The Guardian Climate Change

Environment experts call for bold action as party attempts to revamp creaking infrastructure to hit net zero

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Bolster bus services, build cycle paths, impose frequent flyer levies and reopen old railway lines to decarbonise the UK transport system, environment experts are urging, as the Labour party begins to lay out its plans.

The government’s proposals for rail nationalisation are likely to feature in the king’s speech on Wednesday – but experts warn far bolder steps will be needed to overhaul the UK’s creaking infrastructure to meet the net zero carbon goal.

In France and Ireland, assemblies are laboratories of democracy. They can be here too, if politicians commit to adopting their ideas

Keir Starmer has made it clear he will govern for everyone, “country first, party second”. This is the kind of thing all new prime ministers say on the steps of Downing Street, but I sense that with Starmer it’s different. At some point in Labour’s first 100 days, I think the leadership will announce a major citizens’ assembly for the UK. His staff have been visiting the team behind the Irish citizens’ assembly, which created new political mandates on issues such as abortion and same-sex marriage. If Labour gets this right, it could be the key to galvanising the nation around its manifesto commitments.

Citizens’ assemblies are groups of people selected by lottery, much like jury service. They are demographically representative of the place in question, and they can help build consensus around divisive issues, and inform the public of policy nuances in areas where there is likely to be resistance and misinformation. They can also build solidarity between people, and give citizens a stake in political change. This is particularly relevant in areas such as health and net zero, on which communities can become divided at implementation. Just look at the conversation around vaccines, for instance, or the anti-Ulez protests.

Richard Wilson is the CEO of Iswe Foundation

Former NSW Liberal minister calls on renewables sector to ‘put your mouth where your money is’ in first speech as incoming Climate Change Authority chair

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The incoming Climate Change Authority chair Matt Kean has issued a call to arms for the clean energy industry to “enter the arena” and push back against vested interests seeking to erode public confidence in renewable energy.

Kean, a former energy minister in New South Wales and Liberal MP for another three weeks, told the Australian Clean Energy Summit 2024 in Sydney the industry had the science and the financial heft to counter the “propaganda” of vested fossil fuel interests.

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Artificial intelligence companies have lofty ambitions for what the technology could achieve, from curing diseases to eliminating poverty. But the energy required to power these innovations is threatening critical environmental targets.

Madeleine Finlay hears from the Guardian’s energy correspondent, Jillian Ambrose, and UK technology editor, Alex Hern, to find out how big AI’s energy problem is, and whether it can be solved before it is too late

The 71-year-old Dr Lee Coaldrake pleaded guilty to disturbing the legislature, an offence that dates back to the ‘pineapple rebellion’ of 1939

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A 71-year-old retired anaesthetist fined $5,000 for “disturbing” Queensland parliament has avoided jail for her role in a brief but raucous climate demonstration 20 months ago.

On Tuesday, Dr Lee Coaldrake pleaded guilty to disturbing the legislature, an offence created in response to the “pineapple rebellion” of 1939 in which a group of disgruntled farmers armed with barbed wire and batons tried to hold the government hostage – and one last used more than 30 years ago under the Joh Bjelke-Petersen government.

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Report led by Allan Fels suggests tolls could be reduced overall and made fairer by unifying the city’s paid roads under a consistent rate. Follow today’s news headlines live

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Weather update for Victoria and New South Wales: rain, floods, gusts and snow

Angus Hines, a senior meteorologist from the Bureau of Meteorology, spoke with ABC News Breakfast earlier to provide an update on the rainfall across Victoria.

That has given us minor to moderate flood warnings including in parts of the Yarra River this morning, as all of the rain from last night and yesterday evening drains out through the river network and out towards the ocean.

Take actions to protect your life and property against potential hazards caused by flooding.

Figure represents 64-66% of global output of tetrafluoromethane and hexafluoroethane, MIT study finds

Emissions of two of the most potent greenhouse gases have substantially increased in China over the last decade, a study has found.

Perfluorocarbons are used in the manufacturing processes for flat-panel TVs and semiconductors, or as by-products from aluminium smelting. They are far more effective at trapping heat in the atmosphere than CO2, and can persist in the Earth’s atmosphere for thousands of years, unlike CO2 which can persist for up to 200 years.

Melting of ice is slowing planet’s rotation and could disrupt internet traffic, financial transactions and GPS

The climate crisis is causing the length of each day to get longer, analysis shows, as the mass melting of polar ice reshapes the planet.

The phenomenon is a striking demonstration of how humanity’s actions are transforming the Earth, scientists said, rivalling natural processes that have existed for billions of years.

Heat advisories are in place from Texas to New York as major east coast cities under air quality alerts

Millions of Americans are bracing themselves for dangerous temperatures at the start of the working week as a heat dome blankets the midwest and eastern United States.

Heat advisories are in place in Kansas and Texas all the way to New York and South Carolina, as the area of high pressure that caused misery in the west last week slowly makes its way across the country.

Lending puts banks in ‘complete violation’ of commitments to Paris agreement, climate group says, even as overall funding to sector ebbs

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Australia’s big four banks are in “complete violation” of commitments to the Paris climate accord by funding fossil fuel expansion even as their overall lending to the sector continues to ebb, according to a new report.

The climate activist group Market Forces said in the report that the banks lent the industry $3.6bn in 2023, bringing their total loans to more than $61bn since 2015. Last year, though, was first year in the past eight that banks avoided explicitly backing a new or expanded fossil fuel project.

Blazing temperatures force people to find new ways to keep their pets safe, cool and occupied: ‘They sit, pee and go home’

Heat-resistant bootees, frozen bananas and pet sunscreen – it takes a lot to keep dogs safe during a nationwide heatwave. As pet owners across the US try to keep cool themselves, they’re changing dog-walking habits to accommodate boiling sidewalks or scorching parks, relying on indoor pet games to relish air conditioning, and embracing what has become a new normal for the dog days of summer, as extreme heat becomes an increasingly common reality.

Julie Nashawaty, a professional dog walker who lives in Boston, says her various trips to take pups out around the city have become shorter, as the temperatures reached 90 to 100 degrees this week. “These are really quick breaks, quick walks,” she said. “They sit in the shade under the tree, pee, and then it’s straight back home, where sometimes I’ll even put a cooling blanket on them.” She also puts little boots on dogs’ paws, so their bare feet don’t have to touch blazing concrete.

Senior climate figures welcome move after Conservative government largely left the role to junior ministers

Ed Miliband is to take personal control of the UK’s negotiations at vital international climate talks, in stark contrast to his Tory predecessors.

The energy security and net zero secretary will attend Cop29, this year’s UN climate summit, in Azerbaijan this November to head the UK’s delegation and meet political leaders from around the world.

Bill praised for targeting corporate climate responsibility but lawyers say it could allow polluters to avoid public scrutiny for longer

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The climate plans of Australian companies would be immune to private litigation for three years under an Albanese government proposal before parliament.

The grace period is included in legislation before the Senate that would expand the information companies must provide about the risk the climate crisis poses to their business and what they will do about it.

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Over 245 million Americans are expected to experience 90F temperatures early this week, with some as high as 105F

A heatwave that impacted the US west coast over the past week is now moving east into the midwest and south-east, as millions of Americans have been under a heat alert at some point in the past week.

“Numerous near record-tying/breaking high temperatures are possible over the central High Plains and Southeast Sunday, and along much of the East Coast by Monday,” reported the National Weather Service.

Initiative aims to coax visitors and local people into air-conditioned venues during sweltering summer afternoons

A little after 3pm on a weekday afternoon, the footsteps and voices that echoed along the hallowed halls of the Prado were silenced by a series of percussive detonations that could have been mistaken for an indoor fireworks display.

The source of the disruption, however, was not a vandal or a protester. Watched over by the eight muses for whom the Madrid museum’s Sala de las Musas is named, a tall, famous and angular flamenco dancer called El Yiyo was clicking, clapping, stomping and pirouetting before a rapt, grateful and slightly bemused audience. A few feet away sat the renowned guitarist Rafael Andújar, who had ambled into the sala a few moments earlier, taken his seat and begun to fill the air with notes.

A British geneticist scoured the globe for diverse grains in the 1920s. His research could be vital as the climate changes

A hundred years ago, the plant scientist Arthur Watkins launched a remarkable project. He began collecting samples of wheat from all over the globe, nagging consuls and business agents across the British empire and beyond to supply him with grain from local markets.

His persistence was exceptional and, a century later, it is about to reap dramatic results. A UK-Chinese collaboration has sequenced the DNA of all the 827 kinds of wheat, assembled by Watkins, that have been nurtured at the John Innes Centre near Norwich for most of the past century.

The new foreign secretary has promised to put the UK back on the world stage. Water should be at the top of his agenda

David Lammy made clear in his first weekend as foreign secretary that he would “begin with three resets – with Europe, on climate and with the global south” – to put Britain “back” on the world stage (“David Lammy faces a world in turmoil”). But this is impossible without a reset on water.

Lammy is coming into post at a critical moment. The escalating climate crisis, the threat of future health pandemics and global instability threaten Labour’s vision of a world free from poverty on a livable planet. No one can adapt to a world without water, and progress on tackling the climate crisis and rebuilding global relationships will forever be limited without a reset on water.

NSW enacts highest number of new laws among states, with climate protesters disproportionately affected, report finds

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Brad Homewood describes his first steps into a maximum security facility, where he spent the first three weeks of a two-month jail sentence, as intimidating.

“You’re in there with the worst of the worst,” he says. “There’s a lot of violence in there. I didn’t experience any personally, but you hear it, especially after lockdown.”

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Ed Miliband sets new rules on solar panels and approves three giant solar farms as Labour seeks to end years of Tory inaction

Keir Starmer’s new Labour government today unveils plans for a “rooftop revolution” that will see millions more homes fitted with solar panels in order to bring down domestic energy bills and tackle the climate crisis.

The energy secretary, Ed Miliband, also took the hugely controversial decision this weekend to approve three massive solar farms in the east of England that had been blocked by Tory ministers.

Johannes-Harm Hovinga has to take painkillers to complete 20-day artistic protest at Museum Arnhem

Every day for the last two weeks, Johannes-Harm Hovinga has sat at a raised table in Museum Arnhem, using a two-hole page puncher to systematically perforate the 7,705-page sixth assessment report produced by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

He has printed it out on coloured paper and the result is a vibrant heap piling up at the artist’s feet.