Former US President Barack Obama tells the COP26 climate conference: "We are nowhere near where we need to be"
He takes a swipe at his successor, Donald Trump, saying he set the US back in the fight against climate change
Obama also criticises China and Russia for a "lack of urgency" in tackling the issue
The focus in negotiating rooms is meanwhile on what can be done to help countries on the climate frontline
The world is already at least 1.1C warmer than the pre-industrial era and scientists say we must limit warming to 1.5C
We've been putting your questions to a former top climate negotiator, who is giving us an insight into what happens behind closed doors
We will be back again with our live coverage of COP26 tomorrow when the day's focus will be on gender, science and innovation.
Today's live page was edited by James Clarke and Hugo Bachega. Our writers were Paul McLaren, Jen Meierhans, Kelly-Leigh Cooper, Georgina Rannard, Doug Faulkner and Becky Morton.
Image source, PA MediaThank you for joining us for the start of the second week of negotiations at COP26 in Glasgow.
Analysis shared with the BBC shows there are more delegates associated with the fossil fuel industry attending COP26 than come from any single country.
Campaigners led by Global Witness assessed the participant , externallist and found more than 500 attendees linked to fossil fuel interests.
Their attendance at the pivotal climate conference is seen as controversial. Some campaigners - including Greta Thunberg - have criticised the conference so far as a "greenwashing" failure.
Barack Obama had plenty to say in his COP26 speech earlier as he called on the world to "step up" on climate change.
COP26: 'We are nowhere near where we need to be yet' - Obama
Have you heard of dance energy?
Throughout COP26, you will have heard plenty about wind energy and solar energy. But what about dance energy?
Glasgow nightclub SWG3 is set to trial technology that captures body heat from dancers to create renewable energy to heat up or to cool down the venue.
Long after the party is over, this energy can be stored until it is needed again. The system, which has been called Bodyheat, is due to be installed by 2022 and will save approximately 70 tonnes of CO2 per year.
Reality Check
Image source, Getty ImagesA solar panel installation in southern California
In his speech, former US President Obama said more than three million people worked in clean energy-related jobs in the US.
"That’s more than the amount of people employed by the entire fossil fuel industry.”
According to the latest US Energy and Employment Report, external, there were just over three million people in clean energy-related jobs by the end of 2020.
That's about 10% less than the previous year, largely due to the impact of Covid on employment.
About two million of these were in the energy efficiency sector, which includes the production and installation of energy-saving products.
Another half a million were in renewable energy, and another 300,000 in the clean vehicle sector.
In 2020, employment in the electric vehicle sector grew by almost 8%, as petrol and diesel vehicle sector employment declined by 10%.
The fossil fuel industry as a whole - including coal, gas and oil - employed about 800,000 people in 2020.
This includes mining and extraction jobs, as well as the manufacturing and trading of these fuels.
Jobs in oil, gas and coal extraction have experienced a gradual decline over the past decade, although they have seen a slight uptick in the past couple of years.
Anthony Zurcher
BBC North America reporter
Image source, Getty Images“The US is back,” former president Barack Obama told the gathered delegates at COP26.
Implicit in that statement was that, for the past four years of the Trump administration, the US was absent when it came to global efforts to address climate change.
Obama’s references to Donald Trump during his speech were more regretful than accusatory – akin to President Joe Biden’s apology last week for Trump administration actions.
Obama said he wasn’t “real happy” about the former president’s decision to pull the US out of the Paris Accords. He lamented the current lack of international co-operation, exacerbated by what he identified as a “lack of American leadership” on a range of multilateral issues.
He acknowledged that his efforts, and those of Mr Biden, were made more difficult by Republican hostility toward efforts to address climate change. He said he didn’t have all the answers, that he sometimes feels discouraged and the future can at times seem bleak.
He noted, however, that even under the Trump administration the US made progress toward its climate goals, due to efforts of states, local governments and private corporations. And although the US had “a lot of work to do,” it was prepared to lead once again.
Image source, Kat JonesKat Jones is helping to create a warm welcome in Glasgow for COP26 visitors - in her role as project manager for Stop Climate Chaos Scotland.
She explains how she's making visitors feel at home:
Even without inflated prices, there are lots of people who need to come to COP26 who can't afford to stay in £100-a-night hotels - people coming from the countries most affected by climate change, young activists, and smaller NGOs, which don't have much funding.
We've set up the Homestay Network so they aren't excluded.
As well as offering space in private homes, hosts are helping people find their way around, recommending places to visit and serving them local food.
Quote MessageIt's not just about finding environmentally-friendly and affordable accommodation for delegates who are struggling - it's also about cultural exchange and friendship. Glasgow is such a welcoming city.
Often, at previous COPs, churches and village halls opened their doors and large groups could just take their sleeping bags along.
But, because of Covid, it's much harder to do that. With the Homestay Network you've got one person staying with one family - it's a much safer way of providing accommodation.
I had some people from Madagascar staying with me and they left this morning, so I'm going to Queen Street Station today to meet some new guests and take them back to my house.
BBC Media Action
Today’s theme at the UN climate conference is adaptation, loss and damage.
More now from the BBC's international charity - which has been speaking with people on the climate front line about how warming temperatures and extreme weather are changing their lives.
In the far west of Nepal, Parbati Bhat has been a community health volunteer for 38 of her 58 years.
For the first time, she is treating local people for malaria as changing weather patterns have brought mosquitoes higher into the mountains.
“My relatives live in low-lying areas of Nepal, in Mahendranagar and Dhangadhi. They would tell me that they were troubled by mosquitoes and mosquito-borne diseases like malaria, and I would wonder: what are mosquitoes like? What is malaria like?” she told BBC Media Action.
“There are now eight recent malaria cases in our own village. The mosquito population is growing here, and so are malaria cases.”
In Dhaka, Nazma Begum is one of the thousands of climate migrants relocating to the Bangladesh capital. She now works in a garment factory after her local village’s homes were destroyed by land erosion.
“This is not easy work. It’s very hot, humid, we sweat a lot... and sometimes it gets really awful in the summer. A couple of us even fainted in the last heatwave,” she says.
“It’s even worse at home. It is almost unbearable to sleep with five people, as the tin-roofed room seems like an oven after the evening.”
‘Living Climate Change’ is being screened at COP26 as a way to bring the voices of marginalised people into the discussions. They can be viewed here.
James Cook
BBC Scotland senior news correspondent
Image source, Getty ImagesOn the marches outside COP26, we've heard plenty of calls for us to cut back on meat and dairy to save the planet.
Jennie Macdiarmid, a professor in sustainable nutrition and health at Aberdeen University, agrees with the protesters.
Farming is rapidly gobbling up the world's dwindling carbon budget, she says, suggesting that 20 years from now we may only be eating meat once a week.
Not so fast, says Martin Kennedy, president of the National Farmers Union of Scotland, who argues that agriculture is "getting hit with a stick that's not justified".
"I’ve no beef with vegans," he says. "I just don't think anybody should be telling anybody else how they should be eating."
Anthony Zurcher
BBC North America reporter
Image source, PA MediaJohn Kerry and Barack Obama are in Glasgow today while Joe Biden spoke there last week
For the first time in four years, US officials have been saying the words environmental activists and climate-conscious world leaders have wanted to hear.
Listening to Joe Biden, on the stage at COP26, emphasise the US understood that greenhouse gas emissions represented an existential threat to the world – and his nation was prepared to take action – was certainly a welcome development for many conference attendees.
If there is one thing the past half-decade has underscored for the rest of the world, however, it’s the fickle nature of US politics.
Biden and the Democrats are in charge today, but they could be swept out of Congress next year and out of the White House in 2024. Donald Trump – who recently repeated his claim that global warming is a “hoax” – or someone like him could be in charge, once again withdrawing the US from the Paris Accords and rolling back the current president’s much-touted regulatory reforms.
If the US is an inconstant climate-change advocate, how much can it accomplish at COP26, when many of the pledges and emissions targets have timeframes that stretch through dozens of US election cycles?
Biden, and former President Barack Obama, can offer their apologies for previous US policies. The US has brokered deals this week on methane emissions and forest preservation. It has pushed other nations to commit net-zero-emissions targets in the coming decades, with mixed results.
But until climate change becomes an issue that no long sits atop the cavernous American political divide, their promises and accomplishments could be swept away in the next electoral storm.
Navin Singh Khadka
Environment correspondent, BBC World Service
Image source, Getty ImagesVulnerable countries at COP26 say rich nations are pushing back against their attempts to secure compensation for the damage caused by climate change.
Poorer countries see it as critical that money for what is known as "loss and damage" be part of negotiations this week.
Negotiators agreed in Paris in 2015 to address the issue, but there is no agreement on who should pay for it.
Rich nations are said to be resisting any commitments as they do not want to accept liability and risk being sued, while developing countries argue it is the rich countries that are responsible for most of today's climate change impacts because they started emitting vast quantities of carbon much earlier than the rest of the world.
Negotiators, mainly representing least developed countries and small island states, say loss and damage - such as villages and farms being buried under landslides or swept away by floods - are now happening with increasing frequency and intensity across the globe due to climate change.
They argue climate change is affecting some communities with such intensity that they can no longer adapt, but instead need financial support to rebuild, or to move away.
Anna Holligan
BBC News Hague correspondent
We’ve always considered the Dutch better prepared than most for climate change, but floods this summer were a startling wake-up call.
Swathes of the southern Limburg province were submerged.
The flooding in the southern province of Limburg was declared a disaster in July
A quarter of the Netherlands lies below sea level.
The small northern European country is particularly vulnerable to flooding and could be among the hardest-hit by global warming but it is also one of the largest polluters on the continent.
A country renowned for its storm barriers, pumps, dykes and dunes is now being forced to rethink its survival strategy.
The Dutch meteorological institute recently warned sea levels along the coast could rise by up to 2m by 2100 if global greenhouse gas emissions weren’t reduced and the melting of the Antarctic polar cap accelerates.
Meanwhile, the water authorities, tasked with keeping Dutch feet dry, announced: "Gone are the days we can control water, soil and land as we please."
Drastic choices, it said, were required to contain the consequences of climate change.
At the same time as these warnings though, it has emerged that the Dutch are not on course to deliver the EU-wide emissions reductions targets set for 2030 that it pushed for as part of the bloc.
Image source, PA MediaPrime Minister of Barbados Mia Mottley said rich countries must pay for climate damage
In the past hour Barbados’s Prime Minister Mia Mottley gave powerful remarks about loss and damage. As a small island state, her country is extremely vulnerable to the effects of climate change.
“There is no better measure that the world is failing to understand the climate crisis than its failure to fund the mechanism (an agreement to address climate damage) for loss and damage,” she says.
The financial losses to developing countries from climate change are huge.
Mottley points out Dominica lost 226% of its GDP (the total value of a country’s goods and services) in four hours in 2017 when a powerful hurricane hit the Caribbean.
That’s compared to Germany which lost 0.1% of its GDP in the devastating floods this summer, she says.
She points out it is richer countries who produced most of the greenhouse gases that cause global warming, but poor countries who suffer the effects most.
Quote Message“It’s like me throwing garbage into your yard and telling you to pay to clean it up - even if it means you can’t pay your mortgage, you can’t buy food. You can’t do anything because you have to spend all your money on the garbage I threw into your yard."
Mia Mottley, Prime Minister of Barbados
BBC Media Action
Today’s theme at the UN climate conference is adaptation, loss and damage.
The BBC’s international charity has been speaking with people around the world about how they are being impacted by prolonged droughts, flooding, extreme heat and other changing weather patterns.
In Kenya, Esther Elaar is pregnant and walks over two hours a day to the closest source of water and then carries the full 20 litre can back. The region hasn’t seen rain in months, and water points are shallow and contaminated.
Image source, BBC Media Action“When I get back from fetching water, my legs and back ache,” Esther says. “When I carry heavy loads, I feel the baby move and that gets me concerned. There is nothing I can do about it because I need the water.”
In Nepal, Angyel Jung Bista says they cannot build mud houses in his Himalayan region of Mustang any more, because of more frequent rains.
The changing rain patterns are also affecting the 82-year-old's apple crop – once plentiful, it is now plagued with insects that are decimating the apples. And more frequent landslides are polluting water sources, causing more diarrhoeal diseases.
Image source, BBC Media ActionAngyel Jung Bista with his wife Chhutu Gurung
“At times I get so frustrated that I want to run a bulldozer through my apple orchard,” he said.
“I wonder how miserable the lives of our children will be in the future. I wonder what kinds of diseases the new generation will have to deal with. I’m staring at a very bleak future.”
Peter Betts
Former lead climate negotiator for the UK and the EU
Ever wondered what negotiations actually look like behind closed doors at COPs? How late do they go and how heated can things get?
In big, formal settings with 196 countries represented, it's very hard to negotiate and move forward.
When you move to more informal settings, maybe even over dinner, you can explore what people really care about - what is a negotiating position and where compromises might lie.
Sometimes it can get a bit heated as people look to create a bit of theatre. But, on the whole, it's quite respectful as trust and understanding is built up. It's pretty rare for it to explode into shouting.
During the first week of COP26, we told you how a strike by refuse staff and street cleaners had seen rubbish pile up on the streets in Glasgow.
Now it appears the dispute could be brought to an end after further talks were held between council and union leaders over the weekend.
The workers have been on strike for just over a week in a row over pay and conditions.
The GMB union says it hopes a new deal being put to members will end the action.
Peter Betts
Former lead climate negotiator for the UK and the EU
This COP was billed by US climate envoy John Kerry as the "last best hope for the world to get its act together". So, has it?
We were never going to solve the climate change issue in a single meeting. We aren't on track to meet the 1.5C target and we were never going to get there in this meeting.
But we have made progress - although, again, just not enough.
We need to move faster. Fundamentally this isn't about process, but about political will.
Matt McGrath
Environment correspondent
Image source, ReutersWhile COP26 negotiators wrestle with a long list of knotty issues, their difficulties have been overshadowed by the box office power of former US President Barack Obama.
In a powerful address, Obama criticised the absence of the leaders of China and Russia as showing a “dangerous lack of urgency” on the issue of climate change.
He outlined the scale of the challenge ahead, saying the world was “nowhere near where it needs to be,” and he scolded countries who had made pledges in Paris but failed to carry them out.
The bulk of his remarks were dedicated to young people, to motivating them to channel their anger and frustration with the lack of progress into action.
Perhaps a little unsure of his location, Obama referred to the “emerald isles,” and quoted Shakespeare.
As well as speaking, Obama is also set to hold a number of meetings in Glasgow, including with members of the so-called "high ambition coalition"- which includes island states, the EU and the US.
This grouping was key to achieving the Paris agreement six years ago in the French capital. Getting this coalition back together could be critical to landing a deal here in Glasgow.
Despite the warm welcome for the former president, a small group of young activists was due to stage a demonstration, complaining that the US hadn't delivered its share of the $100bn dollars long promised to poorer nations.
It's a clear reminder that Glasgow will fail, unless there's significant progress on the difficult issue of climate cash.
Peter Betts
Former lead climate negotiator for the UK and the EU
Peter Betts, a former lead climate negotiator for the UK and the EU, has been answering some of your questions about climate change today. We'll return to some of those now the speech from Barack Obama has come to an end.
To what extent can the UK secure climate goals from other countries, asks Frankie, 46, from Oxford.
The UK can't push countries around. We rely on countries' willingness to contribute to solving global problems - and peer pressure.
There are in every country people who want to act and those who don't. What you have to do is find arguments that resonate in each country’s debate.
You can also give countries help with, for example, technical support on renewable energy which will help them attract the investment needed to implement change.