The Guardian

Heatwaves and fires in the northern hemisphere are a frightening portent of what’s in store for Australia.

• Follow our Australia news live blog for the latest updates
• Get our free news app, morning email briefing and daily news podcast

The unprecedented heatwave and fires engulfing Europe might seem a long way away, but they are a frightening portent of what’s in store for Australia.

Britain has just experienced its highest temperature on record, extreme conditions and fires are sweeping Spain, Portugal, France and Greece. But this is just the latest in a string of extreme events globally. In March, scientists were shocked by record temperatures at both poles, including temperatures up to 40C above normal in the Antarctic and 30C above normal in the Arctic. In May, devastating heatwaves across India, Pakistan and surrounding countries led to weeks where temperatures in some regions repeatedly hit almost 50C. This year has also seen extreme heatwaves in south Asia, China and the US.

Sign up to receive an email with the top stories from Guardian Australia every morning

Royal Horticultural Society launches survey to examine damage from this week’s heatwave

The traditional British garden is under threat from extreme heat, the Royal Horticultural Society has said, as it launches a survey to examine the damage from this week’s heatwave.

It is likely that in the future delicate flowers including roses and poppies will have to be swapped for plants such as salvias and dahlias, which are more resistant to heat.

Joe Biden has unveiled a new plan to push billions of dollars to US cities and states to help them cope better with extreme heat.

The US president stopped short, however, of declaring a climate emergency.

Biden outlined the new actions in a speech on Wednesday at a former coal plant in Massachusetts which is now part of an offshore windfarm project.

The initiatives are aimed at helping salvage the president’s tattered climate agenda

• Biden vows to tackle climate ‘emergency’ 
• Biden unveils extreme heat plan – but doesn’t declare climate emergency
  

• Drone footage captured a swarm of jellyfish floating in the waters near Haifa in northern Israel.

The video footage was released by Israel's Parks and Nature Authority.

Jellyfish typically migrate in the summer months and drift close to the shores of the eastern Mediterranean.

Sea pollution and climate change are citied by authorities among the reason for their high concentration.

The company’s new campaign trumpets that it is ‘laying the foundations for a low carbon future’ – without mentioning the nearly $1bn it spent on coal production in 2020 and 2021

• Get our free news app, morning email briefing and daily news podcast

Glencore is one of Australia’s largest exporters of thermal coal – a product that, when burned, is a major driver of the climate crisis.

But the Anglo-Swiss mining giant is on an advertising and marketing blitz in Australia – tagline: “Advancing everyday life” – where mention of the thermal coal that earned them US$10.9bn in revenue in the last two years has so far been conspicuously absent.

Study found nine years of culling has failed to reduce bTB levels in UK cattle herds

Scientists, vets and naturalists are calling for a moratorium on the badger cull in the light of evidence that they say shows nine years of killing badgers has failed to reduce bovine TB in cattle.

The culling of legally protected badgers to reduce cattle TB enters its 10th season this summer, despite the publication of a scientific paper in the journal Veterinary Record earlier this year which concluded that culling had no significant impact on bTB in cattle herds. The paper sparked a row over its methodology, which the government says was flawed, but its supporters say it shows the practice should be ended.

Endemic frogs of captivating beauty, mammals and wild birds are among the species to be found in Peru’s Cordillera Escalera conservation area, a protected highly biodiverse area between the Andes and the jungle in the east of the country

Experts say it would take years to begin shale gas production and it is far less accessible than once thought

The political earthquake in Downing Street has delayed publication of a review into the scientific evidence around fracking for shale gas, which had been expected earlier this month.

In the face of an urgent and intensifying energy crisis, that delay can only be bad news – or so the vocal media and political supporters of shale gas development would have you believe. (The Sun has published at least 14 editorials this year calling for UK fracking – one every fortnight.)

Low-emission zones, now in 320 cities, are increasing as EU battles pollution health emergency

The number of clean air zones across Europe has risen 40% since 2019, forcing older and more polluting vehicles off the road, according to new research based on EU data.

Low-emission zones (LEZs) have now been introduced in 320 European city regions, and that figure is expected to rise by more than half again, to 507, by 2025.

Study found that the most at-risk neighbourhoods were also among the most ethnically diverse and have lower carbon footprints than average

People of colour are four times more likely to live in areas at high risk from heatwaves in the UK as the climate heats up, according to experts.

Researchers at the University of Manchester and Friends of the Earth found one in three people from minority ethnic groups lived in areas most exposed to extreme heat, compared with just one in 12 white people.

Blazes broke out across England on Tuesday as temperatures surged to a historic high of 40.3C, capping two days of extreme heat that scientists warn is 'a wake-up call' for the climate emergency.

Fire brigades in London, Leicestershire, Norfolk and South Yorkshire were among those to declare major incidents as flames destroyed buildings and devoured tinder-dry fields in Wennington, east London, and grasslands elsewhere in the capital and in Groby, Leicestershire

• ‘A wake-up call’: as extreme heat hits UK, experts say net zero is the only way out

President could bypass the political gridlock as nearly 20% population faces 100F and above temperatures

Joe Biden is under pressure to declare a national climate emergency as temperatures soar across the US and Europe.

Facing political gridlock in Washington, the US president could make such an announcement – which would unlock federal resources to deal with the crisis – as soon as this week, the Washington Post reported on Tuesday.

The vast majority know that global heating is dangerous. This summer’s crisis should be a tipping point

Will the heatwave change anything? As predicted, British temperature records were shattered on Tuesday with 40.3C recorded in Coningsby, Lincolnshire. While Wednesday is expected to be cooler, the European crisis continues, with wildfires raging in France, Spain and Portugal. What immediate impact these extremes have on individuals depends on factors including geography, age, health, sex and socioeconomic status. Wealthier people in the UK, as all over the world, are better protected, while poorer people (who are more likely to be black or minority ethnic) are more exposed both at work and home.

This is far from the first disruption to British weather attributed to global heating. This time last year saw flash floods. But sometimes the “heating” part of the climate emergency has felt as though it belonged elsewhere. Predictions for the UK have included more rain rather than sun. So this week’s burning heat has shocked scientists as well as the public. Will this alter how we think and behave?

A true picture of how bad things have become emerges from the report, but with 2,000 pages of convincing evidence, change is possible

The state of the environment report paints a detailed and brutal picture of destruction and loss, and almost none of it is new.

Virtually everything in this five-yearly government report card – that another 202 animal and plant species have been identified as threatened with extinction or worse, that at least 19 ecosystems show signs of collapse, that hundreds of thousands of hectares of native forest have been bulldozed, that vast southern kelp forests have disappeared – was already known and publicly documented.

Experts worried that extreme heatwaves in Europe happening quicker than expected, suggesting climate crisis worse than feared

• UK extreme weather: latest updates

Climate scientists have expressed shock at the UK’s smashed temperature record, with the heat soaring above 40C for the first time ever on Tuesday.

Researchers are also increasingly concerned that extreme heatwaves in Europe are occurring more rapidly than models had suggested, indicating that the climate crisis on the European continent may be even worse than feared.

Spain, Germany and China all have maximum working temperatures. It’s time the UK followed suit

• Mika Minio-Paluello is policy officer for climate and industry at the TUC

We love the summer sun, but it can be deadly. The UK’s former chief scientist, David King, has warned this intense heatwave could cause up to 10,000 excess deaths. Despite decades of warnings from scientists that climate breakdown would bring severe heatwaves to the UK, we are still unprepared. Our buildings, public spaces, rules and laws were made for a different climate in a different century. Extreme heat and stormier winters are becoming the norm in Britain, and we’re struggling to cope.

As record temperatures pass 40C (104F) in the UK, working people deserve to be safe. Builders, postal workers and street cleaners who spend long periods outside in high temperatures are at serious risk of sunstroke, heat stress and skin cancer. Other workers doing physical labour in indoor heat, like packing in a hot warehouse, can also suffer heat stress, respiratory problems and even heart failure. Working under pressure in these temperatures can reduce people’s capacity to concentrate and lead to deadly accidents. This can be especially dangerous in industries such as transport and construction, and in manufacturing plants.

Mika Minio-Paluello is policy officer for climate and industry at the Trades Union Congress and an energy economist with Transition Economics

Its ‘jet zero’ strategy relies on the invention of pie in the sky technologies to tackle dangerous airline emissions

It’s here. The climate crisis has landed in the UK. We’re in a dangerous heatwave that’s forcing schools to close, hospital appointments to be cancelled, trains to reduce service, and flights to stop as the runway melts. Extreme weather is not only a threat to our infrastructure, but a threat to our lives. There’s only one answer: urgent action to tackle the climate crisis.

And yet, on a day that has broken a temperature record set just three years ago, the government has done the opposite. While the tarmac sizzles beneath our feet, the skies above us are still full of planes spewing out greenhouse gases. What will it take for the government to get serious about cutting emissions from flights?

Leo Murray is co-founder and director of innovation at the climate charity Possible

Activists target London HQ of Rupert Murdoch’s media company after UK weather treated as upbeat story

Extinction Rebellion protesters have smashed windows at the London headquarters of Rupert Murdoch’s media company, in protest at his outlets’ coverage of the climate crisis.

Activists targeted the News UK building next to London Bridge station early on Tuesday morning, destroying glass panels and putting up posters reading “tell the truth” and “40 degrees = death” next to the entrance used by journalists at the Sun and the Times.

As a climate scientist, I’m tired of hearing about that summer. The extreme heat we’re experiencing globally has no precedent

I’m too young to remember the 1976 heatwave. But as a climate scientist, I’m tired of hearing about why it means we shouldn’t take the climate crisis seriously. 1976 was undeniably a hot summer. A really hot summer, in fact. Temperatures topped 32C (89.6F)somewhere in the UK for 15 days on the trot, climbing to a maximum of 35.9C on 3 July. But in many ways it was nothing like the heatwave we’re enduring right now.

In 1976, the UK was an anomalous red blob of unusual heat on a map of distinctly normal summer temperatures. Contrast that to July 2022, and there are few places on Earth where temperatures are not considerably above average. What makes 2022 a lot worse than 1976 is not just the temperature itself – which will be 4-5C higher than in 1976 if the forecasts are accurate – but how large an area is currently feeling the heat. Parts of Spain, Portugal, France and Italy have been baking in 40C-plus heat for days on end. Combined with extremely dry conditions, the heat has triggered wildfires and forced thousands of people to evacuate their homes.

Dr Ella Gilbert is a climate scientist at the British Antarctic Survey