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Despite nations’ pledges at Cop28 a year ago, the burning of coal, oil and gas continued to rise in 2024

There is “no sign” of the transition away from burning fossil fuels that was pledged by the world’s nations a year ago, with 2024 on track to set another new record for global carbon emissions.

The new data, released at the UN’s Cop29 climate conference in Azerbaijan, indicates that the planet-heating emissions from coal, oil and gas will rise by 0.8% in 2024. In stark contrast, emissions have to fall by 43% by 2030 for the world to have any chance of keeping to the 1.5C temperature target and limiting “increasingly dramatic” climate impacts on people around the globe.

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During the US time out, Australia and its allies must remain steady and seek to deepen cooperation among themselves

The idea of open international exchange that framed the Australian reforms of the late 20th century and its subsequent economic success are being challenged in the 21st century. The challenge is intensified by the restoration of Donald Trump as president of the United States. He is committed to higher protection, tax cuts that will set record highs for budget deficits, a trade war with Australia’s largest trading partner with a risk of worse, and separation of the United States from the rules-based international trading system. He is also committed to withdrawal from international cooperation and domestic action to reduce climate-changing emissions of greenhouse gases. Global financial crisis is not out of the question.

These developments will damage Australian interests. Global long-term interest rates set a base against which Australian rates settle, and will be higher than they would otherwise have been. International inflation will be higher, increasing Australia’s own inflation challenge. Australia is the developed country that has most to lose from a failure to stop global heating. Australia has more to gain economically than any other country from success in the world achieving net zero carbon emissions, as an exporter of zero-carbon goods to countries which lack rich renewable energy and biomass resources of their own.

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Falling costs and rapidly increasing scale means that big batteries are doing the heavy lifting at crucial points for the grid, particularly around the solar duck curve.

The post Batteries come of age, and are now doing the heavy lifting around the solar duck appeared first on RenewEconomy.

The approval of former Spanish ecology minister Teresa Ribera as the European Commission’s new executive vice-president in charge of competition and the green transition was delayed on Tuesday evening, amid calls for her to resign over the government’s handling of the deadly floods that hit the region of Valencia.

The Peruvian government on Tuesday published regulations to launch and operationalise its long-awaited national carbon registry.

The government of Barbados, an outspoken voice advocating global financial reform at the so-called 'finance COP', has called for integrating carbon pricing into climate justice to support historically marginalised, climate-vulnerable developing countries.

A Berlin-based regenerative agriculture firm has closed a $22 million Series A financing, marking the largest such funding round for an agtech start-up in Germany this year, the company said Tuesday.

Canada’s environment minister announced on Tuesday a new finance platform to mobilise climate-focused investments in vulnerable regions at the UN conference in Baku.

A Canadian carbon project developer has announced its third deal this month to expand biochar production.

António Guterres says global heating is super-charging disasters, and Cop hears warning of ‘inflation on steroids’

This year has been “a masterclass in human destruction”, the UN secretary general has said as he reflected on extreme weather and record temperatures around the world fuelled by climate breakdown.

António Guterres painted a stark portrait of the consequences of climate breakdown that had arisen in recent months. “Families running for their lives before the next hurricane strikes; workers and pilgrims collapsing in insufferable heat; floods tearing through communities and tearing down infrastructure; children going to bed hungry as droughts ravage crops,” he said. “All these disasters, and more, are being supercharged by human-made climate change.”

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Your EV battery is much larger than a home battery. But until now, Australian drivers haven’t been able to run their homes off their cars – or sell power back to the grid. That’s about to change. Syed M Nawazish Ali, Research Fellow in Transport Electrification, RMIT University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

A group of carbon neutral countries including Bhutan, Madagascar, Panama, and Suriname have launched the G-ZERO forum at the COP29 summit in Baku on Tuesday and issued a joint declaration pledging to remain carbon negative “at all times”.

Sir Keir Starmer’s pledge on emissions is an encouraging step at a frightening moment

Predictions that this will be the first calendar year in which the 1.5C warming limit enshrined in the Paris agreement is surpassed provide a stark backdrop to the UN’s 29th climate conference. This year – 2024 – has already seen the hottest-ever day and month, and is expected by experts to be the hottest year too. Addressing delegates on Tuesday, the UN chief, António Guterres, referred to a “masterclass in climate destruction”. The escalating pattern of destructive weather events, most recently in Valencia, is a warning of what lies ahead.

When the 1.5C figure was included in the 2015 deal, it was known to be a stretch. The treaty says countries must hold the average temperature “well below 2C above pre-industrial levels” and aim for 1.5C. Busting this target in 2024 will not mean it has been definitively missed; the measurement of global temperatures relies on averages recorded over 20 or more years. But the crossing of this threshold is a menacing moment. Around the world, people as well as governments and climate specialists should take notice – and act.

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South Korea and the UK announced multimillion dollar funding commitments to support international efforts to reduce methane emissions, while the US launched a fine of over $1,000/tonne on excess production of the greenhouse gas from the fossil fuel sector on Tuesday.

Carbon crediting methodologies may now be approved from mid-2025 following Monday's COP29 agreement on Article 6.4 standards, but technical details still need to be ironed out both in Baku and once the international market becomes operational, according to experts.

New Zealand food manufacturers are beginning to embrace the circular economy but are up against a lack of government support, customer awareness and low-emission freight options. Sitong Michelle (Michelle) Chen, Senior Lecturer in International Business, Auckland University of Technology Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

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Greenpeace and Uplift say Rosebank and Jackdaw licences were granted unlawfully by former Tory government

Climate campaigners have urged a Scottish court to cancel the licence to drill the UK’s largest untapped oilfield, arguing it will cause “sizeable” and unjustified damage to the planet.

Greenpeace and Uplift accuse the former Conservative government of having unlawfully given the Norwegian oil giant Equinor a licence to exploit the Rosebank oilfield, which sits 80 miles (130km) north-west of Shetland and holds nearly 500m barrels of oil and gas.

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Keir Starmer has confirmed that the UK has committed to an 81% cut to emissions by 2035. The prime minister also said the British government was due to launch the CIF Capital Markets Mechanism, a climate finance scheme, on the London Stock Exchange to help developing countries

• UK has ‘huge opportunity’ to lead on green investment, Starmer says

• Cop29 – live updates

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Emissions from flaring are more than double for 10 major international oil companies (IOCs) when including both operated and non-operated assets, compared to when assessing operated assets alone, a new report has found.