Welcome to another edition of Climatebase Weekly.

In today’s edition…

In this edition of This Week in Climate, we cover:

🌁 SF Climate Week (April 18th - April 26th) — SF Climate Week Early Bird calendar access opens March 4 at 12pm PT. Be the first to explore and register for events before the public launch. Sign up to get notified the moment it goes live 

🏔️ Colorado Climate Week (March 30th - April 3rd) — The event calendar is live! There’s already quite a few events to sign up for—and we're still over a month away, so expect more to be added.

🦞 Boston Climate Week (May 3rd - May 10th) — The calendar is now accepting event submissions. Have a venue you would like offer to a climate week organizer? Fill out the venue submission form here.

⚡ Invest in Clean Energy Projects with Climatize — Start investing in vetted renewable energy projects across the U.S. with our partner, Climatize.

*Past performance is not indicative of future success, as returns are not guaranteed. Climatize is an SEC-registered & FINRA member funding portal. Crowdfunding carries risk, including loss.

Quick reminders:

Want first access to this year’s batch of events?

On Wednesday, March 4 at 12pm PT, we’re launching Early Bird Calendar Access to the SF Climate Week calendar — giving subscribers a first look at some of the events weeks before the full calendar opens to the public.

What this means:

👉 Sign up here

Event organizers: Now is the time to submit your event. Any events on the calendar before Early Bird access opens will be featured to this early audience — giving you a head start on visibility and registrations.

Colorado Climate Week is officially live — and the calendar is now open.

Colorado Climate Week will bring together the state’s climate community for a week of events, connection, and collaboration in 2026.

You can now explore and register for events happening across the state, from Denver and Boulder to communities throughout Colorado. Discover panels, workshops, networking events, and community gatherings — and start building your schedule today.

Still planning to host something? It’s not too late. Event submissions are still open, and we’re continuing to add new events to the calendar.

Get involved:

By Julian Moore

A growing list of cities and municipalities worldwide have banned advertising for high-carbon products like fossil fuels, flights, and cruises. The Hague became the first city to do so through local law in 2024, followed by Amsterdam, the world's first capital to enact such a ban, in 2026. Dozens of cities across the Netherlands, UK, Australia, and New Zealand have introduced similar restrictions.

Proponents argue that fossil fuel advertising normalizes high-emission lifestyle choices and undermines climate policy. Many campaigners point to the advertising restrictions behind successful public health campaigns against junk food, gambling, and tobacco ads as evidence that regulating messaging can have a meaningful impact on behavior in the long term. 

The movement to ban fossil fuel ads has had a hard time expanding beyond the city level, however. Even under a favorable regulatory regime, advertising bans in the United States have to clear a number of First Amendment hurdles before any meaningful nation-wide restriction on public speech can be made. Experts emphasize that bans work best alongside complementary policies encouraging sustainable alternatives, rather than as standalone measures.

The Global Battery Alliance (GBA) is developing a certification scheme to make battery supply chains more sustainable and transparent. Launching in 2027, the program will require mines, manufacturers, and recyclers to report data on greenhouse gas emissions, biodiversity, pollution, labor practices, and Indigenous rights. This information will be independently verified and stored in a digital "battery passport" accessible via QR code.

Over 30 major companies, including CATL, BYD, Tesla, and Rio Tinto, are already piloting the scheme in an effort to comply with an upcoming EU law mandating digital passports for batteries sold in Europe.

The GBA, founded in 2017 amid concerns over child labor in cobalt mining, hopes the certification will shift competition beyond price alone, rewarding responsible producers with better access to capital and procurement opportunities and building public trust in a sector critical to the global clean energy transition.

Italy has called on the EU to suspend its Emissions Trading System (ETS) — the bloc's primary climate tool, which requires polluters to buy permits for every ton of CO2 emitted — pending a broader reform later this year. Italian Industry Minister Adolfo Urso dismissed the ETS as simply "a tax" harming energy-intensive industries, citing crises in European chemicals and steelmaking.

Italy has also announced plans to compensate gas-fired power plants for ETS costs, effectively neutralizing the system's decarbonization incentive. Critics warn this would favor fossil fuel investment and do little to lower household bills.

The move reflects growing pressure across the EU, with Germany and Austria also pushing for significant ETS changes. Carbon prices have already dropped from €81 to around €70 in recent weeks. France and Sweden pushed back, defending the ETS as one of the EU's most effective climate instruments. The EU Commission is expected to review the mechanism later this year.

A study of 8,000 tropical plants spanning 200 years found that climate change is significantly disrupting flowering times across the tropics. Analyzing 33 species from countries including Brazil, Ecuador, Ghana, and Thailand, researchers found flowering periods have shifted by an average of two days per decade — some species blooming up to 80 days later than in the 1950s.

This challenges the previous assumption that tropical regions, with their relatively stable temperatures, would be less affected by climate change. Lead researcher Skylar Graves warns the consequences could be severe: when flowering falls out of sync with pollinators, migratory birds, and fruit-eating animals, entire food chains are disrupted.

The tropics host the world's most biodiverse ecosystems, and scientists warn these shifts could trigger "cascading impacts" globally. Experts say the findings highlight a critical gap in climate research and underscore the urgent need for greater conservation efforts in tropical regions.

The Environmental Protection Agency announced a rollback of air pollution rules limiting mercury and other hazardous emissions from coal-fired power plants.

The change weakens the Mercury and Air Toxics Standards by removing updated limits that would have significantly reduced emissions of mercury and other toxic metals such as nickel, arsenic, and lead. The stricter rule was projected to cut mercury pollution by 70% and reduce other toxic metal emissions by about two-thirds, while delivering hundreds of millions of dollars in public health benefits through avoiding illness.

Supporters of the rollback argue that easing the standards reduces operating costs for utilities, particularly for older coal plants, helping maintain consistent electricity supply amid rising energy demand driven by technologies such as data centers.

Public health advocates warn that relaxing limits on mercury—a neurotoxin linked to impaired brain development in infants—and other hazardous pollutants could increase health risks, especially for vulnerable populations. Coal plants remain a major source of hazardous air pollutants despite generating less than one-fifth of U.S. electricity.

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.

Accelerate Resilience L.A. (ARLA)

“Accelerate Resilience L.A. (ARLA), a sponsored project of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, works to heal living systems and accelerate resilience in the Los Angeles region. ”

Carbon Herald Inc

“Carbon Herald is an independent online outlet covering the carbon management industry.”

Enduring Planet

“Enduring Planet provides non-dilutive financing and financial advisory services to climate-focused startups and small businesses across the U.S. ”

Transaera

“Affordable, energy-efficient cooling systems for a greener planet.”

Solom.Earth

“Nature and land use data solutions for businesses to track, understand, and report on ecosystem health at scale, driving impact on the ground.”

Urban Land Institute

“Driving responsible land use and urban development through research, education, and global collaboration.”

AZX, PBC.

“AI Transformation Engineering”

Paces

“Agentic AI for Power Projects and AI Infrastructure”

RyeStrategy

“"Affordable decarbonization solutions for SMBs and enterprise supply chains."”

Seabound

“Decarbonizing shipping by capturing CO₂ emissions directly onboard ships.”

Working Trees

“Empowering farmers to combat climate change through agroforestry and carbon market access.”

Climate Interactive

“Our tools and interactive experiences simulate the effects of policies and technologies on climate change, which we use to motivate decision makers to take effective action”

SMA America

“Empowering global energy independence for a sustainable, climate-friendly future.”

Edacious

“"Transforming food production for better nutrition and sustainability."”

Cloverly

“Digital infrastructure for scaling the carbon markets with integrity”

Center for EcoTechnology

“Empowering sustainable living, saving energy, and reducing waste for a better community and environment.”