There is continuing coverage of the confirmation that 2025 was the third-warmest year on record, according to data from the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service, NASA and the UK Met Office. Agence France-Presse reports that NASA’s statement, published alongside its latest annual report, “makes no reference to climate change, in line with President Donald Trump’s push to deny the reality of planetary heating as a result of human activities”. It continues: “That marks a sharp break from last year’s communications, issued under the administration of Democrat Joe Biden, which stated plainly: ‘This global warming has been caused by human activities’ and has led to intensifying ‘heatwaves, wildfires, intense rainfall and coastal flooding.’” Separately, officials from the EU’s climate monitor tell Agence France-Presse that “Trump’s planned science funding cuts could create blind spots in climate research, but his policies did not impact” their report. Meanwhile, Climate Home News, Politico, Economist, Sky News, BusinessGreen, Hill, Yale Climate Connections, Euronews, Press Association, Inside Climate News and Scientific American report on the high temperatures in 2025 and their implications for the Paris Agreement’s 1.5C goal. Carbon Brief has detailed coverage in its latest “state of the climate” analysis by Dr Zeke Hausfather.

There is ongoing UK media coverage of yesterday’s offshore wind auction. The Times reports that Germany’s RWE won five of the six contracts awarded by the government, with a combined total capacity of 6.9GW. However, according to the outlet, the company “does not expect all of its projects to start up in time to meet [energy secretary] Ed Miliband’s 2030 clean-power goal”. BusinessGreen covers a “snap analysis” from the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit, which “calculates that had the new wind farms been operating over the last year, gas power generation could have been 35% lower, which would have cut day-ahead wholesale electricity prices by 13%”. The Guardian has an explainer, which says: “Official figures show that electricity generated by the latest generation of offshore windfarms will be 40% less expensive than the power produced by a new gas-fired power plant. In official figures published on Wednesday, the government said the cost of building and operating a new gas-fired power station was £147 per megawatt hour, while the auction price for offshore wind was £90.91 per megawatt hour on average.” BusinessGreen has published reactions from clean-energy experts, businesses, politicians and campaigners. The Press Association reports that the Scottish government has called the auction a “missed opportunity”, arguing that “‘much more’ could have been achieved and Scottish projects will be at a ‘competitive disadvantage’ due to ‘unfair’ transmission charges”. The Daily Mail has a story under the headline “giant wind farm ‘will kill thousands of seabirds a year and push puffins to the brink of extinction’, warns RSPB”. The New York Times, Guardian, BBC News and BusinessGreen also cover the results of the auction.

MORE ON UK

• BusinessGreen says the Scottish government has “promised to invest at least £5bn in support of its efforts to deliver a just transition towards net-zero emissions and bolster climate resilience across the country, as it confirmed new funding for a raft of carbon-free transport, clean heat, and nature restoration projects”.
• The Bureau of Investigative Journalism reports that the UK is the “worst” country in the world for letting fossil-fuel companies drill in nature reserves. InfoAmazonia also covers the investigation, which finds that “7,000 protected areas are threatened by oil and gas projects worldwide”. 

Sales and exports of Chinese “new energy” vehicles (NEVs) are expected to slow amid “sluggish demand and lingering external uncertainties”, with sales projected to fall from 28% last year to 15% in 2026, reports Reuters. The newswire adds that exports may increase by just 4% compared with a “stronger-than-expected” 21% growth in 2025, citing data from  the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers. However, the newswire adds that overall vehicle sales will grow 1% this year, falling from 9% last year. The state-supporting Global Times newspaper says that NEV sales and exports in 2026 are estimated to reach 19m and 7m units, respectively. State news agency Xinhua reports the Chinese government aims to “accelerate breakthroughs” in technologies such as all-solid-state batteries for NEVs. The outlet adds that, over the past five years, China’s NEV market grew four-fold, the cost of batteries fell 30% and battery lifespans increased 40%. 

Meanwhile, an editorial in the Global Times argues that the EU’s NEV pricing guidelines “demonstrated resilience” in EU-China relations, adding that the two sides will see “normalised competition” coexist with a “solid cooperative foundation”. Ahead of Canadian prime minister Mark Carney’s official visit to China this week, Bloomberg reports that the Chinese government may “propose easing some restrictions on Canadian rapeseed products” in exchange for Canada relaxing tariffs on Chinese-made EVs.

MORE ON CHINA

• China’s exports of wind turbines to the EU jumped by 66% in 2025, according to customs data, reports the Global Times.
• Despite export controls, China’s rare-earth exports in 2025 increased 13% year-on-year, rising to their highest level since at least 2014, says Reuters.
• China’s 2025 coal imports saw their “biggest annual drop” in a decade due to an “cheaper alternatives” and a “contraction in thermal power”, says Bloomberg.
• Economic Daily: “Dual-carbon goals drive comprehensive green transformation.”
• In the 15th “five-year plan” period (2026-2030), power companies’ development of large clean-energy bases alone could bring 650 gigawatts (GW) of renewable capacity online, according to International Energy Net.
• The South China Morning Post covers a “warning” from China’s security ministry that “anti-China hostile forces” could be “gathering information on natural resources [and] energy facilities”.
• The Financial Times reports that the “vast majority” of the 104 coal-fired power stations “set to start” supplying electricity to the world in 2026 are in China.

“BP has acknowledged for the first time that its struggling green energy businesses are worth far less than previously thought and will wipe $4bn-5bn off their value, taking its cumulative writedowns in the past two years to about $20bn,” according to the Financial Times. The Guardian adds: “The oil company said the writedowns were mostly related to its gas and low-carbon energy divisions in its ‘transition businesses’, but added that wiping between $4bn and $5bn off their value would not affect its underlying profits when it reports its full-year results in February.” Agence France-Presse also covers the story. 

MORE ON OIL AND GAS

• The Times reports that “Shell and Exxon Mobil have halted a planned $500m sale of North Sea natural gas assets to Viaro Energy, a controversial oil producer”. Bloomberg says the “ending of the transaction follows a protracted regulatory review by the North Sea Transition Authority”. 
• The New York Times says: “Some of the biggest early winners in the Trump administration’s efforts to assert more control over Venezuela’s energy industry are not the companies that produce oil but the ones that transform it into gasoline, diesel and other products.”
• Reuters says that “climate activist shareholder group Follow This and more than 20 other investors have filed resolutions calling on BP and Shell to disclose how they will create value if global demand for oil and gas declines”.

Wildfires in the Argentinian province of Chubut, part of Argentine Patagonia, have engulfed more than 21,000 hectares and damaged houses, tourists resorts and infrastructure in close areas, reports EFE Verde. Argentina’s vice president Victoria Villarruel has visited the affected areas in Chubut and stated she will boost reforms “to increase penalties, including prison sentences, for those who start fires”, according to La Nación. Infobae also covers the news, adding the fires remain active, but could decrease as rainfall reaches the region.

MORE ON LATIN AMERICA

• Petrobras and Shell have funded a study to assess carbon stock in Brazil’s soils and forests, with civil society organisations warning of a conflict of interest, reports Folha de São Paulo.

• Colombia’s next president will receive “an energy sector on red alert” and will need to “deliver in energy transition, energy inclusion, fiscal policy and project implementation”, according to a commentary for El Espectador.
• Infobae reports that Bolivia’s government has declared an “energy and social emergency” as the country experiences an economic crisis and fuel shortage. The government has introduced “exceptional measures” to guarantee fuel production and supply in the country.
• Similarly, EFE covers the “multiple crises” affecting Cuba, including an energy crisis with “severe blackout crisis” since 2024 and the “state’s inability to import enough oil”.
• Energy sector leaders and businesses have agreed that Mexico requires a “national strategy, along with infrastructure and legal certainty to make electromobility accessible for people”, reports Excélsior.

Scientists in Antarctica “inaugurated the first global repository of mountain ice cores” yesterday, according to the Associated Press. The newswire continues: “An ice core is something of an atmospheric time capsule, containing information about the Earth’s past changes in a frozen climate archive. With global glaciers melting at an unprecedented rate, scientists have raced to preserve ice cores for future study before they disappear altogether.” Euronews reports that the “human-made cavern” is called the “Ice Memory Sanctuary”. It adds that “the first two ice cores travelled in -20C containers all the way from Europe”. Politico says the “safehouse” is “far from climate change – and Trump”.

UK energy secretary Ed Miliband has written a comment piece for the Guardian under the subheading: “The only way that Britain’s energy bills can come down is if we are no longer reliant on fossil fuels. Today marks a big step towards that goal.” Miliband argues that renewable and nuclear energy “offer a chance for Britain to stand on our own two feet in the world – making and setting the price of our own energy”. However, he says that, “over the last year and a half, a well-funded rightwing network has waged a relentless war against this argument…A lot of nonsense is said about the cost of renewables. The key fact in our auction is this: the average price we have secured for fixed offshore wind projects is £90.91 per megawatt-hour – significantly cheaper than the cost of building and operating a new gas plant.”

MORE UK COMMENT

• The Guardian’s financial editor, Nils Pratley, writes in the Guardian that the wind auction “shows trade-offs are now needed”. He says the auction shows that “the days when offshore wind got cheaper every year are over” and that “the rollout of offshore wind at these prices will not knock squillions off the price of electricity”. 
• Commenting on the UK’s offshore wind auction, the Financial Times Lex column says: “There is comfort that a price exists where developers make money and British consumers are at least no worse off.”
• An editorial in the climate-sceptic Sun says: “Yesterday Ed Miliband signed a giant offshore wind farm deal so expensive that it smashed any hope of delivering on that pledge…Once again, Miliband has put crazed green ideology over getting a good deal for the taxpayer.”

Bloomberg columnist Lara Williams writes that Donald Trump’s “obsession” with Greenland “comes as the critical monitoring of its geography and climate is getting harder and harder”. Williams notes the cuts to US climate science funding. She continues: “Data gaps will erode the precision of forecasting models and the ability to track changes in vital ecosystems. This will make it tougher to create early-warning systems, give the best shipping forecasts and even manage fisheries.” She concludes: “Unfortunately, Greenland is melting ever more rapidly, which would surely be the priority if Trump’s administration cared about genuine global ‘security’. What happens in the Arctic, does not stay in the Arctic. Without the funding of long-term observations and posts detecting emerging changes, we may find that future catastrophes are unstoppable.”

MORE US COMMENT

• New York Times international climate reporter Somini Sengupta writes that “the fate of the world’s largest island has outsize importance for billions of people on the planet, because as the climate warms, Greenland is losing ice”. She says: “Climate change makes the Arctic more accessible and more of a strategic target for world powers, a fact not lost on President Trump.”
• Bloomberg opinion editor Mark Gongloff writes about the financial cost of heat in the US under the headline: “A stealth heat tax has already cost Americans $1tn.”
• Noah Kaufman in the Atlantic: “The climate question that economists cannot answer.”

This edition of the Daily Briefing was written by Ayesha Tandon, with contributions from Yanine Quiroz, Anika Patel and Henry Zhang. It was edited by Leo Hickman.

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