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Letter by 61 Labour MPs supports ‘cheapest and most pragmatic’ plan for new electricity infrastructure

More than 60 Labour MPs have formed a bloc to push back against anti-pylon lobbying by Conservative and Green MPs, saying they back plans to build the pylons despite local opposition in several areas.

MPs, particularly in rural areas, have come under mounting pressure from anti-pylon activists to oppose the infrastructure. The Tories found themselves forced to commit to hold a “rapid review” of overhead pylons in their July manifesto.

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Argentina’s new carbon bill prescribes a revitalised national registry but defers key details regarding Article 6 and the voluntary market (VCM) to a domestic regulatory body, diverging from more explicit approaches seen in other Latin American countries.

Panama on Friday established a temporary moratorium on forest carbon projects and decided to apply state assessment procedures.

It turns out long-held resentments exist even in the animal kingdom. Does that mean they hold an evolutionary advantage?

The best thing that happened to me during the whole of the pandemic was a story on the internet. An Oregon resident, furloughed, saw on a daytime nature documentary that, if you fed crows, they would bring you small gifts. Curious, they tried it, and were delighted to find themselves in effective possession of a 15-strong crow family – but then things took a dark turn. The crows became an army, fiercely protective of their leader’s property. If neighbours came near, the crows would dive-bomb them. “To be clear,” the person wrote on Reddit, “they’re not aggressive 100% of the time. If just the neighbours are out [on their own porch], they are friendly, normal crows. They only get aggressive when someone gets close to me or my property.”

It’s such a lovely phrase, “friendly, normal crows”; it’s just a pity that it’s an oxymoron. Crows are the most prodigious grudge-holders, which a professor of wildlife at Washington University, John Marzluff, discovered by capturing seven of the birds while wearing an ogre mask in 2006. A full 17 years later, crows were still regularly attacking him. Even if you were to query the ethics of his original experiment, you’d have to admit that he paid a high price. How such a thing is possible when the lifespan of a crow is only 12 years is this: not only can they hold a grudge, they can also pass it on to one another. Originally, even birds that witnessed the ogre-trap attacked Marzluff, then over time they transmitted the hostility to their offspring, creating a multigenerational grudge.

Zoe Williams is a Guardian columnist

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Best performing wind farms split between north, south, east and west, but the solar results were more predictable.

The post Australia’s best performing wind and solar farms in October appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Brutal economic situation has inflicted misery on farmers who struggle to turn a profit and forced some to look for alternative streams of revenue

• Revealed: billionaires are ‘ultimate beneficiaries’ linked to €3bn of EU farming subsidies

When Coen van den Bighelaar first spoke to school friends about taking over their parents’ dairy farms, he was the only one of the four to voice serious doubts. Fresh out of university, he was making more money in a comfortable office than his father did toiling for twice as long in the field.

But six years later, Bighelaar has followed in his parents’ footsteps, while his friends’ enthusiasm has waned. One quit farming to take a job in logistics. Another opened a daycare centre to supplement the income from selling milk. A third is thinking about buying land and moving to Canada.

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Thousands of small farms have closed according to analysis of official but opaque data from EU member states

• ‘We didn’t realise how hard it is’: small farmers in Europe struggle to get by

The European Union gave generous farming subsidies to the companies of more than a dozen billionaires between 2018 and 2021, the Guardian can reveal, including companies owned by the former Czech prime minister Andrej Babiš and the British businessman Sir James Dyson.

Billionaires were “ultimate beneficiaries” linked to €3.3bn (£2.76bn) of EU farming handouts over the four-year period even as thousands of small farms were closed down, according to the analysis of official but opaque data from EU member states.

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Developers are cutting generation from their projects and going with a battery-only approach. Solar is the most affected.

The post Developers quietly shed solar generation to focus on battery only projects appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Australia's main grid reached a record renewable share of 47.4 pct for October, while in South Australia wind and solar accounted for an average 85.2 per cent of state demand.

The post Australia reaches record monthly renewable share of 47.4 per cent appeared first on RenewEconomy.

The awards event in South Africa will have emotional connections for the Prince of Wales.

Sixteen hours on overtime the COP16 UN biodiversity talks in Colombia were abruptly suspended, after so many delegates left to catch flights that the meeting could no longer legally make decisions, though before that negotiators had approved a DSI fund and a special body for Indigenous Peoples.

Representatives of 196 countries have been meeting in Cali, Colombia, as part of the COP biodiversity summit.

Representatives of 196 countries have been meeting in Cali, Colombia, as part of the COP biodiversity summit.

Plant’s owners hope analysis of tiny sample will help to establish how to safely decommission facility

A piece of the radioactive fuel left from the meltdown of Japan’s tsunami-hit Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant has been retrieved from the site using a remote-controlled robot.

Investigators used the robot’s fishing-rod-like arm to clip and collect a tiny piece of radioactive material from one of the plant’s three damaged reactors – the first time such a feat has been achieved. Should it prove suitable for testing, scientists hope the sample will yield information that will help determine how to decommission the plant.

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Concerned students press for their high schools – some with $1bn endowments – to reinvest in clean energy

A high school in California has decided not to invest in coal, oil or gas, instead pledging to put money into clean energy. It’s the latest win in a new fossil fuel divestment campus campaign launched by high schoolers across 11 countries that is gaining support in the US.

The Nueva School, an elite private school outside San Francisco, pledged in spring 2024 to invest a portion of its $55m endowment in renewable power. The commitment followed months of pressure from students.

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California lawsuit demands Carefree and parent company Edgewell remove chemicals or add warning label

Carefree menstrual pads are contaminated with toxic PFAS “forever chemicals”, which presents a threat to the reproductive health of women using the products, a new lawsuit filed in California state court alleges.

The suit demands Carefree and its parent company, personal care product giant Edgewell, remove PFAS from the products or put a warning label on its packaging.

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Use of bird hand-puppets to rear young among innovative methods unveiled as part of project to restore species

Sea eagles were last seen soaring over the shimmering mud flats and brackish tidal waters of the Severn estuary more than 150 years ago. Now wildlife charities have unveiled innovative plans to bring the raptor back to the estuary, which flows into the Bristol Channel between south-west England and south Wales, by 2026.

“Sea eagles used to be common in these regions. But they were wiped out through human persecution,” says Sophie-lee Williams, the founder of Eagle Reintroduction Wales, which is leading the project. “We strongly believe we have a moral duty to restore this lost native species to these landscapes.”

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The steep and stark environmental decline was not supposed to happen under the common agricultural policy

The Rhine overflowed last winter, covering fields miles from the river and in some places leaving just the tops of trees visible.

But Thomas Bollig, who farms just a few miles from the banks of the Rhine, was not worried. Even as floods inundated the fields of his neighbours, making sowing impossible, his holdings were largely unaffected. Bollig farms organically, and the natural methods he uses to improve his soil allow his fields to hold more water when it rains, and release it gradually, coping well with floods and droughts.

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Financial entities increased their California Carbon Allowance (CCA) holdings ahead of the final WCI quarterly auction, while Washington Carbon Allowance (WCA) holdings rose amid expectations that a voter initiative to repeal the carbon market will fail at the Nov. 5 election.

Covered emissions under the RGGI regional power sector ETS fell over 3% year-on-year (YoY) in Q3, programme data showed Friday, following two prior quarters of precipitous growth.