Feed aggregator

Airlines have missed 98% of their previous environmental targets yet they keep pushing to persuade more people to fly

Even with lethal wildfires licking around southern Europe’s holiday hotspots, airlines such as Ryanair are still flying people towards the flames. Aviation, dubbed “the fastest way to fry the planet’ by environmental campaigners, due to its high carbon emissions, is back as our default means of getting away. But our chosen means of transport, flying, incrementally wrecks the climates, prospects and lives of the places being flown to. This is no tragic, unforeseen irony, but a deliberate, heavily promoted act of self-destruction.

At precisely the moment when everything should bend to make less climate-damaging choices easier and more attractive, exactly the opposite is happening. Why?

Continue reading...

Miner Rio Tinto has written down the value of its Australian alumina refineries as it factors in the cost of buying Australian Carbon Credit Units (ACCUs) under the government’s reformed Safeguard Mechanism, saying it will continue to need to rely on offsets to meet its decarbonisation targets.

Australia’s largest state farming association wants a temporary ban on new large-scale solar projects as angst grows over "carrying the weight" of the transition.

The post Farming lobby wants ban on new solar farms, as renewables resentment festers in regions appeared first on RenewEconomy.

If confirmed, discovery of room temperature superconductors could be one of the biggest physics announcements this century, paving way for longer-lasting batteries and efficient grids.

The post Discovery of room-temperature superconductors could revolutionise energy systems appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Some undergraduates drop out of degrees after offers of roles by firms "desperate" for staff.

All four seasons were among top 10 hottest since 1884, with extreme heat likely to occur more frequently

2022 was the warmest year on record in the UK, the Met Office has confirmed, with experts warning the unprecedented heat is a sign of things to come.

It was also the first year in which a temperature above 40C (104F) was recorded in the UK. A record-breaking 40.3C was recorded on 19 July at Coningsby, Lincolnshire.

Continue reading...

You might see the heartbreaking videos of stranded whales and dolphins and wonder why we can’t rescue them. Sometimes we can – but time and tide make it harder Vanessa Pirotta, Postdoctoral Researcher and Wildlife Scientist, Macquarie University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

NSW considers following Queensland's tiered coal royalty scheme as it also mulls extending coal price cap.

The post NSW mulls tiered coal royalties as it contemplates end of coal price cap appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Energy analysts at BloombergNEF expect renewable hydrogen to be a cheaper option than existing "grey hydrogen" in five key markets by 2030.

The post Green hydrogen on track to be cheaper than fossil gas hydrogen by 2030 appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Amid the despair and doomism is a real climate emergency. We must act accordingly

How to respond to the avalanche of record-breaking extreme weather and temperatures terrorising the planet? For many scientists it is a moment of genuine despair, but also a time to resist climate doomism.

For British tourists still flying to Greece while it is on fire, and a few holdout news organisations, the answer seems to be to look away or deflect. We shouldn’t join them. Equally, as Michael Mann and Susan Joy Hassol have argued, there is no need to inflate the magnitude of what is happening. The reality is confronting enough.

Continue reading...

Report says nearly 200 cases filed around the world in past 12 months challenging governments and firms

Lawsuits challenging government and corporate inaction on the climate breakdown have become an important driver of change, according to a UN body.

A report by the UN Environment Programme (Unep) and the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University says litigation is setting precedents for climate action all over the world, even beyond the jurisdictions in which cases are filed. But it warns of a growing legal backlash as cases are filed that could delay climate action and criminalise activists.

Continue reading...

Former Liberal MP wants the $3.8 billion undersea transmission project reviewed as a project of state significance, making it subject to a vote by both houses of state parliament.

The post MPs says Marinus Link a bigger deal than AFL stadium, demand vote in Parliament appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Fortescue 's likely first big green hydrogen project will produce 12000 tonnes a year. It will need another 12,500 such projects to meet its 2030 targets, but insists it can still be done.

The post Fortescue still aiming for 15 million tonnes of green hydrogen by 2030 appeared first on RenewEconomy.

An Australian bank has entered into a strategic alliance with a soil carbon project developer, financing a pilot project that will generate Australian Carbon Credit Units by pre paying for the first credits generated under the project, it announced Thursday.

This knowledge is particularly important if we want to help reefs recover devastating events such as mass bleaching and cyclones. Marine Gouezo, Postdoctoral research fellow, Southern Cross University Christopher Doropoulos, Senior research scientist, CSIRO Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

The historic royal tradition of "swan upping" reveals a sharp decline in swan young on the River Thames.

A daily summary of our news plus bite-sized updates from around the world.

Last year's record breaking heat, driven by climate change, gives a snapshot of the UK's future weather.

The Integrity Council for the Voluntary Carbon Market has published the framework it will use to assess whether carbon credits meet its Core Carbon Principles integrity label, work that forges an uncertain path for many REDD projects and raises the bar on transparency.

California regulator ARB on Wednesday presented several scenarios for removing cap-and-trade permits in order to hit the state’s more ambitious emissions reduction goals, sending allowance prices skyward as traders expressed surprise at the magnitude of the potential supply cuts.