A story claiming El Nino, not climate change, is responsible for record high temperatures this year has been criticised as inaccurate by scientists. It originally appeared in the Daily Mail, was then picked up by Breitbart, and subsequently tweeted out by the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology. In the New York Times, Mike Halpert of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Climate Prediction Center says: “Nobody said the record temperatures were exclusively the result of climate change.” The Guardian contains more criticisms from scientists. On Climate Feedback, seven scientists look at various parts of the Daily Mail article in detail. Slateand the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists also cover the story. Carbon Brief also has a guest post on the topic.

Federal officials have denied the final permits required for the Dakota Access Pipeline project in North Dakota, which has long been the subject of protests in the US because it goes through cultural heritage sites of the Standing Rock Sioux. The Army Corps of Engineers has said it will conduct an environmental impact review and determine if there are ways to reroute the pipeline. Dakota Access has become a flashpoint in both the indigenous rights and anti-fossil fuel movement, says the Hill. The story is widely covered, including in the Guardian, the Telegraph, the Independent, the New York Times and the Financial Times.

Beijing’s smog spiked on Sunday to “crazy bad” levels — the colloquial term for when the air monitor index breaches 600, as the designers never thought it would go above 500. The smog occurred despite draconian measures in surrounding cities to reduce the persistent winter pollution in northern China. It has become a political liability for the Communist party, says the Financial Times. Separately, Reuters reports that China is increasing environmental inspections and will punish polluters, as President Xi Jinping vowed to do more to tackle pollution.

The first offshore wind farm in the US could start delivering power into the grid within days — although one wind turbine is failing to turn. This will not delay the start-up, however. The five turbines are located off Block Island in the state of Rhode Island. The company built the wind farm to power about 17,000 homes, at a cost of about $300m. Reuters also covers the news.

Rex Tillerson, chairman and chief executive of Exxon Mobil, is in the line up to be President-elect Donald Trump’s secretary of state. He is one of the new candidates to emerge, and has an interview with Trump scheduled for this week. Trump is due to announce “almost all” of his remaining Cabinet picks in the coming week, says the Hill, which profiles some of his potential picks for the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency.

Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions are still rising, despite global efforts to tackle climate change, according to projections made by consultants NDEVR Environmental. Its emissions are not in line with the targets set by the country’s Climate Change Authority — since 2013, it has emitted twice what it allowed under its budget, and at its current rate of emissions will spend its entire carbon budget by 2031. The Guardian has produced an interactive tracking Australia’s emissions. Separately, the Guardian reports that the Australian government has left open the option of reinstating its carbon tax, although backbenchers have warned that there will be hostility to the move.

A decision by OPEC to cut oil output has sparked a “shale oil party” in the US, according to Robin Pagnamenta, deputy business editor of the Times, in his analysis of the decision. “Opec’s decision to chop production for the first time in eight years has handed their industry a lifeline,” he says, adding that those who have survived the slump are getting ready to cash in again.

Fatih Birol, executive director of the International Energy Agency, sets out five ways in which governments around the world can act on climate change and meet their targets set out in the Paris Agreement. These are: ensure that everyone has access to energy, take steps to rapidly reduce air pollution, make cities energy efficient, power the economy with cleaner, more efficient technologies, and stop incentivising the wasteful use of fossil fuels.

The journal Weather has published a new special issue on “The exceptional winter of 2015/16 in the UK and Ireland” to coincide with the anniversary of Storm Desmond last year. The collection of papers delve into a meteorological and hydrological appraisal of the season, which saw several storms sweep across the UK and record amounts of rainfall in December. The papers include specific studies on the flooding in Northumberland after Storm Desmond and in York after Storm Eva.

A new paper examines China’s stance and role in international climate change negotiations, including in the lead-up to and at the Paris talks in 2015. China’s participation in negotiations has “evolved from playing a peripheral role to gradually moving to the centre,” the researchers say. With the Paris Agreement now in force, the focus turns to implementation, the researchers conclude, for which China “hold[s] the key to actually achieving desired outcomes”.