The Guardian

The BBC's climate editor was removed from the Russian Federation's event at Cop27 by security staff after approaching the stage with a camera operator. 'Are you going to pay for the environmental damage you have caused in Ukraine?' asked Justin Rowlatt, before being escorted from the room by security staff

• Cop27: ‘All of you are war criminals’: activist disrupts Russia event at Cop27 – as it happened
  

Independent experts will consider whether dredging around freeport site in Teesside caused die-offs

The UK government is to set up an independent expert panel to investigate the cause of the mass die-offs of crabs and lobsters on the north-east coast, it has announced.

The panel will consider the impact of dredging around a freeport development in Teesside and the presence of pyridine, a chemical pollutant, among other potential causes, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) said.

Tentative drafts are emerging but some countries appear to be seeking to water down commitments agreed last year

• Cop27 live – latest news updates

Fear of countries backsliding on their commitments to tackle the climate crisis dominated the Cop27 UN climate talks in Egypt on Tuesday, as the first tentative drafts started to emerge of key potential decisions.

Governments are supposed to be building on pledges made last year at Cop26 in Glasgow. These include limiting global heating to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels, doubling the amount of financial assistance for poor countries to adapt to the impacts of extreme weather, and addressing the issue of loss and damage, which means financial assistance for countries stricken by climate disaster.

Activists mark Gender Day at the climate summit in Sharm el-Sheikh as ministers convene to discuss finance

Climate activists in Austria have attacked a painting by Gustav Klimt, with one throwing a black, oily liquid at it and another glueing himself to the glass covering the painting. Members of Letzte Generation Österreich (Last Generation Austria) tweeted that they had targeted the 1915 painting Death and Life at the Leopold Museum in Vienna to protest against their government’s use of fossil fuels. After throwing the liquid at the artwork, which was not damaged, one activist was pushed away by a museum guard while another glued his hand to the glass over the painting

• Climate activists throw black liquid at Gustav Klimt painting in Vienna
  
• Climate protesters glue themselves to National Gallery artwork
  
• Just Stop Oil campaigners glue themselves to Da Vinci copy in Royal Academy
  

Return of one of one of Britain’s rarest fish confirmed after DNA found in water samples above fish passes

For nearly two centuries, one of Britain’s rarest fish has been shut out of its spawning grounds by large weirs.

But the endangered twaite shad has now returned to its historic spawning habitat on the River Severn, thanks to four new fish passes that enable the migratory fish to negotiate weirs and swim up river to lay eggs.

Pair attack Death and Life painting in Leopold Museum in protest against fossil fuel ‘death sentence’

Climate activists in Austria have attacked a painting by Gustav Klimt, with one throwing a black, oily liquid at it and another gluing himself to the glass covering the painting.

Members of Letzte Generation Österreich (Last Generation Austria) tweeted that they had targeted the 1915 painting Death and Life at the Leopold Museum in Vienna to protest against their government’s use of fossil fuels.

Coral cuttings were grown on underwater frames and then planted in patches of bare reef at Fitzroy Island near Cairns. Four years later the corals have spawned for the first time and scientists hope to use the same technique to boost coral cover in other locations on the reef

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Whether or not you agree with their tactics, activists blocking roads and stopping traffic are on the right side of history

“When the anti-suffrage members of the government criticise militancy in women, it is very like beasts of prey reproaching the gentler animals who turn in desperate resistance at the point of death.” These words were spoken by Emmeline Pankhurst some 110 years ago. As the great-granddaughter of Emmeline, and the granddaughter of Sylvia Pankhurst, I’m often asked to make comparisons between the suffragette movement and the environmental movements of today. People regularly ask me whether I endorse the tactics of climate activists such as Just Stop Oil.

The climate activists who recently threw tomato soup on a Vincent van Gogh painting might easily be regarded as gentle beasts turning to desperate resistance. The climate crisis is already deadly for many around the world: in east Africa, one person dies of climate-induced hunger every 36 seconds. My great-grandmother advised suffragettes to go to the House of Commons and refuse to leave; to break windows; to “attack the secret idol of property”. The point she was making was that within every cause there is room for people to find their own versions of activism and militancy. The choice of tactics must not divide the movement.

Conference in Sharm el-Sheikh follows decade-long crackdown on civil society in Egypt

• Cop27 live – latest news updates

“Honestly, what I want is to be in Sharm el-Sheikh and just scream,” said Amr Magdi of Human Rights Watch. Like dozens of other prominent human rights defenders, researchers and environmentalists, Magdi has been unable to attend Cop27 as he is exiled from Egypt because of his work.

“I just want to tell everyone about the injustice happening in Egypt. I can’t do it personally and I’m trying to do it with my work. I’m even helping others who are able to travel there to do this,” he said.

It’s time to ditch the generations-long argument between those who blame overpopulation and those who worry about consumption

• John Vidal is a former Guardian environment editor

By a remarkable coincidence, just as governments, campaigners and business owners are meeting in Egypt to address climate breakdown today, the world is officially crashing past the symbolic 8 billion population milestone . This means global population is on its way to 10 billion or more by the turn of the century.

But there will be no attempt by countries at Cop27 to connect the inexorable growth of human numbers with the seemingly unstoppable rise in temperatures. Despite the fact that the several billion more people expected to be alive in 70 years’ time will put more pressure on resources and will produce far more emissions, the population explosion is yet again being ignored, sidestepped or denied by world leaders.

John Vidal was the Guardian’s environment editor. He is the author of McLibel: Burger Culture on Trial

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A joint editorial published by the Guardian and more than 30 partners calls for rich countries to pay their fair share towards solving the climate crisis

It’s only Tuesday but the end of the climate summit is rapidly approaching. Governments are focused on the final political agreement that will come out of Egypt. Every word matters and as we saw at the end of Cop26 last year, arguments in the final few hours can come down to whether the text includes “phase out” or “phase down” in a particular clause. Ministers arrived over the weekend in anticipation of the final tussle over wording. The role of 1.5C, finance, and loss and damage are understood to be the key dividing points.

Carbon Brief’s senior policy editor Simon Evans has a useful thread on what we might expect from the first draft of the cover decision.

Data shows E coli and intestinal enterococci at levels unsafe for swimming at Wolvercote Mill Stream, near Oxford

The only official bathing water area on the River Thames has failed tests for bacteria associated with sewage pollution, data shows.

A section of Wolvercote Mill Stream, at Port Meadow, two miles outside Oxford, was designated as an official bathing area in April after a campaign by local people.

Exclusive: Raw sewage releases exploit ‘monopoly’ of suppliers, argue corporate wrongdoing specialists

Water companies could be forced to pay their customers hundreds of millions in fines due to sewage pollution, a leading firm specialising in corporate wrongdoing has said.

Fideres LLP, which has conducted investigations into issues ranging from Covid test prices to cryptocurrency scams, is now setting its sights on England’s water companies.

England’s tally of 80 confirmed incidents is second-highest figure since records began

There were 108 confirmed incidents of illegal persecution of birds of prey across Britain in 2021, according to the RSPB’s annual bird crime report.

England’s tally of 80 confirmed persecution incidents was the second-highest figure since records began in 1990, after an unprecedented surge in wildlife crime during the pandemic year of 2020. That year, a record 137 known incidents of bird of prey persecution were logged by the RSPB, with lockdowns seemingly creating an increased opportunity to kill raptors without detection.

The Guardian and dozens of international media titles publish a joint editorial calling for radical thinking on how to fund climate action in poorer countries

• The Guardian view on Cop27: this is no time for apathy or complacency

Dozens of media organisations from around the world have published a joint editorial article calling for a windfall tax on the biggest fossil fuel companies.

The funds raised should be redistributed to poorer, vulnerable countries, the editorial says, as they are suffering the worst impacts of the climate crisis despite having done the least to cause it.

This editorial calling for action from world leaders on the climate crisis is published today by more than 30 media organisations in more than 20 countries

• Impose climate tax on fossil fuel giants, media groups urge

Climate change is a global problem that requires cooperation between all nations. That’s why today more than 30 newspapers and media organisations in more than 20 countries have taken a common view about what needs to be done. Time is running out. Rather than getting out of fossil fuels and into clean energy, many wealthy nations are reinvesting in oil and gas, failing to cut emissions fast enough and haggling over the aid they are prepared to send to poor countries. All this while the planet hurtles towards the point of no return – where climate chaos becomes irreversible.

Since the Cop26 UN climate summit in Glasgow 12 months ago, countries have only promised to do one-fiftieth of what is needed to stay on track to keep temperatures within 1.5C of pre-industrial levels. No continent has avoided extreme weather disasters this year – from floods in Pakistan to heatwaves in Europe, and from forest fires in Australia to hurricanes in the US. Given that these came about from elevated temperatures of about 1.1C, the world can expect far worse to come.

The case for rapid transition to renewables is stronger, but some developments are making it harder

On a breezy day in May, the Met Office issued a pithy forecast which would prove telling: “Quite windy.” In fact, on 25 May the UK set a record for wind power generation, 19.9 gigawatts – enough to cover more than half of Britain’s electricity needs, or boil 3.5m kettles. So plentiful was the wind power that National Grid was forced to ask some turbines in the west of Scotland to shut down, as the network was unable to store such a large amount of electricity.

The episode represents a landmark which underlines both the progress of Britain’s renewables industry and the potholes in the road to replacing fossil fuels. Just six months earlier, global leaders met in Glasgow with renewable energy high on the agenda.

Combined emissions from 15 companies surpass Russia’s and equate to more than 80% of EU’s methane footprint, study finds

The combined methane emissions of 15 of the world’s largest meat and dairy companies are higher than those of several of the world’s largest countries, including Russia, Canada and Australia, according to a new study.

The analysis from the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy and Changing Markets Foundation found that emissions by the companies – five meat and 10 dairy corporations – equate to more than 80% of the European Union’s entire methane footprint and account for 11.1% of the world’s livestock-related methane emissions.

Previous summit’s president tells ministers no ‘backsliding’ must be allowed over climate crisis ‘red line’

Alok Sharma, the former UK cabinet minister who presided over the Cop26 climate summit in Glasgow last year, has warned delegates at Cop27 that the possibility of limiting global heating to no more than 1.5C may be at risk.

“We’ll either leave Egypt having kept 1.5C alive or this will be the Cop where we lose 1.5C,” Sharma said at the opening on Monday of the high-level ministerial roundtable on pre-2030 ambition.