The Guardian

Earlier this year, families from the Indigenous Guna people on the tiny island of Gardi Sugdub became the first to undergo a climate-related relocation by the Panamanian government because of the threat of rising sea levels. Hundreds of residents moved to Isber Yala, a new town built on the mainland. But many fear that the relocation has put their traditions and culture in peril

Photographs by Euan Wallace

The rightwing regional authorities ignored the climate-crisis science and dismissed the weather forecast – the consequences are their responsibility

• Juan Bordera is a climate journalist and an independent MP for Compromís in the Valencian parliament

It’s almost impossible to describe what we have experienced in the flooded villages and towns around the city of Valencia. Many of those villages and towns are in ruins, with at least 217 dead and others to be pulled out of the mud. There are many areas that still need urgent help. There are towns without water or electricity that have not been able to clean up. There are still flooded garages, buildings on the verge of collapse, and health problems that may result from the accumulated water.

But what also defies belief is the regional Valencian government’s sheer negligence in its pre- and post-disaster management. Let me try to summarise some of the most serious shortcomings.

Juan Bordera is a climate journalist and an independent MP for Compromís in the Valencian parliament. He has donated his fee for this article to a fundraiser for those affected by the storm

My mother showed me the importance of Indigenous and Afro-descendant women in protecting the natural world. Yet they continue to face barriers and discrimination in their work

I learned about the importance of women in small communities from my mother. She was a peasant woman – a campesina as we say in Colombia – in the mountains near Cali, where I grew up. She searched the forest for food and cultivated the earth to grow vegetables to feed me and my four siblings. It is women like her that I try to empower with my work supporting the collective rights of Indigenous and Afro-descendant women in Asia, Africa and Latin America.

In an era of environmental crises, people from such communities have an outsized role in preventing the destruction of nature and slowing the climate crisis. Colombia, where the biodiversity Cop16 was held last week, is home to 10% of all life on Earth, stretching from thick mangrove forest of the Pacific coast to the Amazon rainforest. Many of the communities I work with live alongside this rich nature and have made its survival part of their culture, something increasingly recognised in conservation. This is true from the Arctic Circle to the Indonesian forest. My job is to make sure women in these places receive practical support and a fair share of growing financial assistance.

EU member states agree to update urban waste water treatment directive

The UK is falling further behind on sewage pollution regulation as the EU tightens its rules to clean up Europe’s waterways, say critics.

EU member states agreed on Tuesday to update the urban waste water treatment directive to strengthen rules to clean up sewage and chemical pollution from treatment plants. European countries will have to update their sewage systems and treatment plants so that large amounts of human waste and chemicals are removed from rivers by a deadline of 2035. The companies deemed responsible will be required to pay for the infrastructure changes.

George Craig looked after the 5.5-metre croc for decades. But after the keeper retired from the park, Cassius stopped eating and went into ‘very quick decline’

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Researchers are trying to determine the true age of the world’s largest saltwater crocodile in captivity, who died on the weekend.

Cassius, a Guinness World Record holder thought to be at least 110 years old, died at Marineland Melanesia on Green Island, just off Cairns, where he lived since 1987.

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Australian Marine Conservation Society finds Safcol’s No Net Tuna is only entirely ‘green’ product on a red, amber or green scale

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Environmentalists have given the green tick to just one brand of canned tuna as industry heavyweights threaten dwindling fishing populations and other marine life.

For the first time, the Australian Marine Conservation Society has evaluated the nation’s most popular tuna brands and classed them as green, amber or red based on their sustainability credentials.

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As a new report makes clear, the timetable is dauntingly tight. But the potential rewards on offer are huge

One of Labour’s first acts in government was to lift the de facto ban on new onshore windfarms introduced by the Conservatives in 2016, which closed off one of the key pathways to clean, cheap energy by the 2030s. This week, progress was resumed as plans were outlined for what would be the most productive onshore windfarm in England. According to developers, the Scout Moor scheme in Greater Manchester could meet 10% of the region’s energy needs by the end of the decade.

As a major new report published on Tuesday makes clear, if Labour’s mission of a clean electricity system by 2030 is to be met, an avalanche of such projects will be required. The publicly owned National Energy System Operator (Neso) estimates that a doubling of onshore wind capacity will be necessary, along with a still bigger expansion of offshore wind and a tripling of solar power. When this is all considered alongside the need to transform the country’s power and transmission networks at an unprecedented pace, the daunting scale of the task becomes clear. Crucially, though, Neso’s analysis finds that the 2030 date is achievable if, to put it non-technically, the government, the energy industry and regulators truly go for it.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Christian Åslund was shocked at the difference between what he saw in 2002 and what confronted him this summer

Standing in blinding sunlight on an archipelago above the Arctic Circle, the photographer Christian Åslund looked in shock at a glacier he had last visited in 2002. It had almost completely disappeared.

Two decades ago Greenpeace asked Åslund to use photographs taken in the early 20th century, and photograph the same views in order to document how glaciers in Svalbard were melting due to global heating. The difference in ice density in those pictures, taken almost a century apart, was staggering.

Collaboration between RSPB and Chester zoo leads to best mating season on record for the semi-aquatic fen raft spider

Thousands of giant spiders that can grow to the size of a human hand are thriving in the UK, thanks to a successful breeding programme from Chester zoo.

The fen raft spider is a harmless arachnid that plays a vital role in aquatic ecosystems, but 15 years ago was on the brink of extinction because of habitat loss.

Expert analysis backs our policy and its benefits for the country. Defeatist critics should take note

• Ed Milband is secretary of state for energy security and net zero

Labour fought and won the last election on the argument that every family and business in the country was paying the price of the previous government’s failure to deliver clean homegrown energy for Britain.

Families and businesses know from the cost of living crisis that our dependence on fossil fuel markets controlled by dictators such as Putin left the UK vulnerable and exposed to energy price spikes, as well as the escalating costs of climate breakdown. We also know that the drive to clean energy represents the greatest economic opportunity of the 21st century. That is why the prime minister has put delivering clean power by 2030 at the heart of one of his five missions for government.

Ed Milband is secretary of state for energy security and net zero

Cubico project at Scout Moor near Greater Manchester could power the equivalent of 100,000 homes

Plans to build what would be the biggest onshore windfarm in England will move forward this week, the first since the Labour government lifted the de facto ban put in place by the Conservatives nine years ago.

An independent renewable energy developer has submitted plans to erect 21 wind turbines next to an existing windfarm near Greater Manchester.

Former NSW Liberal energy minister Matt Kean debated his former Coalition colleagues about the cost of nuclear power in a parliamentary estimates hearing on Monday. Now chair of the Climate Change Authority, Kean debated Nationals senator Ross Cadell over CSIRO analysis which found nuclear was the most expensive form of large-scale energy available

• ‘No bigger rent-seeking parasite’ than nuclear industry, Matt Kean tells former Coalition colleagues in heated debate

Union says Defra figures show far more farmers will be hit by budget proposal and warns of ‘militant protest’ to come

The government argument that just one-third of farmers will be affected by the new inheritance tax rules is in direct conflict with data produced by the its own environment department, according to the head of the farmer’s union, as the row over inheritance tax for farmers continued.

The announcement in Rachel Reeves’s budget last week of plans to remove the Agricultural Property Relief inheritance tax exemption from farms worth more than £1m has been met with a storm of fury from across the farming industry and suggestions of “militant protest”.

Deputy environment minister calls for urgent action as Riyadh prepares for global summit on issue next month

The degradation of the world’s soils and landscapes is threatening human life, and must be addressed as a matter of urgency, the government of Saudi Arabia has said.

Neglect of the land is wiping trillions of dollars from global economies, hampering agricultural production, disrupting water supplies, threatening children with poor nutrition, and destroying vital ecosystems, according to the country’s deputy environment minister.

Populist groups capitalising on costly environmental policies that affect farmers by offering them support

• What are farmers in the EU required to do to protect the environment?

The painful impacts of the climate crisis and globalisation have left farmers in Europe marginalised and vulnerable to populist politicians, warn anti-racism campaigners and academics.

They argue that if the transition to a low-carbon economy is not properly funded, planned and equitable, it risks fuelling a resurgence of the far right across the continent.

Tyre Extinguishers group stencils ‘These cars kill Valencians’ on 4x4s in city to highlight SUVs’ role in climate crisis

Climate activists in Scotland have carried out a series of actions against SUV cars, saying they are acting in solidarity with the victims of the Valencia floods.

The Tyre Extinguishers have called on their supporters to take actions against SUV cars in their areas, after members of the group in Edinburgh stencilled the sides of targeted vehicles on Sunday night with the words: “These cars kill Valencians.”

One sucker is precariously attached to some flimsy reality – a wet leaf, a slippery rock – the other one pointed at the future

Imagine if your Wikipedia page described you as a “segmented or parasitic worm” with “two head segments” and “suckers at both ends”. You might turn to the Bible, instead – here is the Book of Proverbs on leeches: “The horseleech hath two daughters, crying, Give, give. There are three things that are never satisfied, yea, four things say not, It is enough: The grave; and the barren womb; the earth that is not filled with water; and the fire that saith not, It is enough.”

The daughters are the leech’s words (though some interpret the daughters as the suckers): “Give, give.” Within this damp, humid, leech-infested jungle is the surprisingly sweet idea of the words you say as daughters you have given birth to.

Severe flooding is, unfortunately, inevitable. What isn’t inevitable is how ready we are, from early warning systems to emergency services

• Friederike Otto is a climatologist and co-founder of World Weather Attribution

At the time of writing, the death toll has risen to 214. Battered cars and other debris are piled up in the streets, large swaths of Valencia remain underwater, and Spain is in mourning. On Sunday, anger erupted as the king and queen of Spain were pelted with mud and other objects by protesters. Why were so many lives lost in a flood that was well forecasted in a wealthy country?

From the global north’s vantage point, the climate crisis, caused by the burning of coal, oil and gas, has long been seen as a distant threat, affecting poor people in the global south. This misconception has perpetuated a false sense of security.

Detailed plans from 30 oil and gas producers come amid historic levels of potent planet-heating emissions

A powerful US oil and gas industry lobby group has drawn up detailed plans to kill off penalties for emitting methane, a potent planet-heating gas that’s increasing at the fastest rate in decades, with this effort led by a major donor to Donald Trump whose company has just been fined for methane pollution.

Leaked internal documents from the American Exploration & Production Council (AXPC), a group of 30 oil and gas producers, outline a push to repeal a fee levied on methane emissions should the former US president win this week’s election and Republicans gain control of Congress.

Exclusive: Researchers find treatment plants designed to clean up leachate liquid waste boost levels of banned PFAS

Processes intended to decontaminate noxious liquid landfill waste before it enters rivers and sewers have been found to increase the levels of some of the worst toxic chemicals, a study has shown.

Landfills are well known to be a main source of PFAS forever chemicals – or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances – but the new study shows that the treatment plants designed to clean up the liquid waste can instead boost the levels of banned PFAS such as PFOA and PFOS, in some cases by as much as 1,335%.