Record Breaking Day for Renewable Energy Generation
On Wednesday 22nd April, Great Britain’s electricity grid ran on a record-breaking 98.8% zero-carbon energy, for a short period between 15:30 and 16:00, surpassing the previous record of 97.7% set in April 2025.
Gas usage sank to a historic low, making up just 1.2% of the energy mix, meaning that virtually all of Britain’s twenty-eight million homes and five million businesses were being powered by clean energy for the half hour period. Over 50% came from wind, 34.4% from nuclear, 9.8% from biomass, 2.2% from solar, 1.5% from hydro and the remaining 0.8% from batteries, which store generated zero-carbon energy when generation exceeds demand.
This record shows that Britan’s electricity can be safely and securely run on clean energy. In addition, as well as an overall zero-carbon record, April 2026 also saw solar generation reaching new highs on two consecutive days.
Researchers Develop Battery Recycling with Carbon Capture
Researchers have developed a new battery recycling with carbon capture that not only recovers valuable battery materials more efficiently but also captures carbon dioxide during the process.
Demand for batteries is rising rapidly, as electric vehicles, renewable energy systems and electronics expand worldwide. But with this growth comes a challenge; what do we do with the millions of batteries once they reach the end of their life?
Battery recycling with carbon capture is a new approach to manage this surge in waste. Traditional battery recycling methods can be energy intensive and rely on harsh chemicals to extract the materials, such as lithium, cobalt and nickel, generating emissions and environmental impacts which can partially offset the climate benefits of using batteries in the first place. But battery recycling with carbon capture is a new method which uses a pressurised mixture of carbon dioxide and water, instead of harsh chemicals, to recover materials from the used batteries.
Using this new approach, researchers recovered about 95% of the lithium contained in the batteries. The remaining metals in the batteries, such as cobalt, manganese and nickel, are transformed into useful catalysts that can help produce green hydrogen fuel, another important technology for reducing carbon emissions.
Improved and efficient battery recycling is a critically important part of making the entire battery lifecycle more sustainable as recovering metals reduces the need to mine new materials, which has significant environmental impacts such as land disturbance, water use and greenhouse gas emissions. Battery recycling with carbon capture offers a way to support a more circular economy by reintroducing recovered materials from used batteries into the battery manufacturing supply chain. At the same time, capturing carbon during recycling helps reduce associated emissions.
Early results are promising and researchers are taking the next step to refine and scale the process.
Europe Named Fastest-Warming Continent in Latest Climate Change Report
The United Nations (UN) released a joint report with the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) in April 2026 which states that Europe is the fastest-warming continent, with nearly all of Europe experiencing above-average annual temperatures in 2025.
Hot and dry conditions across Europe in 2025 fuelled more frequent and intense wildfires, burning over 2.5 million acres of land, caused below average annual flows for 70% of Europe’s rivers and impacted snow cover, which feel by nearly 30%.
The report highlights that climate change is not a future threat but a present reality and evidences the need for more urgent action to be taken.
Winners of the 2026 Goldman Environmental Prize Announced
Six grassroot environmental activists from around the world have been awarded the Goldman Environmental Prize in honour of their work to fight climate change and improve biodiversity:
- Iroro Tanshi (Nigeria) – rediscovered the endangered short-tailed roundleaf bat and has been working to save its habitat, the Alfi Mountain Wildlife Sanctuary, from human-induced wildfires through a community-led campaign.
- Borim Kim (South Korea) – started the Youth 4 Climate Action organisation and won a ruling that the South Korean government’s climate policy violated the constitutional rights of future generations, the first successful youth-led climate litigation in Asia.
- Sarah Finch (UK) – fought oil drilling in South-Eastern England for more than a decade, alongside the Weald Action Group, securing the ‘Finch ruling’ from the Supreme Court in June 2024 that authorities must consider fossil fuels’ impacts on the global climate before granting permission to extract them. This legal precedent has already stopped the development of subsequent fossil fuel extraction projects across the UK.
- Theonila Roka Matbob (Papua New Guinea) – led a successful campaign that saw the world’s second-largest mining company agree to address environmental and social devastation caused by its Panguna copper mine. Despite having abandoned the site 35 years ago, the company didn’t formally acknowledge the wide range of harms the mine has caused and begin address the urgent risks until this campaign.
- Alannah Acaq Hurley (US) – led a campaign, acting on behalf of 15 tribal nations, to stop a mega copper and gold mining project (what would have been North America’s largest open-pit mine) that threatened ecosystems in Alaska’s Bristol Bay region. The victory safeguards Bristol Bay and its greater watershed, encompassing 25 million acres of wilderness, rivers and wetland and home to the largest wild salmon runs in the world.
- Yuvelis Morales Blanco (Colombia) – after a major spill in 2018 forced the relocation of dozens of local families and killed thousands of animals, Yuvelis took on some of the world’s biggest oil companies to successfully stop the introduction of commercial fracking into Colombia.
Learn more about the current and past winners of the Goldman Environmental Prize here: https://www.goldmanprize.org/all-winners/