Turkey published its plan for the November climate summit, as a report found the world has built less than half the clean power it promised for 2030

The rest of the day

24 more stories on this beat.

Each with its own sources. None of these is a link to the story above.

1. 02

   Texas freezes data-centre permits, then cuts their fees

   Greg Abbott, the governor of Texas, halted every state-issued permit for new data centres on Monday. [5] The freeze holds until an audit of their power use, water use and tax breaks is finished. [5] More than 470 gigawatts of data centres and other large users are queued to plug into the Texas grid, over five times the state's peak demand. [5] The state's own utility regulator, meanwhile, has adopted softer connection rules than it proposed in March, dropping a joining fee of $50,000 per megawatt and halving the deposit large users must post. [6]

   Why it matters — One arm of the state government is holding new buildings back and another has just made it cheaper for them to connect. Power bills and water are the reason for the first, and the state's appetite for investment is the reason for the second.

2. 03

   EU proposes an energy label for data centres

   The European Commission, the European Union's executive arm, proposed rules on Monday making data centres in Europe disclose how efficiently they use energy and water. [7] Any site drawing 500 kilowatts or more would be rated under an EU labelling scheme. [7] It would also have to report how its water use relates to water stress nearby, and whether it can pass waste heat to other buildings. [7] The rules set no limit on energy or water use, and the EU wants to triple its data-centre capacity within seven years. [7]

   Why it matters — Europe is asking each building to run well while planning three times as many of them. A resident would learn how efficient the data centre down the road is, and not how much of their water or electricity it takes.

3. 04

   Typhoon Dujuan kills two in Japan

   Landslides caused by Typhoon Dujuan's rain killed two people in Japan on Tuesday and left four missing, the public broadcaster NHK said, and cut electricity to nearly 50,000 homes. [8] The storm never made landfall but ran up the Pacific coast past Tokyo, and rainfall records fell in several cities. [9] Evacuation warnings went out to almost two million people and about 400 flights were cancelled on Monday. [9] It is the 25th typhoon of Japan's season and it arrived during Silver Week, a run of public holidays. [9]

   Why it matters — A storm that never came ashore still killed two people, darkened 50,000 households and grounded 400 flights. Japan had warned on Monday that Dujuan could break rainfall records, and it did. [9]

4. 05

   Warming linked to the Nepal glacier disaster

   Human-caused warming very likely helped trigger the glacier collapse that flooded parts of Nepal and Tibet in late August, the World Weather Attribution group said on Thursday. [10] Fast-rising Himalayan temperatures have thinned glaciers and melted the ice and permafrost inside the mountains' bedrock. [10] A 2015 earthquake in Nepal may also have primed the slope. [11] Nepal's disaster authority says at least 1,399 people died and about 5,200 are still missing, and only 105 bodies have been identified. [12]

   Why it matters — Nepal wants help from the United Nations fund for climate damage, and a formal attribution report is the kind of evidence such a request is built on. [11]

5. 06

   US puts $99m into geothermal drilling

   The US Department of Energy said on Monday it had picked 21 projects to share up to $99 million for geothermal power. [13] Geothermal draws heat from deep rock and runs around the clock, not only when the sun shines. [13] Five projects will field-test enhanced geothermal systems, a method that cracks hot dry rock and pumps water through it to pick up the heat. [13] The other 16 will drill to find promising sites. [13] Fervo Energy was picked for two, including a demonstration in Idaho. [13]

   Why it matters — Finding the hot rock and getting a hole down to it is the expensive half of geothermal, and this money goes at that half rather than at power stations.

6. 07

   New York approves a 90-mile power line

   The New York Public Service Commission, the state's utility regulator, approved a 90-mile transmission line on Thursday to increase power flows between Long Island and the rest of the state, including electricity from offshore wind farms. [14] The project will cost $3.26 billion and is being built by New York Transco and the New York Power Authority, aiming to deliver power by 2030. [14] Opponents had argued the line was not needed. [14]

   Why it matters — Wires decide whether an offshore wind farm reaches a city. A report published this week said world grid spending has to nearly double, to about $1 trillion a year, because grids have not kept pace with what is being built. [2]

7. 08

   California declares an El Nino emergency

   Gavin Newsom, California's governor, declared a state of emergency on Monday as a strengthening El Nino raises the risk of damaging storms, widespread flooding and mudslides across the state this autumn and winter. [15] El Nino is a periodic warming of the eastern Pacific that shifts where storms travel. Newsom told state agencies to assess infrastructure including drainage systems, and to speed up work meant to protect highways and bridges from flooding and coastal erosion. [15]

   Why it matters — The declaration came ahead of the storm season rather than after a disaster, which is what lets a state spend on drainage and bridge works now. [15]

8. 09

   Diesel prices set a record

   Global diesel prices hit record highs this week and further rises are possible, the International Energy Agency said on Monday. [16] Wars in the Middle East and Ukraine have damaged refineries, and the ones still running are close to flat out. [16] US refineries operated at their highest rate in eight years in late August. [16] Middle East diesel exports halved between March and August against a year earlier, to about 800,000 barrels a day, the shipping data firm Kpler says. [16] That region supplied nearly 41% of Europe's diesel imports in 2025. [16]

   Mar-Aug 20251,600,000 barrels a day

   Mar-Aug 2026800,000 barrels a day

   Why it matters — Diesel moves lorries, trains, tractors and ships, so its price travels into the cost of nearly everything that gets carried. Europe has lost most of the supplier that covered two fifths of its imports.

9. 10

   Saudi Arabia pushes oil back through the Gulf

   Saudi Arabia is loading crude through the Strait of Hormuz again, after drone attacks shut the pipeline it had been using to reach the Red Sea instead. [17][18] Seven very large crude carriers appeared near its Ras Tanura port on Sunday in satellite images seen by Reuters. [17] JP Morgan analysts said Saudi oil crossing the strait averaged 2.9 million barrels a day over six days, against 700,000 in August. [17] Traders say Aramco has sold about 60 million barrels for transfer at the Omani port of Sohar. [37]

   Why it matters — Hormuz is the route this war was supposed to have closed, and Saudi Arabia is using it because the way around it is broken. Houthi forces separately struck an airbase in southern Saudi Arabia, and Gulf stock markets fell. [38]

10. 11

    Two oil prices, $25 apart

    Cargoes of oil for delivery within weeks have been selling far above the futures price that gets quoted in headlines. [19] North Sea Forties crude reached $136.75 a barrel on one day last week, close to the record $147.37 set in April, while Brent futures were nearer $110. [19] Brent then dropped to about $104.59 once Saudi Arabia offered extra cargoes through Oman [20], having already fallen the day before on an unexpected build in US crude stocks. [36] Futures are for delivery a month or more ahead, and the cargoes are for now. [19]

    123

    $100 a barrel$125 a barrel$150 a barrel

    1. 1Brent futures, about $110$110 a barrel
    2. 2North Sea Forties cargo, $136.75$136.75 a barrel
    3. 3April record, $147.37$147.37 a barrel

    Why it matters — A refinery buying a cargo next week pays the higher number and the lower one is what gets reported. That distance is what a supply scare looks like before it reaches a fuel pump.

11. 12

    Europe enters winter with less gas stored

    European gas storage is 69% full, against an 85% average for this point in the year over the past five years, the industry body Gas Infrastructure Europe says. [21] Germany and the Netherlands hold 35% of the bloc's storage between them and are the furthest behind. [21] Companies held off buying because they expected the Iran war to end quickly and prices to drop, analysts said. [21] Governments did not enforce national storage targets. [21]

    Now69% full

    Five-year average85% full

    Why it matters — Storage is the cushion that stopped European bills spiking in earlier winters, and it is a sixth thinner than usual going in. Germany's chancellor, Friedrich Merz, is weighing costly measures to bring fuel prices down. [21]

12. 13

    JP Morgan says it cannot model the oil endgame

    JP Morgan, one of the world's biggest banks, said on Thursday it has no baseline view for oil markets for the first time since the US-Israeli war on Iran began. [22] We simply don't know how to model the endgame, its analysts wrote. [22] The bank said it had assumed at the start of the conflict that there were economic lines the US administration would not cross; six months in, many have been crossed with no exit in view. [22] Oil has been trading above $100 a barrel. [22]

    Why it matters — When the people paid to forecast a price say they cannot, everyone downstream is guessing too: refiners buying crude, airlines buying jet fuel, and governments deciding whether to fill a gas store.

13. 14

    Nigeria's petrol price becomes an election issue

    Petrol in Lagos and Abuja has risen to about 1,400 naira ($1.05) a litre this month, from roughly 1,200 a month earlier. [23] Some stations in northern Nigeria charge 1,500, and diesel sells above 2,000 naira. [23] The rise followed a decision by the Dangote refinery, the country's largest, to lift its wholesale price to 1,350 naira a litre. [23] President Bola Tinubu removed the petrol subsidy and says there is no going back; the opposition has made fuel a test of his record before the election on 16 January 2027. [23]

    Why it matters — A country that is Africa's biggest oil producer now pays world prices at its own pumps, because the subsidy that broke that link is gone. [23] An Abuja truck driver, Caleb Ojobo, told Reuters that fuel costs leave very little for his family. [23]

14. 15

    More Americans worry about AI's power use

    About 53% of Americans are extremely or very concerned about artificial intelligence's environmental effects, up from 41% a year ago, in a poll by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research and the University of Chicago's Energy Policy Institute. [24] Democrats drove most of the rise, but the survey also found wider worry about what data centres do to the places they are built in. [24] Virginia and Texas have the most data centres in operation, and California, Ohio and New York are among the next biggest. [24]

    202541%

    202653%

    Why it matters — Governors who competed for these buildings are now writing rules for them, and this is the pressure behind that turn. Texas froze its own permits this week. [5]

15. 16

    Investors cool on data-centre share sales

    SB Energy, a subsidiary of the Japanese group SoftBank, has delayed the share sale it had planned for this month. [25] It has proposed the largest data-centre project in the world, in Ohio. [25] Bankers struggled to find enough buyers at the valuation of $50 billion or more the company wanted, four people familiar with the marketing said. [25] Holtec, a nuclear-industry supplier that wants to sell power to AI firms, paused its own share sale indefinitely last week. [25]

    Why it matters — The data centres and the power plants beside them are paid for with money raised on public markets, and two of this autumn's biggest attempts to raise it have now stalled.

16. 17

    How much electricity AI will actually want

    Electricity used by data centres built for artificial intelligence could rise from about 118 terawatt-hours in 2024 to between 239 and 295 by 2030. [26] That is roughly 1% of world electricity demand, according to a study in the journal Nature Communications Sustainability. [26] More than 90% of the new computing capacity is going to North America, western Europe and the Asia-Pacific. [26] Places such as Oregon, Ireland and Iowa face far more strain because the load is concentrated there, while a big system like the Texas grid absorbs it more easily. [26]

    2024118 TWh

    2030, low239 TWh

    2030, high295 TWh

    Why it matters — One per cent of the world's electricity sounds small until you see where it lands. The buildings cluster, so the strain is local even when the share is not. [26]

17. 18

    Alberta becomes the next data-centre province

    Capital Power, a Canadian electricity generator, says Meta's decision to build in Alberta will bring other large cloud companies to the province. [27] Canada has only a handful of very large data centres running, but more than 100 have been proposed in Alberta. [27] It has cheap natural gas, spare land and a cold climate that makes cooling computers cheaper. [27] The telecoms firm BCE said last week it would quadruple its planned Saskatchewan data centre to a 1.2-gigawatt hub. [27]

    Why it matters — Alberta lets builders bring their own generation: Meta is putting up a gas-fired power station with Pembina Pipeline to run its first Canadian site. [27] That is how a province gets the buildings without a fight over everyone else's electricity bill.

18. 19

    A warning system for the Atlantic's currents

    Scientists have started an 81 million pound programme to build an early-warning system for the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation. [28] That is the system of ocean currents that carries warm water north and keeps European winters mild. [28] If it shut down, Europe would face far colder winters and long droughts, and farming would become close to impossible. [28] Whether, when and how fast that might happen are all unknown. [28] In July the research ship Sir David Attenborough watched about 18 million tonnes of ice break off a Greenland glacier. [28]

    Why it matters — Because the current is barely measured, the risk stays distant in the minds of the people who set policy. We might be passing these tipping points without realising, said Paul Holland of the British Antarctic Survey. [28]

19. 20

    There is less dust in the air

    Dust in the atmosphere has fallen by about 10% worldwide over the two decades to 2023, according to work led by Ashok Gupta at the University of California, Los Angeles. [29] The team combined readings from four satellites collected between 2003 and 2023 with three atmospheric aerosol databases, then checked them against ground stations, and every source agreed. [29] Dust is hard to separate from smoke and other pollution in satellite images, which is why it took several methods to be sure. [29]

    Why it matters — Less dust is better for people's lungs and worse for the temperature, because dust in the air throws some sunlight back to space. [29]

20. 21

    The EU asks China to hold back hybrid cars

    The European Union has asked China to limit exports of petrol-electric hybrid cars to Europe, the Financial Times reported, to head off a trade fight. [30] An EU official was quoted saying the bloc would impose limits itself if China would not. [30] The EU has also asked China to limit chemicals exports and to buy more European goods. [30] Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission's president, said the goods trade deficit with China hit 360.6 billion euros last year and widened 9% in the first half of this one. [30]

    Why it matters — Cheap Chinese hybrids and electric cars would lower the price of getting off petrol in Europe, and would also compete with European car factories. The EU says it will use every tool it has to close the gap. [35]

21. 22

    Europe's split power market slows its AI plans

    Large energy-intensive industrial users in the European Union paid about $107 a megawatt-hour for electricity in 2025, more than twice the US level and roughly 57% above China's. [31] Those are International Energy Agency estimates quoted in a Reuters commentary. [31] The piece argues Europe's network cannot move power to where new industry wants it, because links between countries are weak, fees differ sharply and permits are slow. [31] Six mostly US cloud companies are expected to spend more than $1.3 trillion by 2027. [31]

    Why it matters — This is one writer's argument, not a finding, but the price gap underneath it is the IEA's own estimate. Electricity is the one input a European factory cannot shop for abroad. [31]

22. 23

    Governments push both ways on fuel

    More than 30 governments have brought in policies to move away from fossil fuels or use energy more efficiently since the war on Iran began in February, the Associated Press reported. [32] Over the same months world greenhouse gas emissions rose slightly and investment in clean energy fell against a year earlier. [32] The United Kingdom has seen a surge in solar installations and is also weighing more natural gas production. [32] We are seeing an old and a new world interact in contradiction with each other, said Pauline Heinrichs of King's College London. [32]

    Why it matters — Expensive oil pushes a government toward clean power and toward finding more oil at the same time, and this year both moves came from the same capitals. [32]

23. 24

    A wet fortnight ahead across the US

    Rounds of heavy rain are forecast across several parts of the United States over a week to ten days, the Washington Post's weather desk reported on 18 September. [33] A flash flood in New Mexico killed three people the Wednesday before, and by that Friday flood watches covered parts of ten states. [33] Record-warm water in the Pacific has loaded the atmosphere with moisture, and more tropical moisture was expected to reach the Four Corners region as a storm pushed into western Mexico. [33]

    Why it matters — Warmer water puts more moisture into the air, so familiar weather patterns drop more rain than they used to. New Mexico's three deaths came out of a single afternoon of it. [33]

24. 25

    Data centres start buying their own radar

    Climavision, a company that sells weather data to utilities, power producers and government agencies, opened its network of 31 radars across 15 states to data centres from 10 September. [34] Its radars cover gaps in the US government's public network, whose beams can sit above 10,000 feet and miss the weather below that, the company's chief executive Chris Goode said. [34] Data centres are increasingly asked to manage their own generation, storage and demand response, and sharper local forecasts help them avoid being switched off when the grid is tight. [34]

    Why it matters — A building that buys its own radar is behaving like a power company rather than a customer, which is exactly what grid operators have been asking very large users to do. [34]