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Peter Walker, The Guardian
The Guardian reports in an “exclusive” that UK energy secretary Ed Miliband will “explicitly call out politicians who reject net-zero policies for betraying future generations in an unprecedented update to parliament about the state of the climate crisis, which he is calling ‘an exercise in radical truth-telling’”. The newspaper adds: “With Reform UK proposing to scrap all net-zero measures and even questioning the science behind climate change and the Conservatives ditching environmental targets, Miliband hopes to regain the initiative with a stark warning to MPs. In what is planned to be an annual event, the energy security and net-zero secretary will make a ‘state of the climate’ address to the Commons setting out the findings of a new Met Office-led report that says the UK is already facing extreme weather and its effects.” Miliband tells the Press Association: “Our British way of life is under threat. Whether it is extreme heat, droughts, flooding, we can see it actually with our own eyes, that it’s already happening and we need to act. That’s why the government has a central mission to make Britain a clean-energy superpower and tackle the climate crisis.” Similarly, environment secretary Steve Reed tells the Times: “It’s fundamentally unpatriotic of parties like Reform to refuse to act on things [such as climate change] which are affecting our way of life so profoundly.” BBC News says the Met Office’s new report explains that the UK is “breaking heat and rainfall records increasingly frequently as its climate continues to warm”. The outlet adds: “The country's changing weather patterns mean the UK now experiences a ‘notably different’ climate to what it was just a few decades ago, its State of the UK Climate report says. We now have many more very hot days and many fewer extremely cold nights, according to this latest assessment. It shows just how much global warming caused by the vast emissions of greenhouse gases our civilisation creates is reshaping the country's climate.” The Guardian says the Met Office report shows that the “country is firmly in the grip of the climate crisis”. The Financial Times zooms in on another of the report’s key findings: “The UK’s sea level is rising faster than the global average and at an accelerating rate.” The Times examines whether this could be the UK’s “worst year ever” for wildfires. Separately, the Guardian says that “England’s reservoirs are at their lowest level for a decade as experts call for hosepipe bans”. And BBC News has a feature headlined: “As UK faces third heatwave, is this 'just summer'?”
Chloe Chaplain, The i newspaper
There is widespread UK media coverage of the announcement by the government that, as the i newspaper explains in an exclusive, “motorists will be offered thousands of pounds off the cost of buying a new electric vehicle as part of a government drive towards greener transport”. The outlet adds: “The grant scheme will be backed by £640m of government funding and will favour UK-made electric vehicles, sources said. Transport secretary Heidi Alexander is due to announce the policy on Tuesday.” The Sunday Times says: “The UK is to announce a £700m subsidy scheme to convince drivers to switch to electric vehicles. Officials in Whitehall are this weekend adding the final touches to new policies to address concern about the high upfront cost of EVs and the perception of a lack of charging infrastructure.” The Times says the “return of electric vehicle grants for motorists could be the ‘firecracker’ needed to increase demand, industry experts have admitted”. Transport secretary Heidi Alexander tells BBC News that “we will be making it cheaper for those who do want to make the switch to an electric vehicle”.
MORE ON UK
The climate-sceptic Sun carries an “exclusive” about how Labour MPs in the Commission for Carbon Competitiveness have called for the prime minister to “cut net-zero levies on industry or risk killing off manufacturing jobs for good”. The Sun on Sunday uses the story to run an editorial which ends: “When are you going to see sense and scrap net-zero, PM?” The Daily Telegraph also covers the story. The Guardian’s Jillian Ambrose completes the newspaper’s four-part series on the “rise of the right” with a news feature on “the battle over solar farms and pylons as Reform UK takes aim at net-zero”. The i newspaper “reveals” that “people would be able to apply for government grants to help pay for air conditioning units in their homes under plans being considered by ministers”. The Daily Telegraph follows up on the story saying “British households could be allowed to claim £7,500 to install air conditioning heat pumps in their homes”. (See Comment below.) The net-zero-sceptic Daily Telegraph continues its deluge of news stories attacking net-zero. Headlines include: “Badenoch: Rush to meet net-zero is pushing up holiday costs”; “Farmland falls to solar gold-rush”; and “The weather phenomenon driving up Britain’s electricity bills”. BBC News covers comments made by a Reform UK councillor in Nottinghamshire who has “been criticised after claiming man-made global warming is a ‘hoax’”. The outlet adds: “Scientists around the world agree human activities are causing temperatures to rise.”
Trevor Hunnicutt and Maria Cardona, Reuters
US president Donald Trump “defended the state and federal response to deadly flash flooding in Texas on Friday as he visited the stricken Hill Country region, where at least 120 people, including dozens of children, perished a week ago”, reports Reuters. The newswire adds: “The Trump administration, as well as local and state officials, has faced mounting questions over whether more could have been done to protect and warn residents ahead of the flooding, which struck with astonishing speed in the pre-dawn hours on 4 July, the US Independence Day holiday. Trump reacted with anger when a reporter said some families affected by the floods had expressed frustration that warnings did not go out sooner. ‘I think everyone did an incredible job under the circumstances,’ he said. ‘I don't know who you are, but only a very evil person would ask a question like that.’” The Associated Press says “Texas leads the nation in flood deaths due to geography, size and population”. It continues: “Flooding is the second leading weather cause of death in the country, after heat, both in 2024 and the last 30 years, averaging 145 deaths a year in the last decade, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.” The Guardian’s Ed Pilkington explains why the “most disaster-prone US state is so allergic to preparing for disasters”. (See Carbon Brief’s media-reaction summary: “The 2025 Texas floods and the role of climate change”.)
MORE ON US
The New York Times says, “in an effort to shrink the federal government, President Trump and congressional Republicans have taken steps that are diluting the country’s ability to anticipate, prepare for and respond to catastrophic flooding and other extreme weather events, disaster experts say”. Politico reports that “Democrats couldn’t save Biden’s energy programs – so they’ll try to make them a weapon against the GOP” by “centring their 2026 energy pitch on kitchen table economics by contending Republican policies will cost people money”. The Wall Street Journal has a feature on how “Trump’s executive order forms new clouds over renewable energy”.
Tom Wilson, Financial Times
The Financial Times reports that the International Energy Agency has said it “expects global oil demand to grow at the slowest pace since 2009, outside of the coronavirus pandemic, amid early signs that US tariffs are weighing on economic activity”. It adds: “The energy advisory body said it expected consumption to increase by only 700,000 barrels a day this year. That would be the smallest rise in annual demand since the aftermath of the global financial crisis, with the exception of 2020 when demand contracted by 8.7m b/d as governments shut key parts of the economy in order to contain the spread of Covid-19.”
MORE ON ENERGY
The Press Association reports that “BP has said it expects to report higher oil and gas production for the second quarter, after the energy giant renewed its focus on fossil fuels to help boost profits”. Reuters says: “Several Saudi companies, including utilities heavyweight ACWA Power and a subsidiary of oil giant Aramco signed power purchase agreements on Sunday for clean-energy projects with a capacity of 15 gigawatts and investments worth around $8.3bn, the Saudi state news agency (SPA) said.”
Liz Lee, Reuters
Reuters covers comments made by EU climate commissioner Wopke Hoekstra during high-level talks in Beijing with Chinese officials where he said the “world needs China to show more leadership on climate action”. The newswire says Hoekstra has highlighted the “importance of cutting planet-heating emissions and reducing the Chinese economy's reliance on coal”. He tells the outlet in an interview: “We do encourage China to take more of a leadership role going forward and really hit the road with meaningful emission reductions in the next couple of years, and also move out of the domain of coal.” Separately, Reuters reports that “most European Union countries have backed plans to agree a deal on their new climate change target by September, sources familiar with the discussions said on Friday”.
Colleen Howe, Reuters
China has “for the first time set renewable energy mandates for the steel, cement and polysilicon industries, as well as for some data centres, according to a National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) notice on Friday”, reports Reuters. The newswire adds: “Beijing's renewable portfolio standards, or RPS, set out targets for the percentage of power consumption that the various industries must obtain from renewables in each province. Previously the RPS only affected companies involved in power trading and the electrolytical aluminium industry.” The NDRC and the National Energy Administration (NEA) have also approved a plan by China’s major grid operators to “normalise electricity trading” between regions covered by separate grids, business news outlet Jiemian reports. It adds that, according to the grid operators’ plan, the initial focus for low-carbon energy trading will be “listed trading” (挂牌交易) promoting the transmission of low-carbon electricity between specific provinces. Industry news outlet BJX News says the decision will help “achieve the optimal allocation of power resources, to better support China’s power supply”. Energy news outlet International Energy Net says that under the plan, China will “explore signing multi-year green electricity trading contracts to meet electricity users’ green-power consumption needs nationwide”.
MORE ON CHINA
China has been involved in 155 “climate-related projects” in Africa since 2021, of which 66% were focused on renewable energy, reports China Daily. Reuters says that “new-energy truck” sales in China may have risen 175% year-on-year in the first half of 2025, which could see diesel consumption fall 6%. According to the IEA, China’s share of global “clean energy spending” has increased from a quarter to almost a third in the past 10 years, SCMP says. SCMP reports that China’s investments in exploration for “minerals for…green energy industries” rose “more than half from a year earlier” in the
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