Welcome to another edition of Climatebase Weekly (Tuesday, September 23rd, 2025).

In today’s edition…

🌟 Featured climate jobs at 10+ new employers — Scroll down to view them all!

Don't see any that are a good fit for you? Head over to Climatebase to browse over 3k+ new jobs that have been posted in the last 24 hours. 

🌎 This Week In Climate: Fossil Fuel Companies are Linked Directly to Deadly Heatwaves.

🌎 Fellowship Wins: Recent achievements in the from our Fellows

Quick reminders:

Our Fellows continue to make big moves in climate — here are some of the latest career wins from the Climatebase Fellowship community. Want to join the community? Apply to the next cohort of the Fellowship and learn more here.

Want to join the community? Apply to the next cohort of the Fellowship and learn more here.

By Abigail Bassett 

Last week, a new, landmark study directly tied hundreds of deadly heat waves to emissions from the world’s largest fossil fuel producers. According to the study published in Nature, more than 200 extreme heat events that occurred between 2000 and 2023 were intensified and, in some cases, made possible by carbon pollution from companies like ExxonMobil, Chevron, BP, and Shell. 

The study marks the first time that scientists have connected the dots between corporate emissions and specific disasters that have killed people, scorched crops, and strained public health systems. 

That data comes at a troubling moment.  Even as scientists get better at showing how Big Oil is directly impacting the environment and global warming, science is increasingly under attack in the US, the world's second-largest emitter of greenhouse gases. Just last week, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)  announced that it will no longer collect emissions data from the largest polluters, including coal plants, oil refineries, steel mills, and other industrial facilities. That means that both the public and researchers will have less visibility into the pollution that has fueled extreme weather events, at a critical time when climate disasters are exploding worldwide. 

The study in Nature examines how much human-driven climate change, and particularly emissions from the world's largest fossil fuel and cement companies, or “carbon majors,” has amplified historical heatwaves. 

The researchers looked at 213 heatwaves around the world between 2000 and 2023 from the EM-DAT international disaster database, which tracks events that were significant enough to cause health and/or economic damage. Researchers then compared each heatwave’s observed conditions with a simulated preindustrial world (1850-1900) without human-caused global warming. 

According to CNN, “Between the first and second decade that the researchers investigated, climate change made the heatwaves climb from being 20 times more likely to 200 times more likely…Of the extreme heat events the researchers focused on, as many as a quarter of them would have been “virtually impossible” without the climate pollution from any of the 14 biggest carbon majors.” 

The study connects these heatwaves to 180 of the largest carbon-emitting companies, including state-owned and private firms. Researchers reported that these companies account for 75% of all fossil fuel and cement CO2 emissions since 1850. The study reports that the top 14 carbon majors are responsible for nearly as much CO2 as the other 166 companies combined. Using a climate model (called OSCAR), the researchers were able to estimate just how much each company’s emissions contributed to global warming, and how much they contributed to increasing the intensity and probability of heatwaves. 

According to the research, carbon majors are responsible for about half of the overall increase in heatwave intensity since the preindustrial era, and they continue to have an outsized impact. 

That makes what’s happening in the US all the more alarming. While scientists get better at drawing a direct line from climate change to Big Oil, the U.S. is moving in the opposite direction. Last week, the EPA announced that it will halt the collection and publication of detailed greenhouse gas emission data from major polluters. 

The system in question is known as the Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program (GHGRP), and was established in 2009. It required thousands of facilities like power plants, cement producers, and refineries to report their annual emissions. For more than a decade, the database has been relied on by researchers, journalists, policymakers, and courts to track pollution and enforce standards. 

Shutting the GHGRP down just as attribution science comes into its own risks what many experts call a data blackout. Experts warn the move would “blind the public and policymakers to climate pollution.” Without federal records, it will be more difficult to quantify emissions, weakening transparency at a time when it's clear that polluters are directly responsible for the health and climate impacts we’ve seen over the last 20 years. 

The extreme heat is becoming impossible to ignore, and the impact of carbon majors on the warming of the climate is most tangible in economic form. As The Guardian noted, the summer 2024 heat waves, droughts, and floods cost the continent €43 billion in short-term losses (around 0.26% of GDP). 

Outside of Europe, the economic story is similar. Construction, farming, and gig workers are increasingly under threat of heat-related illnesses as the globe warms, slashing output and sparking several new laws aimed at protecting them. Infrastructure around the world has begun to buckle under extreme heat, and property values are falling in high-risk regions. 

These costs are rising faster than earlier models predicted and could dwarf short-term profits. A report from 2024 by the Network for Greening the Financial System (NGFS) noted that climate change could shrink economic growth by up to 30% by 2100. The economic impact could be two to four times worse than previously estimated, according to the report. 

In addition to the economic toll, the legal impact of the Nature study could also be significant. Stronger causal links between emissions and climate-related disasters could accelerate lawsuits against fossil fuel producers, according to reporting at CNN and The Guardian. That shift comes as climate litigation gains traction worldwide: courts recently closed a landmark youth-led case against the U.S. government while simultaneously seeing a surge of suits targeting companies, including a new countersuit in which oil majors are striking back at Greenpeace over its campaigns. 

While it’s still early days following the release of the Nature study, it’s clear that fossil fuel companies are no longer just contributors to a global problem—they are directly tied to deadly heatwaves, economic shocks, and mounting human loss. As attribution research sharpens the case for accountability, the U.S. is rolling back emissions transparency even as Europe, Australia, and the Global South pay escalating costs—making the fight over data, truth, and liability as central to our future as cutting emissions.

Check out some of the latest featured jobs below. If you don't see anything that speaks to you, you can always go to Climatebase to explore over 50,000 new climate jobs.

Rootiful

“ROOTIFUL is a subscription-based online community site built to help vegans and vegan-curious people make new friends, learn new things, and share their own thoughts.”

RMP Global

“Transforming waste into sustainable and cost-effective infrastructure.”

Overstory

“Real-time satellite data to reduce wildfire risk and improve grid reliability, combating climate change.”

Amply

“Revolutionizing heat pump design and sales to accelerate residential decarbonization”

Derapi, Inc.

“Simplifying secure access to distributed energy resources for a greener future.”

The Good Food Institute Europe

“Advancing sustainable, plant-based, and cultivated meat to reduce food system's environmental impact in Europe.”

Gridium

“Hastening the transition to a low-carbon economy by optimizing commercial building energy use.”

Waterfront Alliance

“Championing resilient, accessible, and equitable waterways to combat sea level rise in New York Harbor.”

DG+Design

“"Empowering sustainable brands with clean energy marketing and creative expertise."”