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Your Daily Coffee Could Become More Expensive Due to Climate Change
From increase in coffee prices, to refreezing the Arctic, to the tourism industry, we have the latest climate news and impacts for you in this week's ClimateWatch newsletter.
Good morning, friends! We hope your week has started off well. We have a great lineup of the latest climate news for you this week!
If you’re enjoying your morning coffee while reading this newsletter, our first article in this week’s newsletter may hit close to home for you. Your daily cup of joe may become more expensive due to climate change.
Our second article talks about a unique and ambitious project that aims to refreeze the Arctic to combat climate change.
The final article for this week looks at the significant impacts the tourism sector has on the global climate. Although tourism did take a large hit during COVID, experts say tourism has returned back to its pre-COVID rates, if not exceeded.
Enjoy!
☕️ Your Daily Coffee Could Become More Expensive Due to Climate Change
Coffee lovers are likely to see the price of their daily cup of coffee increase soon due to climate change. The price of arabica coffee beans, the high quality beans found in most restaurants and shops, spiked to $3.50 per pound this month. That is a 70% increase this year, and the highest prices for the crop since 1977. In 1977, the price jumped due to frost killing more than a billion coffee bean trees. Now, climate change may be to blame. Droughts, floods, high temperatures, and extreme weather played a role in diminished crop yields in Brazil and Vietnam, which are major coffee exporters. Experts say these types of events are going to become more frequent and we need to make investments into agricultural research and development to be able to mitigate the impacts of climate change on agriculture.
🧊 Refreezing the Arctic Sea
A UK-based company called Real Ice has an ambitious plan to combat global warming by refreezing the Arctic Sea. It plans to pump ocean water on top of ice caps to help them grow thicker. Real Ice plans to use renewable energy generators near the Arctic Sea to charge hydrogen fuel cells, then place the fuel in water pumping systems and send them to the ice caps with underwater drones. At the beginning of winter, it will pump water to create an extra ice layer on the ice caps. At the end of winter, it will shoot water into the air, creating snow that will fall on the ice caps to protect them in the warmer months. The company says that their plan could give humanity more time to adapt to and mitigate against climate change.
✈️ Global Tourism Negatively Impacts Climate Change
According to new research, the carbon footprint from the travel industry is growing at rates never seen before. An increasing demand for international travel over the past decade has led to higher rates of CO2 each year. Greenhouse gas emissions from international travel are growing 3.5% each year, which is nearly twice as fast as the overall economy. The research shows that the 20 highest-emitting per-capita tourism emissions countries contribute to ¾ of the total carbon footprint. Air and ground travel are the main contributors to the emissions, with private plane emissions increasing significantly in recent years. Experts say countries will need to begin monitoring tourism emissions at the national level, like New Zealand and Denmark and currently doing, to align the tourism sector with global climate goals.
That’s all for this week! If you enjoyed our newsletter, please share it with your friends!
-Hannah, Eric, Amy, and Nick
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