Centrica has been granted a licence to revive the UK’s biggest gas storage facility, reports the Times, as ministers “scramble to bolster energy security”. The paper continues: “The British Gas owner is now in talks with ministers over a consumer-funded subsidy mechanism for the Rough site, which it hopes to bring back in time for this winter. The company had previously indicated that this could cost as much as £500m. The FTSE 100 energy group stopped offering gas storage at Rough, 18 miles off the Yorkshire coast, in 2017 after concluding it was no longer economically viable to repair the ageing infrastructure without subsidies, which ministers had ruled out as poor value for money.” Centrica applied for a storage licence in June and was granted it yesterday, the paper says, but notes that “it still needs a funding agreement and other regulatory approvals including from the Crown Estate and the Offshore Petroleum Regulator for Environment and Decommissioning”. Rough had the capacity to store gas equivalent to about 10 days of UK demand, the paper says, but “it’s not clear how much of this can be refilled in time for this winter”. The Daily Telegraph says that any financial support for Rough “could see a levy added to consumer bills, deepening the cost of living crisis”. Reuters and CityAM also have the story.

In an “exclusive”, Reuters reports that a missing turbine that Moscow says has caused the Nord Stream 1 pipeline to pump less gas to Europe is stuck in transit in Germany because Russia has so far not given the go-ahead to transport it back. According to “two people familiar with the matter”, the turbine had been undergoing maintenance in Canada, but was flown back to Cologne, Germany, on 17 July. However, “it is currently unclear when the turbine can be returned, the people said, adding this could still take days or even weeks”, the newswire reports. It continues: “Germany dismisses Russia’s argument that the missing turbine is the reason for lower supplies via Nord Stream 1, and has accused Moscow of using gas flows as a political weapon. Russia has said that the return of the turbine had a direct impact on the pipeline’s safe operation, adding documentation from Siemens Energy needed to reinstall it was still missing. One of the sources said Moscow had so far not provided the documents needed to import the turbine into Russia, including details on where exactly to deliver it and via which customs station.”German economy minister Robert Habeck said: “Sometimes one has the impression that Russia no longer wants to take it back. That means the pretext of technical problems actually has a political background, and that is the opposite of being a guarantor for energy security in Europe.” Habeck also said that the German government is ramping up plans to conserve gas for the winter despite a partial return to deliveries through the Nord Stream pipeline, reports Politico. It explains that “the measures will require citizens to cut back on their energy consumption and even opt for alternative fuels like coal to make up for reduced gas usage”.

Meanwhile, Reuters also reports that the Greek government said yesterday that it opposes an EU plan for countries to cut their gas use by 15% by March. Unveiling a contingency plan which sees rotating power outages as a last resort if Russian gas supplies are disrupted, Greece has proposed an EU cap mechanism on wholesale gas prices and joint gas purchases to help cut soaring energy costs, the newswire explains. Kostas Skrekas, the energy minister, told a Greek radio station that “right now, Greece is prepared, it has the necessary infrastructure which can secure supplies even at the most adverse scenario of natural gas being cut off.” Politico notes that Poland, Portugal, Spain, Cyprus and Greece have all now said they opposed to binding gas consumption reductions, “while three EU diplomats confirmed there are currently not enough votes to pass the new rules”. The outlet adds: “EU energy ministers are set to discuss the proposal and looming winter gas crisis when they meet next Tuesday, but by that point, the Commission’s proposal could already be a lost cause.”

In related comment, the Daily Telegraph‘s world economy editor Ambrose Evans-Pritchard writes that “there is a suspicion that Brussels is misusing Article 122 and exploiting this crisis to take control of energy policy”. He continues: “It is going to be a fractious debate. Southern Europe has fresh and bitter memories of what happened in the eurozone banking crisis when Berlin promoted a morality tale of profligate Club Med states (it was true only for Greece), and invoked the doctrine of moral hazard to impose punitive austerity. But the Commission is right about the urgency of cuts required to refill gas storage before winter. The menu is hard to fault: a one degree cut in home thermostats; and a 19C limit in commercial offices and public buildings (11 BCM saved); shorter showers; turning off appliances instead of leaving them on stand-by.”

In continuing coverage of heatwaves across the northern hemisphere, Reuters reports that the “vast heatwave covering swathes of Europe” moved steadily eastwards yesterday, forcing countries including Italy, Poland and Slovenia to issue their highest heatwave alerts as firefighters battled wildfires across the continent. Greece, which contained a huge wildfire that raged near Athens for two days and was fanned by high winds, urged Europe to do more to tackle climate change, the newswire reports. A government spokesperson said: “The climate crisis is now evident across Europe, with particular intensity in the wider Mediterranean region. The cocktail of high temperatures, gusty winds and heavy drought inevitably leads to wildfires.” They added that Greek fire fighters had tackled 390 forest fires in one week. In Poland, the authorities issued heat warnings for many parts of the country, with temperatures as high as 36.7C, the newswire says, with a large wildfire fire breaking out near the southern town of Brzesko. Wildfires continued to burn in Portugal, Spain, Italy and Slovenia, the outlet notes. Spain and Portugal have reported more than 1,900 deaths, reports the Independent, while Reuters reports on the “total destruction” felt by Spain’s winemakers. Reuters also reports on how Europe’s power system “is being strained by sweltering summer temperatures, forcing air conditioners into action and drying up rivers needed to cool nuclear plants”.

In the UK, the i newspaper says that the “true impact of the heatwave on public health may not be fully understood for another two weeks, as officials work to verify how many people died or were admitted to hospital”. The Guardian reports on the “uncomfortable day for aviation as Farnborough runway hits 50C”. BusinessGreen covers a new report from the Climate Change Committee (CCC) that warns the “number of people dying from heat-related issues could triple by mid-century as a result of the UK’s poorly ventilated buildings”. Experts and schoolchildren tell BBC News that “current teaching is leaving children unprepared to live in a warming world”. And Bloomberg opinion columnist Mihir Sharma has some tips from India on how the UK can cope with extreme heat.

In the US, the “unrelenting heat” continued to scorch the US east coast and south for the third day yesterday as “dangerously high temperatures had forecasters warning about the dangers of dehydration and exposure”, reports Reuters. The Guardian reports that “heat warnings and advisories have been put in place for 28 states”, noting: “The National Weather Service has warned that extreme heat will affect more than 100 million people in the US this week, with triple-digit temperatures in some states and broken temperature records in many areas across the country.” The Financial Times Energy Source column looks at how the extreme heat “is magnifying New York’s racial disparities”. And the New York Times reports that states in the Colorado River basin are “scrambling to propose steep cuts in the water they’ll use from the river next year, in response to a call by the federal government for immediate, drastic efforts to keep the river’s main storage reservoirs from reaching critically low levels”.

The Financial Times has a piece explaining the role of the jet stream in the simultaneous heatwaves across much of the northern hemisphere. It points to a “peculiar shape in the jet stream dubbed ‘wavenumber 5’”, noting that “scientists are racing to understand whether the band of fast-moving air that controls weather in the mid-latitudes is changing in a way that makes heatwaves more frequent and persistent”. Finally, the extreme weather prompted Pope Francis to call on world leaders yesterday to heed the Earth’s “chorus of cries of anguish”, reports Reuters. In a message for the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, he wrote: “Exposed to the climate crisis, the poor feel even more gravely the impact of the drought, flooding, hurricanes and heatwaves that are becoming ever more intense and frequent.”

There is continuing coverage of the extreme heat affecting parts of China. Reuters says “China will suffer the return of more heatwaves over the next 10 days from east to west, with some coastal cities already on their highest alert level and inland regions warning of dam failure risks because of melting glaciers”. It adds: “A sharp temperature spike is expected on Saturday, before building up into heatwaves, defined as periods of atypically hot weather of three days or more. This Saturday is the day of the ‘big heat’ in the Chinese Almanac based on the lunar calendar. The hot spell is expected to be similar in scope as heatwaves from 5-17 July, but more regions could be hit by temperatures of 40C or higher, Fu Jiaolan, chief forecaster at the National Meteorological Centre, told state media.” CNN also covers the story under the headline: “China endures summer of extreme weather as record rainfall and scorching heat wave cause havoc.”

Meanwhile, in a Bloomberg article, Zhang Hong, deputy general secretary of the China National Coal Association, is quoted as saying: “Coal’s dominant role [in China] is unlikely to change in the next 10 to 15 years.“ The outlet adds that for all of China’s “massive build-up” of clean energy, climate action remains “hostage to energy security”, particularly after last year’s “crippling” power shortages and the “spike” in prices. Elsewhere, Alex Lo, a columnist with the South China Morning Post, writes: “The US and the EU should thank China and India rather than castigating them for buying cheap oil and gas from Russia.”

In a frontpage story, the Guardian reports on new analysis showing that the oil and gas industry “has delivered $2.8bn (£2.3bn) a day in pure profit for the last 50 years”. The study – yet to be published in an academic journal, but confirmed as “accurate” by three experts – finds the “vast total captured by petrostates and fossil fuel companies since 1970 is $52tn”, the paper explains, with the “huge profits…inflated by cartels of countries artificially restricting supply”. It continues: “The analysis, based on World Bank data, assesses the ‘rent’ secured by global oil and gas sales, which is the economic term for the unearned profit produced after the total cost of production has been deducted.” Prof Aviel Verbruggen, lead author of the study, tells the paper that “it’s real, pure profit. They captured 1% of all the wealth in the world without doing anything for it”. He added: “It’s really stripping money from the alternatives. In every country, people have so much difficulty just to pay the gas and electricity bills and oil [petrol] bill, that we don’t have money left over to invest in renewables.”

French utility firm EDF is “trying to alter a key subsidy contract” to avoid missing out on billions of pounds in guaranteed revenue after the Covid-19 pandemic caused further delays to the Hinkley Point C nuclear power station, reports the Financial Times. The paper explains: “The subsidy deal guarantees EDF a price of £92.50 for every megawatt hour of electricity it produces, when it eventually opens, for the first 35 years of its life…Penalty clauses in the subsidy agreement – which guarantees a price that is more than double those offered to developers of rival technologies such as offshore wind — would reduce the 35-year term if Hinkley is not generating electricity by May 2029. EDF would lose one year of guaranteed payments for every year of delay up to 2033. If the delays extended beyond that date the government has the option to terminate the subsidy contract.” EDF has asked to “be allowed to declare a force majeure covering one year of delays due to Covid-19 restrictions that curbed the number of workers on the project”, says Bloomberg. It notes that, if approved, “it will extend the time EDF has to start generating electricity before it starts losing funding”. Hinkley was supposed to start up in 2025, notes the Times, but EDF has pushed this back to mid-2027 and warned of the risk of a further 15-month delay. Another Times article looks at the “spiralling costs” of the project. It says: “[F]rom a projection of £18bn in 2016, the budget has repeatedly risen and, after a £3bn increase in May, stands at £25bn to £26bn. Even that is an understatement given that EDF is still citing 2015 prices, so the effects of inflation are not included.”

The owner of the UK’s largest steelworks, Tata Group, has threatened to shut down operations if the government does not agree in the next year to provide £1.5bn of subsidies to help it reduce carbon emissions, reports the Financial Times. As one of the UK’s largest industrial groups it is “among the biggest emitters of carbon dioxide”, the paper says and “executives have been in talks with the government about decarbonisation plans, but discussions have stalled”. Natarajan Chandrasekaran, chair of Tata Group, tells the paper that “a transition to a greener steel plant is the intention that we have…But this is only possible with financial help from the government. We have been in discussions over the last two years and we should come to an agreement within 12 months. Without this, we will have to look at closures of sites”. Under decarbonisation plans, Tata would close its two blast furnaces at Port Talbot, stop primary steelmaking and instead build two electric arc furnaces, “people familiar with the details” tell the FT. The paper explains: “These furnaces recycle scrap steel and are less carbon intensive than blast furnaces. Building these electric arc furnaces and decommissioning the blast furnaces would cost around £3bn, with Tata seeking £1.5bn from the government.” The Daily Telegraph picks up on the FT’s story, while the Guardian reports that Tata Steel UK made a pre-tax profit of £82m in the last financial year – its first profit in 13 years – “thanks to record steel prices and a recovery in demand across Europe as pandemic restrictions eased”.

UK climate envoy John Murton says the war in Ukraine will accelerate Europe’s shift to renewable energy from fossil fuel in the longer term, even as it prompts nations to burn more coal over the coming months to offset reduced Russian gas supplies, reports Reuters. Addressing journalists in South Africa, alongside delegates from the US, France and Germany, Murton said: “It’s true that, as a result of pressures arising from Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine, some of us anticipate using a little more coal over the next few months than we previously planned…(But) there is not a dash back to coal in UK or in Europe.” The delegates are “visiting South Africa to discuss the details of a $8.5bn package to help it fund a transition from coal”, the newswire explains. It adds: “No new agreement or details emerged from the visit, although the head of South Africa’s presidential climate finance task team, Daniel Mminele, said the country planned to have an investment plan in place by October.”

“There comes a moment when the penny drops. And in Britain this week the sound of dropping pennies was loud,” says an editorial in the Economist that focuses on the UK’s new record temperature of 40.3C. The UK’s heatwave – as well as those across the northern hemisphere – have “emphasised how built environments are designed for a bygone climate”, the outlet says. Parts of the UK rail network “came close to paralysis because the rails on British track beds are optimised to be stress-free at 27C”, it says: “Temperatures in the high 30s are outside their comfort zone. Rails can be changed as societies adapt to rising temperatures. But the cost and disruption of upgrading all the infrastructure that will need it, from houses to hospitals to fire brigades, will be immense.” It continues: “A further irony is that in some cases applying technology to adapt to higher temperatures, in the form of air conditioning for inappropriately designed buildings, increases demand for electricity. In Britain, just this week, such demand has risen by 5% compared with the previous week. This is fine if the juice used comes from green sources. But if it originates in fossil-fuel power stations, it will, itself, accelerate global warming.” Adaptation is “a crucial spanner in the toolkit”, but “it does not absolve people from addressing the problem at source, by encouraging green power-generating and energy-saving technologies and discouraging and decommissioning the ‘brown’ sort”. The article concludes: “If the dropping pennies released by this summer’s heatwaves inspire action in that direction, the suffering and loss of life will not have been entirely in vain.”

It is “good news” that the proposed Sizewell C new nuclear plant in Suffolk has been given the go-ahead, says an editorial in the Daily Telegraph, but “it is depressing that the economic potential of nuclear power is not also being seized”. It continues: “On the contrary, the technology only gets more expensive as the years roll by. Britain will be obliged to pay about £20bn – if budgets do not balloon – to get Sizewell online. Owing to the demise of Britain’s own nuclear expertise, that money will go abroad, to the French firm EDF. It is a domestic decline all the sadder because this country played a leading role in unlocking the power of the atom.” The paper also argues that because new nuclear generation is “likely to take years to come onstream”, it “makes fully exploiting North Sea oil and gas all the more vital”. Indeed, it says, “securing a reliable energy supply has never been more important, as the unfortunate experience of much of Europe shows”.

In other UK comment, Philippa Nuttall – the New Statesman‘s environment and sustainability editor – explains why “deregulation will worsen the climate crisis”. Times columnist Emma Duncan says that “sniffy planning laws are failing the climate”. And Sunny Hundal, deputy editor of the Independent’s opinion section, writes that “the climate crisis isn’t a massive, impossible problem that will cost us trillions to deal with. This narrative is out of date. Most of the technology needed to stop this crisis is now available, and it’s far cheaper than burning oil or gas. It would actually save us a lot of money”.

In an editorial, the Washington Post says that it would be a “dubious move” for US president Joe Biden to declare a national climate emergency to enact forward his climate policies. The paper continues: “A national emergency declaration would unlock 136 statutory powers, only a few of which relate to climate. It would allow the administration to restrict drilling on federal lands and end crude oil exports, but those steps would not enable Mr Biden to efficiently reach his climate goals and could harm US industries. It could also grant the president certain powers to support and redirect spending to renewable-energy production.” Biden “has not exhausted all the other tools in his arsenal”, the paper says, arguing that “emergency powers were never meant to address long-standing policy priorities”. It concludes: “Presidents should not use these declarations to enact their agendas whenever they are impeded by Congress, whether it is President Donald Trump invoking a national emergency over the border or Mr Biden considering one for climate. The extreme climate events of the past week are a warning that there is no time to waste – neither on inaction nor on performative policies that will not produce the scale of change needed. Mr Biden should remember that as he continues to craft his climate response.” A piece in the New York Times explains four “key points” on the implications of declaring a climate emergency.

In other US-related comment, Henry Paulson – a former US Treasury secretary – writes in the Financial Times that “planting trees is not a panacea – we need to save existing forests”. And Washington Post columnist Fareed Zakaria argues that the perfect should not “become the enemy of the good” in climate action, and that “the reality is that we need to cut emissions now, not promise to do so by 2030. And the only way to do it now, and at scale, is to make some tough choices and trade-offs”.

The Financial Times has published a new “special report” series on “Japan and sustainability”. The articles include how Japanese carmakers are racing “to champion ‘green’ combustion engines”, how Japan “faces scrutiny over details of $1.1tn climate plan”, why renewables are in the mix for Japan’s financing of African development, how Japan’s nuclear restart debate is firing up as the “power crunch bites”, and how the war in Ukraine is spurring LNG demand in Japan “despite fossil fuel activism”.

A new study shows that the Congo Basin peatland complex comprises more than one-third of global tropical peatlands and stores 29bn tonnes of carbon below the surface. Using field surveys in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, researchers map the extent, density and carbon content of the Cuvette Centrale region of the Congo Basin. They find “extensive” peatlands covering nearly 170,000 square kilometres of the basin – 15% large an area than previously estimated. The authors write: “keeping the central Congo Basin peatlands wet is vital to prevent peat carbon being released to the atmosphere”. (One of the study’s authors has previously written guest posts for Carbon Brief on the discovery of the Congo peatlands and a new research programme to understand it.)

According to a new study, climate change is driving an increase in income inequality within countries – not just between them, as previous research has focused on. Scientists analyse data from more than 150 countries, relating a measure of income inequality to climate indicators and socioeconomic characteristics. The researchers find that both increases in temperature and rainfall anomalies “have significant adverse effects on within-country inequality”. They also identify “key structural factors” that make countries more vulnerable to climate effects, including the proportion of the population that works in the agriculture sector.