As nations in the Global South analyse pathways to decarbonise the agriculture sector, they will increasingly turn to enhanced rock weathering (ERW) and biochar-based carbon removal projects from 2030, according to recent research.

Global renewable energy capacity targets for 2030 have increased by only 2% since countries agreed at COP28 to triple deployment by the end of the decade, according to a report released Thursday.

Major US environmental group claim that the Trump administration’s proposed repeal of a bedrock US climate regulation would result in billions of additional tonnes of emissions by 2055, along with a slew of negative health impacts.

Cooperation between countries on fossil fuel levies could raise tens of billion of dollars per year in finance to cut emissions in developing countries, or hundreds of billions if prices are also imposed on international aviation and shipping, according to research released on Wednesday.

H2-to-go - German technology conglomerate Siemens has signed a memorandum of understanding with English green hydrogen company Paragon Resources to scale green hydrogen production for industrial decarbonisation, the duo announced Wednesday. Paragon Resources has pioneered a hydrogen production method that doesn't require fossil fuels and external electricity sources, it said.

Climate costs – Losses from catastrophes in the first six months of the year totalled $131 bln, driven by wildfires in the US, said reinsurer MunichRe on Tuesday. Of this, $80 bln was insured, marking the second-highest insured losses for the period since 1980 – lagging only behind H1 2011, which saw high insured losses following the earthquake and tsunami in Fukushima, Japan. MunichRe noted that weather-related events accounted for 88% of total losses and 98% of insured losses in H1 2025. The firm added that total and insured losses both exceeded the 10-year and 30-year averages. Earlier this week, insurer Willis said that insurance companies are routinely seeing insured losses in excess of $100 bln annually due to natural catastrophes.

Investing in a wide range – Alberta's Ministry of Forestry and Parks has invested C$1.3 mln ($940,000) into rangeland biodiversity through the The Rangeland Sustainability Program. The programme is funded in part by the rental fees collected for grazing livestock on Crown land, which are to be reinvested into rangeland stewardship through innovations. This year's funds are being distributed to support education and community outreach, adaptive grazing practices, conservation strategies, grassland bird conservation, and bee biodiversity surveys.

A Moroccan fertiliser producer announced on Tuesday a partnership with a Brazilian company and two groups of local rural producers to restore 100,000 hectares of degraded land in the Cerrado, the biome with the highest deforestation rate in Brazil currently.

Canadian courting advice - The Canadian Climate Institute (CCI) is suggesting stronger climate policy in Canada could bring it closer to its major trade partners outside of the US. The climate policy think tank said Canadian businesses are looking for opportunities beyond the US – with the latest monthly data showing a record low proportion of exports going south of the border and increased trade elsewhere – but other markets Canada seeks to diversify trade with are further along on climate policy, which has important implications for Canada’s economic prospects. CCI looked at uptake of five important and complementary climate and sustainable finance policies across Canada’s top ten non-US trading partners, finding the need for alignment on net zero commitments, climate investment taxonomy, carbon pricing or emissions trading, mandatory climate disclosure, and transition plan guidance.

Battery bust - Battery project cancellations are surging as federal support for clean energy dwindles under the Trump administration, with a new report showing projects are being halted or scrapped at six times the rate seen in early 2024. The analysis by Wellesley College’s “The Big Green Machine” found large-scale initiatives, many in Republican congressional districts and low-income areas, have been hardest hit after losing Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) funding.

Endangerment engagement - Democrats vowed to challenge the US EPA’s plan to revoke the long-standing scientific finding that underpins federal regulation of GHG emissions, while some climate-focused Republicans signalled support for President Donald Trump’s move, E&E News reported. The administration’s proposal would undo a 16-year-old determination that GHGs endanger human health, prompting Democratic lawmakers to push for legal action and stronger state-level climate policies.

Rollback ripple effect - The US EPA on Tuesday proposed revoking the 2009 endangerment finding, which underpins federal regulation of GHG emissions, a move that could remove limits on pollution from power plants and increase legal uncertainty for utilities, E&E News reported. According to the outlet, analysts say the repeal is unlikely to reverse the market shift toward cheaper wind and solar power but adds to regulatory instability for an industry already facing rising demand, plant closures and state-level clean energy mandates.

That was easy – A number of oil refineries, coal-fired plants, steel mills, chemical companies, and others, have been granted exemptions from tightened Clean Air Act regulations by the US EPA, E&E News reported. The outlet said newly released records show so-called applications by fossil fuel producers were as simple as email requests to the agency.

Landfill carbon credits – Brazilian company Orizon on Tuesday completed the registration of its carbon credit project at the Ecoparque Paulinia landfill with Verra. The project has an estimated capacity to reduce more than 1.8 MtCO2 annually, generated through flaring or the use of landfill gas (ACM0001). Its first crediting period runs from Nov. 1, 2022 to Oct. 21, 2029. With this landfill, located in the state of Sao Paulo, Orizon now has its fifth carbon project registered in the voluntary carbon market.

European carbon prices consolidated the sizeable gains made on Tuesday, failing to match gains for gas as EUAs spent much of the day moving sideways before settling marginally down.

Decarbonising Canada’s fleets - Canada’s federal government has announced C$21 mln ($15 mln) for nine R&D projects aimed at reducing GHGs from Canada’s transportation sector, including though improving system efficiency, making it easier to switch to zero-emissions vehicles and addressing technical and market barriers for medium- to heavy-duty vehicles that have low or zero emissions. Another C$5 mln will go to the city of Toronto to transition 60 of its garbage trucks to operate with a hybrid electric-compressed natural gas system.

The Democratic Republic of Congo's new land-use planning law marks an important step in ensuring fair and effective governance of natural resources – but planned oil developments pose a big threat to one of the world's biggest carbon sinks, environmentalists have warned.

Sky-high costs at COP30 – The UN climate bureau held an urgent meeting on Tuesday to address concerns that the elevated prices for accommodation at COP30 could reduce the participation of poorer countries in the negotiations, Reuters reported. The climate conference is set to be held in Belem, a city in the Brazilian Amazon, which needs to more than double its original accommodation capacity to host the 45,000 people expected to attend COP30 – a pressure point for the host country since the announcement of the chosen city. Brazil agreed to address the concerns and report back at the next gathering, on Aug. 11, according to Richard Muyungi, chair of the African Group of Negotiators (AGN), who called the meeting. Prices have reportedly reached up to $700 per night per person for hotels during the event.

Canada is a step closer to its first carbon capture cement plant, doling out C$10 million ($7.24 mln) in federal funding as a Calgary-based startup breaks ground on a commercial-scale plant in Southern Ontario.

The urgent need to reduce emissions is enough to justify releasing government debt brakes, an influential climate policy institute said in a report published on Wednesday.

Not so budget-proof - Germany's draft budget for 2026 has been critiqued by environmental non-profits for doing little to support the shift to a greener economy, particularly in housing and transport. Instead of financing new roads, more money should be directed to public transport, said Friends of the Earth Germany. While WWF lamented that support for energy-efficient building modernisation is cut to €12 bln, down from €17 bln earmarked in 2024. Yet local utility association VKU said a top-up of funds for more efficient heating grids marked a step in the right direction. The budget still needs to be adopted by parliament and Germany’s states - expected at the end of the year. (Clean Energy Wire)

Global power demand is forecast to rise much faster this year and next than over the past decade, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Wednesday, but power sector emissions should dip next year as low-emissions sources displace fossil fuels.

Brazil's COP30 summit marks an inflection point for the UN process of negotiating climate action, as the first summit since the Paris Agreement became fully operational – and a moment to think about how to make the system fit for an era of implementation, according to a paper released on Wednesday.

The ability of EU forests to absorb carbon is rapidly decreasing due to growing harvest rates and extreme weather events, jeopardising the bloc’s climate goals, according to a paper released on Wednesday.

Green reporting for SMEs – The European Commission on Wednesday published a recommendation for voluntary sustainability reporting by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), aiming to help these firms communicate their environmental and social impacts in a simplified way. The recommendation aims to make it easier for SMEs that are not covered by the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) to respond to specific requests for sustainability information coming from large financial institutions and companies. It comes as EU institutions are currently examining changes to the CSRD that would introduce a “value chain cap” to protect companies with fewer than 1,000 employees from excessive information requests coming from their clients.

The European steel industry is calling for a fundamental rethink of the EU’s 2040 climate policy framework, warning that current plans risk “deindustrialisation” unless reforms are made to support the industry’s decarbonisation efforts, and provide stronger protection from global competition.

The EU's political commitment on Sunday to purchase $750 billion of US energy products in the next three years risks derailing the bloc’s decarbonisation efforts, according to researchers who called the EU-US trade deal a 'high-risk' one.

CCS for shipping - Carbon Ridge has deployed its centrifugal onboard carbon capture system (OCCS) aboard a product tanker owned by Scorpio Tankers. The pilot marks the first deployment of such a system in maritime, stated the release on Wednesday. The pilot started in July at Besiktas Shipyard in Turkey aboard the STI SPIGA, owned by the petroleum seaborne transport company. Carbon Ridge also completed an additional financing led by Katapult Ocean and Alfa8, bringing its total funding to over $20 mln.

A carbon capture technology company currently operating in 12 countries is betting that its compact modular units can be the “solar panels” of industrial decarbonisation – cheap, scalable, and easy to replicate – but its global progress hinges on clear policy signals and access to financing.

Pastoral protests - Communities Kenya's Kajiado County are calling for a formal investigation into carbon credit agreements negotiated over their ancestral lands, the Daily Nation reported. Thirteen individuals from Ewuaso Oonkidong’i Ward stated that local brokers have pushed opaque and potentially exploitative 40-year contracts for rangelands covering 2.4 mln ha in the county, without mandatory free, prior, and informed consent (FPIC) from the pastoral communities. They argued these deals amount to flawed, market-driven arrangements that disproportionately benefit intermediaries at the expense of local residents. This is not the first time Kajiado has pushed back against carbon deals. The county saw a similar protest back in April over a 68,000 ha activity.

A Delaware-based holding company said Wednesday it will co-develop a large-scale afforestation carbon credit project in Ghana and launch a regulated exchange in Asia to trade tokenised carbon units.

How to sail low-carbon - The International Bunker Industry Association (IBIA) has joined a consortium that has been awarded UK government funding through the country's Clean Maritime Demonstration Competition, it announced last week. The project aims to strengthen the skills the workforce on ships, at ports, and across the fuel supply chain to adopt low- and zero-carbon fuels. The group includes the University of Plymouth, ferry operator DFDS, information hub Ship.energy, and the British Ports Association.

Sunlight reflection methods such as stratospheric aerosol injection (SAI) could theoretically have a global cooling impact and reduce extreme heat, but may also have adverse effects such as altering rainfall patterns, and would require ongoing political momentum to be effective, say experts.

A Dutch start-up certifier has secured conditional endorsement for its carbon insetting certifications, from a trade group that promotes best practices for voluntary carbon offsetting, the company announced on Wednesday.

Partners power up - Vietnam and the International Partners Group (IPG), which controls the Just Energy Transition Partnership (JETP), have identified 24 energy projects valued at a collective $7 bln that are eligible under the partnership’s Political Declaration, Vietnamese news reported this week. Three projects, two of them hydropower and one transmission project, have already secured funding totalling €612 mln ($707 mln). The IPG will preference projects already on the Power Development Plan 8 (PDP8), the document that lays out the government’s power plans and allowed projects.

The European Central Bank (ECB) on Tuesday announced the introduction of a climate-related risk factor into its collateral framework, in a move expected to impact eurozone lending and accelerate the shift to a low-carbon economy.

Collecting feedback - Taiwan's environment ministry has started to gather feedback from the private sector on the establishment of the domestic emissions trading scheme, as the regulator plans to introduce a pilot in the second half of 2026, the Central News Agency reported. The ministry earlier this week held a meeting to exchange views with members of the Green Growth Alliance, which comprises benchmark Taiwanese companies like TSMC, Formosa Plastics, and Taiwan Cement. The goal is to move toward a "dual-track" system of carbon fees and the ETS,  but the policy design will prevent double charges on emissions, the ministry stressed.      

EU renewables project list – The European Commission on Tuesday adopted an updated list of cross-border renewable energy projects eligible to receive EU funding under the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF). Projects included in the list have a special status that gives them more visibility and also makes them eligible to apply for grants for studies or construction under the CEF. The list includes 13 projects, including offshore wind (Estonia and Latvia), green hydrogen (Germany, Spain and the Netherlands), district heating (Germany and Poland), and the Medlink project (Italy, Algeria, and Tunisia).

A major trading house in Japan is planning to launch an industry coalition for the development of carbon dioxide removal (CDR) later this year.

A Singapore-based digital green finance company said Wednesday it has secured a patent for a blockchain-based carbon stablecoin framework, a system that turns verified carbon reductions into tradeable digital tokens for use in cross-border payments and foreign exchange.

The world needs to drastically reverse its huge expansion of coal mines if it is to reach net zero and keep warming at or below 1.5C, given the upstream methane bomb these mines represent, a think tank warned this week.

Going solar - The International Finance Corporation (IFC) has signed a financing package of up to THB 3,140 mln ($92 mln) with Thailand’s CleanMax Energy, it announced. The funding will support the development and expansion of solar power projects totalling 35 megawatt-peak (MWp) of greenfield solar capacity and refinancing an existing 41 MWp operating projects, for industrial businesses in the country. This investment is expected to boost Thailand’s renewable energy generation capacity, improve energy access, generate local jobs, and support the country’s transition towards a cleaner grid, it said.

The Western Australian state government has opened a fresh grant funding round, offering cash for landholders to access professional advice on developing Australian Carbon Credit Unit (ACCU) projects.

A Papua New Guinea NGO has registered its REDD+ project under Verra's carbon and Climate, Community and Biodiversity Standard (CCBS), as it seeks to be best-in-class in the country's carbon industry that's slowly coming back to life. 

Hot rocks - New Zealand wants to double the use of geothermal energy in the country by 2040 to support its journey towards net zero, according to a draft strategy published Wednesday, as the Pacific nation aims to become a "global leader in sustainable geothermal development". The strategy includes a detailed Draft Action Plan structured across three horizons (2025-26, 2027-28, and 2029 onwards). This plan is designed to achieve goals like improving access to geothermal data, regulations, and enabling place-based geothermal clusters. The goal is also to drive science, research, and innovation, into supercritical geothermal technology.

Right direction – Ratings agency Calyx has launched a new early-stage decision tool to help investors screen, prioritise, and de-risk emissions projects, it announced on Tuesday. Calyx Compass will initially cover the following project types: afforestation/reforestation; agricultural land management; biochar; household biodigesters; improved forest management; and manure management. Over the coming months, it will also add orphaned well plugging, landfill gas, cookstoves, and ozone depleting substances, it said.

Read the label – South Korea has revised its information declaration guidelines for environmental products in response to changes in international regulations, the country's environment ministry announced on Tuesday. The declaration system quantifies and displays the environmental impact of products and services across seven categories, including raw material extraction, production, and distribution. The revision focuses on key export items and other products with high demand for environmental performance assessments, and the number of eligible products has been expanded to 70 from 59, the ministry said.  

Faster, stronger - UNFCCC chief Simon Stiell used appearances in Australia this week to push the government to set an ambitious 2035 NDC, the ABC reported. Stiell called the new target a "defining moment" for Australia, warning that unchecked climate change would be an economic wrecking ball for the Australian and global economy. He also urged Australia and Turkiye to quickly settle their bids to host COP31 next year, saying a deadline to determine the host was now several months overdue. He was in Turkiye last week where he gave a similar message, the public broadcaster said.

An avoided deforestation programme in Argentina is one step away from receiving the first-ever credits under Verra's Jurisdictional and Nested REDD+ (JNR) Framework – which could inject the supply-constrained CORSIA market with millions of new units, pending national authorisation.

Mari-time to capture carbon – CCS developer Carbon Ridge successfully deployed a centrifugal onboard carbon capture system aboard a tanker, a shipping industry first, the company said on Tuesday. The pilot commenced in July at Besiktas Shipyard in Turkiye, in partnership with Monaco-headquartered Scorpio Tankers. Carbon Ridge also completed additional financing to bring the company’s total funding to over $20 mln.

A top Argentinian official on Monday voiced intent to sell mitigation contribution units (MCUs) under Article 6.4 of the Paris Agreement, prioritising this over other Article 6 use cases that involve international trading, to ensure the country meets its Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) targets.