The president joined Republican officials who slammed the National Academies of Sciences for a chapter about climate science in an educational guide for judges.

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

The European Union is facing a green backlash as emissions cuts become harder and require bigger overhauls to industry and livelihoods

Attribution science is advancing quickly, researchers said. That could support lawsuits seeking damages for severe events worsened by global warming.

We visited researchers seeking ways to make homes safer. They set a lot of fires.

The president joined Republican officials who slammed the National Academies of Sciences for a chapter about climate science in an educational guide for judges.

© David Coleman/Alamy

The European Union is facing a green backlash as emissions cuts become harder and require bigger overhauls to industry and livelihoods

© Nadja Wohlleben/Reuters

Attribution science is advancing quickly, researchers said. That could support lawsuits seeking damages for severe events worsened by global warming.

© Stephane Mahe/Reuters

We visited researchers seeking ways to make homes safer. They set a lot of fires.

© Will Crooks for The New York Times

A new book sheds light on President Trump’s affinity for fossil fuels.

A new book sheds light on President Trump’s affinity for fossil fuels.

© Adriana Loureiro Fernandez for The New York Times

As wildfires intensify, threatening more people, a nonprofit is studying how to rethink homes and neighborhoods to prevent catastrophe.

Roger Worthington is helping to lead a $50 billion lawsuit against oil producers. This week he’ll face powerful critics in Congress.

Roger Worthington is helping to lead a $50 billion lawsuit against oil producers. This week he’ll face powerful critics in Congress.

© Michael Hanson for The New York Times

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

In the past weeks, two sites in the United States have halted operations.

© Maddie McGarvey for The New York Times

The Trump administration wants to roll back some Biden-era restrictions on smog-causing emissions from heavy-duty vehicles.

© Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Recent technological advances have brought the president’s goals a bit closer to reality.

© Josh Edelson/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

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