Ask a sixteen-year-old about a social media ban, and you get an answer sharper than most adults arguing about bans. She says, “It doesn’t prepare us for the real world when we will have to deal with these distractions in our life”. The teenager’s response strikes at the core of the ban vs
How I got hooked on chasing solar eclipses Traveling the globe for celestial events may seem downright loony—until you get a taste of the addictive world of ‘eclipse chasing’ Published on: Aug 23, 2026, 18:30:10 IST WSJ Prefer HTon Google Share via Copy link ‘It was glorious
Made-in-India semiconductor chips are now powering key Indian space missions. These domestically manufactured components support lunar and solar exploration efforts. Specialized chips from Mohali's Semiconductor Laboratory are used in Chandrayaan-3 and Aditya-L1
India's space program began with a small rocket range in 1962. It progressed to launching its first satellite and developing indigenous launch vehicles. Chandrayaan-3's lunar landing marked a significant achievement for the nation. The program now includes private sector involvement and ambitious
India plans to establish its own space station by the year 2035. The first module for the Bharatiya Antariksha Station has already received approval. This ambitious project aligns with the nation's growing space capabilities and aspirations. National Space Day celebrates India's achievements and
India observed its third National Space Day, commemorating the Chandrayaan-3 lunar landing. ISRO Chairman Dr. V. Narayanan recalled the agency's humble beginnings and current global standing. He highlighted Chandrayaan-3's soft landing near the Moon's south pole in August 2023
The Indian government created the Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research (IISERs) to offer students an intellectually vibrant research environment and to bring them into research at a relatively — vis-à-vis the Indian milieu — early stage
Prime Minister Narendra Modi aims to lure global expertise to India's expanding space landscape. He identifies the private sector's potential as a crucial asset for global competition. Key advantages include India’s affordability and its appetite for innovation
Six Ways the COP30 Climate Summit Can Succeed or Fail
Six Ways the COP30 Climate Summit Can Succeed or Fail
(Bloomberg) -- When Brazil was named host of the COP30 climate summit two years ago, it was seen as the perfect celebration of the 10th anniversary of the Paris Agreement, where nations pledged to keep climate change within safe limits.
In a month's time, nearly 200 countries will gather at the gates of the Amazon rainforest for a new round of United Nations-sponsored climate talks. But there is still intense discussion about what the main outcome ought to be.
Unlike its past two editions, COP30 (officially, the 30th Conference of the Parties) doesn't have a big headline deliverable. At COP29 in Azerbaijan last year, countries had to agree on a new global climate finance goal. The year before, negotiators took stock of climate progress and agreed for the first time to transition away from fossil fuels.
Brazil has said it wants to move from negotiation to implementation of goals. Yet that's far from simple at a time when the US is withdrawing from the Paris Agreement, there are wars in Ukraine and Gaza and the world is less focused on climate action.
Success or failure will be the defining climate legacy of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
Here are some of the results that negotiators hope for in the Brazilian city of Belém next month:
NDC 3.0
Arguably the biggest deliverable of COP30 actually comes before the summit itself. Countries were required to submit their third round of climate pledges under the Paris accord — known as Nationally Determined Contributions — by the end of last month. These detail how much they plan to cut emissions by 2035 and the policies that will get them there.
More than half of the parties to the Paris Agreement, including China, have submitted their new NDCs. Yet many big emitters haven't. The EU, the most climate-ambitious region, missed the deadline and so did India. The US submitted its pledge early, under the Biden administration, but President Donald Trump has scrapped many of the policies needed to meet it.
By the end of this month, the UN will tally all those emissions-cutting promises and compile a synthesis report showing just how far away the world is from the Paris target of limiting warming to 1.5C. Few expect the UN's global warming projection to be much below 2.5C, which means countries are still way off course.
Mind the gap
Speak to veteran climate diplomats and they'll tell you that this summit most closely resembles COP26 in Glasgow, UK — the last time countries were required to submit climate pledges, after a pandemic-related delay. That COP also didn't have a mandated headline outcome, but it still delivered a landmark commitment to “phase down” unabated coal combustion, alongside a whole host of side deals that ranged from curbing deforestation to launching an alliance of climate-committed banks.
How Brazil responds to this year's NDC synthesis will be the key barometer for success. Ambitious countries, like those in the EU, want to directly address closing the temperature gap to 1.5C and further solidify existing commitments like transitioning away from fossil fuels. But traditional blockers of more climate action, like Saudi Arabia, may well see the current geopolitical environment as an opportunity to walk back from some of those promises.
“What is lacking is political will,” said Tina Stege, climate envoy for the the Marshall Islands. “We need mitigation commitments delivered.”
After months of resistance, Brazil is beginning to warm to the idea of negotiating a so-called cover decision to address the temperature gap, according to people familiar with the matter. But there is little clarity so far over what will be included.
Finance roadmap
Last year, developed countries promised to deliver $300 billion in climate finance to developing nations and small island states by 2035. They also agreed to scale that by an extra trillion dollars through private sources, but left it vague as to how that would be achieved.
Some of those answers should be revealed at COP30. Brazil and last year's Azerbaijani COP presidency are working on a “Baku to Belem” roadmap that activists hope will provide some concrete proposals to mobilize the significant amounts of money needed to help poor countries transition to clean energy and protect their economies from climate change.
Some possible options that have been floated include so-called solidarity levies on stock and bond trades, fossil-fuel emissions and first-class airfares. Yet many of those would need to be agreed outside of the COP process. Multilateral banks are seen as playing a key role, but many are now having to contend with a Trump administration that's hostile to climate change.
The roadmap also won't be negotiated, so it's not clear how far it can go. What is for sure is that developing countries will be looking for more than just empty words.
Adaptation goal
The slow rate of progress in cutting emissions means that more attention is being paid to how countries, businesses and communities will adapt to climate change. For those on the frontlines of extreme weather, adaptation will be the key focus of this year's summit.
Negotiators are unlikely to agree on a new, dedicated finance goal for adaptation, but they will need to narrow down a list of indicators that track resilience to climate change from 400 to about 100 by the end of COP30.
Side deals
Recent COP summits have come with myriad eye-catching declarations and initiatives. Critics say these serve as a useful distraction from the slow progress in negotiating rooms, and often get ignored as soon as everyone leaves. But they can also bring innovative new ideas to the fore and mobilize coalitions of countries to work together on issues like scaling renewable energy or improving farming techniques.
This year is unlikely to be different. One of the signature proposals is a $125 billion Tropical Forests Forever Facility, which will harness capital markets to pay countries to keep their woodlands standing. Another key side deal to look out for is a global coalition on carbon markets. That could bring diverse countries together to align how they put a price on carbon.
Brazil has also made the principle “Just Transition” a key pillar of COP30, to make sure that poor countries and communities aren't left behind during the shift to a clean economy.
Keeping multilateralism alive
Ultimately, one of the main markers of success for COP30 could be proving that the diplomacy show is still on the road after the US, the world's largest economy and biggest historical emitter of CO2, abandons the process.
Harjeet Singh, a longtime COP participant and founding director of the Satat Sampada Climate Foundation, said one “beacon of hope” emerged earlier this year, when the International Court of Justice said countries have a responsibility to do what they can to limit global warming to the critical threshold of 1.5C.
Even so, he said, geopolitics is casting an “ominous shadow” over the prospects for meaningful multilateralism. “This will be a long and arduous fight,” said Singh, “to protect our planet and its people against the forces of inertia and self-interest.”
More stories like this are available on bloomberg.com
©2025 Bloomberg L.P.
Source: LiveMint
Related Posts: COP30, climate summit, Brazil, Paris Agreement, climate change
The Northeast India Space Workshop 2026 will convene in Guwahati to explore regional transformation. This event aims to leverage space technology for global reach and economic growth. Stakeholders will discuss Northeast India becoming a developer and testbed for space solutions
1 days ago
The dramatic 1° Celsius rise in global temperatures since industrialisation has already proved to have upended the lives of wild flora and fauna: that of at least 15,801 species on the Red List of Threatened Species, according to IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature)
2 days ago
India faces a substantial cost gap with the United States for launching payloads. A recent study estimates India's cost at over $13,000 per kilogram by 2025. This contrasts with the United States' estimated cost of $3,225 per kilogram. The study highlights scale and experience as key factors for
2 days ago
Prime Minister Narendra Modi encouraged young space entrepreneurs to innovate for agriculture and daily life. He highlighted the potential of India's private space sector for global impact. Startups were urged to engage with schools and inspire future generations
2 days ago
Rock-solid evidence for the origins of birds Stones in dinosaur stomachs may help understanding of avian evolution Published on: Aug 20, 2026, 21:09:09 IST The Economist Prefer HTon Google Share via Copy link How do you know what a dinosaur ate? Guts rot away after death
3 days ago
Was it meat or glucose that fueled the growth of the human brain? If evolutionary science told us, hitherto, that human brain expansion relied on meat to grow, a new study has an interesting addition to this theory. Published in a recent issue of Science
4 days ago
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is set to launch the GISAT-1A satellite in September, in a mission that will be watched closely for many important reasons. Since the two successive PSLV mission failures, in 2025 and early 2026, ISRO had paused launches as it investigated the reason
4 days ago
The Hara forests are a vital ecological treasure of the Persian Gulf. Spanning the Strait of Hormuz, these mangrove forests consist mainly of grey mangrove trees (Avicennia marina), which have a special filtration system in their roots that allows them to thrive in saline conditions
5 days ago
India spends more to put a kilogram of payload into orbit than any other major spacefaring nation, marring its public image as a cost-effective launcher, according to a new peer-reviewed analysis of more than six decades of rocket launches published in Economics Letters
7 days ago
“The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there,” the English novelist L.P. Hartley wrote famously in his 1953 novel The Go-Between. In a peculiar twist, the same cannot be said of the Moon. It is not a foreign country, or even a foreign world: the U.S
7 days ago
The computer did not create a virus. It did not touch a test tube or handle a living cell. What it did may ultimately be more consequential: it helped decide what the virus’s genome should be. Researchers at Stanford University and the Arc Institute used artificial intelligence (AI) to design
8 days ago
Spectators across Spain watched in wonder, some whipping off their protective glasses and rising to their feet in unison, as a rare total solar eclipse swept across the north of the country on Wednesday (August 12, 2026) evening, plunging it into darkness
8 days ago
Japan's MMX mission will blast off soon to collect Martian moon samples. The spacecraft will orbit Mars for three years and land on Phobos. This mission aims to understand Solar System origins and life's emergence. A rival Chinese mission also plans to return Mars samples around 2031
8 days ago
Draft rules for the SHANTI Act, 2025, mandate financial security for nuclear damage. Operators must maintain insurance or financial security until spent fuel removal. Foreign reactor designs require certification by their country of origin's regulatory body
9 days ago
As a total solar eclipse will be visible in parts of Europe on August 12 for the first time since 1999, solar physicists at the Raman Research Institute (RRI) in Bengaluru, along with collaborators, have predicted the magnetic structure of the Sun’s outer atmosphere, or its ‘crown’
9 days ago
When a young man was brought to my clinic after his first episode of psychosis, his parents wanted to know when he could return to college. This is not an atypical first interaction. However, in many instances, after a few consultations later and especially once the immediate crisis had settled
11 days ago
Some people can live apparently ordinary lives even when both copies of a gene (one inherited from the mother and the other from the father) have stopped working. Until their DNA is sequenced, they may never know that this has happened. A large study from Pakistan, published in Nature (June 2026)
11 days ago
Physicist Deepak Dhar received the 2026 Dirac Medal for his statistical mechanics work. He shares the award with three other scientists for their complex systems research. Their contributions span biology, finance, computer science, and artificial intelligence
12 days ago
Colombia and Venezuela experienced deadly earthquakes due to tectonic plate friction. The Nazca plate sliding beneath the South American plate caused tremors. Earthquake magnitude and depth significantly influenced the destructive impact. Building codes and terrain also played crucial roles in the
12 days ago
India has been invited to join NASA's Moon Base program. Discussions focused on expanding civil and commercial space cooperation. Both nations agreed to advance open scientific data sharing under Artemis Accords. They also reaffirmed commitment to UN guidelines for outer space sustainability
12 days ago
A team led by researchers at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine has found that several inherited traits in the mouse genome break the rules Gregor Mendel laid down in the 19th century about how genes work. This is not because the genes mutate but because of chemical modifications of the genome
13 days ago
Urban India’s water emergency will not be fixed by better crisis management alone. Over the coming decades, hundreds of millions more people will live and work in Indian cities, driving a sharp increase in the urban water demand. And unless we change how we design, finance
15 days ago
IN-SPACe seeks private partners to manage ISRO's new launch complex. This facility will support small rocket launches and enhance launch efficiency. Private entities will handle end-to-end operations and maintenance of the complex. ISRO will provide initial technical and operational support for
15 days ago
NASA astronauts Anil Menon and Jessica Meir on Friday (August 6, 2026) concluded their spacewalk outside the International Space Station to assemble the modification kit for its power channel that would allow addition of solar arrays. The spacewalk – 281st in support of the space station –
15 days ago
The gut microbiomes of eight tribal populations across India have a unique diversity shaped by their traditional diets, and are distinct from those observed in industrialised settings, researchers have reported in Gut Microbes. The effects of probiotics depend on a population’s diet and gut
15 days ago
Five minutes past noon on July 18, the launch pad of Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota roared back to life after a gap of 187 days. The last launch from the space port was on January 12, 2026, involving the PSLV-C62 mission carrying the EOS-N1 earth observation satellite
15 days ago
A lettuce that makes meat protein: The science behind engineering plants to grow an animal molecule & why it matters The study established proof of concept, but lettuce with meat protein is still some distance from ending up in your burger. Updated on: Aug 7, 2026
16 days ago
