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Rishi Sunak’s decision to side with climate deniers isn’t just wrongheaded: it’s costing our environment and our economy

In 2019, the UK became the first G7 country to legislate for net zero carbon dioxide emissions by 2050. At the time, I was the cabinet minister who signed this into law. We did so knowing that taking action to tackle the climate crisis was supported by all the major political parties. We had no time to waste. It had been the Conservative party in opposition under David Cameron that had backed the Climate Change Act more than a decade earlier because we argued that climate action was more important than political divisions. As a result, the UK’s internationally renowned framework of carbon budgets has seen our emissions more than halve since 1990.

Britain has long been viewed as a clean energy leader across the world. We pioneered the first successful emissions trading scheme, followed by the contracts for difference model for funding renewable energy projects that made the North Sea into one of the largest windfarms in the world. A few weeks after delivering the net zero bill, I helped to secure the UK’s bid to host Cop26 in Glasgow. There, more than 80% of countries followed our lead and committed to a net zero target.

Climate and clean energy leadership has created jobs, growth and regeneration. The impact has been transformative. For the first time, wind power now makes up the largest source of our electricity. Coal, which used to make up more than 40% of our power when I was first elected as an MP in 2010, will from next year be consigned to the history books. Our economy has grown by 80% since 1990, and at the same time our emissions have halved. When I signed net zero into law, I always viewed our plan as a mainstream, even conservative, vision. One of the legacies of Cop26 is the growth in clean energy markets across the world. Elsewhere, the Inflation Reduction Act in the US and the green deal in Europe have committed to at least a decade of support for green industries.

Yet the UK now risks falling ever further behind in the net zero race. We have seen Rishi Sunak decide to prioritise new oil and gas expansion at a time when our fossil fuel industries are in rapid decline and will become stranded assets within decades. His decision to renege on net zero means the UK has scaled back on measures that would have saved households £8bn a year in lower energy costs. It has cost us the ability to lead in new technological markets and risks losing Britain the greatest economic opportunity in a generation.

Chris Skidmore is a former Conservative energy minister

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UK nuclear site pleads guilty to IT security breaches from 2019 to 2023

The UK’s most hazardous nuclear site, Sellafield, has pleaded guilty to criminal charges related to cybersecurity failings brought by the industry regulator.

Lawyers acting for Sellafield told Westminster magistrates’ court on Thursday that cybersecurity requirements were “not sufficiently adhered to for a period” at the vast nuclear waste dump in Cumbria.

The charges relate to information technology security offences spanning a four-year period from 2019 to 2023. It emerged in March that the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) intended to prosecute Sellafield for technology security offences.

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Four countries let gas flaring increase last year, pushing global volumes to the highest level since 2019 and adding an extra 23 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent to the atmosphere.

There were few signs of a global energy transition taking place in the Energy Institute’s 2024 Statistical Review of World Energy, which was released on Thursday, as data revealed that global primary energy consumption hit new heights in 2023.

DNA analysis of old samples finds only five historical cases raising hopes for polar bears as a distinct species

A family of “grolars” in Canada’s Arctic remains the only confirmed example of hybrid offspring between polar and grizzly bears, according to a new study which may provide some optimism for conservationists worried about the future of polar bears as a distinct species.

A team of North American researchers examined old bear samples collected between 1975 and 2015 using a newly developed tool to look for previously unknown examples of hybrid bears.

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Britain’s landscape is under threat from developers and rapacious corporations. But I have a solution – if the next PM will listen

What do Britons most love about Britain? At the last count it was still the NHS. After that it was not the royal family, the army or democracy. Believe it or not, it is the countryside, according to polling commissioned last year by Future Countryside, an initiative of the Countryside Alliance. Today, the NHS may cram election manifestos, but of the countryside we hear not a word.

This will not last. An almighty clash is looming between the lucrative renewables industry and defenders of the rural landscape. Labour and the Tories are both eager to weaken local planning. Keir Starmer wants to curb the rights of citizens to object to new development in the countryside. The Tories recently announced a return to onshore wind, hence the proposal for a turbine cluster on the Yorkshire Moors above Charlotte Brontë’s Calderdale. Sixty-five turbines funded by the Saudis are to rise a staggering 200m each, higher than Blackpool Tower. It is hard to believe such an outrage is to be allowed for so trivial a contribution to the climate.

Simon Jenkins is a Guardian columnist

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The EU's carbon market is set for a fundamental deficit of as many as 300 million allowances in 2027, according to analysts speaking on a webinar Thursday, as industrials become more exposed to compliance buying and auction supply tightens after frontloaded REPowerEU sales end.

A voluntary carbon trading platform will auction 1.5 million Internationally Transferred Mitigation Outcomes (ITMOs) at a minimum of $10 per tonne generated by clean cooking projects in Malawi, it announced Thursday.

Germany and Italy are on course to miss their climate goals in sectors excluded from the EU ETS, by such a large gap that they would eat up the entire available surplus of annual emissions allocations (AEAs) left for other countries, according to a report released on Thursday.

A certifier has validated a new methodology for net CO2 removals (CDR) using bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS), in what may provide a boost to the development of the nascent market.

The Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) and the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) released Thursday joint guidelines to support companies in their nature-related disclosures, highlighting the alignment between the two frameworks.

Landmark judgment says planning bodies must account for burning of extracted fuel when considering site proposals

The climate impact of burning coal, oil and gas must be taken into account when deciding whether to approve projects, the supreme court in London has ruled.

The landmark judgment, handed down on Thursday, sets an important precedent on whether the “inevitable” future greenhouse gas emissions of a fossil fuel project should be considered.

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European carbon prices resumed their close formation with natural gas prices on Thursday morning, with EU ETS levels tracking the ebb and flow of the TTF market as it reacted to news that Russian LNG transshipments through Europe will be banned, potentially adding to regional supply, while UK Allowances prices were "absolutely smashed" amid a surge of aggressive selling.

The Organisation for Biodiversity Certificates (OBC) has launched a survey to gather views on the claims that companies can make when buying biodiversity credits, as the organisation expects more clarity will have a significant impact on corporate demand.

Swiss bank UBS has invested in impact data and analytics provider GIST Impact to back its expansion, with a focus on bolstering support for nature-related corporate disclosures among companies and investors.

The private sector-led Integrity Council for the Voluntary Carbon Market (ICVCM) has named its first CEO.

Europe’s carbon market sends a stronger decarbonisation signal than Washington's subsidy-laden Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), an analyst told US television network CNBC Thursday, outlining an EUA price forecast of as high as €130 per tonne by 2028.

The animal, which is still categorised as ‘vulnerable’, has been the subject of a 20-year conservation programme

Less than a quarter of a century after the Iberian lynx was feared to be only a whisker away from extinction, populations of the animal have recovered enough across Spain and Portugal for it to be moved from “endangered” to “vulnerable” on the global red list of threatened species.

The change in status, announced on Thursday by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (ICUN), is the result of a two-decade-long effort from a coalition of partners including the EU and regional and national governments in Spain and Portugal, as well as wildlife NGOs and local people.

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This government had many climate failures, but its 2014 boost to green energy made the UK an offshore wind superpower

As day-trippers to the British seaside enjoy fish and chips and a bracing paddle, they may notice, as they gaze out to sea, one of the great hidden legacies of this Conservative government: offshore wind power. Turning steadily in the breeze, the vast array of offshore and onshore turbinesaround Great Britain provide about a quarter of our electricity needs, with no carbon emissions and at a cost below imported gas or nuclear generation. They are a national success story. We have the second biggest offshore turbine fleet in the world, behind only China.

The Tory government effectively banned onshore wind turbines in 2015. But at the same time, the growth in offshore wind can be traced back to a 2014 decision to establish a new support mechanism for low-carbon generation. Called “contracts for difference”, it guarantees a set price for units of electricity. If the market price falls below the set price, the generator receives a top-up payment. If the market price rises above the set price, the generator pays back the difference.

Rebecca Willis is professor of energy and climate governance at Lancaster University

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Supreme Court has ruled Surrey Council should have considered climate change impacts of new oil wells.