The Guardian Climate Change

As prices soar, farmers are facing the worst harvests in decades, while traditional production methods passed down for generations are being lost

Edilberto Morales has been farming cocoa, the key ingredient in chocolate, in the Lacadon jungle in southern Mexico for decades. Typically, he harvests about 1,000kg of cocoa pods a year, but only produced half that last year, due to drought. It was one of the worst harvests of his lifetime.

“Climate change has affected us a lot,” says Morales, from the town of Maravilla Tenejapa in Chiapas, near the border with Guatemala. “The lack of rain directly affects the solidification of the flower. Without rain, cocoa pods do not develop in seasons of intense heat. On this plot, we used to harvest 1,000kg a year on average; the most drastic change was the last harvest in 2024 when we harvested 500kg.”

Greenpeace urges Labour to ‘fulfil international obligations’ as critics question accuracy of official data

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The UK’s worst methane hotspots include the last coalmine, livestock farm clusters, landfills, power plants and North Sea oil and gas wells, according to an analysis.

The process has also thrown up serious doubts over the UK’s ability to calculate its methane emissions.

Climate scientists have already predicted that 2024 will be the hottest year ever

Japan has recorded its hottest summer on record after a sweltering three months marked by thousands of instances of “extreme heat”, with meteorologists warning that unseasonably high temperatures will continue through the autumn.

The average temperature in June, July and August was 1.76C higher than the average recorded between 1991 and 2020, the Japan meteorological agency said, according to Kyodo news agency.

Seabirds are in a precarious position as their breeding areas are threatened by climate breakdown and overfishing

Five seabirds have been added to the UK’s conservation red list, meaning they are at dire risk of local extinction.

The government has been urged to act as the arctic tern, Leach’s storm petrel, common gull, great skua and great black-backed gull join other seabird species such as the puffin on the list after severe population declines.

Fourteen hiker deaths reported in the park this season, with total fatalities at almost the annual average of 15

More than one dozen park-goers have died in Grand Canyon national park this summer, with three perishing in just over one week in August, as weather extremes linked to climate change make for increasingly dangerous conditions.

With 14 deaths reported in the park this season, total fatalities have already almost reached the annual average of 15, the Hill reported.

The 2024 winter was the second hottest on record since weather data collection began in 1910

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Australia recorded its hottest August on record, with the national temperature 3C above average, as September kicked off with total fire bans in parts of New South Wales on Monday.

Bureau of Meteorology data showed average temperatures across the nation in August were 3.03C above the long-term average, easily beating the previous 2.56C record set in 2009.

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August was a month of extremes, from unseasonal heat to damaging winds. We have no choice but to adapt to the instability – and fire risk – brought by climate change

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Heavy winds struck south-east Australia over the weekend as a series of cold fronts moved across the continent. It followed a high fire danger in Sydney and other parts of New South Wales last week, and a fire in south-west Sydney that threatened homes.

The severe weather rounds out a weird winter across Australia. The nation’s hottest ever winter temperature was recorded when Yampi Sound in Western Australia reached 41.6C on Tuesday. Elsewhere across Australia, winter temperatures have been way above average.

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Campaigners say there’s impatience about Australia’s reluctance to stop ‘opening, subsidising and exporting fossil fuels’

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Anthony Albanese had just finished briefing Pacific island leaders on Australia’s bid to host a UN climate summit when one of his counterparts made a pointed intervention.

The president of the Marshall Islands, Hilda Heine, began her speech diplomatically, saying she was “grateful” for the update and hoped the initiative was a “true” partnership with the Pacific.

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Hurricane Dorian ravaged the Bahamas in 2019. Its poorest survivors are being pushed from one shantytown to the next

Shaquille Joseph knew things were profoundly wrong, irreversibly so, when he heard the bubbling.

The noise had no logical origin. It wasn’t the sound of a tidal wave, roaring towards his house, but a steady fizzing, like a pot of water boiling over in the next room. Moments before, Joseph had been ready to fall asleep in his bedroom. But now he got up and went to the window.

Unseasonably strong winds and record-breaking warm weather has been forecast to continue through the weekend

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Winter has ended in Australia with weather records broken across the country – with expectations of August temperature records being broken on the final day of the month.

Amid wild winds in the country’s south, a warm run of weather was expected to continue through the weekend in central and southern Queensland, along with north-eastern New South Wales. Brisbane is expected to see multiple days of over 30C.

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Heat building up in country’s centre and driving south-east is causing ‘really unusual’ heatwave that is breaking winter records

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Australia’s winter runs from June to August, but swathes of the country have felt like summer the past week with temperatures topping 40C and records tumbling.

“It doesn’t matter how you slice and dice it,” said Dr Linden Ashcroft, a climate scientist at the University of Melbourne. “The temperature records have been gobsmacking.”

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The evacuation of Pokrovsk, the Israeli raid in the West Bank, the Paralympic Games in Paris and the Notting Hill carnival: the last seven days as captured by the world’s leading photojournalists

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It’s really not cool

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More electricity demand and lower than usual generation from two renewable sources raises questions about climate targets

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Greenhouse gas emissions from Australia’s ageing coal-fired power plants rose slightly in the first half of the year, reversing years of declining pollution from the power section and raising questions about the country’s ability to meet its climate targets.

An increase in electricity consumption across the country and lower than usual wind and hydro output led to an increase in coal generation. It pushed up emissions from the electricity grid between January and June.

Many of the roughly 100,000 units are illegal and do not conform to codes, making them a hazard for fires and floods

Josh Alba had lived in an illegal basement apartment in Queens, New York, for almost five years. Despite the low ceilings, he savored his chance to afford housing without roommates. But his tenure there ended during Hurricane Ida.

He’d been asleep on his couch as the rain started falling. He only woke up when his cat smacked him in the face, and he noticed water coming in from outside, rising to at least an inch on the floor.

Nikos Zorzos calls for urgent action to halt construction spree he says presents existential threat to Greek island

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Santorini, the island so Instagrammable it has become Greece’s most popular destination, will not be able to “save itself” if runaway development – the most tangible effect of overtourism – is not instantly curbed, the mayor has warned.

With more than 3.4 million tourists expected to visit the Cycladic hotspot this year, Nikos Zorzos called for urgent action to stop a construction spree that risks spurring the island’s ruination.

Research makes clear that the problem caused by sewage and climate change is more urgent than previously thought

Almost half of all fish species and 10% of mammals rely on rivers and lakes for survival but a combination of climate change and pollution is threatening their existence. Although scientists knew that pollution and warmer water damage life in freshwater they had not realised the combination of the two further hastens the destruction of much aquatic life, especially the diversity of small creatures which fish need for food.

Humans, as happened at the Olympic Games, can choose to avoid endangering themselves by not entering polluted water, but fish in the River Seine in Paris have no options. They are gradually being wiped out by the combination of warmer water and pollution.

Democratic nominees talk to CNN’s Dana Bash on Thursday about fracking, the US middle class and ‘weapons of war’

In a primetime spot on CNN Thursday evening, Kamala Harris and Tim Walz sat for their first interview together as the Democratic ticket, taking questions from the anchor Dana Bash on a range of important issues, including their plans for day one if they win the race, the approach to the war in Gaza, and how Joe Biden passed the baton.

With just over two months until voters will head to the polls on 5 November – and even less time before some will mail in their ballots – the Democratic candidates for president and vice-president made good on a promise to speak more candidly about how they will tackle the US’s most pressing problems.

In sit-down with CNN’s Dana Bash, vice-president defends shifts on policy issues and her support for Biden

Kamala Harris sat for her first interview as the Democratic presidential nominee with CNN’s Dana Bash alongside her running mate, Tim Walz, on Thursday, and defended her shifts on certain policy issues over the years and her support for Joe Biden.

In the interview, which was taped from Savannah, Georgia, earlier Thursday, the vice-president said her highest priority upon taking office would be to “support and strengthen the middle class” through policies including increasing the child tax credit, curtailing price gouging on everyday goods and increasing access to affordable housing – all policies that she has announced since she started campaigning for the presidency.

Meteorologists predict scorching temperatures for the weekend before weather cools just in time for Labor Day

Millions of Americans will continue to swelter as Labor Day weekend approaches, with much of the country under some kind of excessive heat watch.

The brutal heatwave the US midwest suffered earlier this week has spread to the eastern half of the country, with more than 20 million people under some kind of a heat alert.