3 h. ago As the US invests in fossil fuels, young climate activists push back in the courts

In this week’s newsletter: A generation is using the legal system to demand accountability for climate harm• Don’t get Down to Earth delivered to your inbox? Sign up hereRikki Held grew up on her family’s ranch in Montana, watching the land transform amid the climate crisis. The Powder River, which runs through the property, has sometimes dried up during drought, leaving crops and livestock without water. At other points, rapid snowmelt and heavy rains have caused flooding and eroded riverbanks, making the land difficult to use.Two years ago, the 24-year-old and a group of other young people won a groundbreaking legal victory, intended to prevent those impacts from worsening. In August 2023, a judge ruled in favour of plaintiffs in Held v Montana, in which 16 young people accused the state of violating their constitutional rights by promoting planet-warming fossil fuels. The state’s supreme court affirmed the judge’s findings late last year, but plaintiffs say lawmakers have since p...

Events

11 h. ago BP 'woke' agenda axed as it hires first female chief exec and doubles down on fossil fuels

Oil and gas veteran Meg O'Neill will take over in April as the FTSE 100 giant further distances itself from its disastrous foray into green energy.

Politics

21 h. ago Who is the new BP boss Meg O'Neill? Meet Big Oil's first female CEO looking to turn the struggling ship around

She is Big Oil's first female chief executive, the first outsider to take charge of BP in its 116-year history, and one of the few openly gay leaders in the energy industry.

Economics

24 h. ago BP hires first female boss after surprise departure of chief executive

The abrupt departure of Murray Auchincloss follows the appointment of Albert Manifold as BP’s new chairman

Politics

34 h. ago Met Office: 2026 will bring heat more than 1.4C above preindustrial levels

Forecast is slightly cooler than the record 1.55C reached in 2024, but 2026 set to be among four hottest years since 1850Next year will bring heat more than 1.4C above preindustrial levels, meteorologists project, as fossil fuel pollution continues to bake the Earth and fuel extreme weather.The UK Met Office’s central forecast is slightly cooler than the 1.55C reached in 2024, the warmest year on record, but 2026 is set to be among the four hottest years dating back to 1850. Continue reading...

Society

3 d. ago Survivors sue Shell in landmark case over deadly typhoon in Philippines: ‘We swam for our lives’

More than 100 Filipinos affected by Super Typhoon Rai are suing the British company in a case that will likely test whether fossil fuel companies can be held liable for specific climate disasters

Events

3 d. ago Filipino survivors sue Shell in landmark case over deadly typhoon: ‘We swam for our lives’

More than 100 Filipinos affected by Super Typhoon Rai are suing the British company in a case that will likely test whether fossil fuel companies can be held liable for specific climate disasters

Events

3 d. ago MI6 or 007? Britain's new spy chief proves she knows her bugs as she wears 'Miss Moneypenny's brooch' for maiden speech

Blaise Metreweli, 48, the Secret Intelligence Service's first-ever female chief, sent tongues wagging this week after delivering a rare televised address adorned with a jewel-encrusted brooch.

Politics

4 d. ago Ukraine war briefing: Britain’s spy chief to warn of Russia’s ‘expansionist threat’ as Berlin talks enter second day

MI6 chief to deliver remarks on Monday warning ‘chaos is a feature not a bug in the Russian approach’; European leaders to join day two of talks in Berlin. What we know on day 1,391The head of Britain’s foreign spy service, known as MI6, will warn that Russia poses an “aggressive, expansionist, and revisionist” threat, in her first speech since taking office. Blaise Metreweli took over from Richard Moore in October, becoming the first female chief of MI6. “[Vladimir] Putin should be in no doubt, our support is enduring. The pressure we apply on Ukraine’s behalf will be sustained,” Metreweli will say on Monday, according to advance extracts of her remarks. “The export of chaos is a feature not a bug in the Russian approach to international engagement, and we should be ready for this to continue until Putin is forced to change his calculus,” she said, according to the extract.Separately, Richard Knighton, head of Britain’s armed forces, will also call in a separate speech on Monday fo...

Events

5 d. ago Carney’s fossil fuel pivot bewilders climate experts and business leaders

Canadian prime minister’s legacy as one-time UN envoy and clean power advocate undermined by energy shift

Politics

6 d. ago ‘A shift no country can ignore’: where global emissions stand, 10 years after the Paris climate agreement

The watershed summit in 2015 was far from perfect, but its impact so far has been significant and measurableTen years on from the historic Paris climate summit, which ended with the world’s first and only global agreement to curb greenhouse gas emissions, it is easy to dwell on its failures. But the successes go less remarked.Renewable energy smashed records last year, growing by 15% and accounting for more than 90% of all new power generation capacity. Investment in clean energy topped $2tn, outstripping that into fossil fuels by two to one. Continue reading...

Events

7 d. ago Google DeepMind to build its first robotic science laboratory in the UK – business live

Rolling coverage of the latest economic and financial newsIn the energy sector, Russia’s revenues from exports of crude oil and refined products has fallen to its lowest level since the invasion of Ukraine in 2022.The International Energy Agency has reported this morning that Moscow’s sales of fossil fuels fell again in November due to lower export volumes and weaker prices.These brighter prospects extend to our 2026 forecast, which we have upgraded by 90 kb/d, to 860 kb/d y-o-y.“We need to ask who is setting the agenda for the UK’s future with AI.”“In the absence of independent regulation or scrutiny, we’re at the mercy of technology companies’ commercial interests aligning with what the public want.” Continue reading...

Technology

8 d. ago US senator calls for insider trading inquiry over Trump donors buying $12m worth of shares

Co-chairs of LNG firm, who bought stock worth almost $12m each after meeting with Trump officials, deny wrongdoingA senior Democratic senator is calling for an investigation into potential insider trading by fossil-fuel billionaires close to the Trump administration, after a Guardian investigation raised questions about an unusual share buying spree.Robert Pender and Michael Sabel, the founders and co-chairs of Venture Global, a liquefied natural gas (LNG) company headquartered in Virginia, bought more than a million shares worth almost $12m each, just days after meeting with senior Trump officials in March. Continue reading...

Politics

1 week ago ‘Food and fossil fuel production causing $5bn of environmental damage an hour’

UN GEO report says ending this harm key to global transformation required ‘before collapse becomes inevitable’The unsustainable production of food and fossil fuels causes $5bn (£3.8bn) of environmental damage per hour, according to a major UN report.Ending this harm was a key part of the global transformation of governance, economics and finance required “before collapse becomes inevitable”, the experts said. Continue reading...

Events

1 week ago Canada’s environmental ‘realism’ looks more like surrender | Tzeporah Berman

At a time when the UK and other countries are finally taking bold steps for climate, Canada is preparing a new oil pipelineLast week, the United Kingdom did something all too rare: it chose leadership by backing science and prioritizing public safety. The Labour government announced it would ban new oil and gas licences in the North Sea, strengthen a windfall tax and accelerate phasing out of fossil-fuel subsidies.These are not symbolic gestures. They are an acknowledgment that the global energy system is shifting and that mature economies must shift with it.Tzeporah Berman is a Canadian environmental activist, campaigner and writer Continue reading...

Politics

2 w. ago Inside the climate group working everywhere but DC: ‘You can still have huge wins’

Climate Cabinet supports candidates in state and city races as the federal government ignores the climate crisisWith a president who has called climate change a “hoax”, refused to send a delegation to international climate talks, and packed the federal government with former fossil fuel industry employees, this can feel like a dark moment for climate action in the US. But shifting one’s focus to local and state law makes for a very different outlook.Analysts have estimated that 75% of the commitments that the US made at the Paris climate agreement – which Donald Trump pulled the nation out of as soon as he took office – can be reached entirely without federal support. Continue reading...

Politics

2 w. ago What’s behind the massive death toll in floods across Southeast Asia – and why it should serve as a warning

Regional experts warn that without rapid cuts in fossil-fuel emissions and serious investment in resilience – from restoring forests to enforcing planning rules – disasters like this year’s may become regular rather than rare, Stuti Mishra reports

Events

2 w. ago Rising Tide protest: climate activists stop three ships from entering world’s largest coal port in Newcastle

Australian campaigners demand Albanese government cancel planned fossil fuel projects and tax existing operations at 78%Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updatesGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastActivists have blocked two more coal ships from entering the Port of Newcastle on the fourth day of the Rising Tide protests, bringing the total number of ships turned around by campaigners this weekend to three.Thousands of people have gathered at Rising Tide’s annual climate protest at the world’s largest coal port. The blockade began on Thursday and will continue until Tuesday. Continue reading...

Events

3 w. ago Beyond the negative headlines, some truly good things came out of Cop30

In this week’s newsletter: Ultimately, climate progress will come from real-world action, and this year’s summit made some promising strides on that front• Don’t get Down to Earth delivered to your inbox? Sign up hereSome commentators have called Cop30 a failure. An attempt to insert plans for a route to the phaseout of fossil fuels into the legal text was stymied, consideration of how to improve countries’ emissions-cutting plans was put off till next year, and although developing countries got the tripling of finance for adaptation that they were seeking, it will not be delivered in full until 2035 – and will come out of already promised funds.Look beyond the headlines, however, and the Cop achieved a great deal more. Take the outcome on fossil fuels – it seems absurd, but until 2023 three decades of annual climate summits had failed to address fossil fuels directly.UK can create 5,400 jobs if it stops plastic waste exports, report findsZombie fires: how Arctic wildfires that come...

Politics

3 w. ago ‘Fossil fuel giants finally in the crosshairs’: Cop30 avoids total failure with last

It took some oblique wording, but Saudi Arabia made a last-minute decision to sign deal that marks departure for CopDawn was breaking over the Amazonian city of Belém on Saturday morning, but in the windowless conference room it could have been day or night. They had been stuck there for more than 12 hours, dozens of ministers representing 17 groups of countries, from the poorest on the planet to the richest, urged by the Brazilian hosts to accept a settlement cooked up the day before.Tempers were short, the air thick as the sweaty and exhausted delegates faced up to reality: there would not be a deal here in Brazil. The 30th UN climate conference would end in abject failure. Continue reading...

Events