Climate Investors Face Vally Of Death –Climate Crisis AM Edition 3/22/24
Many climate startups are in trouble financially. According to CNBC, a new tech VC called World Fund has raised $325 million to reverse this situation. This is not nearly enough. CNBC reports, “World Fund is seeking to solve what it calls a “valley of death” in the climate tech world — where firms raising cash at the Series B stage of financing face a funding gap that hinders them from scaling their operations. Series B relates to the second round of funding for firms that have met certain milestones.” It should be noted that it is rare that funds that do not manage billions of dollars can affect such a significant problem.
Water Shortage –States Where Farms Use Little Water
EV News –Prices And Sales Dropping
With only a little more than a week to go until Easter, the price of Easter Eggs has surged. The BBC reports, “You may have noticed that Easter eggs are more expensive this year. But did you know that climate change is one of the reasons? Most chocolate is made from cocoa grown in West Africa, but a humid heatwave has blasted the crops and massively cut yields.” Cocoa prices have nearly doubled in less than a year, and the climate crisis may cause that increase to continue.
Utility Fires
Utilities may cause a growing number of fires across the US. This has already happened in California and Hawaii. According to The New York Times, “Large wildfires started by power lines and other utility equipment were, not that long ago, considered something that happened mostly in California. But these disasters are increasingly happening in many more places as forces turbocharged by climate change like extreme heat and drought wreak havoc on electric grids that were not built or upgraded to withstand them.” Wood utility polls across the country are made of decades-old wood. These fragile polls are a risk because rotten wood can easily break.
According to a research paper published by Nature titled “Global warming and heat extremes to enhance inflationary pressure.”, “The empirical evidence for the historical impacts of weather shocks on inflation suggests that the ongoing warming and intensification of weather extremes and variability due to anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions may have consequences for future inflation.” The authors also note that much of the effect will be on agricultural products. The news comes when inflation is falling throughout much of the developed world. Part of these drops is due to food prices that have moved down as supply chain trouble has been solved, at least in part. Global warming could reverse that trend.
