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In 2020 wind turbines provided almost a quarter of electricity, and in EU renewable energy outperformed fossil fuels

The UK’s renewable electricity outpaced its fossil fuel generation for the first time in 2020 and could remain the largest source of electricity in the future, according to an independent climate thinktank.

The thinktank behind the report, Ember, revealed that renewable energy generated by wind, sunlight, water and wood made up 42% of the UK’s electricity last year compared with 41% generated from gas and coal plants together.

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High-integrity offsets and standardised over-the-counter contracts should factor into efforts to scale up the voluntary carbon market (VCM), according to a roadmap published Wednesday by UN climate finance envoy Mark Carney’s private-sector taskforce.

California minted just shy of 1 million new compliance offsets during its second issuance of the year, with an Oregon-based forestry project earning additional credits tagged as providing direct environmental benefits to the state (DEBs), according to data published by state regulator ARB on Wednesday. 

Emissions output under Nova Scotia’s cap-and-trade programme in 2019 slightly overshot the initial allowance budget, while the provincial environment ministry on Wednesday set the auction dates and floor price for the scheme’s two permit sales this year.

EUAs bounced back from below €33 for the second straight session on Wednesday, as a late hike in oil prices helped lift the energy complex, while data showed the number of new participants in the market continued to rise.

In a sharp 180-degree turn from the Trump administration, Joe Biden signed a series of executive orders to address the 'existential threat' of the climate crisis. Biden insisted his climate plan would create millions of new 'clean' jobs to replace those lost in the coal and oil industries

• Biden signals radical shift from Trump era with executive orders on climate change
• US politics live
  

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A raft of major new executive orders from Joe Biden's team adds another tonne of pressure onto Australia's stagnant government.

The post “It is cheaper to deal with climate crisis than to leave it:” Biden takes lead on Climate Day appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Labor to dump Mark Butler as its opposition to Morrison's inadequate climate and energy policies evaporates.

The post Butler dumped as Labor’s climate opposition collapses at a truly pivotal moment appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Oil and gas extraction will be paused and wind energy will expand under Joe Biden's climate plan.

More than 300 dogs in WA and the NT have tested positive to canine ehrlichiosis, a potentially fatal disease transmitted by ticks. Peter Irwin, Emeritus professor, Murdoch University Amanda Barbosa, Post-Doctoral Research Fellow, Murdoch University Charlotte Oskam, Senior lecturer, Murdoch University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

Expanding the scope of the EU ETS to bring in shipping emissions will require a gradual adaptation period for shipowners to get used to the new system, industry representatives said on Wednesday.

An elder European Commission policymaker credited with helping guide the development of the EU carbon market has moved on from the Directorate-General for Climate Action (DG CLIMA), Carbon Pulse has learned.

As HS2 protesters dig down in London, veteran activists explain why the tactic can be so effective

• HS2 protesters hope to occupy Euston tunnel for weeks

Protest tunnelling, back in the spotlight thanks to subterranean anti-HS2 demonstrations in London, became a national preoccupation in the 90s when environmental activists dug a complex series of tunnels in the path of an extension to the A30 in Fairmile, Devon, resisting attempts at eviction by police.

Swampy, the nickname of the well-known environmental activist Daniel Hooper, was one of a group of protesters demonstrating against rerouting the road, and spent seven days and nights in the tunnel. He was the last to emerge.

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US President Joe Biden (D) issued a suite of climate-related executive orders on Wednesday including directing a speedy revision of the nation’s Paris Agreement NDC this spring, an effort to jump start his environmental agenda amid a closely divided Congress.

The government faces legal action over its decision to allow the use of a pesticide that harms bees.

Drive to eradicate TB in cattle will instead focus on vaccination and limiting livestock movements

No new mass culls of badgers will be allowed in England after 2022, under government plans announced on Wednesday.

Since 2013 more than 100,000 badgers have been killed in culls that are intended to reduce tuberculosis infections in cattle. About 30,000 cattle are slaughtered each year at a cost of £150m.

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Scientists say sharks and rays are disappearing from the world's oceans at an "alarming" rate.

Increase in fishing since the 1970s has ravaged abundance of sharks and rays in oceans

The global population of sharks and rays has crashed by more than 70% in the past 50 years, researchers have determined for the first time, with massive ongoing losses pushing many species towards extinction.

A huge increase in fishing since 1970 has ravaged the abundance of sharks and rays in our oceans, with previously widespread species such as hammerhead sharks now facing the threat of being wiped out, the study found. Half of the world’s 31 oceanic shark species are now listed as either endangered or critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. The giant manta ray is also endangered.

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Scientists say temperatures globally at highest level since start of human civilisation

The planet is now hotter than it has been for at least 12,000 years, a period spanning the entire development of human civilisation, according to new research.

The analysis of ocean surface temperatures shows human-driven climate change has put the world in “uncharted territory”, the scientists say. The planet may even be at its warmest for 125,000 years, although data from that period is less certain.

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Campaigners say system risks becoming greenwashing exercise unless loopholes closed

The leaders of two UK environmental charities have written to Mark Carney, the UN climate envoy and former governor of the Bank of England, to raise concerns over a blueprint for carbon offsetting that could result in billions of new carbon credits being sold around the world.

Carney will present plans at the virtual Davos meeting of global business and political leaders on Wednesday evening for vast increases in the number of carbon offsets sold, aiming to expand the market from about $300m at present to between $50bn and $100bn a year.

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