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The New Zealand government is partnering with BlackRock to launch a new NZ$2 billion ($1.2 bln) fund designed to help the country achieve 100% renewable electricity by 2030, it announced Tuesday.

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

A new firm announced a voluntary carbon market listing platform on Monday to accelerate credit supply development by rectifying what it says is the current “information asymmetry” that is stifling growth and trust in the sector.

RGGI Allowance prices fell back from eight-month highs this week in what market participants attributed to a continued sympathy trade with California Carbon Allowances, as well as a lack of fundamental demand specific to the power sector cap-and-trade system.

Brazil’s development bank BNDES on Friday announced that it has scrapped its plan to purchase tens of millions of dollars in voluntary carbon credits from two tender processes last year as the institution restructures its support for the market.

Air travel emissions are proving difficult and costly to cut, but travellers can make a surprisingly big difference simply by changing how they travel to and from the airport. Rico Merkert, Professor in Transport and Supply Chain Management and Deputy Director, Institute of Transport and Logistics Studies (ITLS), University of Sydney Business School, University of Sydney David Li, PhD Candidate, Institute of Transport and Logistics Studies, University of Sydney Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

New restrictions on PFAS and other potentially hazardous chemicals in Australia present an opportunity for industry to develop alternatives for new, safe and clean products. Sarah Wilson, PhD Candidate in Nanotechnology & Innovation Governance, University of Technology Sydney Rachael Wakefield-Rann, Senior Research Consultant, Institute for Sustainable Futures, University of Technology Sydney Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

Soil estimated to be home to 90% of world’s fungi, 85% of plants and more than 50% of bacteria, making it the world’s most species-rich habitat

More than half of all species live in the soil, according to a study that has found it is the single most species-rich habitat on Earth.

Soil was known to hold a wealth of life, but this new figure doubles what scientists estimated in 2006, when they suggested 25% of life was soil-based.

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Kenya should close loopholes that allow untaxed carbon revenue to be shifted outside of the country in its upcoming legislation while steering clear of imposing special taxes and fees on the domestic market, a climate-tech chief executive told Carbon Pulse on Monday.

Carbon credit prices were little changed over the past week amid continuing uncertainty about the impact of the Core Carbon Principles (CCP) framework from the Integrity Council for the Voluntary Carbon Market (ICVCM), although there was a slight bounce in Xpansiv CBL’s nature-based standardised contract.

An inaugural national system for carbon credits using blockchain technology is being launched in the UAE through a partnership between the Ministry of Climate Change and Environment (MoCCAE) and two technology providers. 

EU nations are likely to overachieve on the bloc's overall targets for installing solar power over this decade, according to a business group's assessment of the government plans submitted to date.

World’s tiniest marine mammal – found only in the Gulf of California in Mexico – has only 10 individuals left, study finds

The International Whaling Commission has issued the first “extinction alert” in its 70-year history, to warn of the danger facing the vaquita, the world’s tiniest and most critically endangered marine mammal.

A recent study shows that the small porpoise, found only in the Gulf of California in Mexico, has only 10 individuals left. It has been driven to the edge of extinction due to entanglement in fishing nets known as “gillnets”, which are now illegal in the area.

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Tyre Extinguishers claim responsibility for attack to highlight ‘presence of grossly inappropriate private vehicles’ on roads

Anti-SUV activists used a power drill to sabotage the tyres of more than 60 4x4 vehicles at a car dealership, in an attack they described as a reprisal for the deaths of two girls in a crash at a primary school last month.

In the early hours of Monday morning, activists crept on to the forecourt of the Vertu Jaguar showroom in Exeter. They told the Guardian they went from vehicle to vehicle drilling holes in the sidewalls of all four tyres on each, so they must be replaced.

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Soggy July has affected wheat, barley and hay crops as waterlogged soil makes some harder to harvest

The unseasonably wet weather is causing problems for this year’s harvest, experts have said, with wheat, barley and hay crops affected.

Many farmers have been signed up to a nature-friendly scheme called Mid Tier, which does not allow hay to be cut until July to help wildlife.

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Oarfish swim vertically, moving up and down and side to side like a cursor. It would be easier to believe that they do not exist

A giant oarfish, also known as the “king of herrings”, is an eight-metre long ribbon of silver, tapered at its tail and on its head wearing a permanently stunned face – as though moments ago it was a normal herring and then the world’s largest chef slapped it down on a bench top and rolled over it with a rolling pin.

“These are unpredictable fish,” research biologist Milton Love told the New York Times 10 years ago. But in Japan, oarfish are considered highly predictable: they predict the future. See an oarfish, the story goes, and an earthquake will follow. In the months before Japan’s 2011 earthquake, one of the most powerful ever recorded, 20 oarfish were found on beaches. They’re known as “messengers from the sea god’s palace”, or jinja hime, “shrine princesses”.

The sea god’s palace, Ryūgū-jō, has four sides, each of which faces one of the four seasons. The expression on the oarfish’s face, with one wide eye on each side, makes sense viewed like this, too – one side is seeing the past, and the other the future. Things don’t look good: looking east it sees plum and cherry blossoms, looking west it sees a maple tree making “fire in the branches”.

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The British summer is still based on pre-industrial events. It’s time a government had the guts to shake up the holiday year

If you had booked an August holiday in Britain 10 days ago, then heard the weather forecast, you probably would have taken the first train to Gatwick. The forecast for the following week was awful – for storms, clouds, rain and “unseasonably cold” weather. In other words, another typical August.

In the event the forecast was wildly inaccurate. Where I was on the Welsh coast, just one day passed without sun for all or part of the day. It did rain heavily for part of one day and there was the odd shower. It certainly was not hot. But a week on the beach was feasible, the sea blue and the sunsets glorious. That we saw relatively few visitors was entirely the result of the forecast, according to local businesses. One publican told me he can predict his takings each day not by the weather but by the 8am forecast. Yet it is so often wrong. The weather forecast is England’s economic sanction against Wales.

Simon Jenkins is a Guardian columnist

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European carbon allowance prices edged lower in continued thin trading on Monday morning, shrugging off healthy gains in natural gas as data showed further contractions in industrial output in the EU's largest economy, while energy prices rose in response to increased risks around Russian commodity exports from the Black Sea after attacks on shipping over the weekend.

An India-based carbon developer has submitted a coral reef project in Indonesia’s West Papua for pilot status under Verra’s emerging biodiversity methodology, with plans for other project types already teed up.

Taiwan's main bourse on Monday unveiled a government-backed carbon exchange in Kaohsiung, which will start offering trade in domestic carbon credits in the first half of 2024 at the earliest, while international units might become available later this year.