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The new Office for Environmental Protection will have similar enforcement powers to EU regulators.

Australia is facing an increase in extreme heat, fire danger weather, floods and marine heatwaves, according to the latest biennial snapshot from the Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO. Michael Grose, Climate Projections Scientist, CSIRO Lynette Bettio, Australian Bureau of Meteorology Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

But Green groups say proposals will mean weaker protection for nature after UK leaves EU

A new post-Brexit green watchdog will be able to sue the government over environmental failings, according to new plans set out by Michael Gove. However, campaign groups have questioned the independence of the body because the chairperson and budget will be decided by the environment secretary.

The establishment of the watchdog is part of the draft environment bill, which also puts principles such as “the polluter pays” into legal guidance, but only requires ministers to consider them. The bill, the first for 20 years, makes it a legal requirement for the government to have a long-term environment plan and report on progress to parliament each year.

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California and Quebec will auction off an estimated 42.6 million allowances at 2019 auctions with consignment and unsold volume increasing the total amount offered at the quarterly sales, state data shows.

The Indigenous rangers in this Cape York national park are driven by their love of country and deep satisfaction to be finally back on their homelands

• My favourite national park: tell us why it’s important to you
  

It’s 8am and the Indigenous women rangers of Lama Lama national park are rounding up the younger rangers and casual workers for the day’s fencing. It’s a huge undertaking: kilometres of fencing to keep the cattle and pigs out of the more sensitive areas of the vast national park that hugs the pristine Princess Charlotte Bay, midway up Cape York in far north Queensland.

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State of the climate report points to a long-term increase in the frequency of extreme heat events, fire weather and drought

Australia is experiencing more extreme heat, longer fire seasons, rising oceans and more marine heatwaves consistent with a changing climate, according to the Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO’s state of the climate report.

The report, published every two years, measures the long-term variability and trends observed in Australia’s climate.

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The US space agency says cyber-thieves may have compromised two of its computer servers.

The UK government has confirmed that it will not hold any EUA auctions in Q1 2019, regardless of the outcome of Brexit negotiations.

The Shanghai municipal government released the 2018 allocation plan for its emissions trading scheme, slightly adjusting upwards the programme’s CO2 cap but keeping the system largely unchanged ahead of the national cap-and-trade launch.

Devil’s ivy with synthetic animal gene inserted helped reduce benzene and chloroform levels

A humble houseplant with a dash of rabbit DNA could help lower our exposure to indoor air pollution, new research suggests.

Scientists have revealed that by inserting a rabbit gene into devil’s ivy (Epipremnum aureum) the plant is able to clean the surrounding air by breaking down chemicals such as benzene and chloroform, which in certain concentrations can harm health.

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EU lawmakers early on Wednesday agreed on reforms to the bloc’s power market that will end coal subsidies from 2025, paving the way for a full phase-out of the fuel.

Stay of execution for coal subsidies has been heavily criticised by climate analysts

An EU deal to slowly phase out coal subsidies is “completely inconsistent” with the bloc’s Paris climate agreement commitments, analysts say.

Marathon negotiations ended early on Wednesday with a benchmark CO2 emissions standard of 550 grams per kWh for all European power plants by 2025. But coal-dependent Poland secured a loophole allowing countries another year to negotiate new “capacity mechanisms” that would be exempted from the deadline.

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Emitters in the New Zealand ETS should pay the fixed price option for 2018 instead of surrendering permits, brokers OM Financial said Wednesday, in a recommendation that could keep up to 34 million NZUs in the system next year.

Ministers setting limits for 2019 accused of ignoring scientific advice on overfishing

Fisheries ministers meeting in Brussels to decide EU quotas for next year have set some stocks within levels scientists deem sustainable but left many others vulnerable to overfishing.

The ministers also said there would be a review of the planned ban on the discarding of edible fish at sea, which could, in effect, mean the wasteful practice is allowed to continue despite an eight-year battle to end it.

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A recently revoked Australian energy efficiency project could add annual demand of upwards of 500,000 tCO2e to meet its contractual obligations to the Emissions Reduction Fund (ERF), stretching the country's small secondary offset market to the limits of its capacity and likely pushing up prices in the process.

In our new column about the American south and climate change, we go towards Christians who have been resistant to ideas of environmental stewardship - perhaps it’s a message they need to hear in their own terms

I was, frankly, nervous about speaking to people of faith in the south about climate change. I wrestled with my own preconceived notions and past experiences, and was surprised when conversations took inspiring, if not transcendent, turns.

Secular as I am now, I still think fondly of my childhood minister, Dr Lehman, who loved college basketball and Honda Accords (he drove 13 of them during his lifetime). At the conclusion of each Lakeside Baptist service, he’d call the eastern North Carolina congregation to action.

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Australia’s federal government on Wednesday dismissed a push from the New South Wales state energy minister to put a carbon emissions obligation back into the national energy strategy.

The entrepreneur says his system will see modified electric cars travel at high speed underground.

Court hears department and VicForests have not protected minimum area of old-growth forest required by law in East Gippsland

Logging in old-growth forests in Victoria should cease, according to testimony from the Victorian environment department in a court battle over logging in East Gippsland.

The Fauna and Flora Research Collective is pursuing VicForests and the Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning in the supreme court.

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NSW Coalition energy minister slams federal government's continued refusal to restore emissions component of the National Energy Guarantee, vows to continue to fight for the "critical matter."

The post NSW slams federal Coalition over “extraordinary” refusal to reinstate emissions in NEG appeared first on RenewEconomy.