Published

1 year ago

December 25, 2024

Alice Rush

Welcome to Carbon Brief’s China Briefing.

China Briefing handpicks and explains the most important climate and energy stories from China over the past fortnight.
Subscribe for free here.

Key developments

China’s emissions flat in Q3

Q3 ANALYSIS: Citing official and commercial data, analysis for Carbon Brief by Lauri Myllyvirta at the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) found that China’s emissions “stayed at, or just below, last year’s levels” in the third quarter (Q3) of 2024. The analysis explained that rapid electricity demand growth caused a coal-power rebound, but this was offset by falling demand for oil, steel and cement, along with weak consumer spending due to the sluggish economy. After a rise in Q1 and a decrease in Q2, the latest trends mean China’s overall emissions in 2024 would fall if there is a drop of at least 2% in the final quarter, the analysis found. It said this looked likely, but that recent economic stimulus creates uncertainty around the outlook. It added that, either way, China will “remain off track against its 2025 ‘carbon intensity’ target [energy consumption per unit of GDP], which requires emissions cuts of at least 2% in 2024 and 2025, after rapid rises in 2020-23”.

MISSING TARGETS?: Official data reported by state news agency Xinhua also hinted that China may fail to meet its “energy intensity” target, with China’s electricity consumption growing 7.9%, faster than the GDP growth rate of 4.8% so far this year. Meanwhile, China’s top planner, the National Development and Reform Commission, continues to prepare for the switch from “dual control” of energy – covering energy use and energy intensity –to “dual control” of emissions, issuing a new work plan on establishing a “national-level and provincial-level carbon reporting system” by 2025, said China News. (Read more about the switch to “dual control” of emissions in a previous China Briefing.)

EU’s EV tariffs entered into force

STEEP TARIFFS: The EU’s new tariffs on Chinese-made electric vehicles (EVs) kicked in on 30 October, after talks between Brussels and Beijing failed to find an amicable solution to the months-long trade dispute, the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post reported. The final duty rates for the next five years were confirmed at between 7.8% and 35.3% – on top of a baseline 10% that applies to all EV imports – depending on whether the relevant firm is deemed to have cooperated with the EU probe, said the newspaper. (Read more in Carbon Brief’s Q&A on the global “trade war” over China’s booming EV industry.)

REACTIONS: The Associated Press quoted European Commission executive vice-president Valdis Dombrovskis defending the move: “We’re standing up for fair market practices and for the European industrial base. In parallel, we remain open to a possible alternative solution that would be effective in addressing the problems identified and (World Trade Organization)-compatible.” The Chinese government said it has “repeatedly pointed out” that the EU’s move was “unreasonable and non-compliant”, adding that it did “not agree with or accept the ruling”, according to Xinhua. China has “filed a complaint” with the WTO, said business news outlet Yicai.

Steel ‘overcapacity’ persisted

STEEL SLOWDOWN: The latest data from China’s National Bureau of Statistics showed China’s steel sector is among sectors “bearing the brunt of the nation’s economic slowdown”, reported Bloomberg. The outlet said the steel industry had seen cumulative losses of 34bn yuan ($5bn) in the first nine months of the year, while the oil sector saw losses of 32bn yuan ($4.5bn). Xinyi Shen, China team lead at the CREA, said in a LinkedIn post that steel sector losses continued in the third quarter despite a “significant production cut”. The losses illustrated “persistent structural overcapacity” in the sector, Shen wrote. With global markets shifting towards “greener and more efficient production practices, China’s steel industry must adapt and innovate for sustainable growth”, she added.

STEEL RETROFITS: Meanwhile, more than 140 steel enterprises, whose steelmaking capacity exceeded 620m tonnes, completed “ultra-low emission retrofitting” over the period January to August 2024, according to data from the China Iron and Steel Association (CISA), state broadcaster CCTV reported. It added that the CISA had set new standards for “low-carbon emission steel” and said that deployment of “high-grade steel materials” can cut carbon dioxide emissions by 1.35bn tonnes (GtCO2) by 2030.

STEEL RECYCLING: Meanwhile, China launched a state-owned resources recycling company that “risks weighing down demand for metals, reported Bloomberg. China Resources Recycling Group will recycle steel scrap, as well as batteries and plastics, among other materials, the outlet said. The initiative has support from president Xi Jinping, said state news agency Xinhua. State-run newspaper China Daily anticipated the company would recycle 260m tonnes of scrap steel and iron annually. A recent action plan for the manufacturing industry by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology also set a goal for recycling 62% of “bulk industrial solid waste” by 2030, with 20% of “short-process steelmaking” relying on recycling, reported CCTV. The plan also said that, by 2030, the output of “green factories” will account for more than 40% of the total manufacturing value, added the state broadcaster. Lauri Myllyvirta, author of the above-mentioned emissions analysis for Carbon Brief, described the move as “very important” on LinkedIn, adding that steel was China’s second-largest emitting sector and had the potential, via increased recycling and other measures, to cut its emissions by “by a third or more over the next decade”.

Xi told BRICS to advance ‘low-carbon transformation’

KAZAN DECLARATION: The BRICS group of nations that includes Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – a bloc representing around 37% of global GDP and 42% of greenhouse gas emissions – issued a joint statement “reiterat[ing] that the objectives, principles and provisions of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), its Kyoto Protocol and its Paris Agreement…must be honoured”, state news agency Xinhua reported. The agreement added that such considerations must include “its principles of equity and common but differentiated responsibilities”. In language likely directed towards the EU’s “carbon border adjustment mechanism” (CBAM), the nations “[condemned] unilateral measures introduced under the pretext of climate and environmental concerns”, the statement said.

‘GREEN’ BRICS: State-run newspaper China Daily said Xi told the summit that China was “willing to expand cooperation with BRICS countries in green industries, clean energy and green mining”. The Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post (SCMP) quoted him telling other delegates: “Green is the background colour of this era. BRICS countries should actively integrate into the global green and low-carbon transformation.” The UN said secretary general António Guterres told the meeting that the BRICS could “play a greater role in strengthening multilateralism” and “urged the bloc to…boost climate action”.
BRI ENERGY PLAN: Meanwhile, a ministerial-level meeting on energy in the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), convened in China by the National Energy Administration (NEA), resulted in an action plan for “green energy cooperation” between 2024 and 2029, China Daily reported. The action plan, state broadcaster CCTV said, focused on efforts to enhance countries’ ability to guarantee secure supply of “green energy”, particularly through cooperation on “hydrogen, new energy storage and advanced nuclear power”.

Spotlight

What to expect in China’s climate pledge for 2035

The next round of “nationally determined contributions” (NDC) to the Paris Agreement, outlining countries’ climate goals to 2035, are due by February 2025.

They are also set to be an important agenda item at COP29 in Baku, Azerbaijan next month.

China has not confirmed when it will publish its next NDC. Several groups, including Climate Action Tracker, the International Energy Agency and the Centre for Research on Energy and Air, have set out what it would take to align China’s targets with the 1.5C limit or its existing national goals.

In this Spotlight, Carbon Brief asks leading experts what they expect to see in China’s 2035 NDC. Below are highlights from their answers. Their full responses will be published on Carbon Brief’s website shortly.

Todd Stern, senior fellow, the Brookings Institution and former US special envoy for climate change, in response to a question from Carbon Brief at a Chatham House event:

China is the most important country in the world right now, with respect to their [climate] target. I think that other major players – the US, EU, Japan, Canada, Korea, Australia – are…going to put in pretty ambitious, pretty strong targets of the kind that you want to see.

China now accounts for 30% of global emissions and is basically peaking carbon emissions about now…if not this year then next year. People at the Asia Society and elsewhere have done analysis…basically saying that, in order to be where we need to be, we need to see something like a 30% reduction from China. I am sure this is certainly not what the Chinese are thinking of at the moment, but we’ll see how much of a chance there is to move. If the Chinese come in with a 5-10% target, it will be very bad.

Yao Zhe, global policy advisor, Greenpeace East Asia:

So far, Chinese policymakers have taken a cautious approach, obviously constrained by the challenges in the domestic economy. But, in fact, stronger climate action and more ambitious targets are unmistakably an economic boon for China.

An update of the renewable energy target is expected in China’s new NDC. A stronger target for the next 5-10 years will help expand the domestic market and give industry and investors the confidence they need. It will also lay the groundwork for an ambitious NDC…However, China’s clean-energy potential can only be fully realised with clearer plans to move away from fossil fuels…The new NDC should address this by committing to no new coal power.

Anders Hove, senior research fellow, Oxford Institute for Energy Studies:

China’s past NDCs have tended to reflect trends underway and highlighted concrete targets that are already on-track to be met, rather than adopting ambitious new goals…A modest NDC would likely highlight targets related to renewable energy as a share of electricity production, continued steady growth in wind and solar capacity, and possibly electric vehicle adoption.

Byford Tsang, senior policy fellow, European Council on Foreign Relations:

A reading of policy signals from the recent past suggests that China’s upcoming climate target is going to be conservative: coal-plant approvals spiked in the years following a pledge to “strictly limit” coal power; official data showing that China is on-track to miss its own 2025 carbon intensity targets; and the country’s top energy agency has proposed an annual installation target that would slow down clean-energy deployment.

Li Shuo, director of the China Climate Hub, Asia Society Policy Institute:

At least three variables will determine the quality of China’s headline commitment: the quantum [the minimum amount] of emissions reduction; the base year from which emissions will be reduced; and the sectoral and greenhouse gas coverage…Chinese decision-makers could plant ambiguities in any, none, or all these variables.

Some believe China will adopt its emissions peak as the base year for its 2035 target…This formulation could see China not specifying when and at what level its emissions will peak…[and could] make the question of when, and based on what conditions, Beijing will confirm its emission peak ever more important. Currently, Beijing’s policymakers do not believe China’s emissions have peaked.

Niklas Höhne, part of the Climate Action Tracker (CAT) and NewClimate Institute, and and Bill Hare, co-founder and CEO of Climate Analytics, and part of CAT:

Amid discussions on China setting a percentage reduction target from peak emission levels, CAT recommends basing the 2035 NDC on a historical baseline…CAT’s modelled domestic pathways indicate that China needs to reduce emissions by 55% by 2030 and by 66% by 2035 from 2023 levels to align with the Paris Agreement. A minimum 28% reduction in total greenhouse gas emissions by 2035 is crucial for China to stay on-track for its 2060 net-zero target.

Hu Min, director and co-founder, Institute for Global Decarbonization Progress (iGDP) and Chen Meian, senior program director and senior analyst, iGDP:

China’s new NDC is expected to reflect heightened domestic momentum for decarbonisation…The new NDC might also reflect ongoing domestic adjustments to the system for evaluating mitigation progress, such as by including a carbon-budget system. This would be an encouraging move to address absolute carbon mitigation instead of [carbon] intensity.

Lauri Myllyvirta, lead analyst, Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) and senior fellow, Asia Society Policy Institute:

If it allows emissions to grow until just before 2030 and pursues slow and gradual emission reductions thereafter, China alone would use up almost the entire global carbon budget for 1.5C…As long as the policymakers think in terms of a late 2020s peak, there is little time to reduce emissions from that peak by 2035…While China needs to reduce emissions by at least 30% from 2023 to 2035…it seems more likely that the decision-makers will target a reduction that is a fraction of this, falling short of what’s needed to get to carbon neutrality before 2060.

Lu Lunyan, CEO, WWF China:

We hope China will consider setting clear and ambitious targets for total greenhouse gas emissions, including non-CO2 gases, such as methane, alongside increasing the share of non-fossil fuels, and aligning with the Paris Agreement on the path to net-zero. In addition, sector-specific decarbonisation strategies, particularly for heavy industries, transportation and power generation, will be crucial to achieving meaningful emissions reduction.

This spotlight was compiled by Anika Patel.

Watch, read, listen

US-CHINA: US thinktank the Brookings Institution said in a commentary that the “next US administration’s challenges with China on climate change are threefold”: maintaining climate progress; accelerating the US energy transition; and “continuing to press for forward movement on China’s emissions reductions efforts”.

LIU’S CONFIDENCE: At an Arctic Circle climate action summit, Chinese climate envoy Liu Zhenmin said China was “confident” it would peak emissions by 2030 and reach carbon neutrality by 2060.

‘GREEN’ TRANSITION: Beijing Daily published an analysis on economic reform, technology innovation and “green transition” by economist Liu Shijin, former member of China’s National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference and former deputy president of the State Council’s Development Research Center.
EV COMEITITION: The Financial Times reported that Chinese EV giant BYD’s quarterly sales overtook the US’s leading EV producer Tesla for the first time.

230 billion

TChina’s economic losses due to “natural disasters” between July and September 2024, in yuan, equivalent to $32bn, as reported by Reuters. The figure is based on data from the Ministry of Emergency Management and Reuters calculated that the loss in the third quarter of 2024 was more than double that in the first half of the year. It said total losses of 323bn yuan ($45bn) in 2024 to date were higher than the 308bn a year earlier.

New science

Research on the strategy for constructing a green and low-carbon urban ecosystem under the dual-carbon strategy: a case study of Wenzhou, Zhejiang

Asia Pacific Science Press

A new study on the city of Wenzhou, in Zhejiang province in east China, examined the “low-carbon transition of modern cities” under China’s “dual-carbon” strategy. It found that Wenzhou has adjusted its energy structure by “vigorously developing” renewable energy sources, guided local enterprises to adopt energy-saving technologies, as well as integrated the “low-carbon concept” into urban planning. The study concluded that these methods – technology adaptation, policy support as well as “talent cultivation and recruitment” strategy – are “validated” for cities’ low-carbon transition in China.

China Briefing is compiled by Wanyuan Song and Anika Patel. It is edited by Wanyuan Song and Dr Simon Evans. Please send tips and feedback to china@carbonbrief.org

The post China Briefing 31 October 2024: Q3 emissions; EU’s EV tariff in effect; NDC expectations appeared first on Carbon Brief.

China Briefing 31 October 2024: Q3 emissions; EU’s EV tariff in effect; NDC expectations

Greenhouse Gases

DeBriefed 27 February 2026: Trump’s fossil-fuel talk | Modi-Lula rare-earth pact | Is there a UK ‘greenlash’?

Published

12 hours ago

February 27, 2026

Alice Rush

Welcome to Carbon Brief’s DeBriefed.
An essential guide to the week’s key developments relating to climate change.

This week

Absolute State of the Union

‘DRILL, BABY’: US president Donald Trump “doubled down on his ‘drill, baby, drill’ agenda” in his State of the Union (SOTU) address, said the Los Angeles Times. He “tout[ed] his support of the fossil-fuel industry and renew[ed] his focus on electricity affordability”, reported the Financial Times. Trump also attacked the “green new scam”, noted Carbon Brief’s SOTU tracker.

COAL REPRIEVE: Earlier in the week, the Trump administration had watered down limits on mercury pollution from coal-fired power plants, reported the Financial Times. It remains “unclear” if this will be enough to prevent the decline of coal power, said Bloomberg, in the face of lower-cost gas and renewables. Reuters noted that US coal plants are “ageing”.

OIL STAY: The US Supreme Court agreed to hear arguments brought by the oil industry in a “major lawsuit”, reported the New York Times. The newspaper said the firms are attempting to head off dozens of other lawsuits at state level, relating to their role in global warming.

SHIP-SHILLING: The Trump administration is working to “kill” a global carbon levy on shipping “permanently”, reported Politico, after succeeding in delaying the measure late last year. The Guardian said US “bullying” could be “paying off”, after Panama signalled it was reversing its support for the levy in a proposal submitted to the UN shipping body.

Around the world

RARE EARTHS: The governments of Brazil and India signed a deal on rare earths, said the Times of India, as well as agreeing to collaborate on renewable energy.
HEAT ROLLBACK: German homes will be allowed to continue installing gas and oil heating, under watered-down government plans covered by Clean Energy Wire.
BRAZIL FLOODS: At least 53 people died in floods in the state of Minas Gerais, after some areas saw 170mm of rain in a few hours, reported CNN Brasil.
ITALY’S ATTACK: Italy is calling for the EU to “suspend” its emissions trading system (ETS) ahead of a review later this year, said Politico.
COOKSTOVE CREDITS: The first-ever carbon credits under the Paris Agreement have been issued to a cookstove project in Myanmar, said Climate Home News.
SAUDI SOLAR: Turkey has signed a “major” solar deal that will see Saudi firm ACWA building 2 gigawatts in the country, according to Agence France-Presse.

$467 billion

The profits made by five major oil firms since prices spiked following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine four years ago, according to a report by Global Witness covered by BusinessGreen.

Latest climate research

Claims about the “fingerprint” of human-caused climate change, made in a recent US Department of Energy report, are “factually incorrect” | AGU Advances
Large lakes in the Congo Basin are releasing carbon dioxide into the atmosphere from “immense ancient stores” | Nature Geoscience
Shared Socioeconomic Pathways – scenarios used regularly in climate modelling – underrepresent “narratives explicitly centring on democratic principles such as participation, accountability and justice” | npj Climate Action

(For more, see Carbon Brief’s in-depth daily summaries of the top climate news stories on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.)

Captured

The constituency of Richard Tice MP, the climate-sceptic deputy leader of Reform UK, is the second-largest recipient of flood defence spending in England, according to new Carbon Brief analysis. Overall, the funding is disproportionately targeted at coastal and urban areas, many of which have Conservative or Liberal Democrat MPs.

Spotlight

Is there really a UK ‘greenlash’?

This week, after a historic Green Party byelection win, Carbon Brief looks at whether there really is a “greenlash” against climate policy in the UK.

Over the past year, the UK’s political consensus on climate change has been shattered.

Yet despite a sharp turn against climate action among right-wing politicians and right-leaning media outlets, UK public support for climate action remains strong.

Prof Federica Genovese, who studies climate politics at the University of Oxford, told Carbon Brief:

“The current ‘war’ on green policy is mostly driven by media and political elites, not by the public.”

Indeed, there is still a greater than two-to-one majority among the UK public in favour of the country’s legally binding target to reach net-zero emissions by 2050, as shown below.

Steve Akehurst, director of public-opinion research initiative Persuasion UK, also noted the growing divide between the public and “elites”. He told Carbon Brief:

“The biggest movement is, without doubt, in media and elite opinion. There is a bit more polarisation and opposition [to climate action] among voters, but it’s typically no more than 20-25% and mostly confined within core Reform voters.”

Conservative gear shift

For decades, the UK had enjoyed strong, cross-party political support for climate action.

Lord Deben, the Conservative peer and former chair of the Climate Change Committee, told Carbon Brief that the UK’s landmark 2008 Climate Change Act had been born of this cross-party consensus, saying “all parties supported it”.

Since their landslide loss at the 2024 election, however, the Conservatives have turned against the UK’s target of net-zero emissions by 2050, which they legislated for in 2019.

Curiously, while opposition to net-zero has surged among Conservative MPs, there is majority support for the target among those that plan to vote for the party, as shown below.

Dr Adam Corner, advisor to the Climate Barometer initiative that tracks public opinion on climate change, told Carbon Brief that those who currently plan to vote Reform are the only segment who “tend to be more opposed to net-zero goals”. He said:

“Despite the rise in hostile media coverage and the collapse of the political consensus, we find that public support for the net-zero by 2050 target is plateauing – not plummeting.”

Reform, which rejects the scientific evidence on global warming and campaigns against net-zero, has been leading the polls for a year. (However, it was comfortably beaten by the Greens in yesterday’s Gorton and Denton byelection.)

Corner acknowledged that “some of the anti-net zero noise…[is] showing up in our data”, adding:

“We see rising concerns about the near-term costs of policies and an uptick in people [falsely] attributing high energy bills to climate initiatives.”

But Akehurst said that, rather than a big fall in public support, there had been a drop in the “salience” of climate action:

“So many other issues [are] competing for their attention.”

UK newspapers published more editorials opposing climate action than supporting it for the first time on record in 2025, according to Carbon Brief analysis.

Global ‘greenlash’?

All of this sits against a challenging global backdrop, in which US president Donald Trump has been repeating climate-sceptic talking points and rolling back related policy.

At the same time, prominent figures have been calling for a change in climate strategy, sold variously as a “reset”, a “pivot”, as “realism”, or as “pragmatism”.

Genovese said that “far-right leaders have succeeded in the past 10 years in capturing net-zero as a poster child of things they are ‘fighting against’”.

She added that “much of this is fodder for conservative media and this whole ecosystem is essentially driving what we call the ‘greenlash’”.

Corner said the “disconnect” between elite views and the wider public “can create problems” – for example, “MPs consistently underestimate support for renewables”. He added:

“There is clearly a risk that the public starts to disengage too, if not enough positive voices are countering the negative ones.”

Watch, read, listen

TRUMP’S ‘PETROSTATE’: The US is becoming a “petrostate” that will be “sicker and poorer”, wrote Financial Times associate editor Rana Forohaar.

RHETORIC VS REALITY: Despite a “political mood [that] has darkened”, there is “more green stuff being installed than ever”, said New York Times columnist David Wallace-Wells.
CHINA’S ‘REVOLUTION’: The BBC’s Climate Question podcast reported from China on the “green energy revolution” taking place in the country.

Coming up

2-6 March: UN Food and Agriculture Organization regional conference for Latin America and Caribbean, Brasília
3 March: UK spring statement
4-11 March: China’s “two sessions”
5 March: Nepal elections

Pick of the jobs

The Guardian, senior reporter, climate justice | Salary: $123,000-$135,000. Location: New York or Washington DC
China-Global South Project, non-resident fellow, climate change | Salary: Up to $1,000 a month. Location: Remote
University of East Anglia, PhD in mobilising community-based climate action through co-designed sports and wellbeing interventions | Salary: Stipend (unknown amount). Location: Norwich, UK
TABLE and the University of São Paulo, Brazil, postdoctoral researcher in food system narratives | Salary: Unknown. Location: Pirassununga, Brazil

DeBriefed is edited by Daisy Dunne. Please send any tips or feedback to debriefed@carbonbrief.org.

This is an online version of Carbon Brief’s weekly DeBriefed email newsletter. Subscribe for free here.

The post DeBriefed 27 February 2026: Trump’s fossil-fuel talk | Modi-Lula rare-earth pact | Is there a UK ‘greenlash’? appeared first on Carbon Brief.

DeBriefed 27 February 2026: Trump’s fossil-fuel talk | Modi-Lula rare-earth pact | Is there a UK ‘greenlash’?

Greenhouse Gases

Analysis: Constituency of Reform’s climate-sceptic Richard Tice gets £55m flood funding

Published

15 hours ago

February 27, 2026

Alice Rush

The Lincolnshire constituency held by Richard Tice, the climate-sceptic deputy leader of the hard-right Reform party, has been pledged at least £55m in government funding for flood defences since 2024.

This investment in Boston and Skegness is the second-largest sum for a single constituency from a £1.4bn flood-defence fund for England, Carbon Brief analysis shows.

Flooding is becoming more likely and more extreme in the UK due to climate change.

Yet, for years, governments have failed to spend enough on flood defences to protect people, properties and infrastructure.

The £1.4bn fund is part of the current Labour government’s wider pledge to invest a “record” £7.9bn over a decade on protecting hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses from flooding.

As MP for one of England’s most flood-prone regions, Tice has called for more investment in flood defences, stating that “we cannot afford to ‘surrender the fens’ to the sea”.

He is also one of Reform’s most vocal opponents of climate action and what he calls “net stupid zero”. He denies the scientific consensus on climate change and has claimed, falsely and without evidence, that scientists are “lying”.

Flood defences

Last year, the government said it would invest £2.65bn on flood and coastal erosion risk management (FCERM) schemes in England between April 2024 and March 2026.

This money was intended to protect 66,500 properties from flooding. It is part of a decade-long Labour government plan to spend more than £7.9bn on flood defences.

There has been a consistent shortfall in maintaining England’s flood defences, with the Environment Agency expecting to protect fewer properties by 2027 than it had initially planned.

The Climate Change Committee (CCC) has attributed this to rising costs, backlogs from previous governments and a lack of capacity. It also points to the strain from “more frequent and severe” weather events, such as storms in recent years that have been amplified by climate change.

However, the CCC also said last year that, if the 2024-26 spending programme is delivered, it would be “slightly closer to the track” of the Environment Agency targets out to 2027.

The government has released constituency-level data on which schemes in England it plans to fund, covering £1.4bn of the 2024-26 investment. The other half of the FCERM spending covers additional measures, from repairing existing defences to advising local authorities.

The map below shows the distribution of spending on FCERM schemes in England over the past two years, highlighting the constituency of Richard Tice.

Map of England showing that Richard Tice's Boston and Skegness constituency is set to receive at least £55m for flood defences between 2024 and 2026 — Flood-defence spending on new and replacement schemes in England in 2024-25 and 2025-26. The government notes that, as Environment Agency accounts have not been finalised and approved, the investment data is “provisional and subject to change”. Some schemes cover multiple constituencies and are not included on the map. Source: Environment Agency FCERM data.

By far the largest sum of money – £85.6m in total – has been committed to a tidal barrier and various other defences in the Somerset constituency of Bridgwater, the seat of Conservative MP Ashley Fox.

Over the first months of 2026, the south-west region has faced significant flooding and Fox has called for more support from the government, citing “climate patterns shifting and rainfall intensifying”.

He has also backed his party’s position that “the 2050 net-zero target is impossible” and called for more fossil-fuel extraction in the North Sea.

Tice’s east-coast constituency of Boston and Skegness, which is highly vulnerable to flooding from both rivers and the sea, is set to receive £55m. Among the supported projects are beach defences from Saltfleet to Gibraltar Point and upgrades to pumping stations.

Overall, Boston and Skegness has the second-largest portion of flood-defence funding, as the chart below shows. Constituencies with Conservative and Liberal Democrat MPs occupied the other top positions.

Chart showing that Conservative, Reform and Liberal Democrat constituencies are the top recipients of flood defence spending — Top 10 English constituencies by FCERM funding in 2024-25 and 2025-26. Source: Environment Agency FCERM data.

Overall, despite Labour MPs occupying 347 out of England’s 543 constituencies – nearly two-thirds of the total – more than half of the flood-defence funding was distributed to constituencies with non-Labour MPs. This reflects the flood risk in coastal and rural areas that are not traditional Labour strongholds.

Reform funding

While Reform has just eight MPs, representing 1% of the population, its constituencies have been assigned 4% of the flood-defence funding for England.

Nearly all of this money was for Tice’s constituency, although party leader Nigel Farage’s coastal Clacton seat in Kent received £2m.

Reform UK is committed to “scrapping net-zero” and its leadership has expressed firmly climate-sceptic views.

Much has been made of the disconnect between the party’s climate policies and the threat climate change poses to its voters. Various analyses have shown the flood risk in Reform-dominated areas, particularly Lincolnshire.

Tice has rejected climate science, advocated for fossil-fuel production and criticised Environment Agency flood-defence activities. Yet, he has also called for more investment in flood defences, stating that “we cannot afford to ‘surrender the fens’ to the sea”.

This may reflect Tice’s broader approach to climate change. In a 2024 interview with LBC, he said:

“Where you’ve got concerns about sea level defences and sea level rise, guess what? A bit of steel, a bit of cement, some aggregate…and you build some concrete sea level defences. That’s how you deal with rising sea levels.”

While climate adaptation is viewed as vital in a warming world, there are limits on how much societies can adapt and adaptation costs will continue to increase as emissions rise.

The post Analysis: Constituency of Reform’s climate-sceptic Richard Tice gets £55m flood funding appeared first on Carbon Brief.

Analysis: Constituency of Reform’s climate-sceptic Richard Tice gets £55m flood funding

Greenhouse Gases

Cropped 25 February 2026: Food inflation strikes | El Niño looms | Biodiversity talks stagnate

Published

2 days ago

February 25, 2026

Alice Rush

We handpick and explain the most important stories at the intersection of climate, land, food and nature over the past fortnight.

This is an online version of Carbon Brief’s fortnightly Cropped email newsletter.
Subscribe for free here.

Key developments

Food inflation on the rise

DELUGE STRIKES FOOD: Extreme rainfall and flooding across the Mediterranean and north Africa has “battered the winter growing regions that feed Europe…threatening food price rises”, reported the Financial Times. Western France has “endured more than 36 days of continuous rain”, while farmers’ associations in Spain’s Andalusia estimate that “20% of all production has been lost”, it added. Policy expert David Barmes told the paper that the “latest storms were part of a wider pattern of climate shocks feeding into food price inflation”.

Sign up to Carbon Brief’s free “Cropped” email newsletter. A fortnightly digest of food, land and nature news and views. Sent to your inbox every other Wednesday.

NO BEEF: The UK’s beef farmers, meanwhile, “face a double blow” from climate change as “relentless rain forces them to keep cows indoors”, while last summer’s drought hit hay supplies, said another Financial Times article. At the same time, indoor growers in south England described a 60% increase in electricity standing charges as a “ticking timebomb” that could “force them to raise their prices or stop production, which will further fuel food price inflation”, wrote the Guardian.

‘TINDERBOX’ AND TARIFFS: A study, covered by the Guardian, warned that major extreme weather and other “shocks” could “spark social unrest and even food riots in the UK”. Experts cited “chronic” vulnerabilities, including climate change, low incomes, poor farming policy and “fragile” supply chains that have made the UK’s food system a “tinderbox”. A New York Times explainer noted that while trade could once guard against food supply shocks, barriers such as tariffs and export controls – which are being “increasingly” used by politicians – “can shut off that safety valve”.

El Niño looms

NEW ENSO INDEX: Researchers have developed a new index for calculating El Niño, the large-scale climate pattern that influences global weather and causes “billions in damages by bringing floods to some regions and drought to others”, reported CNN. It added that climate change is making it more difficult for scientists to observe El Niño patterns by warming up the entire ocean. The outlet said that with the new metric, “scientists can now see it earlier and our long-range weather forecasts will be improved for it.”

WARMING WARNING: Meanwhile, the US Climate Prediction Center announced that there is a 60% chance of the current La Niña conditions shifting towards a neutral state over the next few months, with an El Niño likely to follow in late spring, according to Reuters. The Vibes, a Malaysian news outlet, quoted a climate scientist saying: “If the El Niño does materialise, it could possibly push 2026 or 2027 as the warmest year on record, replacing 2024.”

CROP IMPACTS: Reuters noted that neutral conditions lead to “more stable weather and potentially better crop yields”. However, the newswire added, an El Niño state would mean “worsening drought conditions and issues for the next growing season” to Australia. El Niño also “typically brings a poor south-west monsoon to India, including droughts”, reported the Hindu’s Business Line. A 2024 guest post for Carbon Brief explained that El Niño is linked to crop failure in south-eastern Africa and south-east Asia.

News and views

DAM-AG-ES: Several South Korean farmers filed a lawsuit against the country’s state-owned utility company, “seek[ing] financial compensation for climate-related agricultural damages”, reported United Press International. Meanwhile, a national climate change assessment for the Philippines found that the country “lost up to $219bn in agricultural damages from typhoons, floods and droughts” over 2000-10, according to Eco-Business.
SCORCHED GRASS: South Africa’s Western Cape province is experiencing “one of the worst droughts in living memory”, which is “scorching grass and killing livestock”, said Reuters. The newswire wrote: “In 2015, a drought almost dried up the taps in the city; farmers say this one has been even more brutal than a decade ago.”
NOUVELLE VEG: New guidelines published under France’s national food, nutrition and climate strategy “urged” citizens to “limit” their meat consumption, reported Euronews. The delayed strategy comes a month after the US government “upended decades of recommendations by touting consumption of red meat and full-fat dairy”, it noted.
COURTING DISASTER: India’s top green court accepted the findings of a committee that “found no flaws” in greenlighting the Great Nicobar project that “will lead to the felling of a million trees” and translocating corals, reported Mongabay. The court found “no good ground to interfere”, despite “threats to a globally unique biodiversity hotspot” and Indigenous tribes at risk of displacement by the project, wrote Frontline.
FISH FALLING: A new study found that fish biomass is “falling by 7.2% from as little as 0.1C of warming per decade”, noted the Guardian. While experts also pointed to the role of overfishing in marine life loss, marine ecologist and study lead author Dr Shahar Chaikin told the outlet: “Our research proves exactly what that biological cost [of warming] looks like underwater.”
TOO HOT FOR COFFEE: According to new analysis by Climate Central, countries where coffee beans are grown “are becoming too hot to cultivate them”, reported the Guardian. The world’s top five coffee-growing countries faced “57 additional days of coffee-harming heat” annually because of climate change, it added.

Spotlight

Nature talks inch forward

This week, Carbon Brief covers the latest round of negotiations under the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), which occurred in Rome over 16-19 February.

The penultimate set of biodiversity negotiations before October’s Conference of the Parties ended in Rome last week, leaving plenty of unfinished business.

The CBD’s subsidiary body on implementation (SBI) met in the Italian capital for four days to discuss a range of issues, including biodiversity finance and reviewing progress towards the nature targets agreed under the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF).

However, many of the major sticking points – particularly around finance – will have to wait until later this summer, leaving some observers worried about the capacity for delegates to get through a packed agenda at COP17.

The SBI, along with the subsidiary body on scientific, technical and technological advice (SBSTTA) will both meet in Nairobi, Kenya, later this summer for a final round of talks before COP17 kicks off in Yerevan, Armenia, on 19 October.

Money talks

Finance for nature has long been a sticking point at negotiations under the CBD.

Discussions on a new fund for biodiversity derailed biodiversity talks in Cali, Colombia, in autumn 2024, requiring resumed talks a few months later.

Despite this, finance was barely on the agenda at the SBI meetings in Rome. Delegates discussed three studies on the relationship between debt sustainability and implementation of nature plans, but the more substantive talks are set to take place at the next SBI meeting in Nairobi.

Several parties “highlighted concerns with the imbalance of work” on finance between these SBI talks and the next ones, reported Earth Negotiations Bulletin (ENB).

Lim Li Ching, senior researcher at Third World Network, noted that tensions around finance permeated every aspect of the talks. She told Carbon Brief:

“If you’re talking about the gender plan of action – if there’s little or no financial resources provided to actually put it into practice and implement it, then it’s [just] paper, right? Same with the reporting requirements and obligations.”

Monitoring and reporting

Closely linked to the issue of finance is the obligations of parties to report on their progress towards the goals and targets of the GBF.

Parties do so through the submission of national reports.

Several parties at the talks pointed to a lack of timely funding for driving delays in their reporting, according to ENB.

A note released by the CBD Secretariat in December said that no parties had submitted their national reports yet; by the time of the SBI meetings, only the EU had. It further noted that just 58 parties had submitted their national biodiversity plans, which were initially meant to be published by COP16, in October 2024.

Linda Krueger, director of biodiversity and infrastructure policy at the environmental not-for-profit Nature Conservancy, told Carbon Brief that despite the sparse submissions, parties are “very focused on the national report preparation”. She added:

“Everybody wants to be able to show that we’re on the path and that there still is a pathway to getting to 2030 that’s positive and largely in the right direction.”

Watch, read, listen

NET LOSS: Nigeria’s marine life is being “threatened” by “ghost gear” – nets and other fishing equipment discarded in the ocean – said Dialogue Earth.

COMEBACK CAUSALITY: A Vox long-read looked at whether Costa Rica’s “payments for ecosystem services” programme helped the country turn a corner on deforestation.

HOMEGROWN GOALS: A Straits Times podcast discussed whether import-dependent Singapore can afford to shelve its goal to produce 30% of its food locally by 2030.

‘RUSTING’ RIVERS: The Financial Times took a closer look at a “strange new force blighting the [Arctic] landscape”: rivers turning rust-orange due to global warming.

New science

Lakes in the Congo Basin’s peatlands are releasing carbon that is thousands of years old | Nature Geoscience
Natural non-forest ecosystems – such as grasslands and marshlands – were converted for agriculture at four times the rate of land with tree cover between 2005 and 2020 | Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Around one-quarter of global tree-cover loss over 2001-22 was driven by cropland expansion, pastures and forest plantations for commodity production | Nature Food