Feed aggregator

First big solar farm to be built in Mt Isa grid after APA lands a 15-year supply contract with a local zinc miner.

The post First stage of Mt Isa solar farm gets green light after supply deal with zinc miner appeared first on RenewEconomy.

As the serious business of negotiation finally begins in Glasgow, we look at the key barriers to progress.

The agreement between the world's richest economies makes no reference to cutting emissions by 2050.

When Prime Minister Scott Morrison returns from the Glasgow climate summit, he must start a proper national conversation on net-zero. Frank Jotzo, Professor, Crawford School of Public Policy and Head of Energy, Institute for Climate Energy and Disaster Solutions, Australian National University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

Helping developing nations pay for the expensive work of emissions reduction and adaptation benefits everyone on the planet. Melanie Pill, PhD candidate, Australian National University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

Reach net zero requires policies spanning energy, industry, transport, agriculture, land use, even trade. Climate change is a whole-of-government issue. It’s every minister’s problem. James Ha, Associate, Grattan Institute Alison Reeve, Deputy Program Director, Energy and Climate Change, Grattan Institute Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

In the race to avert catastrophic global heating, there is no more wriggle room left

Six years ago, as the Paris accord was agreed amid euphoria at the 21st UN climate conference, the French hosts wisely insisted on a clause obliging countries to match promises with deeds. Having committed to try to hold global temperature rises “well below” 2C compared to preindustrial times – and aspire towards a limit of 1.5C – governments were mandated to produce updated plans in 2020, showing how they would actually achieve that goal.

Delayed by a year due to the Covid pandemic, the climate summit now beginning in Glasgow represents that moment of truth. In the words of Laurent Fabius, the former French foreign minister who presided in Paris, Cop26 “is the Cop of action, at which we apply the Paris agreement”. Boris Johnson has acknowledged that there is no prospect of a formal commitment to the 1.5C threshold in Glasgow. But if a pathway to that target is not kept open, the world’s leaders will knowingly be locking the planet into a journey towards environmental catastrophe. This year’s extreme weather events – the terrible heatwaves, wildfires and floods that have made headlines across the globe – are evidence that the destructive consequences of global heating are happening faster than expected and on a larger scale. The world today is 1.1-1.2C hotter than in the preindustrial era. Heating beyond 1.5C would deliver even more devastating droughts and crop failures. It would increase the chances of greater famine and ecosystem collapse.

Continue reading...

Boris Johnson says there is a 'long way to go' at news conference at the end of the G20 meeting in Rome and before Cop26 gets under way.

World leaders meeting at the G20 summit in Rome have agreed that countries must take meaningful action to keep the world from warming by no more than 1.5C above pre-industrial levels, but face criticism for offering few concrete commitments in order to reach the target.

Sunday’s final communique did not include a commitment to achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2050.

• G20 pledge to take climate action criticised for ‘lacking ambition’

Continue reading...

UK PM says climate crisis talks at G20 over weekend only ‘inched forward’

Boris Johnson has warned that the Cop26 climate summit is at serious risk of failure, as the target of keeping the global temperature rise below 1.5C is not on track and pledges from countries so far are a “drop in the rapidly warming ocean”.

As the historic conference hosted by the UK opened in Glasgow, the prime minister delivered a blunt message that the 1.5C target is “very much in the balance”, describing the chances of a deal that keeps the goal alive as “six out of 10”.

Continue reading...

Hundreds in Halloween outfits march in Edinburgh and Cop26 Coalition holds rally in Glasgow

Climate justice campaigners held events in Scotland’s two biggest cities on Sunday as world leaders arrived in Glasgow for the start of the Cop26 summit.

In Edinburgh, hundreds of activists in Halloween costumes marched through the city and held a rally outside the Scottish parliament.

Continue reading...

From ‘climate trains’ and indigenous ceremonies to pilgrimages and protests, delegates, activists and journalists descend on the UN climate conference

Continue reading...

Scientists from the WMO say global warming is leading the world into "uncharted territory".

Report sets out heatwaves, wildfires, droughts and floods that have wreaked havoc this year

The climate crisis has driven the planet into “uncharted territory”, with far-reaching repercussions for today’s and future generations, according to the UN World Meteorological Organization. It said the Cop26 summit, which started on Sunday, is a “make-or-break opportunity to put us back on track”.

The WMO’s State of the Global Climate report shows that the last seven years are the hottest seven years on record, with accelerating sea level rise hitting new heights in 2021. The report sets out the heatwaves, wildfires, droughts and floods that have wreaked havoc across the planet this year and is intended to inform Cop26 negotiations.

Continue reading...

At Cop26 a plan is urgently needed that will allow Africa to develop as well as adapt to global heating

• Lazarus Chakwera is president of Malawi

When will rich countries take responsibility? Last week, ahead of Cop26 in Glasgow, it was revealed that many of them had lobbied against the UN’s climate recommendations – namely that urgent action is needed. At the same time, some questioned the need to fund poorer countries to adapt to the effects of climate change – despite the failure by developed countries to deliver the $100bn (£75bn) they had pledged.

Africa has done little to create the climate crisis. Yet the locust plagues in the Horn of Africa, the first climate change famine in Madagascar and the water crises in southern Africa are all evidence that my continent is already paying the price of others’ emissions. The fund that some would like diminished is not charity, but a cleaning fee that must be paid.

Lazarus Chakwera is president of Malawi, chair of the 46-member Least Developed Countries and chair of Southern Africa Development Community

Continue reading...

Too few leaders will arrive at Cop26 bearing any mandate for serious climate action, because hardly any have tried to get one

To be facetious about it, they only have 12 days to save the Earth. As politicians and officials from 197 countries begin just under a fortnight’s work at the Cop26 summit in Glasgow, you can sense a strange mixture of feelings: expectation, cynicism, fatalism, anger and fragile hope.

It will be easy to lose track of what is at stake and who is who – although anyone feeling confused should recall the report issued in August by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and its bracing conclusion: that huge environmental changes triggered by global heating are now everywhere, and avoiding a future that will be completely catastrophic demands “immediate, rapid and large-scale reductions” in carbon emissions. The point is simple enough. But one familiar factor may well weaken the resolve of the key people at Cop26: the fact that too few politicians will arrive in Scotland bearing any mandate for serious climate action, because almost none of them have tried to get one.

John Harris is a Guardian columnist

Continue reading...

Prince of Wales urges G20 to set aside differences and build sustainable economy

Cop26 is “the last chance saloon” to save the world from runaway climate change, Prince Charles has told world leaders in Rome ahead of the crucial climate summit in Glasgow.

Speaking to an audience including Boris Johnson on the sidelines of the gathering of the G20 group of industrialised nations, Charles said it was the moment to begin a green-led economic turnaround.

Continue reading...

Some defences are at risk of failure but private owners cannot be forced to make upgrades

• Fixing flood defences: ‘All we can do is ask’

A third of England’s most important flood defences are in private hands, an investigation has found, with more than 1,000 found to be in a poor state and some at risk of “complete performance failure”.

Private owners cannot be forced to make upgrades to the defences, which can involve bills of hundreds of thousands of pounds. The government admits it can only “encourage” third-party owners to do maintenance, though the Environment Agency can carry out emergency repairs if there is a risk to people, property or environment, and try to bill the freeholders afterwards.

Continue reading...

Environment Agency can do emergency work if life is at risk, but it’s hard to make landowners in England carry out repairs

James Mead was out running in January 2017 when he received a call from a colleague at the Environment Agency. A sinkhole had swallowed up two spaces in the car park at Sheffield’s Decathlon store and he needed to get there pronto.

Mead, on call for the Environment Agency as a senior adviser, legged it down to the city centre to inspect the damage. “It happened overnight but just the previous day there would have been cars parked there. The worst-case scenario was very serious,” he said.

Continue reading...

Conference president, Alok Sharma, says countries must agree on how to tackle crisis

Alok Sharma, the president of the Cop26 climate summit, has called on global leaders to “banish ghosts of the past” and step up with new pledges to lower emissions as the world is running out of time to keep warming below 1.5C.

As leaders prepared to fly in for the conference in Glasgow, Sharma could not say with certainty that the two-week event would end with a deal to keep that prospect alive. As host nation, the UK is responsible for overseeing the negotiations and trying to extract meaningful pledges from the representatives of almost 200 countries in attendance.

Continue reading...

Andrew Forrest strikes deal with billionaire Bamford family to become biggest supplier of renewable hydrogen in UK, with focus on heavy transport.

The post Forrest strikes deal with UK billionaires for biggest renewable hydrogen play in UK appeared first on RenewEconomy.