The Latest Breaking News from The Conversation

This roundup of The Conversation’s climate coverage was first published in our award-winning weekly climate action newsletter, Imagine.

In the late 19th century, Stuttgart was booming. The southern German city was famously the cradle of an emerging automobile sector and had already established itself as an industrial powerhouse and centre for toolmaking, mechanical engineering and textiles. Rail connections in the Baden-Württemberg region accelerated development, transported workers and spread…

At the UN climate conference Cop30 in Belém, Brazil, I asked some young climate activists and negotiators about their hopes, expectations and demands. Despite their positivity and the push for action from climate movements, Indigenous people and civil society, a lack of consensus on key issues was palpable.

When Cop30 convened in Belém, deep inside the Amazon, the world’s attention turned once again to negotiations, emissions pledges and political manoeuvring. The global stage was set against one of Earth’s most biodiverse landscapes and some of its most vulnerable communities, yet the conversation still leaned heavily toward geopolitics rather…

The next global volcanic disaster is more likely to come from volcanoes that appear dormant and are barely monitored than from the likes of famous volcanoes such as Etna in Sicily or Yellowstone in the US.

Jane Austen’s Paper Trail is a podcast from The Conversation celebrating 250 years since the author’s birth. In each episode, we’ll be investigating a different aspect of Austen’s personality by interrogating one of her novels with leading researchers. Along the way, we’ll visit locations important to Austen to uncover a…

As Russian bombs continued to pound Ukraine, a different conflict has blown up over plans to end that almost four-year-long war. The Trump administration on Nov. 20, 2025, formally presented Ukraine with a 28-point proposal to end the war, and President Donald Trump announced the country had until Thanksgiving to…

Extreme heat, fires and flooding – all hallmark consequences of climate change – directly influenced this year’s UN climate change conference Cop30 in Belém, Brazil.

A recent spill of bio-beads – small plastic pellets used by some wastewater treatment facilities since the 1990s – has brought renewed attention to a problem that has been quietly accumulating in coastal waters for years.

When climate change is discussed, whether at UN climate summits, in company boardrooms or in the media, the focus is often on mitigation (cutting greenhouse gas emissions to achieve net zero). Adaptation, the practical steps to prepare for the consequences of a changing climate, receives far less attention in the…

In 2017, a new global treaty was meant to bring mercury pollution under control. But three decades of data from UK harbour porpoises show mercury is still increasing, and is linked to a higher risk of dying from infectious disease.