American President Donald Trump has enjoyed all the pomp and ceremony of a British state visit, with some business deals being signed as part of the UK-US love-in.
A £150bn investment deal with US technology companies was announced, with Google, Microsoft, OpenAI, Nvidia promising investments in the UK’s tech sector, while Palantir pledged to invest up to £1.5bn in British defence tech. Meanwhile, UK pharmaceutical company GSK, oil major BP, Barclays bank and others said they would invest in the US.
At a Thursday press briefing hosted at the UK prime minister’s residence Chequers, Keir Starmer said the deal made the UK and US “first partners on defence and first partners on trade”.
Trump also used the briefing to call on the UK to “drill, baby, drill” for oil and gas in the North Sea. The UK government has committed to ending new oil and gas licences in the North Sea, but Starmer said fossil fuels will be part of the British energy mix for “years to come”. The final details of the recent UK-US trade deal, including its impacts on energy, are yet to be confirmed.
As well being part of the UK-US tech deal, Palantir is also among the companies accused of “profiting from Israel’s prolonged violations of international law”, in a briefing published by international non-profit Amnesty International on Thursday. Palantir did not respond to a request for comment.
The UK has said it will continue with plans to recognise Palestinian statehood, despite Trump’s disapproval. Meanwhile, in Brussels, the European Commission has proposed suspending certain trade agreements with Israel and sanctioning “extremist [Israeli] ministers” and members of Hamas.
The ongoing violence and declining humanitarian situation in Gaza — an independent UN inquiry made it clear this week that Israel has committed genocide against Palestinians — continues to present risks for companies and financiers linked to Israel’s war effort.
Person in the news
Recent actions by the US Securities and Exchange Commission suggest it is seeking to reduce the influence of investors and switching its allegiance to companies.
Chair Paul Atkins, appointed by Trump at the end of 2024, has made a series of announcements in recent weeks aligning the agency with the president’s pro-business agenda.
On September 15, the SEC said oil company ExxonMobil could build an in-house voting platform for retail shareholders, which would see the investors voting with management by default. The fossil fuel company is seeking to weaken the influence of activist shareholders.
On the same day, Trump asked the regulator to consider abandoning quarterly financial reporting and shift to twice-yearly reporting, claiming it “will save money and allow managers to focus properly on running their companies”.
Many sustainability professionals agree Trump’s decision could have positive implications for sustainability. By thinking longer term, companies have more space to explore investments that may not deliver returns in the short term but will pay off in the longer run.
Europe
The European Commission has published its Clean Transport Corridor Initiative to speed up the deployment of charging infrastructure for heavy-duty electric vehicles along major freight routes, starting with the Scandinavian-Mediterranean and North Sea-Baltic corridors. The programme is part of the commission’s industrial action plan for the European automotive sector, announced in March to support the transition to cleaner vehicles. Transport ministers from nine member states along the two corridors have endorsed the initiative.
Danish wind energy company Ørsted has published the prospectus for its DKr60bn ($9.5bn) rights issue, detailing sharp cuts to share prices. The company, half-owned by the Danish state, will sell 900.8mn shares at DKr66.60 each — a 67 per cent discount to the previous closing share price. A portion of the proceeds will cover additional funding needed to complete its 924 megawatt Sunrise Wind project off the New York coast, after its US developments were curtailed by the Trump administration.
French consumer protection group Consommation, Logement, Cadre de Vie, environmental advocacy federation France Nature Environment, and non-profit Client Earth are suing the government for failing to address illegal defeat devices exposed in the 2015 “dieselgate” scandal. The organisations have requested that the court recognises the French government’s failure to hold car manufacturers accountable, order recalls, and impose penalties of up to €50mn a semester if it does not comply. A ruling against France could open the door to similar cases across Europe.
The Geneva-headquartered World Trade Organization’s agreement on fisheries subsidies entered into force on September 15, after two-thirds of members ratified the deal. The agreement, which was adopted three years prior, prohibits subsidies for illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing, for fishing overfished stocks, and for unregulated high seas fishing.
The European Investment Bank has approved a €80mn loan to Spanish transport manufacturer Compañía Auxiliar de Ferrocarriles to advance digital systems, develop autonomous mobility solutions, and boost energy efficiency in Spain’s transport sector. It has also granted €70mn to French dairy co-operative Sodiaal to support further research and development into low-carbon farming practices and the sector’s energy transition.
The European Council has opened negotiations with Albania on its green and sustainable connectivity policies. The talks, marking the country’s sixth EU accession conference, centred around trans-European transport and energy networks, as well as environment and climate policies.
The council has adopted amendments to the EU’s cohesion policy funds — the Cohesion Fund, the European Social Fund Plus, the European Regional Development Fund and the Just Transition Fund. The changes aim to align investments with the bloc’s economic, social and geopolitical priorities, and its climate and environment targets.
UK
The UK government has announced a nuclear partnership with the US, which it said will accelerate the nuclear build-out in both countries. The deal was signed off as part of President Trump’s state visit to Britain. The agreement seeks to reduce the time needed for regulatory approval in both countries as reactors that have already been approved in one country can be fast-tracked in the other. The announcement also includes a string of nuclear deals between UK and US companies. For example, US group X-energy and British gas owner Centrica plan to build up to 12 advanced modular reactors in Hartlepool, in north-east England.
Climate minister Katie White gave a speech at the International Atomic Energy Agency’s 2025 general conference on Tuesday signalling the UK’s nuclear ambitions.
Data from energy analysis company Cornwall Insight warned that the large-scale nuclear reactor Sizewell C, being built in the UK, will add to businesses’ energy bills. Companies that use large amounts of electricity, but do not qualify for exemptions, will have to cover £200,000 of financing from 2026 under the Nuclear Regulated Asset Base model, used to fund new nuclear power stations. Currently, 500 of the biggest electricity users get a 60 per cent discount on bills, rising to 90 per cent next year. The analysis also found that investment to upgrade and develop new electricity cables will add a further £100,000 in costs for large businesses without exemptions, climbing to £250,000 by 2030. The combined effect of the charges will amounted to a roughly 5 per increase on energy bills.
In further nuclear news, local-level opposition groups have alleged that the government’s Nuclear Regulatory Taskforce is acting in the interests of the nuclear industry and risks weakening nuclear safety rules in the UK. The Stop Sizewell C group said in evidence submitted to a consultation by the task force that its proposals lack “credibility and rigour”, and serve to “undermine confidence in regulators and the UK’s nuclear regulatory regime”. The report also argued that framing nuclear regulators as being “slow, inefficient and costly” gives them undue blame for industry delays.
State-owned energy company Great British Energy has published a statement of its strategic priorities. The statement outlined what energy secretary Ed Miliband would like the company to deliver. GBE will act as a blended finance instrument intended to drive private investment in the energy transition, the statement confirmed.
The Department for Business and Trade has published guidance as part of its Growth Gateway programme aimed at increasing trade and investment between the UK and low and middle-income countries, with a focus on sustainability. The guidance covers topics including sustainability opportunities in Vietnam, solar irrigation investment in Africa, and financing green sectors in south-east Asia. The guidance has been written alongside consultancy the Boston Consulting Group.
US
The Environmental Protection Agency has proposed ending its greenhouse gas reporting programme, which covers around 8,000 facilities including oil and gas refineries and power plants. The agency said the mandatory collection of such data is unnecessary because it “has no material impact on improving human health and the environment” and is excessively costly for businesses. The move follows President Trump’s “unleashing American energy” executive order, and it will now go to public comment.
An Eighth Circuit judge has ordered the Securities and Exchange Commission to either defend, change or formally repeal its climate disclosure rule. The SEC has declined to defend the rule in court. To repeal it, the commission will need to reopen the rule to public comment, which lawyers said could take years.
Democratic Congress members of Illinois have written a letter to EPA administrator Lee Zeldin declaring their support for the endangerment finding and “deep concern” at the agency’s proposal to eliminate it. The 2009 endangerment finding saw the Supreme Court rule that GHGs are air pollutants subject to regulation under the Clean Air Act. In July, Zeldin proposed rescinding the finding. Nearly 200 members of Congress have spoken out in support of it.
Meanwhile, a report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine found it is “beyond scientific dispute” that human-caused emissions of GHGs harm public health and welfare in the US.
California Air Resources Board chair Liane Randolph will stand down on September 30, it was announced. State governor Gavin Newsom has named Lauren Sanchez, senior adviser to the governor for climate, as the next CARB chair. Sanchez will begin her new role on October 1 and will be leading the board when California’s mandatory climate disclosure rule becomes effective on January 1 2026.
Americas
Canada’s 2030 climate target is looking “out of reach” as emissions have flatlined, think-tank the Canadian Climate Institute warned this week. Emissions sat just 8.5 per cent below 2005 levels in 2024, while the country’s 2030 target requires a 40–45 per cent reduction from 2005 levels, data from the institute shows.
Asia-Pacific
The Australian government has published the long-awaited findings of its first National Climate Risk Assessment. The 72-page report evaluates the risk of 10 “priority hazards” — such as flooding, drought, extreme heat and bushfires — against scenarios of 1.5C, 2C and 3C global warming. In plausible futures, these hazards will get worse, resulting in “compounding, cascading and concurrent” risks across the country, it said.
The Australian government has also published its 2035 target to reduce emissions by 62–70 per cent below 2005 levels by 2035. The goal acts as the country’s nationally determined contribution under the Paris Agreement.