The predicted £264bn cost by 2050 could be even higher, plus renewables avoid a far higher total of emissions than can be captured, writes Andrew Boswell, while Simon Oldridge calls out vested interests

Prof Myles Allen and colleagues, in their letter (12 July) on carbon capture and storage (CCS), propose licensing gasfields on condition that producers store an increasing proportion of “the carbon dioxide their products generate”. Their proposal only considers CO₂. Methane is excluded by choice although it leaks throughout global fossil-fuel supply chains, including during extraction, processing, liquefaction and shipping.

A growing academic literature, supported by satellite observations of major methane plumes, shows that these emissions can be very substantial, and are the dominant near-term climate impact for gas supplied as liquefied natural gas.

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© Photograph: Peter Cade/Getty Images

© Photograph: Peter Cade/Getty Images

© Photograph: Peter Cade/Getty Images

Heatwaves, high energy prices, calls for reindustrialisation and North Sea drilling are all high on the to-do list

Wildfires cast a pall of smoke this week over Greater Manchester, whose former mayor Andy Burnham stands on the threshold of No 10. Amid three UK heatwaves so far this year, which have killed thousands of people in England and Wales, damaged harvests and left children crying in classrooms, the new prime minister’s plans for the climate crisis remain as shrouded as his city.

“Burnham has been very quiet about the climate [crisis] so far,” says Chris Venables, an environmental campaigner and fellow at the Green Alliance thinktank. “I don’t think [it] is at the forefront of his mind, but that does not mean he will water down this agenda.”

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© Photograph: Guy Bell/Shutterstock

© Photograph: Guy Bell/Shutterstock

© Photograph: Guy Bell/Shutterstock

At the Royal College of Nursing meeting last month, top of the agenda was not the recruitment crisis or NHS waiting lists but climate change. Have nurses nothing better to do, asks Professor Roger Watson.

The post Have Nurses Nothing Better to Do Than Discuss Climate Change? appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

Three small-boat migrants who gang-raped an unconscious woman on Brighton beach in an "entirely predatory and callous attack" face deportation after being handed lengthy jail sentences today.

The post Small-Boat Migrants Who Gang-Raped Unconscious Woman on Beach Jailed for 60 Years appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

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.

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© Photograph: Hugh Hastings/Getty Images

© Photograph: Hugh Hastings/Getty Images

© Photograph: Hugh Hastings/Getty Images

Operator brings in independent legal firm to look into whistleblower allegations relating to June heatwave

Great Britain’s grid operator has brought in independent investigators to look into accusations that its staff were involved in a cover-up over the power system being at a greater risk of blackouts during the heatwave.

The government-owned energy system operator will face the scrutiny of an external legal firm after a whistleblower claimed that control room staff were warned against leaving a paper trail relating to efforts to stabilise the power system during record high temperatures in late June.

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© Photograph: Gareth Fuller/PA

© Photograph: Gareth Fuller/PA

© Photograph: Gareth Fuller/PA

Prof Myles Allen, Stephanie Loo and Toby Lockwood, and Olivia Powis, respond to an article by George Monbiot about ‘the great carbon capture con’

George Monbiot suggests that we can solve climate change without carbon capture and storage (The great carbon capture con: behold the wasted billions Burnham could claw back, 8 July). Physics says otherwise. The world is going to generate more carbon dioxide than we can safely dump into the atmosphere, and we can’t rely on our stressed biosphere and oceans to mop up the excess. Stopping global warming will therefore require capturing and durably disposing of carbon dioxide on a huge scale, which right now means injecting it back underground.

Where George does make a good point is in questioning whether carbon dioxide disposal should for ever be paid for using public money. Why should private companies be allowed to make large profits taking carbon out of the ground while the taxpayer foots the bill to put it back? The obvious solution: require those who extract fossil fuels to pay for the disposal of the carbon dioxide their products generate. If the fraction they store rises to 100% by mid-century, fossil fuel use would cause no further warming thereafter.

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© Photograph: Richard Saker/The Guardian

© Photograph: Richard Saker/The Guardian

© Photograph: Richard Saker/The Guardian

Microsoft, Amazon and Google say they still aim to achieve net zero output despite construction boom

Microsoft, Amazon and Google’s collective carbon emissions have increased by nearly a fifth in the past year, driven largely by datacentre construction.

In the financial year ending March 2026, the three tech companies emitted 119m mTCO₂e (metric tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent), or about a third of those of France.

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© Photograph: Audrey Richardson/Reuters

© Photograph: Audrey Richardson/Reuters

© Photograph: Audrey Richardson/Reuters

They suck up energy and water, and blast out heat. Just who is better off from all this investment – aside from tech bros?

The two great existential threats of our time – the climate crisis and AI – come hurtling together in the explosion of datacentres across Australia and around the world.

You can hardly avoid hearing about them these days, either with awed reverence of the promised benefits to humankind or with fear and anger given the implications for the climate, inflation, jobs and even housing affordability.

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© Photograph: Jono Searle/AAP

© Photograph: Jono Searle/AAP

© Photograph: Jono Searle/AAP

The scientific consensus is that burning fossil fuels drives the climate crisis, yet the world’s biggest oil companies are planning to increase production

As the world swelters in ever more dangerous heat, why are oil companies being allowed to turn up the gas instead of paying for the consequences of their greed?

That ought to be the question on everyone’s minds amid baking heat domes over much of the northern hemisphere, temperature records being smashed day after day, children dying in locked cars, hospitals filling with heatstroke victims and emergency services tackling wildfires.

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© Photograph: Christian Hartmann/Reuters

© Photograph: Christian Hartmann/Reuters

© Photograph: Christian Hartmann/Reuters

Exclusive: Campaigners argue news channel’s attacks on climate action ‘work in financial interests’ of Sir Paul Marshall

The hedge fund run by the co-owner of GB News almost tripled its investments in fossil fuel companies in the first quarter of 2026 to $2.8bn (£2.1bn), the Guardian can reveal.

Critics have accused Sir Paul Marshall of “cashing in on climate chaos” and have claimed the news channel, which frequently attacks climate science and action, was “working in its owner’s financial interests”.

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© Photograph: Anna Gordon

© Photograph: Anna Gordon

© Photograph: Anna Gordon

Readers respond to an article about Erin Brockovich’s battle against datacentres and voice their fears for the environment

What are the benefits obtained from AI’s massive use of electricity and water (‘We’re up against forces that have all the money in the world’: Erin Brockovich on her battle against AI datacentres, 29 June)? Analysis shows that the top four uses of AI are “therapy/companionship”, “technical assistance and troubleshooting”, “fun and nonsense”, and “fan fiction and storytelling”.

AI use for therapy, and due to loneliness, appears not to reduce loneliness. AI provides affirmation, but at the expense of reducing the social skills needed to interact in the real world. Teachers report that students’ use of AI reduces their capacity for critical thinking.

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© Photograph: Canadian Press/Shutterstock

© Photograph: Canadian Press/Shutterstock

© Photograph: Canadian Press/Shutterstock

Kemi Badenoch, who joined US anti-abortion activists and European far-right parties at ARC, described energy secretary as a ‘villain’

Britain’s net zero policies and the energy secretary, Ed Miliband, have come under fire at a conference of conservatives, rightwing populists and wealthy US backers linked to Donald Trump.

The energy policies pursued by the British government were described as a “tragic mistake” by Trump’s energy secretary, one of a number of officials from the US administration attending the event.

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© Photograph: Jordan Pettitt/PA

© Photograph: Jordan Pettitt/PA

© Photograph: Jordan Pettitt/PA

Prime minister was forced to row back on some policies despite strong support among voters for climate action

Keir Starmer has faced a problem no Labour government has needed to deal with before. His energy and climate policies – core to solving the cost of living crisis – have come under attack from opposition parties, which have made dismantling the agenda one of their top priorities, second only to immigration, in their pitch to voters.

This is new in British politics, where a cross-party consensus on the climate and environment has held at least since the days of Margaret Thatcher. She warned the UN of the climate crisis in 1988; David Cameron in 2006 urged voters to “vote blue, go green”; Theresa May enshrined in law the requirement to reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050; Boris Johnson championed the Cop26 UN climate summit in Glasgow in 2021; even Rishi Sunak only tried a partial rollback of green policies as a last desperate throw before calling an election.

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© Photograph: Mauro Pimentel/PA

© Photograph: Mauro Pimentel/PA

© Photograph: Mauro Pimentel/PA

Extreme rain and landslides pushed Tapanuli orangutans closer to extinction.

Top 10% generate climate and biodiversity damage bill that exceeds economies of most countries, say researchers

The environmental damage bill racked up by the highest-consuming 10% of the world’s population has reached up to $5.7tn a year – larger than the economy of every country except the US and China, a study has found.

Mega-consumers in this group are concentrated in the global north, accounting for more than half the population of the US and 40-45% of people in the EU.

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© Photograph: Francis R Malasig/EPA

© Photograph: Francis R Malasig/EPA

© Photograph: Francis R Malasig/EPA

Small-boat migrants who appeared on a controversial episode of Question Time where Reform's Zia Yusuf was "ambushed" were placed there by campaigners at the invitation of the BBC.

The post Channel Migrants Placed on Question Time by Campaigners at BBC’s Invitation appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

Climate minister Chris Bowen says country must prepare for changing world and can play bigger role in reducing emissions

Australia will find exporting fossil fuels increasingly difficult but can switch to exporting clean energy products, the president of the next UN climate negotiations has declared.

Speaking at a climate conference in Bonn, Germany, Chris Bowen, Australia’s minister for climate change and energy, argued his country had led the global push to “transition away from fossil fuels” – based on the rapid growth of renewable energy and batteries in its domestic power grids – and that its economy could manage the switch.

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© Photograph: Bec Lorrimer/The Guardian

© Photograph: Bec Lorrimer/The Guardian

© Photograph: Bec Lorrimer/The Guardian

Respect Henry Nowak's family’s wishes and don’t exploit his death, intoned Starmer. But when murdered Rhiannon Whyte's mother demanded an end to illegal immigration, Starmer didn't want to know, says Steven Tucker.

The post Two-Tier Tears: Don’t Politicise the Grief of Henry Nowak’s Parents, Warns Starmer – Whilst Politicising the Grief of Henry Nowak’s Parents appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

US energy secretary Chris Wright featured in seminars to judges when he was a fracking executive

As cities and states sue big oil for billions in damages over allegations that it covered up the dangers of its products, rightwing organizations are attempting to discredit the wave of litigation. They claim the lawyers behind it are teaming up with an environmentally focused legal education non-profit to bias federal judges against oil companies.

But it is actually fossil fuel-backed organizations that are attempting to sway the judiciary in their favor, one of those law firms is countering. Evidence of this includes judicial seminars hosted by one such group featuring pro-industry speakers such as the current energy secretary, Chris Wright, in his former occupation as a fracking executive.

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© Composite: Reuters

© Composite: Reuters

© Composite: Reuters