Initiative has helped country tap satellite data to improve its own agricultural statistics and drought and flood modelling capacities.

04/06/2026 - A new calculator now makes the effects of CO₂ pricing visible for every household. Developed by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) in collaboration with RWI - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research, the online tool also shows how government rebates can provide financial relief and where savings can be made in everyday life. The tool is anonymous and free to use. With the new CO₂ price calculator, users can quantify their personal emissions from transport and heating. Photo: AdobeStock With the CO₂ price calculator, users can quantify their personal emissions from transport and heating, the resulting costs, and the potential financial relief available to their household. It not only illustrates how different CO₂ price levels would affect individual budgets, but also simulates options for redistributing government revenues - for example, via a per capita rebate or a reduction in electricity prices, for example. Link to the free CO₂ calculator: https://co2-preis-rechner.rwi-essen.de/ Users can also compare their financial outcomes with those of other household types. Additionally, they receive practical suggestions on how to reduce CO₂ emissions and costs through behavioural changes or home renovation measures. The tool also contributes to scientific research, as anonymised usage data feeds into further academic analysis. This new CO₂ price calculator expands PIK's suite of useful online tools designed to help users gain a clearer understanding of CO₂ pricing. As early as 2021, the then Mercator Research Institute on Global Commons and Climate Change (MCC) - which became part of PIK in early 2025 – developed an online calculator showing the impact of various national CO₂ price levels for average households. In addition, the MCC-developed platform Carbon Pricing Incidence Calculator presents these policy instruments in an international context. While the other two tools focus on the systemic and global dimensions of climate policy, the new calculator by PIK and RWI aims to make costs tangible to individual households.

Climate Policy Integration (CPI) is key to mainstreaming and harmonising mitigation and adaptation in policy responses to climate change worldwide. However, little is known about how CPI can be applied in practice, beyond single policy areas, particularly in the integration of adaptation and mitigation responses. We investigate this in the context of responding to climate impacts such as extreme heat, a climate risk growing in international importance. Using the 2022 UK heatwaves as a case study, our paper explores: (a) the extent to which key stakeholders consider the integration of adaptation and mitigation to be important; (b) perceptions of the feasibility of integration; and (c) main enablers and/or challenges with integration of adaptation and mitigation. To do this, interviews (N = 38) and four focus groups (N = 21) were conducted with policymakers, first responders, utility providers, and civil society responsible for managing heat risks. Our findings reveal a tension that CPI is essential to achieving a “climate resilient net zero”, yet unrealised. To facilitate CPI, we present a new anticipatory narrative with international and multi-contextual significance, that considers the convergence of key elements integral to effective CPI decision-making in the context of heat risk: (1) ‘Challenges’ − that may hinder, undermine, or act as a barrier to the integration of mitigation and adaptation; (2) ‘Enablers’ − which support, or help to facilitate greater integration, or synergies, between mitigation and adaptation; (3) ‘Framings’ − different ways participants described, defined or interpreted the issue of integration; (4) ‘Importance’ – the extent to which participants thought that integrating mitigation and adaptation was important; and (5) ‘Feasibility’ – or how possible integration is. We conclude that unless all five elements are fully addressed iteratively by end-users when tackling and understanding heat risks, new problems may emerge.

Negotiations are ongoing but fraught for designing a new global science-policy panel for chemicals and waste pollution. In this Perspectives article, we challenge three assumptions guiding these negotiations. First, the new panel should resemble the existing panels of the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the Inter-governmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). Second, the creation of a new panel will automatically carry authority within policymaking. Third, the participation of industry is crucial without special consideration for its interests. Further, we identify three steps to enhance the panel’s relevance and influence.

This article explores the relationship between political uncertainty and carbon emissions across 34 Global South countries from 2000 to 2023, uncovering key links between policy stability and environmental sustainability. By employing the year- and country-fixed effects model alongside generalized least squares with panel corrected standard errors, this analysis highlights the impact of political instability on environmental outcomes. Robustness checks—conducted via the generalized method of moments and a dynamic linear panel model—further confirm the consistency and reliability of the results. The findings reveal that political uncertainty significantly elevates carbon emissions and follows a nonlinear pattern: moderate political uncertainty tends to stimulate economic activity, resulting in higher emissions, while extreme uncertainty curtails economic activity, thereby reducing emissions. Moreover, a positive interaction between political uncertainty and mineral policy signals increased resource extraction in politically unstable settings. Conversely, interactions with technological innovation and energy transition display significant negative effects, suggesting that technological advancement and renewable energy adoption effectively counteract emissions growth under high political uncertainty. This study provides new insights into the distinct political and economic dynamics influencing environmental challenges in Global South countries, emphasizing the crucial role of technological innovation and energy transition in mitigating the environmental impacts of political instability.

In June 2019, the UK government legislated a net zero target by 2050. This will directly impact the UK oil and gas industry. This study reports perceptions of key oil and gas professionals regarding the impact of transitioning to net zero on impairment, values, write-downs, and going concern in the UK oil and gas industry, as well as required net-zero-related disclosures. Data were collected through 22 interviews, two written responses to our interview questions, and disclosures made by oil and gas companies in their annual reports. We use conservatism and stakeholder theory to inform our results. Our findings confirm there will be serious impacts of the transition to net zero on impairments, asset write-downs, and on the value and going concern of several oil and gas companies. However, these impacts will not fall equally across the industry, and it is likely therefore that stakeholders will be affected differently. Our results contribute, first, to the debate on the impacts of the transition to net zero on key accounting measures of oil and gas companies; second, we identify risks associated with the transition to net zero for these companies and their stakeholders, and we classify the at-risk oil and gas companies operating in the UK; third, we present a collection of disclosure items deemed necessary by our interviewees. Our specified disclosure items may complement those of the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) and the Transition Plan Taskforce (TPT).