Amsterdam, Netherlands – Between January and August 2026, energy prices accounted for the entire rise in eurozone inflation from 1.7% to 3.2%, according to new Greenpeace International analysis that exposes the scale of fossilflation.

Without the oil price shock driven by the US-Israel war on Iran, eurozone inflation in August would have been 2.2%, rather than 3.2%. The findings show how fossil fuel dependence leaves households exposed to price shocks, which in turn have an impact on the wider economy.[1]

John Noël, campaigner at Greenpeace International, said: “The problem is bigger than any single conflict or oil price spike. As long as economies remain tied to volatile fossil fuel markets, repeated disruptions are hitting household costs. Governments must protect people from rampant fossilflation by replacing the fossil fuel system with decentralised renewable energy and electrification.”

The report found that energy prices accounted for 97% of fluctuations in eurozone inflation since 2024, when the temporary distortions of the pandemic years had cleared, demonstrating that fossilflation is a recurring source of economic instability that needs to be addressed by governments and central banks, rather than being treated as a temporary phenomenon that is outside of their scope.

The analysis also found that households can be protected from that economic exposure by switching to renewable energy like wind and solar, and electrified technologies powered by electricity instead of fossil fuels. In an illustrative simulation, a fully electrified German household using an electric vehicle, heat pump, rooftop solar and battery storage faced a 1.5% price increase between January and August 2026, compared with 2.5% for a standard household using the official consumer basket.

Noël added: “While fossil fuel companies are making obscene profits, people are increasingly struggling to make ends meet. Renewable energy can protect households and give them more control over their bills. Rooftop solar, batteries, electric vehicles, public transport and heat pumps can reduce the exposure of countries, families and businesses to volatile fossil fuel markets. Central banks need to recognise fossil fuels as an economic risk and governments must accelerate the shift to decentralised renewable energy systems that shield people and local businesses from recurring price shocks, rather than leaving them exposed.”

Greenpeace is calling on governments to speed up the shift from fossil fuels to decentralised renewable energy and electrification, which can be funded by introducing permanent taxes on oil and gas companies’ profits. Replacing dependence on volatile international oil and gas markets with clean energy generated closer to home would help protect household budgets from future price shocks while cutting climate pollution as part of a just energy transition.

ENDS

Notes:

[1] Fossilflation: how oil and gas prices drive inflation and how households can be protected

The research relies on official consumer inflation datasets and recognised international commodity benchmark databases. Consumer price index (CPI/HICP) time series and basket weightings were sourced directly from Eurostat and the European Central Bank (ECB) for the Euro Area and Destatis for Germany. Global energy benchmark prices—including Brent crude in euros and Dutch TTF natural gas—were compiled via market databases like Macrobond. Using these official figures, the analysis used econometric methods—including variance decomposition, local projections, OLS regressions, and counterfactual index modeling—to isolate fossil energy pass-through and simulate household electrification savings.

Contacts:

John Noël, Campaigner, Greenpeace International, jnoel@greenpeace.org

Dr. Mauricio Vargas, Economist and Financial Expert, +49 151 11765567, mvargas@greenpeace.org

Greenpeace International Press Desk, +31 (0) 20 718 2470 (available 24 hours), pressdesk.int@greenpeace.org

When oil and gas prices rise, people can end up paying more for essentials. The war on Iran has exposed this vulnerability again. Dependence on fossil fuels leaves people’s living costs tied to conflict, disrupted supplies and volatile international markets.

Written by Dr Mauricio Vargas, an economist at Greenpeace Germany, and published by Greenpeace International, this report examines fossilflation, the inflationary pressure caused by rising fossil fuel prices. Drawing on data for the eurozone and Germany, it investigates how energy prices drive changes in inflation and how renewable energy and electrification can reduce exposure to price shocks.

Key findings

• Energy drove the total rise in eurozone inflation in 2026. The annual inflation rate increased from 1.7% in January to 3.2% in August. Energy’s contribution more than accounted for that increase, while other components partly offset it.
  
• Without the oil-price shock, August inflation would have been substantially lower. The analysis estimates a eurozone inflation rate of 2.2%, rather than 3.2%, had oil prices remained at their January level.
  
• Energy has been a major source of inflation volatility. Energy accounted for 97% of fluctuations in the eurozone’s overall inflation rate between January 2024 and August 2026. This measures movements in the inflation rate, not the proportion of every price increase caused by energy.
  
• Electrification and renewables can help protect people from fuel-price shocks. In a German household simulation using electric heating and transport, solar panels and battery storage, the modelled mix of consumer purchases rose in price by 1.5% between January and August 2026, compared with 2.5% for the official consumer basket. The simulation excludes upfront investment costs and does not guarantee the same savings for everyone. 

Reducing fossil fuel dependence can help protect people’s budgets

The report argues that replacing oil and gas with renewable electricity should be part of governments’ response to rising living costs. Changing fossil fuel suppliers does not remove exposure to international fuel-price shocks. Investment in decentralised renewable energy, storage, electricity networks and electric heating and transport can help reduce that dependence. 

Greenpeace calls for peace and action to protect people from the costs of fossil fuel dependence. Governments must make the transition accessible, including to people who cannot afford the upfront costs of cleaner energy and transport. Renewable energy is not just a climate tool; it must be taken as an urgent measure for peace and economic security.

Download the report:

Fossilflation: how oil and gas prices drive inflation and how households can be protected

Yerevan, Armenia – At the UN Biodiversity COP17, negotiations have hit a plateau. Greenpeace calls on governments to get their act together and focus on the actions needed to achieve the targets of the globally agreed framework to protect biodiversity (KM-GBF) and prevent corporate lobbyists from capturing the negotiations. The ministerial High-Level Segment, taking place during the second week, must provide the political leadership needed to deliver a strong, action-oriented response to the Convention’s first Global Review, with just four years left to meet those targets.

An Lambrechts, Biodiversity Politics Expert, Greenpeace International said: “COP17 has taken stock of the gaps that must be closed to keep the 2030 targets within reach. Countries agree there is a problem. They now need to own the moment and move from recognition to action, match ambition with sufficient funding flowing in the right direction and address the drivers of biodiversity loss. Governments must send a strong signal that they are ready to walk the talk. That includes reforming subsidies and fiscal and financial policies to align with nature and human rights protection.”

Language on human rights-based approaches and the rights and roles of Indigenous Peoples and local communities also remains under pressure across several agenda items. Discussions on the governance of the new subsidiary body on Article 8(j) raise concerns about respect for self-determination, as governments debate how Indigenous Peoples and local communities should be represented rather than allowing them to decide for themselves.

Solomon “Uncle Sol” Kaho’ohalahala, Indigenous Native Hawaiian Elder, said: “It is unacceptable that governments are still trying to decide who is going to represent Indigenous Peoples and local communities in the negotiations, given our critical role as nature protectors. Indigenous Peoples and local communities are not just terms to be discussed in negotiation rooms, and added or deleted from text agreements. We are the ones standing on the frontlines of nature protection, fighting for our survival and for the future of the planet. We can make our own decisions, our rights must be respected and our voices must be heard.”

On Saturday evening, Greenpeace lit up Yerevan’s iconic Opera Theatre with a question for world leaders: “What future do you want?” The projection brought the biodiversity crisis into the heart of the city, highlighting the risk of missing 30×30 and money flowing to destructive industries. Ahead of COP17’s final week and ministerial High-Level Segment, its message was clear: “Delay is destruction.”

Camila Jardim, International Political Expert, Greenpeace Brazil said: “The decisions governments make in Yerevan will matter beyond this conference. COP17 must send a strong signal to the UN climate conference, COP31, that climate and biodiversity action must reinforce each other, with the protection and restoration of high-integrity ecosystems and respect for rights guiding both decisions and implementation. Governments must use this final week to agree on concrete actions and return home ready to deliver them. There is no time for further delay.”

ENDS

Photos and video: Photo and Video are available in the Greenpeace Media Library.

Contacts:

Diego Gonzaga, Communications Lead at CBD COP17, Greenpeace International, +1 415 527 9440, dgonzaga@greenpeace.org

Jaqueline Sordi, Media Lead at COP17, Greenpeace International, +55 51 99678 9048, jsordi@greenpeace.org

Greenpeace International Press Desk, +31 (0)20 718 2470 (available 24 hours), pressdesk.int@greenpeace.org.

Demanding action from world leaders at CBD COP17 in Armenia, protesting a gas project in Australia, and calls for Big Tech regulations in Brazil, here are a few of our favourite images from Greenpeace work around the world this week.

Armenia – Activists send a message to world leaders at the Conference of the Parties (COP17) to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). The 17th UN Biodiversity Conference, CBD COP17, takes place in Yerevan, Armenia, from 19-30 October, 2026. Greenpeace is at the CBD to demand governments address gaps in the implementation of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (KM-GBF) with concrete action, close the biodiversity finance gap, ensure quality of 30×30, from forests to the high seas, by safeguarding ecosystem integrity and respecting rights, and maximise synergies between climate and biodiversity action.

Armenia – Greenpeace International and Indigenous Peoples and local communities from around the world deployed an artistic installation to the centre of the UN Biodiversity Conference to demand delegates at CBD COP17 to recognise and respect the rights and roles of Indigenous Peoples and local communities as the foundation for achieving global biodiversity targets.

Australia – Greenpeace activists deploy massive 14m x 12m banner that reads ‘Stop Woodside’s Dirty Gas. Save Scott Reef.’ upon a Floating Production Unit at Woodside’s Scarborough gas project over 200km off the coast of Exmouth in peaceful protest of Woodside’s reckless plans to drill for oil and gas at Scott Reef.

Mexico – The results of a water quality study conducted by Greenpeace Mexico in August 2026—involving community-based monitoring and laboratory analysis at 17 sampling sites, including wells and *cenotes* (sinkholes) across 6 locations in the state of Yucatán—confirmed contamination by organic matter, harmful bacteria, excess nutrients, and indicators of porcine fecal matter. Two additional studies, carried out in 2024 and 2026 by the *Red en Defensa del Agua y el Territorio Maya To’one Ja’o’on* (“We Are Water” Network) across five overlapping sites in 5 municipalities, confirmed—using the “Pig2Bac” method—that the source of the contamination is large-scale pig fecal matter. These analyses were performed at the laboratories of Johns Hopkins University (United States) and the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM).

In response to these findings, the organisation carried out a symbolic intervention at one of the *cenotes* sampled last August. Through this action, they issued a firm call to the relevant environmental authorities to implement a moratorium, enforce strict regulations, or shut down this type of industry, while also demanding comprehensive protection for the Mayan Forest (both its surface and its subterranean environment).

Brazil – Less than a week before the elections, Greenpeace Brazil joined hundreds of activists and civil society organizations at Meta’s headquarters in São Paulo (Meta Platforms is an American multinational technology company) in a peaceful protest to send a clear message: Meta, keep your hands off our election! Thousands of complaints compiled by the CTRL+Z organization exposed serious failures on Meta’s platforms that are interfering with Brazil’s elections, manipulating social media, and threatening our democracy. We don’t need anyone meddling in our choices. We urgently need regulation of Big Tech! Brazil decides Brazil’s future.

Spain – A massive mobilisation of civil society and institutional groups including Greenpeace Spain is demanding that the Regional Government of Andalusia immediately revoke the permits for toxic discharges into the river’s estuary.

Organisations warn of the risk of turning the Guadalquivir into a “sewer for mining waste” through the discharge of more than 115,000 million liters of water contaminated with heavy metals. These discharges threaten protected areas of high ecological value, such as Doñana and the Natura 2000 network, and also pose a threat to public health due to their impact on fisheries, agriculture, and the drinking water we obtain from aquifers.

Germany – Greenpeace agriculture experts measure nitrate levels in surface waters near Karlstadt in der Main-Spessart constituency, represented in the federal parliament by Alexander Hoffmann(CSU). The environmental campaigners take a water sample from the local stream and analyse the results on site.

Greenpeace has been a pioneer of photo activism for more than 50 years, and remains committed to bearing witness and exposing environmental injustice through the images we capture.

To see more Greenpeace photos and videos, please visit our Media Library.

With just three years to 2030 – the major milestone for global biodiversity commitments – the world is not on track to meet them. A Global Review of progress towards the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework confirms that implementation is lagging across the board, highlighting  marine and coastal regions as a major gap. Marine and coastal ecosystems face overlapping pressures from industrial fishing, coastal developments, pollution and other industrial activities. 

Governments commit to conservation internationally while continuing to approve destructive activities nationally, so when it comes to marine and coastal areas, only 10.04% are protected or conserved to some degree. Even that figure does not tell the whole story: many areas counted as protected remain exposed to destructive activities, or fail to respect the rights of Indigenous Peoples and coastal communities. 

With decision makers meeting at the UN Biodiversity Conference COP17 in Yerevan, the question is, how can governments close the implementation gap when it comes to marine protection, while supporting and centering the leadership of Indigenous Peoples and local communities?   

Protecting 30% of land and ocean by 2030 is not simply about reaching a numerical target. Protection must be effective and equitably governed, respect the rights of Indigenous Peoples and local communities, and address the destructive activities driving biodiversity loss.

For coastal communities, governments’ failure is not abstract. In Thailand’s Chana district, coastal communities have resisted an industrial estate project they did not choose, while establishing Talae Na Baan zones in which they set fishing rules, restore biodiversity through traditional “fish homes” and protect local waters. Yet these community-led solutions often lack formal legal recognition and can be overridden by large-scale state concessions. In Chile, legal frameworks exist to recognise Indigenous stewardship of marine and coastal areas, but weak and slow implementation leaves communities facing continued industrial pressures. These cases expose the injustices small-scale fishers, Indigenous Peoples and local communities often have to face. Those who have been protecting vital ecosystems for generations are often sidelined, treated as stakeholders to be consulted within someone else’s plans, and often not even that.

Top-down conservation can consequently restrict access to customary waters without addressing the industrial activities driving their destruction. Protecting the marine and coastal ecosystems on which we all depend requires more than participation: it requires legal recognition of the customary and tenure rights and scaling up community-led conservation initiatives, alongside support for community-led and co-managed governance of protected and conserved areas.

As governments meet at COP17, the debate over marine protection must go beyond how much ocean is designated as protected. Marine ecosystems do not follow administrative boundaries. Mangroves, seagrass beds, coral reefs, migration routes and the high seas are part of the same living ocean. Protecting isolated patches while the surrounding waters remain exposed to pollution, destructive fishing or extraction will not halt biodiversity loss.

The entry into force of the new agreement on Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction, known as the BBNJ Agreement or Global Ocean Treaty, creates a historic opportunity to protect biodiversity on the high seas. Synergies between the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and the Global Ocean Treaty can help drive a seamless network of protected areas from coastal waters to the high seas. But effective marine protection is not only about where protected areas are established. It is also about who has the power to shape and govern them. 

Indigenous Peoples and coastal communities must have a decisive role in decisions affecting the waters, livelihoods and cultures they have sustained for generations. The evidence shows what this can achieve. After more than a decade of community management, the Kawawana community conserved area in Senegal had restored a heavily degraded ecosystem, with 20 fish species, manatees, dolphins and crocodiles returning. The recovery also helped revitalise the local fisheries economy and improve people’s quality of life. This is not simply a case for consulting communities: it shows what becomes possible when their authority, knowledge and governance are recognised and supported. 

Governments increasingly praise Indigenous Peoples and local communities as essential partners in protecting biodiversity, while continuing to deny them meaningful authority over the ecosystems they sustain. At CBD COP17  the UN biodiversity conference in Yerevan in October, consultation and participation alone will not be enough. Governments must uphold Indigenous Peoples’ distinct rights to self-determination, customary tenure and free, prior and informed consent. They must equally recognise the rights and role of local communities and small-scale fishers by securing their access to coastal resources and giving them real influence over decisions affecting their waters and livelihoods. 

An ocean area is not truly protected if destructive activities continue inside it. Nor is conservation just if the people who have stewarded those waters for generations are pushed aside in the process.

COP17 should not be another round of ambitious speeches. Governments must close the gap between commitment and delivery, and shift power and resources for ocean protection towards the people already defending the sea.

The Global Review makes the failure visible. Governments gathering in Yerevan must make ocean justice part of the solution.

Dr Erika Bjureby Saldes is the Biodiversity Global Political Lead at Greenpeace International and Nichanan Tanthanawit is the Global Project lead for Ocean Justice Campaign at Greenpeace Southeast Asia, Thailand.

What would you do, if a factory farm close to your home started burning pig waste? If toxic smoke and fumes began choking your community? If you’re Wilberth Alfonso Nahuat Puc, you fight back. 

Wilberth lives in Santa María Chí, a Mayan community of about 500 residents in the lush forests of Mexico’s Yucatán peninsula. For years, he had to deal with an industrial megafarm holding 49,000 pigs just 250 meters from his town. 

“The impact was direct. Water contaminated by high concentrations of nitrites, nitrates and fecal bacteria coming from the farms led to gastrointestinal and respiratory diseases,” Wilberth says.

By 2023, the megafarm began burning pig waste, filling the air with toxic smoke that left local children and adults suffering from acute pharyngitis (a sudden, severe sore throat). Realising their health and home were on the line, the community organised peaceful protests to stop the burning.

The response from the farm’s owners and authorities was swift and aggressive. Wilberth, acting as local Municipal Commissioner, was hit with lawsuits designed to silence local leadership and people standing up for their rights.

But Wilberth and his neighbours didn’t go silent, instead they filed 28 environmental injunctions against state, municipal, and federal agencies, demanding transparency and testing. And their persistence worked. On September 4, 2025, environmental regulators permanently shut down the megafarm after confirming illegal wastewater dumping and repeated safety breaches. By April 30, 2026, the last animal was removed from the site.

The environmental cost of Mexico’s pork expansion in the Maya rainforest

Wilberth’s victory in Santa María Chí offers a hopeful roadmap for local action, but the broader threat remains. The state of Yucatán accounts for nearly 10% of Mexico’s total pork production, driven largely by meat exports to international markets like the United States, South Korea and Japan.

The region sits on top of the Great Mayan Aquifer, a vast subterranean freshwater system of wells and sinkholes known locally as cenotes (from the Mayan word “dzonot”). This freshwater system is a vital source of drinking water to 5 million people, and because the region’s limestone ground is highly porous, liquid manure and chemical runoff sink almost instantly into the underground water network.

A new report released this week by Greenpeace México and Greenpeace International, titled The Price of Pork, reveals the scope of this crisis. Water samples gathered across 17 sites in Yucatán showed widespread fecal contamination and nitrate levels far exceeding World Health Organization safety guidelines. High nitrate levels in drinking water are linked to serious health conditions, including colorectal cancer and pre-term birth – and a growing body of research links ingested nitrate to these risks at levels far below the current WHO guideline.

Despite these risks, official data shows that over 90% of industrial pig farms in the region operate without mandatory environmental impact assessments.

Community resistance against pork megafarms, and protecting the aquifer 

Although Wilberth and his community successfully shut down their neighbouring megafarm, their work is far from over.

“We insist, resist, and persist against pork megafarms, because there is still much to do,” Wilberth says. “The territory remains damaged, even though the farm that affected my community has closed. It is a problem that affects the entire peninsula, and we know our territory can no longer support another megafarm.”

The toxic waste left behind still needs to be safely removed and the groundwater restored. 

While Wilberth’s story demonstrates the power of local people resisting industrial agriculture, it shouldn’t be left to local communities and volunteers to fight every megafarm one by one. Across the rest of the Yucatán peninsula, hundreds of similar megafarms continue to operate near residential areas and protected ecosystems.

To protect local health and save the region’s remaining clean water, Greenpeace México is urging Mexican authorities to place an immediate pause on new or expanding industrial pork operations, hold illegal operators accountable, and ensure local communities have a final say in developments that impact their water and land.

Across the world, massive factory farms are polluting local drinking water to line the pockets of a wealthy few. But communities are drawing a line in the sand. From the Yucatán Peninsula to every corner of the world, people are standing up, fighting back, and demanding clean water.

Water is a human right, not corporate profit. Join the global movement—sign the petition today.

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José Luis Perlasca is a Campaigner at Greenpeace México

In a year of exceptionally high land and ocean surface temperatures that have triggered wild climate extremes, the annual UN climate talks will again put governments in the spotlight. The COP31 summit will be held in Antalya, Türkiye in November and poses a critical question to governments: how will they accelerate their efforts to solve the escalating climate crisis?

That question holds an unfortunate truth: for too long too many governments have failed to ratchet up action with the urgency needed. As a result, oil and gas companies and nature destroyers have continued to profit at the public’s expense as communities increasingly face so-called ‘natural disasters’ such as wildfires, drought and torrential rainfalls.

It’s time the tide turned! In a year in which the US/Israel war on Iran and geopolitical tension further exposed the inherent risk of oil and gas and led to fossilflation, this year’s climate COP offers renewed hope of change to accelerate the transition away from fossil fuels – the single biggest driver of the climate crisis – and to end and reverse forest destruction.

For many people though, COPs sound like political speeches and photo ops disconnected from everyday life. But they are also one of the key tools we have to tackle the climate crisis together because they are the place where governments make critical decisions that impact us all. So the COP is a moment where governments must listen to our voices and take action for the planet. 

What is the climate COP?

COP stands for Conference of the Parties, the annual UN climate summit held under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the international treaty established in 1992. Currently, 198 parties participate in the UNFCCC and these countries meet at COPs to negotiate how to limit global heating, cut greenhouse gas emissions and support communities already affected by climate impacts.

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What have COPs achieved?

While at times progress has been far too slow, finally at COP21 in Paris in 2015, the Paris Agreement was reached. This landmark moment saw governments agree to hold temperature increases to “well below 2°C” and aim for 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels – a planetary boundary beyond which climate risks escalate. It represented a turning point in efforts to curb global warming.

In fact, the Paris Agreement gave the world a new direction and accelerated the clean energy transition. National policies have led to the projected temperature increase falling from just below 4°C at the time of adoption of the agreement to just below 3°C today. There is still a large 1.5°C ambition gap, however, and the UNEP’s Emissions Gap Report 2026 has said we could reach global warming of up to 2.8°C this century if current government policies continue.

Another pivotal moment arrived at COP28 in Dubai in 2023, when a COP decision for the first time called for a transition away from fossil fuels and where governments also committed to end forest destruction by 2030. It was an historic moment, but at the time Greenpeace also warned: “Leaders must now commit to a full, fast, fair and funded fossil fuel phase-out”.

And now, momentum towards a just transition away from fossil fuels is gathering pace. Last year, at COP30 in Belém, Brazil – when the world celebrated the 10-year anniversary of the Paris Agreement – more than 80 parties backed a proposed roadmap to end fossil fuels. 

Unfortunately, that roadmap did not become part of the final COP30 outcome, but it showed that while there were some countries still clinging onto oil and gas, there were many others ready to plan for and implement a post-fossil-fuel future. The next challenge is turning that into action.

COP31: the urgency of action ahead of a looming 1.5°C overshoot 

The scale of the problem was set out in an heartbreaking report from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) in September, when it said we expect to head beyond the 1.5°C threshold within the next few years. It called on governments to minimise the extent and length of any overshoot and accelerate climate action to help reduce temperatures in the long-term.

But even in the best case scenario, the UNEP said that our temperature rise is still expected to hit 1.8°C before declining. This is why Greenpeace is demanding that governments urgently respond by rapidly transitioning away from fossil fuels and ending forest destruction to minimise the threat.

What’s on the agenda for COP31?

This year’s COP is unique because it is being hosted by both Türkiye and Australia, the first UN climate summit where the powers of the COP presidency is being split between two countries. It’s an unusual arrangement where Australia will chair the COP’s negotiations – a role it must now live up to after pledging to undertake it in meaningful partnership with the Pacific. 

This is why the preparatory pre-COP – an important milestone on the road to COP31 – was held in Nadi, Fiji, in October as part of an Australia-Pacific presidency. That’s where some of the key Pacific expectations for COP31 were presented: keep 1.5°C within reach, make climate finance accessible to frontline communities and place the ocean at the heart of the climate agenda.

The dual-presidency role has also seen Türkiye present a COP31 Presidency’s electrification pledge, aiming to increase electricity’s share of global final energy consumption to 35 % by 2035. It was a goal also backed by Australia to make COP31 an ‘Electrification COP’.

While Greenpeace has welcomed the presidency’s electrification target, it must not distract from the central issue: ending the extraction and expansion of fossil fuels because electrification alone will not solve the climate crisis.

What must governments do on fossil fuels at COP31?

At COP31, governments must translate the COP28 commitment made in the global stocktake to transition away from fossil fuels into actionable national plans. In the wake of the perils fossil fuel dependency has brought this year amid the fall-out from the US/Israel war on Iran, COP31 must signal a firm commitment to a new path – one anchored in renewables-based electrification and an active wind-down of fossil fuels as part of a fast, fair and funded just transition. 

Essentially, what governments need to do is to reaffirm and accelerate efforts to the energy goals agreed at COP28: tripling renewable energy and doubling energy efficiency by 2030 by accelerating a just, orderly and equitable transition away from fossil fuels in this critical decade. 

Greenpeace is also calling for the ‘35 by 35’ electrification goal to become a credible pathway to displace fossil fuels from electricity generation. Renewable power generation should increase to at least 75% by 2035 as part of a phase down of fossil fuels, backed by finance, technology and capacity building support tailored to Global South countries’ sectoral and infrastructure needs.

We are also calling on governments to present national action and roadmaps to transition away from fossil fuels – building on the landmark Santa Marta conference – with developed countries taking the lead. And the establishment of a Just Transition Mechanism to coordinate fragmented global efforts and accelerate international finance and capacity support for just transition.

What must governments do for forests at COP31?

At COP31, Greenpeace is calling on governments to establish an implementation and accountability framework capable of delivering the 2030 forest and biodiversity targets. Forests stand at the crossroads of climate change, biodiversity loss and land degradation. Their fate is being put at risk by the deep fragmentation of the global forest governance landscape.  

Greenpeace argues one of  the problems is that existing frameworks underestimate the significance of forest degradation by focusing primarily on deforestation, while failing to adequately address impacts from logging, next to extractive activity and global commodity supply chains. 

Efforts to achieve the 2030 forest and biodiversity targets previously agreed under separate UN conventions must accelerate, through an inclusive, participatory, multi-stakeholder coordination process that also improves accountability and bridges the gaps between finance and delivery.

After the global community’s failure to reach ambitious decisions on forests at COP30 in the Amazon, the Brazil-led 2030 Forest Roadmap initiative offers a critical opportunity to turn commitments and agreed targets into action. The question no longer is whether forests will remain standing, but they will remain functioning.

There can be no 1.5°C solution without work to end and reverse forest destruction and at COP31, states need to establish an implementation and accountability framework that can deliver the 2030 forest and biodiversity targets.

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What must governments do for climate finance and to make polluters pay at COP31?

At COP31, it is vital that developed countries announce ambitious multi-year post-2025 commitments that reflect their fair share in delivering the US$300 billion climate finance goal established at COP29. As 2026 has painfully laid bare, devastating climate impacts have significantly intensified, but conversely richer developed countries have cut back, rather than stepped up their public finance to disproportionately impacted Global South and climate vulnerable countries. 

It’s thus critical that COP31 helps bridge the gap between what developed countries are providing and ensure they fulfil their international climate finance obligations.

At COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan, a new US$300 billion climate finance goal was established to pay for mitigation, adaptation and loss and damage in disproportionately impacted Global South countries. Although woefully inadequate to meet the needs of climate vulnerable states – it’s vital that developed countries announce ambitious multi-year post-2025 commitments that reflect their fair share in delivering the goal by 2035.

And there are clear ways to help plug the finance gap through progressive environmental taxation, such as ensuring wealthy polluting oil and gas corporations and the super-rich are held to account for their climate damages. As oil and gas companies book mega profits, COP31 can help unlock progress by endorsing the principle of progressive taxation.

The people’s voice at COP31

While not everyone of us can attend the COPs to demand change, it’s critical that civil society, Indigenous Peoples, youth and activists are inside the UN venue to hold governments accountable, to challenge greenwash and to amplify voices that too often go unheard.

While corporate lobbyists from fossil fuel giants or meat and dairy companies prowl the UNFCCC system to try and exert influence over the outcome, Greenpeace attends the COPs to challenge and expose them. 

We’re also there to maintain the pressure on politicians to ensure they act in the interest of people, not profit, and make the urgent changes our world demands. It’s far from perfect, but the path to keep 1.5°C alive also runs through the COP and it’s long past time they led to accelerated action. 

• Greenpeace policy briefing: COP31 priorities and expectations 

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Berlin, Germany – Greenpeace Germany activists protested during NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang’s keynote at NVIDIA GTC Conference. The activists projected “NVIDIA, clean up your dirty business” onto the stage and unrolled a banner with the same message referencing the environmental and ethical impact of the AI frenzy, enabled by the massive production of their chips for global markets.

In recent years, Greenpeace organisations have repeatedly exposed the company’s climate footprint especially through its outsourced manufacturers powered by dirty fossil fuels and concentrated in East Asia.[1][2]

Benjamin Stephan, Big Tech campaigner at Greenpeace International, said: “While NVIDIA is building an unchecked AI empire no one consented to, people are paying the price. Around the world, communities face damage to water supplies and soil, alongside rising electricity bills because of unchecked expansion of data centres. Meanwhile, the environmental burden of chip manufacturing weighs on communities in East Asia.”

NVIDIA, the world’s most valuable company by market capitalisation, generating huge profits, plays a central role in the AI investment frenzy. It has partnered with financial institutions to finance more data centres, glossing over both their environmental impacts and the risk of further inflating a financial bubble on the brink of bursting. Greenpeace International is sounding the alarm about this Big Tech expansion, which poses a direct threat to the environment and the global economy.

Referencing recent remarks by NVIDIA’s CEO[3], Stephan said: “The world does not need more ‘pain and suffering’. People are already facing multiple crises, from climate change to the rising cost of living. Better technology is possible, if driven by communities’ needs and controlled by strong, binding regulation, so that technology serves the public interest rather than further inflating the AI bubble.”

Greenpeace International demands that NVIDIA serve the public interest by investing substantially in additional renewable energy capacity. The organisation also calls on the company to extend its 100% renewable energy target beyond its own corporate operations to cover its entire manufacturing supply chain by 2030, including suppliers in key production regions in East Asia.

Finally, Greenpeace International is calling for NVIDIA to implement an independent audit process covering all distributors, subsidiaries and third-party vendors worldwide to ensure that its products are not used in ways that violate human rights and are not incorporated into military equipment.

ENDS

Notes:

[1] NVIDIA’s climate hoax: New analysis on NVIDIA’s rising emissions and greenwashing details how NVIDIA has misleadingly masked its staggering emissions impacts.

[2] NVIDIA’s Green Illusion analysis by Greenpeace East Asia shows the environmental burden of chip productions is concentrated in manufacturing hubs such as South Korea and Taiwan, where power grids remain heavily reliant on fossil fuels.

[3] In an online interview published by the New York Times, NVIDIA’s CEO called for more fossil fuels and claimed “we must endure pain and suffering before AI can save us”.

Contacts: 

Guillaumine Lickel, Deputy Communications Lead , Greenpeace International, +33 6-73-89-48-90 (EMEA), glickel@greenpeace.org

Greenpeace International Press Desk, +31 (0)20 718 2470 (available 24 hours), pressdesk.int@greenpeace.org

Amsterdam, Netherlands – Greenpeace has urged governments meeting at the UN climate summit COP31 in Antalya next month to take stock of the latest emissions gap data and rapidly scale up action towards a just transition away from fossil fuels to keep 1.5°C alive.

The United Nations Environment Programme warned global warming could reach up to 2.8°C this century if current government policies continue, a worse prediction than last year, but rapid emissions cuts could still limit that to 1.7°C to 1.8°C. It said emissions cuts of 18 percent by 2030, 45 percent by 2035 and 69 percent by 2040 – all based on 2025 levels – were needed for this scenario, in addition to carbon dioxide removals.[1]

In its Emissions Gap Report 2026: The Point of Return, the UNEP said the roll-out of renewable energy and climate policies had already yielded cuts to emissions, but a massive acceleration was required to limit the extent of an overshoot of the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C limit. It had earlier declared the world would exceed 1.5°C warming, likely in the next few years.[2]

Jasper Inventor, Deputy Programme Director at Greenpeace International said: “This UNEP report is yet another alarm, but governments keep hitting the snooze button. Climate action delayed is climate harm multiplied. The pathway back to 1.5°C is still there in front of us, but only if governments wake up to the reality that the stability of our climate is rapidly slipping away.

“As we come to terms with the prospect of a 1.5°C overshoot, we know that every fraction of a degree still matters and these successive UNEP reports must galvanise political leaders to take the steps needed now and tomorrow to help turn the trajectory around. That means holding fossil fuel polluters to account and standing with the people rather than profiteers.”

The UNEP report starkly revealed the shortfall in government policies, outlining that even with the full implementation of climate action plans (NDCs), this would only reduce emissions by 5-8 percent by 2030 and 11-15 per cent by 2035, relative to 2025 levels.

At COP31, Greenpeace is calling on states to reaffirm and accelerate action towards the first Global Stocktake energy goals agreed at COP28 in Dubai in 2023: tripling renewable energy and doubling energy efficiency by 2030 and accelerating a just, orderly and equitable transition away from fossil fuels this critical decade.[3][4]

Notes:

[1] UNEP: Emissions Gap Report 2026: The Point of Return 

[2] UNEP report: Limiting Overshoot 

[3] UNFCCC: Outcome of the first global stocktake

[4] Greenpeace: COP31 Priorities and Expectations

Contact:

Aaron Gray-Block, Greenpeace International, Climate Politics Communications Manager, aaron.gray-block@greenpeace.org

Greenpeace International Press Desk, +31 (0)20 718 2470 (available 24 hours), pressdesk.int@greenpeace.org

Mérida, Mexico – Water testing conducted in Mexico’s Yucatán State, in an area near the state capital city of Mérida, has found that severe, widespread fecal and chemical contamination is threatening the country’s largest source of renewable groundwater, driven in part by illegal industrial pig farms, a new report by Greenpeace México and Greenpeace International has revealed today.[1]

José Luis Perlasca, Campaigner at Greenpeace México, said: “For years, the rapid expansion of high-impact industrial activities has been allowed to take place in one of Mexico’s most important—and at the same time, most vulnerable—hydrological systems, causing various problems of water and groundwater contamination on the peninsula. This report offers a grim picture of the devastating effects that megafarms are having on the Selva Maya.

Commissioned by Greenpeace México and conducted by an accredited independent laboratory, the study, titled ‘The Price of Pork: How Illegal Pig Megafarms Are Destroying Mexico’s Underground Springs’,  investigated 17 sites across six communities, taking water samples from wells and cenotes, the iconic freshwater sinkholes that dot the densely forested Yucatán Peninsula. The results showed critical levels of fecal bacteria, with multiple sites reaching maximum laboratory quantification limits. 

Additional studies conducted by local Maya community group To’one Ja’o’on (We Are Water) Network in collaboration with Johns Hopkins University and the National Autonomous University of Mexico at five overlapping sites has confirmed the presence of pig fecal matter in water samples.[2]

Perlasca continued: “The contamination of Mexico’s largest groundwater source not only threatens the environment and the livelihoods of nearby communities but also poses a potential public health disaster that could endanger the drinking water supply for millions of people. Environmental authorities need to realise: this is not just a local problem, but one that could jeopardise the whole region’s capacity for survival and regeneration.” 

Testing revealed high levels of water pollution, with nitrate concentrations in several locations exceeding World Health Organization (WHO) drinking water safety guidelines and two-thirds exceeding lower thresholds recognised as presenting health risks through long-term exposure. At peak contamination sites, chemical oxygen demand and phosphorus levels suggested direct influxes of livestock manure slurry or municipal wastewater. Nitrate contamination in drinking water has been linked by recent research to health risks like colorectal cancer and pre-term birth at levels far lower than the current WHO guideline.[3]

The Yucatán Peninsula karst aquifer is the world’s most extensive interconnected cave system and supplies drinking water to 5 million people in southeast Mexico.[4] However, the region’s highly porous karst limestone provides minimal filtration against surface pollutants, meaning agricultural runoff and swine manure slurry can migrate rapidly into the subterranean system, posing severe health risks and threatening fragile ecosystems.

The report highlights systemic regulatory failure, where over 90% of industrial pig megafarms operate illegally in the Yucatán peninsula without mandatory environmental impact assessments, driving deforestation and pollution. Dozens of these operations encroach directly on Protected Natural Areas and Indigenous Maya territories without free, prior, and informed consent from local communities, violating constitutional rights and destroying traditional livelihoods.

Greenpeace México is calling on Mexican authorities to enforce an immediate moratorium on new and expanding industrial livestock operations across the Yucatán Peninsula, prosecute illegal megafarms, and uphold the rights of Indigenous Maya communities.

ENDS

Notes:

Download the full report from Greenpeace Mexico: THE PRICE OF PORK: How Illegal Pig Megafarms Are Destroying Mexico’s Underground Springs

[1] Estrada-Medina, H., & Álvarez-Rivera, O. O. (2024). Distribución geográfica y características del medio físico natural de los ambientes kársticos de México. Acta Universitaria

[2] Carter et al, (2026) Establishing Methods to Monitor Swine Fecal Contamination of Surface Water, Drinking Water, and Settled Dust in Communities Neighboring Swine Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations, Yucatán, Mexico, 2022. Environmental Justice

[3] Evaluation of the parametric value for Nitrate in drinking water. Report delivered to the Ministry of Environment and Gender Equality of Denmark on November 24, 2025.

[4] Global Americans, ‘Tourism Boom, Water Bust: The Hidden Crisis Beneath the Maya Train’, 13 October 2023

Contacts:

Joe Evans, Global Comms Lead for Agriculture, Greenpeace UK, +44 7890 595387, joe.evans@greenpeace.org 

Sara Del Real, Oficial de Comunicación, Greenpeace México, +52 554084 5320, sdreal@greenpeace.org