International: South America

More in International: South America

Brazil to propose mega fund to conserve forests at COP28 climate summit

27 Nov 2023

Brazil plans to propose a “huge” fund to pay for the conservation of tropical forests at the United Nations COP28 climate change summit, the country’s top climate negotiator said.

The Galapagos are going green

23 Nov 2023

In recent years, there has been a growing movement to transform the archipelago into a beacon of sustainability.

Does the Amazon’s drought mean the forest is at a tipping point?

22 Nov 2023

Scientists say deforestation is compounding the effects of climate change, threatening to turn parts of the forest into savannah.

Oil companies attending climate talks have minimal green energy transition plans, analysis finds

14 Nov 2023

In 2022, a Brazilian oil and gas company had 68 places staked out for oil exploration off the South American coast, searching for new reserves while spending $6.9 billion in oil development projects.

Bolivia forest fires shutter thousands of schools

30 Oct 2023

Tens of thousands of Bolivian pupils had their classes suspended as schools closed their doors due to air pollution caused by massive forest fires, the education minister.

Amazon rainforest at risk of a large-scale dieback

6 Oct 2023

The impacts of global warming, deforestation and intensified land use are pushing the South American monsoon towards a critical destabilisation point.

South America swelters in unseasonal spring heatwave

2 Oct 2023

As the Northern Hemisphere emerges from the hottest summer on record, South America has taken up the planet’s extreme-heat mantle.

Brazil to revise climate targets to cut emissions 53% by 2030

21 Sep 2023

Brazil is expected to announce revised climate targets this week, as President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva strengthens a prior pledge made by his predecessor Jair Bolsonaro.

Lula scraps Bolsonaro’s cuts to Brazilian climate target ambition

19 Sep 2023

The Brazilian government has agreed to cancel former president Jair Bolsonaro’s cuts to its climate ambition and to work on a new improved climate target.

Extratropical cyclone kills at least 21 people in Brazil

8 Sep 2023

The extreme weather in the south of the country has displaced more than 3,700 people with more flooding anticipated.

Ecuador rejects oil drilling in Amazon protected area in historic vote

23 Aug 2023

Nearly 60% of voters back a push to halt to drilling in Yasuni National Park, a victory for environmental groups.

Brazil govt finalises proposal for cap-and-trade carbon market

21 Aug 2023

Brazil has finalised a proposal for the establishment of a cap-and-trade carbon market in a move to curb greenhouse gas emissions and help the administration reach its emissions reduction targets.

Carbon credits - land grab or the Amazon’s future?

11 Aug 2023

The Brazilian city of Belém is hosting the Amazon Summit, which brings together the eight South American countries who share a slice of the Amazon.

Lake Titicaca drying up as heat wave turns winter upside down

10 Aug 2023

The parched shoreline and shrinking depths of Lake Titicaca are prompting growing alarm that an ago-old way of life around South America's largest lake is slipping away as a brutal heat wave wreaks havoc during winter.

Brazil hosting Amazon summit: What you need to know

8 Aug 2023

Leaders are gathering in Brazil to discuss ways to protect critical rainforest after years of deforestation and threats.

Winter heat wave in Chile offers 'window' to warmer world

8 Aug 2023

A winter heat wave bringing historically high temperatures to Chile is a "window" to an increasingly warm future, according to scientists.

Climate change is pushing young people in Honduras to leave farming and migrate

27 Jul 2023

Drought and erratic rainfall in Honduras is undermining agriculture and pushing young people to migrate in search of a more secure future.

South America will pledge to end Amazon deforestation by 2030

21 Jul 2023

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s ambitious pledge to end illegal deforestation of the Amazon rainforest by 2030 is going regional.

Drought leaves millions in Uruguay without tap water fit for drinking

18 Jul 2023

After years of underinvestment, reservoir has had to be topped up from estuary, raising health concerns.

‘Historic milestone’: Ecuador nears vote to keep Amazon oil on the ground

11 Jul 2023

The fate of the Yasuní rainforest, at the heart of the Ecuadorian Amazon, will be decided at the polls this August, when the nation votes on whether to leave large oil reserves found within Yasuní on the ground.

Brazil’s President Lula unveils plan to end deforestation by 2030

7 Jun 2023

Lula’s proposal would advance a commitment to deforestation made at the 2021 climate talks in Glasgow, Scotland.

Brazil to set tougher climate change target, sources say

24 May 2023

President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva plans to commit Brazil to a more ambitious climate change goal this year, addressing criticisms of the previous target set by his far-right predecessor Jair Bolsonaro, two sources told Reuters.

Patagonia's underwater defense against climate change

17 May 2023

Chile's Patagonia is known for its mountains and hiking paradise but it is also home to the largest continuous kelp forest in the world.

Caribbean island's quest to become the world's first climate-resilient nation

21 Apr 2023

The Caribbean island of Dominica is one of the world's most at-risk places from climate change. Can it fulfil plans to become the world's first climate-resilient nation?

Brazilian Govt eyes permanent climate emergency for over 1000 cities

28 Mar 2023

Brazil's Minister of Environment and Climate Change Marina Silva Sunday admitted that President Luiz Inácio Lula Da Silva's administration was considering the possibility of declaring a state of climate emergency in 1,038 municipalities mapped as most vulnerable, Agencia Brasil reported.

Brazil hit by deadly floods and landslides

22 Feb 2023

Hundreds of rescuers searched on Monday for survivors of landslides and flooding that killed at least 40 people along the coast of Brazil’s southern state of Sao Paulo following a huge weekend downpour.

Calls for action as Brazil Yanomami indigenous people face crisis

27 Jan 2023

Brazilian officials have said that the Yanomami indigenous people are living in dire conditions, as illegal gold miners threaten them with violence and block the delivery of goods such as food and medicine to their embattled region.

Forest equity: what indigenous people want from carbon credits

16 Dec 2022

In a world where carbon credit markets are taking advantage of Indigenous people and their forests, the United Nation is losing its leadership on combating climate change, says Indigenous leader Levi Sucre Romero.

Lawyers press International Court to nvestigate crimes against humanity in Brazil’s Amazon

10 Nov 2022

Even as environmentalists cheer the ouster of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro as a turning point for the Amazon rainforest, new information filed Wednesday with the International Criminal Court suggest that the battle to protect the region and its inhabitants is far from over

Lula victory boosts climate effort hopes

1 Nov 2022

The victory of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in Sunday’s Brazilian presidential election was greeted with relief by world leaders desperately looking for some good news on climate change.

There’s only one choice in Brazil’s election — for the country and the world: Nature

28 Oct 2022

When Brazil elected Jair Bolsonaro as its president four years ago, this journal was among those that feared the worst. “The election of Jair Bolsonaro is bad for research and the environment,” we wrote (Nature 563, 5–6; 2018).

As climate risks intensify in Brazil, election rivals offer few solutions

19 Oct 2022

“People’s post-traumatic stress levels are extremely high,” says Rafaela Facchetti, a researcher at Brazil’s National School of Public Health, or ENSP.

Successes and struggles: Brazil’s 20-year Amazon reforestation carbon sink project

14 Oct 2022

The Peugeot-ONF Forest Carbon Sink project, implemented more than 20 years ago in northwestern Mato Grosso state, within the “arc of deforestation” of the Brazilian Amazon, has achieved significant ecological restoration and carbon sequestration results.

Beef in the time of net zero: Reducing livestock emissions in Latin America

13 Oct 2022

Beef production accounts for almost 60% of emissions from agriculture and land use change in Latin America, according to a recent study by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). However, its researchers suggest it is possible to reduce these emissions through new production models and changes in diets.

The return of Aztec floating farms

11 Oct 2022

In Mexico City, a 700-year-old Aztec farming technique is giving a sustainable edge to modern agriculture. Chinampas, or "floating gardens", are ancient engineering wonders. These man-made island-farms are the last vestiges of a massive 14th-Century land reclamation project of the Aztec Empire that continues to feed the people of Mexico City even today.

New Brazilian Congress not likely to address climate

5 Oct 2022

Brazil has a major role to play in addressing climate change as home to the world’s largest rainforest, but after Sunday’s election, the subject is less likely to come up than ever.

Reducing beef’s carbon footprint is key to achieving net-zero in Latin America and the Caribbean

28 Sep 2022

In Latin America and the Caribbean, one of the biggest drivers of greenhouse gas emissions in the region — and its best hope for achieving net-zero emissions by 2050 — remains the food system.

Puerto Rico is in the dark again, but solar companies see glimmers of hope

23 Sep 2022

Much of Puerto Rico is still without power after Hurricane Fiona battered the island on Sept. 19. The storm laid bare how vulnerable the territory's power system still is five years after Hurricane Maria plunged it into an 11-month blackout — the longest in American history — and led to the deaths of almost 3,000 people. Yet, some see hope.

Mangroves keep carbon in the soil for 5,000 years

21 Sep 2022

On top of all the other dazzling biology, mangrove forests are massive carbon sinks. According to new research on a Mexican mangrove forest, they can keep carbon out of the atmosphere for millennia.

As demand for electric cars grows, Chileans face the effects of lithium mining

19 Sep 2022

The South American country of Chile has become a center of lithium mining, which has boomed as demand for electric car batteries has risen. But what are the environmental costs?

Global pact sought to preserve 80% of Amazon forest

12 Sep 2022

Scientists warn that the Amazon is close to a tipping point

‘Gigantic missed opportunity’: Chile rejects green constitution

6 Sep 2022

Chile rejected a new constitution on Sunday which, if accepted, would have significantly expanded environmental rights and recognised the urgency of climate action.

Why lithium power politics are playing out very differently in Chile and Bolivia

26 Aug 2022

The people of Bolivia and Chile imagine a different kind of extraction: one that is controlled by those who live by the resources and one that does not destroy the earth.

Peru's capital Lima backs Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty

25 Aug 2022

City lawmakers in Lima, Peru on Monday unanimously passed a motion calling for a Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty, a proposed global mechanism for tackling the source of most of the greenhouse gas emissions that are fueling the climate emergency.

In Guatemala, Indigenous is ingenious when it comes to climate change

10 Aug 2022

On International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples, World Food Programme agronomist Deborah Suc tells Simona Beltrami she’s lost her shyness for sticking up for others – and the environment.

Chile’s lithium provides profit to the billionaires but exhausts the land and the people

3 Aug 2022

The Atacama salt flat in northern Chile, which stretches 1,200 square miles, is the largest source of lithium in the world. We are standing on a bluff, looking over la gran fosa, the great pit that sits at the southern end of the flat, which is shielded from public view.