A tense slowdown in carbon reductions
• The European Commission announced a major revision of the Emissions Trading System (ETS), aiming to slow the pace of emission reductions, extend free allowances for industry, integrate 250 million tonnes of certified domestic carbon removals, and strengthen investment in industrial decarbonization.
• This plan responds to the need to support industry in the face of soaring energy prices and geopolitical tensions, while maintaining the ETS as a central lever for emission reductions and technological innovation.
• This reform aims to support competitiveness, accompany the ecological transition, and contribute to achieving climate neutrality by 2050.
Source: ESG Today – "EU Taps the Brakes on ETS Carbon Pricing System"
Drought threatens €500 billion in property damage
• In France, the CCR (Caisse Centrale de Réassurance) estimated that cracks in houses caused by repeated droughts and soil movement could represent a cumulative risk of up to €500 billion over fifty to one hundred years.
• More than 60% of individual houses, about 12.1 million homes, are located in areas of medium or high exposure according to the Geological and Mining Research Bureau.
• This phenomenon was identified as the main current natural threat, requiring determined prevention policies to limit its structural impact.
Source: Reporterre – "Les maisons fissurées pourraient coûter jusqu'à 500 milliards d'euros aux assureurs"
Emergency farming law: the right imposes controversial pesticides and water reserves
• On July 16, 2026, the joint committee adopted the 'Emergency Farming Law', led by the right-wing majority, allowing in particular the reintroduction of banned pesticides and the eased expansion of agricultural water reserves.
• This text, supported by the FNSEA and criticized by green and left-wing MPs, strengthens the farming sector's control over water governance and loosens procedures for intensive livestock farming.
• The law aims for a regulatory transformation of the farming sector, while prompting appeals announced before the Constitutional Council.
Source: Reporterre – "Loi d'urgence agricole : Laurent Duplomb impose son texte"
Heatwave: climate misinformation surges on CNews and Europe 1
• During the exceptional heatwave of May 2026, the Media Observatory on Ecology (OME) recorded 62 cases of climate misinformation across eight French media outlets, mainly on CNews, Sud Radio, and Europe 1, where most of these statements came from political guests and newsroom members.
• This multiplication of erroneous messages during an extreme episode raised concerns about their repercussions for media credibility and public understanding of climate issues.
• The OME and the NGO Quota Climat stressed the need for strengthened regulation to limit this kind of drift and protect the integrity of the environmental debate.
Source: Vert le media – "62 cas de mésinformation climatique recensés sur CNews, Europe 1 et Sud Radio pendant la vague de chaleur de mai"
New York suspends the massive construction of data centers
• The State of New York introduced a one-year moratorium on the construction of new data centers larger than 50 MW, by decree of Governor Kathy Hochul, a first in the United States.
• This decision brought out a debate on the ecological, social, and territorial costs of these infrastructures, echoed by citizen and political mobilizations in the United States and Europe, as well as bill proposals and amendments rejected or under discussion.
• The scale of this opposition aims to trigger regulatory transformations, as more than 42 US local authorities have introduced local moratoriums and France is seeing similar efforts to frame or curb the development of data centers.
Source: Reporterre – "En limitant les data centers, New York lance un mouvement aux États-Unis"
Social dialogue and climate: companies facing intense heat
• The Convention of Companies for the Climate (CEC) launched for 2025-2026 a 'social and environmental dialogue' track open to all social partners, whereas until now it addressed only executives.
• This program, which has already brought together 1,700 companies and generated 1,300 roadmaps since 2020, aimed to include unions and management to co-build organizations resilient to extreme heat and global warming.
• The stated objective rested on developing more sustainable business models and integrating social dialogue to support the transformation of professional practices.
Source: Le Monde – "Quand direction et syndicats cherchent un chemin commun face au réchauffement climatique : comment faire pour que, quand on avance, on embarque tout le monde ?"
2030 Alpine Olympics: when sufficiency turns into ecological havoc
• Preparations for the 2030 Winter Olympics in the French Alps mobilized major construction projects, such as the creation of four athlete villages, the renovation of existing infrastructure, and the deployment of valley lifts, accompanied by heavy soil artificialization and increased dependence on artificial snow.
• Concerns were expressed locally about the ecological footprint, the loss of farmland, the risks of budget overruns, and the opacity of planning.
• In a context of heightened climate vulnerability, the project aims to combine territorial development, security innovations, and promises of environmental sufficiency, while public consultations and arbitrations remain ongoing.
Source: Reporterre – "Forêts rasées, montagnes bétonnées : la vraie carte des JO 2030 dans les Alpes"
CNRS-IRD merger: French climate research in peril
• The government launched a project to merge the Research Institute for Development (IRD) with the CNRS, placing this initiative within the 'Efficient State' program launched in 2025, with the goal of implementation as early as January 2027.
• Researchers, international partners, and IRD collaborators expressed serious concerns about the dilution of skills, the loss of a unique scientific model, and the future of contract staff.
• This restructuring, accompanied by budget cuts and the absence of an impact study, raises major issues for the continuity of research on climate-change adaptation and international scientific cooperation.
Source: Reporterre – "Au pire moment, la France saborde un institut sur l'adaptation au changement climatique"
Citeo imposes ReUse and sidelines local players
• The eco-organization Citeo, backed by large industrial groups, launched in June 2025 the national ReUse scheme to develop a glass deposit system in France, piloted in four regions and targeting national rollout in 2027.
• This initiative led to the gradual ousting of existing local companies, generating economic losses, job cuts, and the exclusion of solutions already in place.
• Citeo confirmed the irreversibility of ReUse, despite criticism of its implementation by several associations, and plans a generalization of the scheme through pooling criteria from 2026.
Source: Reporterre – "Consigne du verre : les groupes industriels reprennent la main en écartant les petites boîtes"
France faces an age of fire amplified by global warming
• Since 2010, France has seen a thirtyfold increase in the number of fires and a tenfold increase in burned areas, with 42,810 hectares ravaged between January and July 2026, including several thousand at Fontainebleau, in the Drôme, the Pyrénées-Orientales, the Var, and during a major fire at Saumos that forced 20,000 people to evacuate.
• This dynamic, 90% driven by human causes and worsened by extreme climate conditions, resulted in the destruction of forests, the loss of biodiversity, and the alteration of essential ecosystem services.
• Faced with this upheaval, France must combine reducing greenhouse gas emissions and changing behaviors to curb this systemic transformation of fire risk.
Source: Reporterre – "30 fois plus d'incendies en 20 ans : la France est entrée dans l'ère du feu"
