By April 17th, 10 days later, Reuters were reporting; “Almost 117,000 people have been evacuated due to floods in Kazakhstan, the Central Asian nation's emergencies ministry said” 2, obviously a traumatic experience for everyone affected. Eventually on the 10th of June the Astana Times reported that “4,521 families in Kazakhstan have received compensation worth … US$126.6 million for repairs and restoration of their homes” and that “In total, … US$522.9 million is required for the complete restoration of housing” 3 a huge amount (half a billion dollars), a difficult undertaking and five times the US$110 million we reported in Q1 as being the country’s renewable budget for 2024.

Internationally this is not the only natural disaster afflicting the world, in April and May the USA saw tornadoes stronger and more intense than anything seen before, wreaking death and destruction 4 and India is seeing the highest temperatures ever with Reuters’ reporting; “While every year temperatures in India tend to peak in the months of May and June, the number of heatwave days recorded over north-western and eastern parts of the country this season have been more than double the normal, with eastern India also experiencing its hottest April on record.” 5

India is not the only place experiencing heat, back to the USA again in June a heat dome established over the Western U.S. and multiple news outlets reporting “extreme heat this week — with temperatures easily topping 100. Blame a condition known as a heat dome” 6 this follows a similar occurrence in 2023 and some of the highest temperatures ever recorded. “Phoenix was one of several cities in the region that experienced their hottest summers on record in 2023. … Last summer, 645 people died in the Phoenix area due to heat-related illnesses.” 7 will temperatures in 2024 be even hotter?

All this should not come as a huge surprise, the UN and the Paris Accord was meant to limit the increase in temperature ideally to 1.5℃ (to limit sea level rise) or at a maximum of 2.0℃ because above these temperatures extreme weather events become more extreme and more often. The events reported are science predictions moving towards science facts. “Human-caused global warming [is] at all-time high” according to a report released by the University of Leeds. They are not saying anything new, NASA and European Union's Copernicus Climate Change Service also concluded that 2023 was the hottest total year on record. 8

All of this suggests that globally more must be done to reduce the amount of GHG discharged into the atmosphere globally, but in fact the opposite is happening; according to the IEA CO2 emissions grew by 1.1% in 2023, increasing 410 million tonnes (Mt) to reach a new record high of 37.4 billion tonnes (Gt). This compares with an increase of 490 Mt in 2022 (1.3%). Emissions from coal accounted for more than 65% of the increase in 2023.9 The report goes on to suggest the number of renewables coming on line is reducing the growth of GHG emissions, but the continued and increasing use of coal is still pushing C02 emissions up, faster than renewables can reduce it.

The UN is even more damning, “As things stand, fully implementing unconditional Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) made under the Paris Agreement would put the world on track for limiting temperature rise to 2.9°C above pre-industrial levels this century. Fully implementing conditional NDCs would lower this to 2.5°C.” 10 Already the maximum 2.0°C temperature rise is nothing but a dream.

It is time for governments to take climate change seriously, stop lamenting the cost of energy transition and realise the cost implication of climate change impacts; not only in terms of money, but human costs too. As the floods in Kazakhstan demonstrate, 100,000 people were impacted, many of them seriously; having their life upended, torn apart by the rush of flood waters; and then there are the financial costs, in this case over half a billion USD (five times the annual renewable budget) which may go some way to relieve the physical hardship of those worse effected, but will do very little to alleviate the emotional suffering brought on by this catastrophe.

Meanwhile the headlines just keep coming as the heat just keeps rising, the latest being some 1,000 deaths for participants of the Haj in Saudi Arabia, with one headline blaring “Climate change boosted deadly Saudi haj heat by 2.5°C, scientists say” 11

Let’s hope our next news letter can be a little more upbeat.