During his election campaign Donald Trump suggested that climate change was nothing more that a “hoax”, however in a conversation with journalists from the New York Times yesterday, he indicated that his views had changed. When asked if he thought human activity was linked to climate change he replied: “I think there is some connectivity. Some, something. It depends on how much.” He also said that he thought clean energy was “important”, and that he would keep an open mind on whether he would follow through on this campaign promise to pull the US out of the landmark Paris climate deal, agreed by 195 nations last December. The u-turn has produced a backlash from his supporters. However, Travis Nichols, a spokesman for Greenpeace, told the Independent that the fact he had appointed a series of climate change deniers and oil industry lobbyists to his transition team indicated his administration would still be in “climate denial”, regardless of his comments in the interview. The New York Times has published the full transcriptof the interview. Reuters, the Hill and the Guardian also report on Trump’s remarks.

President-elect Donald Trump intends to eliminate all of Nasa’s climate change research and shift its focus towards deep space exploration, his senior advisor regarding the agency has said. This would mean the elimination of Nasa’s world-renowned research into temperature, ice, clouds and other climate phenomena, the Guardian reports. This will form part of a crackdown on “politicized science”, Trump’s advisor Bob Walker said, arguing that there was no need for Nasa to do “politically correct environmental monitoring”. “Earth-centric science is better placed at other agencies where it is their prime mission”, he continued. “My guess is that it would be difficult to stop all ongoing Nasa programs but future programs should definitely be placed with other agencies. I believe that climate research is necessary but it has been heavily politicized, which has undermined a lot of the work that researchers have been doing”.

Extraordinarily hot temperatures in the Arctic, with air temperatures 20C higher than normal for the time of year, are stopping ice forming and could lead to record lows of sea ice at the north pole next year, scientists say. Danish and US researchers monitoring weather stations and satellites say that such temperatures are unheard of. In addition, sea temperatures have been averaging nearly 4C higher than usual in the past two months. Temperatures have been only a few degrees above freezing when -25C should be expected said research professor Jennifer Francis of Rutgers university, adding: “These temperatures are literally off the charts for where they should be at this time of year. It is pretty shocking”. Energydesk and the Financial Times also cover the “scary” warming in the Arctic.

Donald Trump has sparked ethical concerns as he appeared to use his new position has president-elect to advance his own business interests, the Times reports. He encouraged Nigel Farage, UKIP’s interim leader, to redouble his opposition to offshore wind farms in Scotland. Last year Trump tried to block the construction of an offshore wind farm near his Menie golf resort so that the turbines would not be seen by golfers, an appeal that was rejected by the UK’s supreme court. Andy Wigmore, an American media consultant who was present at the meeting, said that Trump returned to the subject again and again. Trump later tweeted that he thought Farage would make a “great” ambassador to the US. Lang Banks, director of WWF Scotland, commented: “One would have thought Mr Trump would have far more important issues to be dealing with. Offshore wind turbines are already making a significant contribution to the UK’s power supply. And, given that Scotland is home to a quarter of Europe’s offshore wind resource, we should be aiming to make the most of this clean power source.” Grist and the Financial Times also have the story.

The UK’s foreign secretary Boris Johnson has said Labour could be at risk of damaging the national interest by criticising Donald Trump over his views on climate change. Johnson rejected shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry’s assertion that the election of Mr Trump was a “hugely dangerous” development for the future of the planet, responding: “I really must say to the right honourable lady that I believe she is being premature in her hostile judgements of the administration-elect. And any such premature verdict, I believe, could be damaging to the interests of this country”. When Ms Thornberry asked him for his reasons for being positive about Trump’s view on climate change he replied: “I think it’s vital that we are positive as we can possibly be about the new administration-elect”.

Climate change is altering the ecology of the Arctic Ocean on a huge scale as algae, the base of the food web, blooms much earlier in the year, scientists from Stanford University have found. This is likely to have profound impacts for animals further up the chain – but scientists still don’t know enough about the biology of the Arctic Ocean to predict what its future ecosystem will look like.

Britain’s energy market has become so heavily distorted by subsidy payments for suppliers of low-carbon power that it is now “completely opaque”, claimed Lord Darling of Roulanish in the House of Lords last night. The former chancellor suggested that the UK’s energy market is failing to deliver value for money for consumers. The remarks came during a session on the economics of energy policy with Dermot Nolan, chief executive of Ofgem, the UK’s energy regulator. Nolan said that he was “deeply sceptical” of subsidies, but this was the consequence of years of government policy to tackle climate change, and that subsidies would gradually be withdrawn as renewables such as wind and solar became competitive.

A study of more than 250 plants and animals suggests their ability to adapt to environmental changes like rainfall and temperature will be vastly outpaced by future climate change, the BBC writes. Tropical species, amphibians, reptiles and plants are particularly vulnerable, found the researchers from the University of Arizona. While some might be able to move geographically to cope, others live in isolated areas where they cannot move.

The US President-elect’s promise to unleash coal and fracking in order to create “many millions of high-paid jobs” won’t come true, writes George Monbiot in the Guardian. “However slavishly governments grovel to corporate Luddism, they will not bring the smog economy back”. Jobs in the rust belts and rural towns are at high risk of automation, and so “abundant jobs will not return to the places that need them most”. Monbiot continues: “The failure by mainstream political parties to produce a new and persuasive economic narrative, which does not rely on sustaining impossible levels of growth and generating illusory jobs, provides a marvellous opening for demagogues everywhere…A complete reframing of economic life is needed not just to suppress the existential risk that climate change presents (a risk marked by a 20°C anomaly reported in the Arctic Ocean while I was writing this article), but other existential threats as well – including war”.

The recent slowdown in global surface temperature rise was largely a result of a redistribution of heat within the Earth’s oceans, a new study says. Researchers reviewed the evidence, uncertainties and knowledge gaps regarding the slowdown, concluding that it is a phenomenon seen only at the Earth’s surface and “does not represent a slowdown in warming of the climate system”. Rather than surface temperature, a better measure for monitoring global warming is ocean heat content, the researchers recommend.

Shipping in the Canadian Arctic has increased significantly as sea ice extent has declined, a new study finds. Researchers compared records of shipping activity with sea ice observations for 1990-2015. The findings show that increases in shipping are directly related to sea ice reductions in the Beaufort Sea, Western Parry Channel, Western Baffin Bay, and Foxe Basin.