Search Climate Insights Directory

The BC3 Basque Centre for Climate Change's annual accounts for 2025 were audited by Forvis Mazars Auditores, S.L.P., which issued an unqualified opinion stating the accounts provide a 'true and fair view' of the entity's financial state. The center reported total income from its own activities of 8,326,518.02 euros, primarily driven by subsidies. The audit highlighted the recognition of these subsidies as a key risk area due to their materiality. The center maintains a diverse workforce of 143 people, including 123 researchers, and achieved significant academic output, including 118 articles in indexed journals. Financially, the entity is exempt from corporate tax on its social purpose activities and reported a total result for the year of 108,996.37 euros.

The document outlines how climate change affects the tourism industry through environmental degradation and extreme weather, while highlighting the sector's contribution to global emissions. It encourages reporters to investigate adaptation strategies, the risk of exclusionary sustainable tourism, and the specific tensions faced by local populations who depend on tourism but suffer its climate impacts.

The report highlights the systemic risks of fossil fuel dependency, noting that three-quarters of the global population live in importing countries that spent $1.7 trillion on imports in 2024. It argues that the current crisis in the Middle East, particularly the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, serves as a catalyst for Asia to transition to electric technologies. The document asserts that scaling EVs, solar, wind, and heat pumps could reduce fossil fuel import bills by approximately 70%, with EVs already displacing 1.7 million barrels of oil per day in 2025.

The EU significantly expanded its renewable energy capacity between 2022 and 2025, with solar PV reaching 406 GW and wind reaching 246 GW. This transition reduced the bloc's reliance on imported fossil fuels, saving an estimated EUR 58 billion in coal and gas import costs. While countries like Spain have successfully delinked electricity prices from gas costs, others like Italy remain highly vulnerable due to continued dependence on imported fossil fuels, particularly during the 2026 Strait of Hormuz blockade.

A conflict in the Middle East involving Israel, the US, and Iran has caused global fossil fuel supply disruptions, leading to a nearly 50% increase in European gas prices in early March 2026. The briefing highlights that the EU's fossil import bill rose by an estimated €2.5 billion in the first ten days of the crisis. It argues that countries with high gas reliance for electricity, such as Italy, are most exposed to price spikes, while those that have decoupled gas from electricity prices, like Spain, are more resilient. The author contends that electricity market reforms or removing carbon costs (EU-ETS) are less effective than investing in renewables and clean flexibility to ensure long-term energy security.

A conflict in the Middle East in March 2026 caused European gas prices to spike by nearly 50%, increasing the EU's fossil import bill by €2.5 billion in ten days. The report highlights that countries with lower gas reliance, such as Spain, are more insulated from electricity price hikes than gas-heavy markets like Italy. It argues against suspending carbon costs under the EU Emissions Trading Scheme, noting that gas volatility has a far greater impact on bills than carbon pricing.

The document explains how a warming atmosphere and oceans fuel more powerful thunderstorms, leading to stronger straight-line winds and a shift in 'Tornado Alley' toward the Eastern US. It highlights the economic toll, noting that severe weather accounted for 91% of billion-dollar disasters in the US in 2025, and encourages newsrooms to use attribution studies and local data to illustrate these climate connections.

The document outlines the climate and social risks associated with the expansion of data centers, highlighting their massive energy and water consumption. It warns journalists against uncritically accepting corporate claims about job creation and investment, urging them to investigate local resource competition, 'digital sacrifice zones,' and extractivist dynamics in the Global South.

The report examines the growing instability of France's 'Cat-Nat' insurance regime, where the public reinsurer (CCR) is seeing its reserves deplete while private insurers maintain record profitability. It highlights an emerging insurability crisis for local authorities, particularly in overseas territories and northern France, and argues that the financial burden of climate change is unfairly shifted toward the public sector and policyholders. Reclaim Finance calls for a revision of the financial effort sharing to ensure that major listed insurers contribute more to prevention and repair.

The document argues that the global military carbon footprint estimates provided by Bohigas et al (ranging from 0.5% to 1.3% of global emissions) are unreliable due to implausible assumptions and incomplete data. Specifically, it notes that the lower estimate assumes non-US militaries have zero emissions, while the upper estimate relies on US emissions intensity which may not reflect the higher fossil-fuel intensity of other major military spenders like China, Russia, India, and Saudi Arabia. The author further highlights the omission of aviation's upper-atmosphere heating effects, 'scope 3+' war-fighting impacts, and the potential of environmentally-extended input output models (EEIOMs) to provide more accurate data.

The global pipeline for wind and utility-scale solar projects grew by 11% in 2025, reaching 4.9 TW. While China and India lead in construction and prospective capacity, G7 nations show stagnant growth in their pipelines, creating a gap in meeting the COP28 goal to triple renewable energy capacity by 2030.

A study by World Weather Attribution on the impact of nine named storms in the western Mediterranean, finding that while evidence is uncertain, there is a trend toward increased intensity of extreme heavy rainfall events, particularly in northern regions, exacerbated by urban development in floodplains.

The document proposes tripartite contracts to address high electricity prices and market volatility in Europe, which currently hinder industrial decarbonisation. By placing a public contracting entity between clean energy generators and industrial consumers, these agreements aim to provide long-term revenue certainty for developers and fixed price certainty for industries. The brief highlights that while technologies for low- to medium-heat processes are ready, market gaps and electricity taxation remain barriers. It notes that the European Commission is developing such agreements for offshore wind, grids, and storage, drawing on practices from Spain, France, and Italy.

The briefing discusses the systemic nature of climate disinformation, driven by the public relations industry and Big Tech algorithms for profit. It highlights Spain's initiative to hold digital platforms and executives legally accountable for the algorithmic amplification of illegal content and disinformation. The text also notes the European Union's endorsement of the UN Declaration on Information Integrity on Climate Change and the implementation of fossil fuel advertising bans in cities like The Hague, Amsterdam, and Florence as models for protecting the public from corporate-driven deception.

The document argues that fossil fuel companies use sports sponsorship and advertising to gain social license and normalize polluting consumption, which hinders climate policy. It calls for Norway to implement a ban on fossil fuel advertising, similar to restrictions on tobacco and alcohol, noting that a Klimakultur poll across seven countries shows majority support for such bans in winter sports due to concerns over snow loss.

The document outlines how to cover torrential rains by focusing on the scientific drivers of extreme precipitation, the disproportionate impact on vulnerable populations, the role of territorial planning, and potential adaptation solutions.

The guide outlines best practices for covering wildfires, advising journalists on physical safety, the distinction between climate-driven conditions and ignition sources, and the importance of reporting on vulnerable populations and adaptation measures. It notes that while direct attribution of a single fire to climate change is difficult, global warming increases the frequency and intensity of disasters through higher temperatures and prolonged droughts.

The document advocates for the introduction of wealth taxes in South Africa to combat inequality and fund socioeconomic rights. It challenges the notion that wealth taxes harm growth, arguing instead that redirecting wealth toward public spending can stimulate demand and investment. The brief recommends a combination of Financial Transaction Taxes (FTTs), increased dividend taxes, and a progressive net wealth tax, citing successful international examples from countries like France, Argentina, and Colombia.

The document reports that Europe experienced its joint-fourth warmest December on record in 2025, with temperatures 1.99°C above the 1991-2020 mean. For the spring of 2026 (March-May), forecasts project warmer-than-average temperatures across the continent, with the highest anomalies in northeastern Europe, and generally weakly positive precipitation anomalies.

ClientEarth argues that the proposed Ocean Act must move from 'paper commitments to real practice' by becoming a legally binding Regulation rather than a Directive. The organization advocates for the achievement of 'Good Environmental Status' (GES) under the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD) as the overarching objective, which would prioritize environmental thresholds over socio-economic goals. Key recommendations include establishing a legally binding target for 30% of EU seas as effectively managed Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) by 2030, banning bottom trawling in MPAs, and phasing out harmful fisheries subsidies. ClientEarth also proposes 'Ocean Mainstreaming' to integrate marine protection across all EU sectoral policies and calls for stronger enforcement mechanisms, including access to justice and infringement proceedings, to close the existing implementation gap.