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Approval of 800MW Vineyard Wind is first step in Biden Administration's goal of 30GW of installed capacity of offshore wind power by 2030.

The post Biden approves first major offshore wind farm in US appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Morrison government will spend $5.4m creating parks in an area more than twice the size of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park

Australia is adding an area of the Indian Ocean bigger than France to its network of marine parks in an attempt to keep out international fishing boats and promote scientific discovery in two biodiversity hotspots.

The Morrison government announced $5.4m would be spent to create two marine parks around Christmas Island and the Cocos (Keeling) Islands covering 740,000 sq km – a huge expanse of ocean almost as large as the state of New South Wales.

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Power and industry will face the highest increase in ambition under Germany’s amended Climate Change Act adopted on Wednesday, though analysts believe the impact on EU carbon allowance demand can only be determined once the bloc’s carbon market reforms are undertaken.

Spanish utility Iberdrola reported a 25.5% drop in its remaining EU ETS-covered generation in Q1 on Wednesday, continuing its rapid decarbonisation and diminishing need for carbon allowances.

Almost 380 million more carbon allowances will be withdrawn from the EU ETS through next summer and inserted into the MSR, the European Commission announced late Wednesday in its annual 'TNAC' update, with the market's oversupply increasing by 14% last year largely due to the pandemic.

Exclusive: Thinning indicates profound impact of humans and could affect satellites and GPS

Humanity’s enormous emissions of greenhouse gases are shrinking the stratosphere, a new study has revealed.

The thickness of the atmospheric layer has contracted by 400 metres since the 1980s, the researchers found, and will thin by about another kilometre by 2080 without major cuts in emissions. The changes have the potential to affect satellite operations, the GPS navigation system and radio communications.

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The UK must risk an in-person meeting in Glasgow if this crucial climate conference is to be a success

Walkouts, standoffs, shouting, tears, bloodletting – the UN climate Cops have seen it all. The annual meetings, in which all countries bar a few failed states take part, under the 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), are the only global forum for discussing the future of the planet. They have veered between triumph and disaster, marked by dramatic and sometimes traumatic moments. At their best they can be momentous events, shifting the world’s response to the climate crisis into a higher gear, as at the landmark Paris Cop in 2015.

This year’s 26th conference of the parties, postponed from last year because of Covid-19 and shaded by the pandemic, will be different. Scheduled to take place in Glasgow in November, these will be the most important talks since 2015. At Cop26, countries will lay out their plans for curbing greenhouse gas emissions this decade – probably the last decade in which we still have a chance of limiting global heating to 1.5C, beyond which corals bleach, low-lying islands face inundation and extreme weather will take hold.

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California’s WCI-linked cap-and-trade floor price is on pace to rise above $19.00 next year as inflation surged over April amid easing of COVID-19 restrictions across the US, according to federal data released Wednesday.

EUAs continued their record-breaking run early on Wednesday, with prices jumping to just shy of €55 after a strong pre-holiday auction and as investors inflows continued to build.

DuPont and Daikin, manufacturers of ‘short chain’ PFAS, did not inform regulator the FDA negative results of tests on animals

Chemical giants DuPont and Daikin knew the dangers of a PFAS compound widely used in food packaging since 2010, but hid them from the public and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), company studies obtained by the Guardian reveal.

The chemicals, called 6:2 FTOH, are now linked to a range of serious health issues, and Americans are still being exposed to them in greaseproof pizza boxes, carryout containers, fast-food wrappers, and paperboard packaging.

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Addressing the climate crisis will be the greatest undertaking in the history of humankind. We have to give it all we have

Joe Biden wants to cut US emissions in half from their 2005 levels. However, since emissions have been slowly declining since then, this amounts to only a 37% drop from 2020 levels.

That, in a nutshell, is the issue. Our leaders are adhering to a template that doesn’t meet the urgency of the moment. The US is not even the world’s largest emitter any more, and China – the biggest polluter – seeks to build more coal-fired power plants, failing to reach carbon neutrality until 2060. Unfortunately, that is a perfect illustration of just how disconnected we are from the gravity of the situation.

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Fed by myths, fairytales and Disney, America’s demonization of wolves has been going on for centuries, and continues full throttle

Nothing embodies wildness like wolves, our four-legged shadow, the dogs that long ago refused our campfire and today prefer freedom and risk over the soft sofa and short leash. The dogs that howl more than bark, add music to the land, and – if left alone to work their magic – make entire ecosystems healthy and whole.

Related: Idaho bill seeks to kill more than 1,000 wolves

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Soil underpins Australia's economy – yet since Europeans arrived, the natural asset has steadily been degraded. A new national plan aims to change that. Vanessa Wong, Associate professor, Monash University Luke Mosley, Associate Professor, University of Adelaide Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

Growatt has won an 'All Quality Matters' award for the outstanding performance of its ARK battery in the organisation's PVE Test Program.

The post Growatt’s ARK battery wins ‘All Quality Matters’ award appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Licences given to arms firm Lockheed Martin said to go against government’s stance on exploiting seabed

Deep-sea mining exploration licences granted by the British government are “riddled with inaccuracies”, and could even be unlawful, according to Greenpeace and Blue Marine Foundation, a conservation charity.

The licences, granted a decade ago to UK Seabed Resources, a subsidiary of the US arms multinational Lockheed Martin, have only recently been disclosed by the company.

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Survey of 800 cities around world finds almost 43% do not even have plan to adapt to impacts of global heating

One in four cities around the world lack the money to protect themselves against the ravages of climate breakdown, even though more than 90% are facing serious risks, according to research.

Cities are facing problems with flooding, overheating, water shortages, and damage to their infrastructure from extreme weather, which is growing more frequent as the climate changes. A survey of 800 cities, carried out by the Carbon Disclosure Project, found that last year about 43% of them, representing a combined population of 400 million people, did not have a plan to adapt to the climate crisis.

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ESB chair says not to worry about when coal plants might close, because they're already going broke.

The post “They’re going broke”, ESB chair says coal plant closures now unavoidable appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Solar photovoltaic pioneer Professor Martin Green says solar module prices will continue to plummet, reaching 10 US cents per watt by 2023.

The post More solar price falls will lead to “insanely cheap” electricity by 2023 appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Clean Energy Regulator officially declares that the RET is met, as new wind and solar delivered more than 33,000GWh in the 12 months to late January.

The post Australia officially met renewable target in January, despite big project delays appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Australia will spend A$280 million ($219 mln) over the next decade to buy carbon credits from large industrial facilities cutting emissions below their Safeguard Mechanism baselines.