A recent report by The Times, indicates that the President of the COP26 summit, Alok Sharma is apparently in dispute with Robert Jenrick, the communities secretary over a deep coalmine in Cumbria.
Earlier this month the communities secretary formally refused to intervene in the £165m Whitehaven project to remove coking coal from beneath the Irish Sea for steel-making. A government source reportedly told The Times that Jenrick did not consult Sharma or other ministers on the plan, in line with planning guidance. Work is likely to begin on the first deep coalmine for 30 years as the government tells other nations to slash carbon emissions.
The decision could complicate efforts to forge an alliance with Joe Biden’s White House, which has described international action on climate change as a key foreign policy goal. Earlier last week Mr Sharma congratulated American Secretary John Kerry on bringing the US back to the Paris Agreement, noting the great importance of the accord being fully universal again. They agreed that there is no time to waste on tackling climate change. They noted that UK and USA were once again tightly aligned in prioritising this shared challenge and will work together to raise global efforts ahead of COP26 in November.
In a virtual address to the Netherlands-hosted Climate Adaptation Summit, the first ever global summit focused solely on adaptation and resilience, the Prime Minister will launch the Adaptation Action Coalition.
