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I went to China to check out the trackless tram. I came back convinced it’s a transformative transit technology.

The post Why trackless trams are ready to replace light rail appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Tasmania energy minister Guy Barnett speaks at All-Energy wearing a tie decorated with wind turbines. The contrast with federal counterpart Angus Taylor could not be greater.

The post It’s a tie! Tasmania defies federal Coalition on bipartisan approach to energy appeared first on RenewEconomy.

A Wodonga installer has won the country’s most prestigious clean energy award, taking home the 2018 Solar Design and Installation Award from the Clean Energy Council.

The post Wodonga solar installer wins national award appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Sir David Attenborough on Love Island, Global Warming, population growth and meat eating.

Australia is likely to double its installed solar capacity to 18GW by the end of 2020, lifting its share of generation to around 10 per cent and reinforcing argument for battery storage.

The post Australia installed solar capacity to double to 18GW by 2020 appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Three big solar new farms totalling more than 370MW join the grid and start to deliver output into the National Electricity Market.

The post Three biggest solar farms join the grid in Victoria, NSW, and South Australia appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Astronomers have announced the possible discovery of the first known moon outside our Solar System.

Zoos can help save animals not just cage them, says veteran wildlife photographer Joel Sartore.

The Clean Energy Council congratulates the winners of the 2018 Solar Design and Installation Awards, which were announced this evening at the All-Energy Australia Exhibition and Conference in Melbourne.

The post Solar design and installation awards showcase industry innovation appeared first on RenewEconomy.

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

As more companies and individuals are looking for tools to mitigate their impact on climate change, the idea of utilizing blockchain technology has been on the forefront of many conversations. It is one of the building blocks behind cryptocurrency and companies are looking to utilize blockchain technology as a means to streamline the development and sale of carbon credits.

Manitoba has scrapped its carbon tax plan in defiance of the Canadian federal government, the province’s premier has announced.

The heated battle over the direction of the US Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS) between refiners and biofuels advocates has found some common ground in criticising the EPA’s issuance of numerous compliance waivers this year, according to stakeholders speaking at a conference this week.

Renovations can create more waste than new constructions – but they don't have to. Deepika Mathur, Researcher in sustainable architecture, Charles Darwin University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

Donna Strickland has become the first woman in 55 years to win the Nobel Prize in Physics.

The US still supports the CORSIA international flight offsetting mechanism but sees China’s early participation as essential to the scheme’s launch, an industry event heard on Wednesday.

European carbon prices clawed back above €21 on Wednesday, recovering from a three-day low hit intraday amid a firmer energy complex and a steepening EUA futures curve.

On the land and in the towns they’re affected to varying degrees; some find it harder to cope. But they all agree something has changed

• Read part one of The New Normal here
  

If you don’t fully appreciate the complexity of rural communities, farmer Peter Schmidt is not the sort of bloke you would be expecting in the Mulga Lands. His place is 21,000 hectares – 52,000 acres in the old money – and his family have been there since his grandfather selected blocks in the 1890s. The closest town is Wyandra, a blip on the highway on the way to Cunnamulla from Charleville – a drive that reveals the disused fences of smaller blocks long abandoned as unsustainable.

Schmidt though is still at his homestead at Alawoona, its sheds and outbuildings surrounded by a metre-high levee, standing like a bad joke in their sixth year of drought. He put it in after the 2012 flood, which washed a foot of water through his house. Problem is, that flood heralded the start of the dry and it pretty much hasn’t rained since. He jokes with station hand Joe that he cursed the place and might have to break the levee to bring on the rain. But far from being a man of superstition, Schmidt is a rural scientist, with two masters degrees – one each in rural education and cattle behaviour. He has a softly spoken manner and a sense of humour born in the Mulga.

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Clearing of forests in reef catchment zone show Australia a global deforestation hotspot, campaigners say

New official data shows clearing of forests near and along the Great Barrier Reef continued despite Australian government pledges to protect the natural wonder, with at least 152,000 hectares felled in 2016-17 alone.

Forests covering 770,000ha – an area about three times the size of the Australian Capital Territory – in the reef catchment zone have been bulldozed over the past five years. The area cleared last year was larger in size than that covered by new re-growth.

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The California Air Resources Board (ARB) will not submit additional appeals in the La Paloma bankruptcy case, an agency official said, after a federal judge threw out its legal challenge this summer.