A New York offshore wind project is to resume construction after a federal judge temporarily lifted a suspension put in place by the Trump administration, reports CNBC. The publication says that the resumption of the Empire Wind project is the “latest setback for president Donald Trump’s efforts to stop offshore wind projects”. The New York Times says that “attorneys for Empire Wind had told the court that the project, which is about 60% complete, would face ‘existential risk’ if it was further delayed”, adding: “Equinor, the Norwegian energy giant developing the windfarm, said that if construction did not restart in the coming days it would lose more than $1bn in contracts and that a specialised ship needed for construction would set sail for another project.” Reuters reports that another near-completed wind project in Massachusetts is also seeking the right to resume work. There is further coverage in the Guardian, Bloomberg and Associated Press.

Meanwhile, the US Senate voted yesterday to approve billions of dollars in funding for federal science agencies, “rejecting deep cuts proposed by Trump in space and other areas”, says Reuters. It continues: “The Senate bill approved significant science funding for NASA, the National Science Foundation and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration above what the White House had sought.” The Senate “rejected nearly all of Trump’s cuts to NASA”, the article notes, explaining that instead of a $6bn cut, NASA’s budget has been reduced from $24.9bn to $24.44bn. NBC News adds: “The package even includes notable boosts for a few science programs that the Trump administration had singled out for elimination in its budget request, such as NOAA’s satellite programme. It also provides funding to boost National Weather Service staffing, which the administration cut significantly.”

MORE ON US

• Trump administration officials have vowed to keep all US coal plants running, reports Bloomberg.
• The administration is “planning to propose that the nation’s largest power grid operator hold an emergency auction in which tech companies would bid to have new power plants built”, according to the Wall Street Journal.
• A bipartisan group of lawmakers have proposed creating a new agency with $2.5bn to boost production of rare earths and the other critical minerals, says the Associated Press. 
• The Associated Press reports that international media have “flocked” to Greenland as Trump turns the “Arctic island into a geopolitical hotspot”.

State Grid, China’s main grid operator, will invest 4tn yuan ($574bn) to upgrade the country’s power grid over 2026-30, an average of 800bn yuan in investment per year, reports Reuters. It adds that this surpasses last year’s “record” investment of 650bn yuan ($93bn). State news agency Xinhua says the figure represents a 40% jump from 14th “five-year plan” period (2021-25) investments, attributing it to China “ramping up wind and solar capacity to meet its goal of peaking carbon emissions by 2030”. It adds that the funding will “go towards shoring up China’s west-to-east power transmission network”. Business outlet Jiemian reports that State Grid’s chosen investment priorities show that “promoting renewable energy integration remains the current focus of grid investment”. Bloomberg says that despite this record spend, the country’s grid could still struggle to keep up with the “faster pace” of expanding demand from electric vehicles and data centres. 

MORE ON CHINA

• China has set a target of establishing an “energy meteorological service system” by 2027 against the backdrop of climate change, reports BJX News.
• Most research institutions expect China to add 100-120 gigawatts of new wind power, according to FengMang Energy.
• International Energy Net says that cancelling export rebates for solar products poses “immediate and severe” challenges for smaller firms and “outdated capacity”. Xinhua says government anti-involution policies must prevent simple “capacity restrictions and scale controls” that could lead to “industry-wide homogenisation”.
• Financial Times says China’s cleantech manufacturers still face “significant” import reliance on key technologies, such as copper foil, bearings and transistor modules.
• President Xi Jinping’s speech at the “central urban work conference” included a call to “focus on building green and low-carbon beautiful cities”, reports Xinhua.
• China and Canada signed agreements on energy cooperation, reports Reuters, during Canadian leader Mark Carney’s trip to Beijing.

German energy company EnBW has pulled out of a set UK offshore wind projects, claiming they are “no longer economically viable” following failure to secure subsidy contracts from the government in an auction that concluded on Wednesday, reports the Times. The newspaper says that the two projects, Morgan and Mona, both won planning consent last summer and would each comprise up to 96 turbines generating up to 1.5 gigawatts of power. It continues: “BP and EnBW jointly bought the seabed leases for the projects in 2021, committing to pay a record price to the Crown Estate, in what was BP’s first foray into offshore wind in the UK. It was one of a raft of big bets on green energy made by BP’s then-chief executive Bernard Looney, who was ousted from the company in 2023 after misleading the board about his relationships with colleagues.” 

MORE ON UK

• Chris Stark, the energy secretary’s “clean power” tsar, told MPs that delays to constructing electricity cables in East Anglia could risk progress towards achieving the UK’s clean-energy target for 2030, reports the Daily Telegraph.
• The Daily Telegraph covers analysis from energy consultancy Wood Mackenzie projecting a fall in wholesale gas prices by the end of the decade, noting that UK taxes on the associated CO2 emissions would mean that the drop in prices may not be as large as it could have been.
• The Daily Express reports that the world’s largest offshore wind farm, being built off the coast of Yorkshire, could provide a £6bn boost to the economy once completed.
• The Guardian quotes campaigners who have accused oil major BP of having an “insidious influence” on science education in the UK through its partnership with the Science Museum.
• The Times speaks to a homeowner left with damage to his property following a “botched” job to fit a heat pump, insulation and solar panels, under the government’s energy company obligation (ECO) scheme for lower-income homes.
• Green cars, long seen as unlucky in the UK, are now on the rise as a preference for electric vehicles grows, Reuters reports.

Climate change, pollution and biodiversity loss have “dropped down an international ranking of short-term concerns for high-profile business leaders, academics and politicians”, Climate Home News reports. It continues: “Each year in August and September, the Global Risks Perception Survey run by the World Economic Forum (WEF) asks more than 1,300 experts – largely from the global north – what they are most worried about. It is released in the run-up to an annual gathering of leaders in the Swiss ski resort of Davos, which takes place next week. This year, the number of respondents citing environmental issues as top concerns over the next two years fell, while more warned of economic risks like geoeconomic confrontation, economic downturn, inflation and asset bubbles bursting.”

Writing in the Atlantic, economist Noah Kaufman looks at efforts to quantify future damages from climate change. He writes: “Experts being clearer about what economics can and cannot tell us would not resolve disagreements about climate policy. But this would make it harder to treat speculative damage estimates as decisive evidence for unsupportable claims. The full effects of climate change are unknowable and a more constructive public discussion about climate policy will require getting more comfortable with that.”

MORE COMMENT

• Energy consultancy director Richard Ollington writes in the Financial Times that “small nuclear reactors are worth waiting for”.
• Climate reporter Bianca Hall writes in the Sydney Morning Herald that recent fires in Australia mean “we can no longer pretend this isn’t a crisis”.
• Conservative MP and shadow energy secretary Claire Coutinho has an opinion article in the Daily Telegraph containing a number of falsehoods about the UK’s recent offshore wind auction and what it means for bills. [For more on the auction, see Carbon Brief’s Q&A.] Meanwhile, a Times columnist says Ed Miliband is “wrong, but at least he’s driven”.
• Two climate journalists at the Financial Times, Attracta Mooney and Pilita Clark, answer questions from readers.
• In the Wall Street Journal’s “Free Expression” newsletter, columnist Jack Butler comments on the deterioration of respect for established climate science with the question: “Is the climate freakout over?”

An editorial in the Indian Express cites new Carbon Brief analysis finding that coal power production in India and China fell simultaneously for the first time in 52 years last year. The editorial says: “In recent years, India and China have often been unfairly painted as the villains of the climate change story…This criticism overlooks the progress made by these countries in achieving their developmental goals through the use of green technology…Carbon Brief’s latest data, released earlier this week, shows that India and China stewarded the world’s renewable energy (RE) expansion in 2025. Record-breaking RE capacity additions led to a fall in coal power generation in the two countries for the first time in 50 years. China achieved this feat even as its electricity demand increased approximately five times compared to 2024, while India is on track to become the second-largest renewables market in the next five years.”

MORE CHINA COMMENT

• Climate publication Heatmap has a story on “why climate experts now say China is a climate hero”.
• For Climate Home News, researchers from Global Energy Monitor argue that “to break its coal habit, China should look to California’s progress on batteries”.
• In the South China Morning Post, journalist James Borton says the High Seas Treaty is a chance for China to lead on marine conservation.

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

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