Category Archives: Climate crisis

‘My life and my home’: young people start to testify at historic US climate trial

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The plaintiffs note that Montana’s constitution pledges a healthy environment ‘for present and future generations’

The US’s first-ever trial in a constitutional climate lawsuit kicked off on Monday morning in a packed courtroom in Helena, Montana.

The case, Held v Montana, was brought in 2020 by 16 plaintiffs between the ages of five and 22 from around the state who allege state officials violated their constitutional right to a healthy environment by enacting pro-fossil fuel policies.

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Tony Abbott and John Howard join Jordan Peterson-led group looking at ‘meaning of life’

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Alliance for Responsible Citizenship includes prominent Brexit voices and Bjørn Lomborg, who has questioned the urgency of the climate crisis

The former prime ministers Tony Abbott and John Howard are among six Australians who have joined a global group fronted by Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson and backed by a pro-Brexit hedge fund billionaire and a Dubai-based investment group.

The group – The Alliance for Responsible Citizenship (Arc) – has been gathering high-profile figures from politics, industry, academia and thinktanks for an inaugural three-day conference in London in late October.

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Greta Thunberg takes part in her last school strike for climate

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As activist graduates from school, she says she will still protest on Fridays as ‘fight has only just begun’

After what began as a solo protest in Sweden five years ago and grew into a movement with millions of children across the world participating, Greta Thunberg has taken part in her last “school strike” protest as she graduates from school.

The protests, which led to many climate activist movements across Europe, the US and Australia, are known as Fridays for Future or School Strike for Climate.

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Smoke from Canadian wildfires hits Norway and flows to southern Europe

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Researchers used a model to predict how the smoke would move through the region and said it wouldn’t pose a health risk

Smoke from Canadian wildfires that has descended upon parts of the eastern US and Canada in a thick haze has drifted over Norway and is expected to hit southern Europe, Norwegian officials said on Friday.

Using a climate forecast model, atmosphere and climate scientists with the Norwegian climate and environmental research institute (NILU) predicted how the smoke would travel through the atmosphere, flowing over the Scandinavian country before moving further south. The smoke was not expected to pose a health risk there.

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£19.3bn of fossil fuels imported by UK from authoritarian states in year since Ukraine war

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As Russian oil and gas imports fell petrostates including UAE, Qatar and Saudi Arabia increased exports to UK

UK fossil fuel imports from authoritarian petrostates surged to £19.3bn in the year following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, it can be revealed.

Efforts to end the purchasing of oil and gas from Russia appear to have resulted in a surge in imports from other authoritarian regimes, including Algeria, Bahrain, Kuwait, Libya, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), according to data from the Office for National Statistics analysed by DeSmog.

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Surviving the smoke-pocalypse 101: Californians offer advice to New Yorkers

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Orange smoky skies might be a new phenomenon for those on the east coast, but for the American west, it’s just the average summer

It was a sight all too familiar to Californians: orange skies and thick smoke blanketing the sky, emitting the eerily out-of-place smell of a campfire.

But this time the scenes were in New York City, as smoke from more than 400 wildfires darkened the famous skyline and gave the US its worst day of air pollution in recent history.

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Green party MP Caroline Lucas to stand down at next election

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Former party leader says she wants to ‘dedicate myself fully to climate and nature’

Caroline Lucas has said she feels more optimistic about the environment than when she first joined the Green party in 1986, as she prepares to retire from parliament after 13 years as her party’s only MP.

Lucas told the Guardian she felt “gratitude” for her career as the Greens’ first ever MP, adding that she took heart that many of the causes she has long championed were now the policies of both Labour and the Conservatives.

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Canada wildfires: blazes intensifying due to climate crisis, says Kamala Harris; Trudeau accuses opposition of inaction – as it happened

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US vice-president said administration working with Canada to tackle the crisis; Canadian PM accuses opposition leader of fighting climate plan

Protesters are set to descend upon the White House on Thursday amid growing anger among climate activists at Joe Biden for allowing a controversial gas pipeline in Appalachia to be fast-tracked.

Several hundred protesters are expected to demand Biden “reclaim his climate legacy” by blocking the Mountain Valley pipeline, a 300-mile pipeline that will bring fracked gas from West Virginia to southern Virginia.

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Army of fake social media accounts defend UAE presidency of climate summit

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Sultan Al Jaber – Cop28 president and CEO of state oil firm – is ‘ally the climate movement needs’, posts say

An army of fake social media accounts on Twitter and the blogging site Medium have been promoting and defending the controversial hosting of a UN climate summit by the United Arab Emirates.

The president of the Cop28 climate talks is Sultan Al Jaber, who is also the chief executive of the state oil giant Adnoc, which has major net zero-busting expansion plans.

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Canada wildfires smoke could linger over parts of US for days, officials warn

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Millions of Americans remain under air pollution warnings as schools close and air travel is disrupted

Toxic smoke from Canadian wildfires could linger over vast swathes of the US for days, officials warned, as millions of Americans remained under air pollution warnings.

Across the eastern US residents were again urged to stay inside and limit or avoid outdoor activities on Thursday, as schools in some cities closed, sporting events were canceled, and air travel was disrupted.

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Canada’s wildfires are part of our new climate reality, experts and officials say

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Canada is on track to experience its most severe wildfire season on record, and it’s part of a trend experts say will intensify

Canada’s ongoing wildfire season is a harbinger of our climate future, experts and officials say.

The fires are a “really clear sign of climate change”, said Mohammadreza Alizadeh, a researcher at McGill University in Montreal, who is also a postdoctoral associate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

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UN climate talks might avoid fossil fuel phase-out, says Cop28 official

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Majid Al Suwaidi says governments not in agreement yet over whether issue should be on agenda

UN climate talks this year might skirt the vital question of whether and how to phase out fossil fuels, as nations have not yet agreed to discuss the issue, one of the top officials hosting the talks has said.

Majid Al Suwaidi, director-general of the Cop28 climate talks for its host nation, the United Arab Emirates, said governments were not in agreement over whether the phaseout of fossil fuels should be on the agenda for the conference, which begins in November.

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UK government under fire for investing overseas aid in fossil fuel firms

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Taxpayer’s money also going to companies found to be flouting human rights in Kenya and DRC, says Commons committee

The UK government is under attack for investing taxpayers’ money in fossil fuel companies, a hospital in Kenya accused of imprisoning patients who couldn’t pay for treatment, and a business in the Democratic Republic of the Congo that exposed workers to dangerous chemicals and dumped untreated industrial waste.

MPs questioned the investments at a two-hour session in parliament on Tuesday, and excoriated Andrew Mitchell, minister for development, for making overseas aid available to a company owned by Africa’s richest man that is suspected of causing serious environmental damage.

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‘Absolute scandal’: UAE state oil firm able to read Cop28 climate summit emails

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Exclusive: UN conference president Sultan Al Jaber is also head of oil firm, which was consulted on how to respond to a media inquiry

The United Arab Emirates’ state oil company has been able to read emails to and from the Cop28 climate summit office and was consulted on how to respond to a media inquiry, the Guardian can reveal.

The UAE is hosting the UN climate summit in November and the president of Cop28 is Sultan Al Jaber, who is also chief executive of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc). The revelations have been called “explosive” and a “scandal” by lawmakers.

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England ‘4,700 years from building enough onshore windfarms’

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Thinktank says effective ban on planning permissions means country is way behind on much-needed renewable energy

It would take almost 4,700 years for England to build enough onshore windfarms to help meet the UK’s clean energy needs unless the government lifts an effective block on new turbines, according to the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR).

Only 17 small-scale onshore windfarms have been approved in England since 2015 when the government changed planning laws to create a de facto ban on onshore windfarms, according to the thinktank.

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Bureau of Meteorology puts Australia on ‘El Niño alert’

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Update warns there is a 70% chance of the climate system developing before the end of this year, raising the risk of heatwaves and bushfires

The Bureau of Meteorology has placed Australia on “El Niño alert”, warning there is now a 70% chance of the climate system developing before the end of this year.

El Niño tends to reduce rainfall and push up daytime temperatures in winter and spring, increasing the risk of bushfires, heatwaves and coral bleaching on the Great Barrier Reef.

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Iraq’s oil boom blamed for worsening water crisis in drought-hit south

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Pollution from gas flaring – the burning of natural gas associated with oil extraction – is also a major concern in the oil-rich but extremely dry south

Western oil companies are exacerbating water shortages and causing pollution in Iraq as they race to profit from rising oil prices after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Water scarcity has already displaced thousands and increased instability, according to international experts, while Iraq is now considered the fifth most vulnerable country to the climate crisis by the UN. In the oil-rich but extremely dry south, wetlands that used to feed entire communities are now muddy canals.

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Don’t Look Up director Adam McKay to triple donations to Just Stop Oil

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Hollywood director of climate crisis satire praised protestors for waking up ‘sleeping governments’ and will triple donations over weekend

The Hollywood director of Netflix film Don’t Look Up has pledged to triple donations to Just Stop Oil over the weekend, the group has said.

Adam McKay, who made the satire on the climate crisis as well as Step Brothers and The Big Short, said he stands with the protesters, praising them for waking up “sleeping governments”.

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Snow fly in US and Canada can detach its legs to survive, research shows

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Flies chilled to sub-zero temperatures amputate one or more of their six limbs to protect their internal organs

Flightless snow flies in the US and Canada can amputate their legs to survive as they begin to freeze, researchers have discovered.

Lab experiments in which the flies were chilled gradually to sub-zero temperatures revealed they can detach one or more of their six legs, an apparent “last-ditch tactic” to protect their internal organs from the advancing cold.

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Arizona limits future home-building in Phoenix area due to lack of groundwater

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Action set to slow population growth for one of the most rapidly expanding areas of the US amid ‘megadrought’

The state of Arizona has restricted future home-building in the Phoenix area due to a lack of groundwater, based on projections showing that wells will run dry under existing conditions.

The action by the Arizona department of water resources on Thursday is set to slow population growth for the Phoenix region, the state capital, home to 4.6 million people and one of the most rapidly expanding areas of the United States.

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