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Climate scientists believe that if Greenland continues to rapidly melt, tens of millions of people around the world could face yearly flooding and displacement by 2030

Many people believed he couldn’t do it. Ski across the Greenland ice sheet, a vast, unmapped, high-elevation plateau of ice and snow? Madness.

But Fridtjof Nansen, a young Norwegian, proved them wrong. In 1888, he and his small party went light and fast, unlike two large expeditions a few years before. And unlike the others, Nansen traveled from east to west, giving himself no option of retreat to a safe base. It would be forward or die trying. He did it in seven weeks, man-hauling his supplies and ascending to 8,900ft (2,700 meters) elevation, where summertime temperatures dropped to -49F (-45C).

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Last year, there were a record 227 killings globally. It is our duty to keep resisting the insatiable forces that led to their deaths

Each year, we learn more about the climate crisis. The data flows: ever-rising heat, unprecedented deforestation, record rainfall. And once a year, we also learn more about the human impact of the crisis too, as data is released on the killings of land and environmental activists, the very people highlighting and protesting at the breakdown of our climate. In 2020, that number rose to a record 227 killings worldwide.

Every time, the data hits me like a blow to the face. I’ve spent much of my life as an environmental activist and journalist, and so if I haven’t actually met the people sadly on this list, I’ve met hundreds exactly like them. Strong local people, attached to place and community, seeing their role in defending terrain and ancestral territory. Every person like this around the world is at risk.

And they are at risk, in the end, not so much because of another local person who pulls the trigger or plunges the blade; they’re at risk because they find themselves living on or near something that some corporation is demanding. Like Fikile Ntshangase, the South African grandmother who led a spirited campaign against a coalmine in KwaZulu-Natal province and was shot dead in her home last year. Or Óscar Eyraud Adams, the indigenous activist who, during Mexico’s worst drought in 30 years, vocally advocated for his community’s right to water, as the authorities denied them and granted corporations ever more permits. Oscar was shot dead in Tecate last September.

The demand for the highest possible profit, the quickest possible timeline, the cheapest possible operation, seems to translate eventually into the understanding, somewhere, that the troublemaker must go. The blame rarely if ever makes its way back up to a corporation’s HQ. But it should. Especially since the people who inhabit these places never really share in the riches produced there: colonialism is still running strong, even if it’s dressed up with corporate logos or hidden with offshore bank accounts.

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A new fund launched on Monday that aims to invest in forest planting on marginal land in New Zealand to profit from the nation’s rapidly rising carbon price.

Rooftop solar sends operational demand to a record low in NSW, the state grid with the heaviest dependence on coal.

The post Rooftop solar sends minimum demand to record low in coal dependent NSW appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Water companies let raw sewage into English waters more than 400,000 times in 2020, Environment Agency data reveals

One of the first complaints lodged with the post-Brexit environmental watchdog accuses the government and Ofwat of failing to enforce the law to stop water companies from routinely discharging raw sewage into rivers.

The office for environmental protection (OEP) is being asked to investigate why water companies have been able to continually fail to meet duties placed on them by law to treat sewage. The secretary of state for the environment, George Eustice, and the financial regulator, Ofwat, had failed to enforce the law, the complaint said.

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Australian and global oil and gas companies continue to pour huge amount of investment growing their production, defying global climate targets, new report finds.

The post Australian and global fossil fuel giants make $1 trillion bet against global climate efforts appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Australian solar start-up founded in a garage and backed by billionaire investors included Mike Cannon-Brookes, claims new world solar efficiency record.

The post Australian solar innovator backed by Cannon-Brookes claims world efficiency record appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Tesla calls for storage target of 20GW to help ensure enough dispatchable capacity is build to support a grid dominated by wind and solar.

The post Tesla calls for a 20 gigawatt storage target for Australia appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Labor's coal contrarian Joel Fitzgibbon to leave parliament, just as Albanese promises to be in lockstep with the US on climate policy.

The post Fitzgibbon’s departure will free Albanese to take climate fight to Morrison appeared first on RenewEconomy.

A 'megapod' of about 150 humpback whales has been filmed feeding off the New South Wales coast near Bermagui. This is believed to be the second time a pod of this size has been filmed in Australian waters. Footage courtesy of Sapphire Coastal Adventures and David Rogers

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China will develop a futures market for carbon in a bid to establish more funding channels for emissions cuts, said an official statement from the nation’s Cabinet, which also indicated a potential expansion in the types of projects that could be eligible to generate offsets for the national emissions trading scheme.

Another carbon trader has left BP to join a recently established emissions desk in Singapore, operated by a major commodity trading house.

Epuron moves forward with what would be the biggest wind farm in northern Queensland, close to what was the state's only wind farm for nearly 20 years.

The post Epuron pushes forward with huge wind farm in north Queensland appeared first on RenewEconomy.

More than 220 environment and land rights activists were murdered last year, according to a report.

Wind, solar and tidal projects will compete for contracts, including funding for onshore schemes

Renewable energy developers will compete for a share in a £265m subsidy pot as the government aims to support a record number of projects in the sector through a milestone subsidy scheme later this year.

Under the scheme, offshore wind developers will compete for contracts worth up to £200m a year, and onshore wind and solar farms will be in line for their first subsidies in more than five years.

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Figures from Global Witness for 2020 show violent resource grab continued unabated despite pandemic

Murders of environment and land defenders hit a record high last year as the violent resource grab in the global south continued unabated despite the pandemic.

New figures released by Global Witness show that 227 people were killed in 2020 while trying to protect forests, rivers and other ecosystems that their livelihoods depended on.

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UK policies will deliver a quarter of emissions cuts needed, say campaigners ahead of the COP26 summit.

Roaming pet cats can kill more than 180 animals each year. But most people who keep cats inside do so for the welfare of their pet. Lily van Eeden, Postdoctoral research fellow, Monash University Emily McLeod, PhD Candidate, Queensland University of Technology Fern Hames, Director, Arthur Rylah Institute for Environmental Research Zoe Squires, Policy Officer, Arthur Rylah Institute for Environmental Research Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

New report questions assumptions over costs and benefits of new transmission link for Snowy 2.0, and why consumers will be lumped with the cost.

The post Snowy 2.0 hit by another blow out in costs, and consumers will foot the bill appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Locals in the host city are being asked to offer a warm welcome to indigenous delegates visiting for Cop26

In October, Calfín Lafkenche of the Mapuche people of Patagonia, on the southernmost tip of Chile, will embark on an 8,000-mile journey across the Atlantic. He won’t be the only one taking such a trip; indigenous people from Peru’s highest mountains will walk for eight hours to board day-long flights, while those from the deepest Amazon will travel for two days to board a canoe bound for their nearest town. Their ultimate destination? Glasgow.

These are just some of the indigenous communities journeying across the globe to make their voices heard for the first time at Cop26, the UN climate change conference taking place in Glasgow from November.

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