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.

Third of world’s energy needs should come from electricity by 2035, says Murat Kurum, as priorities set out for this year’s UN climate summit

The world should aim to meet a third of its energy needs from electricity within a decade to cut greenhouse gas emissions, the host of the next UN climate summit has said.

While about a third of global electricity generation already comes from renewable sources, other energy-intensive sectors – chiefly transport, heating and industries – have lagged behind. Close to four-fifths of final energy still comes from fossil fuels, as a result.

Exclusive: Mining giant says technology is not yet advanced enough to run a fully electrified fleet but experts say it is hooked on federal fuel tax credits

• Revealed: the internal BHP memo that slammed the brakes on world’s biggest miner’s climate push

• Read more from the BHP files investigation here

• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

BHP has continued to spend hundreds of millions of dollars buying diesel trucks in the Pilbara despite internal documents suggesting it would increase emissions and be “misaligned” with its decarbonisation goals.

The mining giant is Australia’s biggest consumer of diesel and trucks are its biggest single source of diesel emissions. Replacing the fleet with battery-electric trucks is considered a critical step in the multinational’s efforts to decarbonise.

Australia is pioneering a revolution in home renewables and battery use, proving what is possible with the right policies

The timing was rich with symbolism. As intense heatwaves pummelled Europe and Asia, and oil markets around the world leapt and sputtered, the two big chimneys of one of Australia’s largest power stations were being demolished. Meanwhile, the Australian energy minister was holding a media conference to hail a fall of up to 10% in the benchmark electricity price in parts of the country.

Quietly, and with surprisingly little fanfare from the rest of the world, Australia is pioneering a revolution in home renewables and battery use, proving what is possible with the right policies. The country was already one of the global leaders in domestic solar power, with panels on one in three homes. It also remains, however, a major contributor to the climate crisis through its vast fossil fuel exports. But it is batteries that are giving Australia a new burst of speed.

Outrage as leaked documents reveal mining giant’s backsliding on commitments to slash emissions

• Adam Morton: Big Mining gets a $4bn tax break to use fossil fuel. It’s a strange way to tackle emissions

• Read more from the BHP files investigation here

• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

The independent senator David Pocock says leaked BHP documents show that the mining giant is “laughing” at Australia’s key climate policy while pocketing hundreds of millions of dollars through a generous diesel tax break.

An exclusive investigation based on documents leaked to by the Guardian and the ABC show BHP has scrapped a project to significantly reduce global emissions, delayed vast renewables projects in the Pilbara and war-gamed options to push the electrification of its polluting diesel truck and train fleets into the next two decades.

Exclusive: Cache of internal documents leaked to the Guardian and the ABC’s Four Corners show multinational has war-gamed ways to massively delay decarbonisation

• Revealed: the internal BHP memo that slammed the brakes on world’s biggest miner’s climate push

• Read more from the BHP files investigation here

• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

The world’s biggest miner has halted or delayed projects to cut vast amounts of emissions and has quietly war-gamed options to push major climate investments in its Western Australian iron ore operations into the next two decades, internal documents show.

An exclusive investigation based on documents leaked to the Guardian and the ABC’s Four Corners can reveal that BHP, one of Australia’s biggest historic emitters, has dumped plans for a facility that could have significantly reduced emissions and has put on ice renewable projects designed to power its iron ore operations in the vast, resource-rich Pilbara region.

Exclusive: BHP once dubbed climate change an ‘existential’ threat. But leaked documents show it has backtracked on decarbonisation at a vast network of mines

• Read more from the BHP files investigation here

In the middle of 2019, London was sweltering through a heatwave.

Temperature records tumbled. Frail, ill and elderly people died in their hundreds.