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Plastic toys are convenient and cheap but they can be bad for the environment.

Australian rooftop solar installations surge to new records, but as we reveal on this podcast some big retailers are making significant sales without the means to install the panels.

The post Solar Insiders Podcast: Record installations, phantom sales, and the demise of the roof monkey appeared first on RenewEconomy.

AECOM has been appointed by Octopus Investments and Edify Energy as their project manager and technical advisor for the $450 million 333MWp Darlington Point Solar Farm.

The post AECOM appointed to project manager and technical advisor role on the Darlington Point Solar Farm in New South Wales appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Morrison's loopy campaign against EVs may turn out to be his Prince Philip moment, when it dawns on the public that the entire government is locked in the past.

The post Electric vehicles: Could this be Scott Morrison’s Prince Philip moment? appeared first on RenewEconomy.

New Zealand’s gross GHG emissions rose 2.2% in 2017, government data showed Thursday, sparking fresh vows from Climate Change Minister James Shaw to reform the nation’s emissions trading scheme and put in place legislation to bring carbon output to zero by mid-century.

Controversial coalmine still faces hurdles including seven plan approvals, court challenges and royalties negotiations

On Tuesday the government approved the groundwater plan for Adani’s Carmichael coalmine in central Queensland. It’s the latest development in the long fight over the mine proposals, which environmental campaigners have turned into a landmark decision on Australia’s climate change policies. Here’s what the latest decision means for the mine’s prospects.

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Australian researchers are developing short-term weather forecasts for solar farms to help them precisely predict output as little as five minutes in advance.

The post Five-minute forecasting to boost solar and wind and battery investments appeared first on RenewEconomy.

If you think a Labor win will end the climate and renewables scare campaign, think again. But there's hope, in the form of a new, open economic modelling platform.

The post Call this a scare campaign? It’s nothing compared to what we will see, post election appeared first on RenewEconomy.

A daily summary of our news plus bite-sized updates from around the world.

Scott Morrison says ‘Bill Shorten can’t explain what his policies mean to Australians’, but car manufacturers are all moving towards electric vehicles

Hyundai Motor Group says it will sell every electric vehicle it brings to Australia and has “no fear” of the market changing in order to cut carbon pollution.

The carmaker has responded to the political commentary of recent days, which included the prime minister Scott Morrison claiming Labor’s electric vehicle target was a threat to Australians who like to drive SUVs.

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Grants of up to £100,000 available to increase number of drop-off points and cut waste

A £1m fund to help expand and improve paper cup recycling facilities across the UK will be launched on Thursday by the coffee giant Starbucks and environmental charity Hubbub.

Local authorities, recycling companies and social enterprises will be invited to bid for grants of up to £100,000 on behalf of their communities to create at least 10 large-scale recycling programmes.

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European carbon prices shot to their highest in almost 11 years on Wednesday, as speculative buying was fuelled by rising gas prices and indications that Brexit was poised for a longer extension.

California issued more than 646,000 California Carbon Offsets (CCOs) across six projects, and forestry projects made up a bulk of the new issuances, regulator data showed Wednesday.

Equivalent of 11,000 new cases a day occur worldwide due to toxic air from traffic, researchers say

Four million children develop asthma every year as a result of air pollution from cars and trucks, equivalent to 11,000 new cases a day, a landmark study has found.

Most of the new cases occur in places where pollution levels are already below the World Health Organization limit, suggesting toxic air is even more harmful than thought.

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A rise in voluntary market issuances over the past year could signal that entities are preparing for the start of multiple international emissions trading regimes in the next decade, but some cautioned there still may be too much risk to engage in early purchasing.

The world is on the brink of creating irreversible damage to the environment if better policy isn't rolled out. Read the findings of the UN report. Pedro Fidelman, Senior research fellow, The University of Queensland Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

The most sensitive search to date for the gas that might signal life on the Red Planet draws a blank.

There's a new addition to the family tree: an extinct species of human that's been found in the Philippines.

Research has thrown up 600 new cancer vulnerabilities and each could be the target of a drug.

European carbon prices skyrocketed to a new 10-year high near €27 on Wednesday, but a poll of analysts showed a consensus view that EUAs will come back down to earth in the near term.