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Queensland to legislate renewable targets to build 22GW of wind and solar, and 12GW of storage. But it will still have the lowest share of renewables in 2035.

The post Queensland to legislate renewable targets in $62 billion wind, solar and storage plan appeared first on RenewEconomy.

A £6.5m scheme to help prevent the extinction of priority species in Scotland has been launched.

Deteriorating conditions and other whales in area south of Sydney hampered attempts, say rescuers

A humpback whale trapped in waters south of Sydney has finally been freed after a gruelling eight-hour rescue mission.

Rescue efforts began on Saturday morning after reports of a whale in distress off Five Islands near Port Kembla. Volunteer crews from Marine Rescue NSW and NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service were called to assist at about 8.30am.

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Pollution from gas flaring – the burning of natural gas associated with oil extraction – is also a major concern in the oil-rich but extremely dry south

Western oil companies are exacerbating water shortages and causing pollution in Iraq as they race to profit from rising oil prices after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Water scarcity has already displaced thousands and increased instability, according to international experts, while Iraq is now considered the fifth most vulnerable country to the climate crisis by the UN. In the oil-rich but extremely dry south, wetlands that used to feed entire communities are now muddy canals.

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Japanese start-up Green Carbon has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Philippines’ state-owned National Development Company (NDC) with a view to generating 45 million carbon credits annually across a range of project types.

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

Speculators extended net holdings across North American carbon markets this week, while producers shed significant length across California Carbon Allowances (CCAs) and RGGI Allowances (RGAs), data from the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) showed Friday.

Hollywood director of climate crisis satire praised protestors for waking up ‘sleeping governments’ and will triple donations over weekend

The Hollywood director of Netflix film Don’t Look Up has pledged to triple donations to Just Stop Oil over the weekend, the group has said.

Adam McKay, who made the satire on the climate crisis as well as Step Brothers and The Big Short, said he stands with the protesters, praising them for waking up “sleeping governments”.

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Travel blog Capture the Atlas has crowned its best Milky Way photographs of the year. This year’s shots captured the galaxy glowing above dramatic landscapes in Namibia, Chile, Japan, Spain, Iran and New Zealand

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Dupont, Chemours and Corteva agree deal and 3M also reportedly considering $10bn settlement to avoid trial due to start on Monday

DuPont and two related companies said they would pay close to $1.2bn to settle liability claims brought by public water systems serving the vast majority of the US population on Friday, just days before the start of a bellwether trial in South Carolina over PFAS contamination.

PFAS maker 3M was reportedly also considering a settlement that would keep the company from having to face allegations that it was responsible for knowingly contaminating drinking water supplies around the United States.

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Flies chilled to sub-zero temperatures amputate one or more of their six limbs to protect their internal organs

Flightless snow flies in the US and Canada can amputate their legs to survive as they begin to freeze, researchers have discovered.

Lab experiments in which the flies were chilled gradually to sub-zero temperatures revealed they can detach one or more of their six legs, an apparent “last-ditch tactic” to protect their internal organs from the advancing cold.

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Carbon credit certifier Verra on Friday agreed to join an initiative to bolster development of the voluntary carbon market (VCM) in Brazil, aiming to help scale the nation’s nature-based activities.

A persistent loophole in EU ETS regulations has been artificially tightening the carbon market for years, according to observers, steepening the annual drawdown in permit supply with knock-on effects for allowances prices and costs for European industries.

A cookstove project in Malawi has been downgraded by a carbon credit rating agency to having a low chance of achieving its stated carbon avoidance because of concerns about usage and stove effectiveness, while credits from a biodigester project in India were given a very low chance of avoiding a tonne of CO2.

The European Commission's transport boss underlined this week that their institution has no intention of proposing new measures aimed at curbing private jet emissions despite a push from a group of several member states to tighten environmental measures on their use.

A bill designed to inform California's forthcoming review of its WCI-linked cap-and-trade regulation was held on Thursday, while a suite of voluntary carbon offset and climate disclosure bills in the Golden State sailed through their first floor votes this week.

Swedish steelmaker SSAB has taken a major step towards plans to convert the entire Nordic production system to fossil free by around 2030.

Investigation involving Guardian shows systematic and vast forest loss linked to cattle farming in Brazil

More than 800m trees have been cut down in the Amazon rainforest in just six years to feed the world’s appetite for Brazilian beef, according to a new investigation, despite dire warnings about the forest’s importance in fighting the climate crisis.

A data-driven investigation by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ), the Guardian, Repórter Brasil and Forbidden Stories shows systematic and vast forest loss linked to cattle farming.

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The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region's aspirations to become a global hub for decarbonisation and sustainable finance will hinge on the construction of more robust market infrastructure and improved transparency on creation and use of carbon credits, concluded a roundtable debate at a conference held in Bahrain.

EU carbon prices climbed on Friday morning after the daily auction cleared at a premium to the spot market for the fourth time in a row, reversing the previous session's slide that had seen prices fall to a four-month low, while energy markets also recovered some of yesterday's sharp decline.