Climate Change & Environment
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Aid pours into Pakistan; deaths from floods cross 1,200 mark

Planes carrying fresh supplies are surging across a humanitarian air bridge to flood-ravaged Pakistan as the death toll surged past 1,200, officials said Friday, with families and children at special risk of disease and homelessness.

The ninth flight from the United Arab Emirates and the first from Uzbekistan were the latest to land in Islamabad overnight as a military-backed rescue operation elsewhere in the country reached more of the 3 million people affected by the disaster. Multiple officials blamed the unusual monsoon and flooding on climate change, including U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who earlier this week called on the world to stop "sleepwalking" through the deadly crisis.

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Villagers brave snakes and hunger to protect land in flooded Pakistan

The southern Pakistan village of Karim Bakhsh is almost entirely under muddy water after catastrophic monsoon rains -- hardly any stable buildings are left for shelter, the wheat silos are empty and venomous snakes are a constant threat.

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Carbon four times costlier to society than thought

The cost inflicted on the world by carbon pollution may be nearly four times higher than recent estimates, a study said Thursday, highlighting how much climate action could save this and future generations.

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Summer 2022 joint hottest on record in England

England experienced its joint hottest summer on record this year, tied with 2018, the country's meteorological agency said on Thursday, according to provisional statistics.

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Number of Brazil Amazon fires hits five-year high in August

More fires burned in the Brazilian Amazon rainforest this August than in any month in nearly five years, thanks to a surge in illegal deforestation.

Satellite sensors detected 33,116 fires according to Brazil's national space institute. The dry season months of August and September are usually worst for both deforestation and fire.

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US asks farmers: Can you plant 2 crops instead of 1?

There is only so much farmland in the United States, so when Russia's invasion of Ukraine last spring prompted worries that people would go hungry as wheat remained stuck in blockaded ports, there was little U.S. farmers could do to meet the new demand.

But that may be changing.

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Africa urged to propose action on climate at conference

Africa's nations must develop strategies to address climate change which poses an existential threat to the continent's megacities, Gabon's President Ali Bongo Adimba said at the third Africa Climate Week conference.

African officials and experts should sharpen the positions they will present at the 27th annual United Nations climate conference to be held in Egypt in November, said Bongo.

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UN forecasts rare 'triple-dip' La Nina climate effect

The La Nina weather phenomenon is likely to last until at least the end of the year, the United Nations forecast Wednesday, becoming the first "triple-dip" La Nina this century.

La Nina will likely span three consecutive northern hemisphere winters -- southern hemisphere summers -- according to the U.N.'s World Meteorological Organization.

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Europe plan for floating gas terminals raises climate fears

As winter nears, European nations, desperate to replace the natural gas they once bought from Russia, have embraced a short-term fix: A series of roughly 20 floating terminals that would receive liquefied natural gas from other countries and convert it into heating fuel.

Yet the plan, with the first floating terminals set to deliver natural gas by year's end, has raised alarms among scientists who fear the long-term consequences for the environment. They warn that these terminals would perpetuate Europe's reliance on natural gas, which releases climate-warming methane and carbon dioxide when it's produced, transported and burned.

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G20 environment ministers in Bali spur global climate action

Environment officials from the Group of 20 leading rich and developing nations are gathering Wednesday on Indonesia's resort island of Bali for talks to spur global climate action and other troubles that have worsened due to the war in Ukraine.

Implementing each G-20 nation's contribution and synchronizing targets among developing and developed countries are to be discussed in the closed-door meetings, Indonesia's environment minister Siti Nurbaya said before the one-day meeting.

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