The household energy price cap could triple from today’s “already record level” to more than £6,000 a year from next April for typical households, the Press Association reports, citing a “worrying new forecast” from consultancy Auxilione. It says: “The forecasts, based on Friday’s gas price, are another major blow for families around Britain and will put extra pressure on the government to act.” The Mail on Sunday says: “It is feared millions will be unable to pay bills over the next year, unless ministers increase the current £400 they’ve promised households as a discount.” The i newspaper also has the story. The Sunday Telegraph carries the story on its frontpage, reporting: “[Business secretary] Kwasi Kwarteng is planning to clamp down on wind and solar energy firms as a new forecast predicted the energy price cap will hit £6,000 in April.” It explains: “Around a third of wind and solar producers are on inflexible legacy contracts [under the Renewables Obligation], which have earned them billions from the high price of electricity during the energy crisis. Kwarteng is planning to offer the firms a favourable fixed-term rate at which to sell energy to suppliers for 15 years if they agree to stop selling cheap renewables at high wholesale prices.” The article quotes a “Whitehall source” saying: “Given renewables are dirt cheap and gas is eye-wateringly expensive, we need to decouple the price of renewables from gas so households fully benefit from all forms of cheap renewable energy.” (See Comment below for Kwarteng’s article on the gas crisis for the Mail on Sunday.)

An “exclusive” in the Sun on Sunday says leadership frontrunner Liz Truss “hinted families and businesses will get more help with soaring energy bills this winter”. The paper adds: “Britain must beef up our own energy supplies by drilling more in the North Sea, turbocharging investment in nuclear and fracking where locals want it, she said.” The Sunday Express says a decision over whether to lift the UK moratorium on fracking is “imminent”, once the new prime minister is in place early next month. The Daily Express quotes Truss supporter Chris Phillip MP saying: “[W]e need to do more to develop domestic sources. That means North Sea drilling. It means opening up fracking where rural communities support it. And it means turbo charging the development of domestic nuclear power stations.” The Sunday Times says Truss plans an emergency budget on 21 September “where she will need to tell voters whose energy bills are set to rise to £3,500 in October and £4,200 in January how the government will help”. The Financial Times reports Truss’s comments to the Sun on Sunday under the headline: “Liz Truss hints at help with energy costs for businesses and households.” The Daily Telegraph says: “Energy suppliers have been asked by Whitehall officials whether they would be able to funnel more public funds to households through an existing subsidy mechanism, in the clearest sign yet that a fresh intervention is planned amid surging energy prices.” Another Sunday Times article covers who would be in Truss’s cabinet, explaining that Kwarteng “is in line to be her chancellor and the pair have been in near-constant dialogue”. The Mail on Sunday covers Truss rival Rishi Sunak’s latest comments on energy: “The former chancellor also vowed to prioritise reducing the cost of electric vehicles.”

Elsewhere, the Financial Times reports calls from energy firm SSE to “sell some of their production at fixed prices ‘far lower’ than current wholesale rates”. The article is based on a comment for the paper by SSE boss Alistair Phillips-Davies (see Comment). Today’s i newspaper frontpage carries an “exclusive” titled: “Cost of living debt crisis over energy bills.” The Press Association says: “Almost half of bill-payers struggling with energy costs before next hike – poll.” The Daily Telegraph has a feature on “the energy bills crisis we cannot afford to ignore” that says: “Protecting suppliers and customers has proven difficult so far and will only get tougher.” Today’s Financial Times frontpage says the cost of bailing out failed energy supplier Bulb “expected to soar to more than £4bn by the spring unless the government achieves a sale, saddling every home with an additional £150 or more on its bills next year”. CNN reports: “Why UK energy prices are rising much faster than in Europe.” It quotes one expert pointing to the UK’s heavy reliance on gas for heating and power as being a “double whammy effect”. The Press Association reports: “[Scottish first minister] Nicola Sturgeon has warned the looming energy price cap rise must not ‘be allowed to go ahead’.” BBC News reports Sturgeon saying the option of nationalising energy companies should be “on the table”. The Observer frontpage says: “Libraries and museums to be ‘warm havens’ for people struggling with energy bills.” The Financial Times reports calls to scrap the energy price cap in favour of a “social tariff”.

The Sun on Sunday reports: “Doctors will be able to write prescriptions to give Brits money off their energy bills under radical government proposals. The idea has been drawn up by the Treasury as they scramble to ease the painful cost of living crisis hammering the country.” An accompanying Sun on Sunday editorial says: “[T]here is only one place to stick the idea that GPs should ‘prescribe’ money-off vouchers for patients struggling with energy bills. The waste-paper basket.” The Guardian says: “GPs reject Treasury plan for them to prescribe money off energy bills.” The Press Association reports “doctors’ anger” over the proposals. The Guardian reports on “energy crisis hotspots” where “communities are at greatest risk of serious financial hardship as a result of unaffordable energy costs, according to Friends of the Earth”. Another Guardian report says the opposition Labour Party has called for a “national mission” to insulate homes and help keep bills low. The Guardian also reports: “A lobbying firm whose clients include the oil giant BP provided ‘administrative support’ to a committee of Conservative MPs conducting an inquiry into the energy crisis.” The Daily Telegraph reports: “The owner of Britain’s biggest wood-burning power station was handed billions of pounds of public money even though ministers were warned that using trees as fuel was more harmful to the climate than coal.”

Meanwhile, a frontpage story in the Sunday Express has the print headline: “Boris: ‘Mighty’ trade deal to cut bills.” It says the UK could join the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade grouping, with prime minister Boris Johnson quoted saying this “will mean lower prices on our supermarket shelves”. (The article does not explain how joining the bloc would cut energy bills.) The Sunday Telegraph reports: “Why it could be curtains for sash windows in latest net-zero plans.”

(See more UK-focused news coverage and comment below.)

Floods and landslides due to intense monsoon rains have killed at least 50 people in northern and eastern India, Reuters reports, citing officials. The Independent says: “Disasters caused by landslides and floods are common in India‘s Himalayan north during the June-September monsoon season. Scientists say they are becoming more frequent as global warming contributes to the melting of glaciers in the region.”

In other extreme weather news, Reuters reports: “New Zealand faces ‘big task’ in recovering from heavy rains, floods.” The Guardian reports: “New Zealand’s flood-prone areas not ready to cope with climate crisis, Ardern says.” Another Reuters piece says: “China’s farmers struggle to save crops as heatwave, drought drag on.” The Financial Times reports: “China intensifies measures to deal with heatwave and power shortages.” The Guardian says: “China drought causes Yangtze river to dry up, sparking shortage of hydropower.” A feature in the Daily Mirror is titled: “Worst droughts around the world as nations fail to tackle climate change.” The Financial Times climate graphic of the week is titled: “Record lows for rivers across China, US and Europe sap economies.” The Guardian has a feature titled: “Hunger stones, wrecks and bones: Europe’s drought brings past to surface.” Reuters has as similar piece. BBC News asks: “Why do the trees think it’s autumn already?”

More European metal smelters are expected to shut, the Financial Times reports, due to “exorbitant energy costs following Russia’s invasion [of Ukraine]”. It continues: “The closures have vast ramifications for the European economy, as the region’s biggest manufacturers in strategic sectors such as steel, defence, aerospace and cars try to become less reliant on imports. These industries rely on smelters for metals such as aluminium and zinc to manufacture their products. If more smelters close, it will force them to turn to overseas producers, helping China and Russia cement their grip on global markets.” Reuters reports: “Italian manufacturers cut output to save energy, government official says.” The Times says: “Germany on brink of recession as energy costs hobble producers.”

Meanwhile, the Times reports from France that “private jets face restrictions and possible bans under President Macron’s plans for ‘sobriety’ in energy use”.

German economy minister Robert Habeck said yesterday that allowing the country’s three last nuclear power stations to remain operational would be of little help in solving the country’s energy crisis because it would only save about 2% of gas use, Deutsche Welle reports. It quotes him speaking during a discussion with citizens at the government’s “open-door day” in Berlin: “[Extending the life of nuclear power plants is a] wrong decision given how little we would save.“ Bloomberg notes that during the same event, German chancellor Olaf Scholz highlighted maintenance and repair issues in France as a reminder of the problems older nuclear plants are facing, adding that a study on the security of supply that will help Germany to decide on the nuclear plants will be available by the end of the month or early September. It continues that about 60% of Germans are in favour of extending the life of the remaining nuclear power plants in Germany, according to an Allensbach poll for Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung published yesterday. Finance minister Christian Lindner of the pro-business Free Democrats “reiterated his stance that it would be better to extend the lifespans of nuclear plants for a limited time than to bring coal plants back online”, according to Reuters. It also says Habeck was “open to extending the lifespan of one nuclear power plant in Bavaria if a stress test showed this was necessary to ensure the stability and supply of the electricity network in winter”.

Meanwhile, the Financial Times reports that Gazprom will shut down the Nord Stream 1 pipeline, which delivers gas to Europe via the Baltic Sea, from 31 August to 2 September for unscheduled maintenance. Gazprom said it would then resume supplying up to 33mn cubic metres of gas to Europe daily, roughly 20% of NS1’s capacity, or roughly the same amount it has been supplying through the pipeline to Germany in recent weeks, notes the newspaper. Die Zeit reports that Ukraine has offered Europe to help bridge the impending gas supply stop through the NS1. The news quotes the operator of the Ukrainian gas pipeline network in Kyiv: “The capacities of the Ukrainian gas transmission system and the route through Poland are more than sufficient to ensure the fulfilment of the delivery obligations of Russian gas to European countries”. MailOnline reports that Scholz was interrupted while speaking by “topless demonstrators” who stormed the stage with a slogan on their skin reading “gas embargo now” as the security team tried to wrestle them away from the podium. Sky News also highlights the story adding that around two-thirds of Germans are unhappy with the work of their leader and his “fractious coalition”. It says only 25% of Germans believe the social democrat Scholz is doing his job well, down from 46% in March, according to the poll by Insa for Bild am Sonntag weekly newspaper. EurActiv reports that “Conservatives and the Left have teamed up with the far-right AfD in Eastern Germany to slam the federal government as local politicians warn of social unrest following soaring energy prices in a letter to Green energy minister Robert Habeck”.

Finally, Bloomberg reports that the water level at a key German choke point at Kaub on the Rhine River jumped on Saturday, easing a crisis that hampered energy and industrial production this month.

The NHS Confederation, which represents the leaders of the UK’s health service, has warned of a “humanitarian crisis” this winter without further government action to offset rising energy bills, BBC News reports. The group says “many people would face the awful choice between skipping meals to heat their homes or having to live in cold and damp conditions”, the broadcaster adds. The Guardian quotes the group’s chief executive saying: “NHS leaders have made this unprecedented intervention as they know that fuel poverty will inevitably lead to significant extra demand on what are already very fragile services. Health leaders are clear that unless urgent action is taken by the government, this will cause a public health emergency.” Reuters, ITV News and the Daily Mirror are among the many outlets covering the group’s letter to ministers.

An editorial in the Sun says: “The ‘eating or heating’ dilemma households are tipped to face this winter gets repeated so often now that it sounds trite, but that won’t make the horrifying reality any easier to bear. Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, ominously predicts the number of deaths caused by fuel poverty will this year be ‘massively higher’ than the already shocking 10,000 that occur in a normal year.”

MailOnline calls the letter an “unusually political move” and says the NHS Confederation chief executive Matthew Taylor is “Tony Blair’s former chief adviser”. The Daily Telegraph covers the group’s letter under the headline: “NHS lobby group playing cynical politics game, says cabinet minister [Jacob Rees-Mogg].” An accompanying Daily Telegraph editorial is titled: “The NHS Confederation is behaving like a wing of the Labour Party.”

The two candidates to replace Boris Johnson as UK prime minister “are failing to promise the policies needed to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions, a right-leaning thinktank has warned, despite a clear need for measures that would cut consumer bills as well as carbon”, the Guardian reports. It says Onward is calling for grants and loans to insulate “Britain’s draughty homes” and a stamp duty rebate for those installing heat pumps, as well as “salary sacrifice” schemes to encourage the uptake of electric vehicles. The Times reports: “Call to halve stamp duty if you fit heat pump.” The Independent says thinktank Onward has called for stamp duty rebates to fund “greener homes”. Another Independent article reports on calls from WWF-UK: “Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak are being urged not to ‘sideline’ the climate crisis in their Tory leadership race, amid growing alarm that this issue is being forgotten.”

Citing “leading experts”, the Times reports that the government “must act urgently to reduce the risk of blackouts this winter by getting households and businesses to use less energy”. It continues: “Ministers…[should] tell the public to save energy and should embark on an emergency programme of insulation and efficiency to help consumers reduce demand…Experts said such measures would also help to tackle soaring energy bills.” The article quotes one former government adviser saying: “The most important thing you can do to improve security of supply is reduce demand.” It quotes a “Whitehall source” saying: “We are not advising people to reduce their energy demand.” The piece says: “A government spokesman declined to comment on why it was not encouraging energy saving at present and reiterated its statement that Britain’s energy supplies were secure.” An accompanying Q&A in the Times explores the “nightmare scenario if winter does its worst”.

Separately, BBC News reports that households could be offered discounts on their energy bills if the cut their usage at peak times, under plans “set to be announced in the next two weeks”. It adds: “There are hopes it can be put in place this winter, with energy bills rising.” Press Association also has the story. A Sunday Times feature is titled: “How your car and dishwasher could earn you money and stop blackouts.” The story is the frontpage splash for today’s Daily Express, with the headline: “Get paid to turn off your washing machine.” An accompanying editorial (not yet online) says “we welcome National Grid’s initiative”. It continues: “Other countries, such as Germany, have ordered households to reduce their energy use, but we hope it doesn’t come to that in the UK.”

The chancellor Nadhim Zahawi is “looking at options for bailing out businesses this winter”, the Sunday Times reports. Citing “government sources”, it says: “Zahawi believe[s]…proposals being drawn up by the Treasury for the next prime minister should include the option of repurposing Covid schemes to help businesses ride out the energy crisis.” The paper also quotes the former head of energy regulator Ofgem, Dermot Nolan, saying he thinks the government “should provide emergency support [for households]…at a higher level”. An accompanying feature in the Sunday Times is titled: “The great forgotten: how SMEs fear going bust as energy prices surge.” The Guardian reports: “The energy crisis is tearing through Britain’s high streets, with warnings on Friday of a ‘lost generation’ of small businesses, as the impact of soaring gas and electricity prices begins to hit cafes, restaurants, shops and salons.” The Press Association reports: “[Federation of Small Businesses] warns energy costs pushing small firms to the brink.”

In related comment, an editorial in the Sunday Times says: “Small and medium-sized businesses, SMEs, are the backbone of this country’s economy and that backbone is creaking and threatening to break under the strain of soaring energy bills.” It backs “imaginative measures” to “help struggling businesses”, noting how “the power of the state [was used] to get the country through the pandemic”.

There has been a surge in insurance claims for subsidence after “scorching temperatures caused cracks to appear in homes” during this summer’s heatwaves, the Mail on Sunday reports. It cites figures from the UK’s largest home insurance firms showing claims are up “more than 200%”. The paper quotes the head of home underwriting at insurer LV saying: “We’re starting to see the effects of climate change and the impact this is having on homes – whether that be storm, flood, fire or subsidence claims – which have all risen in recent years depending on the season.” (The first part of the quote is highlighted in print.) The Financial Times, the Daily Telegraph and the Independent also have the story.

Outgoing UK prime minister Boris Johnson has “secretly given the green light for a £30bn nuclear power station” at Sizewell in Suffolk, the Sunday Times reports, despite having “said that he would not make major decisions before leaving office”. The paper says Johnson and chancellor Nadhim Zahawi “took a decision in principle to part-fund the proposed construction of the Sizewell C nuclear reactor[s]…several weeks ago – without telling other ministers”. (The project is still subject to a final investment decision by developer EDF.) The Press Association reports that a final decision on government investment in the project is expected “early next year” subject to private funding being found for the majority of the expected “£20-30bn” cost. The newswire quotes a government spokesperson saying “negotiations are still ongoing on Sizewell C”. The Guardian says “some of [leadership frontrunner] Liz Truss’s senior allies are split over the decision”. The Independent also has the story. The Daily Telegraph reports: “Fund nuclear power with green bonds, Treasury told.”

Writing in the Mail on Sunday, secretary of state for business, energy and industrial strategy Kwasi Kwarteng says Russia’s invasion of Ukraine “has also pushed European gas prices to unimaginable highs…By deliberately restricting exports, they are manipulating the price we pay at home.” Kwarteng, a supporter of foreign secretary Liz Truss’s leadership bid, continues: “Thanks to a £90bn investment in clean energy in the past decade, the UK now has one of the most secure and diverse energy systems in the world.” Kwarteng notes that “millions of families will be concerned” about how they will pay their energy bills and adds: “I want to reassure the British people that help is coming. Right now, work is happening across government to assess all the options at our disposal to mitigate the worst effects of the gas crisis…On day one, the new prime minister will have the full information and analysis before them, allowing them to work up the best package measures that will help deal with the issue.” He continues: “We need to crack on with more nuclear power stations, back British-made small modular reactors, invest in cheap renewable energy such as offshore wind, and lift the ban on shale gas extraction in England where there is local consent. We also need to maximise North Sea oil and gas production. Rather than slapping a punitive windfall tax…we need to incentivise investment.”

Kwarteng’s column is reported on the frontpage of the Mail on Sunday with the headline: “Cost of living: Help is coming.” It says: “Minister tipped as new chancellor tells MoS of ‘package of measures’ for families battling soaring bills.” BBC News also has the story.

In the Financial Times, Alistair Phillips-Davies, the chief executive of energy firm SSE, writes that by the 2030s: “I believe that the UK will have solved virtually all the big energy problems it is currently facing. By then, we will have an abundance of cheap offshore wind generated in Britain and will have built the network superhighways to transport it to areas of demand.” He continues: The UK will be able to balance the system with zero-carbon hydrogen, carbon-abated technologies and flexible sources of storage. We will have reformed our energy markets and successfully uncoupled the cost of homegrown technologies such as wind and solar from the international gas price. Energy will be affordable, supply will be secure and we’ll be well on the way to net-zero.“ For now, however, he says that households will need more government support this winter: “Rather than being a handout, this is essentially a mortgage, secured against the cheap future energy system I’ve described.”

An editorial in the Observer says: “The country needs public investment funded by borrowing to protect households from eye-watering increases in energy and food prices and to shield the parts of the state people will need to rely on more than ever from the corrosive impact of inflation.” For BusinessGreen, Jess Ralston of thinktank ECIU says: “The next prime minister is sleepwalking into a winter gas crisis.”

For the Daily Telegraph, climate-sceptic columnist Dominic Lawson criticises Labour’s proposed energy cap freeze: “The real cost of the gas – sent spiralling up because of sanctions and shortages in the wake of Russia’s war on Ukraine – is what it is”. In the Daily Telegraph, columnist Juliet Samuel complains that “successive governments have regulated the market in a way that does not encourage investment in secure energy supply”. (The government’s capacity market is designed to encourage investment in secure energy supply.) In the Sunday Times, columnist Matthew Syed rails against “the latest obsession – whether privatisation in the 1980s or net-zero more recently – leaving us with a[n energy] system that is incoherent and fragile”. For the Daily Telegraph, Nick Timothy writes a column trailed on the frontpage that claims prime minister Theresa May (for whom he wrote the manifesto that lost her her electoral majority) committed to net-zero “without a plan”. Another Daily Telegraph comment by columnist Kate Andrews is titled: “The state cannot control the global energy market – no matter how much the Left demands it.”

Writing in the Spectator, James Kirkup, director of the Social Market Foundation thinktank, says the contenders to be the next UK prime minister are wrong to “deplore” solar farms, which are “nothing less than an economic miracle, delivered by private companies seeking profit”. He continues: “When British politicians, especially on the right, debate renewable energy, they routinely overlook the fact that renewable energy is now, by and large, cheaper than either fossil fuel or nuclear power.” Kirkup adds: “More panels means less reliance on expensive fossil fuels. There is a problem with solar panels in fields: there aren’t enough of them.” The Independent reports: “Sunak’s promise to protect farmland from solar farms criticised.” It adds: “Renewable energy advocates said biofuels used 77 times the amount of arable land as solar farms.”

A Financial Times Lex column is titled: “Energy costs: solar panels bring rays of hope to UK householders.” It says: “Residential solar panel installations have surged this year.” The Daily Express says: “Soaring energy prices are inspiring many Britons to look at alternative energy sources, including solar power.” The Guardian reports: “Solar panels: how to fix your energy bills while the sun shines.”

A new study unpacks “how and why China has been promoting nature-based solutions (NbS) in multilateral and domestic policy settings”. Analysing the content of English- and Chinese-language policy briefings, diplomatic remarks and government documents from 2019 to mid-2021, the authors find that “China’s NbS goals and actions differ significantly in domestic and international settings”. Internationally, China has been “reframing the country’s pre-existing large-scale afforestation, green financing, disaster risk reduction, and ecotourism projects as NbS”, the authors say. Meanwhile, in multilateral fora, “Chinese diplomats and practitioners are promoting NbS as an umbrella term to enhance the legitimacy of domestic projects now labelled as NbS, project an image of climate action and global environmental leadership, and increase China’s discursive power within global environmental governance”.