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What happened at Cop26 – day three at a glance
Summary of the main developments on the third day of the UN climate summit in Glasgow
Country pledges at Cop26 would limit global temperature rises to below 2C, the first time the world has been on such a trajectory, according to research from the University of Melbourne.
More than 20 countries and financial institutions have vowed to halt all financing for fossil fuel development overseas and divert the estimated $8bn a year to green energy. The signatories include the US, UK, Denmark and some developing countries, including Costa Rica. The European Investment Bank is one of the financial institutions involved.
Continue reading...Glasgow activists ‘re-open’ disused building to house Cop26 visitors
Council property has been restored to habitability by locals after reports of activists having to sleep rough
Activists in Glasgow have “re-opened” a disused building to house climate justice campaigners visiting the city for the Cop26 summit, as those forced to camp because of lack of affordable accommodation face plummeting temperatures.
The Glasgow city council property in Tradeston, a former homeless services unit, has been restored to habitability over the past few days by a group of local activists frustrated at reports of visitors forced to sleep rough.
Continue reading...UK releases 2022 carbon allowance auction calendar
Insulate Britain’s protests are disruptive, annoying – and justified | Owen Jones
Like the suffragettes, protesters are castigated for taking direct action. But how else will we wake up to the climate emergency?
Few people today would claim not to sympathise with the suffragettes – but this wasn’t true at the time. When parliament debated women’s struggle for the vote in 1914, Lord Robert Cecil – later a recipient of the Nobel peace prize, who was in fact supportive of women’s suffrage – declared that “suffragist outrages” were a “very serious evil” with the aim of “anarchy”. There was only one solution “to prevent them from committing crimes”, he said: “deportation”. When Reginald McKenna, then home secretary in HH Asquith’s Liberal government, offered four options to deal with them – letting them die (“That is, I should say, at the present moment the most popular, judging by the number of letters I have received”); deportation; treating them as “lunatics”; or giving them the franchise – his fellow parliamentarians laughed uproariously at each.
The suffragettes, it should be said, did not sit around singing kumbaya, and were far more militant than contemporary protest movements in Britain. They committed arson, including the burning of several private homes – with five resulting deaths –and smashed up art galleries and museums. They attempted to destroy Glasgow’s aqueduct and attacked churches. Targets for bombing included the extremely busy street outside the Bank of England, although the device was defused, while a train driver was nearly killed by another bomb. Damned at the time as terrorists and anarchists, the militants are today seen sympathetically by history. As the cheerful “soldiers in petticoats” in Disney’s Mary Poppins predicted: “Our daughters’ daughters will adore us, and they’ll sing in grateful chorus: ‘Well done, Sister Suffragette!”
Continue reading...2021: A year of wild weather
Why activists fear little-known treaty could slow fossil fuel phase-out
Vital rulings on the world’s energy future are being made behind closed doors and others may be unknown
The energy charter treaty (ECT) was signed in 1994 to protect the interests of western investors pouring money into the oil- and gas-rich nations of the former Soviet Union. Entering into force in 1998, the treaty generated few cases and even less attention.
That changed in 2014 when investors in the energy firm Yukos were awarded a record $50bn payout after a tribunal found that Vladimir Putin’s government had expropriated their assets to prevent Yukos’s then chief executive, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, from entering politics. The European court of human rights reached a similar verdict in the same week.
Continue reading...Secretive court system poses threat to Paris climate deal, says whistleblower
Treaty allows energy corporations to sue governments for billions over policies that could hurt their profits
A secretive investor court system poses a real threat to the Paris climate agreement, activists have said, as governments taking action to phase out fossil fuels face a slew of multimillion-dollar lawsuits for lost profits.
New data seen by the Guardian shows a surge in cases under the energy charter treaty (ECT), an obscure international agreement that allows energy corporations to sue governments over policies that could hurt their profits.
Continue reading...Leatherback turtle nest numbers in south Florida double previous record
Biologists heartened as 79 nests of endangered reptile recorded in Broward county this year after low of 12 in 2017.
The number of leatherback turtle nests found along some south Florida beaches reached record numbers this year, surprising biologists.
The 79 nests laid by endangered turtles along beaches in Broward county this year is nearly double the previous record, according to the South Florida SunSentinel. The previous record was 46 in 2012, and the record low for leatherback nests was 12 in 2017.
Continue reading...Cop26: finance, protest and indigenous voices – in pictures
The Guardian’s picture editors select recent images from UN climate change conference
Continue reading...COP26: What do the poorest countries want from climate summit?
Twenty countries pledge end to finance for overseas fossil fuel projects
UK among countries at Cop26 vowing to divert funds to low-carbon energy from 2022
More than 20 countries and financial institutions will halt all financing for fossil fuel development overseas and divert the spending to green energy instead from next year.
The move marks a significant boost for the transition to clean fuels. The Guardian understands the countries involved include the US, UK, Denmark and some developing countries that would receive such finance, including Costa Rica. The European Investment Bank is one of the financial institutions involved.
Continue reading...Activists interrupt Rishi Sunak's Cop26 speech with fossil fuel questions – video
Climate activists were removed from a Rishi Sunak photo opportunity after questioning the chancellor on government deals with fossil fuel companies.
Fatima Ibrahim, the co-founder of the UK's Green New Deal movement, posted the moment on Twitter. 'Is he that scared of young people asking him questions?', she wrote
Continue reading...Galapagos marine reserve: Conservationists hail expansion
COP26: What's the climate impact of private jets?
COP26 climate change summit: So far, so good-ish
Over half of CERs from Indian wind projects non-additional, report finds
RGGI prices boomerang after Virginia elects GOP governor, House
COP26: Vulnerable countries criticise net zero plans for moving goalposts, emphasising undeveloped tech
Euro Markets: Midday Update
Cop26: Sharma’s claim bankers are ‘new Swampys’ is appropriation, says activist
Summit president’s comments on finance day accused of trying to commercialise climate activism
Alok Sharma, the UK cabinet minister and president of the Cop26 summit, has been accused of appropriating the climate activism movement after he told conference delegates “you are the new Swampys”.
Opening the summit’s finance day, which aims to channel cash towards transitioning global economies to net zero carbon emissions, Sharma recalled climate protests of the 1990s.
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