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A daily summary of our news plus bite-sized updates from around the world.

Scientists say keeping temperature rises to 1.5C is vital physical threshold for planet that cannot be negotiated

The 1.5C temperature limit to be discussed by world leaders at critical meetings this weekend is a vital physical threshold for the planet’s climate, and not an arbitrary political construct that can be haggled over, leading climate scientists have warned.

World leaders are meeting in Rome and Glasgow over the next four days to thrash out a common approach aimed at holding global temperature rises to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels, the lower of two limits set out in the 2015 Paris climate agreement.

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Glasgow 2021 must be the moment when the promise of Paris 2015 becomes real – history will not forgive us otherwise

Summits do not always live up to the name. They can get bogged down in detail and disagreement, never really reaching altitude.

That is often the case with the annual UN climate summits known simply as the Cop, which have earned a reputation since the first was held 26 years ago for being bewildering marathons that overrun and underdeliver.

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Jamen Percy was taking photos of surfers at Freshwater beach on the northern beaches of Sydney last week when he noticed the water turning blue – he was witnessing a rare bioluminescence bloom

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As delegates descend on Glasgow next week to attempt to finalise the Paris Agreement’s Article 6, the absence of one long-time carbon markets negotiator who died tragically earlier this year from COVID-19 will weigh heavily on their work.

Regulated entities saw their California Carbon Allowance (CCA) net short position nearly halve this week amid reported exchange-for-physical deals, while financial entities saw their net length jump close to an all-time high, according to US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) data published Friday.

A project developer has secured a deal with a host country government to make corresponding adjustments (CA) to its national GHG inventory when a carbon outcome is sold on the voluntary carbon market (VCM).

The conservative-dominated US Supreme Court on Friday agreed to hear a legal challenge that would kneecap the EPA in regulating CO2 emissions or allow Congress to delegate such authority to the agency, in a potentially ominous sign for the country’s already minimal climate policy future.

Prime minister says ‘too many countries doing too little’ amid last-minute talks before summit

World leaders have been warned that Cop26 must “mark the beginning of the end of climate change” amid last-minute talks that could help determine the future of the planet.

With the long-awaited environmental summit due to start on Monday, Boris Johnson issued his plea while saying “too many countries are still doing too little”.

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California’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) posted a credit surplus during the second quarter of 2021, according to state data posted Friday, bucking traders’ expectations of a deficit as renewable diesel (RD), renewable natural gas (RNG), and electricity volumes shot up.

The PM should be taking a higher 2030 emissions reduction target to Cop26. No ifs, buts or maybes. Yet he squibbed it

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When Scott Morrison strode into his press conference room on Tuesday to confirm Australia would be taking a net zero emissions target to the Cop26 in Glasgow, the prime minister was running on high revs.

Possibly this was an excess of adrenalin. Big parliamentary day and all that. But he looked nervous. Morrison rarely looks nervous, so this presentation was memorable.

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Foraging bees keep away from centre of colony when infested with mites, find researchers

In the past 18 months humans have become all too familiar with the term “social distancing”. But it turns out we are not the only ones to give our peers a wide berth when our health may be at risk: research suggests honeybees do it too.

Scientists have found that when a hive of honeybees is under threat from the mite Varroa destructor – a parasite linked to the collapse of honeybee colonies – the bees respond by changing the way they interact with one another.

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Switzerland's recent bilateral crediting deals send no signal for decarbonisation at home, while for the countries hosting the emission reductions the agreements close some of their best available options to implement their NDCs and raise ambition in the future, according to researchers at NewClimate Institute.

Nations are set to gather in Glasgow next week as the UNFCCC convenes its 26th Conference of the Parties, with pressure building on negotiators to agree a set of rules governing international emissions trading as private sector initiatives threaten to bypass the UN process.

Prime minister on way to Italy says our civilisation could mimic the decline of the Roman empire ‘unless we get this right’

Boris Johnson has likened the globe’s battle against the climate emergency to a football team losing 5-1 at half-time, as he flew to Rome for a world leaders’ gathering seen as crucial for setting the tone for next week’s Cop26 climate summit.

Speaking to reporters on the flight to Italy for the G20 meeting, Johnson conceded that he had not always been convinced about climate change, and that his mind had been changed in part by a briefing given by government scientific advisers soon after he became prime minister.

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Yes, there have been compromises. But this is the biggest ever plan to curb emissions and, ahead of Cop26, will send a signal to the world

Move aside, Donald Trump: there’s a new American for the world’s progressives to hate. What’s more, he’s not even a Republican, but rather a member of Joe Biden’s Democratic party. He’s Joe Manchin, who represents West Virginia in the US Senate – the body that’s split 50-50, and which Democrats only control if every single senator stays onside. It’s thanks to him – aided and abetted by the Arizona’ Democrat senator Kyrsten Sinema – that Biden cannot take his place at the Cop26 summit in Glasgow proudly pointing to a raft of measures, signed and sealed, by which the US government will tackle the climate crisis.

Biden had a whole plan worked out, and most Democrats backed him. But Manchin refused to say yes. He insisted that Biden drop perhaps the most powerful element of his climate programme: rewards for energy companies that shift to renewable sources, and fines for those that stick with fossil fuels. Manchin killed that off, perhaps because he represents a state that still has some coal mining, perhaps because he has big personal investments in coal, perhaps because he has received fat donations from the fossil fuel industry. Or maybe just because West Virginia voted by an almost 40-point margin for Trump last year and so, to keep winning, Manchin has to look more like a Republican than a Democrat.

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Swedish activist says she has not officially been invited to Glasgow climate summit

Greta Thunberg has joined protesters at a “climate justice memorial” in the City of London to protest against the financing of fossil fuel industries ahead of the Cop26 summit.

Activists from environmental groups including Pacific Climate Warriors, Coal Action Network and Extinction Rebellion laid wreaths and flowers at the entrance of the Lloyd’s headquarters.

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Ten people detained in Essex and nine in Hertfordshire after group’s 16th action on UK roads

Insulate Britain protesters have been arrested walking on to the M25 in several locations, causing major disruption on London’s orbital motorway days before the start of the Cop26 climate summit.

In driving rain just after 8am on Friday, two groups affiliated with the climate activist movement walked between lanes of oncoming traffic at junctions 28 and 29 of the M25 in Essex.

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Pope Francis has urged world leaders to offer 'concrete hope' to future generations. In a special message for BBC Radio 4's Thought for the Day, before the Cop26 summit in Glasgow next week, the pontiff said climate change and Covid-19 had 'raised numerous doubts and concerns about ... the way we organise our societies'. These global crises could only be overcome through 'a renewed sense of shared responsibility for our world', he added 

• Pope Francis urges leaders to take ‘radical’ climate action at Cop26

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EUAs traded moderately firmer on Friday morning as bargain-hunting traders bought in response to Thursday's price decline, while energy markets continued to fall across the board.