Many publications continue to report on wildfires striking multiple parts of the world simultaneously. The Guardian reports that more than 7,500 people have been evacuated or ordered to stay inside as “the worst wildfire in at least four decades ravages the Canary island of Tenerife, burning through 2,600 hectares of land and drawing closer to the capital, Santa Cruz”. It adds: “Fernando Clavijo, the regional president of the Canaries, said more than 250 firefighters – backed by military emergency crews and 17 aircraft – were working to tackle the fire, which broke out in the north-east of the island on Tuesday and which currently has a 32km (20-mile) perimeter.” Clavijo told a press conference on Wednesday that “the fire is out of control, the scenario is not exactly very positive”, according to the Independent. Santa Cruz, the island’s capital, is currently just 12 miles from the flames, notes Sky News.

Elsewhere, the Independent reports that Canada is evacuating residents from the provincial capital city of Yellowknife and other smaller communities “amid wildfires that have creeped perilously close, threatening to engulf homes across vast swathes of the Northwest Territories”. It adds: “Air evacuations were set to commence on Wednesday in the city of Yellowknife, home to approximately 20,000 people.” The Guardian adds that long lines of traffic have “clogged the only road out of the Canadian city”.

A separate Guardian story reports that Hawaii’s supreme court yesterday heard attempts by fossil fuel companies to dismiss a climate accountability lawsuit, as the state still reeled from its worst wildfires in history. The court held a moment of silence for those who lost their lives in the blazes, the newspaper says. Elsewhere, the New York Times reports on how neglected landscapes, weak building standards and decommissioned dams left Hawaii more vulnerable to wildfires. The Economist reports on “lessons” from the fires.

Several UK newspapers cover a report from the defence committee warning that the UK must urgently prepare for the “profound” impact of climate change on national security matters. The Daily Express reports that senior Conservative MP Tobias Ellwood, who chairs the defence committee, “warned melting ice caps will trigger a mineral race and open new routes which Russia could use to reach Europe and North America quickly”. According to the Express, Ellwood said: “The security implications of climate change are profound and cannot be ignored. But they are currently not fully appreciated, let alone factored into our long-term strategic planning. Global security has entered a volatile new chapter. The impact of climate change makes the case for increased defence spending all the more powerful.” The Guardian adds that, according to the report, “the impact of global heating on the armed forces covers every aspect of their operations”. It continues: “These include high temperatures making training locations such as Cyprus unusable at certain times of the year, increasingly harsh conditions for armed service personnel operating abroad, the threat that armoured vehicles will break down in rising temperatures and the risk to the UK from a collapse in security across the world.” The report also said that the ministry of defence “should be more ambitious with its decarbonisation plans and could do much more to cut carbon emissions without sacrificing military efficiency”, according to the Press Association. The i newspaper also has the story.

Elsewhere, City AM reports on new research from the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU), a non-profit promoting informed discussion on climate change, finding that taxpayers are being left “£1.5bn worse off per year due to Treasury red tape blocking new offshore wind projects”. It adds: “Treasury rules that constrain the number of contracted farms allotted at offshore wind auctions will constrain the number of projects being approved and keep bills higher.” The Guardian also reports on the analysis.

In addition, the Times reports that the “future of a green energy trust backed by the government is in the balance amid a dispute with its investment manager over a solar project in India”. And the Guardian reports that campaigners have criticised the government for ditching proposed food waste legislation that could have “reduced food prices and helped tackle the climate crisis”.

Tropical storm Hilary strengthened into a hurricane on Thursday, “with forecasters warning it could potentially bring devastating rainfall and high winds to southern California this weekend”, the Hill reports. It explains: “The last tropical storm to impact the state was 84 years ago, according to official records. The National Hurricane Center said Hilary was about 475 miles south of Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, as of 5pm Thursday ET, with maximum sustained winds of 110mph. While Hilary is likely to weaken as it travels northward, it could bring heavy rainfall to the south-western US, along with large swells and high surf along the coast.” CBS News reports that, after becoming a hurricane, Hilary “later strengthened to a major Category 3”. However, it is not expected to be a hurricane on final approach to California, a hurricane expert tells CBS News.

China will establish a recycling mechanism for “ageing” solar panels and wind turbines, reports Reuters. The authority says the aim is to address the “increasing volumes of waste generated by the industry”. The newswire says that China has “ramped up” its wind and solar manufacturing capacities as part of its efforts to “decarbonise and reduce reliance on coal”. 

Separately, at China’s first “national ecology day” on 15 August, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the country’s top economic planner, announced China has achieved “significant accomplishments” on “dual carbon” targets in the past three years, reports the Chinese energy news site China5e.com, citing an article by NDRC. These achievements include mainly eight areas, such as the establishment of the “1+N” policy framework for achieving carbon peak and carbon neutrality; the “steady advancement” of energy sector’s “green” and low-carbon transformation, and “active engagement” in global climate governance. The NDRC highlights that China has “promoted the realisation of the Sharm El-Sheikh Implementation Plan” at the COP27, striving to construct a global environmental governance system characterised by “fairness, equity, cooperation, and mutual benefit”. 

Meanwhile, CBC News, the Canadian public broadcaster, reports that Canadian federal environment minister Steven Guilbeault will visit China at the end of August for diplomatic talks on “protecting nature and fighting climate change”. Guilbeault’s office says that “the whole world is being confronted by the triple crises of climate change, pollution and biodiversity loss…addressing global environmental challenges requires China’s engagement”. The South China Morning Post quotes Matthew Oxenford, senior analyst at the Economist Intelligence Unit, and says that China will “dominate” the global “green tech” industry until “at least the 2030s” even developed countries implement policies to “bolster their domestic supply chains to reduce dependence on China”. Bloomberg has a story headlined: “US-China solar trade probe ruling to reshape billions in trade.”

Finally, the website FORESIGHT Climate & Energy quotes Yan Qin of Refinitiv, a market analysis firm, who says that Chinese authority is “not overly concerned by the EU’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), as its lawmakers have decided that the amount of exports covered by its current scope is acceptable”. She highlights that the CBAM “has already been used by the Chinese authorities as an external driver to put pressure on [its] domestic industry to decarbonise, for example increasing the uptake of green electricity in steel and aluminium production”. Reuters writes that there was a rise of over 1% in oil prices on Thursday following China’s central bank’ “efforts” to counter the “increasing pessimism” surrounding the nation’s property market and the broader economy. And Climate Home News explores how recent deadly floods in Beijing have tested China’s “sponge cities”.

In its first session after the summer break, the German federal government has initiated two legislative proposals aimed at helping achieve climate targets, reports Die Zeit. The outlet details that the cabinet approved a draft law for municipal heat planning linked to the “controversial” heating law and agreed on the so-called Solar Package I, intended to accelerate the expansion of photovoltaics in Germany. Through the heat planning law, citizens and businesses will gain “clarity” about future local heat supply, such as whether district heating or hydrogen supply is planned and whether heating adjustments are required, notes the outlet. It adds that Solar Package I includes simplifications, such as abolishing the complex registration of balcony solar systems with network operators. Tagesschau reports that a new regulation will exclude cities and communities from future decisions regarding constructing photovoltaic installations along highways and railway lines. This has left communities “not particularly enthusiastic” about the prospect, the outlet says. In addition, Clean Energy Wire reports that the German Building Materials Trade (BDB) has warned that the country’s “excessive” energy efficiency standards for new buildings are driving up construction costs and hindering affordable housing.

Meanwhile, Manager Magazin reports that the dispute over a planned liquified “natural” gas (LNG) terminal off the coast of Rügen island in Germany is escalating. The outlet notes that the economy ministry will examine the “suitability and reliability of the potential contracting partner”, Deutsche ReGas. Reuters notes that the resort town of Binz on Rügen, which opposes Deutsche ReGas’ terminal on environmental grounds, asked anti-money laundering authorities in July to probe the firm’s capital.

Finally, FAZ quotes a representative of the German energy company RWE, Sopna Sury, saying that government subsidies are essential for viable hydrogen technology, drawing a parallel to the initial years of wind and solar power, where competitiveness took over a decade to achieve. Also, Handelsblatt reports that German solar companies Heckert Solar, Wattkraft and Interfloat are seeking funding from the economy ministry to establish their own photovoltaic production, spanning cell manufacturing to solar modules to reduce dependency on Chinese solar manufacturers dominating the European market.

In an editorial, the FT argues that, globally, the nuclear industry needs to improve to be able to contribute to meeting climate goals. It says: “If nuclear power is to play the part many western governments envisage, the industry needs to improve financing, construction and supply chains, and demonstrate it can build big reactors within the time and resources allotted…If ‘gigawatt-scale’ reactors are to play their part in the west’s climate transition, the nuclear industry must be better at planning and execution.”

In the Guardian, Canadian author Naomi Klein and ​​Prof Kapuaʻala Sproat, a researcher at Ka Huli Ao Native Hawaiian Law Center and the Environmental Law Program, write on how Hawaii has experienced “devastating water theft” from big corporations, which is likely to worsen after the state’s worst wildfires in history. The women say: “All over Maui, golf courses glisten emerald green, hotels manage to fill their pools and corporations stockpile water to sell to luxury estates. And yet, when it came time to fight the fires, some hoses ran dry. Why? The reason is the long-running battle over west Maui’s most precious natural resource: water…It’s a situation that has left many Native families with no access to county water lines (which also means no fire hydrants) as well as no paved roads to escape the fires that increasingly threaten their homes and lives.”

For New Scientist, veteran extreme weather scientist Dr Friederike Otto writes on the importance of understanding the role that climate change plays in extreme weather events. As part of this, she explains how media reporting of extreme weather used to be framed along the lines of: “Although this is the kind of phenomenon that global warming makes more frequent, we can’t attribute individual weather events to climate change.” Otto writes: “This was correct in the 20th century, but it is definitely wrong today.”

A new study finds that reducing air pollution will result in additional warming two or three decades after the fact – not immediately, as previously thought. Using satellite data, researchers investigate aerosols and cloud droplet concentrations, finding a non-linear relationship between the two. With this  “revised relationship”, they find that warming in heavily polluted areas will be delayed by several years, with this “climate penalty” manifesting itself in China starting around 2025 and in India by mid-century under strong air-quality regulation. This underscores “the urgency of mitigating greenhouse gas emissions”, the authors write.