In an interview with the Financial Times, US president Donald Trump has “said he wants to ‘take the oil in Iran’ and could seize the export hub of Kharg Island, as the US sends thousands of troops to the Middle East”. The newspaper adds: “The president’s comments come as the US-Israeli war against Iran has thrust the Middle East into crisis and sent the price of oil surging by more than 50% in a month. Brent crude rose above $116 a barrel on Monday morning in Asia, near its highest level since the conflict began. Trump said: ‘To be honest with you, my favourite thing is to take the oil in Iran but some stupid people back in the US say: ‘why are you doing that?’ But they’re stupid people.’” Such a move would involve seizing Kharg Island through which most of Iran’s oil is exported.”

Relatedly, the New York Times says the “US and other exporters are poised for a windfall, but disruptions to Persian Gulf supplies are also pushing gas-buying countries to consider alternatives like coal, solar and nuclear energy”. Nikkei Asia reports that Australian coal shares have “surged” as the Iran war deepens the energy crisis, with Asia “scrambling” for alternatives amid disruption to oil and gas. A separate New York Times article explains “this is what happens when the gas runs out”, adding: “With a cutoff in shipments imminent, Asian countries, the biggest importers of liquefied natural gas from the Middle East, are already burning more coal and reducing consumption.”

MORE ON ENERGY CRISIS

• Bloomberg: “Iran war’s gas supply shock pushes top consumers back to coal.”
• Le Monde: “Will the war in Iran advance or hinder Europe’s energy transition?”
• Japan is “considering ramping up coal-fired power generation amid a liquefied natural gas crunch”, reports OilPrice.com. 
• Deutsche Welle: “Solar is winning the energy race.”
• Bloomberg: “South Korea Weighs first driving curbs in 35 years on oil crunch.”
• Yahoo Finance reports how a growing number of analysts believe that the “shift from oil isn’t just about being ‘green’ anymore – it’s a massive power move for national security”.

UK chancellor Rachel Reeves will “warn G7 nations they must move faster on clean energy to insulate economies against global price shocks from oil and gas as she and the energy secretary Ed Miliband meet G7 finance and energy ministers on Monday”, reports the Guardian. The newspaper adds: “Keir Starmer will also gather major energy industry and insurance figures to thrash out what emergency measures might be needed to contain the continuing crisis from the blockade of the strait of Hormuz. But in an explicit rebuke of the Conservatives and Reform, who have urged her to end the ban on new oil and gas licenses, Reeves will tell her fellow ministers that long-term energy security from renewables and nuclear is the only way to prevent future crises. ‘As we move faster on renewables and nuclear, our partners in the G7 must do the same – because staying stuck on the rollercoaster of global oil and gas prices will help nobody,’ Reeves told the Guardian ahead of the meeting.”

The Financial Times also carries the story, adding: “Reeves will warn allies within the group – which also includes the US, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Canada and Britain – to ‘act together, not in ways that shift pressure on to partners or weaken collective resilience’ in response to the economic fallout from the war in Iran, according to the UK Treasury.”

Germany will “review whether to reactivate standby coal-fired power plants in an effort to reduce energy prices that have been elevated since the war in the Middle East, reports Bloomberg. The outlet adds: “Lawmakers of the conservative party of chancellor Friedrich Merz as well as their coalition partner, the Social Democrats, agreed on the move as part of a package of energy measures after talks in parliament Friday.” It says a “final decision” is expected in the “next few weeks”. Politico says the “controversial move – which would likely push up the country’s CO2 emissions – is intended to save gas”.

Deutsche Welle quotes Merz speaking at an event organised by the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung in Frankfurt: “We may need to keep our coal plants online for longer…I am not ready to gamble with the core of our energy supply just because we agreed on some deadlines years ago.” Deutsche Welle adds: “Germany has used coal as its primary energy source for many decades. However, its share [of electricity] has dropped to less than 22% by 2024, with renewable energy sources at nearly 60%. The county is in the process of eliminating coal to minimise pollution, with the last coal-fired plants to be phased out by 2038.”

Kemi Badenoch, the leader of the UK’s opposition Conservative party, is “peddling a dangerous fantasy” about North Sea energy in her attempt to reverse a ban on new oil and gas licences, a leading campaign group has said, reports the Guardian. The newspaper adds: “The Conservative leader is expected to call on the government to lift its suspension of the licences as part of a drive to reduce energy prices, as the party launches a new campaign aimed at boosting the fossil-fuel sector. However, critics have questioned the efficiency of the policy, claiming it would be unlikely to cut household bills. Tessa Khan, executive director of the renewable energy campaign group Uplift described it as ‘vapid, political game playing at the expense of ordinary people’.”

The Times says: “The Conservatives have joined Reform in demanding that ministers scrap VAT on energy bills and ‘get Britain drilling’ again in response to the war in the Middle East. The party claimed that the government could cut bills by up to £200 by removing some of the taxes and charges that are placed on gas and electricity charges.” [See Comment below.] During a TV interview yesterday with the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg, Badenoch vowed to scrap UK energy secretary Ed Miliband’s “silly green taxes”, reports the Daily Mail. Badenoch is reported saying: “But drilling in the North Sea is a bigger issue. This is about our energy security. Yes, let’s have renewables, yes, let’s have nuclear, but just saying no to North Sea oil and gas, something that is already there when we are not ready for a full transition, is a bad decision.”

The Sunday Express says “Badenoch will visit an oil rig [today] as she launches a campaign to ‘get Britain drilling’”. The newspaper claims: “The future of Britain’s remaining oil and gas reserves in the North Sea is now one of the key dividing lines in UK politics.” BBC News carries the reaction of Labour’s exchequer secretary to the Treasury Dan Tomlinson who says the “central foundation” of the Tory energy plan – to maximise North Sea drilling – “won’t bring bills down”. [See Carbon Brief’s new factcheck: “Nine false or misleading myths about North Sea oil and gas.”]

MORE ON UK

• The Financial Times: “UK ministers explore ‘targeted’ energy bill relief for those most in need.”
• Ministers have “started a [long-planned] review of electric car sales quotas, raising expectations that the UK will reverse one of the government’s flagship green policies”, reports the Sunday Times.
• The Independent: “Britons turn to solar power to ‘insulate’ against oil and gas chaos, says E.On.”
• The Daily Express: “Households given free electricity in 4 years with plug-in solar panels from Lidl.”
• The Guardian: “How EVs could be part of answer to UK’s fuel reserve worries.”
• The Daily Telegraph covers a new “report” by a climate-sceptic lobby group which claims that “net-zero investments are costing pension savers hundreds of thousands of pounds in lost returns”.

There is continuing coverage in the US of the Trump administration’s attempts to terminate existing clean-energy deals. The Financial Times reports that the administration is “seeking to halt the remaining offshore wind projects in the US, offering buyouts to companies that are developing them in exchange for fossil-fuel investments”. The newspaper adds: “The Department of the Interior had held talks with several companies with offshore wind leases to persuade them to enact deals such as the one agreed with TotalEnergies [last] Monday, people familiar with the matter said…The government’s strategy has shifted towards incentivising companies to give up their leases – some of which cost hundreds of millions of dollars – and instead pump those funds into fossil fuel projects.’”

Relatedly, the New York Times carries a feature headlined: “Clean energy companies are trying to survive the Trump era.” It says: “Offshore wind is out. Geothermal power is in. And many climate technology start-ups are looking for ways to carry on without federal backing.”

MORE ON NORTH AMERICA

• Clean Technica: “Balcony solar is spreading across the US.”
• BBC News covers the election of former journalist and activist Avi Lewis as the leader of Canada’s left-leaning New Democratic Party: “In 2015, Lewis and [his wife Naomi Klein]…launched a document dubbed the Leap Manifesto, which proposes broad societal and economic changes to address climate change.”
• The Guardian: “A costly plan will keep a steel plant in JD Vance’s hometown running. Locals are aghast: ‘It’s horrible’.”
• NBC News: “As Western heatwave ends, scientists try to make sense of its length and intensity.”
• The New York Times interviews Thomas Jorling, an adviser to Republicans who cosponsored the Clean Air Act in 1970, on why he now “disputes the Trump administration’s claim that it shouldn’t apply to planet-warming greenhouse gases”. 

China’s commerce ministry has announced two trade barrier investigations into US measures that “impede green technology trade and harm global production and supply chains”, reports state news agency Xinhua. Reuters cites the ministry saying the US has implemented measures that limit the exports of Chinese clean-tech products and “slow down the deployment of new energy projects”, harming Chinese companies’ interests. The newswire adds that China’s investigations are a “reciprocal” response to two US Section 301 investigations. Xinhua publishes the full text of the statement from the commerce ministry. Chinese commerce minister Wang Wentao has called on the World Trade Organization to help developing nation members “seize opportunities in green development”, reports Singaporean newspaper Lianhe Zaobao.

MORE ON CHINA

• Chinese automakers claimed 8% of Europe’s market in February, with their share of battery EVs rising 2 percentage points to 14%, reports Bloomberg.
• MEE’s head, Huang Runqiu, has called for “improving the green development level of enterprises in the private sector”, reports Xinhua.
• The Global Times: “UK wind power controversy reflects expansion of overstretching security concept in West.”
• Former UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon has called for stronger climate cooperation between China and South Korea, reports China Daily.
• China’s climate envoy Liu Zhenmin said China will implement its “dual carbon” goals regardless of how the international situation changes, reports Sina News.
• China has issued guidelines to provide unified standards for carbon accounting across public institutions nationwide, reports BJX News.

The UK media carries a wide range of commentary about the nation’s energy policy in light of the global energy crisis triggered by the Iran war. In the Financial Times, columnist and former Conservative policy advisor Camilla Cavendish argues that the “debate over North Sea oil and gas resembles a bar brawl between opponents who can’t see straight”. She continues: “At the extremes, the pro-drill, pro-frack contingent are of the ‘let’s keep dancing ‘til the music stops and worry about carbon emissions later’ variety. Their opponents adopt a self-defeating pout: ‘We’re going to be climate leaders, even if we kill our own economy.’ The answer must be to harness every bit of energy supply we can – drill more though not every drop. And to restore faith in climate action by tackling some of the rank absurdities in UK energy policy.” She concludes: “It shouldn’t be controversial to argue that we must back more gas production, face down Green concerns about nuclear and introduce more honest carbon accounting. But that means taking the ideology out of the debate.”

Writing in the Observer, former editor Will Hutton argues that “an energy revolution is in the wind”, adding: “Labour’s plans for cheap renewable power will transform British lives as dramatically as the NHS once did.” In the Guardian, Gaby Hinsliff says that “Ed Miliband’s stock is rising because he’s a rare commodity in Labour these days: a thinker”. The Sunday Times’s data editor Tom Calver asks: “Why is the rush into renewable energy not lowering our bills?” He concludes: “Wind and solar are the cheapest sources of electricity we have. Building a network that can carry them – and contingencies for when it is dark and still – is anything but. Until the grid catches up with our rush towards wind, British households will pay a premium.”

MORE UK COMMENT

• Writing in the Scottish edition of the Daily Mail, Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch claims that “saving Britain’s oil and gas industry is a personal mission of mine…That’s why I have launched the Conservative’s campaign to get Britain drilling”. [See News above.]
• An editorial in the climate-sceptic Daily Mail claims that Badenoch’s plan is a “lot more plausible than Labour’s dangerous pursuit of net-zero targets”.
• An editorial in the climate-sceptic Sun claims “as long as Ed Miliband is calling the shots, Britain’s rocketing fuel crisis will continue”. Similarly, an editorial in the Sun on Sunday is headlined: “Red Ed is hellbent on sticking to net-zero crusade and leaving ordinary Brits to foot the bill.”
• In the climate-sceptic Daily Express, columnist Nick Ferrari claims that “deranged Ed Miliband pulls dull Starmer’s strings in pursuit of his net-zero mania”.
• An editorial in the climate-sceptic Daily Telegraph claims the “Labour Party has no credibility on rising oil and gas prices. Meanwhile, Daily Telegraph columnist Jeremy Warner says: “Times have changed, but Ed Miliband is stranded in another age.”
• An editorial in the climate-sceptic Spectator is headlined: “The Tories are the real green party.”

Writing in the Sydney Morning Herald, environment reporter Caitlin Fitzsimmons focuses on a new report published by the Australian Senate which investigates climate misinformation. She writes: “Climate action has a new enemy – the rise of ‘AI slopaganda’…The old enemies have not gone away – climate falsehoods are also spread by vested interests representing the fossil-fuel industry, community members with genuine concerns but misguided beliefs, and sites serving clickbait to drive advertising revenue…What do we have to thank for this toxic cocktail of consequences? Why, the same fossil-fuel interests that caused the greenhouse pollution behind global warming in the first place.” She concludes: “When the information environment is so heavily polluted, quality independent journalism is more important than ever. It is also under increasing threat. This is not the time to roll back copyright protection so that AI companies can simply grab whatever they want. Big Tech has stolen our attention, mental health, children’s wellbeing, livelihoods and elections. Now it’s coming for reality. We shouldn’t fall over ourselves to help it.”

MORE COMMENT

• Tej Parikh, the Financial Times‘ economics leader writer, argues that the Iran war will “cement China’s superpower status” because, in part, it has “made significant investments in electrification”.
• Nikolaus J Kurmayer for Euractiv on “why a €1tn green bet hasn’t broken [Europe’s] import habit”.
• Javier Blas for Bloomberg: “The oil market is moving into demand destruction mode.”