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The Alberta government on Thursday announced that it will tighten output-based standards for both industrials and power generators in its Technology Innovation and Emissions Reduction (TIER) large emitter programme while also raising the scheme’s offset usage threshold and creating several new classes of credits.

The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) on Wednesday asked for public input on its rules for making environmental marketing claims, including for carbon offsets and renewable energy, as it looks to bolster enforcement against greenwashing.

South Australia seeks partners for green hydrogen power plant for Whyalla, which it hopes will be as transformational as the original Tesla big battery.

The post South Australia seeks proposals for electrolyser and “world’s biggest” hydrogen power plant appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Brazil’s incoming president adds voice to demand as Montreal talks restart after series of walkouts

Brazil’s incoming president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has backed calls for rich nations to provide more money to protect Earth’s ecosystems at Cop15 as talks restart in Montreal after a series of walkouts.

More than 100 environment ministers arrived at the biodiversity summit in Canada on Thursday before a weekend of intense negotiations on this decade’s UN targets to protect the natural world.

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A two-year-old US-based soil carbon removal company on Thursday announced the close of a Series A funding round exceeding $12 million.

Danish developer takes majority stake in 3.6GW solar hydrogen and "power-to-X" project near Gladstone in Queensland.

The post Danish developer takes control of huge 3.6GW solar hydrogen project in Queensland appeared first on RenewEconomy.

For the first time, Australia has moved to cap natural gas prices in a bid to stop energy price pain. Is the cap too high – or was it necessary to mollify the producers? Samantha Hepburn, Professor, Deakin Law School, Deakin University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

Indigenous engineering and care for Country points to a better way to manage the Baaka. Michael Westaway, Australian Research Council Future Fellow, Archaeology, School of Social Science, The University of Queensland Badger Bates, Indigenous knowledge holder, Indigenous Knowledge Sue Jackson, Professor, Australian Rivers Institute, Griffith University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

Most food waste still goes into red bins of mixed waste bound for landfill. It’s using up precious landfill space and harming the environment when it could produce valuable compost and biogas instead. William Clarke, Professor of Waste Management, The University of Queensland Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

EU legislators will on Friday aim to negotiate to a finish EU ETS-related bills under the bloc's overarching Fit for 55 climate policy package, with talks expected to last over one or even two nights.

A pair of tech companies belonging to Frontier, a carbon removal funding initiative, announced Thursday investment of up to $11 million in seven projects that cover an increasingly wide array of tech-based CO2 removal activities.

US star, who was also in Succession, urged leaders at biodiversity conference to take more forceful action to end nature crisis

The US actor James Cromwell revisited his old role in Jurassic Park with a modern twist in a protest against inaction on the nature crisis. He urged leaders at Cop15 to “Stop the Human Asteroid” as he stood in front of a model dinosaur surrounded by pictures of world leaders’ heads as bits of rock flying into Earth.

The 82-year-old actor – known for his roles as Ewan Logan in Succession and the farmer in Babe – staged the protest near the Cop15 convention centre in Montreal, where more than 10,000 people have gathered to create the next decade of targets to bend the curve on biodiversity loss. He told the Guardian: “With all the history of the Cops, we have achieved nothing, absolutely nothing, and they know that. I don’t know how they look at themselves in the mirror in the morning.”

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UK corporates are seeking to buy foreign carbon credits for offsetting because of a lack of high quality domestic  projects, according to a survey of listed companies commissioned by a listings firm.

Chemicals that leach out of plastic shown to cause fatal abnormalities, including gut developing outside body

Sea urchins raised in sea water with high levels of plastic pollution, including fragments collected from a Cornish surfing beach, die from developmental abnormalities, research shows.

Scientists placed fertilised urchin eggs in seawater with varying levels of plastic to compare the effects of newly made plastic pellets, or “nurdles”, with the impacts of high levels of fragments found washed up on Watergate Bay in Cornwall.

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A Brazil-based startup on Thursday announced it has started to operationalise $100 mln towards reforesting degraded Amazonian land through a revamped methodology, and is already in a discussion to sell the resulting carbon removal credits at a level well above other VER prices. 

Populations have increased tenfold in the past two decades, leading to a new national strategy to halt the rapid spread

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Populations of feral deer have increased tenfold in the past two decades with numbers now too high to be managed by recreational hunting or other recent control measures.

Numbers of the invasive species are now so large in some parts of the east coast that a new national strategy by federal and state governments proposes establishing a “containment zone” to stop the spread of the animals westward across the country.

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Labor revokes Abbott government move which allowed energy from burning wood waste to be counted with solar and wind

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Electricity generated by burning native forest wood waste will no longer be allowed to be classified as renewable energy under a regulatory change adopted by the Albanese government.

The decision, which Labor had promised to consider after it was recommended by a Senate committee in September, reverses a 2015 Abbott government move which allowed burning native forest timber to be counted alongside solar and wind energy towards the national renewable energy target.

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Much of the media and NGO community have recently muddied the waters around the global carbon market by repeating a set of myths around the market, writes Charles Bedford of Carbon Growth Partners.

EUAs posted robust gains late on Thursday morning as traders switched their focus from REPowerEU negotiations and options expiry to Friday's trilogue discussions on EU ETS reform and next week's expiry of the December futures contract.

A weekly summary of our biodiversity news plus bite-sized updates from around the world. All articles in this edition are free to read (no subscription required).