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The breaking news is that, after one of the most divisive US Presidential campaigns in history, Donald Trump will be the next US President.

“The American people will wake up tomorrow morning shaking their heads when they learn that a small group of radical Republican house members is trying to block a serious law enforcement investigation of potential fraud at Exxon.”

The political and regulatory fall-out from the crude by rail crash in the Colombia River Gorge earlier this month is still continuing.

Great news for those fighting Big Oil in the Arctic, as after spending a whopping $2.5 billion for drilling rights in US Arctic waters, oil companies such as Shell and ConocoPhillips have quietly relinquished their rights to some 2.2 million acres.

Every day, it seems, brings more bad news for the fossil fuel industry. The week started badly with the news that they US coal giant Arch Coal, which owns the world’s biggest coal-mining complex, was filing for bankruptcy.

Obama may be talking the climate change talk in Paris, but back home the Republican Party (GOP) is doing everything in its power to make sure there is no deal.

To start with one huge, massive, significant step forward. Victories do not come sweeter than this. After years of campaigning by millions of people from grass-roots activists, First Nations, farmers and ranchers to environmental groups such as Oil Change International, Sierra Club, 350.org and many others, President Obama announced on Friday that the controversial Keystone XL (KXL) pipeline is dead.

Just as the Republicans seemed to be gaining a head of steam in their efforts to overturn America’s decades-old crude export ban, the White House has announced it would veto any proposals.

If nothing else, President Obama’s energy and climate policy is certainly contradictory. Although desperate to have a positive legacy, he has recently been criticised for allowing Shell to drill for oil in the Arctic just days before visiting the Arctic himself to warn about climate change.

President Obama’s Arctic tour continues to make global news. Yesterday Obama, who has become the first President to visit the Alaskan Arctic, warned that “Climate change is no longer some far-off problem; it is happening here, it is happening now.”