United Nations University scientists warn that electricity grids with 15 to 20 year lifespans are still being planned using historical climate data that may no longer reflect future conditions, exposing infrastructure and investment to growing physical and financial risks. A new UNU-INWEH policy brief calls for transparent, domain-informed AI and stronger regulatory guardrails to support climate-resilient energy planning.

Emergency visits by children with suicide-related crises increased by 74% between 2016 and 2022, according to a new study from scientists at Northwestern University and Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago.

The study represented more than 5 million emergency department (ED) visits for mental health concerns by U.S. children in the six-year period. About half of suicide-related ED visits — and half of all children’s mental health ED visits — occurred in hospitals with lower pediatric volume (under 10,000 annually). A child experiencing a mental health crisis may arrive at any emergency department, and many are not prepared to care for children with acute mental health needs, the study authors said. 

Critical Path Institute is deeply saddened to announce the passing of Peter Barton Hutt, a longtime member of C-Path’s Board of Directors, on September 2, 2026.

Because greenhouse gases affect the global climate regardless of where they are emitted, countries benefit from other nations' efforts to cut emissions while retaining incentives to underinvest themselves. In a Policy Article, Catherine Wolfram and colleagues argue that countries could make climate policy more effective by forming a coalition that would adopt carbon pricing for four major industrial sectors – iron and steel, aluminum, cement, and fertilizers – which together produce about 20% of global greenhouse-gas emissions. To prevent companies from shifting production to countries with weaker climate policies, coalition members would also impose carbon charges on imports from nonmembers, the authors note. Here, Wolfram et al. investigate the value and potential of such coalitions. Using detailed data on individual industrial plants and global trade patterns, the authors compared a uniform carbon price with a graduated system that sets lower prices for lower-income countries. They found that an initial coalition could reduce global greenhouse-gas emissions by about 1.5%, while having relatively small effects on industrial production, limiting carbon leakage, and generating nearly $200 billion in annual public revenue. According to the authors, the approach is designed to address a central weakness of international climate policy: countries differ greatly in their economic capacity and willingness to impose carbon costs. A tiered system, combined with technology sharing, climate finance, and capacity building, could therefore allow lower-income countries to participate while gradually strengthening their climate policies. “A coalition that marries carbon pricing and trade policies offers a practical path at a fractious time and offers a pathway to overcome the international climate-policy coordination problem. It aligns incentives, builds on what countries are already doing, and replaces a race to the bottom with a race to the cleanest,” Wolfram et al. write.

The future of American innovation depends as much on investing in people as it does on investing in technology. Today, The National Academy of Inventors (NAI) launched the National Invention Ambassadors Network to help prepare a new generation of innovators and build America’s future.