Exclusive: Fossil fuels no longer dominant energy source, IEA leader says, as summit considers electrification pledge
The world has left behind the age of coal, oil and gas and is now firmly in “the age of electricity”, the world’s leading energy economist has said.
Fatih Birol, the executive director of the International Energy Agency (IEA), said more than twice as much electricity generation would be added to the global economy in the next decade than in the last, as countries scramble to secure their energy supplies against fossil fuel price volatility and supply shocks, such as the Iran war.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
11/13/2026 - 00:00
Owning an electric car, driving an electric motorbike taxi, riding scooters – we speak to people in Oslo, Kigali and Shanghai about their everyday routines
The race to electrification has emerged as a key theme of this year’s UN climate summit: increasing the use of electricity – particularly from clean sources – has the potential to improve daily life for people around the world.
The summit’s co-hosts are now trying to get countries to promise to increase their electricity use to 35% of all energy used by 2035. The global figure currently stands at 23%, but some countries are already striding ahead. As 100,000 delegates, negotiators and world leaders thrash out the details in Antalya, Turkey, the Guardian spoke to three people in Norway, Rwanda and China to find out what life looks like in more highly electrified countries.
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11/12/2026 - 17:12
Protesters with the Sunrise Movement youth climate group push for new Senate leadership and ending the filibuster
Dozens of protesters with the Sunrise Movement, a youth climate organization, were arrested after staging a sit-in inside Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer’s Washington DC office Thursday
According to the Sunrise Movement, 54 people were arrested, among a few hundred who joined the protest from across the country, including some from New York, which Schumer represents. On its Instagram, the group is fundraising $24,000 to cover the bail fees and any potential legal fees for those arrested.
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11/12/2026 - 17:00
Decision disappoints experts hoping for world’s biggest emitter to take global lead on climate crisis
China has ruled out hosting the Cop33 UN climate summit in 2028 after months of deliberations, leaving the field open for other Asian countries to hold it, the Guardian understands.
The decision will disappoint many countries and climate experts, who had hoped the world’s biggest emitter would take the lead on the global stage, as the US under Donald Trump has vacated all forms of international cooperation on the climate.
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11/12/2026 - 15:53
Sightings of the species are becoming increasingly common as experts worry about danger posed by busy waterways
A humpback whale was spotted on Thursday swimming in New York’s Hudson River, sparking a social media frenzy.
Brad Hoylman-Sigal, president of Manhattan borough, was among those to share a photograph of the whale on Facebook, an image taken on Thursday morning and provided by Gotham Whale, a citizen science and education group that tracks marine mammals in New York’s waterways.
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11/12/2026 - 12:51
Andy Burnham’s newly appointed climate adviser used report to warn of national security risk from collapsing ecosystems
The UK government still has no plans to publish an explosive report showing the national security risk from the collapse of ecosystems around the world – even after handing the key official behind the report a new advisory role.
Andy Burnham addressed the Cop31 climate summit in Turkey on Thursday and said the UK was determined to reach net zero by 2050 and work with its partners to build a clean energy future.
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11/12/2026 - 11:39
Swedish activist criticised world governments for their failure to prevent environmental breakdown
The planet is “not dying, it is being killed and we know by who”, said Greta Thunberg, who excoriated world governments for their failure to prevent environmental breakdown in her first appearance at the annual UN climate talks in five years.
Thunberg, 23, the Swedish activist who became famous for heading the school climate strike movement, delivered her stark message to those gathered at the Cop31 summit in Antalya, Turkey, amid the ongoing failure by countries to adequately address the climate crisis.
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11/12/2026 - 10:25
Flanked by Greta Thunberg, Rikki Dank says the Australian PM must heed the calls for action on climate change
An Indigenous climate activist who is taking the Australian government to the UN human rights committee over its coal and gas exports stood alongside Greta Thunberg at the Cop summit to demand Anthony Albanese “stop speaking and start listening”.
Draped in traditional dress in front of a media throng, Rikki Dank, a Gudanji and Wakaya traditional owner, delivered an impassioned plea to Albanese to listen to “the Australian people when they say no more new coal, oil and gas”.
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11/12/2026 - 09:00
Battery maker CATL aims to have 2,000 swapping stations in China by the end of 2027 and to bring the tech to Europe
Every day, Wang Bing drives his big electric lorry to send about five tonnes of goods between the cities of Haikou and Dongfang on Hainan, a tropical island in southern China. A round trip covers about 500 kilometres (310 miles). But refuelling is not something Wang worries about.
“When my battery runs low, I just drive my truck into a battery-swapping station to get a fully charged one,” says the 53-year-old, who shares the journey with a colleague in eight-hour shifts.
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11/12/2026 - 06:00
Kerry decries president for ceding clean-energy dominance to China and says climate crisis still a key issue for voters
Donald Trump is the “biggest loser we’ve seen in a long time” for scrapping action on the climate crisis and ceding the clean energy race to China, former US secretary of state John Kerry has said.
Kerry, speaking at the Cop31 climate summit in Turkey, criticized Trump for withdrawing the US from the international climate process and axing measures that reduced planet-heating emissions. Unlike almost all other countries in the world, the Trump administration has sent no delegation to the resort city of Antalya for the annual UN climate talks, which started on Monday.
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