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900 Years Ago, One of the Largest Civilizations in the World Was Abandoned – Archaeologists Have Now Discovered New Clues

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Monday, July 29, 2024

The remains of the most sophisticated prehistoric native civilization north of Mexico are preserved at Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site in Illinois. Archaeologist Natalie Mueller’s new study casts doubt on a popular theory about why the ancient city was abandoned. Credit: Joe Angeles / Washington UniversityThe Cahokia Mounds, once a thriving settlement near present-day St. Louis, was abandoned by 1400, leaving behind a mystery. Recent research challenges the long-held belief of drought-induced crop failure as the cause. Instead, evidence suggests the Cahokians may have had the skills to mitigate such environmental challenges, and their departure was likely influenced by social factors and external pressures.Nine hundred years ago, the Cahokia Mounds settlement, located just across the Mississippi River from what is now St. Louis, was a thriving metropolitan area with a population of around 50,000. It was one of the largest communities in the world at the time. However, by 1400, this once-bustling site had become nearly deserted, and the reasons for the mass departure remain a mystery.One popular theory is that the Cahokia residents abandoned the settlement after a massive crop failure brought on by a prolonged drought. But a new study in the journal The Holocene by Natalie Mueller, assistant professor of archaeology in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, and Caitlin Rankin, PhD ’20, suggests the Cahokians likely had other reasons to leave town. Rankin dug deep into the soil at the historic Cahokia site to collect isotopes of carbon, atoms left behind by the plants growing when the human population collapsed and drought was common across the Midwest.Insights From Plant IsotopesAll plants use one of two types of carbon, Carbon 12 and Carbon 13, for photosynthesis, but not all plants do photosynthesis the same way. Plants adapted to dry climates — including prairie grasses and maize, an important new crop during the Cahokia period — incorporate carbon into their bodies at rates that leave behind a tell-tale signature when the plants die and decay.Most of the other plants that the Cahokians would have harvested for food — including squash, goosefoot, and sumpweed — will leave a different signature, one they share with plants from wetlands and native forests.Rankin’s samples showed that ratios of Carbon 12 and Carbon 13 stayed relatively consistent during that crucial period — a sign there was no radical shift in the types of plants growing in the area. “We saw no evidence that prairie grasses were taking over, which we would expect in a scenario where widespread crop failure was occurring,” Mueller said.The Cahokians are known for their ingenuity, and Rankin said they may have had the engineering and irrigation skills to keep crops flourishing under difficult conditions. “It’s possible that they weren’t really feeling the impacts of the drought,” said Rankin, now an archaeologist with the Bureau of Land Management in Nevada.Mueller added that the sophisticated society that blossomed at Cahokia almost certainly included a storage system for grains and other foods. Residents also enjoyed a varied and diverse diet — including fish, birds, deer, bear, and forest fruits and nuts — that would have kept them nourished even if a few food sources disappeared.Future Research and the Real Reasons for AbandonmentTo get a better grasp of the diets and agricultural practices of Indigenous people of the Midwest, Mueller hopes to build a database that collects paleo-botanical evidence from across the region. “Gathering that information would help us see if people switched to different crops in response to climate change,” she said. She’s also planning to grow certain food crops in controlled conditions on campus to understand how they might have responded to ancient droughts and other challenges.So, why did the Cahokians leave their land of plenty? Mueller suspects it was a gradual process. “I don’t envision a scene where thousands of people were suddenly streaming out of town,” she said. “People probably just spread out to be near kin or to find different opportunities.”“They put a lot of effort into building these mounds, but there were probably external pressures that caused them to leave,” Rankin said. “The picture is likely complicated.”Reference: “Correlating Late-Holocene climate change and population dynamics at Cahokia Mounds (American Bottom, USA)” by Caitlin G Rankin and Natalie G Mueller, 18 June 2024, The Holocene.DOI: 10.1177/09596836241254488

The Cahokia Mounds, once a thriving settlement near present-day St. Louis, was abandoned by 1400, leaving behind a mystery. Recent research challenges the long-held belief...

Cahokia Mounds

The remains of the most sophisticated prehistoric native civilization north of Mexico are preserved at Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site in Illinois. Archaeologist Natalie Mueller’s new study casts doubt on a popular theory about why the ancient city was abandoned. Credit: Joe Angeles / Washington University

The Cahokia Mounds, once a thriving settlement near present-day St. Louis, was abandoned by 1400, leaving behind a mystery. Recent research challenges the long-held belief of drought-induced crop failure as the cause. Instead, evidence suggests the Cahokians may have had the skills to mitigate such environmental challenges, and their departure was likely influenced by social factors and external pressures.

Nine hundred years ago, the Cahokia Mounds settlement, located just across the Mississippi River from what is now St. Louis, was a thriving metropolitan area with a population of around 50,000. It was one of the largest communities in the world at the time. However, by 1400, this once-bustling site had become nearly deserted, and the reasons for the mass departure remain a mystery.

One popular theory is that the Cahokia residents abandoned the settlement after a massive crop failure brought on by a prolonged drought. But a new study in the journal The Holocene by Natalie Mueller, assistant professor of archaeology in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, and Caitlin Rankin, PhD ’20, suggests the Cahokians likely had other reasons to leave town.

Rankin dug deep into the soil at the historic Cahokia site to collect isotopes of carbon, atoms left behind by the plants growing when the human population collapsed and drought was common across the Midwest.

Insights From Plant Isotopes

All plants use one of two types of carbon, Carbon 12 and Carbon 13, for photosynthesis, but not all plants do photosynthesis the same way. Plants adapted to dry climates — including prairie grasses and maize, an important new crop during the Cahokia period — incorporate carbon into their bodies at rates that leave behind a tell-tale signature when the plants die and decay.

Most of the other plants that the Cahokians would have harvested for food — including squash, goosefoot, and sumpweed — will leave a different signature, one they share with plants from wetlands and native forests.

Rankin’s samples showed that ratios of Carbon 12 and Carbon 13 stayed relatively consistent during that crucial period — a sign there was no radical shift in the types of plants growing in the area. “We saw no evidence that prairie grasses were taking over, which we would expect in a scenario where widespread crop failure was occurring,” Mueller said.

The Cahokians are known for their ingenuity, and Rankin said they may have had the engineering and irrigation skills to keep crops flourishing under difficult conditions. “It’s possible that they weren’t really feeling the impacts of the drought,” said Rankin, now an archaeologist with the Bureau of Land Management in Nevada.

Mueller added that the sophisticated society that blossomed at Cahokia almost certainly included a storage system for grains and other foods. Residents also enjoyed a varied and diverse diet — including fish, birds, deer, bear, and forest fruits and nuts — that would have kept them nourished even if a few food sources disappeared.

Future Research and the Real Reasons for Abandonment

To get a better grasp of the diets and agricultural practices of Indigenous people of the Midwest, Mueller hopes to build a database that collects paleo-botanical evidence from across the region. “Gathering that information would help us see if people switched to different crops in response to climate change,” she said. She’s also planning to grow certain food crops in controlled conditions on campus to understand how they might have responded to ancient droughts and other challenges.

So, why did the Cahokians leave their land of plenty? Mueller suspects it was a gradual process. “I don’t envision a scene where thousands of people were suddenly streaming out of town,” she said. “People probably just spread out to be near kin or to find different opportunities.”

“They put a lot of effort into building these mounds, but there were probably external pressures that caused them to leave,” Rankin said. “The picture is likely complicated.”

Reference: “Correlating Late-Holocene climate change and population dynamics at Cahokia Mounds (American Bottom, USA)” by Caitlin G Rankin and Natalie G Mueller, 18 June 2024, The Holocene.
DOI: 10.1177/09596836241254488

Read the full story here.
Photos courtesy of

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How Feminism Can Guide Climate Change Action

Feminism gives us the analysis, tools and movement to create a better climate future for everyone. It’s time to embrace it

This year is projected to be the hottest on record. The latest United Nations estimates indicate that, without radical and immediate action, we are headed toward an increasingly unlivable planet with an increase of up to 3.1 degrees Celsius by the end of the century. Solving the climate crisis requires urgent, global cooperation.But the yearly global climate meeting (called the Conference of the Parties, or COP) held in November in the petrostate of Azerbaijan upheld the status quo, at best. The current economic system that underpins that status quo is rooted in the extraction of natural resources and exploitation of cheap or unpaid labor, often done by women and marginalized communities. This system therefore drives the climate crisis while perpetuating inequalities based on gender, race and class. It prioritizes the interests of corporations, governments and elites in positions of power and wealth, while destroying the natural environment that poor and marginalized people depend on the most.We need a different tack to move the needle. As gender-equality researchers at the U.N., we see growing evidence that women, girls and gender-diverse people are bearing the brunt of climate change. And that raises a question: What if we approached climate from a feminist perspective?On supporting science journalismIf you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.Feminism offers an analysis of how inequalities structure our world and therefore drive the climate crisis, among other global concerns. We believe that it provides a vision of a better climate future, and a practical approach for moving towards it. That sound future is not just about ending fossil fuel–based economies—though that is urgent and necessary—but a more fundamental transformation of our economic and political systems.Women worldwide have unequal access to economic resources, such as jobs, bank accounts, land and technology. This means that when weather patterns change, disrupting infrastructure and public services, they are less able to adapt, recover and rebuild. As a result, their livelihoods and economic security are particularly at risk. U.N. Women’s latest research finds that, globally, climate change may push up to 158 million more women and girls into poverty, and 236 million more women and girls into food insecurity, by 2050 under a worst-case scenario. In addition to income poverty, women and girls face rising time poverty. As water, fuel and nutritious food are harder to come by and the health care needs of family members increase, women and girls have to spend more time on unpaid care work. This reduces the time they have to do paid work, go to school or take care of themselves.This toxic combination of time and income poverty has far-reaching, long-term consequences. After years of slow progress in reducing rates of child marriage, for example, this practice is on the rise again in places experiencing environmental stress, as families struggle financially and see early marriage as a form of security for their girls. In drought-prone areas, girls are increasingly likely to drop out of school, as families cannot afford fees and need their girls to contribute to household work, stunting their opportunities for life.The feminist climate justice approach tries to address the interlinked challenges of climate change, gender inequality and social injustice. It is based on the recognition that women and girls who are poor, from “lower” castes or a marginalized ethnic group, or are disabled, are most affected by disasters and environmental degradation, while their knowledge and contributions to addressing them are consistently sidelined. A feminist climate justice approach elevates their voices and values their contributions to understanding the climate crisis and charting a new way forward. For example, women from Indigenous and local communities have used their traditional knowledge of tree species to lead sustainable forestry initiatives in Colombia; and in Bangladesh, during extreme floods, women relied on traditional rural cooking methods to provide food in remote affected areas.We need to move away from economies based on extraction and pollution, towards ones that are based on regeneration and care for one another and for the environment. These new systems would prioritize the well-being of people and the planet, over profits and elite power, to enable a more sustainable, resilient, inclusive and equitable future. This feminist vision builds on thinking from a diversity of cultural contexts and growing interest in “well-being economies.” For example, the Buen Vivir (Living Well) paradigm that underpins the development strategies of Bolivia and Ecuador is inspired by Indigenous knowledge and values that promote harmonious relationships between humans and nature. Meanwhile in Canada, a Quality of Life strategy was introduced to support a resilient COVID-19 recovery, focusing on improving key areas of life such as health, social belonging, environmental quality, prosperity and public trust.As detailed in our report Feminist Climate Justice: A Framework for Action, moving towards this vision requires action around four pillars.First, we must recognize women's rights, labor and knowledge. To be effective, climate policymaking needs to take into account the expertise that women, including Indigenous and rural women, bring to bear on issues like preserving ecosystems and environmentally sustainable agriculture. This is essential to avoid the problem of maladaptation—well-intended adaptation projects that either don’t work or cause more harm than good.We must redistribute resources away from male-dominated, environmentally harmful economic activities towards those prioritizing women’s employment, regeneration and care for both people and ecosystems. The idea of a just transition, which is gaining prominence on the climate agenda, must extend beyond providing new jobs for men laid off from fossil fuel industries to address the longstanding economic disadvantages women and marginalized groups face: persistent wage gaps; vast inequalities in land ownership, labor force participation, access to education, training and technology; and inadequate or absent social protection.We must ensure representation of diverse women’s voices in environmental decision-making, whether in social movements, environmental ministries or COP delegations. In civil society, women organizing collectively within and across movements have the right to be heard and see their interests reflected, without being threatened, harassed and even killed for their activism. Ending impunity for violence against human and environmental rights defenders is therefore also essential.And we must repair the impacts of environmental degradation—acknowledging that the Global North bears the largest share of responsibility for historical emissions—and guarantee not to repeat those harms. Wealthy countries need to make good on long-standing climate finance commitments and ensure resources get to grassroots women’s organizations at the forefront of this crisis. As campaigners chanted at COP28, “billions not millions, make polluters pay.” Taxing and regulating the corporations that are causing climate chaos in developing countries is necessary as part of reparations.As well as the “what” of feminist climate justice, the ‘how’ is equally important. The vast gap between the demands for bold climate action and sluggish government responses raises urgent questions on how to ensure accountability. Given the tensions and conflicts between countries at the moment, the fact that every government comes together each year to negotiate on climate is an achievement not to be dismissed. But still, it feels like we are a million miles from where we need to be. The role of social movements—feminists, environmentalists, indigenous people’s organizations, youth—working with allies in the UN, governments and progressive business to demand faster, more radical action will be critical. Our hope is that the feminist climate justice framework can help unite a common understanding of the urgency and direction of necessary action across these four pillars to demand a more sustainable future.This is an opinion and analysis article, and the views expressed by the author or authors are not necessarily those of Scientific American.Laura Turquet is deputy chief of research and data at U.N. Women. Follow Turquet on Bluesky lauraturquet.bsky.socialand LinkedInSilke Staab is senior research specialist at U.N. Women. Follow her on Bluesky @silkestaab.bsky.social and LinkedInBrianna Howell is research analyst at U.N. Women. Follow her on LinkedIn

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How Can Religion Help the Climate Fight?

It’s a weird time for religion in the United States. Christians are on track to become a religious minority in the country within a few decades but also, soon, to wield incredible power in a second Trump administration—thanks not least to a neo-Crusader defense secretary nominee, Christian nationalists likely leading the Office of Management and Budget as well as the House of Representatives, and an array of powerful Christian judges appointed in Trump’s first term whose numbers will only grow in his second. Meanwhile, amid a devastatingly grim Advent season for other communities, Latino Christian leaders interviewed by Axios “say they will unpack the Holy Family’s immigration plight during Christmas services to offer hope for immigrants” facing ICE raids and deportations in the new administration. White Protestants and Catholics voted by large margins for Trump; Black Protestants, Jews, atheists, and agnostics voted overwhelmingly against him. Muslim voters outraged by Biden’s support for Israel’s slaughter in Gaza abandoned the Democrats at striking rates, many voting instead for Jill Stein.So while the ranks of the religiously unaffiliated or even nonreligious may be growing, the relevance of religion to politics clearly persists. And that means religion is relevant to climate change too.The Pew Research polls in 2022 found that moderately or highly religious people were much less likely to rate climate change as a serious problem than atheists were. But the surveys also showed huge numbers of religious people to be concerned. Growing numbers of religious leaders and groups—even among white evangelicals—are pushing for policies protecting the climate and environment.To learn about the contours of the growing religious advocacy for climate and environmental protection, I called up the Reverend Susan Hendershot, an ordained minister in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) and president of Interfaith Power and Light, a group focused on engaging people of faith in environmental causes and climate action. This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.How do you perceive your job in terms of engaging religious communities in climate advocacy?Interfaith Power and Light started in 2000 because our founder was seeing a disconnect between what she was hearing from environmental organizations, in terms of climate change and care for the earth, and the fact that she was not hearing that in her place of worship. For her, it became a mission to say that as faith communities, we are called to care for creation and we need to find ways to live that out: It’s not just talking about it, it’s doing something. From the start, there was a focus on greening houses of worship as an act of faith. So everything from energy efficiency upgrades to installing solar in houses of worship. And the other side of that has been the focus on policy advocacy, to say personal action is important and it gets us a certain way down the road as part of civil society, but unless we have the right policies in place, we can’t actually make the progress that we need to make. It’s centered on spiritual values and on the moral opportunity to take action—to say people of faith are and should be leaders in working for climate and environmental justice. But this is focused on people from many different religious backgrounds, right?We say we work with people of all spiritual traditions and no spiritual traditions, recognizing that there are a lot of spiritual but not religious folks that are out there and that is a growing percentage. We want to make sure that there’s a big tent out there that’s for everyone who wants to take action from a place of spiritual values.Climate anxiety is on the rise. What does the lens of faith or spiritual values have to offer the climate fight, in your view?I see faith communities and leaders having three roles in the climate movement. The first one is pastoral, because there’s a lot of climate anxiety and grief out there, whether it’s people who have suffered from a climate disaster who are recovering and need a support system or young people who are considering whether they even want to have a family because do you want to bring children into a climate-changed world? So that pastoral role is really, really important. Faith leaders are trained to work with people who are suffering, grieving, in trauma.The second role I see as the practical role, which is offering leadership within their own faith community, working to move climate solutions forward in their houses of worship: renewable energy systems, energy efficiency, electric vehicles. Just serving as models in the community of what’s possible. The third role is the prophetic role. We have to talk about this. One of the things Katharine Hayhoe says as a climate scientist and person of faith is that the most important thing you can do for climate change is to talk about it, because part of the problem is it’s not being discussed enough. Pastors are called to use their prophetic voices in their places of worship to move people to action. How does the fragmentation of religious groups right now complicate your work? I’m thinking about the very prominent evangelical voices allied with Trump who see fossil fuels as part of a kind of a nationalist vision. I like to use Yale Climate Communication’s “Six Americas” study as an example. If you compare when they first started doing those studies to now, over time there has been an increase in the people who are alarmed and concerned about climate change and a really big decrease in those who are what we would call doubters. There are folks who have a lot of influence and power who are pushing fossil fuels and looking to continue to have an “all of the above” energy strategy—we see that in the news media every day now—but the reality I think is that for most folks on the ground, they are grappling with the real climate challenges that they’re facing every day. It used to feel sort of far away, like you’re talking about polar bears and ice caps. Now we’re seeing floods and droughts, and farmers are seeing changes in their growing seasons for their crops. That makes it more real to people. I think those powerful voices pushing fossil fuels will be drowned out by the realities on the ground.So how do you envision people of faith being mobilized for climate policy advocacy?The Inflation Reduction Act was the result of many years of advocacy amongst people from all walks of life across the country, and this money is starting to make a real difference on the ground. There’s a lot of money going into nonprofits, including houses of worship, who are installing solar and other energy efficiency systems and getting rid of their gas appliances and so on. One of the things that we found in our recent solar survey is that there are about 2,500 communities of faith around the country that have installed solar, with more coming through the direct pay mechanism with the IRA. We have a few congregations that have received their payment for direct pay, and many many more that have applied, and others that are in the exploratory phase. This trend is competitive with businesses like Starbucks and Walmart and all these other businesses that get a lot of attention around their solar installations.That’s also happening on the consumer level—faith communities are made up of people, many of whom have homes, and they’re also looking for ways they can adapt, use this federal funding to make these improvements in their own homes that improve their lives, their bottom line, as well as the health of their families.The next piece of work is to protect what those incentives are and have done so that they won’t be rolled back or clawed back. There’s a lot of personal connection to that for folks, whether that’s because they live near drilling sites and they don’t want to see methane rules rolled back because it’s improving the health and air quality in their community, or folks who are saying we don’t want to roll back the direct pay portion of the IRA funding because that’s a way that’s helping faith communities install solar and be able to put more money into the mission and serve their communities. I think part of the opportunity here is to make those connections for individuals that are personal for them—whatever that means for them or their family.Good News/Bad NewsThe BBC has put together a list of “seven quiet breakthroughs for climate and nature in 2024.” They include the U.K. finally closing its last coal-fired power plant and deforestation in the Amazon rainforest in Brazil falling to a nine-year low.Driven by the climate crisis, the country’s home insurance problem is growing. Nonrenewal rates (that’s when an insurance company drops a home that was previously covered) rose in 46 states in 2023, according to data obtained by the Senate Budget Committee. Read The New York Times’ feature on this or check out their accompanying data visualization to see where insurers are dropping coverage in your state.Stat of the Week$100 per yearThat’s the possible extra cost to American consumers of increasing liquefied natural gas exports (as the Trump administration plans to do), according to a new study released by the Department of Energy this week. It also found that the LNG exports could lead to an extra 1.5 gigatons of greenhouse gases by 2050.What I’m ReadingAs Clock Ticks to Act on the Climate Crisis, N.C. Activists Target a ‘Carbon Plan’At Inside Climate News, Lisa Sorg profiles the activists fighting a longtime villain in the environmental justice movement, Duke Energy, which has released a “carbon plan” that involves building numerous natural gas plants while keeping their coal plants open for years, completely missing the company’s 2030 emissions-reduction goals. Some of these activists, like 74-year-old Bobby Jones, have been fighting Duke Energy for years.“I know my children and grandchildren will not be the ones who can afford clean water and clean air,” Jones said. “They will be the ones relegated to cancer alleys. So I’ve got to fight. And I’ve got to encourage others to fight. Because we already see climate change. We don’t have to wait for it to happen.”Jones often thinks of the final words of [environmental justice advocate] John Gurley, as cancer had hollowed out his body. “The last conversation we had, we were talking about Duke Energy. And he said, ‘Bobby, hold them accountable.’”Read Lisa Sorg’s full report at Inside Climate News.This article first appeared in Life in a Warming World, a weekly TNR newsletter authored by deputy editor Heather Souvaine Horn. Sign up here.

It’s a weird time for religion in the United States. Christians are on track to become a religious minority in the country within a few decades but also, soon, to wield incredible power in a second Trump administration—thanks not least to a neo-Crusader defense secretary nominee, Christian nationalists likely leading the Office of Management and Budget as well as the House of Representatives, and an array of powerful Christian judges appointed in Trump’s first term whose numbers will only grow in his second. Meanwhile, amid a devastatingly grim Advent season for other communities, Latino Christian leaders interviewed by Axios “say they will unpack the Holy Family’s immigration plight during Christmas services to offer hope for immigrants” facing ICE raids and deportations in the new administration. White Protestants and Catholics voted by large margins for Trump; Black Protestants, Jews, atheists, and agnostics voted overwhelmingly against him. Muslim voters outraged by Biden’s support for Israel’s slaughter in Gaza abandoned the Democrats at striking rates, many voting instead for Jill Stein.So while the ranks of the religiously unaffiliated or even nonreligious may be growing, the relevance of religion to politics clearly persists. And that means religion is relevant to climate change too.The Pew Research polls in 2022 found that moderately or highly religious people were much less likely to rate climate change as a serious problem than atheists were. But the surveys also showed huge numbers of religious people to be concerned. Growing numbers of religious leaders and groups—even among white evangelicals—are pushing for policies protecting the climate and environment.To learn about the contours of the growing religious advocacy for climate and environmental protection, I called up the Reverend Susan Hendershot, an ordained minister in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) and president of Interfaith Power and Light, a group focused on engaging people of faith in environmental causes and climate action. This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.How do you perceive your job in terms of engaging religious communities in climate advocacy?Interfaith Power and Light started in 2000 because our founder was seeing a disconnect between what she was hearing from environmental organizations, in terms of climate change and care for the earth, and the fact that she was not hearing that in her place of worship. For her, it became a mission to say that as faith communities, we are called to care for creation and we need to find ways to live that out: It’s not just talking about it, it’s doing something. From the start, there was a focus on greening houses of worship as an act of faith. So everything from energy efficiency upgrades to installing solar in houses of worship. And the other side of that has been the focus on policy advocacy, to say personal action is important and it gets us a certain way down the road as part of civil society, but unless we have the right policies in place, we can’t actually make the progress that we need to make. It’s centered on spiritual values and on the moral opportunity to take action—to say people of faith are and should be leaders in working for climate and environmental justice. But this is focused on people from many different religious backgrounds, right?We say we work with people of all spiritual traditions and no spiritual traditions, recognizing that there are a lot of spiritual but not religious folks that are out there and that is a growing percentage. We want to make sure that there’s a big tent out there that’s for everyone who wants to take action from a place of spiritual values.Climate anxiety is on the rise. What does the lens of faith or spiritual values have to offer the climate fight, in your view?I see faith communities and leaders having three roles in the climate movement. The first one is pastoral, because there’s a lot of climate anxiety and grief out there, whether it’s people who have suffered from a climate disaster who are recovering and need a support system or young people who are considering whether they even want to have a family because do you want to bring children into a climate-changed world? So that pastoral role is really, really important. Faith leaders are trained to work with people who are suffering, grieving, in trauma.The second role I see as the practical role, which is offering leadership within their own faith community, working to move climate solutions forward in their houses of worship: renewable energy systems, energy efficiency, electric vehicles. Just serving as models in the community of what’s possible. The third role is the prophetic role. We have to talk about this. One of the things Katharine Hayhoe says as a climate scientist and person of faith is that the most important thing you can do for climate change is to talk about it, because part of the problem is it’s not being discussed enough. Pastors are called to use their prophetic voices in their places of worship to move people to action. How does the fragmentation of religious groups right now complicate your work? I’m thinking about the very prominent evangelical voices allied with Trump who see fossil fuels as part of a kind of a nationalist vision. I like to use Yale Climate Communication’s “Six Americas” study as an example. If you compare when they first started doing those studies to now, over time there has been an increase in the people who are alarmed and concerned about climate change and a really big decrease in those who are what we would call doubters. There are folks who have a lot of influence and power who are pushing fossil fuels and looking to continue to have an “all of the above” energy strategy—we see that in the news media every day now—but the reality I think is that for most folks on the ground, they are grappling with the real climate challenges that they’re facing every day. It used to feel sort of far away, like you’re talking about polar bears and ice caps. Now we’re seeing floods and droughts, and farmers are seeing changes in their growing seasons for their crops. That makes it more real to people. I think those powerful voices pushing fossil fuels will be drowned out by the realities on the ground.So how do you envision people of faith being mobilized for climate policy advocacy?The Inflation Reduction Act was the result of many years of advocacy amongst people from all walks of life across the country, and this money is starting to make a real difference on the ground. There’s a lot of money going into nonprofits, including houses of worship, who are installing solar and other energy efficiency systems and getting rid of their gas appliances and so on. One of the things that we found in our recent solar survey is that there are about 2,500 communities of faith around the country that have installed solar, with more coming through the direct pay mechanism with the IRA. We have a few congregations that have received their payment for direct pay, and many many more that have applied, and others that are in the exploratory phase. This trend is competitive with businesses like Starbucks and Walmart and all these other businesses that get a lot of attention around their solar installations.That’s also happening on the consumer level—faith communities are made up of people, many of whom have homes, and they’re also looking for ways they can adapt, use this federal funding to make these improvements in their own homes that improve their lives, their bottom line, as well as the health of their families.The next piece of work is to protect what those incentives are and have done so that they won’t be rolled back or clawed back. There’s a lot of personal connection to that for folks, whether that’s because they live near drilling sites and they don’t want to see methane rules rolled back because it’s improving the health and air quality in their community, or folks who are saying we don’t want to roll back the direct pay portion of the IRA funding because that’s a way that’s helping faith communities install solar and be able to put more money into the mission and serve their communities. I think part of the opportunity here is to make those connections for individuals that are personal for them—whatever that means for them or their family.Good News/Bad NewsThe BBC has put together a list of “seven quiet breakthroughs for climate and nature in 2024.” They include the U.K. finally closing its last coal-fired power plant and deforestation in the Amazon rainforest in Brazil falling to a nine-year low.Driven by the climate crisis, the country’s home insurance problem is growing. Nonrenewal rates (that’s when an insurance company drops a home that was previously covered) rose in 46 states in 2023, according to data obtained by the Senate Budget Committee. Read The New York Times’ feature on this or check out their accompanying data visualization to see where insurers are dropping coverage in your state.Stat of the Week$100 per yearThat’s the possible extra cost to American consumers of increasing liquefied natural gas exports (as the Trump administration plans to do), according to a new study released by the Department of Energy this week. It also found that the LNG exports could lead to an extra 1.5 gigatons of greenhouse gases by 2050.What I’m ReadingAs Clock Ticks to Act on the Climate Crisis, N.C. Activists Target a ‘Carbon Plan’At Inside Climate News, Lisa Sorg profiles the activists fighting a longtime villain in the environmental justice movement, Duke Energy, which has released a “carbon plan” that involves building numerous natural gas plants while keeping their coal plants open for years, completely missing the company’s 2030 emissions-reduction goals. Some of these activists, like 74-year-old Bobby Jones, have been fighting Duke Energy for years.“I know my children and grandchildren will not be the ones who can afford clean water and clean air,” Jones said. “They will be the ones relegated to cancer alleys. So I’ve got to fight. And I’ve got to encourage others to fight. Because we already see climate change. We don’t have to wait for it to happen.”Jones often thinks of the final words of [environmental justice advocate] John Gurley, as cancer had hollowed out his body. “The last conversation we had, we were talking about Duke Energy. And he said, ‘Bobby, hold them accountable.’”Read Lisa Sorg’s full report at Inside Climate News.This article first appeared in Life in a Warming World, a weekly TNR newsletter authored by deputy editor Heather Souvaine Horn. Sign up here.

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Our Big Global Problems Are Connected, so Tackle Them Together, Scientists say

This story was originally published by Grist and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. As global temperatures rise from the burning of fossil fuels, researchers and policymakers have proposed solutions like installing renewable energy, replacing gasoline-powered cars with electric ones, and developing technology to suck carbon out of the air. But these policies often address climate […]

This story was originally published by Grist and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. As global temperatures rise from the burning of fossil fuels, researchers and policymakers have proposed solutions like installing renewable energy, replacing gasoline-powered cars with electric ones, and developing technology to suck carbon out of the air. But these policies often address climate change in isolation—without regard for other pressing issues like a decline in biodiversity, the contamination of freshwater sources, and the pollution of agricultural soils.  A new report released Tuesday by the United Nations’ expert panel on biodiversity makes the case for a different approach based on addressing the “nexus” between two or more out of five essential issue areas: climate change, biodiversity, food, human health, and water. Such an approach is not only more likely to help the world meet various UN targets on biodiversity, sustainable development, and climate mitigation; it’s also more cost-effective. “We have to move decisions and actions beyond single-issue silos,” said Paula Harrison, a professor of land and water modeling at the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology and a co-chair of the report, in a statement. Other scientific reports have studied the interlinkages between two or three of these issues, but she told reporters on Tuesday that this latest report is the “most ambitious” to date. The new report was the result of three years of work of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, or IPBES, an expert body that’s analogous to the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which periodically assesses the state of the science on global warming. The report centers on biodiversity—that’s the IPBES’s remit, after all—describing how the variety of life on Earth is “essential to our very existence.” But it goes out of its way to show how rapidly accelerating biodiversity loss is both contributing to and being exacerbated by other crises. Climate change, for instance, is making some habitats inhospitable to their erstwhile animal populations, while the loss of those populations can have impacts on freshwater availability and carbon storage. The five interlinking issues were selected by representatives of the 147 IPBES’s member countries. Meanwhile, solutions that focus on just one issue may have detrimental effects on other elements. Pete Smith, a professor of soils and global change at the University of Aberdeen in the United Kingdom, gave the example of bioenergy with carbon capture and storage, or BECCS, a climate solution in which crops are grown to draw CO2 out of the air and then burned to generate energy. The resulting greenhouse gas emissions are captured and stored in rock formations, with the aim of removing them from the carbon cycle permanently. The problem, Smith said, is that to implement this process on a large scale would require vast tracts of land that might otherwise have been used to grow food crops—so BECCS can unintentionally harm food security. Devoting land to single-variety crops can also use up lots of water and jeopardize biodiversity. “When you just focus on climate change,” he told Grist, “you might end up with some solutions that damage other elements of the nexus.” In other scenarios, it’s not the solution itself that’s problematic; it’s the way it’s implemented. Planting trees, for example, can be done in consultation with local communities and taking into account unique ecosystem needs. Or, as Smith described, a big company seeking to generate carbon credits could evict Native peoples from their land and start a plantation of fast-growing, nonnative tree species.  The latter situation might benefit climate change in the narrowest sense, Smith said, but “with a whole bunch of negative impacts on people, on health, on water.” The assessment finds that, between 2001 and 2021, every one of the five issues analyzed has been damaged by factors including urbanization, war, and growing per capita consumption—except for food availability. That could be explained by a kind of decision-making the report describes as “food first,” in which more food is grown to benefit human health at the expense of biodiversity, freshwater availability, and climate change. Decision-making built solely around climate change or conservation could be similarly counterproductive, the report says, based on an analysis of 186 future scenarios crafted from 52 scientific studies. The most promising alternative is a “nature-oriented nexus” focused on all five target areas, emphasizing “strong environmental regulation, sustainable agricultural practices, lower rates of global per capita consumption, and strong development of green technologies.” More than 160 scientists from 57 countries contributed to the report, which was formally adopted this weekend at IPBES’s annual conference in Windhoek, Namibia. During a press conference on Tuesday, the authors said they were ending the year “on a high note for multilateralism,” in contrast to the stalemates that defined other intergovernmental negotiations in 2024, like the global plastics treaty and the climate conference in Baku, Azerbaijan. In addition to the nexus report, IPBES member states also approved a report on the “transformative change” that is needed to address global crises connected to biodiversity, including climate change. Notably, that report says that “disconnection from and domination over nature and people” is at the root of toxic chemical pollution, deforestation, the burning of fossil fuels, and other causes of climate and environmental degradation. Both reports highlight the need to address the inequitable concentration of wealth and power and the prioritization of short-term material gains in order to “prevent triggering the potentially irreversible decline and projected collapse of key ecosystem functions.”  “Right now, our economic and financial system is not fit for purpose; it does not value nature,” Pamela McElwee, a professor of human ecology at Rutgers University and a co-chair of the nexus report, told reporters on Tuesday.  The nexus report finds that $7 trillion a year in public subsidies and private financial incentives go toward activities that directly damage the five issue areas. Only $200 billion—less than 3 percent of that total—is spent directly on improving biodiversity. Because the nexus report was requested directly by the governments of IPBES’s 147 member countries—among them, China, India, Indonesia, Nigeria, Pakistan, the United States, and most of Europe—the scientists who contributed to it are hopeful that their recommendations will be adopted by policymakers. In the report, they highlight 71 cross-cutting responses to interlinked global problems, ranging from reducing plastic pollution to conserving wetland ecosystems to providing universal health coverage.  Smith, who is a soil researcher and has also contributed to reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, said working on the report has changed his own outlook. “I’ve tried to apply the nexus thinking on a couple of projects on how climate change affects the food system, and people in disadvantaged communities,” he said. “All of these things are leading me to take a broader, less siloed view than I would have done 10 years ago.” Previous IPBES reports have shown how biodiversity is “declining faster than at any time in human history.” At the group’s next conference in 2025, it’s expected to present a new assessment of businesses’ impact and dependence on biodiversity, and IPBES plans to release its second global assessment of the state of biodiversity in 2028. 

Climate
Energy
Technology

Cold weather-related deaths rising in US: Study

Deaths in the United States from cold weather-related causes have been rising, according to a new study published in a medical journal on Thursday.  The study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), found that the number of Americans who died from cold weather-related factors more than doubled from 1999 to 2022,...

Deaths in the United States from cold weather-related causes have been rising, according to a new study published in a medical journal on Thursday.  The study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), found that the number of Americans who died from cold weather-related factors more than doubled from 1999 to 2022, with the highest rate being detected in the Midwest.  Over 40,000 people died between 1999 and 2022 in situations in which cold was found to be the underlying or a contributing factor, according to the study.  The death rate from cold weather-related causes was the highest among adults aged 75 and over. As people age, the body’s ability to regulate temperature worsens, therefore being more prone to body temperature declines.  People between the ages of 45 and 74 had the highest year-to-year increase in cold-related deaths. Black, American-Indian and Alaska Native people had the highest cold-relate death rates, according to the study. The highest annual mortality rate spike from cold weather-related factors was among white and Hispanic people.  “Even though we are in this warming world, cold-related deaths are still a public health issue in the U.S.,” Michael Liu, the study’s lead author, told The New York Times.  The study’s authors wrote that “although mean temperatures are increasing in the U.S., studies have found that climate change has been linked with more frequent episodes of severe winter weather in the U.S. over the past few decades, which may in turn be associated with increased cold-related mortality.”  Deaths during winter months in recent years have been 8 to 12 percent higher than those in non-winter months, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

Climate
Health

In Florida, the Miccosukee Fight to Protect the Everglades in the Face of Climate Change

For centuries, the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida has called the Everglades home

EVERGLADES, Fla. (AP) — As a boy, when the water was low Talbert Cypress from the Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida rummaged through the Everglades’ forests, swam in its swampy ponds and fished in its canals.But the vast wetlands near Miami have radically changed since Cypress was younger. Now 42 and tribal council chairman, Cypress said water levels are among the biggest changes. Droughts are drier and longer. Prolonged floods are drowning tree islands sacred to them. Native wildlife have dwindled. “It’s basically extremes now,” he said.Tribal elder Michael John Frank put it this way: “The Everglades is beautiful, but it’s just a skeleton of the way it used to be.” EDITOR’S NOTE: This is part of a series of on how tribes and Indigenous communities are coping with and combating climate change.For centuries, the Everglades has been the tribe's home. But decades of massive engineering projects for development and agriculture severed the wetlands to about half its original size, devastating an ecosystem that’s sustained them. Tribe members say water mismanagement has contributed to fires, floods and water pollution in their communities and cultural sites. Climate change, and the fossil fuel activities that caused it, are ongoing threats.The Miccosukee people have long fought to heal and protect what remains. They were historically reluctant to engage with the outside world due to America’s violent legacy against Indigenous people. But with a new tribal administration, the tribe has played an increasingly collaborative and leadership role in healing the Everglades.They’re working to stop oil exploration and successfully fought a wilderness designation that would have cut their access to ancestral lands. They’ve pushed for a project to reconnect the western Everglades with the larger ecosystem while helping to control invasive species and reintroducing racoons, hawks and other native animals. In August they signed a co-stewardship agreement for some of South Florida's natural landscapes. They've held prayer walks, launched campaigns to raise awareness of important issues and used airboat tours as public classrooms. Even so, a new report on the progress of Everglades work acknowledges a lack of meaningful and consistent engagement with the Miccosukee and Seminole tribes. It calls for applying Indigenous knowledge to restoration efforts and a steady partnership with tribes, whose longstanding, intimate and reciprocal relationship with the environment can help with understanding historical and present ecological conditions. The Miccosukee's past fuels their activism today For generations, the Miccosukee people would make pilgrimages from northern Florida to the Everglades to fish, hunt and hold religious ceremonies. When the Seminole Wars broke out in 1817, the tribe navigated the vast terrain better than the U.S. Army. By the late 1850s, Col. Gustavus Loomis had seared every tribal village and field in a region known as the Big Cypress, forcing the Miccosukee and Seminole people to seek refuge on tree islands deep in the Everglades. “That’s the reason we’re here today. We often look at the Everglades as our protector during that time. And so now, it’s our turn to protect the Everglades,” said Cypress.Many of the Everglades’ modern problems began in the 1940s when the region was drained to build cities and plant crops. Over time, the ecosystems where the Miccosukee people hunted, fished and gathered plants, held sacred rituals and put their deceased to rest, have been destroyed.A state-federal project to clean the water and rehydrate the landscape aims to undo much of the damage. But water management decisions and restoration efforts have flooded or parched lands where tribe members live and hold ceremonies. That’s a reason the tribe has pushed for decades for a comprehensive response with the Western Everglades Restoration Project. Members have spoken at public meetings, written letters to federal agencies, lobbied with state and federal leaders while gathering with stakeholders to hear their concerns. If all goes right, the project will clean polluted water, improve hydrology, provide flood protection and reduce the likelihood and severity of wildfires. Groundbreaking for the project began in July there . Still, there are concerns about community flood risks and whether the project will do enough to improve water quality and quantity after a part of the plan was removed.A second engineered wetland that would have cleaned water was removed from the project proposal after landowners wouldn't give up their lands. The area's geology was also deemed too porous to sustain it. In the absence of an alternative, some people worry water will not meet standards.Even so, Curtis Osceola, chief of staff for the Miccosukee Tribe, said of the project: “If we get this done, we will have forever changed the future for the Miccosukee and Seminole." Victory in fight over wilderness designation In a region of the Everglades now known as the Big Cypress National Preserve, environmental activist and Miccosukee tribe member Betty Osceola learned as a child to spear hunt and subsist off the land like her ancestors did. It's where she still lives, in one of 15 traditional villages that a few hundred Miccosukee and Seminole people also call home. In its cypress swamps and sawgrass prairies, they hunt, gather medicinal plants and hold important events. It’s home to ceremonial and burial grounds, and to the endangered Florida panther.The National Park Service wanted to designate the preserve as wilderness to protect it from human impacts. The tribe pushed back, saying it would have significantly affected their traditional ways of life, limited access to their homelands and ignored the critical stewardship they've provided for centuries. Allowing Indigenous people to remain caretakers of their lands and waters, numerous studies have shown, are critical to protecting biodiversity, forests and fighting climate change. After a stern fight involving campaigns, a petition, testimonials and support from numerous government officials, the tribe succeeded. The National Park Service listened to the tribe's concerns about the legal conflicts the designation would have on their tribal rights, said Osceola, the Miccosukee's chief of staff. Although they continue objecting to the agency's advancing proposal to expand trail systems in the preserve, which the tribe said are near or past culturally significant sites, “they did listen to us on the wilderness designation and at least they’re not, at this time, proceeding with any such designation,” he added. The Miccosukee continue pushing to phase out oil drilling in Big Cypress, writing op-eds and working with local, state and federal governments to stop more oil exploration by acquiring mineral rights in the preserve. Elders look to the next generation to protect the Everglades On a windy afternoon, Frank, the tribal elder, and Hector Tigertail, 18, sat under a chickee, or stilt house, on the tribe’s reservation. A wooden swing swayed near garden beds where flowers, chilies and other plants sprung from the soil. A plastic deer with antlers lay on the grass nearby, used to teach Indigenous youth how to hunt. Frank, 67, shared stories of growing up on tree islands. He remembered when the water was so clean he could drink it, and the deer that emerged to play when a softball game was underway.He spoke of the tribe’s history and a time when wildlife in the Everglades was abundant. Of his distrust of government agencies and the tribe's connection to the land. And he spoke often of his grandfather's words, uttered to him decades ago that still resound. “We were told to never, ever leave the Everglades,” said Frank. “The only way to prolong your life, your culture, your identity is to stay here in the Everglades... as long as you're here, your maker's hand is upon you.”Tigertail heard similar stories from his uncles and grandfather growing up. They helped him feel connected to the Everglades and to his culture. Their stories remind him of the importance of being stewards of the lands that have cared for him and his ancestors. Tribal elders are teaching youth what Cypress called “the modern” way to protect the Everglades – with policy, understanding government practices and integrating traditional and Western science.As a tribal youth member, Tigertail is doing what he can to preserve the Everglades for his generation and ones to come. He works with the Miccosukee Tribe's Fish and Wildlife Department to remove invasive species like pythons and fish like peacock bass. And he tries to be a voice for his people.“To hear that we’re losing it slowly and slowly saddens me," said Tigertail. "But also gives me hope that maybe there is a chance to save it.” The Associated Press receives support from the Walton Family Foundation for coverage of water and environmental policy. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of AP’s environmental coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/climate-and-environmentCopyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Photos You Should See - Sept. 2024

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