With the climate crisis growing ever more urgent, and intersecting with other racial injustice, socioeconomic and health crises, we must secure ambitious NDCs from major emitters like the US this year. Quite simply, 2021 is shaping up to be a make-or-break year. Read more >
Rachel's Latest Posts

US Should Pledge to Cut Heat-trapping Emissions At Least 50 Percent Below 2005 Levels by 2030
March 10, 2021 10:06 AM EDT

The FHFA Begins to Reckon with Climate Risks to the Housing Market
March 5, 2021 1:48 PM EDT
Yesterday I had the opportunity to offer comments at the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s public listening session on its recently issued Request for Information (RFI) on climate and natural disaster risk to the housing finance system. This is a watershed moment, with a growing recognition from regulators and market actors that climate change is an economic threat and that climate risks must be acknowledged and addressed. Read more >

As the US Rejoins the Paris Agreement, What’s Next on the Road to COP26?
February 18, 2021 12:56 PM EDT
On Feb 19th, the United States will officially be back in the Paris Agreement, thirty days after President Biden signed a declaration to rejoin the agreement on his first day in office. The President has clearly signaled to the world that climate change will be a top tier domestic and international priority, putting the climate crisis at the center of US foreign policy and national security. There’s a lot of ground to make up but the hope of Paris is alive and strong. Read more >

Five Years on, Keeping the Hope of the Paris Agreement Alive and Strong
December 9, 2020 4:05 PM EDT
On December 12, the world will mark the fifth anniversary of the landmark Paris Agreement. Back in 2015, there was so much hope that this would be a true turning point for global climate action. Yet, we have fallen well short of sharply bending the global heat-trapping emissions curve, and meanwhile climate change is unfolding around us in terrifying ways. Nevertheless, the Agreement endures and continues to be a precious beacon lighting the way. Now it’s time for nations—including the US, which will shortly rejoin the Agreement under President Biden—to show renewed and strengthened commitment to its goals, for people and the planet. Read more >