Every other week, we share five links that made us think in our popular sustainable business briefing. Sign up here to get the next edition delivered straight to your inbox.
🌊 What a Historic ‘Blue Wave’ Midterm Means for Climate Action — Grist
The blue wave has a lot of us feeling hopeful about U.S. climate action, but this Grist roundup shows exactly where that hope is grounded. Updated continuously, it walks through key races and what each could mean, from the implications of Talarico’s “all of the above” energy strategy in Texas to Michigan’s limits on utility political spending. Bookmark it and check back as the analysis rolls in. (10 minutes)
🗞️ The Global We Times: News From 2036 — UN Live
These headlines juuuuuuust might beat the ones from Wednesday. For its 10th birthday, the Museum for the United Nations asked artists, scientists and philanthropists to write the headlines they want to wake up to on October 24, 2036. From a year without deaths attributable to fossil fuel air pollution, to belonging integrated into urban building codes, to a lullaby being named the world’s biggest hit following a father-led global movement for care - the headlines helped me envision a decade where we take this week’s momentum forward. And behavioral science backs the exercise: people who can picture a concrete future feel more motivated to build it. 💪
🌍 COP31: Will This Year’s Climate Summit Be the Most Underwhelming Ever? — New Scientist
Lest we forget, COP31 starts next week in Antalya. You’re forgiven if you missed it; New Scientist predicts this year’s summit could be the most underwhelming yet, with no big treaty on the table, an agenda of “hangover decisions” and critics questioning whether the UN process is still fit for purpose. “We can’t carry on as we do,” said one seasoned negotiator. The question remaining: could the revolutionary energy of 2026 offer an opportunity to reinvent it? (7 minutes)
🌡️ Giant ‘Heat Storms’ Are Scorching the Earth — Reuters
I’m fascinated by the role of language in climate policy and adaptation (remember Japan’s new word for cruel heat?). Now Reuters is in the game with “heat storms,” a way to connect what look like isolated heat waves into global patterns that can more clearly be tied to climate change. It even names them, hurricane-style. Read to the end for a fascinating story of a single 2023-24 storm that links a Texas football game, a $546,000 Spanish olive oil heist and collapsing students in the Philippines. (25 minutes)
📚 What 100 reports show about sustainability goals — thinkPARALLAX
Our friends at thinkPARALLAX recently ran a meta-assessment of 100 U.S. impact reports published in the past two years, with lots of interesting findings. This excerpt focuses on goals in voluntary reporting and reveals a startling lack of consistency and transparency - whether that’s companies going quiet on goals once their end date has passed (which was the case for many in 2025) or leaving out the details outsiders need to assess progress. (4 minutes)
🎯 Working on new targets of your own? Setting goals worth standing behind, then reporting on them openly (messy bits included), is a big part of our work with clients. Hit reply if you’d like to have a chat.