| | | Sandra Gutierrez, a home cook and cooking teacher, chops vegetables from her home garden for a bean salad in her kitchen in Cary, N.C., in 2023. (Lauren Vied Allen for The Washington Post) | | Welcome. This week, legal rights for waves in Brazil and nuclear-powered AI. But first, my colleague Nicolás Rivero wrote about the new "Planetary Health Diet." I'll be back next week with a column. |  | | Hello, I'm Nicolás Rivero filling in for Michael Coren: I'm not a perfect role model for a healthy or sustainable diet. I know I should eat more fruits and veggies and less red meat. Once, a climate team colleague reporting on the massive greenhouse emissions that come from beef emphatically told me: "Cows are the coal of food." But it's been hard to put that knowledge into practice. My brain and stomach are wired to expect meat and a side in every meal. I still make my grandmother's picadillo recipe and my mom's meatballs. And I have to confess: While thinking about all those beef emissions while reporting this column, I caved in to an irresistible craving for a hamburger. So I was reassured to learn from a team of respected scientists that you don't have to quit meat cold turkey to help the planet and improve your own health. You don't even have to swear off burgers. The biggest change most people would have to make is eating some more legumes, nuts and whole grains. That's according to a team of medical researchers, environmental scientists and policy experts who crafted a loose set of food guidelines they call the "Planetary Health Diet." If everyone ate this way, scientists say it would shave about 5 percent off global greenhouse emissions and prevent more than 7 million premature deaths per year from illnesses such as heart disease and diabetes. "If consumers were to adjust their diet … that would have huge implications on carbon emissions and climate change," said Klaus Hubacek, a Dutch environmental scientist who was not involved in designing the Planetary Health Diet, but published a paper estimating food-related emissions would fall by a sixth if people followed it. Click below to find out how you can work these guidelines into your weekly meal plan — and to see some recipes that can help you get started. Write me with your questions at climatecoach@washpost.com. I read all your emails. |  | Learning Curve Over the past 485 million years, the Earth's temperatures have been a roller coaster more volatile and extreme than researchers once imagined. Researchers in the journal Science recently combined more than 150,000 pieces of fossil evidence with state-of-the-art climate models to reconstruct global temperatures and their link with rising carbon dioxide. It contains a warning: Many of the world's worst moments — including a mass extinction that wiped out roughly 90 percent of all species and the asteroid strike that killed the dinosaurs — were associated with swift and dramatic temperature shifts. In the past, the Earth's average temperature reached 96.8 degrees Fahrenheit (36 degrees Celsius) — far higher than the historic 58.96 F (14.98 C) the planet hit last year. Read more here by The Post's Sarah Kaplan and Simon Ducroquet. |  |  | Snapshot How far will people go to defend a shrinking coastline? The Post went to Galveston, a roughly 30-mile-long barrier island near Houston, to see what happens where the sea wall ends. After a devastating hurricane in the 1900s, Galvestonians built a 17-foot-high sea wall, raising entire neighborhoods by pumping in millions of cubic yards of sand. But seas have risen 8 inches since then, while the land continues to subside. The sea wall protects only about a third of the island. Where it ends, the high tide line has encroached on existing condominiums. Two more luxury projects are proposed along one of the fastest-eroding stretches of beach. |  | | The solution, if there is one, will come at a remarkable price: $57 billion over two decades. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers may build a sea wall, levees, flood walls and 18 miles of double dunes — the largest authorized project in the history of the agency. Read more of "Where the sea wall ends" by The Post's Chris Mooney, John Muyskens, Brady Dennis and Ricky Carioti. |  | The Second Degree Many bakers wrote back about my last column about "chaos wheat." Where can you buy your own climate blend wheat? The Breadlab suggests Chimacum Valley Grainery for a grain mix that includes hard red spring wheat, two purple wheats and a blue variety. If you'd like stone-ground flour, Charles in Newtown, Conn., recommends Janies Mill in Ashkum, Ill. For those looking for recipes, any whole-wheat recipe will do — check out Pale Blue Tart, a newsletter by Caroline Saunders, a climate journalist and Le Cordon Bleu-trained pastry chef, who's shared her "100% climate-friendly dessert recipes." Randy Creswell, who has been growing wheat in his urban backyard in Grand Rapids, Mich. for about 15 years, pointed out that wheat originated in the mountains of today's Iraq, part of the Fertile Crescent. "Each valley had its own variety and bread had a unique taste in each valley," writes Creswell. "In Michigan, I simulate its origin by planting it as winter wheat, in August and September." After growing until snowfall, it resumes in the spring and he harvests in early summer. "The variation in my growing areas means some always succeeds," he says, noting a record harvest of 15 lbs./100 square feet. Finally, if you want to dive deeper, Alan Bromborsky suggested this fascinating video by Charles Mann, author of 1491, about the original chaos farming of Mesoamerica before the "Homogenocene." |  | On the Climate Front From The Post: Microsoft wants to reopen the Three Mile Island nuclear plant to power AI. This country is now the world's first to have more EVs than gas-powered cars. Don't throw away your old baby supplies. Here's how to give them a new life. A bottle of water per email: the hidden environmental costs of using AI chatbots. From elsewhere: Iconic waves in Brazil have been granted legal personhood for the first time, reports Hakai. The world's biggest banks have pledged support for nuclear power, reports the Financial Times. In Indonesia, the world's biggest deforestation project, is getting underway for sugar cane, reports Mongabay What's on the House GOP's congressional to-do list this month, asks Heated: The Liberty in Laundry Act and the Hands Off Our Home Appliances Act (HOOHA). |  | | Chris Chalumeau snapped this photo of a Cooper's hawk catching a drink at a wildlife watering hole in southeast Arizona's Coronado National Memorial. The birds make their nests across the continental United States from backyards to deep forests. Send your photos to climatecoach@washpost.com | | Was this email forwarded to you? Sign up here to get The Climate Coach in your inbox every Tuesday. See you next Tuesday, Michael Coren, Climate Coach | | |
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