Climate, in brief

Diesel cost $6.52 a gallon in the US on Wednesday, 76% more than a year earlier, according to the motoring group AAA. [4]

Diesel fuels vehicles and backup generators. [6] Its price squeezes trucking, farming and factories. [7] In the end it reaches groceries too, says Joseph Brusuelas, chief economist at the firm RSM. [6]

Supplies are short because the Iran war has choked the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow sea lane out of the Gulf. [6] Ukrainian drone attacks on Russian refineries took another 800,000 to 1 million barrels a day of diesel off the market, says S&P Global, an energy data firm. [6]

On Tuesday Donald Trump said he backed stopping diesel exports. [2] Republicans in some of the closest election races had asked for it. [3] Its strongest champion is Chuck Grassley, a senator from the farming state of Iowa. [6]

The US used about 4.1 million barrels of diesel a day this year and sold about 1.5 million a day abroad, according to S&P Global. [6]

Chris Wright, Trump's energy secretary, said on Wednesday that a ban would not work. [4] If refineries cannot export diesel they run out of places to store it, he said, and must process less oil, which pushes up petrol and jet fuel prices. [4]

The consultancy Wood Mackenzie says a ban would fill Gulf Coast storage tanks in just over a month. [5] Refiners would then have to cut the oil they process by more than 2 million barrels a day, about 12%. [5]

Doug Burgum, the US interior secretary, warned that countries which sell fuel to the US could hit back, hurting states such as California that import some of their energy. [3]

The Trump administration denied a report of a 90-day ban on Wednesday. [5] Wright has also called executives at several big refiners to ask whether they would limit exports on their own, three people told Reuters. [5]

The American Petroleum Institute, the oil industry's main US lobby group, and more than 30 business groups urged Trump on Wednesday to reject any limit on fuel exports. [1]

Europe is short of diesel and buys a lot from the US, so a ban would tighten its supply further. [2] The profit European refiners make on diesel hit a record on Wednesday after Trump's comments. [3]

Petrol averaged nearly $4.50 a gallon on Friday. [9] Fears that fuel will keep prices rising pushed US 30-year mortgage rates above 7% by the end of the week. [9]

Why it matters. Wright said the Trump administration would announce new policies in the coming days; the next test is whether they include any limit on exports, and whether Gulf Coast storage tanks start to fill. [4][5]

The US and Iran held three hours of talks through go-betweens on Tuesday, their first in months. [13] Iran then offered to reopen the Strait of Hormuz within seven days. [11] In return the US would lift its naval blockade of Iranian ports, drop sanctions on Iranian oil and agree a ceasefire that includes Lebanon. [11] On Saturday Donald Trump rejected the offer, saying Iran wanted a deal because it was 'losing so badly'. [11]

Why it matters. About a fifth of the world's oil exports went through the strait before the war, and its closure is the main reason fuel is dear in the lead story. [14] Iran's foreign minister, Abbas Araqchi, says the go-betweens have not passed on any US answer, and the Wall Street Journal reported that Trump expects more bombing after the elections. [12]

The Houthis, an armed group that controls much of northern Yemen and is allied to Iran, said they fired dozens of missiles and drones at Saudi targets on Thursday. [14] Saudi Arabia said it shot down six ballistic missiles. [14] It had issued emergency alerts for Mecca, Jeddah and Yanbu, its main oil port on the Red Sea. [14] Saudi Arabia said it stopped another Houthi missile early on Saturday, fired towards the city of Khamis Mushait. [11]

Why it matters. Iran and its allies squeeze Saudi oil exports from two sides: the Houthis at the mouth of the Red Sea, and Iran at Hormuz. [14] Iran's president said the Houthis are responsible for their own actions. [14]

A Ukrainian drone attack on the Moscow area, one of its largest, damaged the refinery at Kapotnya on the city's south-eastern edge and killed at least three people, local officials said. [15] The refinery supplies a large share of Moscow's fuel, including diesel and aviation fuel. [15] It has been hit several times before. [15] On Monday queues formed again at petrol stations, which began rationing fuel. [15]

Why it matters. Attacks on Russian refineries are one reason diesel is short around the world, the problem in the lead story. [6] Trump says Ukraine's strikes are raising US diesel prices, while experts more often blame the Iran war, the Washington Post reports. [15]

Libya's National Oil Corporation said on Saturday it had reopened the main pipeline from Sharara, the country's largest oilfield, to Zawiya on the coast. [16] An armed group and members of the Petroleum Facilities Guard, the force that protects oil sites, had closed a valve on 21 September in a dispute over their status and pay. [16] The five-day shutdown cost 942,376 barrels of oil, worth about $95 million. [16] It also closed one unit at the Zawiya refinery, which supplies fuel inside Libya. [16]

Why it matters. Sharara can pump about 300,000 barrels a day and has stopped many times over protests and political fights. [16] The UN mission in Libya had warned that a long shutdown could threaten the country's fuel and electricity. [16]

Judge P. Kevin Castel of a US federal court in New York ruled on Wednesday that the state's climate superfund law is overridden by the US Clean Air Act and interferes in foreign affairs. [17] The 2024 law would make fossil fuel companies pay $75 billion over 25 years into a fund for projects that protect New York from the effects of warming. [17] The US Justice Department and environment agency brought the case. [17] A different federal judge in New York made a similar ruling last month. [17]

Why it matters. Vermont is the only other state with such a law, and a challenge to it is still in court. [17] Several more states have proposed similar laws, so the rulings reach beyond New York. [17]

Pedro Pizarro, head of Edison International, which owns the utility Southern California Edison, asked California's lawmakers this week to meet in a special session before the year ends. [18] He wants limits on what power companies owe when their equipment starts a wildfire. [18] Southern California Edison's equipment is being investigated for starting the Eaton fire near Altadena in January 2025. [18] The Los Angeles fires that month killed more than two dozen people. [18]

Why it matters. Lawmakers failed to agree a plan last month, and the ratings agency Fitch has cut its outlook on the company. [18] Pizarro says the doubt is adding hundreds of millions of dollars to its borrowing costs, and only Governor Gavin Newsom can call the session. [18]

India now has 300 gigawatts of renewable power plants, 54% of all its capacity, against about 4 gigawatts a decade ago. [19] Its power lines have not kept up: one in four projects between states is more than a year late. [19] Weak lines caused nearly two-thirds of the clean power India had to switch off in the first three months of 2026, 300 gigawatt-hours, the research group Ember says. [19] A solar farm takes 18 to 24 months to build, and lines take longer. [19]

Why it matters. Ember calls this gap the biggest risk to India's goal of 500 gigawatts of clean power by 2030. [19] Batteries could have stored the power for the evening, a researcher told the BBC, but many battery projects fell through when prices jumped. [19]

Solar panels now make about a quarter of Pakistan's electricity in peak months, up from under 1% a decade ago, Jan Rosenow writes in an opinion piece for Yale Environment 360. [20] Homes and businesses bought most of them without a big government subsidy, to escape dear and unreliable grid power. [20] Up to three-quarters of the country's solar may never have been officially recorded. [20] Sales of grid electricity fell 10% in 2023. [20]

Why it matters. The grid's wires and standby power plants still have to be paid for, so when richer customers leave, the cost is spread over fewer people. [20] Poorer households that cannot buy panels can end up paying more, and Nigeria and Zambia show the same signs. [20]

A month after floods swept through parts of Nepal on 26 August, the country's disaster agency says 1,453 bodies have been recovered and 5,644 people are still missing. [21] Many are believed to be trapped in six tunnels dug for hydropower projects. [21] Only 112 bodies have been handed to families; 1,333 are buried for now until DNA tests can name them. [21] Nepal's government puts the cost of rebuilding at $4.77 billion, and about 7,500 homes were damaged or destroyed. [21]

Why it matters. Prime Minister Balendra Shah told the UN General Assembly on Thursday that the floods were a warning to the world about climate risks in the Himalayas. [21] He asked for more international help with the recovery. [21]

Tech companies want geothermal power, made from the heat in deep rock, for data centres in the dry western US, because it runs day and night, Grist reports. [22] Google agreed this month to buy 396 megawatts from Fervo Energy's Cape Station in Utah. [22] Most new geothermal methods pump water into hot rock, and Fervo's first commercial project, in Nevada, lost 30% of the water it injected. [22] Rough sums by Utah FORGE, a government geothermal lab, say 2 gigawatts made this way could use 42 million gallons a day. [22]

Why it matters. That is about half of what Albuquerque, New Mexico's biggest city, uses each day, in a state in a drought that has lasted decades. [22] Data centres already use water to keep their servers cool, so the two demands land on the same scarce supply. [22]

X-energy, a nuclear start-up backed by Amazon, now has up to $2.1 billion of US government money for its first four small reactors, Canary Media reported this week. [23] They are planned for a Dow Chemical plant in Seadrift, Texas. [23] The latest $1 billion was announced last month, after $1.2 billion in 2021, and the company matches each federal dollar. [23] The reactors would give Dow's plant both steam and electricity, cutting about 440,000 tonnes of greenhouse gas a year. [23] The US nuclear regulator is expected to approve construction in early 2027. [23]

Why it matters. X-energy has not updated its 2023 cost estimate of $4.75 billion to $5.75 billion, and Dow will not decide to build before 2028. [23] Its deals with Dow, Amazon and Centrica, a British energy company, add up to as many as 144 of its reactors. [23]

Indian Point, a nuclear plant on the Hudson River north of New York City, closed in 2021 and is being taken apart by its owner, Holtec International. [24] In a close race for the US House, Republican Mike Lawler wants it reopened and took Energy Secretary Chris Wright to the site. [24] His Democratic challenger, Cait Conley, lists stopping that push as a priority. [24] Reopening would need five local and state bodies to agree, and three have said no. [24]

Why it matters. After the plant closed, New York burned more gas and its power-sector emissions rose 22% from 2019 to 2022. [24] About 20 million people live within 50 miles of the site. [24]

CDP, Italy's state lender, is in talks to sell 15% to 35% of Ansaldo Energia to investors from the Gulf, including Mubadala, Abu Dhabi's state wealth fund, two sources told Reuters. [25] Ansaldo, based in Genoa, makes gas and steam turbines, generators and nuclear technology. [25] Its orders rose 24% last year to 2.3 billion euros, and Reuters says it is gaining from the power demand of data centres. [25] Any deal would see Ansaldo help build gas power plants in the Gulf. [25]

Why it matters. CDP owns 99.6% of Ansaldo and would keep control, one source said. [25] Ansaldo already won a contract last year to supply four turbines for a 1-gigawatt power plant at Al Dhafra in the United Arab Emirates. [25]

A group of US senators from both parties has been writing a bill to make energy projects faster to approve, Grist reports. [26] It is expected to narrow the environmental checks government agencies must make and to make permits harder to challenge in court. [26] Politico reported that the senators now plan to finish it after the midterm elections. [26] Trump has signalled he would stop blocking wind and solar projects to win Democratic votes for it. [26]

Why it matters. Solar farms and batteries make up almost 80% of the new US power plants expected this year. [26] Gas was the biggest source of US electricity last year, and both industries want the bill. [26] Voters turn against it when it is described as helping data centres, a pollster, Alex Lundry, says. [26]

Local opposition has blocked, withdrawn or stalled more than $170 billion of AI data centres in the US since January 2024, the advisory firm Relae says, Utility Dive reports. [27] Goldman Sachs, the US bank, expects data-centre power use to reach 66 gigawatts in 2027, but only about half of the capacity due in the next two years to arrive on time. [27] At a New York Times event this week, Justin Pearson, a Tennessee state lawmaker, said pollution from data centres' gas turbines and diesel generators is killing people in communities now. [28]

Why it matters. Many utilities and regulators now ask big new users for deposits, minimum contracts and exit fees to weed out projects that will never be built. [27] Texas has paused new data-centre connections while it checks its 474 gigawatts of requests. [27]