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30 Times Nature Made Us Say “NOPE”

December 25, 2025

Sometimes we get so used to dreamy landscapes and cute puppies that we forget about nature’s dark side. But it’s there. Regardless of whether we pay attention to it or not. To remind you about some of the Mother Earth’s scariest ‘children,’ Bored Panda has compiled a list of photos that should send shivers down your spine. Or at least make you say a loud “NOPE.” From half-dead spiders covered in fungus to mutated frogs with eyes growing in their mouth, consider viewing these images as a contest: if you can scroll to the very end, you win. The prize? Nightmares.

Discover more in 30 Times Nature Made Us Say “NOPE” (WARNING: This List Is Not For Sensitive People)

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#1 What Do You Do When You See A Flying Fox In Your Backyard? (The Philippines)

No that isn’t the camera angle, that is actually one big bat. The flying fox also called the fox bat are among the largest bats in the world with a wingspan of 5 feet (1.5 metres) and a head and body length of about 16 inches (40 centimeters). They are found on tropical islands and the mainland of Asia. As scary as they look, these gentle giants only eat fruit.

#2 Haven’t Cleaned Behind The Dresser In Months

Did you know that some lizards lay eggs while some give live birth? That’s right, while you will find lizard eggs of geckos, iguanas and monitor lizards, you won’t see blue tongue lizards, Solomon island lizards and shingle-back lizards laying eggs! They give birth to their live offspring.

#3 Crazy Bird Tornado

This may look like a shot from Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds, but this eerie scene was created by none other than mother nature herself. A Reddit user posted the shot to the site’s r/WTF thread and titled it “birdnado.” The cluster is thought to be made up of starlings, a bird known for flying in thick flock formations called murmurations. These clusters reduce the amount of energy required during travel and protect them from predators. If starlings sense a shift in one part of the flock the entire pattern will shift.

#4 Toads Riding On A Python

68mm just fell in the last hour at Kununurra. Flushed all the cane toads out of my brothers dam. Some of them took the easy way out – hitching a ride on the back of a 3.5m python.

#5 Believe It Or Not, This Is One Of The Least Dangerous Spiders We Have In Australia

This is the huntsman spider, a common friend to be found in houses and garden across Australia. He’s harmless really, don’t let his large size intimidate you. Huntsmen won’t bite humans unless provoked, are not venomous and are actually handy to have around the place, he’ll use his speed and agility to keep your cockroach population under control.

Think of the huntsman as a handy pet. Respect his space, let him do his job and he’ll look after you well.

#6 Birds Using A Dead Pike’s Mouth To Nest

Pike fish are freshwater fish known as ambush predators because of their ability to lie perfectly still for an impressive amount of time, thankfully for these birds this pike is out of water so it’s safe to say it’s actually dead.

#7 I Want To Ride My Bicycle

Did you know that bees swarm when when the queen bee leaves the colony with a large group of worker bees? It’s how a new honey bee colony is formed. In the prime swarm, about 60% of the worker bees leave the original hive location with the old queen. This swarm can contain thousands to tens of thousands of bees. Usually, swarming takes place in spring, within a two- or three-week period, but occasional swarms can happen throughout the producing season as well.

#8 There Was A Friggin Gecko Hiding In My Son’s Toy Spider

Geckos are reptiles found in all parts of the world except for Antartica. To avoid predators they have developed special features such as camouflage to help them hide in any environment (even a toy spider). Most geckos are nocturnal creatures which means they are active at night, but there are day geckos which are willing to venture out during the daylight hours in search of food.

#9 My Town In Central Texas Has A Bird Problem

Every autumn, flocks of birds migrate to warmer territories. Most birds migrate at night (when the air is cooler and calmer, and there are fewer predators), flying in tandem even when they are 655 feet (200 meters) or more apart. Some of them, however, can be spotted during the daytime as well.

#10 Sawfish

Sawfishes are large rays that are characterized by their long blade-like snouts. Along this elongated snout are lateral tooth-like denticles set inside sockets – which give the allusion of a giant chainsaw. Sawfishes use their “saw” (rostrum) during feeding time and to defend themselves. The rostrum will slash in a side-to-side motion and dislodge invertebrates from the substrate to stun fish.

#11 Lizard Shed His Entire Face In One Go

If you want to peel of the skin from your pet lizard’s head, you should try to take it off in one piece, and you want to make sure that it’s ‘released’ around the ears. Also, be extra careful around the eyes.

#12 Mother And Girlfriend Found This On The Beach Today. Any Idea What It Is?

This was found in Broome, Western Australia and looks like an anemone. More specifically, Dofleinia armata, the armed anemone. Also called the striped anemone. It is considered extremely dangerous as it can inflict painful stings that take months to heal.

#13 The Fox And The Hound

This poor fox obviously fell into the freezing water, perhaps pursuing prey onto thin ice, and drowned. We’d like to think that its doggy cousin is paying condolences in a sweet moment of canine comradeship.

#14 This Fascinating Creature, A Deep-Sea Squid, Was Video Taped By Shell Out In The Perdido Area Of Alaminos Canyon, At 7800 Ft. Depth

We are well aware of the weird and wonderful creatures that inhabit the vast depths of the ocean, but this bigfin squid is very rarely seen, and little is known about them as a species.

This is the best and most recent footage of the elusive creature, taken on 11 November 2007 by an oil company in the Gulf of Mexico. The species are very distinct from all previously known squids, with the length of the elastic tentacles estimated to be up to 15–20 times the body length. Estimates based on video evidence put the total length of the largest specimens at 8 metres (26 ft) or more.

#15 Death Shrouds From h**l – Spiders Cocooned These Trees To Save Themselves From A Flood

In 2010 a monsoon hit Pakistan that caused the rivers to swell and insects to run for cover. The strange anomaly was captured by aid worker Russell Watkins, a multimedia editor with the U.K.’s Department for International Development (DFID) in the Pakistani village of Sindh.”There wasn’t a scientific analysis of this being done. Anecdotally, I think it was pretty much any kind arachnid species, possibly combined with other insects,” he told National Geographic. It was noted that because the flood waters took so long to recede, spiders who had sought asylum in the trees had just begun to spin weaves. Locals said they had never seen anything like it before.

#16 Found A Beehive While Renovating An Old House

Bees can find a cozy space between walls, causing issues for homeowners. How do you tell them to leave? We all know the value that bees have for ecosystems so simply gassing them should not really bee and option.

They can cause damage and mold though, especially if they are honey bees, so should be removed. Call a professional beekeeper to come and take the hive away, don’t attempt it yourself!

#17 In Case You Ever Wanted To Know What A Hedgehog Skeleton Looked Like

As you can see, our spiky little friend wears his spines, which are made of keratin like our hair and nails, like a fur coat. The spines, unlike porcupine spines, don’t easily attach from their bodies and are neither poisonous nor barbed. They can still be painful to the touch though!

#18 Snaggle-Toothed Snake Eel Found On The Beach In Puerto Vallarta, Mexico

This nightmarish creature is the snaggle-toothed snake eel or the Aplatophis zorro. It is a tropical eel found in the eastern central Pacific Ocean. According to the specimen found and studied by John E. McCosker and David Ross Robertson in 2001 they can reach a maximum length of 104 centimeters or 3″4 in feet (gulp). The eels live at 5-10 metres deep and live in burrows.

#19 Frog With Eyes In Its Mouth As A Result Of Macromutation

A macromutation is a mutation that has made a significant impact on an organism, caused by a change in a regulatory gene that’s responsible for the expression of an array of structural genes. It’s been suggested that the cause of the mutation was the result of a parasitic infection by a trematode worm (Ribeiroia ondatrae). Trematode infections have reportedly been linked to an increasing number of amphibian limb mutations, particularly missing, malformed, and extra hind legs.

#20 You Can See The Back Of An Owl’s Eye Through Its Ear

“Like all birds, owls lack the external ear structures found in most mammals,” photographer Jim McCormac said. “The birds’ ears are unadorned openings in their skulls, visible only when the feathers on the sides of the animals’ heads are parted. But these owls’ unusually large earholes and eyes also offer a “behind the scenes” peek at their visual system, showcasing the evolutionary adaptations in sight and hearing that make the birds so successful at stealthy nighttime hunting.”

#21 Lactarius Rubidius Growing Out Of Fox Skull

Lactarius Rubidius, more commonly known as the ‘candy cap’ mushroom, is found in western North America and is known mainly as an aromatic mushroom. Instead of being eaten as a vegetable, they are instead used mainly as a flavoring in a way similar to vanilla, saffron, or truffles. Would you eat this one if you found it?

#22 This Spider Web That Looks Like A Spider-Man Mask

Light, temperature, and humidity can affect the strength of a web. The adhesive droplets that spiders apply to their silk become sticky only when the silk leaves the spider’s body. But its strength can be affected by environmental factors, thus transforming into a creepy skull like this one.

#23 Snake Was Electrocuted Then Bitten By Another Snake, Which Was Also Electrocuted

This shocking situation occurred within a power box and is just a terrifying ma-ssss-acre of serpentine proportions. Perhaps it was a botched rescue attempt after one poor snek found himself in trouble, his buddy tried pulling him away and suffered the same fate. Either way, it’s truly the stuff of nightmares.

#24 Someone Bugged His Phone

Things like this can happen when people fumigate. Insects try to escape chemicals by crawling into tight little places. Then they usually die.

#25 Just Going To Run

This cozy fella has been identified as a ratsnake. Native to North America, ratsnakes are commonly found in the forests of the eastern and central United States and are essentially harmless to humans. If bitten by one of these critters, the most you will need is a small bandage, they are not venomous.

As the name suggests, their diet consists largely of small rodents, meaning they can often be found around barns and garages. Careful handling them though if you do find one in your shoe, instead of biting they are more likely to cover their victim with a foul-smelling musk!

#26 Hydnora Africana

The plant grows underground, except for a fleshy flower that emerges above ground and emits an odor of feces to attract its natural pollinators, dung beetles and carrion beetles. The flowers act as temporary traps, retaining the beetles that enter long enough for them to pick up pollen.

#27 Something Is Growing Inside A Bottle Of Natural Orange Juice I Abandoned Inside A Cabinet For Over A Year

This looks like it could be a cylindrical yeast colony. They form when nutrients settle on the bottom below the colony, allowing it to form vertically.

#28 Grow Bigger Or Die

It’s hard to say how large these terrifying-looking locusts actually are. Are they true giants, or is the snake just a lil nipper? Either way, they appear set for a lovely sit down meal.

#29 Weird Mold Growing Out Of Cat Food Can I Left In An Empty Room For 10 Days

By the looks of it, this could be a type of fungi called phycomyces. Phycomyces is not known to produce toxins, although its chemical composition has been investigated in considerable detail. It is probably safe for mammals: the fact that the dung of small mammals is the best natural source for Phycomyces spores suggests a regular consumption as food.

#30 The Assassin Bug – The Ferocious Bug That s***s Prey Dry And Wears Their Corpses

This terrifying and aptly named insects inject a lethal saliva into their prey which liquefies the insides, which are then sucked out.
The corpses of the emptied out creatures are then worn as camouflage by the cunning assassin. The camouflage is to protect the bug from being preyed on by jumping spiders, but if anything you’d think it would make them look even more tempting!

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Nine of our best climate stories from 2025

December 22, 2025

At Climate Home News, we found this year a pretty depressing one to cover, shaped as it was by Donald Trump’s attacks on climate science and action at home and abroad – and rounded off by the UN declaring global warming will break through the key 1.5C limit the world set itself in 2015.

But it wasn’t all bad. Nobody had decided to follow the US out of the Paris Agreement by the time it turned 10 this month. Anti-climate candidates in Canada and Australia, backed by Trump, lost elections convincingly. And 2025 may also have been the year carbon dioxide emissions fell for the first time.

What’s more, our reporting this year saw results in the real world. After we revealed that Chilean doctors believe pollution from copper mines in the northern hub of Calama is causing autism, campaigners sued state-owned mining company Codelco. The case is ongoing.

One of the lawyers representing the campaigners said “when [Climate Home News] revealed our silent suffering and our fight, we felt we had finally been heard and had entered the national conversation thanks to international media coverage. That was the final push to file the lawsuit.”

If you want to fund more impactful reporting like this in 2026, please subscribe and unlock all of our content for just the price of a coffee per week. Or to keep up with our latest coverage, you can sign up for our free newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn, Instagram, BlueSky and Facebook.

Below are nine of our best stories this year and, if that’s not enough, here’s nine more from 2024.

1. Solar squeeze: US tariffs threaten panel production and jobs in Thailand

In the year of trade wars, Trump extended Biden-era tariffs on solar panels from China to neighbouring countries. Nicha Wachpanich spoke to some of those workers who subsequently lost their jobs making panels at Chinese-run factories in Thailand and found that the US levies and bad behaviour by bosses had combined to crush their dreams of a better life.

Solar Thailand — Bunyuen Sukmai, a labour lawyer and former auto-factory worker, goes through files of dismissal dispute cases (Photo: Peerapon Boonyakiat)

2. Business-as-usual: Donors pour climate adaptation finance into big infrastructure, neglecting local needs

Trump being Trump, and axing US climate finance, is no reason to let other wealthy donor nations off the hook. We examined the latest spreadsheets for annual adaptation aid and found Japan is counting support for massive infrastructure projects in its figures, despite them having only a dubious role in helping people adapt to climate change.

Our reporter Tanbirul Miraj Ripon visited one such project – the Matarbari port in Bangladesh. He found that the port handles coal and gas imports and has destroyed locals’ homes and livelihoods. Despite this, on paper it represents $363 million in Japanese climate adaptation finance, the biggest single climate resilience project being funded by a wealthy country in 2023.

3. Ethiopia’s bold EV ambitions hit bum p s in rural areas

Other nations are trying hard to go green but finding it tricky. This year, Ethiopia hosted the Africa Climate Summit, was selected as the host of COP32 and opened the continent’s biggest hydropower dam.

It plans to use some of this clean power to charge electric vehicles, after banning imports of cars with internal combustion engines (even as the European Union is softening its own 2035 ban on ICEs). While that will reduce Ethiopia’s already tiny emissions and its fossil fuel import bills, it won’t be easy in a nation where only half the population has electricity access, as Solomon Yimer and Vivian Chime reported.

In Ethiopia, EV ambitions are hitting bumps in rural areas — A newly inaugurated EV charging station installed by Ethio Telecom in Addis Ababa. (Photo: Solomon Yimer)

4. Ending poverty and gangs: How Zambia seeks to cash in on the global drive for EVs

Other African governments are trying to cash in on their minerals, which big players like China, the US and increasingly Saudi Arabia want for green technologies and/or making equipment for wars.

Pamela Kapekele went to look at the situation in Zambia’s Copperbelt province – where you can probably guess what they produce! She found that good tax regulations and working conditions will be needed if locals are to see the benefits of surging demand for the metal.

Later in the year, an acid spill from a copper-mine tailings dam that contaminated the country’s main river showed the value of environmental regulation too. Reporting from Nigeria’s lithium and South Africa’s platinum mines also highlighted the challenges of making minerals mining and processing cleaner and fairer for communities.

Zambia copper mining — Illegal miner Mulenga Chishala climbs out of a mining tunnel

5. Is the world’s big idea for greener air travel a flight of fancy?

Some sectors – like international aviation and shipping – tend to fall outside the scope of national media, and it’s a gap we’ve aimed to fill. Together with Singapore’s Straits Times, we tracked the supply chain for what the airline industry calls “Sustainable Aviation Fuel” (SAF) and found that virgin and barely used palm oil – which threatens rainforests – is being passed off as waste cooking oil and used to power planes in Europe.

Malaysia is a particular hotspot for this fraud, as government subsidies there make virgin palm oil cheap in the shops – and it can be sold for a higher price as “used” cooking oil, providing a profit motive for flipping it. Our investigation was picked up by the Financial Times, Bloomberg and the Malaysian authorities, who have since launched a crackdown on this kind of fraud.

But with verification of the materials used for SAF relying on just a handful of commercial auditors conducting mainly paper-based checks, airlines currently cannot know for sure if their green jet fuel is actually sustainable. Their advertising to passengers should – but often doesn’t – reflect this uncertainty.

Members of the public delivering their used cooking oil (UCO) to Evergreen Oil & Feed’s joint collection drive with the Melaka City Council in May 2025. (Photo: Sairien Nafis/Climate Home News/The Straits Times)

6. Brazil’s environment minister suggests roadmap to end fossil fuels at COP30

Our reporting was often prescient this year. We called it correctly that the US would leave the Paris Agreement but not the UNFCCC, that Argentina would not follow America out of Paris, that Ethiopia rather than Nigeria would be chosen as COP32 host and that petrostates would try to kill a new green shipping framework at the International Maritime Organization.

We are also pretty sure we were the first – at least in English – to pick up on Brazilian Environment Minister Marina Silva’s proposal for COP30 to agree on a roadmap away from fossil fuels, which she aired back in June at London Climate Week. That proposal was pushed by President Lula at the start of COP30, dominated much of the conversation at the summit and will continue to be discussed throughout 2026.

Brazil's environment minister Marina Silva at a press conference in London. (Photo: Credit: Isabela Castilho / COP30 presidency) — Brazil’s environment minister Marina Silva at a press conference in London. (Photo: Credit: Isabela Castilho/COP30 presidency)

8. PR firm working for Shell wins COP30 media contract

In the summer of 2025, our crack investigative reporter Matteo Civillini got the scoop on how the Brazilian government, via a contract tendered by the UN, was working with Edelman on international media relations for the COP30 climate summit while the global PR giant was simultaneously engaged in promoting Shell’s fossil fuel interests in Brazil.

This story was picked up by a range of other media, and amplified calls for agencies whose clients include fossil fuel firms to be excluded from the climate negotiations. Advocacy group Clean Creatives was inspired by Matteo’s reporting to launch a campaign against Edelman’s COP involvement. That culminated in an open letter from influencers and creators with a combined audience of over 24 million calling for Edelman to be dropped. The drumbeat on this theme is likely to get louder in 2026.

COP30 President André Aranha Corrêa do Lago speaks to journalists at COP30 (Photo: Flickr/COP30)

8. “House of cards”: Verra used junk carbon credits to fix Shell’s offsetting scandal

And talking of smoke and mirrors, just when we thought the murky web of carbon offsetting linking oil and gas major Shell to sham rice-farming projects in China couldn’t get any more convoluted, it did exactly that.

By combing through the records of carbon-credit registry Verra – the world’s biggest – Matteo confirmed that nearly a million bogus offsets from 10 disqualified methane reduction projects had been compensated for with the same number of junk credits from another four such projects that were also axed by Verra.

“It’s frankly unbelievable that Verra considers it appropriate to compensate for hot air credits with other hot air credits,” Jonathan Crook, policy lead at Carbon Market Watch, told us. “To pretend this is a satisfactory resolution is both absurd and deeply alarming.”

Verra insists the replacement credits were technically available to plug the gap left by the first batch – even though the second set, too, now need to be swapped out. Shell is keeping its distance, saying it does not manage or operate “the projects in question” despite being earlier involved in the Chinese rice-farming programmes as their “authorised representative”. Mind-boggling indeed!

Farmers transplant rice seedlings in the fields in Lianyungang City, Jiangsu Province, China, on June 17, 2025. (Photo: Costfoto/NurPhoto)

9. Self-taught mechanics give second life to Jordan’s glut of spent EV batteries

In what was on balance a bad year, we brought you some hope too. A landmark advisory opinion on climate change and human rights from the International Court of Justice in The Hague was stronger than anyone imagined and may open the door to lawsuits against polluting countries and companies in 2026.

Other good news stories included analysts suggesting China’s fossil fuel use could peak this year, the UN’s loss and damage fund launching its first call for proposals, South Korea and Morocco moving to phase out coal and a boom in imports of solar panels to Africa.

Hope came too from ordinary people and their ingenuity – like the untrained Jordanians interviewed by Yamuna Matheswaran, hooking up solar panels to old Tesla batteries, lowering both their electricity bills and their carbon emissions into the bargain.

Man leans over large depleted EV battery in a workshop in Amman — Shadi Jameel at work in his repair shop in Amman’s al Bayader industrial area (Photo: Shadi Jameel)

The post Nine of our best climate stories from 2025 appeared first on Climate Home News.

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Owner Brings His Cat Everywhere And They Go On All Kinds Of Crazy Adventures Together (29 Pics)

December 18, 2025

Most pet owners like to take their animals on adventures. Especially dog owners: going on long walks, taking them on car rides or even to other countries. However, most of us would agree that house cats are not that happy to leave their home and would rather be left alone than go on a trip to Bali with you. Well, in the case of this cat named Cathode, ‘most of us’ would be wrong.

This cat Rémy Vicarini took home from the shelter six years ago goes on all kinds of adventures with her owner, from biking to mountain climbing, to skydiving. Yes, skydiving. Cathode experiences so much that there’s nothing left to do but envy her. Rémy always ensures that his cat is safe and sound, of course. The owner never does what Cathode doesn’t want to do and always puts her first.

More info: Instagram | youtube.com

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Rémy tells us more about how he got the currently 8-year-old Cathode: “I rescued Cathode when she was 6 months old in a shelter, I was in long studies and I looked for a feline companion to share my life.”

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Rémy tells us about Cathode’s character and personality: “Cathode is very endearing, obedient and gluey. She is very curious and at the same time a little fearful. That’s how I manage to take her and that’s why she stays with me, she trusts me. In the beginning, I only had one apartment life to offer her, so I wanted to let her discover the outdoors in complete safety.”

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“Cathode is always safe with me, I make sure. In all the sports I practice with Cathode, I master them very well on my own, so when I am with Cathode I don’t take any risks. Cathode is always attached with a leash so that she keeps a safe distance in the basket and does not go too far. On a motorbike, she has a helmet that helps stop the wind in her eyes,” said Rémy when asked about Cathode’s safety.

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Rémy explained how long it took him to train Cathode to get used to motorcycles, bikes, etc.: “I took Cathode by bicycle for the first time a month after adoption. It was dark and there was no car. Then the bike, but she was already used to the bike.”

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“Cathode prefers the bike, the speed is just perfect, not too fast and enough speed to have the wind in your whiskers. On my back, all the bumps are cushioned, it’s great for Cathode. I love cycling too, and even more so because I see Cathode happy,” said Rémy when asked what their favorite activities are.

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We asked what adventure are they looking forward to: “We already have a lot of adventure with Cathode. I just wish it could go on for a long time. And maybe one day we’ll be able to take a long bike trip across Europe.”

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Rémy tells us more about himself, his life, and his journey: “I am an engineer and a Ph.D. in science. I am a lonely and hardworking person, I have always been really into what I do! I took responsibility for Cathode the day I adopted her, so I had to give her the best I could from there. She makes me feel good, she makes me feel like a good person, and I know that I can count on her, she will never give up on me.”

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I Want To Show That Adopted Dogs Are Beautiful So I Captured These 30 Photos

December 18, 2025

Hey. My name is Anne and I am a professional dog photographer from Austria. I have two rescued dogs from Romania, Yuri, and Finn. My mission is to give them the life they deserve and to recover their lost time. From the lonely Romanian streets to the most amazing places in the European wilderness.

Together we are discovering the world from crystal-clear lakes to endless fields of flowers, fairytale forests, thundering waterfalls, mountain peaks, and places above the clouds.

More info: Instagram

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#1

I started taking photos of Yuri and Finn during our travels and adventures, to show all the people around the world a piece of their beautiful souls combined with breathtaking landscapes and to show how special and unique rescued dogs are.

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Due to Corona, we cannot travel how and whenever we want. Many suffer from wanderlust and that’s why I thought this is exactly the right time to publish this post. With these photos of my two lovely dogs, I want to take you on a little adventure, where you can start to dream and where you can forget the recent crazy time.

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I really hope these photos will make you smile and that you enjoy this collection of some of our favorite moments.

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The ocean, our planet’s forgotten hero, deserves a formal place in UN climate talks

December 15, 2025

Tiago Pitta e Cunha is chief executive of the Oceano Azul Foundation.

The recent COP30 in Belém, Brazil, brought nations together to confront the escalating climate crisis. But amid their discussions, there was a paradox: while a growing number of countries see the ocean as essential to climate action, there is still no institutional mechanism to integrate this critical ally into global climate deliberations.

One way of doing that could be to establish a dedicated ocean agenda item within the official COP agenda, upgrading the existing informal ocean climate dialogue created in COP26 in Glasgow and in doing so, opening a door to unlock the ocean’s potential for climate change mitigation and adaptation.

The ocean is the forgotten hero of the climate system. It absorbs more than 90% of excess heat generated by global warming, regulates temperatures across all continents and stores 25% of the greenhouse gases emitted annually into the atmosphere.

It is also the ultimate destination of more than 90% of the accumulated stock of all man-made carbon since the beginning of the industrial revolution, making it Earth’s most vital carbon sink.

Ocean-based solutions

But despite this indispensable role, the ocean has historically been almost absent in climate strategies and finance. For years, ocean action received less than 1% of global climate finance.

There has been some progress, however. Initiatives such as the “Blue NDC Challenge”, which calls on countries to insert the ocean into their national climate action plans (NDCs), co-led by France and Brazil and supported by nations including Belgium, Cambodia, Canada, Indonesia, Portugal and Singapore, demonstrate a growing political will.

Dec 10, 2025

News

US set to push fossil fuels under its G20 presidency

But Trump’s attempts to undermine climate action could face blowback as most other nations remain committed

Read more
Oct 13, 2025

Nature

As coral reefs pass tipping point, ocean protection rises up political agenda

New scientific studies show coral reefs are under severe pressure from global warming, while ocean acidification poses a threat to marine life

Read more
Sep 21, 2025

News

Treaty to protect deep ocean reaches key threshold for entry into force

The High Seas Treaty, now signed into law by 60 countries, is seen as crucial to achieving a global goal of protecting 30% of land and sea ecosystems by 2030

Read more

As more countries incorporate ocean-based measures into their national climate plans, there’s clear momentum. Research suggests that fully deploying ocean-based solutions – from decarbonising shipping to expanding marine protected areas – could deliver up to 35% of the emissions reductions needed to stay on a 1.5C pathway by 2050.

Yet, this recognition has not translated into formal institutionalisation within the process of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). For its first 25 years, the ocean was largely absent from COP discussions. While recent efforts have integrated some ocean references into important climate texts, ocean consideration remains informal and scattered – almost a footnote.

The recently revealed breach of the seventh planetary boundary for ocean acidification – and rebukes from the International Court of Justice and the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea – underscore the dire need for formal integration.

Ocean agenda item at future COPs

A dedicated ocean agenda item at future COPs, starting with COP31, is not merely desirable; it is a necessity. This would elevate the ocean’s status, provide the meaningful integration of the ocean into the climate regime, and bring transparency to discussions on the key ocean-climate related issues.

It would also empower the UNFCCC secretariat to take more meaningful ocean-climate action. Countries are starting to become convinced of this imperative, with Fiji leading the charge in Belém by calling for a dedicated ocean agenda item.

Peter Thomson, the UN Secretary-General’s special envoy for the ocean, similarly emphasised that without a dedicated agenda item, the ocean will remain invisible in the very negotiations that depend on it.

The reef surrounding Namotu Island, Fiji, has experienced serious coral bleaching caused by increasing ocean temperatures. (Photo: Beau Pilgrim / Climate Visuals)

Additionally, the global target of 30×30 encompassing the protection of 30% of the ocean by 2030, must be formally acknowledged as essential in the fight against climate change.

Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) offer a prime example of the ocean’s untapped power. These designated zones safeguard critical marine ecosystems, increase biomass, expand fish stocks and enhance biodiversity.

Crucially, MPAs significantly boost the ocean’s natural capacity for carbon sequestration, particularly in blue carbon ecosystems such as mangroves, salt marsh lands and seagrass beds, and by enhancing the biological carbon pump in the high seas.

As the Paris Agreement turns 10, what has it achieved?

Furthermore, with the High Seas Treaty entering into force in January 2026, creating MPAs in areas beyond national jurisdiction becomes a reality, offering an opportunity to integrate ocean and climate solutions on a global scale. MPAs offer thus a strong and often overlooked pathway for countries to meet their climate targets and accelerate their journey towards net zero.

The urgency of securing results from the ocean-climate nexus demands a fundamental re-evaluation of its position within the UNFCCC process. The cross-cutting nature of ocean issues means that without a formal agenda item, discussions will remain fragmented and ineffective. The momentum generated by the Blue NDC Challenge and the growing number of nations championing ocean solutions must be formalised before COP31.

We have run out of time and can no longer afford to treat our ocean as an optional extra. The moment for the ocean to secure a permanent, central position in global climate action is now.

The post The ocean, our planet’s forgotten hero, deserves a formal place in UN climate talks appeared first on Climate Home News.

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121clicks, Adorable, Animal Antics, Animal Beauty, Animal Behavior, Animal Lovers, Animal Moments, Animal Photos, Animal Portraits, Animal Snapshots, Animals, Bored Panda Animals, Breathtaking Moments, Cute Animals, Funny Animals, Heartwarming, Hidreley, Hilarious, Instagram, Msn-gallery, Nature, Nature Lovers, Nature Photography, Nature Scenes, Outdoor Photography, Pet Photography, Pets, Photo Inspiration, Photography & Digital Art, Photography Collection, Stunning Animals, Wholesome, Wild Creatures, Wildlife, Wildlife Art, Wildlife Photography

30 Heartwarming And Funny Animal Photos That Might Instantly Brighten Your Day

December 15, 2025

If you decided to click on this post, there’s a good chance you’re an animal lover. We certainly are – discovering new wildlife content is one of our favorite things, and sharing it with you, dear pandas, is even better.

This time, thanks to the Instagram page ‘121clicks,’ we’re thrilled to showcase some of the wholesome – and sometimes downright hilarious – animal moments they’ve shared. Without keeping you waiting any longer, scroll down and enjoy our selection of delightful images.

Discover more in 30 Heartwarming And Funny Animal Photos That Might Instantly Brighten Your Day

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#1

Photo by Libaradova

#2

Photo by Fotografia depressao

#3

Photo by Elene Arrien Dublang

#4

Photo by Hans Silvester

#5

Photo by Kenya

#6

Photo byKathrin Federer

#7

Photo by Robin_Runsvik

#8

Photo by Ashvin Trivedi

#9

Photo by Marcel Lesch

#10

Photo by Maciej Dakowicz

#11

Photo by Safaridot.com

#12

Photo by Pang Way

#13

Photo by Thomas Vijayan

#14

Photo by Nicolli Penteado

#15

Photo by Pravin Tamang

#16

Photo by Avijan Saha

#17

Photo by Sune Jonsson

#18

Photo by Skeys images

#19

Photo by Neşe Arı

#20

Photo by Subrata Dey

#21

Photo by Rajib Sharma

#22

Photo by Vadim Trunov

#23

Photo by Kody Antle

#24

Photo by Stefano Lista

#25

Photo by Manish

#26

Photo by Tejas Soni

#27

Photo by Tran Tuan Viet

#28

Photo by Yusuf Duyar

#29

Photo by Sankar Ghose

#30

Photo by Lopa Mudra

You might also like: 50 Times Cats Made Their Owners Laugh And They Just Had To Share Pics Online

Source Link 30 Heartwarming And Funny Animal Photos That Might Instantly Brighten Your Day

Biodiversity, Finance, Nature, News

Funding for protected areas fell in 2024, threatening global nature target

December 11, 2025

A global goal to protect 30% of the planet’s land and sea ecosystems by 2030 is at risk of falling off track due to a decline in international finance, a new report has found, which leaves developing countries with a $3-billion funding gap.

The target known as “30×30” was adopted at UN biodiversity talks in 2022, and aims to protect nature and cut planet-heating emissions by increasing protected areas across the world. Experts estimate this can contribute to slash at least 10 gigatonnes of carbon emissions annually.

To achieve this target and as part of the landmark Kunming-Montreal biodiversity pact, developed countries agreed to mobilise $20 billion directly to developing countries by 2025. About a fifth of this funding is estimated to reach protected areas, which means that developing countries should receive $4 billion by 2025 for this purpose. By 2030, this figure should reach $6 billion.

But a new report by Indufor – a forest intelligence group supported by nature NGOs – found that developed countries only delivered $1 billion in 2024 for protected areas, falling $3 billion short of the 2025 target.

Last year also marked the first year-on-year decline in funding for protected areas after consistent post-pandemic growth, the report shows.

$3bn funding gap

The report shows there has been an overall increase in support for protected areas in developing countries, which has grown by more than 150% in the last decade. After the pandemic, philanthropic funding drove most of the growth, with a rise of more than 70% in this period.

These funds are meant to pay for establishing new protected areas, providing capacity to park rangers, and supporting Indigenous groups and local communities, among other initiatives.

However, the current rate of increase is too slow to reach the $6-billion-by-2030 target, the report says. To achieve this, international funding must grow by about 33% each year between now and 2030, since at the current pace developing countries would only receive $2 billion by 2030.

The drop in 30×30 funding in 2024 could be driven by a reporting lag by philanthropies, the report says, as some grants are coming to an end after the growth in post-pandemic contributions and could be renewed. However, the reports also warns that cuts to US foreign aid could further reduce the available finance in 2025.

Dec 10, 2025

Clean Energy Frontier

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Dec 9, 2025

Politics

Saudi Arabia and COP31 host Türkiye move to weaken climate language at UNEA

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Dec 10, 2025

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Small islands underfunded

So far, Africa has received the most finance with about half of the overall funding reaching the continent in 2024, while small island developing states remained severely underfunded by international flows.

Safiya Sawney, Grenada’s Climate Ambassador, said at the report launch on the sidelines of the UN Environment Assembly in Nairobi that the funding coming to the Caribbean is not enough. “We’ve heard from the report that there has been scaled up philanthropic financing, I can tell you that it’s not reaching my region, it’s not reaching my country,” she emphasised.

Jiwoh Abdulai, Sierra Leone’s minister of environment and climate change, also told the event that developed countries should step up finance, warning that the cost of inaction will be higher. “The best time to put out a fire is when it is in your neighbour’s house before it gets to yours,” he added.

Earlier modelling by the Campaign for Nature in 2020 suggested that expanding and managing the world’s protected areas would require an average investment of at least $140 billion per year globally by 2030, funded through a mix of domestic and international sources. Already, the $6-billion target falls significantly short of this figure.

Abdulai said that besides the funding gap, there is also an accessibility problem. Countries ask for funding and it comes five years later, making “the money not even close to enough to solve the problem” as needs tend to grow after the initial request.

He said developed countries need to fulfill their pledges because “if the funding is not coming, then we are not addressing the problem – and if we are not addressing the problems today in the frontline countries, tomorrow the frontline will move from our countries to yours”.

New nature fund needs $40m by December to get going — A community ranger standing in a mangrove forest restored as part of a nature protection project in Kenya. Photo: Anthony Ochieng / Climate Visuals Countdown

US retreat sounds alarm

The report also shows that the funding for protected areas has so far come mostly from a few sources. Since 2022, just Germany, the World Bank, the Global Environment Facility (GEF), the European Union and the United States, provided more than half of all international finance for the 30×30 goal.

“There is a real risk or a significant vulnerability if even one major donor were to pull back,” said Michael Owen, one of the report’s authors. This leaves global biodiversity protection vulnerable to political transitions, at a time of rising geopolitical tensions, which could trigger sudden changes in funding or even retrenchment, he warned.

The report notes that “the shuttering of USAID leaves a significant gap to be filled, as it has been the sixth largest international 30×30 funder making up nearly 5% of total flows”.

With just five years left to meet the 30×30 target, Brian O’Donnell, director of the Campaign for Nature, said there is “a clear need to ramp up marine conservation finance”, especially for small island states. He added that meeting the 30×30 goal “is essential to prevent extinctions, achieve climate goals, and ensure the services that nature provides endure, including storm protection and clean air and water.”

Anders Haug Larsen, advocacy director at Rainforest Foundation Norway, said the world is currently far off track, both in mobilising resources and protecting nature.

“We now have a short window of opportunity, where governments, donors and actors on the ground, including Indigenous Peoples and local communities, need to work together to enhance finance and actions for rights-based nature protection,” he added.

The post Funding for protected areas fell in 2024, threatening global nature target appeared first on Climate Home News.

Source Link Funding for protected areas fell in 2024, threatening global nature target

Brazil, Climate Finance, Conservation, Finance, Forests, Investigations, Nature

Deep in the Amazon, forest protection cash must vie with glitter of illegal gold

December 8, 2025

Beneath the thick and unbroken rainforest canopy, there is a growing sense of desperation among the guardians of French Guiana’s slice of the Amazon.

Illegal miners, lured by the prospect of untapped gold, are crossing into the French-ruled territory from the nearby border with Brazil, pushing local authorities to the limit.

France spends more than 100 million euros ($115 million) a year to fight illegal gold mining in Guiana Amazonian Park, which extends over some 34,000 square km (13,000 square miles) – an area larger than Belgium.

But stopping the miners sneaking in from Brazil sometimes feels like a losing battle.

“More than money, we need a joint, permanent policing strategy, with officers from both countries on the same boat, to create a barrier and stop the mining along the border,” said Thierry Girardot, a former senior official with the French park’s delegation in Camopi, a handful of wooden buildings separated from Brazil by the meandering Oiapoque River.

Oct 24, 2025

News

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Read more
Nov 26, 2025

News

With no COP30 roadmap, hopes of saving forests hinge on voluntary initiatives

The world is falling short of a target to halt deforestation by 2030, but the “Amazon COP” failed to agree a concrete global plan to save rainforests despite backing by over 80 nations

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Oct 2, 2025

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There are an estimated 7,000 miners digging for gold inside the national park at present and about 95% of them are Brazilian, said Major Christophe Laratte, who oversees French operations to combat illegal gold mining in French Guiana alongside the national police force.

The wildcat miners cut down trees and use mercury to separate fragments of gold, polluting rivers and leaving desolation behind them. About 90% of the territory’s coastline shows signs of mercury contamination, Laratte told Climate Home News.

Felipe Finger, head of the Special Inspection Group at the Brazilian Institute of Environment and Renewable Natural Resources (IBAMA), displays confiscated gold during an operation against illegal mining in Yanomami Indigenous land, at a farm in rural Roraima state, Brazil, December 7, 2023. (Photo: REUTERS/Ueslei Marcelino)

What is the TFFF and will it help?

But despite the damage caused by miners, the vast expanse of forest around the Oiapoque is still relatively pristine, making the Brazilian side of the border a potential candidate for funding from the Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF), the new multilateral fund launched by Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva ahead of COP30 in the Amazon city of Belém.

Under the current plan, Brazil would be eligible for an estimated $1.3 billion a year in forest payments, according to online platform TFFF Watch. However, this amount would need to be split between the country’s conservation areas and Indigenous territories, numbering more than 3,700 in total.

Part of France, French Guiana is not listed among the forested developing nations that could be eligible to benefit from the fund, in contrast with Brazil.

But while authorities on both sides of the border hope the TFFF could boost efforts to fight illegal mining by channelling cash to local communities, Indigenous leaders and economists told Climate Home News they feared the planned fund would be no match for the profits from illegality – even once the fund is able to start disbursing aid.

Thierry Girardot, former deputy head of France’s vast Guiana Amazonian Park, says money alone will not stop the illegal mining around the border area. (Photo: Pedro Ladeira)

The TFFF aims to raise $25 billion in public capital and an additional $100 billion from private investors, operating as a fixed-income investment fund. Its returns will be used to reward developing countries and local communities that conserve tropical forests and act as a disincentive to activities that damage them.

So far, Brazil and Indonesia have contributed $1 billion each and Norway has promised to provide $3 billion once the fund secures its first $12 billion. Germany, France and Colombia have also offered support under varying conditions.

Brazil’s Ministry of Finance told Climate Home News that the next step after COP30 is to set up governing boards for the TFFF and the Tropical Forest Investment Fund (TFIF), its investment arm.

The TFIF will only be launched when it reaches an initial goal of $10 billion in startup capital, the ministry said, adding that more fundraising activities are planned for the short term. So far, the TFFF has raised about $6.7 billion in total, around half on conditional terms.

The new rainforest fund plans to pay countries about $4 per hectare of conserved forest per year, obliging them to demonstrate the results of their forest protection efforts before receiving the money. According to the concept note, at least 20% of the resources should be allocated to Indigenous peoples and local communities.

Largely pristine rainforest surrounds the Oiapoque River, which marks the border between Brazil and French Guiana (Photo: Pedro Ladeira)

Miners use profits to make inroads

But officials and Indigenous leaders battling illegal miners along the border between French Guiana and the far northern Brazilian state of Amapá said their experience suggests the fund’s promise of more financial aid may not be enough to deter the destructive activity.

Siméon Monnerville, chief of the Teko people, said basic social assistance paid by the French government to every resident of about 600 euros (around $700) a month had not stopped miners from recruiting Indigenous locals.

He said the miners look for people who know the rivers and streams, initially offering them excessive sums of more than 1,000 euros per day.

Explainer: Can a new climate fund help save the world’s rainforests?

With few other ways to earn money to buy goods such as smartphones, many are tempted, said a leader of the Waiãpi people, another Indigenous community living on both sides of the border.

“There is almost always an Indigenous person in the boat, because they know how to pass the rocks in the river,” the leader said, asking to speak on condition of anonymity.

Across the Oiapoque, Brazil’s Montanhas do Tumucumaque national park spans nearly 39,000 square km (15,000 square miles).

Here, too, the miners have made deep economic inroads.

A boat passes along the Camopi River in French Guiana, where illegal gold miners are sneaking in from across the Brazilian border. (Photo: Pedro Ladeira)

Inside the borders of the national park, many of the 800 residents of the village of Vila Brasil make a living by catering to the needs of the miners, operating restaurants and guesthouses and selling equipment.

The community also has secured political backing – highlighting another potential hurdle for the TFFF in Brazil and elsewhere. A bill in the Brazilian Congress introduced by Senator Lucas Barreto, who represents Amapá, seeks to remove the village from the national park’s boundaries and shrink the protected area by 8,000 hectares (19,800 acres).

Shopkeepers in Vila Brasil, who spoke to Climate Home News on condition of anonymity, said they supported the bill and wanted the village removed from the park, which would drastically reduce the risk, intensity and frequency of government enforcement.

Fund’s financial promises “too small”

The issue highlights a crucial flaw in the TFFF’s design, said Tasso Azevedo, one of Brazil’s leading experts in climate and forest policy, founder of MapBiomas and former director of the Brazilian Forest Service.

Azevedo, who two years ago presented the original conservation finance proposal to Lula’s team that eventually became the TFFF, said the amount the TFFF has fixed for reward payments is no match for the illegal profits that drive deforestation.

“The payment per hectare was set very low, because it was calculated based on what they thought could be raised from the fund,” he said.

A wildcat gold miner stands at an illegal gold mining camp during an operation against illegal gold mining at the Urupadi National Forest Park in Amazonas state, Brazil, May 23, 2023. (Photo: REUTERS/Adriano Machado)

The original idea, developed by Azevedo and economist Pedro Moura, was for the global oil industry to commit $1 per barrel of oil produced. With current demand of roughly 30 billion barrels per year, this could have supported payments of about $30 per hectare per year of conserved tropical forest – while the final TFFF proposal offers just $4.

“Certainly, the current value is not enough to stop economies that destroy forests. It’s a very small amount,” Azevedo said.

In the meantime, the biggest question mark hanging over the plan is whether it can raise its initial target of $125 billion, said Moura, a specialist in market-based conservation mechanisms who heads BVRio, an environmental commodities and traceability company.

“That’s the big ‘if’ right now,” he said.

“It’s not all about money”

The Brazilian government says the TFFF’s distinguishing feature lies in its promise of a steady, long-term flow of payments guaranteed by investment returns, and that the proposed $125 billion target is only a starting point rather than a minimum requirement.

For João Resende, secretary for economic affairs at Brazil’s Finance Ministry, the key lies in changing how governments see climate spending.

“The big shift is getting countries to stop seeing it as an expense and start treating it as an investment. Brazil was able to put in $1 billion because we see it as investment,” he said.

Dec 3, 2025

Energy

Brazil’s Congress defies Lula to push through “devastation bill” on COP30’s heels

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Oct 21, 2025

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In Montanhas do Tumucumaque, park director Fernanda Brandão said budget constraints limit the Brazilian authorities’ ability to crack down on illegal mining. That means proposals such as the TFFF could help bring consistency to enforcement actions as long as the payments ensure a steady stream of funding.

On the other side of the border, Laratte said reining in the miners is challenging and requires a multi-pronged approach.

Miners quickly adapt to law enforcement strategies by funding networks of lookouts and preparing back-up kits to replace equipment seized during operations, which cost the French government about 110 million euros per year, he added.

“It’s a complex issue, involving social, strategic and diplomatic aspects,” Laratte said. “It’s not all about money.”

Reporting for this story was supported by the Pulitzer Center.

Main image: Siméon Monnerville, chief of the Teko people, says illegal miners recruit Indigenous locals with the promise of high wages, in Camopi, French Guiana. (Photo: Pedro Ladeira)

The post Deep in the Amazon, forest protection cash must vie with glitter of illegal gold appeared first on Climate Home News.

Source Link Deep in the Amazon, forest protection cash must vie with glitter of illegal gold

Amazon, Cop30, Forests, Nature, News

As fossil fuels dominate Amazon COP, a roadmap to end deforestation falls behind

December 5, 2025

As countries ramp up pressure for a COP30 decision on a roadmap to transition away from fossil fuels, they have yet to push hard in the Amazon city of Belém for another much-anticipated roadmap to end deforestation.

Discussions on both mechanisms took off after Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva told world leaders at the summit’s opening that COP30 must deliver “roadmaps to plan in a fair way the reversal of deforestation, reducing the dependency on fossil fuels and to mobilise the necessary resources to reach these objectives”.

Since then, more than 80 countries have rallied behind a fossil fuel transition roadmap – yet negotiators from tropical countries and observers say a roadmap to end deforestation has not gained the same momentum at the UN climate talks.

At least 42 countries have expressed support for a deforestation roadmap – among them the European Union, the AILAC group of Latin American countries and the Environmental Integrity Group which includes Mexico, Liechtenstein, Monaco, South Korea, Switzerland and Georgia.

World failing on goal to halt deforestation by 2030, raising stakes for Amazon COP

Current negotiating drafts include an option to convene a dialogue of ministers on the creation of national roadmaps to end deforestation, which observers told Climate Home News is a weak option that must be improved with more pressure from countries.

Panama’s head of delegation Juan Carlos Monterrey told an event hosted by Climate Home News this week that a plan to protect forestats has to be one of the key outcomes of COP30. “If we don’t get a roadmap to end deforestation at the Amazonia COP, we will never get it,” he said.

Irene Vélez Torres, Colombia’s environment minister, called on countries to support the roadmap in an op-ed, adding that time is of the essence – and that ending deforestation can’t be achieved by “just blindly marching forward without a clear sense of direction”.

At COP26, more than 140 countries agreed to halt and reverse deforestation and land degradation by 2030 – a pledge that was reiterated in the landmark COP28 deal where countries also agreed to transition away from fossil fuels.

But a recent report by conservation groups and research institutions shows that governments are far off track, as deforestation levels last year were 63% higher they should be to meet the deforestation goal.

Need to pick up momentum

Observers told Climate Home News that forests have been a predominant theme in Belém outside the formal talks, where the Brazilian government has launched initiatives like the Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF) – a new fund to protect rainforests.

But inside the negotiations, countries need to pick momentum, said Fernanda Carvalho, head of policy for climate and energy at WWF, given that they have been presented with a “unique opportunity” to agree on a deforestation roadmap.

Norway pledges $3bn in boost for Brazil-led tropical forest fund

Carolina Pasquali, executive director of Greenpeace Brazil, said conversations should include commitments on both fossil fuels and forests, adding “it’s not one or the other”.

“For me, the sad part about this is that I have not heard a single party saying they are against it. So if this doesn’t happen just because not enough momentum was created, what kind of result is that?” she told journalists in Belém.

Any roadmap to end deforestation would need to create a “clear international process” that allows countries to coordinate action and “send a strong signal that forests are central to the climate solution”, said Kendall Damon, climate policy associate at The Nature Conservancy.

Veteran Brazilian tropical scientist Carlos Nobre told a press conference that important ecosystems like the Amazon rainforest and coral reefs across the world are approaching a dangerous tipping point, which could cause them to collapse irreversibly.

Indigenous peoples call for forest outcome

A strong outcome in the COP30 “Mutirão” political decision on reversing deforestation is one of the main Indigenous demands, said Juan Carlos Jintiach, an Indigenous activist from the Ecuadorian Amazon and executive secretary of the Global Alliance of Territorial Communities.

He added that any plan to reverse deforestation must also address the rights of Indigenous communities, emphasising that “for us, any conversation on forests is a conversation on land tenure”.

Indigenous people attend a protest to call for climate justice and territorial protection during the U.N. Climate Change Conference (COP30), in Belem, Brazil, November 17, 2025. (Photo: REUTERS/Anderson Coelho)

During COP30, Indigenous groups in Brazil have secured major victories in demarcation of their land, with the creation of 10 new territories, after several protests at the conference venue in Belém and a meeting on the sidelines with the ministers for environment and Indigenous peoples.

Earlier in the two-week summit, 35 countries and philanthropic organisations renewed a five-year pledge to provide Indigenous people, local communities and Afro-descendent communities with $1.8 billion to help secure their land rights in key ecosystems.

“We will cooperate with any goal to halt deforestation – but governments need to work with us directly,” said Jintiach. “Countries need to be coherent in the applicability of their commitments.”

The post As fossil fuels dominate Amazon COP, a roadmap to end deforestation falls behind appeared first on Climate Home News.

Source Link As fossil fuels dominate Amazon COP, a roadmap to end deforestation falls behind

Brazil, Cop30 Bulletin, Finance, Forest, Germany, Justice, Nature, News, Politics

COP30 Bulletin Day 10: Talks disrupted as fire causes evacuation

December 5, 2025

COP30 delegates were evacuated from the climate conference venue on Thursday after a fire broke out shortly before 2pm local time. Thirteen people were treated on site for smoke inhalation, according to Brazil’s COP30 presidency, which said their condition continues to be monitored.

Flames were brought under control in around six minutes after firefighters and UN security officers intervened “swiftly”, the presidency added in a statement.

Videos circulating online – including one posted online by the AFP news agency – suggest the fire originated in the pavilions area of the venue. A Reuters photograph shows that the Africa pavilion, in particular, sustained damage.

Sonia Borrini works in communications for the African Development Bank which runs the pavilion. She told Climate Home News she didn’t know what had caused the fire, but the pavilion’s technicians said fire broke out in their technical room and one had to run out without shoes.

“What I understood is that it started just where all cables are, between [the Africa] pavilion and the East African Community pavilion,” she said.

Helder Barbalho, the governor of Pará state where Belém is located, told Brazilian news outlet G1 that the two initial hypotheses on the source of the fire are a short-circuit in one of the pavilions or a failure in an electricity generator.

The fire breaks out in the pavillions (Video: Andrea Grieco)

The Brazilian fire service conducted a safety assessment and reopened the venue at 8.40pm local time, although the area affected by the incident will remain isolated until the conclusion of the conference.

In a statement to media, the COP30 presidency said no plenary would be held on Thursday night but plenary sessions could take place as normal on Friday.

“We still have substantial work ahead, and we trust that delegates will return to the negotiations in a spirit of solidarity and determination to ensure a successful outcome for this COP,” it added.

Climate Home News editor Megan Rowling was working in the press centre when she heard a big stampede and was evacuated, along with everyone else. “One thing is for sure,” she said, “this is not going to help the negotiations which have already fallen behind.”

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Mohamed Adow, director of Power Shift Africa, said the fire caused a “fright” but “what could have spiralled into a disaster was contained in minutes thanks to the swift, disciplined work of the security teams and marshals on site. They moved fast, kept people calm, and restored order before rumours could outrun the truth. They deserve full credit.”

He added: “Even in a moment of chaos, one thing stood out: people from every corner of the world, different nations, creeds and affiliations, looked out for one another. Delegates helped strangers, staff guided crowds, and no one stopped to ask who belonged to which bloc before stepping in. When faced with a crisis, cooperation wasn’t a slogan, but a human instinct in its rawest, truest form.”

UN chief backs call to triple adaptation finance

Before the fire incident, as negotiations on a Belém “Mutirão” decision dragged on beyond the Wednesday deadline the COP30 presidency had targeted, UN chief António Guterres called on governments to agree a balanced political package that would require compromise and courage.

Such a package should be “concrete on funding adaptation, credible on emissions cuts, bankable on finance”, he told journalists on Thursday morning.

For the first time, he rallied behind a demand from the world’s poorest countries to triple finance to help them adapt to more extreme weather and rising seas to $120 billion a year by 2030.

He noted that communities on the frontlines are watching the UN summit – “counting flooded homes, failed harvests, lost livelihoods and asking ‘how much more must we suffer?’” “They have heard enough excuses, they demand results,” he added.

COP30 Bulletin Day 9: Belém package elusive as Lula steals the show

He warned that an “inevitable” temporary overshoot of the 1.5C warming limit in the Paris Agreement means “more heat and hunger, more disasters and displacements”.

“For millions, adaptation is not an abstract goal,” the Portuguese official insisted. “It is the difference between rebuilding and being swept away, between replanting and starving, between staying on ancestral lands or losing it forever.”

Adaptation needs are “skyrocketing and the overshoot will push them even higher”, he added. Despite this, developed countries’ commitment to double adaptation finance to at least $40 billion by this year “is slipping away”, he warned.

Poorest countries appeal for more adaptation finance at COP30

The latest estimate of developing countries’ annual climate adaptation needs for 2035 outstrips current funding by at least 12 times, with rich nations providing just $26 billion in 2023, according to the annual UN Adaptation Gap Report.

If current trends continue, developed countries are set to miss the 2025 target that they committed to at COP26 four years ago, UNEP’s report said.

“So tripling adaptation finance by 2030 is essential,” Guterres said, adding that it is also “possible and desirable” and he hoped developed countries would “accept to engage in this objective” at COP30 if their concerns on emissions reductions are addressed.

He noted that a new fund to help countries recover from loss and damage is practically empty and called for it to be capitalised. During COP30, the fund has received tiny pledges totalling less than $16 million from Iceland, Japan and Luxembourg. It has now secured combined promises of nearly $800 million but only around half of that is in the bank.

Guterres urged funders, including wealthy governments, climate funds and development banks “to step up and prevent further tragedies”. “It’s about survival, it’s about justice – and for Indigenous peoples, it is also about protecting cultures and homelands that sustain our planet’s vital ecosystems,” he added.

To ramp up emissions-cutting efforts and bring warming back down to 1.5C, he said countries’ national climate plans (NDCs) should be the “floor not the ceiling”, with the responsibility on big emitters to do more.

He did not explicitly back a roadmap to transition away from fossil fuels, as more than 80 countries are pushing for at the talks, but said governments should implement the energy shift they signed up to at COP28 and ensure it is done in a fair way.

Asked if he wanted the US to return to the UN climate process, which climate-change denier President Donald Trump has abandoned, Guterres said “we are waiting for you”, quipping “hope is the last thing that dies”.

Germany pledges €1 billion to TFFF forest fund

Germany has joined a handful of countries pledging money to the Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF), but the conservation mechanism launched by Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva ahead of COP30 is still far short of the $25 billion in public funds it aims to secure.

Following talks between government ministers and Lula on Wednesday, Germany said it would contribute one billion euros ($1.1 billion) over the next 10 years, praising the “innovative approach” of the investment-driven multilateral fund proposed by Brazil.

The TFFF is a blended finance instrument that will invest in financial markets and pay a share of any returns to tropical countries that are protecting their rainforests. At least 20% of all payments must be allocated to Indigenous people and local communities. Read this Climate Home News explainer for more details of how the fund works.

Visitors stroll through the Green Zone corridor at the 30th Conference of the Parties (COP30). (Photo by Alex Ferro/COP30)

“It’s about protecting the tropical rainforests, the lungs of our planet,” a statement by Germany’s development and environment ministers said after Wednesday’s meeting.

At a press conference this Thursday, Germany’s environment minister said the country will disburse $100 million every year over a decade in the form of a grant, which experts said could allow for larger payouts to forest countries since the fund would not have to pay interest. The money would come from the country’s foreign aid budget.

Germany’s promise of support follows a Norwegian pledge of 3 billion euros over the coming decade – which is conditional on other donors also contributing money to the fund, while Brazil and Indonesia have pledged $1 billion each and Colombia has offered $250 million. France has also said it will consider contributing 500 million euros over the next five years.

But campaigners were critical of the German contribution, as the world’s third-largest economy has pledged about the same amount as emerging economies Brazil and Indonesia. A group of German NGOs sent a letter to government officials requesting the country to pledge at least $2.5 billion for the TFFF.

“That the German government is investing in the TFFF is important and the right thing to do. Nevertheless, the investment amount of one billion euros is a disappointment,” said Felix Finkbeiner, founder of Germany-based conservation NGO Plant-for-the-Planet.

Florian Titze, WWF-Germany’s head of international policy, also said the sum was “disappointing”, given that Chancellor Frierich Merz told world leaders at COP30 that the country would pledge a “considerable” amount. “The federal government should now successively increase the German amount and distribute it over the next few years,” he said.

The total pledged so far to the TFFF amounts to roughly $7 billion. However, experts noted that, because Norway’s pledge is conditional and doesn’t count toward the $10bn target set by the Brazilians for COP30, the fund has been left with a shortfall of about $6bn.

British climate minister Ed Miliband said on Monday the UK government was keeping “the option of an investment under review”.

Talks have also been held with China, the United Arab Emirates, Australia, Japan and Canada, Brazilian TFFF official João Paulo de Resende told Climate Home News last month. None of those countries has so far announced pledges.

De Resende said securing political support was more important at this stage than funding promises, which could come later.

Nov 17, 2025

Politics

COP30 Bulletin Day 7: Brazil sets out options to agree a Belém package

The COP30 presidency signposts how governments could land a political decision covering climate finance, trade measures and the emissions cuts needed to limit warming to 1.5C

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Nov 18, 2025

Politics

COP30 Bulletin Day 8: Draft decision draws battle lines on fossil fuel transition, finance and trade

Countries are working on a “Mutirão” decision that will be at the heart of a Belém political package to drive forward multilateral climate action

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Nov 19, 2025

News

COP30 Bulletin Day 9: Belém package elusive as Lula steals the show

After spending the day in high-level meetings at COP30, Brazil’s president says rich nations need to help poor ones on climate action, while a planned early deal is yet to emerge

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Roman ruins and lots of hotels – Türkiye’s pitch to host COP31

Outlining their ultimately successful bid to host COP31, Turkish officials pitched the country as a lower-emissions choice due to its location at the crossroads of Europe and Asia, and played up the rich cultural heritage and top-level tourist facilities of the resort city of Antalya where it will be held.

Australian Minister for Climate Change and Energy Chris Bowen announced last night that his country was ceding the summit’s hosting rights to Türkiye, though Australia – which had greater support for its candidacy – will lead the negotiations.

Türkiye’s pitch for the talks to be held in Antalya, made in a presentation to delegates at the Bonn climate talks in June, promised to deliver a “zero-waste COP”, with a strong focus on heritage sites such as nearby Roman ruins and a shrine to Saint Nicholas of Myra, the inspiration for Santa Claus. The presentation’s slides also praised the Mediterranean city’s food and golf courses.

Turkish officials argued that a COP held in Antalya would have a smaller carbon footprint than Australia’s proposal of Adelaide due to its central geographical location, and also sought to emphasise the city’s urban transport network as well as its strong local logistics and supply chain.

Antalya pictured on February 18, 2024. (Photo by Dominika Zarzycka/NurPhoto)

Antalya, which is a similar size to Belém, with a population of roughly 1.5 million people, is popular with European and Russian sun-seekers in summer. By November, when the COP will be held, temperatures will have dropped to highs of about 21C (70F). That means COP delegates won’t have to compete with as many tourists for the 628,000 beds that the Turkish government says the city has to offer – far more than Belém.

But at a time of worries about democratic backsliding in Türkiye, hosting COP31 in Antalya may draw concerns.

Mahir Ilgaz, a Turkish regional programme director at Oil Change International, voiced doubts about the decision, noting in a social media post that elected mayors – including Antalya’s – have been replaced by government-appointed trustees.

“Colleagues working on local engagement are already wondering how to operate safely and meaningfully in that context,” he wrote on LinkedIn.

Meanwhile, a former Turkish climate diplomat told Climate Home News that they were disappointed Turkiye would not hold the COP presidency.

“We bear the burden, but they hold the power. We have the drum but they hold the drumstick. We do the work but they make the decisions,” the official said.

Chris Bowen, who is likely to be COP31 President, speaks to the media in Sydney, Tuesday, March 17, 2020. (AAP Image/Joel Carrett)

The post COP30 Bulletin Day 10: Talks disrupted as fire causes evacuation appeared first on Climate Home News.

Source Link COP30 Bulletin Day 10: Talks disrupted as fire causes evacuation

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