Reuters says researchers have a message for Americans who like the more “preferable” milder winters and agreeable summers experienced in most of the US since the 1970s thanks to global climate change: enjoy it while you can. “Eighty percent of Americans live in areas experiencing weather that is more pleasant than four decades ago, with balmier winters along with summers that are no more humid and only marginally warmer, researchers said on Wednesday. By 2100, however, 88% of Americans will face weather considerably less comfortable, with summers eventually heating up at a much faster rate than the winters over the course of the 21st century, they found.” The danger of these findings, say the researchers, is that they could make the US public apathetic about this “critically important problem”. The US climate scientist Michael Mann tells the Guardian that there is a danger “the population may have been lulled into complacency when it comes to the impacts of climate change”. The Nature study is widely reported elsewhere, including by the Association Press, MailOnline, Climate Central and Time.

Some of the world’s most eminent scientists have written to the editor of the Times to complain about its coverage of climate science, reports ABC News in Australia: “They suggest the newspaper may be unduly influenced by the Global Warming Policy Foundation, which, despite its name, denies humans are causing climate change. Baron John Krebs, a highly decorated biologist is behind the push, writing that the newspaper has become a ‘laughing stock’ for publishing poor quality science.” The letter states: “”[M]any of the sub-standard news stories and opinion pieces appear to concern, in some way, GWPF. Whether any newspaper should involve itself repeatedly with any pressure group is a matter for debate; it would be deeply perturbing to find that a paper as eminent as The Times could allow a small NGO, particularly one whose sources of financing are unknown, a high degree of influence.” The Guardian also reports the story and carries responses from both the Times and GWPF.

Australia’s Great Barrier Reef has fallen victim to its worst-ever instance of coral bleaching, with a new survey revealing that 93% of the reef has undergone the life-threatening process. The survey by the country’s National Coral Bleaching Taskforce revealed that only a small fraction of the world’s biggest reef system has avoided bleaching entirely. Bleaching occurs when reefs expel the algae from their tissues — which occurs in adverse aquatic conditions like high water temperatures or pollution — placing themselves under great stress and increasing the risk of mortality. TheWashington Post, Independent and Climate Central are among the other publications reporting the news

Developed countries should ramp up coal taxes to meet a promise to deliver $100bn a year by 2020 to poorer nations, India’s climate minister said on Tuesday. India recently doubled its tax on the production of coal from $2.96 to $5.94 a tonne, with the proceeds going to environmental projects. “If they [developed countries] tax at $6 a tonne, it will really mobilise the funds,” said Prakash Javadekar.

The EU abandoned or weakened key proposals for new environmental protections after receiving a letter from a top BP executive which warned of an exodus of the oil industry from Europe if the proposals went ahead. In the 10-page letter, the company predicted in 2013 that a mass industry flight would result if laws to regulate tar sands, cut power plant pollution and accelerate the uptake of renewable energy were passed, because of the extra costs and red tape they allegedly entailed. The measures “threaten to drive energy-intensive industries, such as refining and petrochemicals, to relocate outside the EU with a correspondingly detrimental impact on security of supply, jobs [and] growth,” said the letter, which was obtained by the Guardian under access to documents laws.

The US Senate acted in a bipartisan fashion to pass a sweeping energy bill, touching on everything from cybersecurity for power plants to the future of the grid. Mooney reports: “It has been widely praised by many industry groups, and received somewhat more mixed reviews from the environmental community. Energy efficiency advocates applauded its measures for buildings and weatherization programs even as some greens have expressed concerns about the legislation’s provisions that would define the burning of biomass as carbon neutral.” The bill also contains provisions promoting more research on the sequestering of carbon emissions from coal burning (so-called “clean coal” technologies) and hastening the approval of pipelines and liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports. The Hill also reports the news.

Drax faced protests during its annual general meeting in London yesterday over its use of public subsidies to support its massive coal and wood-burning power station. Banners were unfurled by campaigners seeking to “axe Drax” outside its AGM, as well as at the Drax power station site near Selby, North Yorkshire. Duncan Law, from the Biofuelwatch campaign group, said: “DECC [the Department of Energy and Climate Change] are calling biomass burning in power stations like Drax a ‘transition technology’, and a closer look at Drax’s strongly suggests that the power station’s lifespan is indeed limited. “But the impacts of the logging in the US, which is feeding Drax today, will be long-lasting, if not permanent. Precious wetland forests, once they have been cut down, may never recover.” Last year, Carbon Brief investigated the low-carbon claims made about the imported biomass burned at Drax.

Reuters reports that there are “concerns at the United Nations about apparent attempts inside the United States to ‘sabotage’ President Barack Obama’s commitments to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, the head of the U.N. General Assembly said on Wednesday”. Mogens Lykketoft of Denmark, current president of the 193-nation General Assembly, issued the warning in an interview with Reuters ahead of Friday’s U.N. signing ceremony for the Paris agreement aimed at slowing climate change. “What scares us a little…is there is all this sabotage inside the United States against this commitment for climate change, including (with) the Supreme Court,” he said. Lykketoft was referring Obama’s difficulties in replacing U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who died earlier this year.

Lewis, a professor of global-change science at University College London and the University of Leeds (and one of Carbon Brief’s contributing editors), says that the Paris Agreement finally defined the threshold for ‘dangerous’ climate change: “It is 1.5C above pre-industrial levels. True, this definition is not explicitly spelled out in the agreement text. It is a de facto definition. But it is there all the same. And that is hugely significant.” However, he asks: “Is it based on good science?…The emergence of 1.5C as a serious policy position comes with important lessons for scientists. The global research community has shockingly little to say on the probable impacts of a 1.5C rise…Most impact studies and future-scenario analyses focus on 2C and higher. Few focus on the most-vulnerable regions. It is the same bias that neglects the study of diseases that kill millions outside the developed world…This bias is dangerous. And it will continue until more scientists challenge the agenda of their funders and examine their own preferences for research questions to answer.”

In a letter to the Guardian, Amber Rudd, the UK’s secretary of state for energy and climate change, responds to the “very strange claims” made in an earlier article stating that the lights would stay on even if the construction of Hinkley C nuclear power plant was delayed. Rudd says: “We need electricity that’s safe, clean and reliable at any time of the day or night. New nuclear is one of the best ways of providing this. That’s why we back Hinkley, and I have never said it’s for any other reason.”

Global emissions figures should be treated with caution, says Le Page, “as they come with big uncertainties and some countries’ figures are unreliable – or non-existent”. He adds: “What we can measure with certainty is the level of CO2 in the atmosphere. Alarmingly, it increased by a record 3 parts per million (ppm) in 2015 and looks set to rise even more this year.” The bad news, he says, is that “to have a good chance of limiting warming to 2C, global emissions need to peak earlier, by around 2020. With the emissions of countries like India and Russia still climbing sharply, that seems extremely unlikely…What we need is leadership from a big player. Bernie Sanders has pledged to introduce a carbon tax if he wins this year’s US presidential election. That could be a game changer – but just like keeping to 2 °C of warming, that’s an almighty big if.”

Vaughan looks back to the moment 10 years ago when David Cameron famously “hugged a husky” in the Arctic when trying to perform a green makeover of his Conservative party. This was followed by Cameron’s commitment to lead the “greenest government ever”. A decade on, Vaughan says that “with a succession of green policies now dropped or watered down, those environmental promises are now ringing hollow with many voters”.

Climate Central analysis shows that the world will have to dramatically accelerate emissions reductions if it wants to meet the 1.5C goal. The average global temperature change for the first three months of 2016 was 1.48°C, essentially equaling the 1.5°C warming threshold agreed to by COP 21 negotiators in Paris last December. Rather than using the baselines NASA and NOAA employ, Climate Central compared 2016’s temperature anomalies to an 1881-1910 average temperature baseline, the earliest date for which global temperature data are considered reliable. It adds: “If current emissions trends continue (RCP8.5) we could cross the 1.5°C threshold in 10 to 15 years, somewhere between the years 2025-2030, compared to 2045-2050 when a 1985-2005 baseline is used.”

A new analysis combining the changing risks of heat and cold waves, river and coastal flooding, streamflow droughts, wildfires and windstorms under climate change concludes that Europe “will likely face a progressive increase in overall climate hazard”, especially in south-western regions. The authors identify key hotspots along densely populated and “economically pivotal” coastlines, where they say floods and windstorms could be critical when combined with other hazards.

As global temperatures rise, much of the US is seeing milder winters than 40 years ago. Based on data suggesting warm places grew their populations faster than cold places over the 20th century, a new study concludes that 80% of Americans are, on the whole, experiencing “more pleasant” weather. Any effect is temporary, however, since US summers will eventually warm more than winters and the study does not take into account extreme weather, only average temperatures. By the end of the century, 88% of Americans will experience weather that is “less preferable” than the recent past, the paper suggests.