Feed aggregator

International climate task force says companies should disclose all of their direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions

Banks should disclose lending to companies with carbon-related risks, according to recommendations in a new report by the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures.

The TCFD report – part of a G20 initiative led by governor of the Bank of England Mark Carney and former mayor of New York City Michael Bloomberg – outlines how companies should disclose climate-related information in their financial filings, with the aim of allowing economies to properly value climate-related risks.

Continue reading...

The government has rejected advice to approve the new regulations that ensure homes, hospitals and schools do not overheat as the number of deadly heatwaves rises with climate change

The government must reverse its opposition to new building regulations that ensure homes, hospitals and schools do not overheat as the number of deadly heatwaves rises, according to its official climate change advisers.

The Committee on Climate Change (CCC) recommended the new regulations in 2015 but ministers rejected the advice, citing a commitment to “reduce net regulation on homebuilders”. Without action, the number of people dying as a result of heat is expected to more than triple to 7,000 a year by 2040, the CCC warns in its annual report on the UK’s progress on tackling global warming.

Continue reading...

Our dependence on plastic has to end as we contribute to an estimated 12m tonnes entering our oceans, polluting marine life, every year

Staying hydrated is good for our health. But contributing to the ever growing mound of waste plastic is not only bad for the planet, but for our wellbeing too.

The global demand for plastic bottles, spurred on by the drinks industry, is wreaking havoc on the environment. Every year, about half a trillion new bottles are produced, and many billions end up in landfill, the sea or the environment.

Continue reading...

The Go-Go Gang are a bunch of dancing militants on a mission to save the planet through kidnappings – and killer moves. Find out more in this taste of Murder a Go-Go, photographer Matt Henry’s fictional mashup of eco-action and 1960s exploitation cinema

Continue reading...

Natalie Fee left a job in television to focus on reducing plastic pollution. Her latest project, Refill, aims to make reusing a plastic bottle simpler than buying a new one and it’s catching on in cities from Bath to Bonn

Scrambling down the muddy riverbank, Natalie Fee frowns as she looks out across the River Avon. Three weeks earlier she had spent a day with other volunteers collecting hundreds of plastic bottles that were littering the river as it made its way to the sea. Now a new tide of plastic has returned.

“In a sense it is dispiriting,” says Fee as she starts to gather up the bottles strewn along the bank. “In another way, it just highlights how important it is we keep pushing ahead with the work we are doing.”

Continue reading...

Goat Island, East Devon After trotting through coastal scrub, the path abruptly writhes and plunges into dark shadow

A hot day on the South West Coast Path between Axmouth and Lyme Regis. The quivering air smells warmly of bracken. Gorse pods snap sharply, flinging their seeds into the tangled undergrowth.

After trotting easily through coastal scrub, the path abruptly writhes and plunges into the dark shadow of the chasm. This is the undercliff, a wooded no-man’s land between clifftop and shoreline, formed by a continuous cycle of landslips.

Continue reading...

GTM highlights what is becoming an increasingly common refrain these days — solar prices continue to fall, and they’re not slowing down.

Call for new coal generation to be stopped by 2020 comes as the industry's flagship "clean coal" project terminated after $10 billion investment, and as Coalition considers new coal generator and threatens to turn financial screws on states that oppose fracking.

Perth-based Stellata Energy has won approval for a 120MW solar plant near Merredin, in Western Australia’s wheatbelt, adding to the growing queue of large scale renewable projects lining up for construction after a near four-year investment drought. Stellata has teamed up with UK investment manager Ingenious investment to build the Merredin solar farm, which would be the largest in […]

Self-driving vehicles will not only need to “see” the world, they’ll need to communicate and work together..

Some states and electric power companies are rolling out a new weapon against fossil fuels — giant batteries.

The project, which relied on a “gasifier” to turn a cheap and common grade of coal into fuel, is over, at least for now, Southern said.

Energy Minister Mark Bailey unveiled the first of many fast-charging electric vehicle stations which will be rolled out at various locations right up the Queensland coast.

From 1 July 2017, the Commercial Building Disclosure (CBD) Program will extend to commercial building spaces of 1,000 square metres and more, helping more businesses save on their energy costs.

Eight cargo vessels containing enormous blades, wind towers and more than 450 components for Queensland’s largest wind farm project, RATCH Australia’s Mount Emerald Wind Farm, will soon transit through the Port of Cairns in a boost to local economies.

Changes to maximum allowable reserves for NSW

Deloitte Access Economics has valued the Great Barrier Reef at A$56 billion, with an economic contribution of A$6.4 billion per year. Yet this figure grossly underestimates the value of the reef, as it mainly focuses on tourism and the reef’s role as an Australian icon.

When you include aspects of the reef that the report excludes, such as the ecosystem services provided by coral reefs, you find that the reef is priceless.

Putting a price on the Great Barrier Reef buys into the notion that a cost-benefit analysis is the right way to make decisions on policies and projects that may affect the reef. For example, the environmental cost of the extension to the Abbot Point coal terminal can be compared to any economic benefits.

But as the reef is both priceless and irreplaceable, this is the wrong approach. Instead, the precautionary principle should be used to make decisions regarding the reef. Policies and projects that may damage the reef cannot go ahead.

How do you value the Great Barrier Reef?

The Deloitte report uses what’s known as a “contingent valuation” approach. This is a survey-based methodology, and is commonly used to measure the value of non-market environmental assets such as endangered species and national parks – as well as to calculate the impact of events such as oil spills.

In valuing the reef, surveys were used to elicit people’s willingness to pay for it, such as through a tax or levy. This was found to be A$67.60 per person per year. The report also uses the travel-cost method, which estimates willingness to pay for the Great Barrier Reef, based on the time and money that people spend to visit it. Again, this is commonly used in environmental economics to value national parks and the recreational value of local lakes.

Of course, all methods of valuing environmental assets have limitations. For example, it is difficult to make sure that respondents are stating realistic amounts in their willingness to pay. Respondents may act strategically if they think they really will be slugged with a Great Barrier Reef levy. They may conflate this environmental issue with all environmental issues.

But more importantly, the methodology in the report leaves out the most important non-market value that the reef provides, which are called ecosystem services. For example, coral reefs provide storm protection and erosion protection, and they are the nurseries for 25% of all marine animals which themselves have commercial and existence value.

The Deloitte report even cites (but does not reference) a 2014 study that values the ecosystem services provided by coral reefs at US$352,249 per hectare per year. The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park covers 35 million hectares with 2,900 individual reefs of varying sizes. This means the ecosystem services it provides are worth trillions of dollars per year.

That is, it is essentially priceless.

The problem with putting a value on the Reef

Valuing the environment at all is contentious in economics. Valuation is performed so that all impacts from, say, a new development, can be expressed in a common metric – in this case dollars. This allows a cost-benefit analysis to be performed.

But putting a price on the Great Barrier Reef hides the fact that it is irreplaceable, and as such its value is not commensurate with the values of other assets. For instance, using Deloitte’s figure, The Australian newspaper compared the reef to the value of 12 Sydney Opera Houses. But while they are both icons, the Opera House can be rebuilt. The Great Barrier Reef cannot. Any loss is irreversible.

When environmental assets are irreplaceable and their loss irreversible, a more appropriate decision-making framework is the Precautionary Principle.

The Precautionary Principle suggests that when there is uncertainty regarding the impacts of a new development on an environmental asset, decision makers should be cautious and minimise the maximum loss. For example, if it is even remotely possible that the extension to the Abbot Point coal terminal could lead to massive destruction of the reef, then precaution suggests that it shouldn’t go ahead.

Assigning a value to the reef might still be appropriate under the Precautionary Principle, to estimate the maximum loss. But it would require the pricing of all values and especially ecosystem services.

While the Precautionary Principle has been much maligned due to its perceived bias against development, it is a key element of the definition of Ecologically Sustainable Development in Australia’s Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999.

For a priceless asset like the Great Barrier Reef, it is perhaps better to leave it as “priceless” and to act accordingly. After all, if the Precautionary Principle is ever going to be used when assessing Ecologically Sustainable Development, in contrast with cost-benefit analysis and valuations, it is surely for our main environmental icon.

Ultimately, the protection and prioritisation of the Great Barrier Reef is a political issue that requires political will, and not one that can be solved by pricing and economics.

Neil Perry 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 UK's biggest space company takes the next step in its project to boost wifi in planes over Europe.

Coal entrepreneur and RET critic Trevor St Baker chases technology to have sheets with solar on one side and storage on another "printed like newspapers."

For the first time, urban bats are being monitored in real time using smart sensors at a London park.