The Guardian Climate Change

Kamala Harris and her running mate Tim Walz sat down with CNN’s Dana Bash in a pre-recorded interview that airs Thursday night. Plus: peacocks in Scotland

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Good morning.

Tonight, the US vice-president, Kamala Harris, will give her first major interview since becoming the Democratic presidential nominee. The pre-recorded interview, which was scheduled after some criticism of Harris’s reluctance to expose herself to media scrutiny, will be with CNN’s Dana Bash and will include Harris’s running mate, Tim Walz.

What should we expect from this interview? This will be a big test of Harris’s credibility after a prolonged honeymoon that has seen her surge ahead of Donald Trump in opinion polls. “This is the first time she is going to take questions,” said David Chalian, CNN’s political director. “Now is the opportunity to hear her ruminate aloud, with Dana asking her about her policy positions, her plans for the future, her plans for the country, in an unscripted setting.”

Are Republicans happy with this setup? Republicans have long called for Harris, who has had a variable performance in past televised one-on-ones, to take questions live from the press. Some are mocking the setup of the interview, accusing Harris of being unwilling to risk a high-profile grilling without the protective presence of Walz.

What do the Arlington officials say happened? Arlington said in a statement that one of its representatives was “verbally abused” and pushed aside after telling two Trump staffers that only cemetery representatives were allowed to take video and photographs in section 60, an area where recent US casualties, mostly from Iraq and Afghanistan, are buried. “Federal law prohibits political campaign or election-related activities within army national military cemeteries,” the statement said.

How has the Trump team responded? JD Vance, Trump’s running mate, dismissed the row as media exaggeration over “a little disagreement”. He later accused the media of “acting like Donald Trump filmed a TV commercial at a gravesite”.

After the polar blast of a few weeks back, we have opened our eyes to the luminous full bloom of premature spring

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These unseasonal late-winter days of warmth and clear skies, of the sudden necessity of shorts and T-shirts for the morning dog-walk, are at once glorious and somewhat disconcerting.

Spring – the season of renewal, of awakening, of birth and perhaps re-birth – demands to be celebrated. But somehow this year, all of its ridiculously early harbingers feel double-edged for their presaging of the realities of climate change and sea-level rise.

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Had fires been ranked alongside countries they would have been world’s fourth-largest emitter, study finds

Wildfires that swept Canada’s woodlands last year released more greenhouse gases than some of the largest emitting countries, a study found on Wednesday, calling into question national emissions budgets that rely on forests as carbon stores.

At 647 megatonnes, the carbon released in last year’s wildfires exceeded those of seven of the 10 largest national emitters in 2022, including Germany, Japan and Russia, the study published in the journal Nature found.

City-wide initiative gives restaurants free solar panels to ‘support the community’ during storms and power outages

As a restaurant owner in New Orleans, Shaka Gerel is no stranger to hurricanes.

Afrodisiac, the Jamaican Creole fusion food truck he started with his wife Caron, served jerk chicken and crawfish etouffee, rain or shine, for years. When particularly bad storms took out the city’s power, the couple sometimes used their bright purple truck’s generator to offer their neighbors a place to charge their phones or refill on ice.

Absence of legally binding targets for greenhouse gas reductions from 2031-49 deemed unconstitutional

South Korea’s constitutional court has ruled that part of the country’s climate law does not conform with protecting the constitutional rights of future generations, an outcome local activists are calling a “landmark decision”.

The unanimous verdict concludes four years of legal battles and sets a significant precedent for future climate-related legal actions in the region.

Campaigners hail Labour’s ‘proactive approach’ after series of policy U-turns under Conservatives

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The UK government is considering making further commitments on cutting greenhouse gas emissions, likely to be announced at the UN climate summit this year.

It is hoped the plan will help kickstart global ambitions on cutting emissions and encourage other countries to follow suit.

Exclusive: Over $12bn in subsidies awarded for technologies like carbon capture experts call ‘colossal waste of money’

• How Exxon chases billions in US subsidies for a ‘climate solution’ that helps it drill more oil

A handful of wealthy polluting countries led by the US are spending billions of dollars of public money on unproven climate solutions technologies that risk further delaying the transition away from fossil fuels, new analysis suggests.

These governments have handed out almost $30bn in subsidies for carbon capture and fossil hydrogen over the past 40 years, with hundreds of billions potentially up for grabs through new incentives, according to a new report by Oil Change International (OCI), a non-profit tracking the cost of fossil fuels.

North Atlantic populations are at a historic low, and this year 33 of the country’s rivers were closed during the fishing season as salmon farming and the climate crisis threaten the fish’s future

“What is Norway without the fjords and the mountains?” asks Ann-Britt Bogen from her candlelit kitchen, the wild Gaula River flowing by outside the window, the hillside covered by low-lying cloud. For centuries, the river, which runs 153km (95 miles) from the mountains near the Swedish border to Trondheim fjord, has attracted salmon – and fishers – year after year.

But this spring the salmon, particularly the medium and larger-sized fish, did not come back from the ocean, raising such alarm over the collapse of the salmon population that the river, along with dozens of others in central and southern Norway, was abruptly closed for the first time.

Climate experts raise red flags as oil giant spends millions lobbying while touting ‘underperforming’ carbon capture

When the oil giant ExxonMobil sponsored an event at the re-energizing Democratic national convention (DNC) in Chicago last week, it was disrupted by climate activists outraged that big oil was invited on to an influential political platform. “Exxon lies, people die,” protesters shouted before being evicted.

The event included a “fireside chat” with Vijay Swarup, the company’s senior climate strategy and technology director. Swarup is a 30-year Exxon veteran who headed the company’s research and development team for just under a decade, and oversaw initiatives on biofuels, carbon capture and storage (CCS) and hydrogen.

Greek authorities have started collecting hundreds of thousands of dead fish that poured into a tourist port in the central coastal city of Volos this week after being displaced from their usual freshwater habitats during flooding last year. 'It spans kilometres,' a city council member, Stelios Limnios, told Reuters. 'It’s not just along the coast, but also in the centre of the Pagasetic Gulf,' he said, referring to the waters off Volos, where the coast is lined with holiday homes. There have been warnings that the rotting fish could create an environmental disaster for other species in the area

• Greece tourist port flooded with hundreds of thousands of dead fish

A day after agreement was ratified at the Pacific Island Forum, the country’s climate minister says ‘root cause of climate change’ must be addressed

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Tuvalu’s climate minister has declared that “opening, subsidising and exporting fossil fuels is immoral and unacceptable”, just a day after Australia ratified a climate and security deal with the low-lying Pacific nation.

The Australian prime minister, Anthony Albanese, welcomed the agreement with Tuvalu on Wednesday, saying Pacific island countries were “fully aware of the commitment that we have to climate action” but gas would continue to play a role.

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Researchers warn Asia will become an increasingly dangerous place to live until fossil fuels are replaced

The “hyper-violent” Typhoon Gaemi was made fiercer and more likely to strike by the climate crisis, scientists have found. They said “Asia will become an increasingly dangerous place to live until fossil fuels are replaced”.

The typhoon hit the Philippines, Taiwan and Hunan province in China in late July, with floods and landslides destroying homes, killing at least 100 people and affecting millions. Winds reaching 145mph (233 km/h) sank two large ships, while floods in Manila were as deep as a one-storey building.

Authorities in Volos say affected area spans kilometres and could cause environmental disaster for other species

Greek authorities have started collecting hundreds of thousands of dead fish that poured into a tourist port in the central city of Volos this week after being displaced from their usual freshwater habitats during flooding last year.

The floating carcasses created a silvery blanket across the port and a stench that alarmed residents and authorities who raced to scoop them up before the odour reached nearby restaurants and hotels.

A new report claims that fewer than 4% of London fashion week designers have published emissions reduction targets, compared with 44% of all UK companies. Why is the industry so slow to reform?

In just over a fortnight, some of the UK’s biggest fashion brands will showcase their new collections at London fashion week. Organised by the British Fashion Council (BFC), it’s always an exciting moment, bringing together some of the country’s top creative talent. But it also highlights entrenched problems in fashion. Only 3.4% of BFC members have published public targets to reduce their emissions aligned with the Paris Agreement, according to a new report by ethical fashion not-for-profit Collective Fashion Justice.

The BFC is a body of organisations from the industry who are responsible for overseeing, supporting and advising on the key issues facing the British designer industry, with members including publishing houses, high street brands and retail destinations, including household names like Yoox, Net-a-Porter and Savile Row. Of these members, only five brands – Burberry, Mulberry, Margaret Howell, Rixo and Kyle Ho – have published science-based targets aligned with the Paris agreement, which would, according to CFJ, “make them effective targets worth working towards”. By stark contrast, 44% of all UK companies have a structured plan to reduce their carbon footprint and climate impact, according to recent data from the Climate Ready Index.

They are eco marvels but they are fast disappearing. Sophie Hunter explains why she is using film, music, a few tonnes of salt and a reimagined wife of Lot to sound the alarm

Eerie, desolate wastes in old novels, salt marshes are still seen as flat, grey and inhospitable landscapes today. Rainforests, meadows, oceans and even peatlands have their celebrity champions. But now there is someone to speak up for the magnificence of the tidal marsh: Sophie Hunter, theatre-maker and opera director, hopes her new performance installation will make us take more care of these crucial, carbon-sequestering coastal guardians.

A salt marsh doesn’t attract attention, perhaps because not much seems to happen in these expanses of grass and creek. “And then it disappears twice a day, which is extraordinary,” says Hunter, sitting miles from any marsh in a north London pub, visibly refreshed after her return from her traditional family holiday, swimming, sailing and savouring the salt marshes of a location she asks me not to reveal, with her husband, Benedict Cumberbatch, and their three sons. “Salt marshes are the last wild places in the UK. These liminal intertidal spaces have often been associated with outcasts, people living on the fringes of society. How can we shift our perception to realising how much value they have on so many levels?”

Extinct in central Europe for 300 years, 36 northern bald ibis are following an ultralight aircraft on their long-forgotten migration route from Austria to Spain

The northern bald ibis was extinct in central Europe for 300 years. Now, it has returned – and scientist “foster parents” aboard a tiny plane are teaching the birds to fly their long-forgotten migration routes.

Thirty-six of these endangered birds are now following an ultralight aircraft 1,740 miles (2,800km ) from Austria to Spain, on a trip that could take up to 50 days to complete.

Windell Curole built a vast levee to protect his district from disappearing into the ocean – despite federal resistance to his plan. Had he listened to officials, he says, ‘we wouldn’t have a community’

On 29 August 2021, as Hurricane Ida made landfall on Louisiana’s Gulf coast, 69-year-old Windell Curole sought refuge with others at the three-story Lady of the Sea hospital in Galliano, located 90 minutes south-west of New Orleans.

As Curole looked out the window, watching Ida’s rain hammer the grass, a question tormented him: would the levees that encircled his community be tall enough to hold back the water that was surging toward them?

Why have politicians outsourced the most important issue of our time to private agencies and individuals? We can’t do it all - this way lies disaster

There are several services and assets I would like to see nationalised. But at the top of my list is neither water, nor trains, nor development land, much as I’d like to see them brought under national or local public ownership. Above all, I want to see the nationalisation of my own business: environmental persuasion. I love my job. But I’m not very good at it. None of us is.

We face the greatest predicament humankind has confronted: the erosion and possible collapse of our life-support systems. Its speed and scale have taken even scientists by surprise. The potential impacts are greater than any recent pandemic, or any war we have suffered. Yet the effort to persuade people of the need for action has been left almost entirely to either the private or voluntary sectors. And it simply does not work.

Madrid study finds people from below-average income groups more likely to die in heatwaves

Scorching temperatures across Europe have killed tens of thousands of people in recent years. But as fatalities rise, researchers are finding that one group is disproportionately bearing the brunt of extreme heat: those living in poverty.

“It’s common sense,” said Julio Díaz Jiménez, an investigative professor at Madrid’s Carlos III health institute. “A heatwave is not the same when you’re in a shared room with three other people and no air conditioning, as when you’re in a villa with access to a pool and air conditioning.”

Moisture from crops drives up already high humidity in areas where 55 million are under extreme heat alerts

You won’t believe your ears, but corn is making the extreme heat the US midwest is battling feel more intense, according to experts.

The moisture – or “sweat” – that corn and other crops release in high temperatures is contributing to the humidity in the air in the midwest US, where 55 million people have been under alerts for extreme heat in recent days. The increase in moisture pushes up dew points, making it harder for water vapor to condensate – and for it to feel cooler.