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See Sunak’s green retreat for what it is: a ruthless short-term electoral gamble | Martin Kettle
The PM has calculated that he can gain points with his party membership and skew byelection results. But at what cost?
Rishi Sunak’s retreat from the government’s net zero pledges triggers large- and small-scale conclusions alike. These range from a message about the future of the planet’s place in the prime minister’s priorities, at one extreme, to the anxiety it betrays about how to manage his way through his first party conference as Conservative leader, next month, at the other.
Nevertheless, Sunak’s move should be seen as a short-term electoral gamble rather than a massacre of the entire net zero agenda. That does not mean that it isn’t damaging to the net zero credibility established imperfectly by previous Tory prime ministers, let alone to Britain’s longer-term reputation on climate action. It is all these things. If it is electorally successful, the shift could also become more fundamental and more lasting.
Martin Kettle is a Guardian columnist
Continue reading...Half-million-year-old wooden structure unearthed in Zambia
Fast, beautiful, mates for life: why I am voting peregrine in Australia’s bird of the year 2023 | Imogen Dewey
My favourite bird, the fastest in the world, calls to something in me
- The Australian bird of the year poll launches on 25 September 2023
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The peregrine is the fastest animal in the world. It drops on its prey from above, a 300km/h shard of death. This path, sky to ground, is called a hunting line – a phrase I first saw in JA Baker’s The Peregrine – my favourite book (also Werner Herzog’s, turns out), probably my favourite possession. Book and bird have been indistinguishable to me since: a talisman of what is beautiful and wild.
“They are killers,” Baker wrote in 1967. “That is what they are for.” To find one, look up. See it, as he did, “remote as a star … a small dark knuckle in the flawless sky”. Before it drops:
He seemed to split in two, his body shooting off like an arrow from the tight-strung bow of his wings. There was an unholy impetus in his falling, as though he had been hurled from the sky. It was hard to believe, afterwards, that it had happened at all.
Continue reading...Sunak’s net zero U-turn is so toxic that it’s united Green MPs and car manufacturers against him | Caroline Lucas
With climate change a top priority for the public, surely time is up for a prime minister who couldn’t seem to care less?
- Caroline Lucas is the Green MP for Brighton Pavilion
It’s quite a moment when a Green party MP finds herself on the same side of an argument as the chair of Ford UK – but here we are. Claims reported by the BBC yesterday evening that Rishi Sunak is planning to weaken some of the government’s key climate commitments have managed to unite businesses, the energy sector, car manufacturers, environmental groups and the general public against him.
His leaked programme appears not to be a couple of minor delays here and there but instead a coordinated, calculated and catastrophic roll-back. According to the leak, energy efficiency targets for private rented homes will be dropped; the ban on new petrol and diesel cars will be pushed back to 2035; the phasing out of gas boilers will be delayed; plans for taxes to discourage flying ditched; recycling schemes cancelled.
Caroline Lucas is the Green MP for Brighton Pavilion
Continue reading...Galápagos Islands tightens biosecurity as avian flu threatens unique species
Scientists confirm three birds have died from virus as park authorities redouble efforts to protect islands’ endemic birds
National park authorities on the Galápagos Islands have heightened biosecurity measures to protect the archipelago’s unique fauna from the deadly H5N1 strain of avian influenza after scientists confirmed that three birds had died from the virus.
“From preliminary tests of the five specimens, three of them have tested positive for H5N1 avian influenza,” Danny Rueda, director of the Galápagos national park told the Guardian. Two frigate birds and one red-footed booby were confirmed to have died from the virus on Tuesday, after samples were sent to Guayaquil on the Ecuadorian mainland for examination.
Continue reading...Boris Johnson warns Sunak he ‘cannot afford to falter’ on net zero commitments
Former prime minister says ‘businesses must have certainty’ to invest in green technologies
Boris Johnson has waded into the row over Rishi Sunak’s plans to U-turn on some of the government’s net zero commitments, warning his successor that he “cannot afford to falter now” or “lose our ambition” for the country.
The former prime minister, who oversaw the introduction of many of the targets during his tenure, said “businesses must have certainty” about the UK’s net zero commitments, as companies reacted with alarm to the potential policy shift.
Continue reading...E.ON boss hits out at Sunak’s plan to row back on net zero policies
PM accused of delaying vital work on transforming UK economy as car industry leaders also condemn plans
The boss of one of Britain’s largest energy suppliers has criticised the government’s plan to row back on net zero policies, including the planned phase-out of gas boilers, as a “misstep on many levels”.
Accusing Rishi Sunak of delaying the “vital work of transforming our economy”, the chief executive of E.ON UK, Chris Norbury, said there was no “green v cheap” debate. He said delaying some environmental targets to reduce pressure on household budgets during a cost of living crisis was a “false argument”.
Continue reading...‘Pathetic’: what scientists and green groups think of UK’s net zero U-turn
UK not a serious player in global race for green growth, says Greenpeace, while Oxfam says move is ‘betrayal’
Scientists and environmental groups have expressed anger and dismay at the U-turn on net zero expected by the prime minister.
Continue reading...Renewables are cheaper than ever yet fossil fuel use is still growing – here’s why
Why in the first global stocktake of the world’s progress towards limiting warming to 1.5°C did the UN say we’re still not phasing out fossil fuels fast enough?
The post Renewables are cheaper than ever yet fossil fuel use is still growing – here’s why appeared first on RenewEconomy.
The media needs to cover the climate crisis as seriously as it covered Covid | Mark Hertsgaard and Kyle Pope
With some exceptions, the news industry is still not responding to the true scale and danger of global heating
In much of what we see, hear and read, the climate crisis has become inescapable. On Netflix, Don’t Look Up spent weeks as the most-streamed movie ever. Pop star Billie Eilish sings about hills burning in California. At the bookstore, climate fiction has become a genre of its own, while Jeff Goodell’s The Heat Will Kill You First, a harrowing nonfiction account of what life on a warming planet will mean, is entering its second month on the New York Times Best Sellers list.
And where is journalism in all of this? Despite our living through the hottest summer in history, as well as wildfires, tropical storms and crazy-hot oceans, the news media continues to be outdone by the rest of popular culture when it comes to covering the most urgent story of our time.
Mark Hertsgaard, CCNow executive director, author, and environment correspondent for The Nation, and Kyle Pope, editor and publisher of Columbia Journalism Review, are founders of Covering Climate Now
Continue reading...Revealed: almost everyone in Europe is breathing toxic air
Guardian investigation finds 98% of Europeans breathing highly damaging polluted air linked to 400,000 deaths a year
Europe is facing a “severe public health crisis”, with almost everyone across the continent living in areas with dangerous levels of air pollution, an investigation by the Guardian has found.
Analysis of data gathered using cutting-edge methodology – including detailed satellite images and measurements from more than 1,400 ground monitoring stations – reveals a dire picture of dirty air, with 98% of people living in areas with highly damaging fine particulate pollution that exceed World Health Organization guidelines. Almost two-thirds live in areas where air quality is more than double the WHO’s guidelines.
Continue reading...UK absent from key international statement on climate action
Rishi Sunak accused of ‘disgusting betrayal of vulnerable people’ over net zero U-turn as he misses UN climate ambition summit
The UK was notable by its absence on Wednesday from a key statement pledging ambitious action on the climate crisis, from a group of countries of which it is normally a leading member.
The “high ambition coalition” of countries, which aims to push the world to swifter cuts on greenhouse gas emissions, issued a call for “faster stronger” action on the climate, to cause emissions to peak by 2025, and a plan to put the world on course to meet the goals of the 2015 Paris agreement.
Continue reading...Could wood chips fill the battery demand hole? Biographite start-up hopes to find out
Kiwi company Carbonscape raises $18m to help commercialise its wood-to-graphite technology using EU and US forestry waste.
The post Could wood chips fill the battery demand hole? Biographite start-up hopes to find out appeared first on RenewEconomy.
The world’s largest – and stinkiest – flower in danger of extinction, scientists say
The 42 known species of the parasitic plant Rafflesia, known as the corpse flower, are endangered due to destruction of forest habitats
Parasitic, elusive and emitting an overwhelming odour of putrefying flesh, Rafflesia – often called the corpse flower – has intrigued botanists for centuries. Now, scientists are warning that it is at risk of extinction and calling for action to save it.
The blooms of the Rafflesia have become famous for their odour of decaying meat, produced to attract flesh-eating flies. But the genus – which includes the largest flowers in the world, at more than a metre across – is at risk due to the destruction of forest habitats in south-east Asia. There are 42 species of Rafflesia, and researchers warn that all of them are under threat, with 25 classified as critically endangered and 15 as endangered.
Continue reading...Renewables sail past 70 pct on Australia’s main grid, send coal to fresh lows
Major milestone for Australia's energy transition as huge amounts of rooftop solar help set a new high for the instantaneous share of renewables on the grid.
The post Renewables sail past 70 pct on Australia’s main grid, send coal to fresh lows appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Perovskite solar glass start-up eyes UNSW cell testing technology
California start-up will trial UNSW technology aimed at simplifying how the performance of perovskite solar cells is tested on the production line.
The post Perovskite solar glass start-up eyes UNSW cell testing technology appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Massive wind, solar and battery project edges ahead in Central Queensland
Progress for plans to build more than 4GW of wind, solar and battery storage projects in Queensland coal country, as wind farm wins state approval.
The post Massive wind, solar and battery project edges ahead in Central Queensland appeared first on RenewEconomy.
New Hope for renewables? Coal miner floats huge solar, wind and pumped hydro plan
ASX-listed miner looks to invest some of its windfall coal profits into renewables, including a potential giga-scale solar, wind and pumped hydro project in Queensland.
The post New Hope for renewables? Coal miner floats huge solar, wind and pumped hydro plan appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Colonists upended Aboriginal farming, growing grain and running sheep on rich yamfields, and cattle on arid grainlands
Rooftop solar takes record 74 pct share of generation in world’s biggest standalone grid
Rooftop and distributed solar set remarkable new record for the world's biggest standalone grid after peaking at nearly 2GW and a 74 pct share of output.
The post Rooftop solar takes record 74 pct share of generation in world’s biggest standalone grid appeared first on RenewEconomy.
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