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International Energy Agency report puts halt in emissions from energy down to growth in renewable power

Carbon dioxide emissions from energy have not increased for three years in a row even as the global economy grew, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said.

Global emissions from the energy sector were 32.1bn tonnes in 2016, the same as the previous two years, while the economy grew 3.1%, the organisation said.

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Nesting bald eagles, Adélie penguins and a newly hatched Komodo dragon are among this week’s pick of images from the natural world

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Taronga Zoo's baby pygmy hippopotamus - the first born in seven years - has made its first public appearance.

Researchers in the US are working with dolphins in an effort to work out why closely related whale species in the wild strand themselves on land.

Science correspondent Rebecca Morelle describes her violent encounter with Europe's most active volcano.

A computerised system for injecting medicine without using needles has won an innovation award at the South by SouthWest Interactive technology conference in Austin, Texas.

A bird that watched its own reflection for hours becomes the subject of internet fun.

Hibbertia fumana, thought to have been extinct for 200 years, has been rediscovered in Sydney’s west

A newly rediscovered rare plant – thought to have become extinct almost 200 years ago – has sparked a legal action in Sydney’s west against a development that threatens the flower’s only known location.

About 370 specimens of Hibbertia fumana – a small flowering shrub endemic to Sydney – were found on the grounds of the proposed 83-hectare Simta Moorebank transport hub late last year.

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The nose of a shrimp, the spines of a seahorse, the claws of a crab: Jean Painlevé’s camera captured them all – and turned them into massive, monstrous, mysterious works that caused a sensation in the 1930s. Now the aquatic explorer, famed for his films of copulating seahorses and dancing snails, is receiving his first solo UK show, at Birmingham’s Ikon gallery

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Cromford, Derbyshire The towpath is popular with Derbyshire folk making their version of the passeggiata, often with dogs, and the water vole is easily spooked

William Jessop was a generous man, always ready to give a fellow engineer a leg up. Building the Cromford canal, in the Derbyshire Dales, he hired Benjamin Outram, the son of a local investor, as his assistant. Their great work terminates at Cromford Wharf, once a harbinger of the industrial revolution, now dozing in the evening sunshine, its crumbling stonework the colour of honey.

The northern section of the canal, five miles from the wharf to Ambergate, is a site of special scientific interest, noted for being a last redoubt for water voles, a change of use I doubt Jessop could have foreseen.

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Adani ‘categorically’ rejects letter signed by 91 prominent Australians as protesters confront Queensland premier during tour of Adani’s Indian HQ

Cricket great Ian Chappell has stood by his opposition to the Adani mine proposal as part of a group of prominent Australians branded “elitist wankers” by a federal government MP and “a very small group of misled people” by the Indian miner.

Chappell said it was “worthwhile” if joining his brother Greg in an open letter calling on the Indian miner to abandon its coal plan thrust the issue into the public spotlight in its cricket-loving homeland.

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Tesla has filed to issue $US750 million in convertible notes, and another one million shares of stock in advance of its Model 3 roll-out.

Seawater Hydro could potentially help South Australia resolve its highly publicised energy problems.

Continued surge in NSW wholesale electricity costs could provide even more incentive for rooftop solar and storage.

350.org Australia today announced the launch of a #StopAdani Roadshow.

Finkel says other countries “well advanced” on energy policy, technology reform, as many of 360 submissions plea for bipartisan approach.

South Australia has the most wind energy in the country. Wind turbine image from www.shutterstock.com

The last couple of days have brought the differences between state and federal energy policy into stark contrast. South Australia has unveiled an energy plan in which the state takes a much greater role in the energy industry. The plan includes storage, a new gas plant and greater powers for the state over the National Electricity Market.

SA has the highest proportion of wind energy in Australia – and the federal government has consistently blamed this for the widely reported blackouts last year.

In a acrimonious joint press conference with South Australian Premier Jay Weatherill on Thursday, federal energy minister Josh Frydenberg reiterated that states are responsible for the stability of their electricity system. The federal government has cast doubt on the legality of the plan.

Is reliability a state responsibility?

The federal government has repeatedly claimed that the SA government can’t keep the lights on. More generally, it has implied that the states are responsible for electricity system stability.

Under the National Electricity Market (NEM) framework, these statements are somewhat misleading.

The SA electricity industry is entirely privatised. The NEM governance framework is run by national institutions under the Council of Australian Governments Energy Council, a forum of federal and state energy ministers. This framework is supposed to ensure the system reliably delivers electricity to all consumers.

System security and reliability are the responsibility of the Australian Energy Market Operator. Network investment is the responsibility of private network businesses, overseen by the Australian Energy Regulator.

This governance system leaves little space for the SA government to take action to ensure system security. On the contrary, the NEM was set up to remove direct government involvement in the electricity sector. This was because a market was considered more efficient to achieve the same service.

The federal government has blamed wind energy for SA’s reliability issues. But, even if wind is one factor among many, did the SA government exacerbate the risk of blackouts?

South Australia has actively encouraged co-existence of wind farms and farming activities in its planning legislation. Land use planning laws can have great influence on the uptake of large-scale renewable energy, as Victoria shows.

While state renewable targets have been blamed for uneven investment in renewable energy, the SA target of 50% by 2050 is not actually backed by a particular mechanism. Wind generators settled in South Australia because it has good wind resources and favourable planning laws.

They were financed under the federal Renewable Energy Target, but also by the ACT reverse auction schemes, which led to considerable investment in SA.

The review of the NEM, chaired by Chief Scientist Alan Finkel, will consider how climate and energy policies can be aligned. As the policymaker for the NEM, the COAG Energy Council should be the responsible authority, not individual states, to resolve any mismatch.

Is South Australia breaking the rules?

Apart from public investment in storage and gas, SA’s energy plan aims to give the state energy minister “strong new powers to direct the national market in case of an electricity supply shortfall”. The federal energy minister has implied that some of the SA plans may be illegal and that the government will be seeking legal advice.

But is SA breaking any rules?

The governance arrangements for the NEM are based on an intergovernmental arrangement, which relies on federal-state cooperation. The Australian Constitution contains no clear powers to regulate for energy. This means that having both levels of government work together to overcome these constraints was necessary to set up and manage a national electricity system.

The intergovernmental agreement that sets up the NEM is the Australian Energy Market Agreement (AEMA). All governments – state, territory and federal – have signed this. The AEMA covers the setting up of the market institutions and legislation. Based on this document, all states have passed state legislation that contains the National Electricity Law.

The AEMA includes provisions for amending legislation. These mean that only the COAG Energy Council can amend energy market legislation. Whether the council would agree to SA ministers getting special powers is doubtful.

However, the agreement is political and not legal. Indeed, one clause states that “this agreement is not intended to give rise to legal obligations” for the state and federal signatories.

Where does this leave SA’s plan? It does not break the law, but, depending on how the actual legislation is drafted, it may well fail to pass COAG.

A dangerous development or much-needed leadership?

Due to the limits of the constitution, intergovernmental arrangements play an important role in Australian policy-making. An increasing number of agreements covers areas such as water, environment or trade.

As we’ve seen with debate about the Gonski deal on education funding, these agreements require trust between all parties and should not be lightly departed from.

SA’s frustration with the lack of COAG leadership and the blame game for the blackouts is understandable. The SA energy plan may galvanise energy market reform and lead to a better system. It can be interpreted as taking leadership in the energy-climate debate, where none has been forthcoming from the federal government or COAG.

On the other hand, a danger exists that other states decide to follow SA’s example. With a review of the market in process, one-sided action seems counterproductive.

An agreement on a timely and fair energy transition needs all parties at the table. It will need national coordination and a whole-of-system perspective. Finkel’s task of overhauling the electricity market may just have been made even harder.

Anne Kallies does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond the academic appointment above.

The Budget Blueprint would cut more than 50 programs from the EPA, including Obama's Clean Power Plan.

Fifty years ago, the supertanker the SS Torrey Canyon hit rocks off the coast of Cornwall, spilling more than 100,000 tonnes of crude oil. But it was the clear-up operation that led to the real environmental disaster.

Deputy prime minister wants bans lifted on exploration and development, and royalties paid to landholders

The Nationals leader, Barnaby Joyce, has called for states to lift the bans on coal seam gas and has urged them to follow South Australia’s plan to pay royalties as compensation to landholders.

The deputy prime minister, who is also the minister for agriculture, said lifting the gas bans should not occur on a carte blanche basis because of the need to protect prime agricultural land and productive aquifers. However, he did not say how prime agricultural land should be defined.

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