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China has sent astronauts to live on its space station, the second permanent outpost in orbit.

Greenhouse gas emissions from the world’s maritime fleet increased by 4.7% in 2021, with most of the increase coming from container ships, dry bulk carriers and general cargo vessels, a report from UNCTAD, the UN institution dealing with trade and development, warned Tuesday

Climate change is raising the number of days the Earth passes crucial thresholds of fire risk. But urgently cutting emissions can avoid the worst. Hamish Clarke, Senior Research Fellow, The University of Melbourne Anne Griebel, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Western Sydney University Matthias Boer, Professor, Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment, Western Sydney University Rachael Helene Nolan, Senior research fellow, Western Sydney University Víctor Resco de Dios, Profesor de ingeniería forestal y cambio global, Universitat de Lleida Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

Buying out China’s stake was inevitable but the government still has the onerous task of finding committed investors

Another day, another “confirmation” that the government plans to build the Sizewell C nuclear power plant in Suffolk – surely the “most announced” project in UK infrastructure history. The latest update, though, contained a genuine sign of seriousness: the Chinese are being paid to go away.

China General Nuclear (CGN), a state-backed firm, owned a 20% stake in the fledgling project and had, in effect, a right to subscribe to maintain its holding through the various funding rounds – just as it did at Hinkley Point C in Somerset. In practice, any form of Chinese involvement in Sizewell has been impossible for at least a year.

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The climate activists claim to have targeted 4x4 owners in eight European and US cities

Guerrilla climate activists Tyre Extinguishers have claimed their “largest ever night of action against SUVs”, with 900 of the vehicles targeted around the world.

“Last night (the evening of Monday 28 November and early morning of Tuesday 29 November), citizens in eight countries deflated tyres on nearly 900 polluting SUVs,” the activist group said in a statement.

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The magistrate spoke of using Jan Goodey’s case as a ‘deterrent’ during court proceedings

A climate activist who disrupted traffic on the M25 has been sentenced to six months in prison.

Jan Goodey, 57, from Brighton, was jailed after pleading guilty to intentionally or recklessly causing a public nuisance after taking part in Just Stop Oil’s campaign of disruption on London’s orbital motorway earlier this month.

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Rubicon Carbon, a new voluntary carbon market platform, was launched Tuesday with initial backing of $300 mln from alternative asset manager TPG, which created the company, and with expectations of raising $1 bln in capital by the end of the year to tap into growing corporate demand for voluntary offsets.

Chris O’Shea said the government handing energy companies money in advance presents a big risk

The chief executive of British Gas owner Centrica has warned that more energy suppliers could go bust this winter – with million of pounds of taxpayer cash on their balance sheets.

Chris O’Shea said he believed that some suppliers were “poorly capitalised”, and risked going bust and “taking taxpayer money with them”.

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Adding shipping to the EU ETS is likely to have an initial bearish impact due to how legislators are designing the process, analysts told Carbon Pulse, while the maritime sector is expected to take varying approaches to buying the allowances they will need.

Despite the growing number of firms producing climate-related disclosures, a large proportion do not include useful information, according to research published Tuesday. 

First global analysis follows discovery of toxic pollution particles in lungs and brains of foetuses

Almost a million stillbirths a year can be attributed to air pollution, according to the first global study.

The research estimated that almost half of stillbirths could be linked to exposure to pollution particles smaller than 2.5 microns (PM2.5), mostly produced from the burning of fossil fuels.

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About 600,000 birds have been culled or have died in the UK's worst avian flu outbreak.

As much as €25 billion of ETS-derived revenues distributed by EU member states between 2013-21 were not spent on climate action, according to analysis from a green group published on Tuesday that called for more stringent rules on the spending of funds from ETS allowance sales.

Xpansiv is launching an auction service for carbon credits, the environmental commodities, the environmental commodity marketplace announced Tuesday.

Some 84% of hydrocarbon professionals expect carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS) will be a mainstay in the industry, and over half plan on installing CCUS solutions over the next decade, according to a survey published on Tuesday.

EUAs traded higher in the morning after a strong auction result brought buyers into the market, while UK allowances fell back, wiping out the historical premium the British permit contract has held to EUAs for most of the year.

Work on the first stage of what will be Australia's biggest wind and battery project to begin next year after landing unique finance deal with no long term contracts.

The post Unique finance deal paves way for Australia’s biggest wind and battery project appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Free allowances ‘in direct contradiction with the polluter pays principle’, WWF report says

Big polluting industries have been given almost €100bn (£86bn) in free carbon permits by the EU in the last nine years, according to an analysis by the WWF. The free allowances are “in direct contradiction with the polluter pays principle”, the group said.

Free pollution permits worth €98.5bn were given to energy-intensive sectors including steel, cement, chemicals and aviation from 2013-21. This is more than the €88.5bn that the EU’s emissions trading scheme (ETS) charged polluters, mostly coal and gas power stations, for their CO2 emissions.

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A government-funded initiative by the Nordic nations has published final guidelines that outline how to most effectively use voluntary carbon markets to address the current ambition and implementation gaps in relation to the Paris Agreement's 1.5C temperature warming limit.

Japan on Tuesday announced a proposal to gradually expand the domestic use of carbon pricing to help fund $1.1 trillion in economic transition bonds while also launching a push for increased use of an emissions market to drive decarbonisation across Asia.