Climate Home News

Chileis responsible for around 25% of global copper production - a key ingredient for manufacturing clean energy technologies. But in its copper mining heartland, local people face soaring cases of autism and cancer. Local doctors blame  ongoing mining pollution for the health crisis.  Read the full story here 👉 https://lnkd.in/eSP2HTx8

From coal mines and oil refineries to car factories and construction, the global shift to cleaner sources of energy will alter the nature of employment. In a bid to share the pain and gain more equally, governments at the 2022 COP27 climate summit in Egypt launched a “Just Transition Work Programme” (JTWP). But so far it has delivered little – and talks on how the programme should proceed in practice ended without agreement at COP29. The Azerbaijan presidency running the talks instead focused on landing a new deal on climate finance for developing countries, and governments ended up delaying further discussions on the JWTP until the mid-year climate talks next June in Bonn and COP30 in Belém.

Chile is the top producer of copper - a highly conductive metal used in virtually all electricity-related technologies, which is pivotal for the energy transition. But in Chile's copper-mining Antofagasta region, doctors are raising the alarm on soaring numbers of children being diagnosed with severe autism. The reason, they suspect, is pollution from the region's vast open-pit mines. Local people, including pregnant women, are being exposed to dangerous levels of air pollution and dust containing heavy metals caused by mining operations. Several studies have previously established a link between prenatal exposure to air pollution and heavy metals and autism. The region is “a sacrifice zone, and we are the sacrificed,” says one local resident. Brilliant reporting by Ignacio Conese, who travelled to Antofagasta and found a deepening health crisis as global demand for copper soars. https://lnkd.in/ehXdVJ8C

Climate Home News has launched its second series of long reads on the environmental and human impacts of clean energy supply chains with a hard-hitting investigation into the public health crisis caused by copper mining in the Chilean city of Calama. “No one here is safe from exposure. It’s impossible to live a completely healthy life with air as polluted as ours,” says doctor Iván Silva. “The damage is evident, particularly for children.” Silva is part of a group of medical practitioners raising the alarm about soaring numbers of children in the region being born with severe autism and neurodivergent conditions. Efforts to bring the problem blighting the lives of local families to the attention of the authorities have been ignored by the government and copper giant Codelco. Ignacio Conese reports from Antofagasta. https://lnkd.in/eA_49eT5

We’re putting together our readers’ choice for the top climate issues of 2025. Send us your thoughts!

Chile's northern copper-mining region of Antofagasta is facing a worrying public health crisis: children are being diagnosed with severe autism in record numbers. Doctors from the Chilean Medical Association blame pollution from the vast copper mining industry, which dominates the region. Copper is a key ingredient for manufacturing clean energy technologies from electric vehicles and wires for the grid to wind turbines and solar panels. Chile is the world’s top copper producer. But decades of large-scale mining has left a trail of pollution. In the city of Calama, the nerve centre of Chile’s copper industry, air pollution has exceeded the country’s legal limit for years and airborne dust from mining pits frequently blankets the city, exposing residents to dangerous pollutants.  Doctors, researchers and environmental groups are demanding stricter regulations and accountability from the industry. But their calls have remained largely unanswered. Local people feel abandoned in what they call a “sacrifice zone". For our Clean Energy Frontier series, Ignacio Conese reports on the deepening health crisis gripping Chile’s copper heartland.

Governments have failed to agree on a global mechanism for tackling drought at a United Nations conference in the Saudi capital of Riyadh, despite warnings from scientists of an environmental crisis unfolding beneath our feet. The host nation, Saudi Arabia, gavelled the summit to a close in the early hours of Saturday morning after the stalemate dragged the talks into overtime. Further debate was postponed to COP17 in 2026, which will take place in Mongolia. All the negotiations occurred behind closed doors, but sources told Climate Home that while Africa pushed hard for a legally binding drought protocol, the United States and others opposed it.

Canada, Australia and Germany head to the polls, as climate-sceptic Donald Trump becomes US president again. All countries are due to submit their NDCs before COP30 in Belem. Will that summit deliver the boost in ambition the UN climate process - and the planet - so urgently need? Are 'peak emissions' in sight? 2025 marks the halfway point in the critical decade for keeping the Paris Agreement goals alive. What's your guess for the most important climate topic for 2025? Tell us here 👉 https://lnkd.in/eGVST8Xb

IUCN and numerous other experts and organisations argued before the International Court of Justice in The Hague that countries have a binding legal responsibility to fight climate change. "As others like Vanuatu have argued, in failing to act on climate, states are undermining the human rights of vulnerable communities – particularly the right to life, health, housing and culture. By failing to reign in climate change, states are also undermining nature’s ability to provide communities with food, fisheries, productive farmland, and other services – impacting lives and livelihoods," writes Grethel Aguilar, IUCN's Director General of the International Union for Conservation of Nature. Read her full piece here 👇

🇨🇦 The Canadian government has announced a new target to reduce planet-heating emissions 45-50% from 2005 levels by 2035, despite its official advisors on the Net-Zero Advisory Body (NZAB) - Groupe consultatif pour la carboneutralité (GCPC) recommending a 50-55% goal and climate campaigners calling for an 80% cut. The new target is in addition to an existing goal to cut emissions 40-45% by 2030. Canadian Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault said the 2035 target “keeps us on track to keep the promise to our kids and grandkids that the world we leave behind for them will be safe, sustainable, affordable and prosperous”.