Euronews (July 20)
Spain’s economy looks set to receive a boost from its World Cup win. “FIFA pays the champion federation a record $50 million (€43.7m)… out of a $655 million (€572m) prize pool spread across the expanded 48-team tournament.” Though beneficial, the prize winnings and a surge in celebration spending are negligible at the macroeconomic level. Instead the real driver appears to be “exports, which grow five to six percentage points faster as the title acts as a global advertising campaign for the country’s goods and services.” A 2024 study suggests “winning the World Cup lifts a champion’s year-on-year GDP growth by at least 0.48% over the two quarters after the final, before the effect fades.”
Tags: 50 million, Advertising campaign, Celebration spending, Champion, Driver, Economy, Exports, FIFA, GDP growth, Macroeconomic, Prize winnings, Spain, Surge, World Cup
Wired (August 30)
“A major driver of Antarctica’s cascading crises is the loss of floating sea ice, which forms during winter.” Since 2014, “the coverage of sea ice has fallen not just precipitously, but almost unbelievably, contracting by 75 miles closer to the coast.” Over the past decade, winter sea ice “has declined 4.4 times faster around Antarctica than it has in the Arctic…. Put another way: The loss of winter sea ice in Antarctica over just the past decade is similar to what the Arctic has lost over the last 46 years.”
Tags: 2014, 46 years, 75 miles, Antarctica, Arctic, Cascading, Coast, Contracting, Coverage, Crises, Decade, Driver, Loss, Precipitously, Sea ice, Winter
CNBC (September 24)
“The airline race for a breakthrough fuel to cut one billion tons of carbon is just starting.” As a result of the Inflation Reduction Act, “more investor money is expected to flow into green hydrogen… with climate analysts describing the tax credits as being a huge driver for sustainable aviation fuels because science aside, the biggest challenge with scaling up these operations and SAF production has been the financial incentive.”
Tags: Airline, Breakthrough, Carbon, Climate analysts, Driver, Fuel, Green hydrogen, Inflation Reduction Act, Investor, Money, Race, SAF, Scaling up, Tax credits
