The worst month of climate news in my entire career

This isn't going to be like one of my

normal videos. I don't have a script. I

don't have any fancy production

elements. All I've got is this notebook

with some notes in. And that's because

this past month has not been normal. The

title says it all. Uh I've been doing

this job for what, eight years now as a

climate communicator. I've been

following the climate space for a long

time before then. And this is

undoubtedly

the worst month that I've ever seen when

it comes to the climate. In this video,

I want to talk about why this month has

been so incredibly bad and then talk a

bit beyond that about the information

ecosystem, the landscape that surrounds

climate change, um, and where I fit into

that and frankly how I've been staying

sane over the past month. And before we

get into the news, I just want to be

clear that this isn't everything that

happened. This is sort of what I think

are the most important things that have

happened. And I'm only talking about all

of the really big negative stuff that

happened. There is plenty of positive

stuff that also happened this month, but

for me, the negatives vastly outweigh

the positives. And the balance between

those two is an important thing that

we'll talk about a bit later. But for

now, let's talk about what the big bad

news has been. So, the first significant

headline was that the world has hit a

new peak concentration of CO2 in its

atmosphere. That itself isn't really

news. That's happened every year that

I've been alive and um for quite some

time before then. But what was

noteworthy was the jump of the

concentration from 2023 to 2024, which

was found to be 3.5 parts per million.

That's the largest single year jump

we've ever seen. And that occurred for

two reasons. Firstly, humans are putting

more CO2 into the atmosphere than they

have before. Emissions continue to rise.

Though it is important to note that over

the past decade or so the rate of

increase has been really reduced

compared to the previous decade. But at

the same time the other factor is that

carbon sinks meaning forests, wetlands,

algae in the oceans have become slightly

less effective at taking carbon out of

the atmosphere. And so an increase in

emissions plus a decrease in withdrawals

if you like from the atmosphere means

that the rate of carbon dioxide building

up in the atmosphere is faster than it

was before. And because climate change

is a cumulative problem, the amount of

climate change we experience is

proportional to the total amount of

carbon that's been put into the

atmosphere. That means that as the rate

of increase of CO2 increases, the rate

at which the climate is changing is

accelerating. And whilst this is not

unexpected in the slightest, this is

what scientists have been saying for a

very long time, it's still very bad. It

is worrying. And just last week, we

heard from Antonio Gutes, the Secretary

General at the United Nations, that

overshooting one and a half degrees of

warming is now basically locked in.

Something that pretty much anyone who's

followed this space for a while would

have told you has been the case for a

while. And actually further to that

point in the UK this month the climate

change committee advised the government

that we need to start planning and

preparing for a twoderee warmer world as

soon as 2050. And the reason why our

trajectory is towards this much warming

is because we're just not doing enough.

The state of climate action 2025 report

found that in most areas of the economy

we know what the right solutions are and

we are implementing them. We are moving

in the right direction just not fast

enough. In fact, in many areas, we are

nowhere near fast enough. And in a

couple of areas, like steel, for

example, we're moving in the wrong

direction. And I've got specifics here

that we could talk about. We could talk

about the roll out of renewables, which

is amazing and going very, very quickly,

just not quite fast enough. We could

talk about the rates of deforestation

dropping in the previous decade. They've

gone down quite significantly compared

to 20 years ago, but still not fast

enough to be aligned with, for example,

a 1.5 degree future. Or we could talk

about methane reporting. the fact that

this month we learned that methane leaks

are increasingly being reported to oil

and gas producers and they are starting

to respond. Their response rate has gone

up from 1% last year to 12% this year

and that's you know a big increase but

that's still nowhere near enough. But to

me the most sobering the biggest bad

news story that came out this month was

the publication of the global tipping

points report from the University of

Extter in association with a bunch of

NOS's including the WWF. And in that

report, they basically say that we have

now probably hit the first global

tipping point, which is warm water

corals existing in an ocean that is so

warm that they now cannot sustain

themselves and they are now going to be

in a negative feedback loop. Not towards

extinction necessarily, but certainly to

huge diminishment. And further that we

are close to hitting other tipping

points such as the dieback of the Amazon

rainforest. Though exactly when you have

hit a tipping point is difficult to say.

And again this is not at all surprising.

If you look at a list of tipping points

there are there are various global

tipping points such as the Amazon such

as warm water corals. You've got

stability of various ice sheets. You've

got methane feedbacks and the high

latitudes. The most sensitive to

temperature was always coral. This was

always going to be the first one that we

hit. And based on the trajectory that we

are on, we were pretty much always going

to hit this. But that doesn't make it

any easier to see. We have now warmed

the planet to a point where a

fundamental red line on a global level

has been crossed. And the loss of those

species of coral and attendant species

in their ecosystem

matches a broader pattern. We learned in

uh this was last year actually from the

WWF state of nature report that since

1970 global wildlife populations have

decreased by 73%. Now if you look at

this on a graph, the rate at which we

have lost members of species, not

species, but the actual populations, the

rate at which populations have decreased

has mercifully started to shallow out.

But just look at how much we have lost

since 1970. And yet there's still more

negative things to talk about. We could

be talking about the net zero banking

alliance collapsing under pressure from

the Trump administration. Though how

many of those banks were really going to

hit their targets anyway? They didn't

have plans. You could argue this one's

how much has really changed. We could

talk about the International Maritime

Organization having their carbon tax

negotiations torpedoed by the Trump

administration. That was going to be a

groundbreaking tax where international

shipping would be taxed for the amount

of emissions they produced and the

revenue from that tax would go towards

decarbonizing the sector. It was going

to be groundbreaking and a really

positive thing. And then the Trump

administration threatened low-lying

island states with tariffs if they

supported it. Those island states, I

should point out, being very vulnerable

to rising sea levels. And most recently,

it's actually ongoing as of the time I'm

recording this, Hurricane Melissa just

passed over Jamaica as a category 5

storm. The most powerful storm in the

history of the Atlantic at this time.

And we know from early attribution

analyses, it's got to be very careful

about what we can and cannot say about

the influence of climate change on an

ongoing event, but we know that the

waters that made Hurricane Melissa so

powerful were made warmer because of

climate change. We know that the

intensity of this uh storm was made such

uh I think it's 500 to 900 times more

likely because we're living in a world

that's nearly 1 and a half degrees

warmer. And like I say, this isn't even

everything. We we could talk about more,

but I think that's probably those are

the big big news stories. And and with

all of these, I can't tell if it's

better or if it's worse. That

none of this is surprising. Almost

nothing that's happened this month is

surprising to scientists who have been

saying this stuff for decades. I've been

a full-time science communicator

specializing in in climate since I

finished my PhD at the end of 2017. I've

been following the climate space for

much longer than that.

And this is

unquestionably the worst month for

climate news of my entire career. It has

never been this bad. And to get ahead of

a comment that I probably would have

myself left maybe 10 years ago

referencing the Simpsons movie that this

is actually the best month for climate

news for the rest of your life. That

simply isn't true. We could talk about

when CO2 emissions are likely to peak

and thus when the maximum increase of

CO2 in the atmosphere in a given year

will take place. Or we could talk about

the uh solutions becoming more and more

aligned with a twoderee trajectory

because the technology moves further

along the scurve. But frankly, the big

thing is that you only pass the first

red line of the climate space, the first

global tipping point once, and that's

what's happened this month. This is a

milestone moment in the history of our

species where we have officially pushed

a global system past its breaking point.

I am very aware that the most frequent

criticism of my work is that I can

present too optimistic a take on climate

change. And those people that leave

those comments might look at this video

and say, "He finally gets it. He's

finally on board." And with all due

respect, that isn't the case. I've been

following the climate space for a very

long time. I've actually been writing a

monthly newsletter summarizing the

latest news in the climate space for the

past 3 years. If you're not aware,

there'll be a link down there in the

description. The reason that I make

content in the vein that I do is because

of where I fit in the broader climate

information ecosystem. Climate change is

the largest news story in the world or

at least it should be and it is covered

from so many different angles by so many

different people and most of those

people are constrained by human

psychology and the effect that that has

on the market. I actually made a pair of

shorts demonstrating this point

recently. There is plenty of evidence

that humans are drawn towards negativity

and that negative news headlines receive

more attention than positive news

headlines. And in an issue like climate

change where there is a mix of positive

and negative at any one time, if you

only focus on the negatives and how bad

the situation is, you end up with a

situation where people just think, well,

there's nothing good happening. There's

nothing we can do. It's hopeless. Let's

just stop trying. And that's not

helpful. I also don't think it's helpful

to exclusively talk about the good side

of things and where there is cause for

optimism. What I try to do is provide

contextualized optimism, saying, "Hey,

here is a solution to one part of

climate change, which by the way is a

hugely serious problem. And this

solution on its own is inadequate, but

it is part of a broad suite of solutions

that work and we are rolling out and it

is making a difference. But by the way,

it's still not enough. We need to do

more." In other words, I'm aware of my

place in the choir of voices talking

about climate change. And I think the

most constructive use of my voice is to

provide that contextualized optimism. I

know that if I were to make videos that

had sensationalized headlines uh and and

thumbnails and titles that I would get

more views and I would get more clicks.

But I don't want to do that because I

don't think that is the most productive

use of my voice. Incidentally, I am very

grateful to the people who support me on

Patreon, who mean that I don't have to

go down that route in order to keep

doing this as a job. If you would like

to help me make more videos, you can

sign up at patreon.com/simonfiz

that will also be linked in the

description. If you support me, you help

me make more videos, but you also get

videos early. You get exclusive content

every month, including a

behind-the-scenes vlog. And there is a

post coming for producers about this.

Help me choose topics for me to cover.

And speaking as an individual, this

month has been really hard. Like, and I

think it's partly been hard because I've

recently expanded the number of people

I'm working with to make videos. I've

now got a part-time researcher, Ian. Um,

did a video with him over on Nebula.

I've also got a full-time short form

producer, Tristan, helping me make Tik

Toks and reals. I also did a video with

him on Nebula. And I'm learning how to

manage people. And, you know, I'm not a

a businessman. I'm not a manager. I'm

trained as a scientist. I'm I'm learning

how to do this job really quickly. All

while all of this awful news is

happening. All while I'm still working

out how to be a dad. And frankly looking

at the future that my child is going to

grow up into and trying to square a

circle. It's just felt

this this past month has felt completely

overwhelming. George Marshall wrote a

book called Don't Even Think About It

talks about why our brains are uniquely

poorly wired to deal with climate change

because of various psychological biases.

One of which is the problem is so vast

and so overwhelming that we can't hope

to grapple with it. And these biases

lead many people to just shut down and

say it's too difficult. The world has

warmed too much. The processes are all

against us. there's no point even trying

to do anything and we're cooked. But one

of the other things we do as humans is

we reduce the climate to a binary. It's

either the climate that we evolved to

survive in or it's not. And that's an

unhelpful binary because a world that is

1 and a half degrees warmer than the

climate we evolved to survive in looks

nothing like the climate that is 3°

warmer than the one we evolved to

survive in. And the displacement from

that climate is nonlinear. In other

words, the difference between a 1 and a

half degree world and twoderee world is

not as large in terms of its impacts on

humans as the difference between a

twoderee world and a 2 and 1/2 degree

world. And certainly not as large as the

difference between a 2 and 1/2 and 3°ree

world. And that fact combined with the

fact that climate change is a cumulative

problem means that at no point is

throwing your hands up and saying

there's no point even trying to do

anything. At no point is that the

responsible course of action and is no

point is that the thing that's actually

going to make the future better. So, you

may ask, why make this video with this

framing and talking about how bad things

are right now? You know, I previously

talked about my place in the choir of

voices and trying to effectively be a

balancing agent. And this past month, as

I said, has been really tough for me as

a person. And I'm using this moment

using my voice to mark the severity of

the situation and how I have felt I

guess processing it. But it is not the

lens with which I'm going to view things

going forwards because that's not

helpful. And this is a marathon not a

sprint. And anybody who's ever received

really awful news, like a parent

receiving a cancer diagnosis, will tell

you that you've got to take time to

process what's happened. And you've just

got to keep moving. There's no option to

just stop because that's not helpful.

That's not going to get you anywhere.

And we're all in this together. And this

is the most important thing that we

could possibly be talking about and

working towards, the survival of our

species. and the survival of life as we

know it on this planet. We just got to

keep moving. And for me, taking time at

the moment to process and stay sane has

meant playing a lot of a game called

Planet Crafter. It's a game where you're

terraforming a planet from absolutely

nothing. And I log in and for 30 minutes

at a time, I just make a planet a bit

better. I put a bit more oxygen in its

atmosphere. I put some more butterflies

into its atmosphere. And yes, that's

escapism. It's me taking a break from

reality because reality has been really

awful recently. Doesn't mean ignoring

the problem, but it means making sure

that I can keep going on this marathon

and not burn out because

not tackling this problem is not an

option. And this might surprise you, but

of all the things that I talked about,

the thing that keeps me up at night the

most is biodiversity loss. both because

it represents an existential threat to

our survival being, I would like to

remind you part of nature, not separate

from it, and in fact deeply dependent on

it, but also because it means that the

world that we leave to the next

generation is just poorer. There are

many planetary boundaries that you can

cross and then re. But with biodiversity

loss, when a species goes extinct,

that's it. You you can't bring them

back. It's why at the point of maximum

stress right now, the conservation of

individual species and entire habitats

and ecosystems is so vital. But it can

feel impossible to make a difference

with these things. As an individual,

there's only so much you can do. But as

a group, as a community, we can make a

tremendous difference. And a community

that I've recently joined is called

Planet Wild. And I've actually partnered

with them for this video. Planet Wild is

a community of nearly 15,000 people who

collectively every month fund a new

carefully selected project to protect or

restore biodiversity. It's crowdfunding

but for nature. They document all of

their projects right here on YouTube in

video form so we the community can see

what our contributions have achieved.

And on their app, you can see all of the

projects that have been funded to date,

ranging from enabling indigenous

communities to protect the Amazon to

funding beehive fences in Tanzania that

act as natural barriers between

elephants and humans, protecting both.

And I really like that they explicitly

show you who they are working with on

the ground and what exactly the funding

has accomplished. And that extends

beyond the initial 30-day period. goes

to the one-year video update showing you

what's been accomplished over a year.

And you feel part of a community with

these projects. You can contribute as

much as you want per month, but whether

that's $6 a month or 60 or even more,

you feel like you're part of something

bigger. You feel like you're part of a

group of people who see what's happening

and want to make a difference. And

here's the cool part of this

partnership. The first hundred people to

sign up to Planet Wild with my code

Simon 10 will get a month of supporting

biodiversity projects paid for by me.

So, it's free to you. You can sign up at

the link which is in the QR code on the

screen and down in the description.

After that free month, you can cancel at

any time, no questions asked, but I

think you probably won't want to. Again,

that link is on screen and in the

description. Please use that code simon

10. If you'd like to see Planet World in

action, then you can watch their video

building beehive fences in Tanzania up

here in just a second. And if you'd like

to watch something else from me next,

then here's something I prepared

earlier. Thank you for watching this

video. This has been a difficult one to

make, a bit cathartic, but overall, I'm

quite glad to be moving out of this

month. Thank you again for watching, and

I'll see you in the next one.