Global demand for gas will rise more than 20% from last year’s level by 2050, according to projections released by the oil-and-gas company ExxonMobil, Reuters reports. The outlook, which provides the basis for the firm’s long-term strategy and investments, sees gas displacing coal to “power industries and meet higher electricity use in developing countries”, the newswire says. It notes that  ExxonMobil “has ambitious growth plans compared to other global oil players, with a target to boost production by 18% over the next five years”. Bloomberg notes that the company also forecasts that emissions will be around 4% higher than its estimate last year, due to more coal being used and slowing electric-vehicle sales in the US and Europe. Overall, the oil major estimates that “net-zero goals for the global energy sector are likely to drift further beyond 2050”, the news outlet adds. The oil giant’s global outlook includes a section titled “lessons from Europe”, which takes aim at the EU’s “high-regulation, high-cost” approach to cutting emissions and claims such an approach has “hurt” the bloc’s economy, according to the Financial Times. The newspaper notes that ExxonMobil has “consistently lobbied against European regulations in the climate and sustainability area”, arguing that they undermine competitiveness and make it harder for US companies to operate.

MORE ON EMISSIONS

• Global greenhouse gas emissions in the first six months of 2025 were 0.13% higher than the same period last year, with the US accounting for more than half the increase, according to analysis by the NGO Climate Trace covered by Bloomberg.
• New legal advice commissioned by environmental NGOs argues that national climate action plans under the Paris Agreement are required to address non-CO2 emissions from aviation, according to BusinessGreen. 
• The Financial Times has an analysis piece examining falling global birth rates, which notes that this trend may not lead to lower emissions and may even “slow progress” on climate action due to older populations being “less innovative and more conservative”.

The collapse of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) “can no longer be considered a low-likelihood event”, according to a new study covered by the Guardian. The newspaper notes that climate models recently indicated an AMOC collapse – which would cause dramatic shifts to global weather patterns – was unlikely before 2100. However, the new analysis considered models that were run for longer, suggesting “the tipping point that makes an AMOC shutdown inevitable is likely to be passed within a few decades, but that the collapse itself may not happen until 50 to 100 years later”, the article notes. The newspaper explains that, according to the new analysis, 70% of the model runs led to collapse if emissions continue to rise, 37% with an “intermediate level” of emissions and 25% in the case of “low future emissions”. The article adds that the study makes “deep cuts to fossil fuel emissions even more urgent to avoid the catastrophic impact”. The Daily Mail reports the story with the somewhat more alarmist headline: “Global emergency as key Atlantic current is on the brink of collapse.” Meanwhile, Politico reports on the response to an entirely separate paper concerning AMOC collapse, which EU climate commissioner Wopke Hoekstra has described as a “wake-up call”. Writing on social media, the commissioner stated that “this new study says that the Gulf Stream could collapse in our lifetime”.

Energy company Drax is being investigated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) – the UK’s financial watchdog – about where it sources its wood that it burns to create electricity, the Times reports. The article notes that this provides “fresh ammunition for the scientists, environmentalists and politicians who have long disputed the energy group’s green credentials”. The newspaper explains that the FCA is scrutinising Drax’s disclosures to the market between January 2022 and March 2024 in relation to its “biomass sourcing” from sites in North America and “the compliance of its 2021, 2022 and 2023 annual reports with rules applied to publicly listed companies”. The article notes that this follows a similar investigation by energy watchdog Ofgem, which resulted in Drax paying out £25m. Sky News explains that criticism of Drax’s biomass operations from a climate perspective is “based on its impact on forests and the years needed for its emissions to be offset”. The Financial Times notes that biomass supplies around a tenth of the UK’s power and the government has agreed to continue subsidising Drax’s power plant. The Guardian says the investigation into Drax “will raise fresh questions about its billions in subsidies”. Alistair Osborne, chief business commentator for the Times, writes: “Whatever the truth about the tree-burning power company that has received more than £6.5bn of taxpayer subsidies, the taxpayer needs to be told.”

MORE ON UK

• Only two electric vehicles sold in the UK will qualify for the full £3,750 discount under the government’s new subsidy scheme, the Financial Times reports.
• Funding issues mean flood protection for homes in Scotland may not be built, despite soaring demand due to climate change, according to a report by the auditor general and the Accounts Commission covered by BBC News. 
• The monthly total of grants through the boiler upgrade scheme to help UK households switch to heat pumps reached the highest level since the scheme began in July, according to BusinessGreen.
• Analysis by the thinktank E3G suggests heat pumps could save UK households hundreds of pounds a year on heating bills, if the government took “simple measures” such as “ending green levies on electrical heating”, the Guardian reports.
• The Reform-led Lancashire county council has confirmed that there are no plans for fracking to return in the county, despite a party promise to let energy firms “drill, baby, drill”, BBC News reports.
• The Financial Times reports that UK farmers are on course for “a second year of poor harvests”, with dry weather and “weather extremes” cited as key drivers of the trend. Marian Waters, a farmer in Worcestershire, has a comment piece in the Times bemoaning the impact of drought on farming.

China has established a “national expert committee on climate change and health”, carbon market-focused news outlet Tanpaifang reports. The committee will provide “key technical support” for the National Health Commission’s (NHC) climate change strategies, building a “climate defence line” that will “propel China’s climate change and health adaptation efforts to new heights”, according to Shen Hongbing, NHC deputy director and director of the National Disease Control and Prevention Administration. Shen also states that climate change has become the “most complex public health issue faced by humanity in the 21st century”, the outlet adds.

MORE ON CHINA

• China will “push to cut steel production between 2025 and 2026”, according to the “final draft” of a policy under development, Reuters reports.
• China added 325 gigawatts (GW) of new power capacity in the first seven months of 2025, the People’s Daily says, including 223GW of solar and 54GW of wind.
• China is working to push “economic cooperation” with other Shanghai Cooperation Organisation member states “towards newer, greener…development”, Xinhua says.
• Dialogue Earth reports China is expanding across Indonesia’s “green-energy value chain” as “western financing falters”. Egypt signed a $220m solar project on Wednesday with investors from China, the UAE and Bahrain, Reuters says.
• China’s efforts to curb price wars in the electric vehicle industry have had “limited effect”, Bloomberg says, with top manufacturers continuing to offer discounts.
• Reuters reports that China has “placed curbs” on coal production, following an unexpected supply increase that “weighed on prices”. 

On the 20th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, Mark Fischetti, a senior editor at Scientific American, has an article reflecting on the work that has been undertaken to prepare New Orleans for future hurricanes and flooding. “No matter what officials do, New Orleans will continue to sink. The sea level will continue to rise. Climate change will continue to make storms stronger and rainfall heavier,” Fischetti writes. He adds that “despite stouter levees, floodwalls and barrier islands, vibrant wetlands are crucial to long-term security”. Fischetti also notes that recent actions by officials have undermined progress in this area. “Above all else, Louisiana’s power brokers must listen to science. The cost of not doing so is all around them,” he concludes. 

MORE KATRINA COMMENT

• Writing in Grist, senior staff writer Mark Simon has a piece titled: “We now know just how much climate change supercharged Hurricane Katrina.” 
• Lee Hedgepeth, Alabama reporter at Inside Climate News, has a personal story about surviving the hurricane as a child. “For families experiencing poverty along the Gulf, disasters like the aftermath of Katrina expose how little daylight there is between survival and catastrophe – a gap that climate change is widening,” he writes.
• Teen Vogue has an article titled: “How Hurricane Katrina’s horrors created a generation of climate activists.”

James Massola, the Sydney Morning Herald’s chief political commentator, has an article about Sussan Ley – the leader of the right-leaning opposition Coalition in Australia – and her approach to net-zero. “Sussan Ley is hurtling towards a political showdown over Australia’s net-zero target that could make, or end, her leadership. After three years of an utterly supine party room under Peter Dutton, the Liberal party leader presides over a much-diminished and divided opposition,” he writes. Massola notes that Ley has “initiated a proper review process on climate policy”, but has to contend with the climate-sceptic National party in her coalition, as well as more conservative members of her own Liberal party. He writes that Ley – who supports net-zero – “is no fool”, adding: “She knows the Coalition needs to remain committed to net-zero to have any chance of winning back city seats. The messy debate in the party room is coming, and it will test her leadership like never before. Ley may come to wish that the Coalition split had remained in place.”

Commentators in the UK’s right-leaning newspapers continue to pen articles attacking UK energy secretary Ed Miliband, blaming an increase in the nation’s energy bills on the government’s net-zero policies. Kathryn Porter, an “independent energy consultant” and climate sceptic who regularly writes anti-net-zero articles for the Daily Telegraph, has a piece in which she contradicts government messaging and claims that “gas explicitly [is] not the reason for the latest increase in the price cap”. Lois Perry, former leader of the UK Independence Party (UKIP) and current director of the climate-sceptic Heartland Institute UK/EU thinktank, has an article in the Daily Express attacking Miliband and net-zero policies in general. Climate-sceptic commentator Julia Hartley-Brewer has an article in the Sun concluding that “net-zero claims about saving the planet and cutting our bills are nothing but hot air”.

This edition of the Daily Briefing was written by Josh Gabbatiss, with contributions from Henry Zhang and Anika Patel. It was edited by Daisy Dunne.

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