Several groups say North Dakota governor will sacrifice public lands on the ‘altar of the fossil fuel industry’s profits’
Donald Trump’s nomination of North Dakota’s Republican governor, Doug Burgum, as the interior secretary has prompted swift backlash from environmental advocacy groups alarmed at the incoming administration’s plans to use federal lands for oil and gas drilling.
Burgum, a former businessman, has been governor since 2016 of North Dakota, which is the third largest oil and natural gas producer in the country. Burgum, if confirmed by the Senate, would manage US federal lands including national parks and wildlife refuges, as well oversea relations with 574 federally recognized Native American tribes.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
11/15/2024 - 12:33
11/15/2024 - 12:32
At Cop29 the global south needs to unite for sustainable growth, leveraging resources and negotiating transformative climate finance pacts
More than a century of burning coal, oil and gas has fuelled intense heatwaves, prolonged droughts, heavier rains and devastating floods. To prevent even more severe impacts, the UN global climate summit, Cop29, must deliver tangible results to keep global temperature rises below 2C – the limit defined in the 2015 Paris agreement. Achieving this goal means human societies can only emit a finite amount of additional carbon dioxide, known as the world’s “carbon budget”.
Developed nations have exceeded their carbon budgets, while developing countries remain within theirs. Carbon dioxide lingers in the atmosphere for centuries, turning past unchecked fossil fuel use into a costly planetary bill. Between 1870 and 2019, the US, EU, Russia, UK, Japan, Canada and Australia – home to just 15% of the global population – accounted for over 60% of atmospheric carbon dioxide, according to the Delhi-based Centre for Science and Environment.
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11/15/2024 - 12:24
Far-right president may announce country’s departure from agreement after meeting Donald Trump
There is growing concern that Argentina’s far-right president, Javier Milei, is set to announce his country’s departure from the Paris climate accord.
Earlier this week, negotiators from Milei’s government were ordered to leave the Cop29 climate summit in Baku, Azerbaijan, after just three days. Now, the Guardian understands that Milei is considering announcing a formal withdrawal from the agreement, and that a decision could be made after a formal meeting with Donald Trump.
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11/15/2024 - 11:08
Exclusive: UK energy secretary says at Cop29 that people see the economic advantages of making the transition
Cop29 climate summit – live updates
Renewable energy is now “unstoppable”, and no government can prevent the shift to a global low-carbon economy, UK energy secretary Ed Miliband has said.
He said the UK was acting out of national self-interest by taking a global lead on cutting greenhouse gas emissions and boosting financial help available to poor countries at crunch UN climate talks this week.
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11/15/2024 - 09:38
Ending $7,500 consumer tax credit could have grave implications for already stalling EV transition in US
Donald Trump’s transition team is planning to kill the $7,500 consumer tax credit for electric-vehicle purchases as part of broader tax-reform legislation, two sources with direct knowledge of the matter told Reuters.
Ending the tax credit could have grave implications for an already stalling US EV transition. And yet representatives of Tesla – by far the nation’s biggest EV maker – have told a Trump-transition committee they support ending the subsidy, said the two sources, speaking on condition of anonymity.
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11/15/2024 - 09:00
Climate change minister’s effort to convince Ankara to drop out underlines push for ‘Pacific Cop’
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The climate change minister, Chris Bowen, made a whistle-stop visit to Turkey on Friday night in an attempt to reach a deal for Australia to host tens of thousands of people at a major UN climate summit in 2026.
Bowen visited the Turkish capital, Ankara, on the way to the Cop29 climate conference in the Azerbaijan capital, Baku. The two countries are vying to host Cop31, and the Albanese government hopes Turkey will exit the race in time for an announcement before next week.
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11/15/2024 - 08:32
Carlos Mazón resists calls to step down, saying floods that killed 216 in his area were unprecedented and ‘apocalyptic’
The regional president of Valencia, who is under mounting pressure over his handling of the catastrophic floods that killed 216 people in the area, has conceded mistakes were made but refused to step down, claiming the unprecedented and “apocalyptic” scale of the disaster simply overwhelmed the system.
A total of 224 people lost their lives – all but eight of them in Valencia – when torrential rains and floods hit eastern, central and southern parts of Spain on Tuesday 29 October, drowning people in their homes and cars and sending torrents of water through cities, towns and villages.
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11/15/2024 - 03:26
Australasian Centre for Corporate Responsibility accuses Australian oil giant of misleading and false claims in closing arguments
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Santos misled investors by positioning itself as a “clean fuels company” with a credible net zero plan, the Australasian Centre for Corporate Responsibility (ACCR) has alleged in closing remarks to a world-first greenwashing case.
Noel Hutley SC, representing ACCR, said the case was about protecting the public interest by “ensuring that commitments by Australian companies regarding climate change are reasonably based and not misleading”.
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11/15/2024 - 03:00
The best of this week’s wildlife photographs from around the world
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11/15/2024 - 02:00
What would it witness in Azerbaijan? A species that knows it is destroying itself but is too greedy to change course
Imagine, as many people do, an all-seeing eye in the sky, looking down on planet Earth. Imagine seeing what it sees. It watches, over the course of decades, ice caps shrinking, rainforests retreating, deserts expanding, ocean circulation slowing, freshwater dwindling and sea levels rising, and it thinks – for it has been there since the beginning – “this is familiar”. All the signs are there, of an Earth system sliding towards collapse, as it has done five times since animals with hard body parts first evolved.
But this time, it knows, is different. Not only is one of the life forms causing the collapse, but it shares some of the eye’s supernatural abilities: it too can see what is happening. So, with heightened curiosity, the eye zooms in, to see what this well-informed being is doing to avert catastrophe.
George Monbiot is a Guardian columnist
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