UN secretary-general António Guterres has said that the “world is on the brink of a breakthrough in the climate fight and fossil fuels are running out of road”, the Guardian reports, as two new reports are published illustrating the growing dominance of renewable energy. According to the Guardian, Guterres said: “The greatest threat to energy security today is fossil fuels. They leave economies and people at the mercy of price shocks, supply disruptions and geopolitical turmoil. There are no price spikes for sunlight. No embargos on wind.”

The first of the new reports, from the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), says that around 90% of renewable power projects globally are now cheaper than fossil fuel alternatives, Reuters says. The second, from the UN drawing on data from multiple international agencies, finds that renewables made up 92.5% of all new electricity capacity additions and 74% of electricity generation growth in 2024, the Financial Times reports. It continues: “In value terms, $2tn was invested in clean energy last year, or $800bn more than fossil fuels, up almost 70% over 10 years.” The FT also cites separate analysis from Carbon Brief finding that China’s clean-energy exports in 2024 alone would cut annual overseas emissions by 1%. Another Reuters story notes that, in his speech, Guterres called for companies to power new data centres with renewables rather than fossil fuels. There is further coverage of the speech and the two new reports in titles including Climate Home News, the Associated Press and Euronews. Carbon Brief has pulled out five key takeaways.

The UN’s highest court will today deliver an opinion “that is likely to determine the course of future climate action across the world”, Reuters reports. It continues: “Known as an advisory opinion, the deliberation of the 15 judges of the International Court of Justice [ICJ] in The Hague is legally non-binding. It nevertheless carries legal and political weight and future climate cases would be unable to ignore it, legal experts say.” The newswire quotes Prof Payam Akhavan, an international law expert, saying: “The advisory opinion is probably the most consequential in the history of the court because it clarifies international law obligations to avoid catastrophic harm that would imperil the survival of humankind.” More than 100 states and international organisations have given their views in hearings proceeding the opinion, according to Reuters. The Associated Press says that the 15 judges were asked to answer two questions: “First, what are countries obliged to do under international law to protect the climate and environment from human-caused greenhouse gas emissions? Second, what are the legal consequences for governments when their acts, or lack of action, have significantly harmed the climate and environment?” Al Jazeera covers “what to expect” from the landmark ruling.

A Japanese utility has become the first since the Fukushima nuclear disaster 14 years ago to take steps towards building a new reactor, the FT reports. It continues: “Kansai Electric Power said on Tuesday it would resume a survey into whether it could build a new reactor at Mihama in Fukui prefecture. The project had been suspended after a tsunami in 2011 caused the country’s worst nuclear power accident. Resuming the review marks the first push by a Japanese power company to advance concrete plans to construct a nuclear energy plant from scratch since the disaster.” Channel News Asia reports that the “government has continued to back nuclear power as a reliable and clean source of energy that Japan needs as it aims to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050”. It adds that, 14 years on from Fukushima, “public’s concerns about nuclear power [are] declining, according to opinion polls”. Semafor, Reuters and CNN are among others to cover the story.

The Trump administration has “drafted a plan to repeal a fundamental scientific finding that gives the US government its authority to regulate greenhouse-gas emissions and fight climate change, according to two people familiar with the plan”, the New York Times reports. It continues: “The proposed Environmental Protection Agency rule rescinds a 2009 declaration known as the ‘endangerment finding’, which scientifically established that greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and methane endanger human lives. That finding is the foundation of the federal government’s only tool to limit the climate pollution from vehicles, power plants and other industries that is dangerously heating the planet. The EPA proposal, which is expected to be made public within days, also calls for rescinding limits on tailpipe emissions that were designed to encourage automakers to build and sell more electric vehicles.” A spokesperson for the EPA did not confirm the details of the plan to the New York Times, but acknowledged that a draft proposal had been sent to the White House on 30 June.

MORE ON US

• More than a quarter of firefighting positions at the US Forest Service (USFS) are vacant, according to internal data reviewed by the Guardian, as the country battles dangerous blazes.
• A “century-old” dam in Ohio could put more than 18,000 properties at risk of flooding, the Guardian says, as the “Trump administration continues to roll back investments that would aid in keeping the waters at bay”.
• The cost of providing electricity in the largest US power market will “hit a record high due to soaring demand from artificial intelligence data centres and delays in building new power plants”, the Financial Times reports.
• Fewer than 400 electric vehicle charging points have been built under a $7.5bn federal infrastructure scheme, Reuters says.
• A new heat dome is expected to bring “triple-digit temperatures” to more than 100 million people in the US in the coming days, the Independent reports.

The “only deliverable” expected from tomorrow’s EU-China summit is a “joint statement on climate issues”, the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post (SCMP) says, with “fraught” negotiations on the text having “concluded overnight”. The newspaper adds that expectations for the summit are otherwise the “lowest…in recent memory”. State broadcaster CGTN covers a European Council statement saying the summit is expected to “explore ways to build a more balanced and mutually beneficial trade relationship, while also discussing shared interests such as climate change, biodiversity and the green transition”. Cai Run, Chinese ambassador to the EU, tells state news agency Xinhua that the two sides should use the summit to expand cooperation on “green development”. An editorial in the state-supporting newspaper Global Times argues that “China-EU collaboration on green and tech innovation is accelerating” Europe’s energy transition. Foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun emphasised that climate cooperation is an example of the relationship “yield[ing] fruitful results”, Xinhua reports.

The China Chamber of Commerce to the EU tells the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post that it “hopes the two sides can broker a deal to remove trade barriers” on electric vehicles (EVs) at the summit. Reuters reports Chinese EV manufacturer BYD will “delay mass production” at its factory in Hungary while accelerating production in Turkey. In an interview with the Financial Times, BYD executive vice-president Stella Li criticises the UK’s new EV subsidies, which “essentially exclud[e]” China-made EVs, as “stupid”.

MORE ON CHINA

• New analysis finds China needs to “cut” output of steel made with blast furnaces if it is to meet its “green steel target” this year, Reuters reports.
• Bloomberg reports the NEA is “carrying out month-long inspections” in coal-producing provinces and “may shutter coal mines…producing above permitted levels”.
• The NEA says it will continue to promote “consumption of new energy” in response to NPC recommendations made at the Two Sessions, International Energy Net reports.
• Two people are dead and 10 more are missing after “half a year’s worth of rain fell in five hours” in China’s eastern province of Shandong, Reuters reports. Al Jazeera reports that an official said China has faced a record number of “high-temperature days” since March.
• A commentary by UNICEF China representative Amakobe Sande in China Daily argues that heatwaves, made “more frequent and intense” by climate change, are a “threat to children’s rights”. 
• Xinhua publishes a commentary saying that rectifying “involution” and “disorderly competition” is a “complex systemic endeavor that cannot be achieved overnight”.

According to a new World Bank report, India will need “over $2.4tn by 2050” to develop “resilient, low-carbon infrastructure” to adapt to rising climate impacts in its expanding cities, Hindustan Times reports. Prepared in partnership with India’s urban affairs ministry, the report estimates that by 2050, heat stress could reduce working hours by 20% and heat-related deaths “may rise to more than 328,000 by 2050” if emissions continue at current levels, the story adds. With India’s urban population expected to double by 2050, Indian cities are at a “climate crossroads”, Mint says. The World Bank estimates that urban flooding – which currently costs India 0.5-2.5% of its gross domestic product annually – “will double under a global high-emission scenario”, the paper adds. However, the fact that more than half of India’s urban growth (in terms of new built infrastructure) “is yet to come” can be “a huge opportunity to…avoid large future damages and losses from climate and disaster impacts”, it continues. Meanwhile, another study by the World Resources Institute and the German development agency GIZ estimates that India “may need as much as $13.4tn by 2070 to prepare its urban areas for climate risks”, the Economic Times reports. 

MORE ON INDIA:

• India’s foreign ministry “warn[ed the] west” against “any double standards” on Russian oil imports, Times of India reports. Russian oil giant Rosneft has called EU sanctions on its Indian affiliate “unjustified and illegal” and warned that they “could directly threaten India’s energy security,” according to another Times of India story.
• State-run Oil India is in talks with ExxonMobil, TotalEnergies and Petrobras to “jointly explore” the country’s oil and gas blocks, according to Mint.
• Nikkei Asia reports on the impact of climate change on the “apple basket” of Kashmir, where extreme and “erratic” weather has caused production to fall by over 30%.
• “From snowless winters in the north to early heatwaves in the south”, IndiaSpend maps the weather patterns that “are shifting fast” in just the first half of 2025.
• Times of India covers a “landmark” new study that finds that India’s forests are “less able to convert greenness into actual carbon uptake”.
• More than 368,000 trees could be felled for a coal mining project in “one of India’s last remaining old-growth forests”, Hindustan Times reports.

The Press Association reports that 50 organisations have sent a letter to UK prime minister Keir Starmer urging him to publish the government’s climate action plan ahead of a legal deadline. The newswire continues: “The government is legally obliged to publish a new climate plan by the end of October after it lost a legal challenge last year over the current carbon budget delivery plan, introduced by then-prime minister Rishi Sunak. The plan, which outlines how the UK will meet its targets to cut planet-heating emissions, was found to be unlawful for reasons including the government providing too little detail on how it would ensure delivery of its policies or would address any shortfalls.” The letter, coordinated by Friends of the Earth, said that a “bold and fair” plan could “bring huge economic opportunities that could help ministers deliver their mission for growth – as well as cheap reliable energy, warm homes, clean air, thriving nature and widespread public transport”, according to PA.

MORE ON UK

• A frontpage story in the Financial Times explores “how Britain enticed investors to back its costly new nuclear plant”.
• A major UK oil refinery in Lincolnshire is to shut after being left in an “untenable” position by its “runaway millionaire owners”, the Daily Telegraph says.
• The launch of the electric vehicle grant scheme has led to “chaos and confusion” for carmakers and drivers, industry experts tell the Times.
• An impact assessment carried out by the Foreign Office covered by the Times finds that the UK’s aid cuts will “increase the number of children dying unnecessarily” – but also that “spending on energy, climate and the environment will rise from £414m to £656m”. [Carbon Brief in June reported on how accounting rules changes have allowed the government to meet climate finance targets.]
• Energy secretary Ed Miliband has told a government committee that he is looking into changing rules concerning noise from heat pumps, the Daily Telegraph says.
• “Pressure is growing to renegotiate or leave an international convention” that allows campaigners to challenge building projects on environmental grounds, with their “costs above £10,000 capped and the rest met by the taxpayer”, Sky News says.

For Project Syndicate, former New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern, former UN under-secretary-general Carlos Lopes and former French ambassador and current European Climate Foundation CEO Laurence Tubiana write that Brazil’s COP30 presidency “must eschew flashy results in favour of pragmatic pathways to deliver on past agreements”. They continue: “Fortunately, Brazil recognises this. Its fourth letter to the international community outlines an action agenda aimed at making progress on what the world has ‘already collectively agreed’ during previous COPs and in the Paris climate agreement. Specifically, the agenda seeks to leverage existing initiatives to complete the implementation of the first ‘global stocktake’ under the Paris Agreement, which was concluded at COP28. This focus on previously agreed outcomes is well-suited to the current geopolitical context, in which any agreement can be difficult to reach.”

MORE COMMENT

• For the Financial Times, Benjamin H Bradlow, an assistant professor of sociology and international affairs at Princeton University, writes on the “growing Brics divide between carbon nations and electrostates”.
• A Lex column in the Financial Times explains “why getting to net-zero will take more than peer pressure”. 
• Guardian economics editor Nils Pratley focuses in on private investment into the Sizewell C nuclear project in the UK. Times business commentator Alistair Osborne said private investor Centrica “really can’t lose” with the project.
• A column in the Daily Telegraph by climate-sceptic columnist Matthew Lynn spuriously claims that Sizewell C’s £38bn price tag indicates there is “no hope for net-zero”.
• An editorial in the Daily Mail complains that a “scourge of electric scooters hurtling at reckless speeds along pavements, through red lights and invading parks is one reason Britain feels increasingly lawless”.

This edition of the Daily Briefing was written by Daisy Dunne, with contributions from Aruna Chandrasekhar and Anika Patel. It was edited by Robert McSweeney.

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