Around The Web

New research shows nature started its long road to recovery in 2020 – especially in NSW and Victoria. But overall conditions across large swathes of the country remain poor. Albert Van Dijk, Professor, Water and Landscape Dynamics, Fenner School of Environment & Society, Australian National University Marta Yebra, Associate Professor in Environment and Engineering, Australian National University Shoshana Rapley, Research assistant, Australian National University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

Standard economic theory suggests solar exports shouldn't be taxed at all. Bruce Mountain, Director, Victoria Energy Policy Centre, Victoria University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

Governments have made some progress on pricing carbon from energy use, but the values are still well below estimates of the real cost to the planet, according to OECD analysis published on Tuesday.

EUAs rose for a third straight day on Tuesday as another strong auction continued to stoke bullish sentiment, while an analyst readout of early EU ETS data suggested emissions dropped by less than expected last year.

California Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) credits continued to fade this week to levels not seen since last spring, while market participants noted several reasons for a lack of trades further out on the curve in recent months.

Heatwaves to double and many properties will be uninsurable if global heating reaches 3C, Australian Academy of Science says

Global heating of 3C would more than double the number of annual heatwaves in some parts of Australia, leave properties uninsurable due to flood and fire risk, and make many of the country’s ecosystems “unrecognisable”, according to Australia’s leading scientists.

The Australian Academy of Science is calling on the Morrison government to accelerate the country’s transition to net zero greenhouse gas emissions in a report that examines what Australia could look like in a 3C world.

Continue reading...

Ship likely to be centre of protracted legal battle over what caused it to run aground in the Suez and who is to blame

After hauling its 220,000-ton bulk down the Suez canal a week after blocking the essential waterway, the Ever Given container ship is likely to become the centre of a protracted battle over who will pay for its rescue.

The 400-metre-long vessel was aground on the banks of the Suez canal for a week, causing an estimated £7bn loss each day in trade owing to ships stuck on either side, and up to £10.9m a day for the canal. “We managed to refloat the ship in record time. If such a crisis had occurred anywhere else in the world, it would have taken three months to be solved,” said Osama Rabie, the head of the Suez Canal Authority (SCA).

Continue reading...

The EU’s post-pandemic recovery fund could be spent better as many national plans have “missed opportunities” for low-carbon investments, a Brussels-based green group said on Tuesday.

Federal government should target net-zero emissions by 2050 as “absolute minimum,” new scientific report warns, to avoid potentially insurmountable challenges to Australia.

The post “Delay as dangerous as denial:” Australia faces devastating costs of climate inaction appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Calls for a moratorium on new coal mines, as a record number of new mine proposals lodged in 2020, despite a global decline in demand for coal.

The post Surge in new coal mine proposals in NSW triggers fresh calls for coal moratorium appeared first on RenewEconomy.

South Africa's government has proposed to tighten its 2030 emissions target by almost a third as part of a revised Paris Agreement pledge that sets out intentions for the export of correspondingly-adjusted carbon credits.

More than 2,200 power companies covered by China’s national emissions trading scheme will have to surrender allowances for their 2019 and 2020 CO2 emissions by Dec. 31, the government said Tuesday.

Federal Labor promises to slash EV taxes and fund community battery roll-out, in some of its first energy policies announced since the 2019 election.

The post Federal Labor promises to slash taxes for electric vehicles, build community batteries appeared first on RenewEconomy.

The early peak is thought to be linked to climate change as spring temperatures rise.

New study released after Guardian Seascape investigation shows drop in seafood mislabelling, but campaigners argue it uses less strict methodology

Canada’s food safety authority has announced improved monitoring to tackle seafood fraud, after a recent Guardian Seascape analysis found fish mislabelling to be widespread. However,environmental campaigners are concerned samples taken for a key report behind the announcement did not include restaurants and food services and used a less accurate methodology.

In its latest report, released on 24 March, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) said only 8% of the seafood it had sampled in the past two years was mislabelled, after new investments in food fraud reduction. It looked at 352 samples collected from domestic processors, importers and packaged fish at supermarkets in 2019 and 2020.

Continue reading...

The arrival of spring and the easing of lockdown has brought new optimism. Please don’t batter it into submission again

I went off spring for a while. When you’re a kid, spring is a time as thick and ripe with ritual as Halloween or Christmas – pancake day, then daffodils, becoming very obsessed with lambs being born for some reason, then Easter itself, where your school takes a brief trip to a local church (“That guy got murdered, look! That guy got murdered in the gothest way possible. Anyway, here’s some chocolate – ”), and then sunlight ripples through the cold and you forage in the garden for Easter eggs. But in adulthood my springtime has basically just been “finding out what wacky flavour of hot cross bun Aldi has invented this year” and “arguing with my housemates about why the fluted special edition mug they got with their Yorkie Easter egg does not deserve pride of place in a carefully curated mug cupboard that features many, many stouter and superior mugs”. The dazzle, it’s safe to say, was gone.

Related: Foreign holidays are out for Britons this year. But is that such a bad thing? | Gaby Hinsliff

Continue reading...

Drastic steps taken to protect the Sierra Nevada’s 600 bighorn sheep after another charismatic species developed a taste for them

In order to save one endangered species, California scientists are having to relocate another iconic creature that is, regrettably, eating it.

The California department of fish and wildlife is in the process of moving mountain lions over 100 miles away from struggling populations of bighorn sheep, which are unique to the Sierra Nevada mountains. The herbivores were first listed as endangered in 1999, when their population was estimated at only 125 individuals, according to researchers.

Continue reading...

Exclusive: scientists write to ministers and supreme court over recent ruling in Heathrow case

Prominent scientists and lawyers have said the UK government’s decision to ignore the Paris climate agreement when deciding on major infrastructure projects undermines its presidency of UN climate talks this year.

The experts – including the former Nasa scientist Jim Hansen, the former UK government chief scientist Sir David King and the economist Prof Jeffrey Sachs – have written to ministers and the supreme court about a recent ruling that the government need not take the UK’s obligations under the treaty into account when setting policy, made in a case concerning the proposed expansion of Heathrow airport.

Continue reading...

It’s time to come out of our bubbles and challenge the way the government is approaching the environmental crisis

I became an adult during the pandemic. Because of that, it was a pretty pitiful affair compared with the intoxication of what an 18th birthday is meant to be. Turning 18 is always going to be scary, but it is especially in a society that renders adulthood as something repellently formal.

To be an adult is to be civilised. Or so I’ve been taught. Wilderness is an antonym for civilisation. Since we see “civilised” as being a desirable trait, where does that put “wild”? We look at a soppy dog by a fireplace or a flock of compliant sheep and brand them domesticated, smug in our role as domesticator, not realising that humans are perhaps the most domesticated species of all, with 75% of young people spending more time indoors than prison inmates.

Continue reading...

As Elon Musk demonstrates, the story of Bitcoin isn’t a sideshow to climate; it’s a central force that could drag down the accelerating pace of positive change.

The post Bitcoin is a mouth hungry for fossil fuels appeared first on RenewEconomy.