Oil companies in the US will “get one last crack at new drilling rights in the Gulf of Mexico” today, before the Biden administration imposes a hiatus until 2025, Bloomberg reports. The interior department is auctioning off 10-year drilling leases as it was mandated to by Congress under last year’s Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), the article explains. There are 73m acres available for bidding and companies such as Chevron and Shell are expected to vie for control of the area, it adds. Bloomberg explains that the sale has been “under a cloud of uncertainty because of a months-long legal battle” and the broader uncertainty of the upcoming two-year hiatus on lease sales is “set to drive up industry interest and bidding this week”. All of this comes “just days after the US joined nearly 200 other nations at the COP28 UN climate summit in Dubai in a pledge to transition away from fossil fuels”, the article adds. Meanwhile, the Guardian reports on the proposed expansion of GTN Xpress, a pipeline that carries gas from fracking fields in western Canada through the US states of Idaho, Washington, Oregon and California. The article notes that state officials say the pipeline will “undermine the region’s renewable transition and further fuel climate emergencies”. 

The Financial Times has an article about John Podesta, Biden’s senior adviser in charge of the IRA’s implementation, who has criticised Republican efforts to scrap the bill. The IRA includes $628bn of investments into clean energy and manufacturing, the article notes. S&P Global reports that the US is projected to add 40.6 gigawatts (GW) of renewable power capacity in 2024, “with wind and solar surpassing coal-fired generation for the first time”. It says that “recently announced guidance on domestic manufacturing is expected to help strengthen the clean energy build out”.

In Europe, the Financial Times reports that Norwegian fossil-fuel company Equinor has signed “its biggest long-term gas contract in nearly 40 years” in a €50bn ($54.83bn) deal with German state energy group SEFE. The newspaper notes that EU countries have been seeking “stable supplies to compensate for the loss of piped gas from Russia”, and the European Commission has already signed memoranda of understanding with the likes of Qatar and the US.

US president Joe Biden’s administration has announced a new proposal to ban logging in old-growth forests across the nation, according to the Washington Post. This would require the US forest service to simultaneously revise all 128 of its forest plans, which lay out how all 193m acres of forests and grasslands are managed, it adds. The newspaper says the plan “would prohibit cutting down old-growth trees for economic reasons, preventing carbon-rich forests from being clear-cut at a time when scientists say they are most needed”. Associated Press notes that the administration “appears to be aiming for a middle ground” with the timber industry. While it would limit commercial timber harvests in old-growth forests, it would also allow logging to continue in “mature forests” that have not yet reached old-growth stage, it explains.

The British Museum has revealed a decade-long, £50m partnership with oil giant BP to help fund a major redevelopment project, BBC News reports. The news was announced alongside plans to upgrade one-third of the museum’s galleries and “phase out” its reliance on fossil fuels, the article continues. The museum’s relationship with BP “dates back to 1996 and climate campaigners have long criticised the decision to to take money from an oil-and-gas firm”, the piece continues. According to the Guardian, the museum said BP’s money was the “biggest ever single donation to the UK’s cultural sector” and it would help to fund a £1bn redevelopment. The newspaper quotes Chris Garrard, co-director of the climate campaign group Culture Unstained, who said the deal was “astonishingly out of touch” and “completely indefensible”. The Times says the museum has lost its deputy chairwoman,  Muriel Gray, and “believes it is facing an increased risk of violent attacks after doubling down on its relationship with the fossil fuel industry”. In its coverage, the Daily Mail says the British Museum has “defie[d] the eco-mob” and “bucked the ‘woke’ trend” by accepting money from a major oil company. It notes that others such as the National Portrait Gallery and the Tate galleries have cut ties with the fossil-fuel industry. 

China expects to “expand cooperation along the entire production chain in the energy industry”, Chinese Ambassador to Russia Zhang Hanhui told the Russian state RIA news agency in an interview on Tuesday, reports Reuters. Zhang is quoted as saying: “In the face of fluctuations in the global energy market and in the face of external risks and challenges, Russia and China always adhere to the principles of mutual trust and mutual benefit, constantly increase cooperation in the energy field and thereby make a positive contribution to ensuring global energy security.” The envoy also said both countries were in active discussions about Russia’s planned Power of Siberia 2 gas pipeline, the newswire notes.

Meanwhile, the South China Morning Post reports that China “aims to establish a standard system for green courier packaging by the end of 2025, and ban the use of toxic and harmful materials”, according to a joint action plan by the central economic planner national development and reform commission (NDRC), state post bureau and six other state authorities. The state-run industry newspaper China Energy News reports that an action plan for the development of low-carbon boilers issued by the NDRC and other departments says that by 2025, the “average thermal efficiency of industrial boilers and power plant boilers will increase by five percentage points and 0.5 percentage points, respectively, compared to the year 2021”. It adds that coal-fired power plant boilers will all achieve “ultra-low emissions”. The S&P Global reports that the thermal coal trade in Asia is set to surpass the levels of 2022 by “17%” in 2023, primarily driven by China’s increased “stockpiling of coal”.

In other news, the state-run newspaper China Daily carries a comment piece by Han Wenke, senior counsellor and researcher at the Institute of Energy Research, Academy of Macroeconomic Research, who writes that: “with winters getting colder and harsher, providing regular heating for people in northern China and ensuring the well-being of the people hit by frequent extreme weather events due to climate change is both a manifestation of China’s people-centric development philosophy and the high-quality development of the energy industry”. The state broadcaster CGTN has an interview with a panel of city officials and stakeholders at the China Pavilion at the COP28 on “how major cities like Dubai…and Shanghai, Yantai and Fuzhou in China go about synergizing concrete climate actions such as green transition and carbon trading on one hand and socioeconomic development on the other”. Finally, the South China Morning Post carries a comment piece by Zhou Xiaoming, senior fellow at the Centre for China and Globalisation in Beijing and a former deputy representative of China’s Permanent Mission to the United Nations Office in Geneva. He writes that: “It is unfortunate that global climate goals are being sacrificed on the altar of narrow self-interest. Given the spirit of COP28, and for the sake of the home on Earth we share, isn’t it time that Washington and Brussels abandoned their restrictive trade practices?”

Climate activists Roishetta Ozane and Bill McKibben have an article in the Guardian considering the US government’s support for the expansion of natural gas exports from the Gulf of Mexico. They describe this as “the single biggest fossil-fuel expansion on Earth” and say the US must decide whether or not it will continue “rubber-stamping” it, especially in light of the outcome from COP28 in which nations agreed that they would be “transitioning away from fossil fuels”. They write: “‘Transitioning away from fossil fuels’ doesn’t mean stopping all use of coal, gas and oil tomorrow; sadly, that’s impossible. But it clearly means not building new infrastructure to expand the production and sale of hydrocarbons.” Ozane and McKibben explain that 230 campaign groups have called on the Department of Energy to pause new gas export licences until they “fully revamp” their procedures for working out whether these permits are in “the public interest”. They conclude that while the president cannot stop individual projects, “if the administration pauses the permit process and sends the old criteria back for a serious revamp, it will have the same effect. And it will send a truly powerful signal around the world: the biggest exporter of oil and gas is actually going to change its ways”.

Meanwhile, in the letters pages of the Guardian, Michael Jacobs, a former energy and climate adviser to Gordon Brown, writes in response to criticism of the COP28 outcome from Rupert Read, a philosopher and climate activist. Read had stated that the use of the term “energy systems” in the text meant that it did not call for a transition away from fossil fuels as a whole. Jacobs argues that while the term was “ambiguous” – allowing space for agreement between all nations at COP28 – “this is a battle for interpretation. It is vital that all supporters of climate action insist that COP28 has called for the gradual transition to a non-fossil fuel future. Saying the opposite will be self-fulfilling”.

Some rather less-nuanced musings on fossil fuel phase-out come from an article in the Daily Telegraph by Neil Record, chair of both the free-market thinktank the Institute of Economic Affairs and the climate-sceptic thinktank the Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF). He paints a “nightmarish scenario” – that, he says, is “well supported by fact” – in which all coal, oil and gas supplies are immediately stopped. Record lays out how “six billion people would die within a year”, killed by cold, disease and violence. (The article is based on the premise that this is the reality that Just Stop Oil campaigners are fighting for, rather than the more modest goal of the UK government ending new fossil-fuel licensing.) Record adds that: “If, by the way, my analysis is wrong, [Just Stop Oil] should enlighten us on how an immediate ban on fossil fuels will allow civilisation to continue and flourish.” Finally, Howard Cox, another climate sceptic and founder of the FairFuelUK campaign, has one of his regular slots in the Sun calling for an end to “anti-motorist” policies and lower fuel taxes. 

Writing in Bloomberg, columnist David Fickling explains that “the biggest problem facing the global energy transition over the next decade isn’t technology or politics. It’s money”. He notes that 10 emerging countries in Asia and Africa – including India, Nigeria, Pakistan and Ethiopia – will account for more than half the world’s additional population between now and 2050 and a concomitant share of its energy. He explains that they “have economies highly dependent on foreign capital, either because of their rapid pace of development, or the fragility of their currencies” – meaning their energy policies are open to outside influence. “If rich nations don’t provide the funding for clean energy to fuel their growth, oil producers and their allies stand with cheque books at the ready for the dirty alternative,” Fickling writes. 

Meanwhile, Mekong Eye has an interview with Phirun Saiyasitpanich, the head of the Thai delegation at COP28, in which he emphasises the importance of climate finance for adaptation. “There was a lot of discussion on adaptation finance at COP28. However, the final decision could have been better and could not reach a satisfactory point for all developing countries. But at least we could establish the loss and damage fund,” he says.

A Times editorial  welcomes the move by the British Museum to accept funding from oil firm BP, stating that the museum and its chair, former UK chancellor George Osborne, “should be applauded” for “bucking [the] trend” of cultural institutions turning down money from oil companies. “The idea of ostracising oil companies makes little sense while we all still use petrol. If BP’s charm offensive means more funding for our museums, we all benefit,” the article concludes. The newspaper’s chief culture writer Richard Morrison says calls for divestment “won’t make a jot of difference to whether the world reaches its targets on carbon emissions”. Similarly, an editorial in the Daily Telegraph says it is “refreshing” to see the museum “cock a snook at the prevailing orthodoxy that has infected so many theatres, galleries and cultural outlets which have turned away sorely needed financial support”. It concludes that “it is to be hoped that the management does not wilt under the inevitable barrage of hostility the decision will provoke”.

New research unpacks the “adaptive strategies” shown in the climate-sceptic claims of the Heartland Institute, a conservative US thinktank. Through interviews and observations at Heartland’s International Conference on Climate Change a decade apart (in 2011 and 2021), the researchers identify 10 key themes. Five show similarities over the decade, including: “freedom and liberty, attacks on relevant-expert scientists, science and ‘alarmism’, rhetoric of embattled underdogs fighting orthodoxies, evidence of righteousness and confidence, and adversarial mentalities.” The other five indicate differences in strategy, including: “waning attention, diminished influence, an increased appetite for ‘culture wars’, more personal reflection on legacy, and increased entrenchment in state-level activities such as anti-environmental, social, and governance (ESG) principles initiatives.”

A new “advanced review” article challenges the “narrative” that Russia will benefit from maintaining global reliance on fossil fuels and from climate change itself. Officially, the Russian government argues that the country benefits from warming because it “may increase the extent and quality of its arable land, open a new year-round Arctic sea route, and make its harsh climate more livable”, the authors say. However, drawing on a large group of Russia-focused social scientists and a literature review, the study finds that Russia “suffers from a variety of impacts due to climate change and is poorly prepared to adapt to these impacts”.

A new study identifies an increase in large wildfires for much of the eastern US, which includes “some of the most populated regions of the US”. The researchers assess patterns and changes in large wildfires over 36 years in the eastern temperate forests, a region comprising most of the eastern US. The study identifies “increases in large wildfire size, occurrence, number and total hectares burned” in the southern and eastern parts of the region, while “large wildfires declined or were minimal” in northern parts.