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FIRST LOOK:

Methane Moves At COP: The EPA announced new rules to sharply curtail methane emissions from oil and gas wells today, as the U.S. and the EU are due to formally unveil the Global Methane Pledge at COP26. The rules on existing and new operations will  impose more frequent and strict leak monitoring at compressor stations and gas-fired pneumatic controllers, and require the capture of gas vented or flared as a byproduct of oil extraction. "All told, the estimate is that about 75% of all methane emissions will be covered by this EPA rule," a senior administration official told reporters. The Department of Interior also announced new rules on emissions on public lands, and the Department of Transportation issued new PHMSA rules for all onshore gas gathering pipelines. The flurry of rulemaking comes just ahead of the formal announcement of the U.S.- and EU-led Global Methane Pledge later Tuesday in Glasgow, where President Biden and other world leaders will announce that at least 90 countries have committed to reducing worldwide methane emissions by 30% by 2030, a list that covers roughly two-thirds of global GDP and half of methane emissions, including Brazil, the world’s fifth-largest emitter of methane. (EPA: Washington Post $, CNN, Wall Street Journal $, AP, Reuters, Politico Pro $, New York Times $; Pledge: Reuters, The Guardian, Bloomberg $, Bloomberg $)

Incarcerated Juveniles Fight Wildfires Fueled By Climate Change: Incarcerated juveniles, mostly Black and Brown, are being used to fight wildfires across the U.S. for as little as $1.00 per hour, Atmos reports, as experts doubt the justice and restorative and rehabilitative efficacy of such programs. The use of prison labor, rooted in slavery with a specific carve-out in the 13th Amendment, to fight wildfires in the U.S. is not new, but demand for wildland firefighters is gowing as climate change worsens and lengthens the fire season. Though Ezekiel Nishiyama did not ultimately become a firefighter, he credits his year at the Pine Grove Conservation Camp near Sacramento with helping put him on the path to his current role as a policy and community organizer with the Anti-Recidivism Coalition. But despite anecdotes like Nishiyama's, "there's very little evidence" that juvenile firefighting camps reduce recidivism, Carlee Purdum, a research assistant professor at Texas A&M, told Atmos. Purdum's research also "suggest[ed] that incarcerated people are exploited by" another incarcerated juvenile firefighting program in North Carolina. The need for follow-up after release goes beyond recidivism, as experts also warn of the serious and little-studied (especially in young wildland firefighters) hazards posed by wildfire smoke, namely the ultra-fine particulate matter that can carry toxins deep into the lungs and the effects of which do not become apparent until years later. (Atmos; Wildfire weather: LA Times; Climate Signals background: Wildfires)

Manchin Keynoted Coal Confab In Late September: Sen. Joe Manchin was a keynote speaker at an exclusive, invitation only, coal industry event in late September, Documented reports. The "Coal and Investment Leadership Forum," occurred at an exclusive golf resort owned by Jim McGlothlin of United Coal Company. Manchin, who received nearly half a million dollars last year from the coal brokerage he founded and his son runs, has been "successful" in protecting the coal industry during recent negotiations, Joe Craft III, CEO of Alliance Resource Partners told investors on an October 25 earnings call. Craft, a billionaire Trump donor with close ties to Trump’s disgraced EPA chief Scott Pruitt, was listed as a "host" of the secretive event. Manchin used his power in the Senate to force the removal of the Clean Energy Performance Program from the Build Back Better Act and has also demanded paid family leave be removed from the bill, among other measures that would regulate big business and the fossil fuel industry to protect public health. On Monday, Manchin said he needed "more clarity" on the bill already dramatically pared down and rewritten to comply with his demands, prompting Missouri Rep. Cori Bush to release a statement calling Manchin’s objections "anti-Black, anti-child, anti-woman, and anti-immigrant.” (Documented, Huffpost; Monday comments: Washington Post $, AP, NPR, Bloomberg $, E&E News, Reuters, Politico, New York Times $, CNBC, ABC, CBS, The Hill; Cori Bush response: Business Insider)

DAY 1 WRAP UP: COP26 is underway. Here's what to know. (Washington Post $, Grist, Wall Street Journal $, Axios, Washington Post $, The Guardian), key moments from day 1 of the COP26 climate change summit (New York Times $, CNN, The Guardian, Yahoo), day 2 of the climate summit brings the first concrete commitments (New York Times $), a moment of truth (FT $), 'this is not a drill' - what they're saying at UN climate talks (Reuters, The Guardian), what happens in Glasgow could set a course away from climate calamity — or cement a disaster (HuffPost), world leaders meet for 'last best chance' COP26 climate talks in Glasgow (CNN, AP, New York Times $, FT $)

DEFORESTATION: More than 100 world leaders agree to end deforestation by 2030 at COP26 (CNN, Bloomberg $, AP, CNBC, Wall Street Journal $, CBS, The Guardian, New York Times $, FT $, Washington Post $, The Conversation, BBC)

INDIA: Push for renewable by 2030, net-zero emissions by 2070: PM Modi’s 5 commitments at COP26 summit (India Today, Bloomberg $, FT $, Reuters, The Hill, NBC New York, New York Times $, Bloomberg $, Axios), India climate body pushes for low-carbon steel, heavy industries (Bloomberg $), at COP26, India in unique position with much at stake (Money Control, Ulka Kelkar interview)

OPENING STATEMENTS: 

• GUTERRES: The UN leader warns that the world faces a ‘climate catastrophe.’ (New York Times $, NPR, Buzzfeed, New York Times $), UN chief to COP26: 'enough of killing ourselves with carbon' (Axios, The Hill)
• BIDEN: Biden tells world US ready to lead fight on climate change (Bloomberg $, Wall Street Journal $, E&E News, New York Times $, The Guardian, CNBC, Washington Post $, AP, HuffPost,), Biden apologizes for US withdrawing from Paris deal under Trump (The Hill, Axios, CNN, CBS), Biden calls climate change an 'existential threat' at Glasgow summit (Washington Examiner, CNN), Biden calls for tougher action on emissions and promises job gains worldwide (New York Times $, NPR, Reuters, New York Times $, Wall Street Journal $, Axios), Biden urges global climate action but stops short of making new US pledges (FT $), troubles at home shadow Biden’s climate efforts abroad (AP),  White House unveils strategy for 2050 net-zero goal (The Hill)
• JOHNSON: Boris Johnson climate warning: ‘it's one minute to midnight on that doomsday clock’ (NBC, The Hill, Reuters, Reuters) Boris Johnson will travel home from COP26 by private plane (The Guardian, Bloomberg $) Boris Johnson signals opposition to proposed Cumbria colliery (FT $), Johnson’s extra £1bn climate finance pledge comes with a catch (FT $)
• UNELECTED MONARCHY: Prince Charles calls for ‘war-like footing’ in speech at pivotal COP26 climate change summit (CNBC, FT $), Queen tells COP26 in video address it’s ‘time for action’ on climate (The Guardian, NBC, BBC, FT $)

ENVIRONMENTAL (IN)JUSTICE: Bangladeshi veteran of UN climate talks fears COP26 will fail the world's poorest (Thomson Reuters Foundation), carbon colonialism charge aimed at developed world: COP26 update (Bloomberg $), Marshall Islands pleads with world leaders to stop the 60,000-person nation from drowning (Washington Post $), many of world's poorest nations already experience acute harm from climate change (Axios), rich countries bring 'tough talk on climate' to COP26 but no new plans or money to curb global emissions (Democracy Now, Reuters), COP26 was inaccessible for Israeli minister in wheelchair (Reuters, NPR)

G20: G20 offers little new on climate, leaving uphill task for COP26 (Reuters, E&E News, CNN, Wall Street Journal $), poor countries at COP26 concerned by G20’s limited climate progress (The Guardian)

ON THE GROUND: My day at COP26: 'I told world leaders: we're not drowning, we're fighting' (BBC), chaotic scenes outside COP26, as world descends on Glasgow (The Guardian), the latest: ‘Fossil of the Day’ awards underway at COP26 (AP)

NO SHOWS: Erdogan skips COP26 summit, citing a security protocol dispute (Bloomberg $, Reuters), who will not be at COP26? (FT $), who’s attending (Biden and Modi), and who isn’t (Putin and Xi) (New York Times $)

EXPECTATIONS MANAGEMENT: John Kerry and his team downplay expectations for UN climate conference with Congress mulling Biden's agenda (CNN), Glasgow climate talks are, in many ways, ‘harder than Paris’ (InsideClimate News), Australia has been dragged kicking and screaming to a net zero plan before Glasgow, but we still trail the pack (The Guardian, Michael Mann)

DAVID ATTENBOROUGH: David Attenborough says world is looking to leaders (BBC), David Attenborough urges summit participants to help ‘rewrite our story.’ (New York Times $), Attenborough calls humanity ‘the greatest problem solvers’ (FT $)

GRETA: Greta Thunberg’s dad won’t be with her at the climate summit—and he’s thrilled (Wall Street Journal $), Greta Thunberg and her allies lambaste UN climate change conference from just outside (Yahoo)

YOUTH ACTIVISM: Young activists call Glasgow climate conference 'last chance for humanity' (Yahoo)

FINANCE: Climate finance could make or break the COP26 summit. Here's why (Reuters), [Greek PM Kyriakos] Mitsotakis: we're doing our part when it comes to climate change (Bloomberg $), Britain to fund $3 billion worth of green investments in developing economies (Reuters, Reuters), Europe fears that rising cost of climate action is stirring anger (New York Times $), UK to back $1B World Bank loan to India for green infrastructure: report (The Hill), Urgency over net zero sparks climate tech investment boom (FT $)

TRANSPARENCY: No greenwash and no fudges: COP26’s success depends on leaders telling the truth (The Guardian, Ed Miliband op-ed), do not trust Brazil’s ‘greenwashing’ promises, say Amazon activists (The Guardian)

ECONOMIC SYSTEMS: Message for COP26 negotiators: capitalism has never really worked out for the Earth or for BIPOC communities (Earth Island Journal, Jacqueline Patterson op-ed), at COP26 the stage is set for a battle over the next phase of capitalism (The Guardian, Simon Lewis op-ed)

SUBNATIONAL ACTION: Cities, not countries, are driving the conversation at COP26 (Fortune), mayors take message of local action to UN summit (AP), White House climate adviser emphasizes value of state, local policy at climate summit (The Hill)

PUBLIC OPINION: Polling data is overwhelming – people want leaders to act (The Guardian)

CARBON MARKETS: Put a price on carbon, nature cannot pay': EU urges COP26 (Reuters), Chile, Canada ministers among group calling for true carbon price (Reuters) 

CLIMATE OPTIMISM: Optimism for COP26: we must win the climate battle – and we absolutely can (The Guardian, Fiona Harvey column), after 30 years of COP, our ex-environment editor is now optimistic (The Guardian), climate optimism is an illusion, UN chief tells COP26 (The Guardian)

IN THE SHADOW OF PARIS: Ex-Maldives president to tell COP26: do not compromise on 1.5C (The Guardian), Merkel: 'we are not yet where we need to be' (The Hill), Poland warns EU withholding funds could endanger climate goals (Reuters), world leaders outline climate commitments at COP26 summit (CNBC), Why water is the next net-zero environmental target (CNBC), Methane limits could be COP26's real legacy (Axios, Bloomberg $)

SCALING UP COMMITMENTS: China's Xi calls for stronger action on climate change (Reuters), Xi Jinping makes no major climate pledges in written COP26 address (The Guardian), Russia adopts long-term climate strategy, rejects US criticism (Reuters), Russia’s dirty gas is keeping Europe from freezing over (Bloomberg $), Brazil brings big green plans to COP26. But its track record is dismal (CNN, AP), Brazil indigenous people tell COP26: you need us to solve climate crisis (Reuters), Vietnam targeting carbon emission neutrality by 2050, minister says (Reuters), Macron calls on world's 'largest emitters' to 'scale up' their commitments (The Hill), Trudeau calls upon world leaders to make polluters pay (The Hill),

FOSSILS IN GLASGOW: Ban private jets (Gizmodo), coal language in G20 statement hints at difficult COP26 (Axios), COP26 aims to banish coal. Asia is building hundreds of power plants to burn it (Reuters)

BEYOND COP26: Race to fix climate goes far beyond COP26, says US' Sullivan (Reuters), world has to keep working on climate beyond COP26, says US' Sullivan (Reuters), 

GOTTA BE CAREFUL FOLLOWING THAT GPS: Wolf Blitzer gets lost on the way to UN climate talks (Gizmodo)

ENVIRONMENTAL (IN)JUSTICE: Power shift: the future of energy could look like New Orleans East (The Verge), the event that changed the environmental justice movement forever (Grist), what climate change looks like around the world (Teen Vogue)

CLIMATE DIPLOMACY: UN ambassador [Samantha Power] on how US will respond to climate change differently following COP26 (NPR)

DENIAL & DISINFORMATION: Climate crisis is real but you wouldn’t know from watching Fox Weather (The Guardian), Big Tech finally reckons with climate denialism (Axios), how climate change became political (FT $), stunning survey gives grim view of flourishing anti-democratic opinions (The Hill), Twitter takes aim at climate misinformation during COP26 (Axios)

FACT CHECK: Image purporting to show Time magazine cover warning of an impending ice age is digitally altered (Reuters)

REFRESHERS: The science everyone needs to know about climate change, in 6 charts (The Conversation)

AGENCIES: US housing department to send disaster funds to states, focus on building climate resilience (Reuters), with $1 billion disasters rising in the US, FEMA administrator weighs in on climate change (WBUR)

DOE: US energy Secretary sees gasoline prices easing but blames OPEC (Bloomberg $)

PUBLIC LANDS: Could conservation plan prompt tougher grazing oversight? (E&E News)

THE HILL: Appropriators aim to get started on year-end funding push (E&E News)

WHITE HOUSE: A Biden climate adviser [Gina McCarthy] explains how the US plans to meet its climate goals (NPR), Biden faces battle in support on climate action (FT $), Joe Biden wants America to lead the world against the climate crisis. That goal faces a big test this week. (CNN), VP Harris pitching US climate action in NY as COP26 gets underway (NBC)

INFRASTRUCTURE BILL(S): Dems regroup with $555B climate spending hanging in balance (E&E News)

CITIES AND STATES: Report: Massachusetts doesn’t have enough workers to meet its efficiency goals (Energy News Network)

SCOTUS: EPA climate order fuels calls for Supreme Court reform (E&E News)

IMPACTS: Amazon populations under threat from floods, fires and drought (FT $), ‘ordinary people suffer most’: China farms face climate woes (AP), city known as 'Venice of Africa' impacted by climate change (CNN), climate change is having an adverse effect on South Carolina's low country (NPR), extreme weather events are 'the new norm' (BBC), sea levels rising twice as fast as 1990s (The Times), temperature rises threaten ocean flow catastrophe in the Atlantic (FT $), climate change graph 'needs more colours' as world gets hotter (BBC)

HEAT: An up-and-coming title: 'Chief heat officer' (Axios), businesses feel the heat when workplace temperatures rise (FT $), Climate change could bring near-unliveable conditions for 3 billion people, say scientists (FT $)

DROUGHT: South Madagascar on the verge of climate change-induced famine: How to help (ABC), parched by drought, Paraguay is vulnerable to climate change (Wall Street Journal $), the threat of conflict over water is growing (FT $), water stress drives investor interest to address supply shortage (FT $), 

WELL IF THIS ISN'T A METAPHOR...: Tiny seedlings of giant sequoias rise from ashes of wildfire (AP)

HURRICANES: Forecasters run out of Atlantic storm names for only third time as Wanda forms (Washington Post $)

GRAM 'EM BEFORE THEY'RE GONE: Tourists flock to natural wonders being affected by climate change (CBS)

BOOZE: Fancy a ‘Charbonnay’? How France’s coal belt reinvented itself as a tourist destination (The Guardian)

RENEWABLES: Florida is about to get a massive solar build-out (Canary Media), Siemens Gamesa signs $400 million wind gear agreement with Vietnam's BCG Energy (Reuters), Solar power brings light to Michigan community where utility repossessed street lights (Yale Climate Connections)

DO THEY NEED FIELD RESEARCHERS? ASKING FOR A FRIEND: How Greek islands are labs for clean energy (New York Times $)

EDUCATION: Schools face calls to boost environmental teaching (FT $)

LNG: FERC terminates permitting review for Louisiana LNG project, citing inaction (S&P Global)

OIL & GAS: OPEC+ to steal the show in a busy week for crude oil (Houston Chronicle), who benefits from Big Oil's big profits? Not Houston's laid-off oil workers. (Houston Chronicle)

PIPELINES: Court hears arguments in latest legal attack on Mountain Valley pipeline (The Roanoke Times)

COAL: The G20 agreement on financing coal says nothing about the private sector (Quartz)

HYDROGEN: British firm JCB signs multibillion-dollar deal to import green hydrogen (CNBC)

UTILITIES: Xcel first utility to adopt net zero carbon target across gas and electric operations, CEO says (Utility Dive)

EVs: Congress is poised to fix the most annoying thing about buying an electric car (Grist), international opposition mounts over proposed US EV tax credit (Reuters), Tesla opens charging network to other EVs for the first time (Reuters), electric vehicle maker Rivian targets up to $53 billion valuation in IPO (FT $)

SUPPLY CHAIN ISSUES: Complexity of supply chain emissions forces rivals to work together on net zero (FT $), supply chain woes expected to raise 2022 costs for renewables, Lazard LCOE report finds (Utility Dive), corporate climate pledges often ignore a key component: supply chains (New York Times $)

AVIATION: An electric plane crosses the New Zealand strait for first time (NPR)

RELIGION: Faith groups fight against climate change ahead of UN summit (AP)

AGRICULTURE: Climate change will cut corn yields by a quarter by 2030, NASA says (Bloomberg $), fish farmers grapple with sustainability challenge (FT $)

SHIPPING: Denmark, US and 12 other nations back tougher climate goal for shipping (Reuters, FT $)

BUSINESS: Companies struggle for clarity on net zero targets (FT $)

CARBON PRICING: IMF leads push to clean up world carbon pricing system (FT $)

BITCOIN: Crypto advocates call for clarity amid climate summit (Bloomberg $)

WILDLIFE: In Maine, moose are being killed in effort to save them (Wall Street Journal $)

THEATER: Amid climate talks, an actor’s call to action unfolds onstage (New York Times $)

INTERNATIONAL: China's giant state-owned companies struggle to align climate rhetoric with reality (Reuters), Church of England leader apologises for comparing climate change to rise of Nazis (Reuters)

• World leaders must heed calls from the young to act on climate crisis (FT, Vanessa Nakate op-ed $)
• Stop trying to find magic words to convince climate opponents (The Nation, Mary Annaïse Heglar op-ed)
• As natural gas prices soar, electrification offers both immediate and long-term relief to consumers (Chicago Tribune, Trisha Miller op-ed)
• America's COVID-19 response bodes ill for effective climate action (The Hill, Jim Jones op-ed)
• With the planet in peril, we religious leaders must speak truth to power (The Guardian, Jonathan Wittenberg op-ed)
• Time for the rich world to keep its promises on tackling climate change (FT, Simon Mundy column $)
• 'Indigenous people have the knowledge': conservation biologist Erika Cuéllar on restoring the planet (CNN, interview)
• Joe Manchin: who gave you authority to decide the fate of the planet? (The Guardian, Daniel Sherrell op-ed)
• Quit burning tropical forests and set up carbon markets (Wall Street Journal, Fred Krupp op-ed $)
• For privileged progressives, ‘we’ means ‘you’ (Wall Street Journal, Gerard Baker column $)
• Leaders must be more upfront about the costs of saving the planet (FT, Megan Greene  column $)
• On the climate crisis, delay has become the new form of denial (LA Times, Michael E. Mann op-ed $)
• Why companies must produce five-year plans for climate transition (FT, Paul Simpson column $)

COP26 Disinfo Off To The Stupidest Possible Start: Biden Closed His Eyes! 

Yesterday we tried to warn you about expected disinformation around COP26, and today we’re coming at you with the freshest piles of denier BS. 

For example, a Koch/Heritage guy in the Koch/Heritage Daily Signal wrote that one of the big three things people should know about about COP26 is that “the American people do not support Biden’s plan to waste taxpayer dollars on an international climate change slush fund.” Now, while obviously a “slush fund” is never going to poll very well, there actually does happen to be recent polling on this issue of international climate finance, thanks to Yale/GMU’s team, and it turns out that two thirds of Americans “support providing financial aid and technical support to developing countries to limit their greenhouse gas emissions,” and 61% support funding for developing countries to adapt to climate change. 

And Bjorn Lomborg is flogging his latest WSJ column, this one misrepresenting the link between wildfires and climate change. Lomborg uses a decline in global wildfire burn acreage to claim there’s no climate change connection, but here’s what the actual scientists have said about it in the recent past: “The decline in global average area burned has indeed been misused to support false claims numerous times. There is strong evidence that the increase in fire activity we are seeing in many forested regions is indeed linked to climate change.” 

Lomborg uses last year’s wildfires as an example of climate over-reach, but again, actual scientists see it differently, because they actually do science. World Weather Attribution’s rapid analysis found that the fires were made at least 30% more likely because of climate change, while warming is driving the sorts of weather conditions that fires love. 

Dumb as those attacks may be, they’re far more sophisticated than what may have been yesterday’s biggest, and perhaps stupidest, attack on the COP26: President Biden closed his eyes for half a minute during a speech! 

Feeding directly into the rightwing meme of “sleepy Joe,” (sort of) popularized by Trump during the election his supporters went on to attempt to overthrow via violent insurrection, Washington Post reporter Zach Brown tweeted a clip where Biden “appears to fall asleep during COP26 opening speeches.” 

Now, given the obscure and little-known concept of “jet lag,” combined with the mind-numbingly boring nature of basically every opening speech ever, it wouldn’t be surprising if Biden did fall asleep. But, as Brown implicitly acknowledges with his “appears” language, did Biden actually fall asleep? As the Independent then “reported”, did Biden actually “nod off”? 

Well there’s certainly no indication of his head actually falling down to his chest or really much of any nodding at all in the brief clip. And when an aide comes to his side, Biden’s eyes immediately open again and he doesn’t at all appear like anyone who’s just been startled awake during something they shouldn’t have slept through (not that we’ve ever seen anyone or been the one to actually “nod off” in a meeting after a long night of partying intercontinental travel). 

While neither the deniers at CFACT nor the conspiracy hubs of ZeroHedge (who noted MSNBC covered it, which… they didn’t need to), Fox News (who lazily compiled rightwing tweets) nor Gateway Pundit even tried to verify the “news” that the President didn’t have his eyes Clockwork-Orange-peeled open, the crack team of political propagandists reporters at the New York Post actually did some research for its write-up. Specifically they counted just how long the President closed his eyes: once for seven seconds, then again for an additional twenty-two seconds. 

Yes, they all wrote stories about the President closing his eyes for a combined twenty-nine seconds. 

We’re just relieved Biden didn’t close his eyes for a full thirty seconds, or they might have written instead about how he “appears” to have died! 

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