Record rainfall causes flooding in Hong Kong days after typhoon

Record rainfall in Hong Kong caused widespread flooding in the early hours of Friday, disrupting road and rail traffic just days after the city dodged major damage from a super typhoon.

The Hong Kong Observatory, the city's weather agency, reported hourly rainfall of 158.1 millimetres at its headquarters in the hour leading up to midnight, the highest since records began in 1884.

Late on Thursday, authorities in the Chinese city said various districts had been flooded and emergency services were conducting rescue operations. Members of the public were instructed to stay in a safe place.

"Heavy rain will bring flash floods," the Observatory warned. "Residents living in close proximity to rivers should stay alert to weather conditions and should consider evacuation" if their homes are flooded, it added.

No injuries were reported in the early hours of Friday.

Earlier in the week, Typhoon Haikui left a trail of destruction in Taiwan before crossing the strait and making landfall in China's Fujian province on Tuesday.

Hong Kong's observatory said the latest torrential rain was brought by the "trough of low pressure associated with (the) remnant of Haikui".

The city's Mass Transit Railway announced that it would partially suspend service on one of its lines after a station in the Wong Tai Sin district was flooded, with another handful of stations also affected.

Footage circulated on social media showed an MTR train not stopping at Wong Tai Sin station, which had floodwater on its platform.

Other video clips showed cars and buses half-submerged on main roads.

Heavy rain was also reported in the neighbouring Chinese tech hub of Shenzhen.

Shenzhen prepared to discharge water from its reservoirs, according to Hong Kong officials, which they said could lead to flooding in parts of northern Hong Kong as a result.

Southern China was hit the previous weekend by two typhoons in quick succession -- Saola and Haikui -- though Hong Kong avoided a feared direct hit.

Tens of millions of people in the densely populated coastal areas of southern China had sheltered indoors ahead of the storms.

Climate change has increased the intensity of tropical storms, with more rain and stronger gusts leading to flash floods and coastal damage, experts say.

Agence France-Presse

Energy sector CO2 emissions hit record in 2022: study

LONDON - Global energy sector carbon dioxide emissions hit a record peak last year counter to Paris commitments, a key study warned, and highlighted the "worst ever" impacts of climate change.

UK-based global industry body the Energy Institute laid out the main findings of its Statistical Review of World Energy, conducted with consultancies Kearney and KPMG.

"Carbon dioxide emissions from energy use, industrial processes, flaring and methane... continued to rise to a new high growing 0.8 percent in 2022," read the study.

The annual review was historically published by energy major BP but it has been handed to the institute.

Primary energy consumption grew about one percent last year from 2021, or almost three percent when compared with its pre-Covid level in 2019, the review found.

Fossil fuels remain dominant at 82 percent of consumption, despite a strong showing from renewables.

Meanwhile, wind and solar power together hit a record 12 percent of total electricity generation, helped by the biggest ever increase in capacity for both.

Demand for fuel for transportation continued to rebound from pre-pandemic levels, although China held "significantly" below due to the ongoing impact of its prior 'Zero Covid' restrictions.

Energy Institute President Juliet Davenport warned the sector was heading in the "opposite direction" to the goals of the Paris deal.

"2022 saw some of the worst ever impacts of climate change -- the devastating floods affecting millions in Pakistan, the record heat events across Europe and North America -- yet we have to look hard for positive news on the energy transition in this new data," Davenport said.

"Despite further strong growth in wind and solar in the power sector, overall global energy-related greenhouse gas emissions increased again.

"We are still heading in the opposite direction to that required by the Paris Agreement."

Under the 2015 Paris accord, nations pledged to reach net-zero carbon emissions by the middle of the century with the aim of limiting the increase in global temperatures to 1.5 degrees of pre-industrial levels.

Richard Forrest, chair of Energy Transition Institute at Kearney, added that soaring greenhouse gas emissions reinforced "the need for urgent action to get the world on track to meet the Paris targets."

He noted 2022 was a "turbulent year" that saw energy security top the agenda due to key producer Russia's invasion of Ukraine -- and rebounding post-pandemic demand.

Agence France-Presse

Biden, Metallica and Mariah Carey come together against poverty

NEW YORK, United States - Metallica and Mariah Carey on Saturday led an A-list of musicians, and President Joe Biden made a surprise video appearance, as the Global Citizen Festival sought to mobilize action against poverty and climate change.

Marking its 10th year, the six-hour festival brought thousands to New York's Central Park and featured a sister show in Ghana's capital Accra, where performers included American R&B great Usher and British grime icon Stormzy.

Global Citizen awards tickets to fans in exchange for their commitment to take action to eradicate extreme poverty -- such as contacting elected representatives to encourage foreign aid -- and coincides with the annual UN General Assembly in hopes of raising pressure on world leaders.

"We're inspired and grateful for all the work you've done and want you to know -- your fight is our fight," First Lady Jill Biden said in a video appearance next to her husband.

President Biden -- along with top Senate and House Democrats Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi, who both appeared in person -- highlighted a new climate package that is the most far-reaching legislation ever in the United States to spur clean energy.

But Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley of Barbados warned that action against climate change cannot come quickly enough for islands such as hers.

"Yes, my friends, our time is running out," she said.

Thrash metal legends Metallica got the crowd headbanging with eight songs including a version of "Nothing Else Matters" featuring vocalist Mickey Guyton, who has been outspoken about her experiences as one of the most prominent Black women in country music.

Guests sought to raise awareness on an array of issues including women's rights, especially in light of major protests in Iran following the death of Mahsa Amini, who was allegedly beaten to death after her arrest by morality police who enforce clerical rulers' dress codes on women.

"I have seen my sisters forced to flee abuse, oppression and femicide globally, women like Mahsa Jina Amini," said Anuscheh Amir-Khalili, a refugee advocate in Berlin of Iranian descent.

"We must speak up for oppressed women. I stand here for them," she told the crowd.

European Union chief Ursula von der Leyen, appearing on stage, said, "We have to take care of our girls and our women. They deserve it."

She highlighted recent pledges by Europe including 600 million euros for food security in Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific amid rising hunger in much of the world worsened by Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Mariah Carey was introduced by leading ballerina Misty Copeland, who called the singer with her famed vocal range an inspiration, and was accompanied by a choreographed dance for her classic song "Hero."

Other performers included Maneskin, the new-generation Italian glam rockers who put on an energetic set, Spanish pop star Rosalia, and the Jonas Brothers, with Nick Jonas' wife, Indian screen star Priyanka Chopra, serving as master of ceremonies.

Agence France Presse

How climate change could expose new epidemics

PARIS - Long-dormant viruses brought back to life; the resurgence of deadly and disfiguring smallpox; a dengue or zika "season" in Europe.

These could be disaster movie storylines, but they are also serious and increasingly plausible scenarios of epidemics unleashed by global warming, scientists say.

The COVID-19 pandemic that has swept the globe and claimed over 760,000 lives so far almost certainly came from a wild bat, highlighting the danger of humanity's constant encroachment on the planet's dwindling wild spaces.

But the expanding ecological footprint of our species could trigger epidemics in other ways too. 

Climate change -- already wreaking havoc with one degree Celsius of warming -- is also emerging as a driver of infectious disease, whether by expanding the footprint of malaria- and dengue-carrying mosquitos, or defrosting prehistoric pathogens from the Siberian permafrost.

'IGNORANCE IS OUR ENEMY'

"In my darkest moments, I see a really horrible future for Homo sapiens because we are an animal, and when we extend our borders, things will happen to us," said Birgitta Evengard, a researcher in clinical microbiology at Umea University in Sweden.

"Our biggest enemy is our own ignorance," she added. "Nature is full of microorganisms."

Think of permafrost, a climate change time bomb spread across Russia, Canada and Alaska that contains three times the carbon that has been emitted since the start of industrialization. 


Even if humanity manages to cap global warming at under two degrees Celsius, the cornerstone goal of the 2015 Paris Agreement, the permafrost area will decrease by a quarter by 2100, according to the UN's climate science panel, the IPCC.

And then there are the permafrost's hidden treasures.

"Microorganisms can survive in frozen space for a long, long time," said Vladimir Romanovsky, a professor of geophysics at the University of Alaska in Fairbanks.

AN ANTHRAX COMEBACK? 

As ground thaws, once-frozen soil particles, organic material and microorganisms that had been locked away for millennia are carried toward the surface by water flows, he explained.

"That's how thawing can spread these microorganisms into present day environments." 


There are already examples of ancient, long-frozen bugs coming to life.

"When you put a seed into soil that is then frozen for thousands of years, nothing happens," said Jean-Michel Claverie, an emeritus professor of genomics at the School of Medicine of Aix-Marseille University in France.

"But when you warm the earth, the seed will be able to germinate," he added. "That is similar to what happens with a virus."

Claverie's lab has successfully revived Siberian viruses that are at least 30,000 years old.

These reanimated bugs only attack amoebas, but tens of thousands of years ago there were certainly others that aimed higher up the food chain.

"Neanderthals, mammoths, woolly rhinos all got sick, and many died," said Claverie. "Some of the viruses that caused their sicknesses are probably still in the soil."


The number of bacteria and viruses lurking in the permafrost is incalculable, but the more important question is how dangerous they are.

And here, scientists disagree.

"Anthrax shows that bacteria can be resting in permafrost for hundreds of years and be revived," said Evengard.

In 2016, a child in Siberia died from the disease, which had disappeared from the region at least 75 years earlier.

2-MILLION-YEAR-OLD PATHOGENS

This case has been attributed to the thawing of a long-buried carcass, but some experts counter that the animal remains in question may have been in shallow dirt and thus subject to periodic thawing.


Other pathogens -- such as smallpox or the influenza strain that killed tens of millions in 1917 and 1918 -- may also be present in the sub-Arctic region.

But they "have probably been inactivated", Romanovsky concluded in a study published earlier this year.

For Claverie, however, the return of smallpox -- officially declared eradicated 50 years ago -- cannot be excluded. 18th- and 19th-century victims of the disease "buried in cemetaries in Siberia are totally preserved by the cold," he noted.

In the unlikely event of a local epidemic, a vaccine is available.

The real danger, he added, lies in deeper strata where unknown pathogens that have not seen daylight for two million years or more may be exposed by global warming.

If there were no hosts for the bugs to infect, there would not be a problem, but climate change -- indirectly -- has intervened here as well.

"With the industrial exploitation of the Arctic, all the risk factors are there -- pathogens and the people to carry them," Claverie said.

The revival of ancient bacteria or viruses remains speculative, but climate change has already boosted the spread of diseases that kill about half a million people every year: malaria, dengue, chikungunya, zika.

"Mosquitoes moving their range north are now able to overwinter in some temperate regions," said Jeanne Fair, deputy group leader for biosecurity and public health at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico.

"They also have longer breeding periods."

'CLIMATE CHANGE APERITIF'

Native to southeast Asia, the tiger mosquito (Aedes albopictus) -- which carries dengue and chikungunya -- arrived in southern Europe in the first decade of this century and has been moving rapidly north ever since, to Paris and beyond.

Meanwhile, another dengue-bearing mosquito, Aedes aegypti, has also appeared in Europe. Whichever species may be the culprit, the Europe Center for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) has registered 40 cases of local transmission of dengue between 2010 and 2019.

"An increase in mean temperature could result in seasonal dengue transmission in southern Europe if A. aegypti infected with virus were to be established," according to the Europe Center for Disease Prevention and Control.

As for malaria -- a disease that once blighted southern Europe and the southern United States and for which an effective treatment exists -- the risk of exposure depends in large part on social-economic conditions. 

More than five billion people could be living in malaria-affected regions by 2050 if climate change continues unabated, but strong economic growth and social development could reduce that number to less than two billion, according to a study cited by the IPCC. 

"Recent experience in southern Europe demonstrates how rapidly the disease may reappear if health services falter," the IPCC said in 2013, alluding to a resurgence of cases in Greece in 2008.

In Africa -- which saw 228 million cases of malaria in 2018, 94 percent of the world's total -- the disease vector is moving into new regions, notably the high-altitude plains of Ethiopia and Kenya.

For the moment, the signals for communicable tropical diseases "are worrying in terms of expanding vectors, not necessarily transmission," said Cyril Caminade, an epidemiologist working on climate change at the Institute of Infection and Global Health at the University of Liverpool.

"That said, we're only tasting the aperitif of climate change so far," he added.

Agence France-Presse

Burger King unveils 'Whopper' from cows on green diet

NEW YORK -- For those seeking to tackle climate change and get a fast food fix, Burger King has the answer -- a Whopper from cows that fart and burp less.

The fast-food giant announced Tuesday that select restaurants in five US cities -- New York, Miami, Portland, Los Angeles and Austin, Texas -- would be serving Whoppers made from "reduced methane emissions" beef.

The chain says that adding just 100 grams of lemongrass leaves to a cow's diet late in life could reduce their output of methane, a greenhouse gas responsible for global warming.

Initial study results revealed an up to 33 percent reduction in methane emissions from cows on the new diet in the last three to four months of their lives, Burger King said.

"At Burger King, we believe that delicious, affordable, and convenient meals can also be sustainable," said global chief marketing officer Fernando Machado.

But the company, which worked with two scientists on the project, said it hopes to inspire other groups to make similar moves by making their findings public.

"If the whole industry, from farmers, meat suppliers, and other brands join us, we can increase scale and collectively help reduce methane emissions that affect climate change," Machado said.

Burger King had already moved to respond to changing tastes of environmentally conscious customers who limit their meat intake by offering a vegetarian Whopper last year. 

Agence France-Presse

Nestle vows to plant 3 million trees in Mexico, Brazil to help set off emissions

MEXICO CITY - Nestle SA is launching a reforestation project to plant at least 3 million trees in Mexico and Brazil in the next year and a half as the Swiss food group strives for carbon neutrality by 2050, executives told Reuters.

Nestle is one of a number of major corporations including Microsoft and Amazon that have taken on ambitious targets to reduce carbon emissions, often in response to growing demands from customers and investors to step up efforts to combat climate change.

In September, Nestle - whose products range from KitKat chocolates to Nescafe coffee, Cheerios cereal and Poland Spring bottled water - signed a United Nations-backed pledge aimed at limiting global temperature rise and said it would adjust its business to prioritize renewable energy, alternative packaging materials and carbon absorption.

At a cost of $1 to $15 per tree, the first phase of Nestle's reforestation project could cost as much as $45 million for planting alone.

Laurent Freixe, Nestle's chief executive for the Americas, said the project would be a starting point for further efforts to protect the environment in places like Mexico, where the company sources coffee, cocoa, sugar and dairy products.

"If we want to sustain the economy in this country, if we want to sustain our business in this country, we need to invest in the environment and sustainability, and enhance the biodiversity of the country," Freixe said in an interview on Tuesday.

The company is working with non-profit One Tree Planted to determine which types of trees to plant and where, with Mexico's southeastern states of Tabasco and Veracruz among the options.

The carbon captured by the first million trees would eventually be enough to offset the emissions of a coffee-processing plant expected to start operating in October in Veracruz, said Magdi Batato, Nestle's head of operations.

The $154 million plant is expected to process 20,000 tonnes of coffee per year and employ 250 people directly. When it is fully up and running, Batato said its use of technology, automation and clean energy would make it a model among Nestle's factories.

The project was touted in 2018 by Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador as the first major investment announcement under his administration, and a source of direct and indirect jobs that would push Mexico to become Nestle's top coffee producer. 

source: news.abs-cbn.com

Microsoft to erase its carbon footprint from atmosphere for climate push

Microsoft Corp on Thursday set a new ambition among Fortune 500 companies in addressing climate change, pledging to remove as much carbon as it has emitted in its 45-year history.

The focus on clearing carbon from the atmosphere sets Microsoft's climate goals apart from other corporate pledges which have focused on cutting ongoing emissions or preventing future ones.

"If the last decade has taught us anything, it's that technology built without these principles can do more harm than good," Chief Executive Satya Nadella said at a media event at Microsoft's headquarters in Redmond, Washington.

"We must begin to offset the damaging effects of climate change," he said, adding if global temperatures continue to rise unabated "the results will be devastating."


The plan includes the creation of a "Climate Innovation Fund," which will invest $1 billion over the next four years to speed up the development of carbon removal technology.

The announcement by the world's largest software company reflects the rising profile of US corporate action after President Donald Trump announced in 2017 his decision to pull the United States out of the Paris Agreement, the global pact to fight climate change.

HISTORICAL EMISSIONS A NEW GOAL

Microsoft's pledge to address its historical emissions may resonate with some developing nations which say countries that created the most carbon, and wealth in the process, are not taking responsibility for their past pollution.

US Senators Chris Coons, a Democrat from Delaware, and Mike Braun, an Indiana Republican, applauded Microsoft.

"The scope and scale of this proposal is exactly the kind of bold action we need from the business community," the pair, chairs of the bipartisan Senate Climate Solutions Caucus, said in a statement.

Microsoft plans to cut carbon emissions by more than half by 2030 across its supply chain, an effort requiring technology that does not fully exist, company President Brad Smith said.

He said Microsoft would widen the reach of a fee it has charged its business divisions to account for their carbon emissions.

Microsoft said it charges $15 per metric ton for core carbon emissions internally and will expand the coverage in phases to cover all emissions. Microsoft's price is lower than that for carbon traded in California, where it was $17 per ton in the most recent auction, and the European Union, where it was estimated to trade at 26.57 euros, or $29.58, in the current quarter.

CARBON CAPTURE RAISES QUESTIONS

Co-founder Bill Gates was an early backer of British Columbia-based Carbon Engineering, among a handful of developers of direct air capture technology.

Carbon Engineering CEO Steve Oldham said the firm's first direct air capture plant is under construction and is expected to capture 1 million metric tons of carbon dioxide each year.

Microsoft "is at the helm of what could be a new movement towards negative emissions," Elizabeth V. Sturcken of the Environmental Defense Fund, said in a statement, adding that the nonprofit advocacy group was eager for Microsoft to use its political influence as well.

Microsoft's goal of removing enough carbon by 2050 to account for all its emissions since its founding in 1975 includes direct emissions from sources such as company vehicles and indirect emissions from electricity use.

Question remain about the technology that Microsoft is considering. Sue Reid, vice president of climate and energy at US nonprofit Ceres, which works with companies on sustainability commitments, said the economics of direct air capture have yet to be worked out, and reforestation rates may not be fast enough to catch up with growing emissions.

"That math is all facing some new uncertainty and vulnerabilities tied to exacerbated climate change impact, (like there being) more wildfires," she said.

INVESTORS WANT ACTION ON CLIMATE

Microsoft's announcement comes as big investors pay more attention to how companies tackle climate change.

Earlier this week, BlackRock CEO Larry Fink said companies must act or face investors' anger over how unsustainable business practices might curb their future wealth.

But even as technology companies have stepped in with climate goal plans, they have faced employee criticism for doing too little.

Amazon.com Inc, the world's largest online retailer, last year pledged to be "net zero carbon" by 2040 and to buy 100,000 electric delivery vans from a startup, after employee activists pushed the retailer to toughen its stance on climate change.

Microsoft plans to become net zero carbon a decade earlier than Amazon, although its emissions are roughly a third of Amazon's.

Microsoft expects to release 16 million metric tons of carbon in 2020, including indirect emissions from activities like corporate travel.

Amazon, whose cloud business is bigger than Microsoft's, delivers billions of packages as the largest internet retailer and owns grocer Whole Foods. It emitted more than 44 million metric tons of carbon in 2018, including indirect sources.

It was not immediately clear if the figures reported by the companies were exactly comparable.

EMPLOYEE ACTIVISTS HIGHLIGHT OIL CONTRACTS

Microsoft and Amazon have come under fire from activist tech workers who have demanded that they stop supplying technology to oil and gas companies because of the polluting nature of fossil-fuel extraction. Microsoft in 2017 announced a multi-year deal to sell cloud services to US energy giant Chevron Corp .

Microsoft Workers 4 Good, which says it represents Microsoft employees aiming to hold the company to its stated values, lauded the climate plan but said "this goal is incompatible with contracts that aim to increase oil extraction, a process which we know is not sustainable."

In a blog post, Microsoft on Thursday reiterated its commitment to working with oil and gas providers, saying it is "imperative that we enable energy companies to transition" to renewable energy and carbon-capture technologies.

Bill Weihl, former director of sustainability at Facebook Inc, said Microsoft does not take into account that its work with oil companies could outweigh the gains of measures Microsoft takes on its own carbon reduction.

"There is good stuff here," Weihl said. "But the topline message, that this is urgent, is not matched by what they're focusing on."

source: news.abs-cbn.com

YouTube steers viewers to climate denial videos: US activist group

YouTube has driven millions of viewers to climate denial videos, a US activist group said Thursday as it called for stopping "free promotion of misinformation" at the platform.

New York-based Avaaz said it scrutinized results of Google-owned YouTube searches using the terms "global warming," "climate change," and "climate manipulation" to see what was offered by an "up next" feature and as suggestions.

In response to the report, YouTube said it downplays "borderline" video content while spotlighting authoritative sources and displaying information boxes on searches related to climate change and other topics.

The video sharing platform has remained firm that while it removes content violating its policies against hate, violence and scams, it does not censor ideas expressed in accordance with its rules.

"Our recommendations systems are not designed to filter or demote videos or channels based on specific perspectives," YouTube said in response to an AFP inquiry.

The company added that it has "significantly invested in reducing recommendations of borderline content and harmful misinformation, and raising up authoritative voices."

According to Avaaz, 16 percent of the top 100 videos served up in relation to the term "global warming" contained misinformation, with the top 10 of those averaging more than a million views each.

The portion of potentially misleading videos climbed to 21 percent for YouTube searches on the term "climate manipulation" but fell to eight percent for searches using the term "climate change," according to Avaaz.

"This is not about free speech, this is about the free advertising," Avaaz senior campaigner Julie Deruy said in a release.

"YouTube is giving factually inaccurate videos that risk confusing people about one of the biggest crises of our time," she added.

Discovering the algorithm

An AFP search at YouTube using the term "global warming" yielded a results page topped by a box containing a Wikipedia summary of the subject and a link to the page at the online encyclopedia.

A list of suggested videos on the topic was dominated by sources such as National Geographic, NASA, TED and major news organizations including CBS, PBS, Sky News, and AFP.

Last year, consumption on "channels" of authoritative news publishers at the platform grew by 60 percent, according to YouTube.

"We prioritize authoritative voices for millions of news and information queries, and surface information panels on topics prone to misinformation -- including climate change -- to provide users with context alongside their content," YouTube said.

Avaaz called on YouTube to yank climate change misinformation videos from its recommendation formula completely, and make certain such content doesn't make money from ads at the platform.

The nonprofit also wants YouTube to collaborate with fact-checkers and post correction notices on videos with false climate change information.

YouTube automatically placed ads on some of the videos containing misinformation regarding climate change, making money for the service and the content creators, according to Avaaz.

This could apply to news videos expressing rival sides of the climate change debate. YouTube works with advertisers and provides tools to opt-out of having their ads displayed with certain types of content, such as climate change discourse.

Avaaz said after seeing the YouTube response that the company's rankings lacked transparency and "put a blackbox around their algorithm preventing researchers and investigators from seeing exactly what is happening inside."

"The bottom line is that YouTube should not feature, suggest, promote, advertise or lead users to misinformation," Deruy said.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

Climate crisis to reshape finance: BlackRock CEO

Laurence D. Fink, the founder and chief executive of BlackRock, announced Tuesday that his firm would make investment decisions with environmental sustainability as a core goal.

BlackRock is the world’s largest asset manager with nearly $7 trillion in investments, and this move will fundamentally shift its investing policy — and could reshape how corporate America does business and put pressure on other large money managers to follow suit.

Fink’s annual letter to the chief executives of the world’s largest companies is closely watched, and in the 2020 edition he said BlackRock would begin to exit certain investments that “present a high sustainability-related risk,” such as those in coal producers. His intent is to encourage every company, not just energy firms, to rethink their carbon footprints.

“Awareness is rapidly changing, and I believe we are on the edge of a fundamental reshaping of finance,” Fink wrote in the letter, which was obtained by The New York Times. “The evidence on climate risk is compelling investors to reassess core assumptions about modern finance.”

The firm, he wrote, would also introduce new funds that shun fossil fuel-oriented stocks, move more aggressively to vote against management teams that are not making progress on sustainability, and press companies to disclose plans “for operating under a scenario where the Paris Agreement’s goal of limiting global warming to less than two degrees is fully realized.”

Fink has not always been the first to address social issues, but his annual letter — such as his dictum 2 years ago that companies needed to have a purpose beyond profits — has the influence to change the conversations inside boardrooms around the globe.

And now Fink is sounding an alarm on a crisis that he believes is the most profound in his 40 years in finance. “Even if only a fraction of the science is right today, this is a much more structural, long-term crisis,” he wrote.

A longtime Democrat, Fink insisted in an interview that the decision was strictly business. “We are fiduciaries,” he said. “Politics isn’t part of this.”

BlackRock itself has come under criticism from both industry and environmental groups for being behind on pushing these issues. Just last month, a British hedge fund manager, Christopher Hohn, said that it was “appalling” of BlackRock not to require companies to disclose their sustainability efforts, and that the firm’s previous efforts had been “full of greenwash.”

Climate activists staged several protests outside BlackRock’s offices last year, and Fink himself has received letters from members of Congress urging more action on climate-related investing. According to Ceres and FundVotes, a unit of Morningstar, BlackRock had among the worst voting records on climate issues.

In recent years, many companies and investors have committed to focusing on the environmental impact of business, but none of the largest investors in the country have been willing to make it a central component of their investment strategy.

In that context, Fink’s move is a watershed — one that could spur a national conversation among financiers and policymakers. However, it’s also possible that some of the most ardent climate activists will see it as falling short.

Even so, the new approach may put pressure on the other large money managers and financial firms in the United States — Vanguard, T. Rowe Price and JPMorgan Chase, among them — to articulate more ambitious strategies around sustainability.

When 631 investors from around the world, representing some $37 trillion in assets, signed a letter last month calling on governments to step up their efforts against climate change, the biggest US firms were conspicuously absent.

BlackRock’s decision may give CEOs license to change their own companies’ strategy and focus more on sustainability, even if doing so cuts into short-term profits. Such a shift could also provide cover for banks and other financial institutions that finance carbon-emitting businesses to change their own policies.

Had Fink moved a decade ago to pull BlackRock’s funds out of companies that contribute to climate change, his clients would have been well served. In the past 10 years, companies in the S&P 500 energy sector had gained just 2 percent in total. In the same period, the broader S&P 500 nearly tripled.

In an interview, Fink said the decision developed from conversations with “business leaders and how they’re thinking about it, talking to different scientists, reading different research.” Fink asked BlackRock to research the economic impacts of climate change; it found that they are already appearing in a meaningful way in the form of higher insurance premiums, for fires and floods, and expects cities to have to pay more for their bonds.

Wherever he goes, he said, he is bombarded with climate questions from investors, often to the exclusion of issues that until recently were once considered more important. “Climate change is almost invariably the top issue that clients around the world raise with BlackRock,” he wrote in his letter.

He wrote that he anticipated a major shift, much sooner than many might imagine, in the way money will be allocated.

“This dynamic will accelerate as the next generation takes the helm of government and business,” he wrote. “As trillions of dollars shift to millennials over the next few decades, as they become CEOs and CIOs, as they become the policymakers and heads of state, they will further reshape the world’s approach to sustainability.”

While BlackRock makes its green push, the Trump administration is going in the opposite direction, repealing and weakening laws aimed at protecting the environment and promoting sustainability. Indeed, Fink’s effort appeared to be another example of the private sector pressing on issues that the White House has abandoned.

Still, Fink made plain that while he intends for the firm to consider climate risks, he would not pursue an across-the-board sale of energy companies that produce fossil fuels. Because of its sheer size, BlackRock will remain one of the world’s largest investors in fossil-fuel companies.

“Despite recent rapid advances in technology, the science does not yet exist to replace many of today’s essential uses of hydrocarbons,” he wrote. “We need to be mindful of the economic, scientific, social and political realities of the energy transition.”

BlackRock manages money for countries across the globe as well as US states and municipalities. It could face opposition for its new stance in areas that benefit from fossil fuels, like Middle East countries or states where oil has become a significant part of their economies.

Fink said that because much of the money BlackRock manages is invested in passive index funds like those that track the S&P 500, the firm was unable to simply sell shares in companies that it felt were not focused on sustainability. But he did say that the firm could do so in what are known as “actively managed funds,” in which BlackRock can choose which stocks are included.

BlackRock also plans to offer new passive funds — including target-date funds that are based on a person’s age and are meant to be used to prepare for retirement — that will not include fossil fuel companies. Investors will be able to choose these instead of more traditional funds. To the extent that fossil fuel companies are in an index, BlackRock plans to push them to consider their eventual transition to renewable energy. Fink said the company would vote against them if they are not moving fast enough.

“We will be increasingly disposed to vote against management and board directors when companies are not making sufficient progress on sustainability-related disclosures and the business practices and plans underlying them,” he wrote.


2020 The New York Times Company

source: news.abs-cbn.com

Australian firefighter dies battling blazes, raising death toll to 28

MELBOURNE - A firefighter died while on duty on Saturday in Australia's state of Victoria, raising the toll from this season's devastating bushfires to 28 deaths as the government deploys mental health services to aid those in affected areas.

"It is with great sadness that we confirm that a ... firefighter from Parks Victoria has been involved in an incident while working on a fire in the Omeo area resulting in a fatality," Forest Fire Management Victoria Chief Fire Officer Chris Hardman said in a statement.

Since October, thousands of Australians have been subjected to repeat evacuations as huge and unpredictable fires scorched more than 10.3 million hectares (25.5 million acres), an area roughly the size of South Korea.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who has been heavily criticized by the opposition and environmental groups for his handling of the bushfires and his stance on climate change, was set to address the crisis on Sunday morning on ABC News television.

Meanwhile, his office released a statement saying that more mental health services will be provided for those affected by the fires.

"We need to ensure the trauma and mental health needs of our people are supported in a way like we never have before," Morrison was cited as saying.

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Australia races to evacuate stranded as bushfires take a breather

MELBOURNE/SYDNEY  - Australian officials used a respite on Monday from fierce wildfires that have killed 24 people across the country's southeast to race to reopen blocked roads and evacuate people who have been trapped for days.

A second day of light rain and cool winds brought some relief from heatwave-fueled blazes that ripped through two states over the weekend, but officials warned the hazardous weather conditions were expected to return later in the week.

"There is no room for complacency," New South Wales state Premier Gladys Berejiklian told reporters on Monday morning. Two people remained missing as around 130 fires continued to burn in the state, though not at a high-alert level.

Authorities redoubled their efforts on Monday to provide supplies and repatriate thousands of people who have been trapped by fire lines in coastal towns for several days.

"This morning it is all about recovery, making sure people who have been displaced have somewhere safe (to go) and it is making sure we have resources to build up the presence on the ground to clean up the roads, clean up where the rubble exists," Berejiklian said.

Dean Linton, a resident of Jindabyne in the Snowy Mountains, used the break from an immediate threat to his town to visit his wife and four children who had evacuated to Sydney. He also used the 870 kilometer round trip to pick up a fire-fighting pump and generator to help him protect the family home.

"There's a lot of fuel in that national park; it would only take one lightning strike," Linton told Reuters.

The bushfire season started earlier than normal this year following a three-year drought that has left much of the country's bushland tinder-dry and vulnerable to fires. More than 5 million hectares (12 million acres) of land have been destroyed.

Following are highlights of what is happening across Australia:

* There were no emergency warnings in fire-ravaged states on Monday following the weather change. Victoria state had 25 "watch and act" alerts and South Australia had one "watch and act" alert. In NSW, all fires were back at the "advice" level, the lowest alert level, NSW Rural Fire Service Commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons said.

* Fire officials said the light rain that has brought some relief also posed challenges for back-burning efforts to reduce fuel for future fires and bring existing fires under control.

* In Batemans Bay on the New South Wales south coast, power was expected to remain out for several more days. Further south in Bermagui, food and fuel were running out, Australian Broadcasting Corp reported.

* Military helicopters were due to evacuate more people, including the elderly and young children, from Mallacoota on Monday. More than a thousand people were evacuated from the Victoria state town by two naval ships on Friday.

* Insurers have received 5,850 bushfire-related claims in NSW, Victoria, South Australia and Queensland since the Insurance Council declared a bushfire catastrophe on Nov 8.

* Bushfire losses are estimated at A$375 million ($260 million) since November, with a further A$56 million in insured property losses in September and October, the Insurance Council said. Figures do not include properties lost over the past 24 to 36 hours in areas such as the NSW Southern Highlands and south coast.

* Accommodation provider Aspen Group said on Monday it expects a A$500,000 hit to both revenue and net operating income from the bushfires.

* Canberra was running short of masks with the nation's capital blanketed in smoke, ACT emergency services said. The National Gallery of Australia said it was closed to protect visitors and art works. The government department responsible for coordinating Australia’s response to disasters and emergency management also closed its doors due to poor air quality.

* Army personnel plan to begin digging graves to bury more than one hundred thousand sheep and cattle killed in the bushfires.

* Actor Russell Crowe skipped Hollywood’s Golden Globes ceremony, where he won an award for playing former Fox News Chief Executive Roger Ailes in the TV series “The Loudest Voice in the Room.” Presenter Jennifer Aniston said Crowe stayed in Australia to protect his family from the bushfires and read remarks he had prepared where he said the fires were "climate change based."

* Prime Minister Scott Morrison continued to face criticism of his handling of the crisis. "Poor political judgment is one thing. Competency is another thing altogether. This is the political danger zone Scott Morrison wants to avoid in his handling of the bushfire crisis," Rupert Murdoch's The Australian, a supporter of the government, said in an article by the newspaper's national affairs editor on Monday.

* State officials have thanked people for donations of clothes and food, but said that cash was more useful.

* 41 US firefighters are in Victoria with a further 70 from Canada and the United States expected to join on Jan. 8, the Victoria Country Fire Authority said on Twitter.

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Australian bushfires ease on cooler weather, death toll rises

SYDNEY -- A weather change eased fire threats in southeastern Australia on Sunday after a horror day of blazes that killed one man and injured four firefighters, though authorities said risks remained with a number of fires burning at emergency levels.

Property losses from Saturday's wildfires across eastern Victoria and southern New South Wales were estimated in the hundreds, but authorities said mass evacuations by residents of at-risk areas appear to have prevented major loss of life.

Nearly 150 fires were still burning in New South Wales, and dozens more were burning in Victoria on Sunday morning.

A southerly change that came through on Saturday night has brought cooler temperatures, after they topped 40 C in many areas on Saturday, and there was even the prospect of some light rain in coastal areas in coming days.

"It will be a reprieve of sorts, it will be a psychological reprieve for many, but it's certainly not going to be the sort of relief we're looking for in terms of getting under control all these fires or putting these fires out," NSW Rural Fire Services Commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons said.

The death of a 47-year-old man who was defending a friend's rural property in NSW took the national toll this fire season to 24.

The weather change brought with it strong winds that whipped up fires and kept them burning overnight. In the Southern Highlands region south of Sydney, a new fire was burning out of control after the winds helped drive an existing blaze to jump the Shoalhaven and Kangaroo rivers.

NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian said the focus would be on recovery and helping those who were displaced and had lost their homes, as well as containing fires still burning. She said these were unprecedented circumstances.

"We can't pretend that this is something we have experienced before. It's not," she said, pointing to the concurrence of major fires, and threats to towns previously considered safe.

"The weather activity we're seeing, the extent and spread of the fires, the speed at which they're going, the way in which they are attacking communities who have never ever seen fire before is unprecedented. We have to accept that."

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'They told people not to come': Australia's bushfires ravage tourism industry

SYDNEY - Pillars of fire and smoke from bushfires are tarnishing Australia's reputation for pristine vistas abounding in wildlife and wreaking havoc on tourism, operators said, as authorities are forced to cancel concerts, close parks and evacuate towns.

The smoke has shrouded entire cities and driven air quality to unhealthy levels, with at least 10 people dying in the fires in the past week, while colonies of animals such as koalas and flying foxes have been destroyed.

"Seeing all the images of fires on television and social media is not going to help, it puts a dent in Australia's reputation as a safe tourist destination," said Shane Oliver, chief economist at AMP Capital.

"It's come at a time when the economy was already fragile," he added, ranking tourism as Australia's fourth biggest export whose strength officials had been counting on to help offset a domestic reluctance to spend.

Bushfires burning for weeks near the world heritage site of the Blue Mountains west of Sydney in the southeastern state of New South Wales have driven away tourists.

As visitors take to social media to warn others to steer clear, the number of busloads of tourists each day has fallen to about 4 from 15 or 20, said Stacey Reynolds, a receptionist at the Blue Mountains Backpacker Hostel in Katoomba.

"They told people not to come in and it's affected everything, from restaurants to motels to backpackers to cafes," she added. "The streets are empty."

Although there is no published nationwide data on tourism since the fires took hold in late spring, Australia attracted 2.71 million holiday makers last summer, up 3.2 percent from the previous year, as many fled the northern hemisphere winter.

Hotels in the largest city of Sydney saw a fall of 10 percent in guest numbers in December, the Accommodation Association of Australia said.

"The fires and the smoke have had a real brand and reputational damage in Sydney," added its chief executive, Dean Long.

The train and cable network of Scenic World in the Blue Mountains had 50,000 fewer visitors in December, down 50 percent from last year, Chief Experience Officer Amanda Byrne said.

Scenic World was open, but the hotels around the area are having more cancellations than bookings, she said.

Government agency Tourism Australia, which released a new advertisement last month to lure Britons to beautiful beaches and stunning scenery, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The scorching temperatures and bushfires, which have also burnt vineyards in South Australia and warmed the usually cool island state of Tasmania, will hit the sector hard, said Judith Mair, who studies tourism, environment and consumer behavior.

"It will be in stages - immediately with evacuations, dislocations and cancellations, but also in the longer term, because tourists buy holidays based on the image of a destination and Australia's is being badly affected," said Mair, a professor at the University of Queensland Business School.

Hundreds of national parks in the southeastern states of New South Wales and Victoria, thronged by 100 million visitors a year, have closed.

With fires burning nearby, Christopher Warren, co-proprietor of a bed and breakfast in Kangaroo Valley in New South Wales, said he had to evacuate his guests.

"The worst-case scenario is that we would be hit by a fire and our business would be destroyed," said Warren, who saw the best case as a loss of income exceeding A$80,000 ($56,048), through the disruption of 3 of his busiest months.

Paul Mackie, who uses AirBnB to rent out an apartment on Sydney's Bondi Beach to British and European tourists in the peak summer holiday period was hit by last-minute cancellations.

"I had bookings for the whole of this period going for the next couple of months, but a lot have cancelled because they said they saw the news of the fires," Mackie added.

AirBnB declined to comment.

A Sydney airport spokesman said it did not have recent statistics on whether the fires were hitting arrival. A Qantas spokeswoman declined to comment on whether the wildfires had hurt bookings.

The fires have spotlighted Australia's environment policies, criticized most recently at a UN summit in Madrid, said Susanne Becken, a professor of sustainable tourism at Griffith University in Queensland.

"The government's response to the climate crisis does not bode well...and this is not good for tourism," Becken said.

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Australian Prime Minister jeered by angry bushfire victims

MELBOURNE - Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison faced enraged hecklers and an angry firefighter in a town ravaged by bushfires, piling pressure on the leader amid an unprecedented crisis that has killed at least 18 people.

A firefighter refused to shake Morrison's hand when he visited the town of Cobargo in New South Wales state on Thursday.

Video footage showed Morrison tried to grab the man's hand, who then got up and walked away, sparking an apology from the prime minister. A local fire official explained that the man had lost his house while defending others' homes.

Another man blasted Morrison for watching fireworks over Sydney Harbor from his official waterfront mansion, Kirribilli House, while fires raged further south on New Year's Eve.

"You won't be getting any votes down here, buddy. You're an idiot," the man shouted.

"I don't see Kirribilli burning after the fireworks," he screamed.

Morrison said on Friday he didn't take the attacks personally.

"I understand the hurt, the anger and the frustration," he said in an interview on 3AW radio.

"Whether they're angry with me or they're angry about their situation, all I know is that they're hurting and it's my job to be there to try and offer some comfort and support," he said.

Morrison had walked away from a Cobargo woman who urged him to provide more funding to the town and state firefighters.

"This is not fair. We're totally forgotten about down here. Every single time this area has a flood or a fire, we get nothing," another woman shouted as Morrison drove away.

Even a state politician from his own Liberal party whose seat is in the region took a swipe at the prime minister.

"To be honest, the locals probably gave him the welcome he probably deserved," said New South Wales transport minister Andrew Constance.

The prime minister, who won a surprise election victory last May, ended 2019 on a sour note with fires raging across 5 states while he took off on a family holiday to Hawaii. Facing criticism, he cut the holiday short and apologized for making a mistake.

He urged locals and holidaymakers, who on Thursday were forced to evacuate fire ravaged areas, to be patient, but he is facing criticism for not doing enough to fight the underlying causes of the bushfires or combating the crisis.

"The challenge now is the scale of what we're seeing across several states now. Those resources are being stretched," he said on local radio.

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Australian bushfire smoke turns New Zealand glaciers brown

WELLINGTON -- Smoke from Australia's bushfires has created a haze across New Zealand thousands of kilometers away with normally white glaciers turning a shade of caramel, according to social media posts Thursday.

The acrid-smelling smoke first appeared in the country early Wednesday when in many areas the sun appeared as either a red or golden orb, depending on the thickness of the haze.

"Smoke which has traveled around 2,000km across the Tasman Sea can clearly be seen," New Zealand's official forecaster MetService tweeted. 

"Visibility in the smoke haze is as low as 10km in the worst affected areas." 

A Twitter user called Miss Roho tweeted: "We can actually smell the burning here in Christchurch." 

Another woman, Rachel, posted a photo of the Franz Josef Glacier -- more than 2,000 kilometers (1,240 miles) away -- with its usual pristine white taking on a brown hue.

"Near Franz Josef glacier. The 'caramelized' snow is caused by dust from the bushfires. It was white yesterday," she said in a post Wednesday.

Comedian Jemaine Clement posted a photo of a golden orb.

"All the way over in NZ the Australian bushfire smoke in the atmosphere giving us this strange sun," he said.

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Climate champions Thunberg and Attenborough join forces to push for change

BARCELONA - Two titan climate campaigners, Greta Thunberg and David Attenborough, joined forces on Monday to push politicians and businesses to step up action on climate change after a year in which schoolchildren took to the world's streets in protest.

Swedish teen activist Thunberg, who turns 17 this week, said 2019 had been "a very strange year" as millions of young people skipped school to demonstrate over slow progress on tackling climate change, inspired by her weekly vigils at the Swedish parliament.

British naturalist and broadcaster David Attenborough, 93, said Thunberg had "aroused the world" about the urgency of reining in global warming, achieving things that people who had worked on the problem for 20-odd years had not.

Attenborough - famous for his TV series showing the impact of environmental degradation on flora and fauna - said he had flagged the need for changes to political structures and daily lives two decades ago, but "no one took a blind bit of notice".

Thunberg urged people to "read up" about climate science and what is being done - or not - to tackle the problem. "We climate activists are being listened to - but that doesn't mean that what we are saying is translated into action," she told BBC Radio 4's Today show on which she was guest editor.

"It needs to be a big shift, and that's what we are waiting for - this tipping point," said Thunberg who has Asperger's syndrome and has also suffered from depression in the past.

Attenborough said it was depressing when governments in the United States, Brazil or Australia indicated they were not taking any notice of what should be done.

"It needs a real electric shock - such as you have produced socially - to bring them to their senses, and let's hope that shock will go on," Attenborough told Thunberg on the Today show.

Thunberg has transformed over the past year from an unknown, solo campaigner to the figurehead of a global movement, winning a list of accolades and awards along the way including being named Time Magazine's Person of the Year for 2019 for her work.

Her father Svante explained how he and his wife had changed their lives as their daughter found out about climate science.

He said Greta did not eat for three months, nor speak to people outside her family at one stage, but becoming a climate activist had enabled her to recover and become a happy teenager who "dances around" and "laughs a lot".

The family has since become vegan and no longer uses planes, instead sailing across the Atlantic this year to attend a U.N. climate action summit in New York and then sailing to Spain for December's global climate talks in Madrid.

"I didn't do it to save the climate, I did it to save my child," said her father.

Both Thunberg and Attenborough called on politicians to ensure next year's U.N. climate talks in Scotland produce a successful outcome, with governments due to strengthen their national plans to combat climate change.

The annual conference in Madrid this month was viewed as disappointing, with large carbon-polluting countries resisting pressure to step up their targets to reduce emissions.

"We, and they, must do everything they can to make sure that it doesn't fail and that we succeed in bringing the science into the conversation," Thunberg said. 

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Teen climate activist Greta Thunberg is Time's Person of the Year

NEW YORK -  Greta Thunberg, the teen activist from Sweden who has urged immediate action to address a global climate crisis, was named Time Magazine's Person of the Year for 2019 on Wednesday.

Thunberg, 16, was lauded by Time for starting an environmental campaign in August 2018 which became a global movement, initially skipping school and camping out in front of the Swedish Parliament to demand action.

"In the 16 months since, she has addressed heads of state at the U.N., met with the Pope, sparred with the President of the United States and inspired 4 million people to join the global climate strike on September 20, 2019, in what was the largest climate demonstration in human history," the magazine said.

"Margaret Atwood compared her to Joan of Arc. After noticing a hundredfold increase in its usage, lexicographers at Collins Dictionary named Thunberg’s pioneering idea, climate strike, the word of the year," Time said.

Thunberg, who turns 17 in January, continues to beat the drum, saying in Madrid last week that the voices of climate strikers are being heard but politicians are still not taking action.

(Reporting by Barbara Goldberg; Editing by Toby Chopra and Nick Zieminski)

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Climate change tops list of global worries for young people, says Amnesty

MADRID - Four out of 10 young people view climate change as one of the most important issues facing the world, an Amnesty International survey on the state of human rights showed on Tuesday.

The Amnesty poll, released on Human Rights Day, asked more than 10,000 people aged 18-25, in 22 countries across 6 continents, to pick up to 5 major issues from a list of 23.

Of those, 41 percent selected climate change, making it the most commonly cited issue globally.

“For young people, the climate crisis is one of the defining challenges of their age," said Kumi Naidoo, Amnesty's outgoing secretary general, noting the huge surge in young people protesting about it on the streets.

"This is a wake-up call to world leaders that they must take far more decisive action to tackle the climate emergency or risk betraying younger generations further,” he added.

Among global worries, pollution was ranked second at 36 percent and terrorism third at 31 percent.

At the national level, however, corruption, pollution, economic instability and income inequality came out as the top 4 concerns, with climate change pushed into fifth place.

"We are living inside a failed system," said Naidoo. "The climate crisis, pollution, corruption and poor living standards are all windows on an alarming truth about how the powerful have exploited their power for selfish and often short-term gain."

When asked who should take the most responsibility for protecting the environment globally, 54 percent of respondents said governments, 28 percent individuals and 14 percent businesses.

And 63 percent agreed governments should take the wellbeing of their citizens more seriously than economic growth.

FUTURE COSTS

On Tuesday, meanwhile, a law firm representing 16 children from around the world, including Swedish teen activist Greta Thunberg, sent letters to the governments of Norway and Canada.

Those countries' support for their oil and gas industries breached the children's rights under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, the letters said.

"Expanding your oil and gas production will lock in decades of greenhouse gas emissions, jeopardizing the universal rights of all children to life, health, and culture," said the letters.

"As children, the petitioners are the ones who will inherit the worst impacts of the climate crisis and bear the future costs of the decisions you make today," they added.

The 16 children, who also include 14-year-old US activist Alexandria Villasenor, in September filed a complaint with the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child against five countries over their carbon emissions.

The new letters came after the Philippines unveiled on Monday the findings of a four-year inquiry into the human rights impacts of climate change in the Southeast Asian country and the contribution of 47 "carbon major" companies to those impacts.

Its Commission on Human Rights, which heard harrowing testimony from typhoon survivors, concluded that the companies played a clear role in causing global warming and its effects.

Based on the evidence, it said fossil fuel companies could be found legally and morally liable for human rights violations arising from climate change.

Scientists say burning fossil fuels for industry, energy and transport is responsible for the vast majority of the greenhouse gas emissions heating up the Earth.

Greenpeace Southeast Asia Executive Director Yeb Saño said a growing number of climate-related legal cases are now being heard or filed across the world.

"With the conclusion of this investigation, we believe many more communities will take a stand against fossil fuel companies that are putting profit before people," he said in a statement.

At the UN talks on Monday, Rose Whipple, an 18-year-old activist from the Santee Dakota tribe in Minnesota, in the United States, spoke about how she and other young people had tried - and failed - to stop approval for a tar sands oil pipeline, arguing it would contaminate their sacred river water.

"We (indigenous people) are on the frontline doing this work today, right now," she told journalists. "We deserve to be listened to, and we also deserve to have our lands back."

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