The Guardian

Donald Trump made a speech at the White House on Thursday in which he confirmed the US would be withdrawing from the Paris climate agreement. Over nearly 25 minutes, Trump argued that the agreement was bad for America, but said he’d be open to renegotiating a deal which was ‘fair to the United States’

• Donald Trump confirms US will quit Paris climate agreement

• Former president had spent years negotiating for landmark climate accord
• Mitch McConnell: ‘Trump has put families and jobs ahead of leftwing ideology’

Barack Obama led condemnation of his successor’s decision to withdraw from the landmark Paris climate accord, which the former president’s administration painstakingly negotiated over the course of several years.

In a statement released just before Donald Trump officially announced that the US would remove itself from the deal, Obama said the administration had joined “a small handful of nations that reject the future”. He warned that the more than 190 countries that remain participants will “reap the benefits in jobs and industries created”, but he said that US states, cities and businesses “will step up and do even more to lead the way, and help protect for future generations the one planet we’ve got.”

Donald Trump announces US will be withdrawing from the Paris climate accord ‘to protect America and its citizens’ and seek a new deal ‘on terms that are fair to the United States... but if we can’t, that’s fine’

• Donald Trump confirms US will quit Paris climate agreement
• Paris climate agreement: Trump withdraws US from global accord – live

Conditions over the past few years are putting stress on butterfly populations as food sources are diminished, but certain species are thriving

A beautiful creature has fluttered into my path. Well, actually, it landed on the doormat with a resounding thud. The Butterflies of Sussex might sound of limited geographical interest but it’s the best new butterfly guidebook in the country.

Newcomers will enjoy the fascinating anecdotes and beautiful photos by lepidopterist Neil Hulme. Obsessives searching for the elusive purple emperor will gobble up the grid references for the “master trees” around which male emperors congregate shortly after midsummer.

Diocese of Rockhampton, which covers Queensland gas and mining towns, votes to sell coal seam gas and thermal coal assets

The Anglican church in Australia’s largest coalmining region, including the site of Adani’s proposed Carmichael mine, has vowed to renounce interests in fossil fuels.

The Anglican diocese of Rockhampton, which includes central Queensland mining and gas towns across 20 parishes – the largest of which is bigger than Victoria – voted to divest from the likes of thermal coal and coal seam gas at a synod meeting on 20 May.

The US abandoning the global climate deal brings risks, but the unity of the rest of the world and plummeting green energy costs are reasons for hope

• Live coverage: Trump pulls US out of Paris climate agreement

Will Donald Trump’s decision to pull the US out of the Paris climate change agreement tip the world into fiery catastrophe? The extraordinary unity of the rest of the world’s nations in tackling global warming, allied with the booming green economy, driven by plummeting renewable energy costs, are strong reasons to think not.

Related: Donald Trump confirms US will quit Paris climate deal

Trump is doing his best to ruin the world for our children and grandchildren

• Live coverage: Trump announces US will withdraw from Paris climate deal

In an inexplicable abdication of any semblance of responsibility or leadership, Donald Trump has announced that he will begin the process to withdraw the United States from the Paris climate treaty, joining Nicaragua and Syria as the only world countries rejecting the agreement. It now seems inevitable that the history books will view Trump as America’s worst-ever president.

If I and my advisors had never learned what Science is or how & why it works, then I’d consider pulling out of the Paris Climate Accord too.

World’s second largest greenhouse gas emitter will remove itself from global treaty as Trump claims accord ‘will harm’ American jobs

• Live coverage: Trump announces US will withdraw from Paris climate deal

Donald Trump has confirmed that he will withdraw the US from the Paris climate agreement, in effect ensuring the world’s second largest emitter of greenhouse gases will quit the international effort to address dangerous global warming.

The US will remove itself from the deal, joining Syria and Nicaragua as the only countries not party to the Paris agreement. There will be no penalty for leaving, with the Paris deal based upon the premise of voluntary emissions reductions by participating countries.

Reports say US president will ditch the agreement on carbon emissions curbs as world leaders vow to remain committed regardless of Trump’s decision

• Big oil darlings: the 22 Republican senators who urged Trump to withdraw
• The world prepares: China and EU strengthen promise to Paris deal
• And then there were three?: US would join Syria and Nicaragua on ‘no’ list

8.10pm BST

WH chief of staff Reince Priebus is wearing a green tie. Oh the irony. pic.twitter.com/JEPw9gFmz9

Priebus in green. What can it mean? Only one thing. Covfefe.

8.08pm BST

Today is a win for chief strategist Steve Bannon, who with Environmental Protection Administrator Scott Pruitt urged the president to jettison the Paris deal.

George W Bush failed in his attempt to block global action on climate change. His mistake – about to be repeated by Trump – was to imagine the UN process was weak

A smell of burning coal fills the chilly air as delegates pile into the conference chamber. Outside, protestors shiver in polar bear suits under threatening skies and forbidding grey concrete; inside, smiles, colourful costumes and a warm glow. Negotiators, politicians, activists who have spent their lives fighting climate change are jubilant. The US has stalled global action on climate change for two full presidential terms, but no longer. In the chamber, at last, the White House meltdown is in full flow.

This is no vision of a future under Donald Trump: it was the disaster and backtracking that marked the end of climate negotiations for his Republican predecessor, George W Bush, in 2008. Then, as now, a US president in thrall to oil interests tried to block international agreement on emissions. Then, as now, doomsayers foresaw a deathblow to the UN climate negotiations. Then, as now, the US economy was drunk on cheap fossil fuels.

In 2007, conservationists discovered a new species inhabiting a beach just behind a pub in Granity, New Zealand. But could they save it before erosion and rising waters wiped it off the face of the planet?

Who says village life has to be boring? Granity, New Zealand may be home to less than 300 people, but this lovely seaside village on the western coast of South Island was also – until last year – home to a species found no-where else on Earth. And today, the town has quite the tale to tell.

In 2007 reptile expert Tony Jewell noticed there was something very different about the little lizards that skittered beneath the cobble stones on the beach behind Miners on Sea pub and hotel in Granity. Built in 1892, the pub has a long history of serving nearby mining communities.

The summer months are officially here for the northern hemisphere, while winter beckons for the south. We’d like to see your wildlife photos

The temperature is up and the sun is out (for now) as June introduces the summer months to the northern hemisphere. For the southern hemisphere all the preparations for winter will now come in handy for the months ahead. So what sort of wildlife will we all discover on our doorsteps? We’d love to see your photos of the June wildlife near you.

You can share your June wildlife photos, videos and stories with us by clicking on the blue ‘Contribute’ buttons. Or if you’re out and about you can look for our assignments in the new Guardian app.

If it pulls out, the US would be the only country to argue that the accord demands too much of signatory nations

The Paris climate pact agreed at the end of 2015 was a historic achievement after more than two decades of failed efforts to reach a global consensus on climate change. It became legally binding about a year later, after countries responsible for 55% of global greenhouse gas emissions had ratified it.

Only two countries have not joined: Syria, which was crippled by war at the time of negotiations, and Nicaragua, which refused to sign up because it considered the deal too weak. Therefore, if the US pulls out on Thursday – as is expected – it would be the only country in the world to argue that the Paris accord demands too much of signatory nations.

World leaders, businesses, scientists and charities join in urging the US president not to abandon the global accord

World leaders, businesses, investors, scientists and development charities have joined in urging Donald Trump not to withdraw the US from the Paris climate change agreement.

The US president is due to announce his decision at 3pm ET on Thursday and is expected to pull the world’s largest economy, and second greatest polluter, from the global accord agreed unanimously by almost 200 nations in 2015.

Only other UN members not party to Paris agreement never signed up, but for reasons of war and principle, not disbelief

Assuming the US does, as expected, pull out of the historic Paris agreement on climate change, it will join a very small list of countries with which it has little else in common in terms of emissions.

The only other UN members not signed up are Nicaragua and Syria, which both chose not to enter into the climate accord in the first place.

Law restricting NGOs in run up to polling day have pushed climate and pollution issues off the election agenda, say opposition parties and green groups

Debate on environmental issues has been stifled in the run-up the general election leaving voters in the dark , opposition parties have claimed, as a result of the Lobbying Act and government determination to avoid criticism over problems such as air pollution.

Green groups have privately raised concern, along with other charities, over the impact of the law, and now have the support of all major parties apart from the Conservatives.

Pikestone Fell, Weardale An oystercatcher, a gaudy pied clown with crimson beak and eyes, flew straight towards us, piping hysterically

In winter this part of the Weardale Way can be a morass, but the rain-leached soil drains quickly in spring. After weeks of dry, windy, weather, the mud had turned to sand and our boots were soon covered in yellow dust. In some sheltered hollows heather, at last showing a green tint of new shoots, shimmered in a heat haze.

Our route followed the wall that divides upland pasture from heather moorland. Together they provide habitats for grouse and the wading birds that return here from the coast to breed, and late May is the peak time for egg hatching.

Australian Institute of Marine Science says reef’s capacity to recover under threat from climate change and pollution

Parts of the Great Barrier Reef not regularly affected by problems such as cyclones have demonstrated the reef still has the ability to regenerate, with a survey showing sharp declines in coral cover in the north but increases elsewhere.

However, the latest results from the Australian Institute of Marine Science (Aims), collected by divers visiting 243 individual reefs, do not include the losses caused by bleaching this year, or the effects of cyclone Debbie, both of which killed coral in the central section.

Deputy PM departs from official Coalition line, saying ‘to speculate on what Donald Trump might do is insanity’ and I’m going to ‘see what happens’

Barnaby Joyce has declined to say whether Australia should remain within the Paris climate accord if the United States pulls out, in a departure from the official government line that Australia will stay the course.

While Australia’s energy and employment ministers have said this week Australia will honour its Paris commitments regardless of what Donald Trump decides, the Nationals leader and deputy prime minister was more guarded on Thursday.

Intensive farming cited as main reason for destroying natural barriers to deluge and making low lying areas more vulnerable to floods

Only a tenth of England’s extensive floodplains are now fit for purpose – 90% no longer function properly – with the shortfall putting an increasing number of homes and businesses at risk of flooding, according to a new report.

Floods are more likely due to climate change and will claim higher economic costs unless action is taken to halt the damage to floodplains and restore some of their functions, warned the authors of the 12-month study – the first to paint a comprehensive view of England’s floodplains and their capabilities.

“We have ignored our floodplains,” said George Heritage of Salford University, co-author of the study the Changing Face of Floodplains, published by Co-Op Insurance on Thursday. “The changes to them mean water [from heavy rainfall] can flow much faster downstream, and can flow at the same speed as the water in the rivers.”

This accelerated flow has led to sudden and unstoppable deluges in recent years. For instance, Storm Desmond in 2015 affected more than 6,000 homes as rivers and streams burst their banks and spread water over floodplains. As these natural floodplains had been altered by man-made features, they no longer had the ability to store water, leading to rapid flows into urban areas which led to the devastation.

Storm Desmond caused more than £500m in damages, and misery for families excluded from their homes sometimes for months. The UK’s flooding bills are on the rise, with scientists warning of rocketing numbers of cloudbursts and periods of sudden and intense rainfall as climate change takes effect.

Floodplains act as natural “sponges”, soaking up excess water in their vegetation, forming natural buffers that hold back or divert rushing water after rain, and providing areas where rivers can breach their banks and wetlands can be replenished.