There is extensive continuing coverage in the UK press of the news that the UK government is “considering” a new national road-charging system as an alternative to the levy on petrol and diesel. The Times, which broke the story on its frontpage yesterday, says that “drivers would support a national road-charging system providing that it was not simply used as a ‘cash cow’ by the treasury, ministers have been told”. It adds: “Research shows broad backing among drivers for a ‘pay per mile’ road-pricing system, with many insisting that it would be fairer than the present fuel duty. A study by the RAC found that 44% of drivers supported the move as an alternative to the levy on petrol and diesel, almost twice as many as opposed it. The UK’s fuel taxes are the highest in Europe.” But the Times also points out the history of such ideas: “Road charging has long been regarded as politically toxic. The Labour government ditched similar plans for road charges 13 years ago after a petition attracted 1.8m signatures. Today motoring groups warned that any proposals drawn up by Boris Johnson’s government would provoke the same backlash if drivers had to pay more than they do now.” Indeed, several newspapers report on a “backlash” to the fresh proposal. The Daily Telegraph says: “Officials were urged not to use a new road pricing system as a ‘post-Covid cash cow’ as the government mulls plans to replace £40bn in lost tax revenue from fossil fuel cars as Britain switches to electric vehicles. Experts said any motoring tax hike will be met with widespread opposition from drivers and would be borne by poorer households unable to buy electric cars, as well as families living outside big cities.” The Daily Mirror quotes AA president Edmund King, who says: “The government can’t afford to lose £40bn from fuel duty and car tax when the electric revolution arrives. It is always assumed that road pricing would be the solution, but that has been raised every five years since 1964 and is still perceived by most as a ‘poll tax on wheels’.” The Guardian says that “after a dramatic drop in road usage due to Covid-19, fuel duty receipts are expected to plunge by almost £5bn this year, according to the Office for Budget Responsibility, the government’s economics forecaster”, adding: “However, [chancellor Rishi] Sunak could look at other ways to raise taxes to repair the public finances – particularly as spending on UK roads is funded by general taxation, rather than levies such as fuel duty and VED [vehicle excise duty, often referred to as road tax]…The rate of capital gains tax – levied on profits from asset sales – could be increased after a major review ordered by the chancellor said it could raise £14bn for the exchequer.” Meanwhile, MailOnline reports that “hundreds of councils are failing to install electric car charge points in residential areas in a blow to plans to ban sales of new petrol and diesel vehicles by 2030”. A piece in the Daily Telegraph reports on: “Why Britain’s plans to build an electric car ‘gigafactory’ are struggling.”

On the comment pages, the reaction to the road charging proposal is largely negative. An editorial in the Sun says it is a “fuellish idea”, adding: “It would be insane to slap a brand new tax on drivers. We get that the Government will have a £40bn fuel duty shortfall if everyone eventually buys an electric vehicle. A ‘pay as you drive’ scheme may even be a fairer alternative if tracking technology can be made to work nationwide and allows for, say, traffic conditions and the time of day. But it cannot be added to what are already Europe’s highest taxes on motorists. Not without a revolt.” In the Daily Mail, columnist Ross Clark says: “The PM’s [expected]_announcement of a complete ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel vehicles by 2030 is premature and potentially very damaging to the economy. As he prepares to ‘reset’ his government, he needs to rethink this policy.” An editorial in the Daily Mirror says: “Charging drivers to use roads, whether per mile or with vast extension of tolls, would hit those on lower and middle incomes hardest…Any chancellor raising taxes fairly would put them up for the highest earners, not drivers already watching decent living standards vanish in their rear view mirrors.” A feature in the Daily Telegraph looks at why “from charging points to the recycling of batteries, the UK must rapidly overhaul its transport infrastructure to meet the goal” of banning new sales of petrol and diesel cars by 2030.

Ahead of Boris Johnson’s expected speech this week setting out the UK government’s “10-point plan” for decarbonising the economy, ITV News reports that “the government is set to invest several hundred million pounds in carbon capture and storage technology”. It adds: “ITV News understands that on Wednesday the prime minister will pledge to help fund four carbon capture and storage ‘hubs’ in the UK – in Scotland, Wales, the Humber and Teesside – and to have them up and running ‘by the mid-2020s’. Net Zero Teesside is one of the projects set to receive financial support from the taxpayer. The project is being developed by BP, ENI, Equinor, Shell and Total, with BP leading as operator. The plan is to capture CO2 emissions from a range of heavy industries, including a gas-fired power station and chemical plants.”

Separately, Sky News carries an interview with climate minister Lord (Zac) Goldsmith in which he says that nature has been “utterly neglected” as a way to tackle climate change. The news channel adds: “Ahead of the government revealing a new 10-point plan on the climate, Lord Goldsmith also told Sky News that he supported a ban on the controversial practice of peat burning used by gamekeepers…Lord Goldsmith said: ‘I want us to phase out peat burning. I don’t pretend to be an expert but I’ve reviewed the science and it seems to me pretty clear that it’s a practice that needs to be phased out.’” The Daily Telegraph reports that damaged peatlands are emitting as much greenhouse gases as the UK’s road freight traffic, according to the RSPB. The Financial Times has a feature on how the UK is preparing to make a “big bet” on hydrogen: “Boris Johnson, prime minister, this week will lay out his plans for a ‘green industrial revolution’, and has pledged to make a ‘big bet’ on technologies such as hydrogen, which is emerging as an area of global interest as countries adopt targets to halt carbon emissions.”

In other UK news, the Guardian reports that “three of Britain’s biggest energy companies have agreed to build giant underwater power cables to bring Scotland’s vast reserves of renewable energy to millions of homes in England” It adds: “The multibillion-pound energy ‘superhighway’, to be built by Scottish Power, National Grid and SSE, could help to unlock the potential of the prime minister’s plan to build enough offshore wind farms to power every home in the country by 2030.” The news comes on the same day as those same three companies have been revealed to be the first sponsors of next year’s COP26 in Glasgow. Climate Home News says SSE, Scottish Power and National Grid have been named as “primary energy sector sponsors” of the UN climate summit. The Press Association quotes the reaction of Mel Evans, senior climate campaigner for Greenpeace UK, who says: “It is…encouraging that the first COP26 sponsors are companies that are heavily invested in the renewables transition, and that, so far, fossil fuel companies such as BP, Shell and Equinor are not on the list.”

The Guardian reports that a group of leading academics have said that “urgent reforms of the Bank of England are needed to help decarbonise the financial system and boost green investment as Britain recovers from the Covid-19 pandemic”. The Times says that “Boris Johnson is considering a temporary cut to Britain’s aid spending to help repair the nation’s Covid-ravaged public finances”. It adds: “Ministers have drawn up plans to reduce the proportion of Britain’s gross national income spent on aid from 0.7% to 0.5%, saving billions, the Times has learnt. Rishi Sunak, the chancellor, is pressing for the move to be announced in next week’s comprehensive spending review. His allies have insisted that cutting the aid budget is a political necessity at a time when spending on domestic areas will be limited as a result of the pandemic…Whitehall sources have highlighted research into climate change and green energy as the kind of initiatives into which the aid budget could be channelled in future.” The Daily Mirror covers a “major new Red Cross report on climate change [which] says Britain is in danger of facing more floods like those which hit South Yorkshire 12 months ago”. The Times says an island off northwest Wales is turning to tidal power. Finally, BusinessGreen reports on a new research by IPPR which concludes that “delivering green upgrades to homes across the North of England could create almost 190,000 new jobs both in the region and beyond”.

Hurricane Iota was due to strike northeastern Nicaragua’s Miskito region overnight, reaching maximum sustained winds of 155 miles per hour, reports Reuters. As the hurricane was downgraded slightly from a category 5 to 4 storm, Reuters says “the region’s leaders blamed climate change for destructive weather pushing millions closer to hunger”. The newswire adds: “Central America and southern Mexico are still reeling from Hurricane Eta, which devastated crops and washed away hillsides after landing near Puerto Cabezas two weeks ago, killing dozens. Many towns are still partially flooded, and the land is waterlogged from the earlier storm.” Speaking alongside Guatemalan president Alejandro Giammattei, Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernandez told a news conference: “What’s drawing closer is a bomb.” Reuters says this is the first time two major hurricanes have formed in the Atlantic basin in November since records began in 1851. Iota is also the first category 5 storm of the hurricane season. The Daily Telegraph says the 2020 Atlantic hurricane season has seen the most named storms on record, with 30 named storms and 13 hurricanes. The New York Times has a feature looking back at this season’s record-breaking number of storms. It adds: “Scientists have found that climate change affects how hurricanes form and strengthen; rising ocean temperatures linked to global warming can cause storms to weaken more slowly after they move onto land and remain destructive for longer.”

Meanwhile, the Independent reports that, in the Arctic, “two months after the normal point at which the sea ice begins to refreeze into the huge sheets which cap the top of our planet, enormous areas of open water remain”. It adds: “The record-breaking delay comes after the average ice extent for October was the lowest in the satellite record, and means current ice coverage is roughly the same as it was during the height of the summer, when melting after the previous winter was well underway. The lack of ice means the Arctic sea ice extent is currently the lowest for this time of year, for at least a thousand years, scientists have said, though refreezing has now begun.” A separate article in the Independent reports on a new study which concludes that “artificially cooling the Earth through technologies that reduce incoming sunlight would not be sufficient at preventing extreme warming over long timescales, if not coupled with cuts to greenhouse gases”.

Several outlets cover the news that Amazon founder Jeff Bezos – who is said to be worth more than $200bn – has revealed the first recipients of his new $10bn Bezos Earth Fund. Announcing the news via an Instagram post, Bezos named the US-based organisations set to receive nearly $800m to tackle climate change, reports the Independent: “The first beneficiaries are: The Climate and Clean Energy Equity Fund, ClimateWorks Foundation, Dream Corps Green For All, Eden Reforestation Projects, Energy Foundation, Environmental Defense Fund, The Hive Fund for Climate and Gender Justice, Natural Resources Defense Council, The Nature Conservancy, NDN Collective, Rocky Mountain Institute, Salk Institute for Biological Studies, The Solutions Project, Union of Concerned Scientists, World Resources Institute, and World Wildlife Fund.” CNBC says Bezos remarked that grants are “just the beginning”, adding: “The World Wildlife Fund said it will use the $100m award to protect and restore mangroves from ‘climate-accelerated weather events’ and to develop new markets for seaweed as an alternative to fossil fuel-based products.”

Meanwhile, in other US news, the Hill reports that “a coalition of more than 70 groups, including progressive and environmental organisations, is urging president-elect Joe Biden not to include a former energy secretary who served with him under former President Obama in his incoming administration”. It adds: “The groups’ opposition to Ernest Moniz, who is seen as a leading contender to reprise his role as the nation’s top energy official, stems from connections to the fossil fuel industry and his positions on fossil fuels.” The Guardian has a feature on the Sunrise Movement, a youth group that “helped Biden to win” and who now “want him to fix the climate crisis”.

Separately, the Hill reports that the Trump administration “is advancing oil exploration in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) in a move critics see as an attempt to lock in drilling before president-elect Joe Biden takes office in January”. Another Hill article covers the news that a “scientist who has questioned the link between climate change and extreme weather events has reportedly been detailed to the White House to oversee a program that’s in charge of compiling a major climate change report”.

The Guardian reports that, under a draft plan drawn up by the European Commission, the capacity of the EU’s offshore windfarms in the North Sea, the Baltic, the Atlantic, the Mediterranean and the Black Sea would be increased by 250%. It adds: “The total energy generating capacity in Europe’s seas stands at 23 gigawatts (GW)…from 5,047 grid-connected wind turbines across 12 countries, including the UK. Under a European Commission strategy, the 27 EU member states alone would achieve a capacity of 60GW by 2030 and 300GW by 2050, with Germany set to hugely increase its investment in the sector. According to the leaked paper, the commission ‘estimates that an installed capacity of 300GW of offshore wind [and around 60GW of ocean energies] by 2050 would be needed in the integrated, greener and climate neutral energy system of 2050’.”

In his New York Times column, Paul Krugman begins by arguing that “the big winners [of the US election] were the coronavirus and, quite possibly, catastrophic climate change”. He continues: “Awful as the pandemic outlook is, however, what worries me more is what our failed response says about prospects for dealing with a much bigger issue, one that poses an existential threat to civilisation: climate change. As many people have noted, climate change is an inherently difficult problem to tackle – not economically, but politically. Right-wingers always claim that taking climate seriously would doom the economy, but the truth is that at this point the economics of climate action look remarkably benign. Spectacular progress in renewable energy technology makes it fairly easy to see how the economy can wean itself from fossil fuels…But climate action remains very difficult politically given (a) the power of special interests and (b) the indirect link between costs and benefits.” He concludes: “This is, by the way, possibly the biggest reason to hope that Democrats win those Georgia runoffs. Climate policy really needs to be sold as part of a package that also includes broader investment in infrastructure and job creation – and that just won’t happen if Mitch McConnell is still able to blockade legislation.”

Meanwhile, in her weekly Axios column, Amy Harder says that “president-elect Joe Biden will face constraints of both politics and time when it comes to pursuing his aggressive climate-change agenda”. She adds: “Biden is poised to leverage every inch of the federal government to act on climate change. There are likely to be new financial rules, new environmental regulations and unprecedented limits on fossil-fuel leasing on federal lands and waters, to name just a few of the dozens of probable actions. [But] he’s still unlikely to achieve his biggest goals without major new laws passed by congress.”

Writing for BusinessGreen, E3G’s Tom Burke looks ahead to Boris Johnson “much heralded action plan to reach Britain’s goal of net-zero carbon emissions by 2050”, which is due this week. He writes: “It is a plan. It will have ten points. But to find out how many of them will actually turn into decisions, we will have to wait until the even longer-heralded energy white paper appears – hopefully – later this month…The real problem with the prime minister’s action plan is that for all the compelling headlines it may attract, it is not matched by an equally compelling case for investors. This matters a lot, because much of the investment to get to net-zero will have to come from the private sector…What they will fear most of all is that an energy policy without a very robust analytic foundation will not deliver. On past experience, this will trigger abrupt and arbitrary changes in policy driven as much by unfavourable headlines as by unforeseen problems. It will not take them very long to work out that becoming the ‘Saudi Arabia of wind’ is not compatible with building both Sizewell and small modular reactors and possibly other big nuclear generators. They will recall the prime minister’s affection for white elephants.”

New research explores the reasons why animals are decreasing in size as a general response to global warming. The authors analyse “death time curves” for cold-blooded animals (“ectotherms”), finding that “heat tolerance varies predictably with size”. They explain: “Smaller animals can maintain higher body temperatures than larger ones during short periods, but cannot maintain higher body temperatures over long periods as their endurance declines more rapidly with time.” An accompanying News & Views article adds that the study shows “how body size interacts with the duration of exposure to determine both stressfully hot temperatures and their ecological implications”.

An increasing frequency of very warm and cloudy days could affect the output of photovoltaic (PV) solar panels, a new study suggests. The findings suggest that “summer days with very low PV power outputs are expected to double in the Arabian Peninsula by mid-century but could be reduced by half in southern Europe over the same period, even under a moderate-emission scenario”. Changes for winter – either enhancing or mitigating the impacts on PV output – “are projected to be less striking, at least in low- and mid-latitude regions”, the authors add.

The formation of Antarctic Bottom Water (AABW) in the Ross Sea saw a “recovery” in 2018-19, a new study suggests. The salinity, density and volume of AABW have decreased over the last 50 years, the authors explain, with the most marked changes observed in the Ross Sea. Using in-situ observations, the researchers “document a recovery in the salinity, density and thickness” of AABW formed in the region. The recovery was caused by increased sea ice formation on the continental shelf, the study finds, which was triggered – in turn – by “anomalous wind forcing associated with the unusual combination of positive Southern Annular Mode and extreme El Niño conditions between 2015 and 2018”.