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Exclusive: Critics say removing battery installation requirement will reduce amount homebuyers save on energy bills
Ministers are poised to allow homes in England to be built without carbon-cutting technology in what experts have said is a climbdown after pressure from housebuilders.
The future homes standard (FHS), due to be published in January, will regulate how all homes are built and is expected to enforce tough new regulations such as mandating solar panels on nearly all houses and high standards of insulation and heat pumps in most cases.
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New year plant hunt shows rising temperatures are shifting natural cycles of wildflowers such as daisies
Daisies and dandelions are among hundreds of native plant species blooming in the UK, in what scientists have called a “visible signal” of climate breakdown disrupting the natural world.
A Met Office analysis of data from the annual new year’s plant hunt over the past nine years found an extra 2.5 species in bloom during the new year period for every 1C rise in temperature at a given location during the previous November and December. This year’s hunt started on Thursday and runs until Sunday.
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Mousley Bottom, Derbyshire: This area was a literal dump 40 years ago, devoid of life. But time and a dedicated council have worked their magic
Stand in this wood by the River Goyt, listening to the basso profundo of ravens overhead, and you could imagine that this place is some long-tempered blend of town and country.
In one sense it is. High overhead to the east is the busy Albion Road bridge leading into New Mills town centre. Turn north, and in front of you trees stretch all the way up the hillside, where there are redwings gorging on holly berries and the first pre-spring sounds of wren song that even the rush of the river cannot drown.
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Extreme heat and drought has destroyed 70% of Jordan’s olive crop, endangering livelihoods of 80,000 families and a centuries-old tradition
Abu Khaled al-Zoubi, 67, walks slowly through his orchard in Irbid, northern Jordan, his footsteps kicking up dust from the parched earth beneath centuries-old olive trees. He stops at a gnarled trunk, its bark split and peeling from months of unrelenting heat.
He points out that the branches should be sagging under the weight of ripening fruit, but instead they stretch upward, nearly bare, with only a few shrivelled olives clinging to the withered stems.
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This week’s best wildlife photographs from around the world
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Fire chief says summer, the UK’s hottest on record, was ‘one of the most challenging for wildfires that we’ve ever faced’
Ten English fire services tackled a record number of grassland, woodland and crop fires during what was the UK’s hottest spring and summer on record, figures show.
In total nearly 27,000 wildfires were dealt with by fire services in England during the prolonged dry weather of 2025, according to analysis by PA Media.
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The ‘border adjustment mechanism’ aims to create a level playing field while also encouraging decarbonisation
The biggest shake-up of green trade rules for decades comes into force today, as companies selling steel, cement and other high-carbon goods into the EU will have to prove they comply with low-carbon regulations or face fines.
But a lack of clarity on how the rules will be applied, and the failure of the UK government to strike a deal with Brussels over the issue, could lead to confusion in the early stages, experts warned.
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In this week’s newsletter: From geopolitics to populism, multilateralism is under pressure – but climate action cannot succeed in a fractured world
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January might seem a bit too early to propose a word of the year, but I know mine already: multilateralism – the principle that common problems should have common solutions. It rests on the idea that all countries and people have a stake in the future of the planet we share, and that their rights should be respected. That cooperation beats competition, or going it alone.
Multilateralism is what has kept the UN process of climate diplomacy going, but now the principle is under threat as never before, amid a rising tide of populism and conflict. The US, under Donald Trump, explicitly rejects multilateralism, in favour of carve-ups between great powers. But if we are to stave off climate breakdown, only multilateralism will work.
‘Cities need nature to be happy’: David Attenborough seeks out London’s hidden wildlife
EU’s new ‘green tariff’ rules on high-carbon goods come into force
Renewable energy project approvals hit record high in GB in 2025, data shows
Multilateralism faces a toxic brew of debt, climate crisis and war. It’s time for a reboot | Mo Ibrahim
The ‘new world order’ of the past 35 years is being demolished before our eyes. This is how we must proceed | Gordon Brown
Into the void: how Trump killed international law
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The monsoon season is crucial for agriculture, making up 80% of annual rainfall, but also extremely destructive
January brings torrential rain to south-east Asia – more than 250mm fell in just two days in Singapore last year. This is because of the monsoon, a pattern of wind and rainfall, the name of which stems from the Arabic word for “season”.
The monsoon is sometimes described in terms of a sea breeze, in which the wind reverses direction in the morning and evening as the relative temperature of land and sea change, blowing out to sea at first and then inland as the land cools.
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The Colla Indigenous people claim Rio Tinto’s plans to extract the key mineral will harm fragile ecosystems and livelihoods
Miriam Rivera Bordones tends her goats in a dusty paddock in the russet mountains of Chile’s Atacama desert. She also keeps chickens and has planted quince and peach trees and grapevines, which are watered by a stream winding down the hills towards the Indigenous community of Copiapó.
But now the huge British-Australian mining multinational Rio Tinto has signed a deal to extract lithium, the “white gold” of the energy transition, from a salt flat farther up the mountains, and she fears the project could affect the water sources of several communities in the area.
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