4 h. ago Al Gore wonders if ‘bullying’ Trump prompted Bill Gates to backtrack on climate

Exclusive interview with ex-US vice-president at Cop30 also reveals his hope around much-maligned climate summitFear of being bullied by Donald Trump may have prompted Bill Gates to row back on the climate crisis, Al Gore has speculated, as he slammed the billionaire’s new position as “silly”, and the US president for his anti-climate stance.Trump, “the most corrupt president in American history”, was “badly damaging the US economy” by pulling away from renewable energy and promoting fossil fuels, the former US vice-president warned. Continue reading...

Politics

15 h. ago Cop can be torturous and tedious – but here’s why it’s worth paying attention

In this week’s newsletter: Critics have yet come up with an alternative that would truly bring all countries together to work to solve the climate crisis• Don’t get Down to Earth delivered to your inbox? Sign up hereWorld leaders – or at least about 50 of them – flew away from preliminary Cop meetings in the Amazonian city of Belém last week, where they met to discuss the climate crisis, the ravages committed on the planet’s biggest rainforest only too apparent beneath them, if they chose to look.Deforestation, drought and the climate crisis are pushing the Amazon to what could become a “tipping point”, where it changes state from a rainforest to a savannah ecosystem, and from a massive absorber of carbon to releasing carbon into the atmosphere, which would have devastating consequences for the whole world.‘It will never be forgiven’: UN climate chief warns world to act or face disasterTyphoon Fung-Wong becomes second in a week to hit the PhilippinesI wish we could ignore Bill Gates...

Politics

31 h. ago How Scotland's forests can deliver future prosperity with higher wages, affordable homes and more

Planting more trees and using the wood to build energy-efficient homes would help tackle climate change and the biodiversity crisis, while creating jobs and wealth

Society

37 h. ago ‘She rang me to say there was water coming into the house’ – This is climate breakdown

His mother had lived in the same house for 83 years. When the floods came, no one was ready. This is Paul Gilbert’s storyLocation Chesterfield, UKDisaster Storm Babet, 2023Paul Gilbert’s mother, Maureen, lived in Chesterfield. In 2023, Storm Babet claimed seven lives across the UK, led to more than 10,000 people being evacuated from their homes and caused in excess of £450m in property damage. Extreme rainfall is more common and more intense because of human-caused climate breakdown across most of the world, and experts have linked some of the damage caused by Storm Babet to the climate crisis. Continue reading...

Society

39 h. ago Top UN official warns inaction on climate crisis ‘will never be forgiven’ as Cop30 opens in Brazil

Simon Stiell told ministers from nearly 200 countries in Belém that governments dragging their feet on cutting fossil fuel use would be held responsible for famines, conflicts, and economic turmoil

Events

59 h. ago ‘It will never be forgiven’: UN climate chief warns world to act or face disaster

Faltering governments will be blamed for famine and conflict abroad, and face stagnation and inflation at home, says climate chief at start of Cop30Governments failing to shift to a low-carbon economy will be blamed for famine and conflict abroad, and will face stagnation and rising inflation at home, the UN’s climate chief warned on Monday at the start of the Cop30 climate talks.Simon Stiell, the executive secretary of the UN framework convention on climate change, addressed the gathering of ministers and high-ranking officials from nearly 200 countries, in a stark portrayal of the price of failure on the climate crisis. Continue reading...

Events

68 h. ago Rich countries have lost enthusiasm for tackling climate crisis, says Cop30 chief

Brazil’s André Corrêa do Lago says countries should follow China’s lead on clean energy as conference beginsCop30: what are the main issues?Net zero to NDCs: your Cop30 jargon busterRich countries have lost enthusiasm for combating the climate crisis while China is surging ahead in producing and using clean energy equipment, the president of the UN climate talks has said.More countries should follow China’s lead instead of complaining about being outcompeted, said André Corrêa do Lago, the Brazilian diplomat in charge of the Cop30 conference, which begins on Monday. Continue reading...

Events

3 d. ago Swinney calls for swift and decisive action in tackling climate crisis

Gillian Martin is representing Scotland at the Cop30 summit in Brazil.

Events

3 d. ago ‘Existential and urgent’: what impact will ICJ climate ruling have on Cop30?

Decision by international court of justice hailed as a gamechanger for climate justice and accountabilityIn July 2025, the international court of justice delivered a landmark decision that clarified that all states were bound under international law to tackle the human-made climate crisis, which the judges unanimously concluded posed an “urgent and existential threat” to the planet’s life-sustaining systems and therefore humanity itself.The ICJ advisory opinion built on rulings from hundreds of climate lawsuits across the world over the past decade or more, and added further legal weight to strong decisions from the inter-American court of human rights in July 2025 and the international tribunal on the law of the sea in May 2024. Continue reading...

Politics

3 d. ago Amid squabbles, bombast and competing interests, what can Cop30 achieve?

Climate summit in Brazil needs to find way to stop global heating accelerating amid stark divisions“It broke my heart.” Surangel Whipps, president of the tiny Pacific nation of Palau, was sitting in the front row of the UN’s general assembly in New York when Donald Trump made a long and rambling speech, his first to the UN since his re-election, on 23 September.Whipps was prepared for fury and bombast from the US president, but what followed was shocking. Trump’s rant on the climate crisis – a “green scam”, “the greatest con job ever perpetrated”, “predictions made by stupid people” – was an unprecedented attack on science and global action from a major world leader. Continue reading...

Events

4 d. ago I wish we could ignore Bill Gates on the climate crisis. But he’s a billionaire, so we can’t | George Monbiot

Money talks – and his essay denouncing ‘near-term emissions goals’ at Cop30 mostly argues the case for letting the ultra-rich off the hookLet’s begin with the fundamental problem: Bill Gates is a politics denier. Though he came to it late, he now accepts the realities of climate science. But he lives in flat, embarrassing denial about political realities. His latest essay on climate, published last week, treats the issue as if it existed in a political vacuum. He writes as if there were no such thing as political power, and no such thing as billionaires.His main contention is that funds are very limited, so the delegates at this month’s climate summit in Brazil should direct money away from “near-term emissions goals” towards climate “adaptation” and spending on poverty and disease.George Monbiot is a Guardian columnist Continue reading...

Society

5 d. ago The Guardian view on worsening extreme weather: the injustice of the climate crisis grows ever clearer | Editorial

The increasing ferocity and frequency of tropical storms imposes an unbearable burden on countries including JamaicaThe geographically uneven risks from increasingly extreme and dangerous weather grow ever starker. As Jamaica and other Caribbean countries clear up after Hurricane Melissa, and Typhoon Kalmaegi heads west after killing nearly 200 people in the Philippines and Vietnam, the case for more international support to countries facing the most destructive impacts from global heating has never been stronger.Last week’s five-day rainfall in Jamaica was made twice as likely by higher temperatures, according to initial findings from climate attribution studies. The current death toll across the Caribbean is at least 75. The economic and social costs are hard to quantify in a region that is still recovering from 2024’s Hurricane Beryl. Crucial infrastructure has been destroyed before the loans used to build it have even been paid off. Andrew Holness, Jamaica’s prime minister, esti...

Society

6 d. ago Prince William tells Cop30 'courage and unwavering commitment' needed to tackle climate crisis

The Prince of Wales made a landmark speech at the global climate summit in the Amazon in Brazil

Politics

6 d. ago ‘We need help’: devastated Jamaican communities still await aid after Hurricane Melissa

Ravaged communities near Montego Bay recount what last week’s category 5 storm took from them‘New reality’: Hurricane Melissa strength multiplied by climate crisis, study says‘How do you rebuild all this?’ Black River residents assess damage after Hurricane MelissaSitting outside her house in muddy slippers amid the ruins left by category 5 Hurricane Melissa that ravaged parts of Jamaica last week, Narva Maxwell Taylor recounted how she and her family had to fight for their lives when the storm sent flood waters surging through their home.“We have to give God thanks we are alive. We could be dead. But everything is gone. I don’t have anything left now,” Taylor, a resident of Catherine Hall, Montego Bay, said. Continue reading...

Politics

6 d. ago Six pieces of data to give hope about the future of the climate crisis

The world remains off-track from the Paris Agreement goal of keeping global warming rises to ‘well below’ 2°C – but there remain grounds for hope as the international COP30 gets underway. Nick Ferris reports from Belém, Brazil

Events

6 d. ago ‘New reality’: Hurricane Melissa strength multiplied by climate crisis, study says

Winds of Melissa’s strength are now five times more frequent due to the climate crisis, research saysEvery aspect of Hurricane Melissa, the most powerful storm ever to hit Jamaica, was worsened by the climate crisis, a team of scientists has found.Melissa caused widespread devastation when it crunched into Jamaica as a category five hurricane on October 28, with winds up up to 185mph. Continue reading...

Events

6 d. ago The era of fine speeches and good intentions is over. Brazil’s Cop30 will be about action | Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva

This is our message to world leaders: make this the ‘Cop of truth’, before people lose faithLuiz Inácio Lula da Silva is the president of BrazilToday, in the Brazilian Amazon, the Belém summit opens ahead of the 30th United Nations climate change conference (Cop30). I have convened world leaders in the days leading up to the conference so that we can all commit to acting with the urgency the climate crisis demands.If we fail to move beyond speeches into real action, our societies will lose faith – not only in the Cops, but in multilateralism and international politics more broadly. That is why I have summoned leaders to the Amazon: to make this the “Cop of truth”, the moment we demonstrate the seriousness of our shared commitment to the planet.Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is the president of Brazil Continue reading...

Politics

7 d. ago ‘We’re leading the way’: Starmer defends plans for green economy before Cop30

PM defies critics calling for a slowdown as he flies to Brazil, where he may have frosty reception after opting out of tropical forest fundUK opts out of flagship fund to protect Amazon and other threatened tropical forestsThe UK will lead on tackling the climate crisis, the prime minister vowed on Wednesday, despite critics calling for a slowdown, because shifting to a low-carbon economy will cut bills, boost economic growth and bring national renewal.But his words risked being overshadowed by a bitter row over funding for tropical forest preservation at the UN Cop30 climate conference. Continue reading...

Politics

7 d. ago The Guardian view on the Francis curriculum review: raising the right questions in a world with few certain answers | Editorial

In an age of increasingly capable machines, it makes sense for schools to value creativity and life skills as part of a well-rounded educationSocieties evolve and schools are under pressure to adapt, but some features of education policy are perennial. For example, modernisation will always be denounced as a dilution of standards. Inevitably, Conservatives have leapt on recommendations by an independent review, commissioned by the government, as proof that Bridget Phillipson, the education secretary, is “dumbing down” the curriculum.The basis of these charges is that the review, led by Becky Francis, professor of education at University College London, proposes reducing the burden of GCSE exams and scrapping the English baccalaureate – a cluster of subjects that, when taken together, constitute a metric of success recognised in school league tables. Conservatives are also unhappy about the notion that primary schoolchildren should learn about the climate crisis and be encouraged to ...

Politics

7 d. ago Experts call for new taxes on worst polluters to help poorer nations with climate crisis

Report to be discussed at Cop30 says global agreements should target carbon intensive activities and ‘ultra high net worth individuals’New taxes on the super-rich, fossil fuels, financial transactions and highly polluting and carbon-intensive activities should be explored as key ways of raising the finance needed to help poor countries, governments have been told in an influential report.The proposal is one of the top recommendations of a new blueprint for global climate finance, the Baku to Belém roadmap, drawn up by the governments of Brazil and Azerbaijan, the current and the previous president of the UN climate Cop process. Continue reading...

Events