By David Callaway, Callaway Climate Insights

Tropical Storm Elsa made landfall along Florida’s northern Gulf Coast on Wednesday, with maximum sustained winds estimated at 65 mph. The National Hurricane Center said a storm surge, heavy rains and winds had hit the Florida peninsula and a tropical storm watch had been issued for parts of the mid-Atlantic coast.

As with most other climate changes this summer, Europe has taken the lead over the United States; this time in the fight against global financial instability.

As U.S. lawmakers, mostly Republican, voice concerns about the Federal Reserve’s toes dropping with greenhouse gas emissions disclosures on Wall Street, the European Central Bank intervened two feet earlier in the call. day. The ECB has said it will add the impact of climate change to its fundamental policy decisions going forward, ending any debate on whether a central bank should be involved in the matter.

President of the ECB Christine Lagarde said this would manifest itself in the central bank’s regulation of corporate bond purchases, which as a Callaway Climate Outlook noted, have taken a decidedly green turn this year. The statement comes a week before the European Union is set to unveil a major new set of carbon reduction regulations, including a possible border carbon tax.

That will do nothing to stop the debate in the United States over the role of the Fed, but the Biden administration would be in favor of a Fed that is more involved in the climate. When it comes to financial markets, today we see the negative impact on markets of global Covid deaths exceeding four million – and increasing. A new report published this morning in one of the Lancet publications estimates that climate change – by extreme heat – is responsible for more than five million deaths a year.

If that’s not a financial threat to watch out for, we don’t know what it is.

More ideas below. . . .

ZEUS: Forecasting climate intelligence with Iggy Bassi from Cervest

. . . . While running a farming business in Ghana ten years ago, Iggy Bassi noticed that while local farmers blamed the gods for poor harvests, predicting the future climate impact with science could create better results, writes David Callaway. Earthscan, a new tool developed by Bassi’s Cervest, allows anyone from farmers to global hotel chains and real estate portfolios to measure the expected impact on their properties from several different customer scenarios, such as status quo or spikes emissions. Find out why investors like Marc Benioff and Chris Sacca support Cervest as it prepares to enter the market. . . .

Read the full ZEUS column

Hulbert: How the ESG surge could ultimately hurt green stocks

. . . . Green actions? Brown stocks? The only sure thing in the new ESG world for investors may be the stocks of banks and asset managers, writes Marc Hulbert. New study from the Booth School of Chicago and UPenn’s Wharton reveals surprising reasons for the current momentum of green stocks and poor performance of brown stocks, mostly fossil fuel stocks, and predicts what could happen when the underlying results catch up with the hype. . . .

Read the full column

Thursday Subscriber Outlook: Rupert Murdoch’s New Climate Business?

. . . . Can time be fair and balanced? This is the question that raises eyebrows this week after that of Rupert Murdoch News Corp. (NWSA) announced the launch of a weather information channel. Murdoch, who is one of my former bosses, has made a name for himself as a climate skeptic / denier. But there is no doubt about the money in extreme weather conditions, as evidenced by the success of The Weather Channel. And millions have been lost betting against Rupert over the decades. It’s going to be good. Read more here. . . .

. . . . Another consortium of global banks this week launched another private carbon offset market, seeking to take advantage of the absence of any major global platform. Give the banks credit to go where the money goes, but with the growth of all regional carbon exchanges, that market is getting crowded. Read more here. . .

. . . . Just a week after our interview with Val Smith of Citi, where she noted that the bank is seeing an increase in sustainability obligations this year.unlike loans, new figures show that SLBs have already surpassed last year’s record sales. Bond issues exceeded $ 90 billion through May, according to BloombergNEF. Still small by global bond standards, but clearly a trend to watch. . . .

. . . . Could climate change trigger a trade war? As Europe grapples with the potential fallout from its idea of ​​taxing carbon at borders, a more pressing fight is developing between the United States, Canada and Mexico, where NAFTA partners disagree over that of Manuel Lopez Obrador plans to raise the temperature by relying on fossil fuels. As there is no other mechanism to get Mexico to comply, other than polite negotiation, the two northern partners may be called upon to take more drastic measures. Read more here. . . .

. . . . The European invasion of renewable energy projects in the United States this year is no longer just about offshore wind and electric vehicles. Earlier this week, Swedish investment firm EQT Partners bought Cypress Creek Renewables, a large California-based solar developer, from a group of private investors who turned it over for around $ 80 million. . . .

. . . . A green tanker? Carbon offsets are starting to get silly and overcrowded. A new European task force announced Thursday will be the last to attempt to tackle the proliferation of greenwashing around carbon markets, especially by fossil fuel companies. Read more here. . . .

EU Notebook: Europe Tackles Green Laundering Claims on Bonds; the more Germany is leading the revolt against nuclear energy

. . . . A new proposal from the European Commission to clean up the reputation for “greenwashing” of the green bond industry is gaining strength in Brussels but recently suffered a little publicity stunt when it emerged that the EC itself did not follow its own ‘gold standard’ rules in upcoming funding, writes Daniel Byrne from Dublin. In addition, Germany is leading a group of Central European countries in a revolt against the plan to include nuclear energy in the taxonomy of green finance in Europe. And the largest electrolyser in Europe has just started up in Germany. . . .

Read the full EU notebook

Editor’s Choice: China’s largest offshore wind farm; Hydrogen start-up supported by Gates; BlackRock climate fund raises $ 250 million

China has completed its largest offshore wind farm in the Yellow Sea after turbines off the coast of Rudong County in eastern Jiangsu Province were completed last week. The wind farm is expected to generate a massive amount of renewable energy, and officials say they aim to cut COâ‚‚ emissions by around 1.6 million tonnes.

A startup supported by Gates is working on a hydrogen-natural gas project

A startup backed by Bill Gates’ clean energy fund plans to launch a pilot project by the end of 2022 that will be able to reduce COâ‚‚ emissions from hydrogen production while using natural gas, writes Corey Paul for S&P Global Market Intelligence. California-based C-Zero Inc. is working to commercialize a technology that splits methane into hydrogen and carbon by moving it through a mixture of molten salts. Paul notes that an advantage of this process, called pyrolysis, is that the carbon extracted from methane is in solid form, which avoids the challenges of injecting COâ‚‚ gas underground to sequester it. Another is that pyrolysis can reduce emissions while accommodating the use of existing natural gas infrastructure.

BlackRock raises $ 250 million for emerging markets climate fund

BlackRock (BLK) said on Thursday it has secured more than $ 250 million in pledges from a consortium of global institutional investors, governments and philanthropists for the Climate Finance Partnership to invest in climate infrastructure in markets emerging. The partnership will invest in renewable energy production, energy storage solutions, electrified transportation services and other activities related to the transition to a low carbon economy. Its goal is to raise at least $ 500 million, the company said. The consortium includes the governments of France, Germany, Japan and other philanthropists and institutional investors.

Words to live. . . .

“You will forgive me for not having a lot of patience when some of my colleagues in the Senate tell me that we cannot afford to act on climate change. Is that so? The question that must be asked, as strongly as possible, is how can we afford not to act? – Senator Bernie Sanders.

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