Around The Web

EUAs tumbled early on Tuesday as the imminent resumption of full auction volumes led to the fewest number of bidders in the daily auction for nearly six years, while energy prices fell as the market awaited details of a Brussels plan to uncouple gas and electricity prices.

Announcement means 11 of agency’s 14 areas in England now in drought status after record dry spell

All of south-west England is in drought after some of the driest conditions in nearly 90 years, the Environment Agency has said.

The Wessex area – which includes Bristol, Somerset, Dorset, south Gloucestershire and parts of Wiltshire – has been declared in drought status.

Continue reading...

Solar and wind projects to expand in size and provide bulk of total American electricity supply by decade’s end, study shows

Renewable energy is set for an unprecedented boom in the US in the wake of its first ever climate bill, with the capacity of solar and wind projects expected to double by the end of the decade and providing the bulk of total American electricity supply, new analysis has shown.

The passage of the legislation, known as the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), will help propel the US towards the forefront of the clean energy economy, experts predict, helping it compete with China on the manufacturing and installation of solar panels, wind turbines, batteries and emerging zero carbon technology.

Continue reading...

Upstream oil and gas companies Equinor and Wintershall Dea have teamed up to pursue the development of an extensive CCS value chain that will connect CO2-emitting establishments in Europe with offshore CCS sites in the Norwegian Continental Shelf (NCS), they announced on Tuesday.

A couple has been convicted by a Taiwanese court for running a carbon credit investment scam and defrauding over 70 victims out of more than NT$100 million ($3.3 million).

Despite many challenges, December’s crucial biodiversity talks in Montreal may set a new path for humans to live with nature

• What is Cop15 and why does it matter for all life on Earth?

They are known as “the twins”, born in 1992 at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro but diplomatically separated and left to develop at different speeds. One is the UN’s climate change convention, or UNFCCC, now a fully fledged global agreement with huge annual summits attended by heads of state and rock stars pledging to reduce emissions.

The other, the UN convention on biological diversity (CBD), aims to protect the world’s 10 million species of animals and plants, but it meets less often, is modest by comparison, and has yet to make its mark with the public in the same way as climate.

John Vidal is a former Guardian environment editor

Continue reading...

Flooding in Pakistan has killed more than 1,000 people and affected over 30 million, in a catastrophe that is still unfolding. ‘We are witnessing the worst flooding in the history of the country,’ says Dr Fahad Saeed, a scientist with the Climate Analytics group

• ‘Monster monsoon’: why the floods in Pakistan are so devastating

Continue reading...

Accidents and pollution are making road vehicles untenable. With public transport and ride-sharing, their demise can’t come soon enough

In 1989 a group of Chinese government urban planners came to Europe on a fact-finding mission. They were widely praised for curbing car use – the country of 1 billion people, after all, had just a few million vehicles; the bicycle was king; its city streets were safe and the air mostly clean. How did they manage to have so few cars? asked their hosts, grappling as ever with chaotic British streets, traffic jams and pollution.

“But you don’t understand,” replied one of the delegation. “In 20 years, there will be no bicycles in China.”

John Vidal is a former Guardian environment editor

Continue reading...

Conservationists say auditor general’s report shows offsets must be ‘last resort’ amid calls for overhaul of biodiversity market

• Follow our Australia news live blog for the latest updates
• Get our free news app, morning email briefing or daily news podcast

A New South Wales government environmental offsets scheme is failing to protect some of the state’s most endangered species and ecosystems and is riddled with integrity and transparency concerns, according to a review by the state’s auditor general.

The report, described as “utterly damning” by conservationists, prompted opposition and crossbench MPs to call for an overhaul of the scheme.

Sign up to receive an email with the top stories from Guardian Australia every morning

Continue reading...

Renewables takes back seat at Woodside as profits surge on soaring global gas prices.

The post Renewables hardly get a mention as super profits wed Woodside to gas appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Like Australia, Chile is facing mounting environmental pressures, such as an escalating water crisis. If the constitution is approved in September it’ll deliver profound changes to the country. Ana Estefanía Carballo, Honorary Research Fellow in Mining and Society, School of Geography, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, The University of Melbourne Erin Fitz-Henry, Deputy Coordinator - Anthropology, Development Studies & Social Theory, The University of Melbourne Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

He wanted me to stay when the drains backed up and left the garden submerged in a foul pond. Obviously I still went

I had four teenagers all packed and ready to go to Ramsgate, and I was doing a quick final scout around the house for where the terrible smell was coming from. I love seeing a teenager with an overnight bag. You just know they’ve forgotten the real stuff (toothbrush, pants) and remembered the dumb stuff (crochet hooks, spare headphone case). And they look so proud and independent.

In fact, the smell was outside the house, a backed-up drain that had made a zen-looking but appallingly foul pond of the garden. Mr Z came back from work and identified this, just as we were all leaving. “Do you want me to stay?” I said, with a lot of heavy upwards inflection to indicate that no way on earth was I going to. “Well, yes,” he replied.

Zoe Williams is a Guardian columnist

Continue reading...

Namibia will establish an enabling framework to develop carbon market-based options, such as an emissions trading scheme, to help the country implement its NDC targets, it was announced on Monday.

A theme emerges as NSW auditor-general raises serious concerns about the effectiveness and integrity of the state's Biodiversity Offset Scheme.

The post “Failure by almost every measure:” Offsets under fire again after “damning” audit appeared first on RenewEconomy.

A custom tube trailer will transport the first shipment of renewable hydrogen from Hydrogen Park SA, for use in production of high-purity argon.

The post First batch of SA-made renewable hydrogen heads to Whyalla by tube trailer appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Coca Cola steps closer to 100 per cent renewables in 8-year deal with biggest wind farm in Western Australia.

The post Coca-Cola steps closer to 100 pct renewables in deal with state’s biggest wind farm appeared first on RenewEconomy.

This long-overdue change is good news for households and the planet but much more must be done to future-proof housing

Energy-efficiency standards for new homes in Australia are being upgraded for the first time in a decade. New homes will be required to improve minimum performance from six stars to seven stars under the nationwide house energy rating scheme. Federal, state and territory building ministers agreed on the change last Friday.

The rating will also use a whole-of-home energy “budget”. This will allow homes to meet the new standard in different ways. The standard will come into force in May 2023 and all new homes will have to comply by October 2023.

Continue reading...

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

California legislators on Sunday published a raft of climate- and energy-related bills just days ahead of the end of session, with the proposals including a direct emissions reduction goal for 2045 and an extension for the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant.

The Ontario Ministry of Environment, Conservation, and Parks (MECP) on Friday published draft regulatory amendments to the province’s Emissions Performance Standard (EPS) in order to align with the updated federal carbon pricing benchmark and output-based pricing system, without any mention of incorporating carbon offsets into the programme for large stationary facilities.