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Olivia Bowden, The Guardian
The Canadian government has announced it will provide urgent assistance to British Columbia after a series of unprecedented fast-moving wildfires forced more than 20,000 people to evacuate, reports the Guardian. Of 102 wildfires burning across the province as of yesterday, nearly half were “out of control” according to the BC Wildfire Service, the article explains. On Saturday, British Columbia had declared a provincial state of emergency, reports Reuters. The fast-moving fires have developed on the back of hot, windy weather and prolonged drought, says the Associated Press. It quotes the BC Wildfire Service director of operations, who called conditions “explosive”. The New York Times, Al Jazeera, BBC News and Sky News also have the story.
Meanwhile, wildfires continue to burn in multiple parts of the world. In Indonesia, the Associated Press, Agence France-Press and Reuters report that authorities have closed access to Mount Bromo national park on Java island as firefighters battle a wildfire raging there for nearly a week. The Associated Press reports that two pilots died after their helicopter crashed when fighting a forest fire in the US state of Utah. Reuters reports on fires in Washington state. In the UK, BBC News reports that firefighters are dealing with blazes in Nottinghamshire, Horsham, Gloucestershire and a second fire on a peatland nature reserve near Peterborough.
MORE ON WILDFIRES
The Financial Times looks at how “evacuations are changing in an era of big blazes”. The Saturday read in the Guardian explores the “deadly health burden of wildfire smoke”. Euronews adds that wildfire smoke is emerging as a “growing threat to pregnant women”. The Independent looks at Europe’s wildfires in numbers, while the Guardian reports on the “vicious” impact on wildlife of a heathland fire in the UK. Inside Climate News says that huge wildfires are testing the “limits of international cooperation”. BBC News and Euractiv report on arrests of people starting fires – deliberately or by accident – in France and Greece, respectively. The Economist: “NASA takes aim at fire storms.”
Agence France-Presse
Western Europe experienced its hottest June-to-July period on record as “climate change fuels an historic summer of heat, drought and wildfires across the region”, reports Agence France-Presse (AFP). Quoting data from the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), the newswire reports that the combined average temperature in western Europe for June-July was 21.62C – beating the 2022 record for the same period. Levels of soil moisture were "significantly lower" than in July 2022 when the last severe drought hit western Europe, the newswire explains. It quotes C3S deputy director Dr Samantha Burgess, who says: "This is a clear example of how climate change is intensifying heat extremes, with heat and drought increasingly reinforcing one another.” The Associated Press also has the story, while the Guardian leads with the C3S finding that the average global sea surface temperature outside of the polar regions was the highest on record for July, beating the previous record set in 2023.
Meanwhile, record-low water levels in the River Danube have exposed remnants from “dozens” of second world war German ships from the riverbed during an intense drought, reports the Guardian. It notes that the vessels were part of Adolf Hitler’s Black Sea fleet that the German military deliberately sank towards the end of the war to slow down the Soviet advance. The New York Times also has the story. Reuters reports that low water levels risk halting cargo traffic on a key stretch of the Rhine this week, effectively splitting the critical waterway into two separate zones.
MORE ON EUROPE
The CEO of reinsurer Swiss Re has warned that the “risk of heatwaves and the associated fatalities was underestimated” in Germany, reports Reuters. The Independent: “Drought and scorching heatwaves threaten Europe’s vision of a nuclear-powered future.” A rare solar eclipse on Wednesday will add pressure on Europe’s “tight” power system, as heatwaves have forced nuclear and coal plants to switch off across the continent and low water levels curtail hydropower stations, says the Financial Times.
Kelly Ng, BBC News
Chinese authorities have evacuated more than a million people from their homes in eastern China as Typhoon Dolphin made landfall yesterday, reports BBC News. With maximum winds of 94mph, the storm first hit Yuhuan in the Zhejiang province before making a second landfall in the city of Wenzhou about an hour later, the outlet explains. Dolphin has also brought torrential rains to the Philippines – where eight people died – as well as to parts of northern Taiwan and Japan's Okinawa island before bearing down on China, the outlet adds. Hong Kong officially recorded its highest ever temperature – 36.9C – as the typhoon swept warm air over the city, reports the Guardian. Reuters says Dolphin is the most powerful tropical cyclone to hit China this year. Nearly 1,400 flights in and out of Shanghai's two main passenger airports have been cancelled, notes AFP.
China’s new five-year plan for the “safe production of electricity” calls for strengthening risk management and control for coal-fired power units amid the energy transition, plus improving safety management for renewable power generation, according to industry news outlet BJX News. The Communist party-affiliated newspaper Study Times publishes an article by Wang Hongzhi, the head of the National Energy Administration, written in conjunction with the plan. Wang says that China’s share of non-fossil energy in energy consumption is expected to reach around 80% by 2060, which requires safeguarding electricity security. Wang also says that changes in the power generation mix have significantly increased “fluctuations and uncertainties” in the power system. China also needs to improve its disaster prevention capabilities as “extreme, sudden and highly damaging weather events” are becoming more frequent, exceeding existing “defence standards” amid climate change, Wang writes, according to the outlet.
MORE ON CHINA
Bloomberg says recent Chinese solar stock volatility was due to “domestic efforts to end below-cost sales and renewed [US] tariff threats”. Bloomberg: “China solar firm’s US tax-credit bid tested by Hong Kong tie.” China’s July oil imports rose 22% from June after “flows through the strait of Hormuz picked up and refiners boosted purchases”, reports Bloomberg. The Economist reports on how “China became the world's great oil power”. The South China Morning Post says China plans to expand output by 50% at the world’s largest rare-earth deposit in Inner Mongolia. India is preparing an incentive scheme to “encourage domestic polysilicon manufacturing” to reduce its reliance on China, reports Reuters. Bloomberg reports India is pressing China to “resume sharing water-flow data as concerns mount over Beijing’s construction of the world’s largest dam on the Yarlung Tsangpo”. Zero-carbon industrial estates, which are tied directly to renewable power, are seen by Chinese battery makers as a “route to easier compliance” of the EU’s “carbon cap”, reports the South China Morning Post. Yicai reports that Chinese company Envision has launched a supercomputing hub in northern China with renewable power accounting for two-thirds of the installed capacity.
Ben Clatworthy and Oliver Wright, The Times
In a frontpage story of its Saturday edition, the Times reports that Andy Burnham’s government is ”looking to relax some of Labour’s net-zero targets to help tackle the cost of living crisis”. The newspaper says it has “learnt” that “ministers are planning to water down rules on electric car sales, which could mean that half the new cars sold at the end of the decade will still have petrol engines”. The Department for Transport will shortly launch a consultation that “will propose relaxations of the rules”, it says. [This was widely reported in June.] In addition, the Times reports, the government will not stick rigidly to its pledge to produce enough clean energy to meet 95% of UK electricity demand by 2030. Referencing the newspaper’s interview with new energy secretary Miatta Fahnbulleh, the article says: “She suggested that…[the] pledge could be delayed by one or two years if it resulted in reduced costs for consumers. ‘We need to keep momentum [towards clean power],’ she said. ‘But we’ve also got to do it in a way that works for people. And that is about affordability.’” [These quotes do not appear in the interview article itself.] A separate Times article says that “ministers will examine how to encourage drivers of plug-in hybrid cars to charge them more frequently and not rely on conventional fuels”.
Meanwhile, the |
