Climate change is causing sea levels to rise faster than for 3,000 years, bringing a “torrent of trouble” to almost one billion people, UN secretary-general António Guterres has warned, according to the Guardian. Speaking to the UN security council, he described “a mass exodus of entire populations on a biblical scale” as some nations could cease to exist. The secretary-general also notes that sea level rise can act as a threat-multiplier with “dramatic implications” for global peace and security, the newspaper adds. The Independent notes Guterres cited research by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) showing that even if global warming is limited to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels, as per a goal of the Paris Agreement, there will still be a considerable sea level rise. He listed various “mega-cities” under threat – including Cairo, Dhaka, Shanghai, London, New York and Buenos Aires. He also said such sea level rise amounts to “a death sentence” for vulnerable countries, including many small island nations, according to Associated Press. Some outlets also report directly on the WMO figures referenced by Guterres, with the Hindustan Times noting that India is among the nations with large coastal populations that are particularly vulnerable.

Meanwhile, Axios reports on a new study in Nature Communications that shows that even if emissions are curtailed in line with a “moderate emissions scenario”, sea levels will continue rising through to at least 2150 and beyond due to the delayed melting of the Greenland and Antarctic Ice Sheets. It says “only by limiting human-caused global warming to 1.5C or less, which many scientists don’t consider feasible, can multi-century melting of the globe’s ice sheets and increase in sea levels be averted”. The authors of the study conclude that limiting warming to 2C, the other key aim of the Paris Agreement, “would be insufficient to slow down the rate of global sea level rise”, according to MailOnline.

As if to remind people of this reality, the Washington Post reports that the amount of floating sea ice encircling Antarctica has recently reached its lowest level ever recorded. The newspaper describes this as “a sign that one of the most remote and mysterious facets of the climate system may, at last, be responding to the overall planetary warming trend”.

The European Parliament has formally approved a law to ban the sale of new petrol-and-diesel cars in the EU from 2035, according to Agence France-Presse (AFP). It says that EU member states have already approved the legislation and “they will now formally nod it into law”, but adds that “much debate lies ahead on proposed measures against larger freight and passenger vehicles”. Reuters notes that the “landmark rules” will require carmakers to achieve a 100% cut in carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from new cars sold, with the aim of driving a shift to electric car sales. They also include a 55% cut in CO2 emissions for new cars sold from 2030 versus 2021 levels, which the article adds is “much higher” than the existing target of 37.5%. While many car manufacturers are already shifting to electric models, the new rules still received pushback from some nations and industry groups, it continues. As a result, the newswire adds, “the final deal includes some flexibilities including that small carmakers producing less than 10,000 vehicles per year can negotiate weaker targets until 2036”. The Wall Street Journal says it also contains a review clause that requires the EU’s executive body, the European Commission, “to assess progress toward the zero-emission targets in 2026”. 

Separately, another Reuters article reports that the European Commission has proposed more stringent CO2 limits for heavy-goods vehicles, requiring new trucks to cut emissions by 90% by 2040 and all new city buses to be zero-emissions vehicles from 2030. It notes that the proposal “disappointed campaigners, who said new CO2-emitting trucks registered in 2040 would still be on the road in 2050 – thwarting the bloc’s net-zero deadline”. In a separate, but related, story, Energy Monitor reports that EU leaders have tasked the European Commission with proposing an EU Critical Raw Materials Act next month. It notes that, for some, the question of where to source sufficient materials to build electric cars and other low-carbon technologies is “actually far more worrying than the US green subsidies getting all the attention at the moment”.

The Daily Telegraph has a story headlined “net-zero costs 1,300 Ford jobs in UK”, which is about the car company scaling back in the UK over the next three years as it shifts production towards electric vehicles. The article itself does not mention the term “net-zero” and notes that “Ford in the UK has been declining as a manufacturing force for decades”. That said, UK automotive trade body the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) has warned that more than 22,000 jobs in the UK’s car industry are at risk as car firms pivot away from traditional car parts to electric vehicles, the i newspaper reports. Meanwhile, the newspaper says Ford has also announced it will build a $3.5bn battery plant in the US state of Michigan, enabling it to take advantage of the US  government’s new tax credits for electric vehicles. Across the Atlantic, the Hill reports that this project will be “the country’s first automaker-backed lithium iron phosphate battery plant”, and it will initially employ 2,500 people. Quartz presents an overview of the situation in the UK, stating that its “attempts to build a battery industry are faltering”, something it attributes in part to “a post-Brexit, pandemic-hit economy that’s on the brink of recession”.

Wind turbines and solar panels are now generating almost enough electricity to power every home in China, says Bloomberg. Citing the data from the National Energy Administration (NEA), it adds that the “near match” – between the wind and solar output of “1,190 terawatt-hours” and the total residential power consumption of “1,340 terawatts-hours” – underscores “two important things” about China’s power system. The first is the “rapid growth in renewables” as the country “sinks hundreds of billions of dollars into meeting climate goals and reducing its reliance on expensive fossil fuels”. The second is the “relative insignificance of household power when it comes to energy demand in China”. The article says that China’s generators “still needed to burn more fossil fuels – and emit more greenhouse gases – just to keep up with what proved to be a relatively tepid year for economic growth”.

Meanwhile, ​​Yicai reports that Contemporary Amperex Technology (CATL), a Chinese company and the world’s “leading supplier of batteries for electric vehicles”, has “agreed to provide technology and support to Ford Motor’s planned $3.5bn lithium iron phosphate battery plant in Michigan”. Citing analysts, the Shanghai-based financial outlet adds that the “new plant will be able to take full advantage of the tax benefits of the US federal government’s Inflation Reduction Act without direct financial investment from CATL”. Politico 

points out: “To Democrats, such projects and the domestic manufacturing incentives included in Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act are the key to creating a homegrown clean energy industry that will end China’s dominance, while weaning the US off fossil fuels.” It adds that energy experts and members of both Republican and Democratic parties “acknowledge that the US cannot yet make a full break from China, which has had a decade-long head start in developing the supply chain for batteries, solar panels and other clean energy production”.

An “exclusive” in the South China Morning Post says that the recently announced visit of Australian trade minister Don Farrell to Beijing “aims to remove trade impediments”. Separately, another Bloomberg article writes that Mongolia – the “biggest supplier of coal to China’s steel industry” – is “changing the way it sells its product in a bid to improve transparency and reap better returns from its top export earner”. It adds that the new auction system also “coincides with a rapprochement in Beijing’s relations with Canberra, which has seen Australian coal shipments resume after being banned since late 2021”. Finally, the state-broadcaster CGTN reports that China’s national climate centre has forecast that the ongoing La Niña event, which “causes climate chaos, will come to an end early in the spring this year”.

The Daily Telegraph reports that nuclear power projects such as Sizewell C in Suffolk will be granted so-called “‘green” status under plans by UK chancellor Jeremy Hunt to unlock billions of pounds in funding for the industry. The newspaper adds: “The chancellor is expected to announce the change within weeks as part of a broader shake-up of the UK’s financial rules on green energy. It would see nuclear power projects classed as ‘green’ or “sustainable” investments, clearing the way for more institutional investors and environment-focused funds to back them. There are also hopes that the Treasury could fund new power plants with money raised through the government’s green gilts and green savings bonds…A recent review by former energy minister and Tory MP Chris Skidmore said that supporting the construction of more nuclear reactors was a ‘no regrets’ option…Top fund managers such as Legal & General and Aviva have previously expressed caution about the green credentials of nuclear, with Aviva chairman George Culmer last year saying there was an ‘ongoing debate’. Nuclear industry insiders believe classing projects as ‘sustainable’ would clear up much of this uncertainty, because it would allow investments to count towards the environmental targets of investors and major companies.”

Global oil and gas industry profits jumped to around $4tn  in 2022, from an average of $1.5tn in recent years, according to the head of the International Energy Agency (IEA), Fatih Birol, quoted in Reuters. However, he told a conference in Oslo, Norway, that nations should prepare for a drop in demand, noting that “the countries in the Middle East [especially] have to diversify the their economies” and that the upcoming COP28 climate summit in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) “could be an excellent milestone to change the destiny of the Middle East countries”. Another Reuters story says the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) expects global oil demand to rise this year by 2.3%, due in part to China’s relaxation of Covid-19 restrictions.

In the US, Bloomberg reports that Alaska’s senators have condemned any potential Biden administration move to restrict the progress of ConocoPhillips’ $8bn Willow oil project. In the UK, Lord Lucan – a hereditary peer who is also executive director of onshore oil-and-gas development company Angus Energy – has won an appeal to explore for oil in West Sussex after a planning decision likely to lead to a High Court challenge, according to the Daily Telegraph. Finally, the Financial Times reports that various hedge funds have “reaped a windfall” as coal prices have risen amid the wider energy crisis.

In Australia, the Green party has said it will pass the Labor government’s planned overhaul of the safeguard mechanism, a climate policy that is meant to cut industrial emissions, but only if it is prepared to stop new coal and gas projects, according to the Sydney Morning Herald. The newspaper says this sets up “a third clash on big election promises” between the Greens and Labor after disputes on housing and an industry investment fund that could support fossil fuel projects. The Guardian notes that Greens “occupy the kingmaking position” in the Australian Senate and have been “signalling for months they want the Albanese government to stop new coal and gas projects”, the newspaper notes.

The Biden administration has outlined how states and non-profit groups can apply for $27bn in funding from the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, which was a “centrepiece” of last year’s landmark Inflation Reduction Act, Bloomberg reports. It says this includes “plans to steer $7bn toward residential and community solar projects in disadvantaged communities”. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) said it envisaged the  remaining $20bn going to as many as 15 community development organisations, credit unions, housing agencies and other non-profit institutions, the article continues. According to the Independent, EPA administrator Michael Regan said this “green bank” will unlock billions in private investment to enable communities “that have never participated in the clean-energy economy to participate in full force” in creating green jobs.

The United Arab Emirates’ (UAE) pick to lead this year’s COP28 climate talks has called on the world  to “fight climate change, not each other” at the World Government Summit in Dubai, in a speech that, Associated Press says, directly addressed “the anger activists have felt over his selection”. It notes that Sultan Al Jaber, who is the CEO of Abu Dhabi National Oil Company, also described the negotiations as an “unprecedented opportunity to engage the energy industry in a technological revolution”. Reuters says al-Jaber said the world needs a “course correction” to limit global warming, stating that he would lay out an inclusive and innovative roadmap. A key component of COP28 will be the “global stocktake”, where nations report on how much progress they have made on cutting greenhouse gas emissions, the Guardian reports. It quotes Al Jaber saying: “We don’t need to wait for the stocktake to find out what it will say. We already know that we are way off track.”

The Daily Telegraph’s world economy editor Ambrose Evans-Pritchard says “the climate Left has picked the wrong target in vilifying BP”, stating that it is wrong to lump all of the oil-and-gas companies together. “Bernard Looney’s BP is doing its part to decarbonise the world in a way that does not trigger energy mayhem in the process and does not provoke a paralysing political backlash. So are all of the European ‘majors’ to varying degrees,” he writes. Evans-Pritchard goes on to list BP’s various low-carbon achievements and hails the “tactical wisdom of BP’s plan to slow its exit from fossils this decade”. He adds: “If eco-radicals were less absolutist and more willing to recognise political constraints, they would distinguish between European majors metamorphosing into greenish energy transition companies and unreconstructed behemoths such as Exxon – or indeed OPEC, Russia, and state owned drillers accounting for 85% of global oil supply.”

Meanwhile, some of Evans-Pritchard’s colleagues at the Daily Telegraph continue the newspaper’s regular attacks on net-zero policies. The newspaper’s chief city commentator Ben Marlow pens a piece on the job losses at car manufacturers in the UK as companies shift towards electric vehicles. He says the “government and big companies need to be more honest about the costs of net-zero, because they are likely to be astronomical and to be born disproportionately by the sort of blue-collar workers that Ford employs across the world”. The Daily Telegraph’s financial columnist Matthew Lynn describes a plan to subsidise hydrogen mixed into gas pipelines with an extra levy, which the headline of his piece describes as “another stupid net-zero tax”. He does, however, describe net-zero as “a worthy goal, and one in which the UK is right to aim for world leadership”, but says it has so far been characterised by “a series of half baked initiatives, poorly planned and even more poorly implemented”. 

A piece in the Spectator by law professor Andrew Tettenborn takes a rather more negative view of “net-zero, stating that “it won’t happen” due to the need to “keep the lights on” amid an energy crisis and alleged reductions in people’s “quality of life”. (This stance omits the many benefits of net-zero which include improved health and clean air, as well as the fact that the current energy crisis is almost entirely the result of disrupted fossil fuel supplies.) Tettenborn uses attempts to build a solar farm in the east of England to illustrate his point about the “problem with net-zero”.

A new study quantifies the impact of feedbacks between the Antarctic ice sheet, the ocean and the atmosphere on the rate of global sea level rise (SLR). Typically, model projections of SLR “do not account for the two-way interactions between ice-sheets and climate”, the researchers note. Using a “coupled global climate-ice-sheet model of intermediate complexity”, the researchers find that “Antarctic ocean-ice-sheet-ice-shelf interactions enhance future subsurface basal melting, while freshwater-induced atmospheric cooling reduces surface melting and iceberg calving”. The combined effect is “likely to decelerate global sea level rise contributions from Antarctica” relative to the uncoupled model configurations, the study concludes.

Biological methods of carbon dioxide removal (CDR), such as reforestation and regenerative agriculture, “have a superior return on resource inputs” than mechanical methods, such as direct air capture (DAC) and carbon capture and storage (CCS), a new study suggests. Focusing on the US, the researchers perform a “biophysical input-outcome analysis” on different CDR methods. The findings indicate that “biological methods are both more effective and more resource efficient in achieving a climate-relevant scale of CO2 removal”, the authors say, as well as being less expensive and having “largely positive” co-impacts. The authors note that “despite their disadvantages and a track record of failure to date, mechanical CDR methods continue to receive large subsidies from the US government while biological sequestration methods do not”.