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In the final days of the conference pressure for a roadmap away from fossil fuels is growing as delegates discuss possible outcomes
My colleague Fiona Harvey, a Cop veteran, has just filed this post on host Brazil’s unorthodox approach to these talks and their hopes of wrapping up on time [“vanishingly unlikely” is Fiona’s verdict].
Brazil’s running of Cop30has been unorthodox from the start, with an insistence that effectively there was little to negotiate at this “conference of the parties” and that some of the biggest items – the roadmap to climate finance, the transition away from fossil fuels, and above all a response to the national climate plans that were supposed to be submitted ahead of this Cop – were not even to be on the agenda.
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When the Maui fires ripped through Hawaii, the community came together. For everyone it was a life-changing experience. This is Ryan’s story
Location Maui, Hawaii, United States
Disaster Maui wildfires, 2023
Ryan Kirkham had been the principal at Mauipreparatoryschool for13 years when the Maui wildfires ignited in 2023, killing 102 people in Lahaina and costing almost $3.3bn in insured damages. Climate change is increasing the severity of droughts in the Hawaiian Islands, which correlates with an increased likelihood of wildfires.
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Fallout from increased emissions linked to president’s ‘America First’ policies expected to most affect those in poor, hot countries
This article is co-published with ProPublica, a non-profit newsroom that investigates abuses of power.
New advances in environmental science are providing a detailed understanding of the human cost of the Trump administration’s approach to climate.
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Evidence of waste from primary schools and local authorities in south-east England points to possible large-scale corruption, expert says
Waste from local authorities in the south-east is among the vast mound of rubbish dumped illegally next to a river in Oxfordshire, it can be revealed.
The finding provides evidence of possible large-scale corruption in waste management, a legal expert has warned.
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The Neoliner Origin set off on its inaugural two-week voyage from France to the US with the aim of revolutionising the notoriously dirty shipping industry
It is 8pm on a Saturday evening and eight of us are sitting at a table onboard a ship, holding on to our plates of spaghetti carbonara as our chairs slide back and forth. Michel Péry, the dinner’s host, downplays the weather as a “tempête de journalistes” –something sailors would not categorise as a storm, but which drama-seeking journalists might refer to as such to entertain their readers.
But after a white-knuckle night in our cabins with winds reaching 74mph or force 12 – officially a hurricane – Péry has to admit it was not just a “journalists’ storm”, but the real deal.
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Analysis of new-builds in Birmingham suggests all-electric homes not only use less energy but vary in peak usage
Some of the first homes in the UK designed to meet new building standards put less pressure on the electricity grid than expected, a study has found.
The all-electric properties in Handsworth, Birmingham, have heat pumps, which use electricity to provide heat rather than oil or gas.
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Frome, Somerset: The dampness lingers here, and there is no wind – perfect conditions for a total victory for fern, ivy, and, most of all, moss
Outside this secluded world, autumn turns and falls in yellow, gold and brown. Here, we walk through a different colour palette. Here, as the trees strip themselves bare, the gorge’s gorgeous greens have come to the fore.
There is ivy, of course there is ivy, thick-leaved, stealing long ago over unclaimed ground, shinning up trees, bunching over overhanging banks. But ivy tends to be overlooked and ignored in the vale, such is the lushness and visual impact of two other groups of plants.
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Ending use of coal, oil and gas is essential in tackling climate crisis – but even talking about it is controversial
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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.
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Brazil’s president welcomes world leaders while navigating divided government, promising action on deforestation and emissions
Brazil’s president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has welcomed world leaders to Belém for the first climate summit in the Amazon, where conservationists hope he can be a champion for the rainforest and its people.
But with a divided administration, a hostile Congress and 20th-century developmentalist instincts, this global figurehead of the centre left has a balancing act to perform in advocating protection of nature and a reduction of emissions.
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