2011 has played host to the largest two earthquakes, economically speaking, in the history of the countries of Japan and New Zealand. The M9.0 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami of 11th March, 2011 proved to be the most expensive earthquake of all time, causing between $400-700 billion USD in total losses and approximately 19000 deaths, while the Christchurch earthquake (a M6.3 quake close to the city of Christchurch) caused a huge building stock loss and approximately $15-20 billion USD damage with around 80% insured losses.

Air pollution from the 10,000 largest polluting facilities in Europe cost citizens between € 102 and 169 billion in 2009. This was one of the findings of a new report from the European Environment Agency (EEA) which analysed the costs of harm to health and the environment caused by air pollution. Half of the total damage cost (between € 51 and 85 billion) was caused by just 191 facilities.

An international team of scientists has unravelled how the first ozone hole over the Arctic formed last spring. A comprehensive analysis of the unusually high ozone depletion in March/April 2011 has now been published in advance in the online issue of the journal “Nature”. “The ozone hole over the Arctic was not only the result of a combination of past pollution due to air pollutants, its development is also connected with long-term changes in the climate system,” summarises Dr. Markus Rex, Potsdam atmospheric physicist at the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association, a key result of the study.

Believe it or not, Greenpeace celebrates its 40 birthday today! To mark the occasion, Kumi Naidoo, our International Executive Director, calls on us all to take inspiration from that first Greenpeace voyage, and to demand a better future for our planet: After four decades of putting environmental issues centre stage and achieving significant victories in defence of the planet, today we face a perfect storm of crises; economic, ecological and democratic. And none more challenging than climate change.

Japan can switch off all nuclear plants permanently by 2012 and still achieve both economic recovery and its CO2 reduction goals, according to a new Greenpeace report. Released today, the Advanced Energy [R]evolution report for Japan (1), shows how energy efficiency and rapid deployment of renewable technology can provide all the power Japan needs.

The weakening sun was not the determinant factor for the Little Ice Age. Strong volcanic eruptions in particular, but also a smaller amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere were important factors during this period of cooler climate in the 16th and 17th century, a new study shows. This implies that low solar activity, which is expected by some researchers for the coming decades, cannot considerably slow down global warming caused by humankind’s greenhouse gas emissions.

The environmental restoration of Ogoniland could prove to be the world's most wide-ranging and long term oil clean-up exercise ever undertaken if contaminated drinking water, land, creeks and important ecosystems such as mangroves are to be brought back to full, productive health. A major new independent scientific assessment, carried out by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), shows that pollution from over 50 years of oil operations in the region has penetrated further and deeper than many may have supposed.

When politicians fail, should technicians take over? Can one capture carbon dioxide and store it underground? Should we do it? A new paperback contains all possible arguments regarding this main question of climate change and climate policy – and helps finding the right answer. By Udo E. Simonis

The West Antarctic ice sheet is a potential tipping element of the climate system that might have partially tipped already. According to a study now published in Climatic Change, experts can not rule out that ice masses in the Amundsen Sea sector of Antarctica have already begun to destabilize. This is one of the results of a new assessment of the current state of six potentially unstable regions in the climate system with large direct impacts on Europe. The likelihood of climatic transitions of these elements generally increases as global mean temperature increases due to greenhouse gases emitted by human activity.

Large areas of the globe are likely to warm up so quickly that by the middle of this century even the coolest summers will be hotter than the hottest summers of the past 50 years. By Donna Hesterman