Reality Check

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While much of the focus at COP26 so far has been on what countries can do to tackle climate change, companies and organisations can also play a part.

Two studies have found climate change denial is spreading unchecked on Facebook, despite a pledge from the tech giant earlier this year to flag such content.

The Center for Countering Digital Hate and the Institute for Strategic Dialogue said less than 10% of misleading posts were marked as misinformation.

And the CCDH researchers linked the majority of these to just 10 publishers.

They found that of 7,000 misleading posts describing climate change as "hysteria", "alarmism", a "scam", or other related terms, only 8% were marked as misinformation.

Facebook said this represented a small proportion of climate change content.

Read more here.

Image source, Reuters

While the speeches, debates and negotiations continue inside the COP26 conference venue, outside Glasgow is alive again today with the sights and sounds of climate protestors.

Around 100 activists have gathered outside the UK government's visa and immigration offices in the Cessnock area, not far from the Scottish Event Campus on the River Clyde.

The crowd is chanting “Extinction Rebellion”, accompanied by a drumming band. The group wants to highlight the connection between climate change, war and refugees.

Meanwhile, police earlier surrounded Baile Hoose, external, a former homeless shelter in central Glasgow which has reopened to house climate campaigners during COP26.

Activists have now been advised they are free to come and go again after talks with police liaison officers.

Adam Fleming
Chief political correspondent

The Covid rate in the secure zone at COP26 is lower than in the general population in Scotland, the COP President Alok Sharma has said.

He is looking at whether data could be released to reassure attendees after the UN said it recorded the number of Covid cases but would not publish them.

Georgina Rannard
BBC News

Image source, Edwin Mumbere

I’ve been speaking to 29-year-old Edwin Mumbere in the spectacular Rwenzori mountains in Uganda about bringing solar panels and cleaner energy to people there.

The communities are among the estimated 770 million people globally who aren’t connected to an electricity grid - , external75% live in sub-Saharan Africa.

To cook, keep warm and light their homes, they rely on what they can buy or find locally – charcoal, candles, or even coal.

It’s bad for the environment and often causes serious health problems.

Edwin’s NGO has connected 500 houses to solar power in western Uganda – and two towns now power their street lights through a community-owned solar grid.

He also teaches people to make briquettes (a compressed log from kitchen waste) for cooking – a greener energy source than charcoal.

Edwin became a climate activist after seeing snow disappear from several towering Rwenzori peaks and villages destroyed by flooding.

“Some people in other countries think climate change is a movie, but we are living it every day,” he says.

Chris Morris
BBC Reality Check

Image source, Getty Images

It’s Energy Day at COP26, and the big oil and gas companies are keen to highlight the role they say they can play in a global energy transition.

The American oil giant ExxonMobil, for example, says it “respects and supports” society’s ambition to achieve net zero emissions by 2050.

But it also has plans for a substantial increase in its fossil fuel output in the next few years. And burning fossil fuels is the largest single source of the greenhouse gas emissions which are heating up the planet.

In fact all the big oil companies are still involved in one thing - taking oil and gas out of the ground.

That’s one of the reasons why a series of lawsuits has been launched in the last few years, by states and cities across the US, seeking billions of dollars in damages from these companies.

Critics say they are trying to portray themselves as part of the solution, when they are instead part of the problem.

The oil companies deny the accusations against them, and are fighting hard in court to get cases dismissed. They point out that modern society relies on the products they produce.

You can listen here to an episode of our podcast The Denial Files, which examines some of the accusations against Big Oil.

BBC Sounds

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Our diplomatic correspondent James Landale was in Rome for the G20 which preceded COP26.

He says that the G20 was a failure in terms of its aim to "put some rocket booster under the COP26 summit".

On BBC Radio 4's From Our Correspondent programme he examines whether the summits are the return to multi-lateralism that had been hoped.

You can listen here on BBC Sounds.

The UK government’s global deal to consign coal to the slag heap has been labelled a “glass half-full” announcement by an expert in carbon capture and storage.

Stuart Haszeldine, a professor at Edinburgh University, said while getting countries such as South Africa, Poland and Vietnam to sign up were “really useful hits”, the omission of “really major emitters” like Australia, China and the United States dilutes the impact.

“There's talk about moving towards the end of coal, but this is not quite that,” he told BBC Radio Scotland, adding it is still going to take "tens of years" to fully phase out fossil fuels.

Prof Haszeldine said the UK government’s recent decision not to offer backing to the “low-cost” Acorn Project – a proposed carbon capture facility in Aberdeenshire – was “extremely unhelpful” and “pretty strange”, after it acknowledged the plan passed all the criteria for funding.

Image source, PA Media

A quick update on Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti who tested positive for Covid a day after a breakfast meeting at COP26 with world leaders.

A message on his official mayoral Twitter account said he was "feeling good and isolating in his hotel room".

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson made a brief appearance at the meeting. Presidents of Armenia, Costa Rica and Zambia also took part, as well as UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss and Mayor of London Sadiq Khan.

Leader of Glasgow City Council Susan Aitken, who was also there, has taken a test to be on the safe side and wished mayor Garcetti a speedy recovery.

Rajini Vaidyanathan
BBC South Asia Correspondent

We’re hearing a lot about consigning coal to history at the COP26 summit, but the reality in India is that coal remains part of the country’s present and future.

It’s still the major source of energy, accounting for around 70% of production.

New mines are being built while others are being expanded, so great is the demand for power in this nation of more than 1.3bn that the country continues to import coal.

Image source, EPA

Millions of people also rely on it to make a living, many of them in the poorest communities, so ensuring there’s a“just transition” away from coal is a discussion point at COP. So too will the alternatives available.

India has set ambitious targets to move towards renewable sources - you might hear a lot of talk about green hydrogen too. India is a ripe market for this, experts say, one where investors can expect huge returns - not just environmentally.

But while there is a will to move away from coal, the way to do so is the biggest challenge for a country like India - which needs to balance environmental concerns with economic ambition.

• Read more: Why India can't live without coal

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The Seychelles, a group of islands in the Indian Ocean, is already seeing some of its coastline being reshaped by climate change - and unless more is done, countries like it could disappear entirely.

The country's president, Wavel Ramkalawan, told the BBC's Pierre-Antoine Denis everybody needed to step up.

"If Australia is not doing as much as one might expect, it has to step up, just like China, Russia and other industrialised nations," he said.

There can be no going back to fossil fuels - renewable and safe energies that will protect the planet, like solar and wind, were the only way forward, he said.

He called on world leaders, whether of big countries or small islands, to take hard decisions and have the confidence to show people the way. "What is bad for the planet, is bad for everybody," he said.

Georgina Rannard
BBC News

Image source, David Michael Terungwa

As some 40 countries sign up to stop financing coal, we speak to an activist in Nigeria where the government still gives licences to companies mining coal.

David Michael Terungwa explains how people and environments are destroyed by coal mines.

“Their farmland is taken away, their only source of income. In one community in Benue state their only water source was polluted,” he explains.

In his work on the campaign Coal Free Nigeria, David Michael educates communities about the dangers of mining and environmental degradation.

They’ve had successes too. Two communities – in Kogi state and in Benue – managed to stop mining in their area.

As rainfall decreases in parts of the country and farmers face failed harvests, taking action to curb climate change is essential for Nigeria's future, he says.

Using renewable energy instead of fossil fuels will be essential as the country's demand for energy increases and more people join the electricity grid, he explains.

There are lots of big numbers flying around at COP26 but are the billions and trillions talked about going to be enough?

The UN Environment Programme (UNEP) thinks not. It says the cost to adapt to climate change is in fact between five and 10 times higher than the money currently being spent.

It warns that on the current trajectory, the cost of adapting to extreme weather could be between $140 billion and $300 billion (£102-220 billion) for developed countries by 2030.

By the middle of the century, it says this figure will be more like between $280 billion and $500 billion (£205-367 billion) for developing countries.

In The Adaptation Gap Report: The Gathering Storm, external, researchers also found that international governments were letting the opportunity to reset course after the pandemic pass them by.

In a sample of 66 countries, less than a third had used post-pandemic funding to address climate risk.

The report found that the pandemic had placed nations in a double bind, as falling revenues limit government spending, while the cost of adaptation rises rapidly as climate change accelerates

Image source, Getty Images

Some very positive news coming this morning from the influential International Energy Agency, a body that advises governments about energy.

It has crunched the numbers from promises made at COP26 and calculated that the world will keep to a 1.8C degree rise in global temperatures if all the pledges are carried out.

Remember, the core goal of this summit is to limit the global temperature rise to 1.5C (in order to protect us from the worst effects of climate change) – but before COP26, we were warned that the planet is on track for a 2.7C degree increase.

The IEA says that the pledges to reduce methane emissions and reach net zero made in Glasgow have pushed us closer to a 1.8C degree rise.

IEA President Fatih Birol, external called these results “a big step forward”, adding “much more needed”.

Of course, countries must deliver on their promises for this prediction to be a reality.

Image source, PA Media

We've been talking about coal a lot this morning and about the pledge from more than 40 countries to phase out its use as a source of energy.

But some of the major burners, such as China, the US and Australia, have not signed up to the agreement.

Labour's shadow business and energy secretary Ed Miliband said that "glaring gaps" remained without commitments from large emitters to stop increasing the use of coal domestically.

He said nothing had been said about other fossil fuels - such as gas and oil - and accused the government of letting "others off the hook".

Meanwhile, Juan Pablo Osornio, head of Greenpeace's delegation at COP26, said the statement fell "well short of the ambition needed on fossil fuels in this critical decade".

He added: "The small print seemingly gives countries enormous leeway to pick their own phase-out date, despite the shiny headline."

Image source, Getty Images

Managing the transition from fossil fuels to renewable sources of power will be central to the future of the north-east of Scotland and Europe's energy capital - Aberdeen.

The city is no stranger to transition, from granite mining to fisheries to an oil and gas epicentre since the discovery of North Sea oil in the 1960s. But can a future focused on renewables support the local economy in the same way as the oil and gas sector?

Charlotte Hartley, co-chair of the Energy Institute’s young professionals network, "wholeheartedly believes" it can.

Some companies are starting to take "real steps" to decarbonise and diversify their portfolios to include renewables, she told BBC Radio Scotland. Others are playing "catch-up" but net-zero targets are achievable, she maintains, and if anything "could be more ambitious."

Michelle Hayward, a green activist, told Good Morning Scotland that if Aberdeen remains "tied to the fortunes of oil prices, it is just going to lose jobs”. Investing in renewables will provide a more stable future, she says.

Adam Easton
Warsaw Correspondent

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Poland has pledged to phase out coal in the 2040s, not the 2030s, as part of a global coal phase-out agreement at the COP26 summit, a spokesman for the Polish Ministry of Climate and Environment told the BBC.

The 2040s pledge is in line with a government agreement with unions last year to close all the country’s coal mines by 2049.

Poland’s state-controlled power utilities have already scrapped plans to build new coal-fired power plants, another of the COP26 agreement pledges.

So in effect, Poland signing up to the coal phase out agreement is not a significant development given the government’s own phase out pledge and the scrapping of plans to build new coal plants.

Image source, COP26

Representatives from various countries have been speaking to the conference this morning on the energy transition.

Among them has been Grenada's Simon Stiell who said that while his country neither burned nor produced coal the fuel must be "consigned to history" as it was the single most impactful thing which could be done to meet the 1.5C global warming target.

He said that fossil fuel subsidies were propping up coal and gas - that this was a "wasted opportunity" to invest in renewables.

"Speaking as a small voice from a small island even more creative solutions are required than what is on the table," he said.

He added that what was needed was co-operation and "genuine resolve" from the G20 countries - "if they don't then who will?", he asked.

"The future of countries like mine depend on whether or not coal seams around the world are left as they are," he said.

Another of the countries missing from the pledge to end the burning of coal is the US - although its primary sources of power are oil and gas.

Although China produces more CO2 overall, the US has by far the highest level of emissions per capita - although it has pledged to reduce emissions by at least 50% of 2005 levels by 2030.

President Biden has also stated that it will look to achieve net zero by 2050.

CO2 emissions have been dropping over the last decade, but they need to fall more dramatically to achieve the targets laid out.

More than 80% of US energy currently comes from fossil fuels, although renewable energy sources are on the increase.

UK Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng said that under President Biden the US was "very much behind the net zero agenda" and had made "lots of pledges to reduce natural gas".

Matt McGrath
Environment correspondent

There’s been such a flurry of announcements here today on the world’s most polluting fossil fuel, that it’s hard to see the light for all the (coal) dust.

But there are many questions outstanding.

One of the biggest is the list of countries missing from this bonfire of coal commitments – including the US, China and India.

The time scales for phaseout are also a bit woolly - with richer countries promising to end coal by the 2030s, with developing nations in the 2040s.

None of these commitments are binding – again there is no big stick to force countries to do this.

And how many of the plans to stop using coal in developing countries will need financial support from the developed world?

We’ve already seen the UK, Germany and the US step up to pay South Africa's $8.5bn (£6.2bn) to move away from coal. Other countries are said to be interested in following in South Africa’s footsteps.

So is there also a question of the rich countries paying others to do what they struggle to do at home?

Image source, Reuters

As we've touched on, China is one of the big names missing from the list of countries which have signed up to a pledge to phase out coal.

It has been China's main source of energy for decades and experts say the country will need to end this reliance if it wants to reduce its emissions.

President Xi Jinping says China will "phase down" its use from 2026, but in the short term, Beijing has ordered coal mines to increase production to avoid power shortages over the coming winter.

There has been surging demand from heavy industry in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic and this has led to shortages in several parts of the country in recent weeks.