Picture of global warming

Americas+1 212 318 2000 EMEA+44 20 7330 7500 Asia Pacific+65 6212 1000 • Company • • • • • • • • • Communications • • Follow • • • • • • Products • • • • • Industry Products • • • • • Media • • • • • • • • • • Media Services • • • Company • • • • • • • • • Communications • • Follow • • • • • • Products • • • • • Industry Products • • • • • • Media • • Technology • • • • Businessweek • • • • Media Services • • • Bloomberg There were deep, possibly permanent drought conditions in some countries, devastating floods in others, and ever-more destructive wildfires. Greek villages burned, riverbanks burst in Germany and Brazil’s farms frosted over. If one heat wave stood out from the pattern, it was in the usually temperate region of North America’s Pacific Northwest. It was also a year of climate breakthroughs, both technological and political. Wind power and batteries kept getting cheaper and better. The proportion of new electric passenger vehicles sold worldwide has now reached 10% of the total, according to BloombergNEF. In Iceland, meanwhile, the largest complex ever built to remove carbon dioxide from the air sprang to life. Governments and companies rushed to show they’re doing their part. The 10 biggest economies and institutions overseeing 40% of global financial assets have now committed to phase out carbon emissions. India, the third-biggest emitter, set a 2070 target to reach net-zero. Even Saudi Arabia and Russia announced carbon-neutrality goals. If nations were to...

Photograph: Fida Hussain/AFP/Getty Images Scientists believe climate change is likely to have supercharged the intense rainfall that led to the flooding. UN secretary general António Guterres called it a “monsoon on steroids”. And worryingly, such extreme flooding events are likely to become more frequent around the world. Pakistan’s climate minister, Sherry Rehman, has issued a call for “reparations” from richer countries with higher emissions. As The British-Pakistani novelist Kamila Shamsie agrees. “The world’s richest countries are the ones most responsible for the climate catastrophe, and it’s the poorer nations who are paying the heaviest price. We need urgent and binding commitments from the G20 nations towards net zero,” she says. “As for the poorer nations, such as Giraffes die of thirst in Kenya, December 2021, Ed Ram Photograph: Ed Ram/Getty Images Over the past two years, the Horn of Africa has experienced the worst drought in more than four decades, leading to millions of deaths of humans and animals. The devastation is encapsulated in this aerial shot by photojournalist Ed Ram, showing SOS sign in Puerto Rico during Hurricane Maria, September 2017, Angelina Ruiz-Lambides Photograph: Angelina Ruiz-Lambides This photograph of an SOS sign scrawled on the pavement in the coastal town of Punta Santiago in Puerto Rico became the defining image of Hurricane Maria, the lethal storm that swept through the northern Caribbean in September 2017. Around 3,000 people died ...