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Green manifesto for 2050 includes measures for transport and clean energy but could put islands on a path to confrontation with Madrid

The Balearic islands’ government has launched a pioneering plan to phase out greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, potentially setting itself on a collision course with the Spanish government.

Under the green manifesto, new diesel cars will be taken off the car market in Ibiza, Majorca, Menorca and Formentera from 2025 – the same year that all street and road lighting will be replaced by LEDs.

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But the networks need to improve reporting on climate events unrelated to Trump

In 2016, US TV network news coverage of climate change plummeted. News coverage was focused on the presidential election, but the corporate broadcast networks didn’t air a single segment informing viewers how a win by Trump or Hillary Clinton could affect climate change or climate policy. That followed a slight drop in news coverage of climate change in 2015, despite that year being full of critical events like the Paris climate accords, Clean Power Plan, and record-breaking heat.

The good news is that the annual analysis done by Media Matters for America found that in 2017, network news coverage of climate change soared.

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Eggs laid by white-letter hairstreak found on elm trees in Berwickshire

The microscopic eggs of an endangered butterfly have been found in Scotland, suggesting the insect has returned to breed in the country for the first time in more than 130 years.

Lepidopterists discovered white-letter hairstreak eggs on wych elm trees at Lennel, Berwickshire, this month after an adult butterfly was spotted last summer 10 miles away – the first sighting in Scotland since 1884.

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Officials say Kavous Seyed Emami used endangered Asiatic cheetah surveys as pretext for spying, but no evidence has been cited

UN officials have urged the Iranian government to respect the work of environmental activists following the death in custody last week of wildlife campaigner, Kavous Seyed Emami.

Emami was buried on Monday, but several members of the organisation he founded, the Persian Wildlife Heritage Foundation, remain in jail and the deputy head of the Environmental Protection Organisation, Kaveh Madani, was detained for 72 hours over the weekend.

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Crook, County Durham: A steady rain of shredded petals settles daily on the flagstone path

A family of bullfinches, Pyrrhula pyrrhula, started to visit our winter-flowering cherry in early December, soon after it began to bloom, and they have returned almost every day. I planted the tree about two decades ago and now its crown is level with the bedroom windows, offering opportunities to watch these shy birds at close quarters. They come to feed on its seemingly inexhaustible supply of flower buds that will last until spring.

Bullfinches’ passion for fruit tree flower buds led to their persecution by orchard owners, though they are equally fond of hawthorn for most of the year. The 19th-century parson-naturalist Francis Orpen Morris even had a theory that their name was a corruption of budfinch, “the word bud being pronounced in the vulgate of the north of England, as if spelled ‘bood’.”

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Status of northern hairy-nosed wombat, central rock-rat, numbat and Christmas Island shrew upgraded in latest threatened species list

Four mammals – including the northern hairy-nosed wombat and the numbat – have been upgraded to endangered or critically endangered on the updated Australian threatened species list published on Thursday.

The northern hairy-nosed wombat (Lasiorhinus krefftii) has been steadily contracting its range to a single area within Queensland’s Epping Forest national park, 855km north-west of Brisbane.

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Coalition gives no indication of changing emissions targets, but wants five years' notice, and may use offsets. ESB flags potential use of auctions for reliability mechanism and greater use of demand response. It might not even be needed.

Origin results tell similar tale to AGL - a big utility making money out of rising prices, and battling a backlash from consumers.

New Climate Council report highlights growing number of large scale energy storage projects being rolled out across the east and west coast grids.

Demand tariffs are controversial, but if properly done they could work for everyone. We just need the network owners to do the right thing.

IEA warns Australia not to miss the importance of solar, although it does suggest that Australia waste more money on CCS.

Solar windows would need to trap enough light to generate power, while letting through enough to keep buildings light. Thankfully, newly developed semitransparent cells offer to do just that. Matthew Wright, Postdoctoral Researcher in Photovoltaic Engineering, UNSW Mushfika Baishakhi Upama, PhD student [Photovoltaics & Renewable Energy Engineering], UNSW Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

Origin is earning itself the right to grow by performing better, but the trick will be to sell the interest in APLNG in the next few years, and to replace Eraring with competitive dispatchable renewable generation.

The project will generate revenue to UGL of approximately $170 million and is due to commence in early 2018, with power generation to the grid expected in 2019.

The Hon. Lily D’Ambrosio MP, Victoria’s Minister for Energy, Environment and Climate Change, today visited ACCIONA’s under-construction Mt Gellibrand wind farm.

The record-breaking n-type mono-crystalline silicon solar cell was fabricated on a large-sized industrial phosphorous-doped Cz Silicon substrate with a low-cost industrial IBC process, featuring conventional tube doping technologies and fully screen-printed metallization.

Winning photos from the Underwater Photographer of the Year competition

Shark diving is helping tourists improve their perception about the largest predatory fish in the world.

The Minister has approved the inclusion of 19 species, transfer of 8 species, removal of 2 species and retention of 3 species in their current category in the EPBC Act list of threatened species. He also found 3 species ineligible for listing.

A car launched by Elon Musk could stay in space for millions of years before hitting Earth or Venus.