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Demonstrators display signs and a banner during a “No Climate, No Deal” march on the White House, in Washington, DC, June 28, 2021.
Evelyn Hockstein | Reuters

After a summer of astonishing climate extremes, a landmark scientific report on climate change provides another stark warning. 

It states we have less than a decade to stabilize the Earth’s climate and that this will require big and immediate cuts in carbon emissions. And given the planet is already 1.1 degrees Celsius warmer than pre-industrial times, the need to adapt to higher temperatures could not be clearer.

This window for action is getting narrower by the day, but it is still open. We are being given one final opportunity to stave off catastrophic climate change, and we must seize it.

The report, by the world’s foremost climate scientists at the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, calls for “immediate, rapid, and large-scale reductions” in emissions. If we stop pumping heat-trapping gases into the atmosphere altogether, scientists believe we may be able to contain warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius. If we fail, the consequences for our planet will be dire.

Climate change is a long-term, systemic threat that requires immediate and adequate action that must be sustained over decades. What is required is nothing less than the total transformation of our economic and social systems, from where we source our energy to how we transport goods and people, where we live and work, and what we buy.

Reaching net-zero carbon emissions requires vast amounts of funding. The International Monetary Fund estimates that 6-10% of global GDP — somewhere in the region of an additional $6 trillion to $10 trillion — needs to be invested in the next decade to green our economies.

These are huge sums, but they should not be viewed as a sunk cost — like the expense of cleaning up after flooding, wildfires, and other ravages of extreme weather. Greening our economies is above all an economic opportunity that will create jobs, drive innovation, and boost economic growth.

The coronavirus pandemic proved that vast resources can be marshalled quickly when governments are faced with an existential threat.

In addition to ramping up investment, we need three things to address our climate crisis quickly and at scale.

First, we need a global price on carbon, beginning with a price floor agreement among major emitters that also distinguishes according to countries’ income levels. This could take the shape of taxes, trading schemes, or measures that achieve the same outcome, such as combinations of feebates or regulations at the sectoral levels. Either way, the goal should be to price fuel appropriately and incentivize the switch to cleaner alternatives. Without an appropriate price on carbon, we will not get to net-zero emissions before it is too late.

Second, we need to set aside funds to help millions of people across the world adapt to climate change, especially in developing countries that may not have the resources for the large investments needed. Coastal cities, riverside towns and small island states are vulnerable to storm surges and rising sea levels. Farming communities everywhere need to improve their water efficiency and switch to drought-resistant crops. Because even if we were able to halt all planet-warming emissions tomorrow, scientists warn we will be living in an era of climate extremes for centuries.

Third, the cost of transforming economies to be greener and more resilient must be shared. The transition must be just, both across and within countries. Climate change affects everyone, but it affects the poorest and those who have contributed the least to global warming the most. So far, the sums raised for climate action have fallen far short of the $100 billion a year agreed by the world’s leaders more than 10 years ago. We must now find a way to magnify the impact of climate funding, and transform the billions currently being invested in climate solutions into trillions.

Investing in climate resilience would be a good start. GCA research shows that investing $1.8 trillion globally until 2030 in five climate-adaptation areas — early warning systems, climate-resilient infrastructure, improved dryland agriculture, mangrove protection, and increasing water resilience — could result in $7.1 trillion in net benefits. Adapting now is in everyone’s strong economic self-interest. Beyond preventing dramatic human and economic losses, adaptation policies can pave the way for high-return investments that would not otherwise be viable due to climate risk.

The IMF is doing its part. Its largest allocation of Special Drawing Rights in its history — equivalent to $650 billion  — is now effective and provided a welcome boost to member countries. Options are now being explored to channel SDRs from wealthier to poorer and more vulnerable member countries to support their pandemic recovery and achieve resilient and sustainable growth. A new Resilience and Sustainability Trust is being considered for this purpose.

The world is not short of money or ideas needed to fight climate change. What we need now is for the international community to seize this historic opportunity and act together to create a greener, more equitable and prosperous world for us all.

Kristalina Georgieva is managing director of the International Monetary Fund. Patrick Verkooijen is CEO of the Global Center on Adaptation.

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Global energy giant RWE halts US offshore wind because of Trump

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Global energy giant RWE halts US offshore wind because of Trump

Global renewable developer and energy giant RWE has halted its US offshore wind operations “for the time being” because of the “political environment” the Trump administration has created.

RWE, Germany’s biggest electricity producer, said in March that it had dialed back its US offshore wind activities. But now, CEO Marcus Krebber said in a speech transcript, which he’ll deliver at the company’s Annual General Meeting in Essen on April 30, that its US offshore wind business is now closed (but it wasn’t all bad news): 

In the US, where we have stopped our offshore activities for the time being, our business in onshore wind, solar energy, and battery storage has so far been developing very dynamically. At the start of this year, we reached an important milestone when our US generation capacity hit the 10 gigawatt mark. The construction of a further 4 gigawatts is secured.

He went on to say that renewables have created regional value and jobs, but that the company remains “cautious given the political developments.” RWE has introduced more stringent requirements for future US investments:

All necessary federal permits must be in place. Tax credits must be safe harbored and all relevant tariff risks mitigated. In addition, onshore wind and solar projects must have secured offtake at the time of the investment decision. Only if these conditions are met will further investments be possible, given the political environment.

About half of RWE’s installed renewable capacity is in the US, where it’s the third-largest renewable energy company through its subsidiary, RWE Clean Energy. RWE holds the rights to develop US offshore wind projects in New York, Louisiana, and California.

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RWE paid $1.1 billion for the New York lease area in 2022, where it’s meant to develop the 3 gigawatt (GW) Community Offshore Wind with the UK’s National Grid. Community Offshore Wind was projected to come online in the early 2030s and expected to power more than a million homes.

The developer paid $5.6 billion for the Louisiana lease in the Gulf of Mexico in 2023 as the lone bidder for development rights, and the Canopy Offshore Wind project off Northern California was not expected to be completed for another decade.

Read more: Trump admin halts $5 billion NY offshore wind project mid-build


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Trump’s memecoin dinner contest earns insiders $900,000 in two days

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Trump's memecoin dinner contest earns insiders 0,000 in two days

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump and his allies have raked in nearly $900,000 in trading fees over the past two days from the president’s $TRUMP cryptocurrency token, according to Chainalysis, a blockchain data company. 

The surge came after a Wednesday announcement in which the top 220 holders of the token were promised dinner with the president.

“Have Dinner in Washington, D.C. With President Trump,” reads a message on the front page of the Trump coin’s website. The event, which is black tie optional and hosted at the president’s private club in the Washington area, is scheduled for May 22, with a reception for the top 25 holders. A “VIP White House Tour” will take place the following day, the site says. The website also hosts an active leaderboard displaying the usernames of top buyers.

The $TRUMP memecoin jumped more than 50% on the dinner news, boosting its total market value to $2.7 billion. It was met with fierce criticism from some of Trump’s political opponents who said the move was further evidence that the president was using crypto to enrich himself. Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., a prominent Trump critic, wrote on X that the sale was “the most brazenly corrupt thing a President has ever done. Not close.”

Roughly 80% of the $TRUMP token supply is controlled by the Trump Organization and affiliates, according to the project’s website. Since its launch in January, trading activity has generated about $324.5 million in trading fees for insiders, Chainalysis found. These fees are generated through the token’s built-in mechanism that routes a percentage of each trade to wallets controlled by the project — wallets that, according to the website, are linked to the coin’s creators.

Memecoins, often referred to as meme tokens, are a subset of digital assets that use blockchain technology and derive their value largely from internet culture, memes and social media hype rather than from an underlying utility or asset. The originators of memecoins can make fees when their coins are bought and sold.

They have grown in popularity in recent years as speculative assets, with some coins including dogecoin and fartcoin amassing total market values in excess of $1 billion.

Most of the $TRUMP supply remains locked under a three-year vesting plan, with coins gradually becoming available over time. Lockups like these are meant to protect investors by preventing insiders from cashing out all at once — a scheme commonly known in the crypto world as a “rug pull.” Vesting schedules aim to give retail buyers confidence that early holders won’t overwhelm the market and tank the token’s value.

Still, the dinner contest is being viewed by critics as an unusually explicit attempt to monetize presidential access. 

As CNBC reported Friday, Democratic Sens. Adam Schiff of California and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts are urging the U.S. Office of Government Ethics to investigate whether the promotion constitutes “pay to play” corruption.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment. The company behind the memecoin also did not respond to a request for comment.

Delaney Marsco, the director of ethics at the Campaign Legal Center, a nonprofit focused on campaign finance and government accountability, told NBC News the coin and dinner contest amounted to an unprecedented ethics breach — though it is unlikely to be illegal.

“Criminal conflicts of interest statutes don’t apply to the President,” she said. “That has allowed him to go against decades of of norms that every modern president since Carter has adhered to, which is to divest your financial interests, rid yourself of your businesses, and kind of go in to the presidency with a clean financial slate so that no one could accuse you of manipulating policy decisions or using your position in order to enrich yourself.” 

“The fact that he is not barred by the law from having these financial interests like this meme coin allows him to engage in a lot of seemingly corrupt activity. It has the appearance of a pay to play, so the President is apparently selling access to himself,” Marsco added.

Molly White, an independent crypto researcher, told NBC News that the leaderboard only shows top $TRUMP holders — and then only by their chosen screen name, making it difficult to identify who is paying to potentially join the dinner.

Schiff and Warren have cited public reports showing that some $TRUMP investors have ties to foreign exchanges or received funds from crypto platforms banned in the U.S., including Binance.

White also noted that at least one top $TRUMP owner has an account on Binance, a cryptocurrency company that doesn’t allow American users.

Trump was elected with significant help from the cryptocurrency industry, which poured tens of millions of dollars into the 2024 election, outpacing corporate donations from traditional sectors like banking and oil. After opposing digital assets during his first term, Trump pivoted in 2024 to campaign as a champion of cryptocurrency, casting Democrats as hostile to innovation and as advocating for tighter regulation. 

The $TRUMP token itself offers no product or service, according to the project’s website. It is part of a broader push by the Trump family into digital assets, despite the market’s volatility and regulatory risks.

In addition to the $TRUMP and $MELANIA meme coins, the family is backing World Liberty Financial, a decentralized finance venture that has raised $550 million across two token sales since last October. Buyers are barred from reselling their tokens and receive no share of profits — but a Trump-affiliated entity is entitled to 75% of net revenue, including token sale proceeds.

Together, these projects have created new streams of revenue for Trump and his inner circle at a time when regulatory oversight of cryptocurrency has weakened sharply under his administration.

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Drive Electric Earth Month, continues this weekend, get your EV Qs answered

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Drive Electric Earth Month, continues this weekend, get your EV Qs answered

It’s that time of year again, time for events across the country to show off electric vehicles at Drive Electric Earth Month.

Drive Electric Earth Month is an offshoot of Drive Electric Week, a long-running annual tradition hosting meetups mostly in the US, but also occasionally in other countries. It started as Drive Electric Earth Day, but since not every event can happen on the same day, they went ahead and extended it to encompass “Earth Month” events that happen across the month of April. It’s all organized by Plug In America, the Sierra Club, the Electric Vehicle Association, EV Hybrid Noire, and Drive Electric USA.

Events consist of general Earth Day-style community celebrations, EV Ride & Drives where you can test drive several EVs in one place, and opportunities to talk to EV owners and ask them questions about what it’s like to live with an EV, away from the pressure of a dealership.

This month, there are 158 events registered across the US and 1 in Mexico (including one online webinar about things to consider when purchasing an EV).

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Events have been happening all month, but the biggest weekend is this upcoming one, APril 26-27.

One really neat event was the Asheville event, which showcased the resiliency of EVs in an area devastated by Hurricane Helene, which was made more severe by climate change. That event was attended by the Rivian R1T which famously got dragged 100 feet submerged in mud and came out running fine.

But the bulk of the events happened on the weekends surrounding Earth Day, April 22, so there were several last weekend and will be even more this upcoming weekend.

There are plenty of events in the big cities where you’d expect, but Plug In America wanted to highlight a few of the events in smaller places around the country. Here’s a sampling of upcoming events:

  • Big Island EV – Cruise and Picnic in Waimea, HI on April 26, 10am-1pm – EV drivers will congregate in various places around the Big Island (Kona, Waimea, Waikoloa and Hilo), then drive up Saddle Road to the Gil Kahele Recreation Area on Mauna Kea for a potluck and a chance to talk about the experience of owning EVs on the Big Island.
  • Santa Barbara Earth Day 2025 and Green Car Show in Santa Barbara, CA on April 26-27, 11am-8pm – This is part of Santa Barbara’s Earth Day celebration, which routinely attracts 30,000 participants and is one of the longest-running Earth Day celebrations on the planet. The Green Car Show includes ride & drives and an “Owners Corner” where owners can showcase their EVs and attendees can check them out and ask questions.
  • Earth Day’25 – EV’s role in a sustainable future in Queretaro City, Mexico on April 26, 9am-4pm – The sole Mexican event, this is a combined in-person/online seminar at the Querétaro Institute of Technology.
  • Norman Earth Day Festival in Norman, OK on April 27, 12-5pm – Another municipal Earth Day festival, with hands-on activities for kids to learn about the environment. A portion of the parking lot reserved for an EV car show for EV owners who pre-register to show off their vehicles.
  • Oregon Electric Vehicle Association Test Drive & Information Expo in Portland, OR on April 27, 10am-4pm – This one is at Daimler Truck’s North American HQ, and will have several EVs for test drives, owner displays (including DIY gas-to-EV conversions), and keynote presentations by EV experts. They’ll even have a 1914 Detroit Electric EV available for test rides!
  • And, we at Electrek want to give a shoutout to Rove’s EV Drive Days in Santa Ana 10am-3pm April 28 – ROVE is the company behind the “full-service” EV charging concept that we’ve talked about several times here on Electrek, and we like what they’re doing for EV charging. They’ve hosted a few community events, and this is their contribution to Earth Month.

Each event has a different assortment of activities (e.g. test drives won’t be available at every event, generally just the larger ones attended by local dealerships), so be sure to check the events page to see what the plan is for your local event.

These events have offered a great way to connect with owners and see the newest electric vehicle tech, and even get a chance to do test rides and drives in person. Attendees got to hear unfiltered information from actual owners about the benefits and trials of owning EVs, allowing for longer and more genuine (and often more knowledgeable) conversations than one might normally encounter at a dealership.

And if you’re an owner – you can show off your car and answer those questions for interested onlookers.

To view all the events and see what’s happening in your area, you can check out the list of events or the events map. You can also sign up to volunteer at your local events, and if you plan to show off your electric car, you can RSVP on each event page and list the vehicle that you plan to show (or see what other vehicles have already registered).


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