The UK’s right-leaning newspapers have unleashed a huge wave of editorials attacking energy secretary Ed Miliband since last year’s general election, Carbon Brief analysis reveals.
In the first half of 2024, newspapers published 16 editorials – articles that are considered the newspaper’s formal “voice” – attacking Miliband. In the second half of the year, since Labour’s election win, this increased to 45 – roughly two every week.
Right-leaning outlets such as the Sun and the Daily Mail repeatedly called Miliband an “eco-zealot”, a “madman” and a “hysterical eco-obsessive”, due to his support for net-zero policies.
More broadly, there were 368 editorials published in UK newspapers last year that were about climate change and energy. This is the second-highest annual tally recorded by Carbon Brief’s long-running project, which tracks UK newspaper editorials back to 2011.
In 2024, unprecedented numbers of these editorials opposed climate action in general, as well as renewable energy, specifically.
As the new Labour government pursues a clean power system by 2030 and other net-zero policies, right-leaning newspapers argued that such measures would be costly and harmful.
This continues a recent trend of the right-leaning press rejecting net-zero policies, after briefly embracing climate action during Boris Johnson’s Conservative government.
Attacking Miliband
In his role as energy security and net-zero secretary, Miliband has been the face of Labour’s plan to achieve a clean power system by 2030 and is a long-standing and staunch defender of climate policies in general.
Last year, newspapers such as the Sun, the Daily Mail and the Daily Telegraph continued to push back against net-zero policies, with much of their criticism personally focused on Miliband himself.
Carbon Brief’s analysis identified 61 editorials that directly criticised Miliband in 2024. All of these, barring one published in the Independent, were in right-leaning newspapers.
A particular uptick followed the general election on 4 July, which saw Miliband enter government for the first time in 14 years. Newspapers published 45 critical editorials between election day and the end of the year, amounting to nearly two a week, on average, as the chart below shows.
By far the biggest critic of Miliband was the Sun, which published 29 editorials attacking him. This was followed by the Daily Mail, with 12, and the Daily Telegraph, with nine. The Sunday editions of these three newspapers also published a handful of critical editorials.
The favoured editorial criticism was that Miliband is a “muddled climate zealot”, prone to “demented fantasies”, who places the “mad rush to net-zero” ahead of – the newspapers claim – more pressing issues. Newspapers alleged – often with little supporting evidence – that “his” policies will lead to higher energy bills and the “lights going out”.
This claim was often in response to Miliband stating that renewables would help curb the UK’s reliance on expensive gas, as well as bring down energy prices.
There were several calls for prime minister Keir Starmer to “rein in” Miliband, calling him a “drag” on the Labour government.
Such specific and personal attacks are not directed at all government ministers. As a comparison, Carbon Brief only identified two editorials in 2024 that took specific aim at Miliband’s Conservative predecessor, Claire Coutinho, even though she held the role for half of the year.
(The criticism of Coutinho was also fairly mild in comparison to the claims about Miliband, focusing on the difficulties of building nuclear power. For example, the Sun said she needed a “reality check” and that “both main parties have been an abject failure” on nuclear.)
Miliband, who introduced the landmark Climate Change Act during his first stint as climate secretary in 2008, has long been a target for the right-leaning press and climate sceptics. The same newspapers criticising him now ran a similarly personal campaign to oppose Miliband becoming prime minister, when he was leader of the Labour party in 2015.
Record climate opposition
In total, Carbon Brief identified 368 editorials that touched on climate and energy issues in 15 UK newspapers last year, averaging one per day
Of these, 169 dealt explicitly with climate change. In an election year that saw Labour take power with a clean energy-focused manifesto, many of these editorials referred to measures the new government was pledging or starting to implement.
According to Carbon Brief’s analysis, a record 44 of the editorials published in 2024 argued for less climate action. This is the third record-breaking year in a row for such editorials in UK newspapers, as the chart below shows.
While there were still more than twice as many supportive editorials calling for more climate action, they were heavily skewed towards certain publications.
In total, 80 of the 99 editorials calling for “more action” were published in left-leaning and “centrist” publications, with the Guardian alone publishing 40 of them.
Right-leaning titles, which tend to have higher readerships, published just 19 editorials advocating for climate action, 14 of which were in the Times. The Sun, which is one of the UK’s most-read daily newspapers, did not publish any editorials supporting climate action.
For a brief period, peaking in 2020, these right-leaning publications appeared to have shifted in their attitudes. Publications with long histories of publishing climate-sceptic journalism, such as the Sun and the Daily Express, made public commitments to cover climate change.
This coincided with the Conservative government of Boris Johnson, which made major climate commitments, and the build-up to the UK hosting the COP26 climate summit.
However, since 2020 there has been a steep decline in support for climate action by these newspapers. As the chart below shows, the share of their editorials supporting and opposing climate policies is now back where it was a decade ago.
Carbon Brief’s analysis also assesses the themes present in newspaper editorials.
It shows that, once again, the most common argument against climate action was that there would be a negative economic impact of climate policies. Last year, 35 climate-related editorials, or one-fifth of the total, made this argument.
The “cost of net-zero” has been a key talking point in the right-leaning press. This can be seen in editorial headlines such as “the untenable costs of net-zero” and “it’s time MPs were honest about the true cost of net-zero”, in the Daily Telegraph and Sunday Times, respectively.
Economic benefits of climate policies, on the other hand, were mentioned in 29 climate-related editorials – 16% of the total. Analysis for the UK government has repeatedly demonstrated that switching to clean technologies will save people money, offsetting upfront investment costs, as well as delivering significant social benefits.
Another common negative theme – mentioned in around a sixth of climate editorials – was criticism of climate advocates, from Just Stop Oil to Ed Miliband.
Right-leaning newspapers frequently denounced such advocates for “green piety” and “hypocrisy”, or called them “fanatics” and “extremists”.
Renewable pushback
Carbon Brief analysed 79 editorials that focused specifically on three major energy technologies – renewables, nuclear power and fracking.
Fracking has fallen off the political agenda since plans to overturn a ban on the practice came to nothing in 2022. Only two editorials mentioned it at all in 2024.
Nuclear power was mentioned in 20 editorials, with none expressing anti-nuclear sentiments. Notably, the technology enjoyed support across the political spectrum of newspapers, as it has in previous years.
Renewable energy was far more divisive. Mirroring the results for climate action more generally, 2024 saw a record 25 UK newspaper editorials opposing wind, solar and other renewable energy sources. As the chart below shows, there was also a dip in the number of editorials actively supporting renewables.
All but one of the editorials opposing renewables were published in right-leaning newspapers, particularly the Daily Mail – with 11 – and the Sun, with seven.
Again, the supposed economic cost of renewables was the main reason cited. The Daily Mail said “eye-watering subsidies” were required to support renewables, while the Sun called the government’s plan to cut reliance on expensive gas, in favour of renewables a “ruinous fantasy”.
In contrast, some newspapers made the economic case for renewables. In an editorial about wind power, the Guardian said that “exploiting the British Isles’ most obvious natural asset is environmentally and economically the right thing to do”.
Methodology
This is a 2024 update of previous analysis conducted for the period 2011-2021 by Carbon Brief in association with Sylvia Hayes, then a PhD researcher and now a research fellow at the University of Exeter. Previous updates were published in 2022 and 2023.
The count of editorials criticising Ed Miliband was not conducted in previous years.
The full methodology can be found in the original article, including the coding schema used to assess the language and themes used in editorials concerning climate change and energy technologies.
The analysis is based on Carbon Brief’s editorial database, which is regularly updated with leading articles from the UK’s major newspapers.
The post Analysis: UK newspaper editorials attacked Ed Miliband relentlessly throughout 2024 appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Analysis: UK newspaper editorials attacked Ed Miliband relentlessly throughout 2024
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With the U.S. bombing Iran and the Strait of Hormuz closed, energy experts say countries transitioning to renewables will be more resilient in the “face of the shock.”
The United States’ war on Iran could fundamentally alter how countries consume and generate energy and hamper international progress in combating climate change, a panel of energy experts said today.
The Global Energy Supply in a Decade ‘Is Not a World We’re Going to Recognize’
One month into the US and Israel’s war on Iran, at least 60 countries have taken emergency measures in response to the subsequent global energy crisis, according to analysis by Carbon Brief.
So far, these countries have announced nearly 200 policies to save fuel, support consumers and boost domestic energy supplies.
Carbon Brief has drawn on tracking by the International Energy Agency (IEA) and other sources to assess the global policy response, just as a temporary ceasefire is declared.
Since the start of the war in late February, both sides have bombed vital energy infrastructure across the region as Iran has blocked the Strait of Hormuz – a key waterway through which around a fifth of global oil and liquified natural gas (LNG) trade passes.
This has made it impossible to export the usual volumes of fossil fuels from the region and, as a result, sent prices soaring.
Around 30 nations, from Norway to Zambia, have cut fuel taxes to help people struggling with rising costs, making this by far the most common domestic policy response to the crisis.
Some countries have stressed the need to boost domestic renewable-energy construction, while others – including Japan, Italy and South Korea – have opted to lean more on coal, at least in the short term.
The most wide-ranging responses have been in Asia, where countries that rely heavily on fossil fuels from the Middle East have implemented driving bans, fuel rationing and school closures in order to reduce demand.
‘Largest disruption’
On 28 February, the US and Israel launched a surprise attack on Iran, triggering conflict across the Middle East and sending shockwaves around the world.
There have been numerous assaults on energy infrastructure, including an Iranian attack on the world’s largest LNG facility in Qatar and an Israeli bombing of Iran’s gas sites.
Iran’s blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, a chokepoint in the Persian Gulf, is causing what the IEA has called the “largest supply disruption in the history of the global oil market”.
A fifth of the world’s oil and LNG is normally shipped through this region, with 90% of those supplies going to destinations in Asia. Without these supplies, fuel prices have surged.
Governments around the world have taken emergency actions in response to this new energy crisis, shielding their citizens from price spikes, conserving energy where possible and considering longer-term energy policies.
Even with a two-week ceasefire announced, the energy crisis is expected to continue, given the extensive damage to infrastructure and continuing uncertainties.
Asian crunch
Carbon Brief has used tracking by the IEA, news reports, government announcements and internal monitoring by the thinktank E3G to assess the range of national responses to the energy crisis roughly one month into the Iran war.
In total, Carbon Brief has identified 185 relevant policies, announcements and campaigns from 60 national governments.
As the map below shows, these measures are concentrated in east and south Asia. These regions are facing the most extreme disruption, largely due to their reliance on oil and gas supplies from the Middle East.
Nations including Indonesia, Japan, South Korea and India are already spending billions of dollars on fuel subsidies to protect people from rising costs.
At least 16 Asian countries are also taking drastic measures to reduce fuel consumption. For example, the Philippines has declared a “state of national emergency”, which includes limiting air conditioning in public buildings and subsidising public transport.
Other examples from the region include the government in Bangladesh asking the public and businesses to avoid unnecessary lighting, Pakistan reducing the speed limit on highways and Laos encouraging people to work from home.
Europe – which was hit hard by the 2022 energy crisis due to its reliance on Russian gas – is less immediately exposed to the current crisis than Asia. However, many nations are still heavily reliant on gas, including supplies from Qatar.
The continent is already feeling the effects of higher global energy prices as countries compete for more limited resources.
At least 18 European nations have introduced measures to help people with rising costs. Spain, which is relatively insulated from the crisis due to the high share of renewables in its electricity supply, nevertheless announced a €5bn aid package, with at least six measures to support consumers.
Many African countries, while also less reliant on direct fossil-fuel supplies via the Strait of Hormuz than Asia, are still facing the strain of higher import bills. Some, including Ethiopia, Kenya and Zambia, are also facing severe fuel shortages.
There have been fewer new policies across the Americas, which have been comparatively insulated from the energy crisis so far. One outlier is Chile, which is among the region’s biggest fuel importers and is, therefore, more exposed to global price increases.
Tax cuts
The most common types of policy response to the energy crisis so far have been efforts to protect people and businesses from the surge in fuel prices.
At least 28 nations, including Italy, Brazil and Australia, have introduced a total of 31 measures to cut taxes – and, therefore, prices – on fuel.
Even across Africa, where state revenues are already stretched, some nations – including Namibia and South Africa – are cutting fuel levies in a bid to stabilise prices.
Another 17 countries, including Mexico and Poland, have directly capped the price of fuel. Others, such as France and the UK, have opted for more targeted fuel subsidies, designed to support specific vulnerable groups and industries.
These measures are all shown in the dark blue “consumer support” bars in the chart below.
Such measures can directly help consumers, but some leaders, NGOs and financial experts have noted that there is also the risk of them driving inflation and reinforcing reliance on the existing fossil fuel-based system.
Christine Lagarde, president of the European Central Bank, spoke in favour of short-term measures to “smooth the shock”, but noted that “broad-based and open-ended measures may add excessively to demand”.
Measures to conserve energy, of the type that many developing countries in Asia have implemented extensively, have been described by the IEA as “more effective and fiscally sustainable than broad-based subsidies”.
So far, there have been at least 23 such measures introduced to limit the use of transport, particularly private cars.
These include Lithuania cutting train fares, two Australian states making public transport free and Myanmar and South Korea asking people to only drive their cars on certain days.
Clean vs coal
At least eight countries have announced plans to either increase their use of coal or review existing plans to transition away from coal, according to Carbon Brief’s analysis. These include Japan, South Korea, Bangladesh, the Philippines, Thailand, Pakistan, Germany and Italy.
These measures broadly involve delaying coal-plant closure, as in Italy, or allowing older sites to operate at higher rates, as in Japan – rather than building more coal plants.
There has been extensive coverage of how the energy crisis is “driving Asia back to coal”. However, as Bloomberg columnist David Fickling has noted, this shift is relatively small and likely to be offset by a move to cheap solar power in the longer term.
Indeed, some countries have begun to consider changes to the way they use energy going forward, amid a crisis driven by the spiralling costs of fossil-fuel imports.
Leaders in India, Barbados and the UK have explicitly stressed the importance of a structural shift to using clean power. Governments in France and the Philippines are among those linking new renewable-energy announcements with the unfolding crisis.
New renewable-energy capacity will take time to come online, albeit substantially less time than developing new fossil-fuel generation. In the meantime, some nations are also taking short-term measures to make their road transport less reliant on fossil fuels.
For example, the Chilean government has enabled taxi drivers to access preferential credit for purchasing electric vehicles (EVs). Cambodia has cut import taxes on EVs and Laos has lowered excise taxes on them.
Finally, there have been some signs that countries are reconsidering their future exposure to imported fossil fuels, given the current economics of oil and gas.
The New Zealand government has indicated that a plan to build a new LNG terminal by 2027 now faces uncertainty. Reuters reported that Vietnamese conglomerate Vingroup has told the government it wanted to abandon a plan to build a new LNG-fired power plant in Vietnam, in favour of renewables.
The post Iran war analysis: How 60 nations have responded to the global energy crisis appeared first on Carbon Brief.
Iran war analysis: How 60 nations have responded to the global energy crisis
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