Strange Women Lying in Ponds

Native Americans set up a “community of occupation” near Wrigley Field, home of the Chicago Cubs, in June 1970. AP Photo/Charles E. Knoblock

Forests and land play an important role in absorbing carbon dioxide emissions, but current models and forecasts don't incorporate a surprising ecological discovery: Despite more available carbon, climate change and warmer temperatures are slowing forest growth. A new study, published in Geological Research Letters, considers for the first time the impact of the discovery on climate models, finding that one of the most-used land models for determining the effects of climate change may overestimate forests' future potential for carbon storage by as much as 30%.

Philip Oltermann at The Guardian:

Canada will ​join the Eurovision song contest in 2027, becoming the first new ⁠participant since Australia in 2015, organisers have announced. Participation is not limited to countries in geographic Europe and instead is open to all members of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), which Canada joined last week. Australia is an associate member. The EBU and the Canadian public broadcaster CBC announced on Wednesday that Canada would send an act to the 2027 contest, to be held in Bulgaria in May. The announcement was made on Canada Day, a national holiday. The CBC president, Marie-Philippe Bouchard, said participation “will allow Canadian talent to be showcased on one of the most storied music stages in the world”.

The CBC said it would announce details of how Canada’s entry would be selected later this year. Some Eurovision countries, such as Sweden and Italy, choose their competitors through televised national selections that are highly anticipated TV events in their own right. In other countries, such as the UK, competitors are picked by the national broadcaster. Eurovision’s director, Martin Green, said Canada’s accession was “a further sign that, while born in Europe, the contest continues to welcome the world”. Canadians have entered Eurovision before under different flags, most famously Céline Dion, who won the 1988 contest competing for Switzerland with the song Ne Partez Pas Sans Moi. The New Brunswick-raised Natasha St-Pier and the Quebec-born La Zarra represented France in 2001 and 2023 respectively.

A court in Paris ruled on Thursday (26 June) that energy company TotalEnergies can no longer ignore its indirect emissions and the environmental risks caused by the consumption of its products. The French oil and gas giant has been given six months to formally assess and report on the environmental risks generated by the use of its fuels and natural gas by consumers, and not only those from its own plants. For the oil major, this includes the transport of goods, employee travel, and above all, the use of the products it sells. The simplest example: when you go to a TotalEnergies service station and fill your car with petrol, the CO2 that comes out of your exhaust pipe as you drive automatically forms part of TotalEnergies' indirect 'Scope 3' emissions. The court has not, however, gone so far as to consider TotalEnergies legally responsible for all its customers' behaviour, nor, as the claimants had wanted, to order it to halt its new oil and gas projects around the world and reduce its oil and gas production by 37 per cent and 25 per cent respectively by 2030.