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Almost every day for 40 years, expert diver Jim Abernethy has been swimming with sharks in the Bahamas.

Most concerning is the long-term upward trends of CO₂ emissions form burning fossil fuels, which are far from trending towards net-zero by 2050. Pep Canadell, Chief research scientist, Climate Science Centre, CSIRO Oceans and Atmosphere; and Executive Director, Global Carbon Project, CSIRO Corinne Le Quéré, Royal Society Research Professor of Climate Change Science, University of East Anglia Glen Peters, Research Director, Center for International Climate and Environment Research - Oslo Pierre Friedlingstein, Chair, Mathematical Modelling of Climate, University of Exeter Robbie Andrew, Senior Researcher, Center for International Climate and Environment Research - Oslo Rob Jackson, Professor, Department of Earth System Science, and Chair of the Global Carbon Project, Stanford University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

The first ever physically-backed, exchange-traded carbon investment vehicle will launch on the London Stock Exchange on Thursday.

Fossil fuels are surging in post-pandemic recovery as scientists warn 1.5C emission limits will be reached in 11 years

Global carbon emissions are shooting back to the record level seen before the coronavirus pandemic levels, new analysis has shown. Scientists said the finding is a “reality check” for the world’s nations gathered at the Cop26 climate summit.

The emissions driving the climate crisis reached their highest ever levels in 2019, before global coronavirus lockdowns saw them fall by 5.4%. However, fossil fuel burning has surged faster than expected in 2021, the international research team said, in stark contrast to the rapid cuts needed to tackle global heating.

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Global greenhouse gas emissions will surge past pre-Covid levels, as the world returns to old practice, despite calls for a "green recovery".

The post Global emissions to surge past pre-Covid, as world fails to grasp ‘green recovery’ appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Large scale solar developers in Australia are starting to explore new, larger, module sizes in their installations. There are now many large modules on the market. But is bigger always better? A large scale PV power plant not only delivers consistent green energy, but is also a significant financial investment over 25 years. Long term […]

The post Is bigger always better when it comes to solar modules? appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Critics say pledge to end use of dirtiest fuel source in 2030s and 40s does not go far enough

More than 40 countries have agreed to phase out their use of coal-fired power, the dirtiest fuel source, in a boost to UK hopes of a deal to “keep 1.5C alive”, from the Cop26 climate summit.

Major coal-using countries, including Canada, Poland, Ukraine and Vietnam, will phase out their use of coal for electricity generation, with the bigger economies doing so in the 2030s, and smaller economies doing so in the 2040s.

More than 20 governments and financial institutions, including the UK, US and Denmark, agreed to phase out overseas finance for all fossil fuels.

Research showed that the world could be on track to limit global heating to 1.9C, if commitments from India and other countries on greenhouse gas emissions are fulfilled.

Data seen by the Guardian revealed fossil fuel companies were using the energy charter treaty to sue governments for the losses they incur from national commitments to decarbonise.

Ireland was told it would need to cull 1.3m animals to meet climate targets.

The UK chancellor, Rishi Sunak, told the Cop26 conference London would become a global hub for net zero investment.

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UN climate envoy Mark Carney insisted carbon credits could play a role in corporate climate action on Wednesday, despite protestors disrupting a COP side event seeking to establish credible offsetting practices and denouncing commitments set out by a coalition of hundreds of banks.

Transmission company Transgrid names former AGL boss Brett Redman as new CEO.

The post Redman to head Transgrid as it chases renewable energy future appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Greta Thunberg pledges to offset swear words, investors pledge $175 trillion to decarbonisation, and new targets may keep 2 degrees within reach.

The post Glasgow Brief: Greta pledges net zero swearing, as new targets keep 2 degrees within reach appeared first on RenewEconomy.

More than 100 nations have pledged to end deforestation by 2030. But there’s no mention of the need for Indigenous people to give their prior informed consent. Robert Hales, Director Centre for Sustainable Enterprise, Griffith University Rowan Foley, CEO of Aboriginal Carbon Foundation, Indigenous Knowledge Tim Cadman, Research Fellow with the Law Futures Centre and the Institute for Ethics, Governance and Law, Griffith University Toni Hay, Expert in Indigenous climate adaptation, Indigenous Knowledge Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

Summary of the main developments on the third day of the UN climate summit in Glasgow

• What is Cop26 and why does it matter? The complete guide

Country pledges at Cop26 would limit global temperature rises to below 2C, the first time the world has been on such a trajectory, according to research from the University of Melbourne.

More than 20 countries and financial institutions have vowed to halt all financing for fossil fuel development overseas and divert the estimated $8bn a year to green energy. The signatories include the US, UK, Denmark and some developing countries, including Costa Rica. The European Investment Bank is one of the financial institutions involved.

Catch up on day two here.

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Council property has been restored to habitability by locals after reports of activists having to sleep rough

Activists in Glasgow have “re-opened” a disused building to house climate justice campaigners visiting the city for the Cop26 summit, as those forced to camp because of lack of affordable accommodation face plummeting temperatures.

The Glasgow city council property in Tradeston, a former homeless services unit, has been restored to habitability over the past few days by a group of local activists frustrated at reports of visitors forced to sleep rough.

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The UK government will auction 80.5 million carbon allowances under its emissions trading system next year, marking an almost 4% drop from this year’s volumes, sale hosts ICE said late Wednesday.

Like the suffragettes, protesters are castigated for taking direct action. But how else will we wake up to the climate emergency?

Few people today would claim not to sympathise with the suffragettes – but this wasn’t true at the time. When parliament debated women’s struggle for the vote in 1914, Lord Robert Cecil – later a recipient of the Nobel peace prize, who was in fact supportive of women’s suffrage – declared that “suffragist outrages” were a “very serious evil” with the aim of “anarchy”. There was only one solution “to prevent them from committing crimes”, he said: “deportation”. When Reginald McKenna, then home secretary in HH Asquith’s Liberal government, offered four options to deal with them – letting them die (“That is, I should say, at the present moment the most popular, judging by the number of letters I have received”); deportation; treating them as “lunatics”; or giving them the franchise – his fellow parliamentarians laughed uproariously at each.

The suffragettes, it should be said, did not sit around singing kumbaya, and were far more militant than contemporary protest movements in Britain. They committed arson, including the burning of several private homes – with five resulting deaths –and smashed up art galleries and museums. They attempted to destroy Glasgow’s aqueduct and attacked churches. Targets for bombing included the extremely busy street outside the Bank of England, although the device was defused, while a train driver was nearly killed by another bomb. Damned at the time as terrorists and anarchists, the militants are today seen sympathetically by history. As the cheerful “soldiers in petticoats” in Disney’s Mary Poppins predicted: “Our daughters’ daughters will adore us, and they’ll sing in grateful chorus: ‘Well done, Sister Suffragette!”

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If emissions continue rising, Europe can expect 50C heatwaves every three years, the Met Office says.

Vital rulings on the world’s energy future are being made behind closed doors and others may be unknown

• ECT poses threat to Paris deal, says whistleblower

The energy charter treaty (ECT) was signed in 1994 to protect the interests of western investors pouring money into the oil- and gas-rich nations of the former Soviet Union. Entering into force in 1998, the treaty generated few cases and even less attention.

That changed in 2014 when investors in the energy firm Yukos were awarded a record $50bn payout after a tribunal found that Vladimir Putin’s government had expropriated their assets to prevent Yukos’s then chief executive, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, from entering politics. The European court of human rights reached a similar verdict in the same week.

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Treaty allows energy corporations to sue governments for billions over policies that could hurt their profits

• Explainer: what is the ECT?

A secretive investor court system poses a real threat to the Paris climate agreement, activists have said, as governments taking action to phase out fossil fuels face a slew of multimillion-dollar lawsuits for lost profits.

New data seen by the Guardian shows a surge in cases under the energy charter treaty (ECT), an obscure international agreement that allows energy corporations to sue governments over policies that could hurt their profits.

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Biologists heartened as 79 nests of endangered reptile recorded in Broward county this year after low of 12 in 2017.

The number of leatherback turtle nests found along some south Florida beaches reached record numbers this year, surprising biologists.

The 79 nests laid by endangered turtles along beaches in Broward county this year is nearly double the previous record, according to the South Florida SunSentinel. The previous record was 46 in 2012, and the record low for leatherback nests was 12 in 2017.

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The Guardian’s picture editors select recent images from UN climate change conference

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