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Surviving extreme heat increasingly boils down to this: access to air conditioning | Mark Wolfe
The next great climate divide will be between countries that have the resources to adapt and those that don’t
This summer, much of the media’s attention has focused on record temperatures across Europe and the United States. Television coverage has been filled with familiar images: heat maps shaded deep red, schools closing, rail lines slowing, wildfires spreading and emergency rooms treating growing numbers of people with heat-related illnesses.
Public officials have responded with equally familiar advice: stay indoors, drink plenty of water and, if possible, turn on the air conditioning.
Continue reading...The battle over peat: why do some gardeners still insist on using it?
Peat bogs are essential to the environment, holding twice as much carbon as all the world’s forests. But in the UK, 80% are damaged, most of what is extracted is used in horticulture – and some campaigners fear the problem is getting worse
‘I don’t see how I can possibly do my job and eat mushrooms,” says Sally Nex, a campaign advocate for the Peat-Free Partnership. “An awful lot of the food you buy in the supermarket is grown in peat: field mushrooms and little button mushrooms, salads and many brassicas, herbs in pots … all of those have started in peat.”
I’m taken aback. I’ve bought peat-free compost for years, but I’d never considered “hidden” peat. “I would imagine that most people are buying peat-free compost at the moment – certainly, you only have to go into a garden centre to see the amount of peat-free options you now have,” says Nex. “But you may not realise that an awful lot – probably most – of the plants that are on sale in that garden centre are also grown in peat.”
Continue reading...An extraordinary White House meeting
Sadiq Khan backs calls for maximum workplace temperature in UK
Mayor of London backs calls from unions to update health and safety rules in light of more frequent heatwaves
The mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, is backing calls for a maximum workplace temperature as pressure grows on the government to protect workers from the impact of repeated heatwaves across the UK.
The extreme heat has left people struggling to cope as temperatures in some workplaces climb above 40C, causing thousands of schools to close and hospital and transport systems to break down.
Continue reading...US trial could reveal who paid hackers to target Exxon climate critics: ‘on the edge of our seats’
Oil giant has denied involvement, but climate activists are closely watching court case against Israeli private investigator for answers
A group of American climate activists are closely watching a US court case that could reveal who hired hackers to target their inboxes a decade ago.
In 2015, a set of explosive media reports revealed that ExxonMobil’s own scientists determined as early as 1982 that the extraction and burning of fossil fuels caused the climate crisis – but Exxon went on to fund climate denial campaigns anyway. The reports prompted attorneys general to investigate the company.
Continue reading...England risks building new ‘death traps’ as experts warn of overheating crisis
Vulnerable people more at risk as research finds only half of local authority plans require cooling strategies
England risks constructing a new generation of “death trap” buildings that can fatally overheat unless the government tightens standards and prioritises climate safeguards, planning experts have said.
Fears are growing about the plight of vulnerable people in heatwaves, with research this week suggesting that 2,700 people had died in the May and June heatwaves in England and Wales. Yet only about half of local plans being drawn up by councils and local authorities require new buildings to have a cooling or ventilation strategy to prevent overheating, according to findings from the Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI) and the Town and Country Planning Association (TCPA).
Continue reading...Biodiversity effects under climate extremes intensify with aridity in grasslands but not forests
‘Unprecedented’ changes in UK climate are normalising extremes, report says
Annual State of the UK Climate analysis finds last four years in UK are in top five hottest on record
The UK’s climatic extremes are becoming increasingly normal, a report has found, with last year the hottest on record and further “unprecedented changes” likely to break the record again soon.
Data stretching back to 1884 shows the UK has never experienced a year as hot as 2025, according to the annual State of the UK Climate report, with temperatures pushed to dizzying heights by carbon pollution clogging the atmosphere.
Continue reading...Seven Britons among 12 foreign nationals killed in Spain’s deadly wildfires
Fire broke out last Thursday in the southeastern province of Almería, which is home to many foreign residents
Seven Britons are among 12 foreign nationals killed in wildfires in southern Spain, authorities said.
Officials said 12 of the 13 victims were foreign nationals after completing postmortem examinations after the fires that swept through Andalusia.
Continue reading...Britons urged to take ‘small steps’ to prepare for potential national crises
Government to launch campaign to help people cope with events such as weather emergencies or cyber-attacks
The British public should begin taking “small but important steps” to secure and protect water, power supplies and basic phone signal in case of further severe weather emergencies, national crises or cyber-attacks, Downing Street has said.
Darren Jones, the chief secretary to the prime minister, told MPs “the risks we face from climate change cannot be underestimated”, and warned of the “significant and prolonged disruption to essential services” extreme weather events could cause.
Continue reading...Andy Burnham must act fast on the climate – or risk getting stuck in a ‘derailment’ doom loop | Laurie Laybourn
Around the world, climate-sceptic parties are exploiting floods and fires to make political capital. Without urgent changes, this deadly spiral will continue
Recent unprecedented heatwaves in the UK may have killed thousands of people. Children are suffering in overheating schools. NHS trusts are straining under record-breaking demand. This all comes after climate extremes have even affected national security, with three of Britain’s five worst harvests coming since 2020, impairing food security.
This is what life looks like in the “adaptation gap”.
Laurie Laybourn is executive director of the Strategic Climate Risks Initiative
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Continue reading...Kemi declares war on net zero – and what remains of her party
Badenoch’s ideological purge gathers pace as moderates are cast out and the Tories edge ever closer to political extinction
You have to hand it to Kemi Badenoch. She doesn’t take any prisoners. While the rest of us have been trying to survive a heatwave and are wondering if air-con may be needed for future summers, the Tory leader has taken a more hardline approach to climate change. Call it Schrödinger’s climate change. It’s both happening and not happening at the same time.
Kemi is just about sane enough not to be an out-and-out denier. She leaves that to Reform. Mind you, no one would put it past her to suggest the scientists have got it wrong if the temperature drops for a few days. But her view is that while climate change may be real, there’s no point in trying to do anything about it.
Continue reading...Roger Worthington Is Suing Over a Heat Wave
Most UK media reports on June heatwave failed to mention climate crisis
Exclusive: Analysis of nearly 2,500 articles finds almost three-quarters made no reference to global heating
Most of the UK media stories about the record-breaking heatwave that struck in June failed to mention the climate crisis, analysis has found.
Nearly 2,500 articles about the extreme heat – when temperatures topped 37C, a record for the time of year – appeared in the UK’s nine main national daily media publications. But nearly three-quarters of them – about 72% – left out any mention of global heating or the climate, according to the analysis by the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU).
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