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European carbon prices came under heavy pressure from the opening on Monday as forecasts for milder weather triggered a steep drop in natural gas prices, while the prospect of EUA auctions resuming next week added a bearish tone to the carbon market.

The first-ever Internationally Transferred Mitigation Outcomes (ITMOs) for use under a national Paris Agreement emissions pledge have been delivered, with carbon units from activities in Thailand transacted to Switzerland, the parties announced Monday.

The host of the COP29 climate summit, Azerbaijan, is set to raise its fossil fuel production by one-third over the next decade and create hundreds of millions of tonnes in additional emissions, according to analysis published on Monday, with polluting firms forecast to spend some $41.4 billion on the country’s gas fields.

Research has found that several factors have hampered bees’ ability to create honey over the past decade

It’s a question that has bedeviled beekeepers across the US in recent years: where has all the honey gone? Scientists now say they have some answers as to why yields of honey have declined, pointing to environmental degradation that is affecting all sorts of bees, and insects more generally.

The amount of honey produced by honeybee colonies in the US has dropped by around half a pound, on average, per colony in the past decade, US government data shows, even as the number of managed colonies increased slightly.

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I have become obsessed from afar with Flaco, an owl who fled a zoo in New York nearly a year ago. Over Christmas, I could no longer resist the urge to track him down

I often wonder why birds speak so universally to the sagging middle-aged soul that it has become a comic trope – the vertiginously swift passage from: “Is that a robin?” to: “There’s a lesser yellowleg two hours’ drive away, start the car.”

Is it the freedom they represent? No cholesterol, no mortgage, no self-assessment tax deadline to worry about? Or a sense of wonder in the everyday miracle of their existence, induced by an awareness of mortality? Whatever it is, I am in deep: disposable income frittered on fat balls; constantly snooping on feathery goings-on in the garden; home decor reminiscent of the Portlandia “put a bird on it” sketch.

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Clean energy supply is only one side of the coin when it comes to emissions reductions but gains most of the attention, while energy efficiency could offer vast reductions in tandem with cost savings of some $2 trillion annually, according to a report released Monday.

Forests in Japan have the potential to offset a noticeable share of the country's annual carbon emissions and create great monetary value in the coming two decades, though the market potential of forest carbon hinges on multiple factors, new research has found.

We are seeking expressions of interest from individuals with demonstrated experience in carbon project development and/or carbon standard methodology development.

A South Korean securities firm has teamed up with a domestic research firm to accelerate its carbon finance business, which may include the development of overseas emissions reduction projects.

Environmentalists condemn news of higher forecast production which is also seen as a conservative forecast

Azerbaijan, which is hosting this year’s UN climate talks, plans to increase its fossil fuel production by a third over the next decade, according to an analysis shared exclusively with the Guardian.

The forecast indicates the Cop29 host will grow its annual gas production by about 12bn cubic metres (bcm) over the next 10 years, which is considered a crucial period in which global leaders must cut fossil fuel production if they hope to limit global heating.

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Aqueous rechargeable zinc battery technology inches closer to leaving the lab, after Australian researchers find a way to solve a major corrosion issue.

The post Zinc battery breakthrough as researchers fix spiky crystal problem appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Renewables combined to supply an average share of nearly 40% across Australia's main grids for the year. We look back at the stats and records.

The post 2023 in review: Australia nears half-way mark to 82% renewables appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Environment minister says ‘large areas of [wetland] will be destroyed or substantially modified’ by the proposal for windfarm development

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Tanya Plibersek has blocked plans by the Victorian government to build a plant to assemble wind turbines for offshore windfarms because of “clearly unacceptable” impacts on internationally important wetlands.

Plans to build the terminal at the Port of Hastings – seen as critical for the state’s strategy to develop an offshore wind industry – included dredging up to 92 hectares (227 acres) of the Western Port Ramsar wetland and reclaiming 29 hectares of seabed.

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Australia's first and only homegrown solar panel manufacturer wants to go giga-scale – but says the right federal government support will be crucial.

The post Big new push for Australian made solar as Tindo pitches $100m module gigafactory appeared first on RenewEconomy.

The new year delivers a major blow to Australia's nascent offshore wind industry, with plans for a critical port hub ruled out by the federal environment minister.

The post Major blow to offshore wind as critical port project ruled environmentally “unacceptable” appeared first on RenewEconomy.

The path to 100% renewables is charted. How quickly we get there depends on how we price surplus wind and solar and who controls demand management.

The post How to stop wasting cheap renewables – and drive a faster transition appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Rodney Holbrook, 75, a retired postman, captured footage of a mouse tidying up his workbench after dark. Over a couple of months, he noticed that the things he used during the day were being mysteriously put away at night, so he set up a night-vision camera in his shed in Builth Wells, Powys, Wales, to find out what was happening. He discovered that an industrious mouse was picking up items such as nuts and bolts, clothes pegs and cable ties and tidying them away into a box

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Conservation dogs perform vital roles across Australia. Some are guardians protecting wildlife from predators while others put their powerful sense of smell to use as sniffer dogs or detection dogs. Romane H Cristescu, Researcher in Koala, Detection Dogs, Conservation Genetics and Ecology, University of the Sunshine Coast Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

The southern French city of Montpellier is the latest to recognise the benefits of incentivising residents to get on buses, trams and trains

For residents of Montpellier, the new year has brought new travel possibilities. Since just before Christmas, locals have been able to sign up for a free pass to the entire bus and tram network in France’s seventh‑largest city. The majority of a population of 300,000 have, not surprisingly, taken up the offer. Yet the city council is not presenting this as largesse on its part. Rather, says its head of transport, Julie Frêche, it is making the change “because mobility is a right”.

Slowly but surely, the dial on public transport policy across Europe is shifting. The pandemic – and the apparently long-term change to working patterns it triggered – has played a part, as has the cost of living crisis. Prior to both, the environmental need to rely less on cars had already begun to chip away at longstanding assumptions about how we get around.

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Heavy flooding hit the village of Pulborough in southern England after the River Arun burst its banks. Cars were seen driving on a road amid flooded fields in the aftermath of Storm Henk. Major rivers across the UK were flooded as the government issued a further 300 flood warnings. A succession of storms in recent weeks meant prolonged rainfall fell on saturated ground, causing more extreme flooding

• UK weather: Storm Henk flooding misery to continue beyond weekend

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