Many UK publications report on the surprise return of the former Labour Party leader Ed Miliband to the shadow cabinet, where he has been handed a “key climate role” as shadow business and energy secretary. “The move was warmly welcomed by green business groups and campaigners, who noted that Miliband has long been a vocal advocate of bold climate action, having previously served as energy and climate change secretary as part of Gordon Brown’s administration,” BusinessGreen reports. In a statement, Miliband spoke of a long-term need to focus on climate action once Covid-19 is controlled, the Guardian says. Miliband said: “We cannot go back to business as usual after this crisis. We will need to reshape our economy, addressing the insecurity many millions of workers face. We must also return to climate change as the unavoidable long-term issue of our time.” The i newspaper notes Miliband is “expected to take charge of Labour’s green agenda”. BBC News, the Sun and the Independent also report on the return of Miliband.

Around three-quarters of new electricity generation capacity constructed in 2019 uses renewable energy, representing a new record, the Guardian reports. The new data, from the International Renewable Energy Agency (Irena), shows solar, wind and other renewable sources of power now provide more than one-third of the world’s electricity – another record, the Guardian says. It adds: “But the number of coal and gas plants grew in Asia, the Middle East and Africa. In the Middle East, which owns half the world’s oil reserves, just 26% of new electricity generation capacity built in 2019 was renewable.” BusinessGreen adds that, though a record in capacity was reached, the rate of capacity growth “slowed just a touch” in 2019. “The global renewable power sector added 176GW of new capacity in total last year – just fractionally down on the 179GW added in 2018,” BusinessGreen says.

Meanwhile, the Financial Times reports that G20 oil ministers are to hold an emergency meeting this week “as they try to support an industry decimated by the coronavirus pandemic”. Spearheaded by Saudi Arabia and the International Energy Agency (IEA), the meeting will be the first the G20 has specifically convened to address energy issues – “showing the depth of concern about the oil crash”, the FT says. Global oil demand has fallen by more than a quarter as many parts of the world have grounded flights and installed lockdowns in an effort to combat coronavirus, the FT says. US president Donald Trump has already called on Saudi Arabia and Russia to find a way to cut oil production by at least 10m barrels a day, the FT says, but both countries have insisted that other countries, including the US, participate in cuts, too. Reuters reports that the meeting will be virtual. The Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC+) group is due to meet the day before on Thursday, Axios notes.

Australia’s Great Barrier Reef has been hit by its most widespread mass bleaching event on record, the third such event in five years, report the Guardian and others. One quarter of the Great Barrier Reef suffered severe bleaching this summer, according to analysis of aerial surveys of more than 1,000 individual reefs, the Guardian says. Dr David Wachenfeld, chief scientist at the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, tells Guardian Australia: “My greatest fear is that people will lose hope for the reef. Without hope there’s no action. People need to see these [bleaching] events not as depressing bits of news that adds to other depressing bits of news. They are clear signals the Great Barrier Reef is calling for urgent help and for us to do everything we can.“ The mass bleaching indicates that corals are under intense stress from the waters around them, which have been growing increasingly hotter, the New York Times reports. In the Conversation, Prof Terry Hughes and Morgan Pratchett, who conducted the aerial surveys, say what they witnessed “was an utter tragedy”. They write: “The Great Barrier Reef will continue to lose corals from heat stress, until global emissions of greenhouse gasses are reduced to net zero, and sea temperatures stabilise. Without urgent action to achieve this outcome, it’s clear our coral reefs will not survive business-as-usual emissions.” The Independent also has the story. Last year, Carbon Brief published an in-depth feature on whether the Great Barrier Reef could survive climate change.

Unearthed reports on confidential documents suggesting “lobbyists are coordinating a massive effort on behalf of airlines to push governments and airports around the world to roll back environmental taxes and set up bailout funds in the midst of the coronavirus crisis”. A strategy document produced by the airline industry shows it is lobbying for public money to restart or maintain previous levels of air travel and for any planned tax increases to be delayed for up to a year, Unearthed says. The document details lobbying strategies for Europe, the Americas, Asia and the Pacific, North Asia, Africa and the Middle East, Unearthed adds. Climate Home News also reports on the documents. Meanwhile, BBC News reports that “more than 250 trades unions and environment groups have signed an open letter opposing plans for bailing out the aviation industry”.

The Daily Mail has given its lead op-ed slot to the veteran environmental journalist Geoffrey Lean to remark that the Covid-19 lockdown means the “environment has improved in one fell swoop”. After citing Carbon Brief research about China’s temporary 25% emissions decline, he continues: “The choice is no longer between changing how we do things and business as usual, but between rapid change and a series of environmental disasters that devastate the world economy. Terrible and destructive though it is, the coronavirus crisis provides a pause for thought. It has revealed gaping cracks in our present system, and has already dramatically shifted what is thought to be possible. The environment and the economy, once thought irreconcilable, are increasingly seen to be inseparable. The economy, as Covid-19 has made painfully clear, is a wholly owned subsidiary of the environment, dependent on healthy natural systems. And green investment is increasingly recognised as the best route to prosperity…Imminent decisions could determine whether the world embraces the huge opportunity for low-carbon, environmentally attuned prosperity or tries to claw its way back to the old, unsustainable status quo.”

Elsewhere, there is more comment and analysis looking into how coronavirus may affect efforts to tackle climate change. Writing in the Daily Telegraph, former foreign secretary and Conservative party leader William Hague argues that a firmer line must be taken against China, but adds: “We cannot solve the world’s problems without China. If we want to prevent catastrophic climate change, as well as promote global health, protect bio-diversity, save the oceans, stop nuclear proliferation, restore a prosperous global economy and prevent dangerous new arms races on Earth and in space, we need the Chinese and they need us.” For EurActiv, Annika Hedberg, head of the Sustainable Prosperity for Europe Programme at the Brussels thinktank European Policy Centre, argues the virus should be used as a catalyst to get the EU on a more sustainable track and accelerate efforts towards net-zero emissions. She writes: “With travel and traffic heavily reduced, production processes disrupted and people consuming less, we can expect a short-term reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. This is already evident in China as well as in Europe…However, these reductions are happening for the wrong reasons and are not an answer to the ongoing climate crisis.” Clyde Russell, energy columnist at Reuters, argues that renewable energy could “win” over oil and gas in a post-coronavirus world. He says: “The coronavirus is likely to change the market dynamics of the various types of energy, and mostly in favour of renewables such as wind, solar and hydropower. The outbreak had already wrought radical change in two different ways. The first is that the oil-and-gas industry has been shaken to its core, while the second is that the cost of capital is at record lows, and there will be billions of dollars of stimulus spending looking for a home.” James Murray, editor of BusinessGreen, highlights new analysis from the banking giant Morgan Stanley that suggests coronavirus “won’t derail decarbonisation”. Elsewhere, in BusinessGreen, researchers Marcus Enoch and James Warren presents a “once in a lifetime chance” to change the way we travel. Benjamin Sorrow, a reporter at E&E News, count five ways the economic upheaval caused by coronavirus may affect global emissions. Meanwhile, in Forbes, scientist and writer Prof Laura Tenebaum reminds readers that “climate change hasn’t gone away just because of [coronavirus]”.

A “big read” by FT markets reporter Gregory Meyer explores how Texas, the US’s oil and gas heartland, has embraced solar power. A solar farm the size of a small city will open in Texas this month, he writes. The project will eventually be expanded to generate to 1,380MW – enough power to serve 230,000 homes, he says. Meyer writes: “The solar projects are a threat to fossil fuels. Renewables have helped to force the closures of coal-fired power plants. They are now challenging natural gas’s primacy in the US electricity generation mix as the price of solar equipment keeps on falling.”

A new paper assesses whether the European Union emissions trading system (EU ETS) reduced CO2 emissions despite a relative low carbon price when compared to estimates of the social cost of carbon. Using “an original sectoral emissions dataset”, the researchers estimate the carbon emissions in a world without carbon markets. The findings suggest the EU ETS saved “about 1.2bn tonnes of CO2 between 2008 and 2016 (3.8%)…or almost half of what EU governments promised to reduce under their Kyoto Protocol commitments”.

Rising temperatures “drives spatial and temporal changes in fish body size”, a new study suggests, but “not consistently in the negative fashion expected”. The researchers analysed 10m visual survey records of 355 species, spanning the Australian continent and multiple decades and comprising the most common coastal reef fishes. The findings show “around 55% of species were smaller in warmer waters (especially among small-bodied species), while 45% were bigger”. The study concludes that “the rapid and variable responses of fish size to warming may herald unexpected impacts on ecosystem restructuring, with potentially greater consequences than if all species were shrinking”.

A new “first-of-its-kind” estimation of household-level electricity demand to high temperatures in India suggests that “rising affluence will lead to sharp increases in electricity demand for cooling”. Overall, power demand in India “increases by 11% or more at temperatures above 30C from demand at temperatures of 21–24C”, the study finds. Looking specifically at New Delhi, the study finds that, as temperatures increase, “low-income demand plateaus while richer homes use more”. The findings “underscore the need to improve our understanding of the constraints posed by poverty on climate change adaptation, and for interventions to mitigate risks of heat stress among the poor”, the authors conclude.