Daily Briefing: China ‘weighs’ hosting COP33 | English onshore wind ‘high’ | Swedish climate protest

24.08.26

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China said to weigh potential bid to host UN climate summit

Lili Pike and Alfred Cang, Bloomberg

Bloomberg reports that “China is considering a proposal to host the annual UN climate summit in 2028, a move that would signal the country’s intent to show greater global leadership on the issue”. The outlet adds: “Officials in Beijing are debating the merits of a potential bid to stage the conference…after India in April withdrew an offer to host the negotiations, according to people familiar with the issue, who requested anonymity to discuss private deliberations. Discussions, which have involved the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and environmental officials, are at an early stage and there’s no certainty that China’s government will choose to move ahead with a plan to hold the COP33 talks, the people said. Any decision to do so would require support from the highest levels of government, they said. China’s foreign ministry said in a statement that it isn’t aware of the situation, though the country will continue to support COP events.”

Agence France-Presse also carries the story, saying: “China is mulling a bid to host UN climate talks in 2028, two sources familiar with the matter told AFP Friday, as it seeks to burnish its reputation as a leader in the fight against global warming. Beijing has not yet made a final decision regarding the proposal for the COP33 summit, both sources said, nor is there a clear timeline for doing so. The host does not have to be decided this year.” Seoul Economic Daily notes that such a move would see China “potentially competing with South Korean cities Yeosu and Jeju”.

Onshore windfarm applications hit 10-year high in England

Jillian Ambrose and Alex Clark, The Guardian

Plans for new onshore windfarms in England have reached their highest annual level in a decade, after the government overturned the Conservatives’ de facto ban in 2015, according to a Guardian analysis of government data. It adds: “About 45 applications for new onshore windfarms were submitted in the year to March…Onshore wind power capacity entering the planning system has more than tripled since Labour dropped the blocks on onshore developments within days of coming to power just over two years ago, the analysis revealed.”

Meanwhile, the Sunday Times reports: “[UK prime minister] Andy Burnham is considering spending billions on new infrastructure to help the UK import foreign gas in an unprecedented intervention in the energy market. Ministers are looking at acquiring a huge ship capable of vaporising liquified gas brought from elsewhere in the world, or creating a government-controlled stockpile of natural gas that could be drawn on in emergencies. However, the plans have drawn criticism from energy industry figures who believe the government should prioritise drilling at the Rosebank and Jackdaw oil and gasfields in the North Sea.” The climate-sceptic Daily Mail covers new “exclusive” claims by the Conservatives under the headline: “More than 100,000 North Sea oil and gas jobs set to disappear by 2050.” The Press Association covers Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch’s visit to Scotland on Friday, where she claimed that her party has a “common-sense approach” for domestic drilling of oil and gas. The Herald highlights the views of “Scotland’s top energy expert”, Glasgow University’s Dr Ewan Gibbs, who says: “More drilling won’t lower bills.”

Separately, the Financial Times reports that “Britain’s power companies have been put on alert after hackers thought to be affiliated with the Iranian regime shut down a small UK energy facility”. It adds: “The attack took down one of the UK’s small gas-fired ‘peaker’ plants, which generally have a capacity of about 15 megawatts and are connected to local electricity distribution networks, according to two energy industry executives with knowledge of the situation.” The climate-sceptic Daily Telegraph says that the “costs of upgrading Britain’s energy grid for net-zero threaten to spiral out of control, EDF has warned”. The climate-sceptic Mail on Sunday has a double-page spread under the headline: “Is Ed Miliband’s race to net-zero turning Britain into a solar panel tinder box?” [The article “reveals” fires “involving solar panels” affected 0.01% of the UK’s solar installations in 2025.]

MORE ON UK

The Sunday Times: “After the heatwave, the floods. Is UK ready for autumn downpours?” The Times also reports: “UK drought to last into 2027 without extremely wet winter.”
The Times: “How will ‘the worst El Niño on record’ affect the UK?” Relatedly, the Guardian reports that “Britain’s railway prepares for more extreme weather as intense El Niño develops”.
BBC News: “How a new era of heatwaves could shake up the school calendar.”
Bloomberg: “Londoners find ‘horrendous’ cracks in their homes after successive heatwaves.”
Weaker electric-vehicle targets could mean up to 12 gigawatts less flexible charging capacity being available by 2034, according to new analysis by UK trade association BEAMA, covered by BusinessGreen.
The climate-sceptic Mail on Sunday claims that “Andy Burnham is under mounting pressure to sack his ‘climate tsar’ after she racked up more than enough ‘air miles’ to get to the moon”. The government has responded: “’We make no apology for pursuing international climate action.”

Thousands in Sweden protest over climate policy as election looms

Jerry Fisayo-Bambi, Euronews

More than 10,000 people marched yesterday through the Swedish capital Stockholm in a “protest against human-made climate change”, reports Euronews, “weeks ahead of a 13 September general election where the issue is top among Swedish voters’ concerns”. The outlet adds: “Organised by youth and sporting groups, unions, rural associations and rights groups, the rally…included Sweden’s most famous climate campaigner, Greta Thunberg.” Agence France-Presse adds: “According to a Verian opinion poll published by public broadcaster SVT on Thursday, 37% of respondents said the climate was a top priority in the election.”

MORE ON EUROPE

BBC News reports that a government minister says that France has seen 301 drownings since 19 June, “linking the sharp rise in deaths from last year to a series of prolonged heatwaves”.
The Financial Times: “Data centres drive Ireland to reopen nuclear power debate.”
Reuters: “Norway will drill in Arctic regardless of EU’s position, says energy minister.”
The Times of India carries an interview with the Potsdam Institute’s Prof Stefan Rahmstorf under his quote: “Europe won’t get back its ‘normal’ climate – a swift transition from fossil fuels will prevent worse conditions.”
The Wall Street Journal: “Europe chastised [US president Donald] Trump’s climate rollback. Now it’s delaying its own green goals.”
Deutsche Welle: “Subtropical fruits in Germany? Farmers adapting to drought.”

China’s Typhoon Maysak death toll soars to 159 as region tallies catastrophic losses

Phoebe Zhang, South China Morning Post

Local authorities in south-western China have updated the death toll of Typhoon Maysak from 39 to 159, six weeks after the devastating floods, reports the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post (SCMP). The outlet adds that the disaster affected more than 1.65 million people, according to officials, who also said that the typhoon triggered “historically rare, large-scale and persistent heavy rainfall”. State news agency Xinhua says that “major” rice-producing regions in southern China were hit by multiple typhoons, with early rice in some areas flattened, affecting grain harvesting. Wei Fenghua, with the National Bureau of Statistics, said that despite declining early rice production this year due to adverse weather, China’s output has remained above 28m tonnes for six consecutive years, laying a “solid foundation for a bumper grain harvest for the year”, according to the newswire. China has issued a 2026-2030 plan for the development of climate services, calling for the establishment of a modern system by 2030 to “better meet the climate service needs of economic and social development”, says Xinhua.

MORE ON CHINA

China and Indonesia have agreed to “work closely” on minerals and “green energy”, reports Reuters.
The NEA says China’s total electricity consumption reached 1.04m gigawatt hours in July, up 1.7% year on year, marking a monthly record high, reports Xinhua.
Jiemian says manufacturers are not seeing “significant reductions” in electricity bills, as rising system costs offset cheaper renewable power from its large-scale market entry.
The NDRC’s Li Qingbin tells Economic Daily that China’s “green consumption potential” will bring opportunities for low-carbon industries and contribute to the global response to climate change.
Researchers from China and the US have found that “solar expansion policies across China have led to a reduction in bird diversity”, reports the SCMP. Inside Climate News and Scientific American also cover the story.

US: Amid dire drought on the Colorado River, federal officials announce water cuts to three states

Dorany Pineda and Wufei Yu, The Associated Press

The Associated Press reports that federal officials have announced “sharp water cuts for the next two years…for three western [US] states that rely on the imperiled Colorado River”. The newswire adds: “Under the Bureau of Reclamation’s plan, California, Nevada and Arizona will collectively reduce water use by [1.54bn cubic meters] annually during that period, with the possibility of larger cuts depending on conditions.” It quotes Andrea Travnicek, the Interior Department’s assistant secretary for water and science, saying: “We’ve been in this 26-year prolonged drought period. We continue to see a prolonged drought in our future.” The newswire adds: “Years of overuse combined with drought and rising temperatures due to climate change have depleted the country’s two largest reservoirs, which are both fed by the Colorado.” [See Carbon Brief’s recent analysis headlined: “The two largest reservoirs in the US have hit record-low levels.”] The New York Times has a feature on the city of Phoenix: “America’s desert metropolis is on the short list to lose water.” Separately, the Washington Post has published an article under the headline: “See the invisible force driving destructive floods across the US.”

MORE ON US

The Guardian: “Despite [US president Donald] Trump’s attacks, unions are fighting for good US clean energy jobs.”
The Los Angeles Times: “Florida shows how to adapt as coastal cities face growing threats from sea level rise and storms.”
Fox News: “Record heat takes aim at southern plains with Texas, Oklahoma in the bull’s-eye.”

Comment

Climate demands political leadership

Editorial, Le Monde

An editorial in Le Monde begins: “The 7,000 excess deaths reported in mid-August and the billions of euros in expected climate-related damages from France’s 2026 heatwave have failed to prompt a response from national political leaders commensurate with the scale of the event. Since the first unseasonable heat spike in May, the French public has been met with silence from some and inadequate or demagogic statements from others.” It continues: “Yet, as paleoclimatologist Jean Jouzel has noted [see his comment piece, headlined: “’None of France’s presidential candidates truly grasp the reality of global warming”], climate change is no longer a scientific debate but an eminently political problem. The gap between France’s loud international commitments on climate and their faint echo in everyday life can only erode public trust…The gap between citizens’ heightened awareness of the crisis and the lack of commitment from their elected officials can only stoke anger. A persistent, depressive sense of fatalism could emerge from this heatwave, and it urgently needs to be countered. Counting on the collective suffering to be quickly forgotten once autumn and rain return would amount to abdication.”

How climate is driving new geostrategy

Rana Foroohar, Financial Times

Writing in the FT, Rana Foroohar says: “Climate change will ultimately reshape markets, but it is already reshaping geopolitics…When the world eventually transitions from fossil fuels to clean tech, China will be the main economic beneficiary.” She continues: “As the financial markets themselves begin to better price in the implications of climate change, the winners and losers will become clearer. Anthony Hobley, a UK-based climate change strategist, has written that ‘most investment decisions are still made as if climate change is not happening’, not so much because of denial but because there is still a ‘missing translation layer between climate data and the language of capital’. This means that, despite all the talk about ESG, the way in which capital markets price climate risk – and climate opportunity – is still relatively unsophisticated. Part of this is about the insurance business model, which is built on 12-month renewal cycles, rather than, say, a 20-year forward price curve…As Hobley puts it: ‘When climate risk is modelled as a 2050 scenario, it sits in a timezone where any reasonable discount rate washes it away.’”

MORE COMMENT

UN Environment Programme executive director Inger Andersen in Climate Home News: “How safeguarding land protects our future.”
An editorial in the Washington Post claims that “innovative farming techniques continue to defy warnings that climate change and population growth would ravage agricultural systems”.
Mark O’Connell in the Irish Times: “Ireland may not have mutant Blitz attitude to climate crisis, but we have our own potent version.”
Prof Carlo Ratti in the Financial Times: “Europe can do better than US-style air conditioning.”

Drill, Burnham, drill? The oil basin that is a totem for Trump – and a headache for Britain’s new PM

Matthew Taylor, The Guardian

The Guardian’s “Sunday read” is a feature focused on how North Sea oil, “once the driving force of the UK economy, may be dwindling, but it remains a symbol of prestige and a rich resource for political debate”. It quotes Connor Watt, of Platform, which works with current and former oil workers, unions, community groups and climate activists across Scotland: “The three main wins from the transition to renewables should be jobs, cheaper energy and income from electricity generation that can be used to bolster public finances, to help local communities. But at the moment, despite huge renewable projects going ahead, none of those three things have materialised and people are beginning to wonder why.”

MORE UK COMMENT

The FT has published a transcript of its Political Fix podcast in which senior political journalists George Parker, Stephen Bush and Jim Pickard discuss: “Burnham – to drill or not to drill?”
The Daily Telegraph has a video of its “The Daily T” podcast in which “Camilla Tominey and Tim Stanley are joined in the studio by Claire Coutinho, the shadow energy secretary, to tackle the political and ideological debate surrounding climate change and energy policy”.
An editorial in the climate-sceptic Sun focuses on reports [see above] that the UK is considering “spending billions on a massive ship with a likely huge carbon footprint to store more imported liquefied gas”. It asks: “Wouldn’t it be better to open up new drilling at the Jackdaw and Rosebank North Sea reserves instead?”
Dale Vince in the Independent: “The moment I changed my mind about North Sea drilling.”

Research

Research on “climate change and children’s psychological” wellbeing is skewed towards the US, UK and Australia, but “climate-vulnerable regions remained severely underrepresented despite experiencing disproportionate impacts” | Climate and Health
By the end of the century, intensified fire weather could increase the annual burned area in Europe by around 39% under a low emission scenario and 192% under a high emission scenario | Global Change Biology
Methane emissions from natural gas consumption in Chinese cities is “vastly underestimated or entirely omitted in existing inventories” | Nature Cities

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