and other blessings of modernity. Foreign Minister Khanal is biting hands engaged in feeding his country.
None of this diminishes the tragedy of the thousands of dead and missing in August’s awful flood. Nonetheless, compassion does not require surrendering facts to accommodate what amounts to a scam. There is no evidence of carbon dioxide emissions precipitating the Nepal flood or any other disaster. Even the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has declared as implausible its most extreme predictions of global warming. The most likely cause of the flood has been identified as the failure of bedrock underlying a glacier.
More than climate apostates to blame, Nepal needs modern technology and better land-use practices to protect people as much as possible from the risk of nature’s brutality.
In the meantime, the country has reportedly received $820 million in aid, which suggests that at least some of the developed world is more charitable than villainous.
Angela Wheeler is executive director of theCO2Coalition, Fairfax, Virginia. She is a cum laude graduate of Emporia State University, Kansas, where she studied communication, with additional biology and pre-medicine coursework.
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