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Experts weighed the merits of including agriculture emissions in the EU ETS at an event in Brussels on Wednesday, with panellists agreeing that the market mechanism could be a stronger policy tool than what is in place now to lower the bloc's farming emissions, which have not fallen since 2005.

Peak global oil demand is in sight amid surging demand for electric vehicles, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Wednesday, bringing forward the date 

The Saudi company set up to drive voluntary carbon market (VCM) growth sold 2.2 mln carbon credits in an auction held in Kenya on Wednesday, with the units clearing at a price of 23.50 Saudi riyal per tonne, equivalent to nearly $6.30, and sold to 16 mostly domestic firms.

Shell promised to deliver more value with less emissions on Wednesday, pledging to spend $10-15 billion of capital investment on low carbon technology between 2023-25, after angering climate activists by abandoning plans to cut oil production each year for the rest of the decade.

A Saudi company established to scale up voluntary carbon market involvement across the Global South has announced it will launch an Article 6-ready exchange in 2024 and aims to establish one of the largest global markets by the end of the decade, as it hosted its second auction of credits on Wednesday.

Information commissioner had demanded that the water company publish 53 documents last year

Southern Water is refusing demands by the information watchdog to publish internal communications between board members relating to discussions about raw sewage discharges.

The company, which was fined £90m in 2021 for discharging billions of litres of raw sewage into protected coastal waters, was ordered to publish 53 documents by the information commissioner at the end of last year because of the “substantial and weighty public interest”.

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European carbon prices extended their rally for a sixth day on Wednesday as traders continued to test the strength of short positions ahead of the publication of the weekly Commitment of Traders report, while gas and power markets reversed course after five days of gains.

In a bid to eliminate fears of double counting and bring liquidity back to the crypto carbon space after a troubled year, an emergent blockchain solution, 'the two-way bridge', is gathering momentum.

A new international carbon standard registry that aims to sharply cut the cost of project development was launched in South Africa on Wednesday.

As a coal-fired power station is readied to meet the exploding demand for portable units, let’s face it: this is just extravagance

Fifteen years ago, it was the wood burner: an unnecessary middle-class indulgence that, despite causing untold environmental damage, started popping up in homes across the country. They became symbolic of a certain affluence that allows a privileged few to live in optimum comfort at all times.

Now there’s a new kid on the block: the portable air-conditioning unit. As we adjust to a changing climate, with mid-summer temperatures regularly exceeding 25C and occasionally reaching 35C or even higher, this is the new “must have”. Sales of air-conditioning units were up more than 500% during last year’s heatwave and, according to property website Rightmove, searches for homes with air-conditioning tripled over the same period. At between £300 and £1,000 a pop, they’re not cheap – but they certainly make three or four weeks of good UK weather each year easier to handle.

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Germany's government has agreed on a watered down version of a law to cut emissions from heating amid fears over excessive costs, a move likely to apply bullish pressure to the nation's fuels carbon pricing system as a result of delaying the transition.

BeZero Carbon and ACX have expanded their carbon credit ratings partnership to the Middle East, an offering buyers in the Gulf States access to offset grades.

Taiwan is planning to utilise idle public lands to generate forest carbon credits, with two projects in the pipeline that will be launched next year at the earliest, according to the island’s newly-appointed finance minister.

I’ve seen trees around the UK threatened by development, bulldozers and chainsaws. Now it is happening on my doorstep

I live near a group of beautiful, mature trees that spread across a corner of two residential roads; they are a community hub, providing a shady place to sit and chat. They are much loved, all covered by tree protection orders, and provided as a gift in perpetuity to the community in the 1980s as a planning condition for the creation of a business park. Forty years on, none of this seems to matter. Where bricks and mortar and making money are concerned, trees have no voice: they die silently, even amid a climate emergency that now brings extreme temperatures to London and the south-east with alarming regularity.

After years reporting on the battles of ordinary people to protect trees from bulldozers and chainsaws, I find myself in the midst of one. It is an emotionally sapping, frustrating fight against developers who want to destroy the trees and build luxury homes. It does not seem to matter that the council in question, Richmond upon Thames, a Liberal Democrat-run borough with a strong collection of Green councillors, declared a climate emergency in 2019. Nor that it launched its biodiversity action plan with much fanfare at a May 2019 event where the star speaker was David Attenborough, a local resident. The mantra at the time was “think globally, act locally, make a home for nature”. Alongside the launch, the council printed thousands of leaflets headlined “Local Wildlife Needs your Help”, advising residents how they could support wildlife habitats in the urban environment.

Sandra Laville is the Guardian’s environment correspondent

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Energy giant proposes monitoring wells for five years, as government says seepage volumes are factored into emissions reduction targets

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Decommissioned gas wells from a Santos project off the coast of Western Australia have been leaking from the seabed for a decade, according to documents published by the national petroleum regulator.

The leaks, first reported by WA Today, are located at the Legendre gas field north of the Pilbara port of Dampier, and were detected by an underwater vehicle in 2013.

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The EPP, the European parliament’s largest group, says it supports climate goals but objects to ‘bad proposal’

EU plans to restore biodiversity on land and sea are hanging in the balance after the European parliament’s biggest political group called for the proposals to be torn up and rewritten.

On the eve of a vote on the nature restoration law (NRL) package, the chairman of the centre-right European People’s party (EPP) said the vote was “50-50” with potential for others to join their opposition ranks on Thursday.

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Two male platypuses have been caught on camera fighting for territory in Tasmania, Australia

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The six-nation Coral Triangle Initiative is launching a conservation fund with initial contributions from German development bank KfW and USAID to back its new action plan for marine protection.

A consortium of groups has begun developing a methodology to use carbon finance to transition emerging economies away from coal-fired power to renewable energy, with plans to present the method at COP28 in Dubai, they announced Wednesday.

Thylacine of the sea? That doesn’t make sense

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