Disasters

"The virus, which recently reached the Antarctic region for the first time, is surging again in North America."

"Abe Silverman’s Christmas Eve quickly went from low-key to frantic when Winter Storm Elliott brought a power grid emergency to "much of the Eastern seaboard."

"An internal briefing note reveals BC Energy Regulator inspectors did not find any problems with Coastal GasLink’s emergency plans a few months before soaring temperatures led to flooded pipeline sites, slope failures and damage to sensitive creeks and wetlands".

"Hundreds of thousands of neighborhoods in the United States are seeing population decline as a result of flooding, new research suggests. Those neighborhoods are often located in areas that are growing in population overall, including parts of Florida, Texas and the region around Washington, D.C."

"The Biden administration has initiated a formal evaluation of risks posed by vinyl chloride, the cancer-causing chemical that burned in a towering plume of toxic black smoke following a fiery train derailment earlier this year in eastern Ohio."

"The U.S. environment regulator does not sufficiently verify that carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects keep emissions trapped underground and should boost its requirements to ensure companies receiving CCS tax credits provide an actual environmental benefit, a watchdog group said on Thursday."

"A study published last week shows Bangladesh’s intensifying monsoons come with a staggering death toll, both in the immediate aftermath of the flooding itself and, more significantly, in the months that follow. The true scale of the toll has not been fully captured by local officials, aid organizations, or the international research community."

"Cutting payments to brokers, or selling policies directly to consumers, could save millions. FEMA and insurance companies say it’s not quite that straightforward."

"Going into overtime under the cover of a dark winter night in Dubai, climate negotiators at COP28 cooked up a weak sauce of climate half-measures that fail to adequately address the existential risk of global warming to millions of people around the globe, according to leading climate experts at the conference."

"Environmental groups and negotiators from countries that are most vulnerable to climate disasters assailed a draft of a final agreement, made public at the United Nations climate talks on Monday, that fell short of calling for a phaseout of fossil fuels."