… on a quiet day, I can hear her breathing

Category: Climate Crisis

  • Burnham in danger of sleepwalking into climate disaster, say campaigners

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    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/oct/27/burnham-sleepwalking-climate-disaster-campaigners

    Climate campaigners in London earlier this month protesting against the possible approval of drilling at the Rosebank oilfield in the North Sea. Photograph: Tolga Akmen/EPA

    Letter to PM argues series of wrong choices on North Sea oil, Heathrow, EVs and heat pumps will scupper net zero plans

    Andy Burnham will “sleepwalk” into climate disaster if he fails to get a grip on a series of important policies whose combined impact could scupper plans to reach net zero, campaigners have said.

    Big decisions on North Sea drilling, the expansion of Heathrow airport, electric vehicles (EVs) and grants for heat pumps are awaiting decisions from ministers.

    But they should be considered in the context of their cumulative impacts rather than be taken separately by different government departments, according to Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth (FoE) in a letter to the prime minister.

    Taken together, the emissions resulting from approving drilling at the Rosebank oilfield, expanding Heathrow airport, watering down the UK’s EV targets and cutting heat pump grants would be 402m tonnes of CO2 over the next 25 years, the letter says.

    The emissions would be greater than those of 106 coal plants running for a year, more than enough to prevent the UK meeting its carbon budgets and net zero.

    Doug Parr, chief scientist at Greenpeace, said: “The Burnham government is facing a series of big decisions over the next few months that could define its legacy on climate. This administration seems to get the urgency of cutting the emissions causing deadly heatwaves and droughts, but there’s a real risk they could still sleepwalk into reversing the strong progress the UK has made so far.”

    …

    Article continues at https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/oct/27/burnham-sleepwalking-climate-disaster-campaigners

    Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.
    Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.
    Donald Trump urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a Climate Science denier like him. He says that he makes millions and millions for destroying the planet, Burn, Baby, Burn and Flood, Baby, Flood.
    Donald Trump urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a Climate Science denier like him. He says that he makes millions and millions for destroying the planet, Burn, Baby, Burn and Flood, Baby, Flood.
    UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham says ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him. He says that he's delayed the go-ahead for Jackdaw and Rosebank North Sea oil and gas extraction until after the Holborn and St. Pancras by-election - don't want democracy interfering with Capitalism.
    UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham says ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him. He says that he’s delayed the go-ahead for Jackdaw and Rosebank North Sea oil and gas extraction until after the Holborn and St. Pancras by-election – don’t want democracy interfering with Capitalism.

  • Super-rich get ‘double dividend’ from causes and costs of climate crisis, report finds

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    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/oct/27/super-rich-double-dividend-climate-crisis-oxfam

    Oxfam says investing by rich in disaster recovery widens inequality and gives incentive to delay climate action

    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/oct/27/super-rich-double-dividend-climate-crisis-oxfam

    The richest 0.1% have reportedly contributed by 125 times more than the average person to extreme heat events, through their investments and lifestyles such as the use of private jets. Photograph: Julio Cortez/AP

    The world’s wealthiest people are not just profiting from the polluting causes of climate breakdown, they are also increasingly cashing in on the catastrophic consequences, according to a study by Oxfam.

    The global equality organisation has found that the richest 0.1% of the world’s population are heavily invested in disaster preparedness, recovery and reconstruction – a market that is projected to grow from $70bn to $92bn a year by 2029.

    This gives the planet’s wealthiest and most powerful people a “double dividend” from the climate crisis and, more alarmingly, an incentive to delay or disrupt action to solve the problem, the NGO says.

    It also worsens global inequality as those least responsible for global heating end up having to pay those most responsible in terms of higher food prices, repairing homes damaged by extreme weather or relocating to other areas.

    Jean McLean, Oxfam’s chief influencing officer, accused billionaires of turning chaos into profit. “The super-rich benefit at both ends of the crisis: first, through continued investment in polluting industries, and second, through investment in the booming ‘adaptation economy’ – recovery and rebuilding services are sold back to a warming world,” she said.

    …

    Continues at https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/oct/27/super-rich-double-dividend-climate-crisis-oxfam

    Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.
    Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.
    Donald Trump urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a Climate Science denier like him. He says that he makes millions and millions for destroying the planet, Burn, Baby, Burn and Flood, Baby, Flood.
    Donald Trump urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a Climate Science denier like him. He says that he makes millions and millions for destroying the planet, Burn, Baby, Burn and Flood, Baby, Flood.
    UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham says ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him. He says that he's delayed the go-ahead for Jackdaw and Rosebank North Sea oil and gas extraction until after the Holborn and St. Pancras by-election - don't want democracy interfering with Capitalism.
    UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham says ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him. He says that he’s delayed the go-ahead for Jackdaw and Rosebank North Sea oil and gas extraction until after the Holborn and St. Pancras by-election – don’t want democracy interfering with Capitalism.

  • Heat killed ‘staggering’ 50,000 people in Europe’s cities this summer, scientists warn

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    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/oct/23/heat-killed-staggering-50000-people-european-cities-this-summer-experts

    Hot days pushed vulnerable bodies into overdrive and warm nights prevented them from recovering. Photograph: Anadolu/Getty

    People succumbed to heat at highest rates in Malta, Italy and Hungary, with health issues, loneliness and poverty exacerbating toll

    Heat killed a record 50,000 people in European cities this summer, new research suggests, with scientists blaming climate breakdown for two in every three of the deaths.

    Morgues and funeral homes filled with bodies from June to August as the heat added by planet-baking pollution cut short an extra 32,000 lives in urban areas, the researchers found. Hot days pushed vulnerable bodies into overdrive and warm nights prevented them from recovering.

    The “staggering” death toll, modelled using historical relationships between heat and health in 854 cities, was the worst on record, the study found. Hot weather marked by relentless heatwaves killed nearly twice as many people as it did in each of the two next most dangerous years.

    “In some sense, the absolute numbers of the heat-related deaths estimated across the 854 urban areas are indeed staggering,” said Malcolm Mistry, a climate and health scientist at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, who co-authored the study. “But perhaps what is even more alarming is the proportion of these deaths that we attribute to anthropogenic climate change.”

    The share of deaths due to climate breakdown has risen from about 40% at the start of the century to 65% this summer, the study found.

    …

    Continues at https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/oct/23/heat-killed-staggering-50000-people-european-cities-this-summer-experts

  • World must cut emissions by 18% in four years ‘to find our way back’, UN says

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    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/oct/21/world-cut-emissions-un-climate-crisis

    Global temperatures are forecast to rise to 2.8C above preindustrial levels if current government policies around the world remain unchanged. Photograph: Jon Cherry/Getty Images

    Action needed to avoid disastrous overshoot of climate targets, according to organisation’s environment body

    The world needs to cut carbon emissions by nearly a fifth in the next four years, and by close to half within a decade, to avoid overshooting climate targets by a disastrous margin.

    Although the “window has closed” on holding temperature rises to 1.5C, in line with scientific advice, limiting the “overshoot” of that target is still possible, according to the UN Environment Programme (Unep).

    But countries are failing to translate their long-term targets on reducing emissions into short-term actions, a report on the “emissions gap” between climate goals and policies has found.

    …

    At the Cop30 climate summit in Brazil last November, governments were supposed to make fresh commitments under the Paris agreement to cut emissions. But the commitments made were nowhere near strong enough.

    Even if all of those updated pledges were fulfilled, temperatures would still rise to 2.6C above preindustrial levels, according to Unep’s projections, endangering life across swathes of the globe. Policy has also not kept up with pledges: on current policies around the world, temperatures would rise to 2.8C.

    …

    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/oct/21/world-cut-emissions-un-climate-crisis

    UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham says ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him. He says that he's delayed the go-ahead for Jackdaw and Rosebank North Sea oil and gas extraction until after the Holborn and St. Pancras by-election - don't want democracy interfering with Capitalism.
    UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham says ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him. He says that he’s delayed the go-ahead for Jackdaw and Rosebank North Sea oil and gas extraction until after the Holborn and St. Pancras by-election – don’t want democracy interfering with Capitalism.
    Donald Trump urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a Climate Science denier like him. He says that he makes millions and millions for destroying the planet, Burn, Baby, Burn and Flood, Baby, Flood.
    Donald Trump urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a Climate Science denier like him. He says that he makes millions and millions for destroying the planet, Burn, Baby, Burn and Flood, Baby, Flood.
    Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.
    Nigel Farage urges you to ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him and his Deputy Richard Tice. He says that Reform UK has received £Millions and £Millions from the fossil fuel industry to promote climate denial and destroy the planet.

    21.15 GMT dizzy: C’mon, time to engage your brains. Here’s your starter: “… on current policies around the world, temperatures would rise to 2.8C.”

    So we’re currently near 1.5C, it might not be officially recognised yet, it might be 1.4C but close enough to 1.5C. We currently have extreme weather as a result of 1.5C – severe hurricanes, wildfires, drought, deluges. They’re almost biblical in their extent now.

    Do you think that progression to 2.8C will be linear or logarithmic? I would go for logarithmic and I would also expect that the effects would be so extreme that we – humans – won’t survive them. My earlier rough calculation was based on a 4C increase, not sure that’s necessary.

  • Climate campaigners condemn ‘maddening’ decision to approve Jackdaw gasfield

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    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/oct/21/jackdaw-gasfield-climate-campaigners-condemn-decision-north-sea-mining

    Activists gather during a protest outside the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero in London. Photograph: Carl Court/Getty Images

    Critics say move will jeopardise climate targets, fail to cut cost of living and distract from need to decarbonise energy

    Climate campaigners and green experts have condemned the government’s decision to allow the drilling of the Jackdaw gasfield in the North Sea.

    They said approval for the site would jeopardise the UK’s climate targets, fail to reduce the cost of living, and distract from the need to decarbonise the UK’s energy sector.

    Many drew parallels with the record-breaking heatwave and drought, fuelled by global heating, that the UK experienced this summer.

    “Is the prime minister living in a parallel universe? One where we haven’t just endured our hottest summer on record, with droughts, wildfires and, in all likelihood, the most heat-related deaths on record?” said Danny Gross, climate campaigner for Friends of the Earth. “And where the UN hasn’t warned that we’re on the brink of breaching the all-important 1.5C warming limit?”

    As the gas from Jackdaw will be sold on international markets, Gross said it would not bolster the UK’s energy security, but would add to global greenhouse gas emissions. “The disconnect [between the government’s green ambitions and its actions] is maddening,” he said.

    “This benefits oil giants and their shareholders and doesn’t make life more affordable as Burnham promised,” said Tessa Khan, executive director of the campaigning organisation Uplift. “Clean energy is how we lower bills, reindustrialise regions and increase public control – not by caving to an oil industry making obscene profits while pushing up bills, laying off workers and driving the heatwaves we saw this summer.”

    …

    Article continues at https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/oct/21/jackdaw-gasfield-climate-campaigners-condemn-decision-north-sea-mining

    UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham says ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him. He says that he's delayed the go-ahead for Jackdaw and Rosebank North Sea oil and gas extraction until after the Holborn and St. Pancras by-election - don't want democracy interfering with Capitalism.
    UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham says ignore facts and reality and be a climate science denier like him. He says that he’s delayed the go-ahead for Jackdaw and Rosebank North Sea oil and gas extraction until after the Holborn and St. Pancras by-election – don’t want democracy interfering with Capitalism.

    dizzy 10.18am: I also find this very perplexing, difficult to see who benefits from it other than Shell e.g. there appears to be over-production of fossil fuels (although that doesn’t mean that they’re where they’re useful) and large fossil-fuel subsidies. I am busy, have other pressing demands on my time atm, will return to it.