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Sizewell B nuclear power plant granted a 20-year life extension

Extension comes as government encourages first nuclear power projects in a generation to meet UK’s growing need for electricity

Britain’s most recently completed nuclear power plant will continue generating electricity until 2055 after the government granted the power plant a 20-year life extension.

Sizewell B in Suffolk was due to shut down within the next decade, but under a deal with the government its lifetime will be extended to 60 years to help meet the UK’s growing demand for low-carbon electricity.

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© Photograph: Chris Radburn/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: Chris Radburn/AFP/Getty Images

© Photograph: Chris Radburn/AFP/Getty Images

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Datacentres are a ticking timebomb. We must make sure AI’s benefits outweigh the costs | Nicki Hutley

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

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The great carbon capture con: behold the wasted billions Burnham could claw back | George Monbiot

There are far better ways to tackle climate breakdown, but successive governments have chosen to listen to the fossil fuel companies instead

The new prime minister will be looking for money? Well, here’s £21.7bn lying on the ground. The government could cancel its deranged, disastrous carbon capture and storage (CCS) programme at no cost to public welfare: in fact, it would greatly reduce the harm we will suffer.

Sorry, did I say £21.7bn? That’s the figure the government has been putting in its press releases for spending on this programme between now and 2050. But this covers only the first phase of the project. The climate experts Dr Andrew Boswell and Simon Oldridge worked through the data produced by the government’s Climate Change Committee, which was scattered across different spreadsheets, and discovered that the projected cost of the full CCS programme between now and 2050 is £264bn.

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© Illustration: Eleanor Shakespeare/The Guardian

© Illustration: Eleanor Shakespeare/The Guardian

© Illustration: Eleanor Shakespeare/The Guardian

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GB News co-owner ‘cashing in on climate chaos’ after leap in fossil fuel investments, critics say

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

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‘Why take those jobs away?’: the unionized workers decrying Trump’s war on wind

Workers proud of their efforts to grow renewable energy say US president pursuing ‘personal vendetta’ at their expense

Donald Trump has blamed everything – from “national security” issues, the deaths of birds and whales, and cancer – in his decades-long campaign against windfarms. But as the Trump administration continues to undermine the industry, what worries workers most are their jobs.

Since taking office for a second term, Trump has issued an executive order aiming to halt all wind-energy leases and permits, attempted to issue stop-work orders on wind projects under construction, and paid more than $2.6bn in settlements to buy out wind energy leases. And hundreds of workers have been affected.

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© Photograph: Al Drago/Getty Images

© Photograph: Al Drago/Getty Images

© Photograph: Al Drago/Getty Images

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‘It’s smoke and mirrors’: hope turns to fear in Scottish village chosen for AI datacentre

Suspicions grow in Lanarkshire that local people have been misled on supposed benefits of the huge development

The promise was that a Scottish community would be transformed by massive investment and empowered to chase “the jobs of the future”. Instead, local people in Lanarkshire fear they may have to sell their properties and lose green belt land because of the errors of a badly planned AI datacentre complex, even as those jobs and investments never arrive.

Late last year, representatives of Oakes Energy Services began to knock on doors in Newarthill, a village east of Glasgow. In letters reviewed by the Guardian, they invited residents to individual meetings. They told them about plans for a solar farm, say local people, and made offers: free solar panels, tree planting, or even cash for their properties.

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© Photograph: Murdo MacLeod/The Guardian

© Photograph: Murdo MacLeod/The Guardian

© Photograph: Murdo MacLeod/The Guardian

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What’s holding back Britain’s green revolution? – a visual story

Labour has approved a wave of renewable energy projects, but turning plans into power remains slow. Why is that?

Labour has a race on its hands if it is to lock in its promise to achieve a virtually zero-carbon electricity system by 2030.

Britain’s next prime minister will have to move fast: the climate emergency is raging, high energy bills are driving up the cost of living and the reactionary right is threatening a fossil fuel push if it wins power.

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© Composite: Guardian design / SSE

© Composite: Guardian design / SSE

© Composite: Guardian design / SSE

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New pipeline in Canada to proceed after C$150bn pledged to ease BC and First Nations concerns

Port expansion and protections for whales part of BC and Alberta plan to expand country’s presence overseas

The governments of Canada and the province of Alberta will move forward on a major new oil pipeline after the pair announced a plan to ease concerns of British Columbia and First Nations on the Pacific coast.

Canada’s prime minister, Mark Carney, shuttled between British Columbia and Alberta on Thursday to announce more than C$150bn in new investments in both provinces, part of a broader project of reducing trade with the United States and expanding his country’s presence in overseas markets.

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© Photograph: Canadian Press/Shutterstock

© Photograph: Canadian Press/Shutterstock

© Photograph: Canadian Press/Shutterstock

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ScottishPower owes me £1,000 in solar panel payments

For months I’ve been trying to receive my FIT payment, which should be more than £1,000

I moved into my new house 14 months ago, and soon afterwards applied to ScottishPower, with whom the solar panels are registered for a feed-in tariff (Fit), for transfer of ownership of the panels and the tariff.

After many emails back and forth, I got a response saying they had all the information required.

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© Photograph: Timon Schneider/Alamy

© Photograph: Timon Schneider/Alamy

© Photograph: Timon Schneider/Alamy

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