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Australia's emissions jumped higher in 2021, growing by 4.1 million tonnes, after Morrison government failed to seize chance for a 'green recovery'.

The post Australia’s emissions jumped higher last year, prompting Bowen to slam Morrison’s legacy appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Penalties for peaceful action are now the same as for aggravated assault

Last Friday dozens of armed New South Wales police officers raided a camp near Sydney and arrested two environmentalists. One was Aunty Caroline Kirk, an Aboriginal elder. She was charged with “wilfully obstructing and intimidating police”.

“I can’t run, I can’t climb,” she said. “All I can do … is teach my culture. Why are they doing this?”

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Labor has promised to ‘future-proof Australia’s water resources’. It’s a massive job. Here are the actions the government should prioritise. Stuart Khan, Professor of Civil & Environmental Engineering, UNSW Sydney Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.

A Western Australian gold mine is now being powered by solar power, the first operational project under the state's Clean Energy Future Fund.

The post WA gold mine now renewably powered after rapid solar deployment appeared first on RenewEconomy.

Rio Tinto joins Bill Gates and a host of high profile industrial groups and cleantech investors in fund raising for hydrogen electrolyser start-up EH2.

The post Rio Tinto joins Gates to back renewable hydrogen startup as miners look to future tech appeared first on RenewEconomy.

People who counted plastic waste for a week want to go plastic-free, but say it costs too much.

Games recognition could spur conservation action for the birds lovingly known as ‘rockatoos’ for their punk mohawks, vocal dexterity and percussive talents

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They have shaggy crests and bright scarlet cheeks. They bow, sway, stamp their feet and spread their wings in a Jesus Christ pose, justifying their status. They whistle and whoop. Males even use their enormous beaks to fashion tree branches into drumsticks, which they use to beat on tree hollows approaching the breeding season.

They are palm cockatoos: the largest cockatoo in the world, weighing in up to 1.2kg – lovingly known as “rockatoos” for their punk mohawks, vocal dexterity and percussive talents. And Birds Queensland has officially nominated them as the mascot of the 2032 Brisbane Olympic Games, pointing out that previous Australian Olympic mascots have mostly been mammals.

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Photographer Matt Dunne documents wedge-tailed eagles and sites where they have been deliberately killed. His monograph The Killing Sink captures the tragic loss of life and the efforts of those trying to protect eagles, and shines a light on Australia’s dark history with native species

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19-year-old activist warns world faces ‘total natural catastrophe’ unless citizens take urgent action

Greta Thunberg has warned that the world faces “total natural catastrophe” unless citizens take urgent action as she made a surprise appearance at Glastonbury festival.

The 19-year-old activist led chants of “climate … justice” after delivering a rousing speech from the Pyramid stage which painted an apocalyptic picture of the future of the planet.

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Although artist Aïda Muluneh had an itinerant childhood in Europe and America, she was born in Addis Ababa and is an expert in African photography. When charity Water Aid asked her to participate in a campaign highlighting water poverty, it was the women of Afar, northern Ethiopia, that she shot for her series Water Life, now included in Ekow Eshun’s new book of African art and photography, In the Black Fantastic (Thames & Hudson), published to coincide with a show at London’s Hayward Gallery. Muluneh was pleased that Water Aid wanted to use art for advocacy rather than reportage. “Our continent has many layers,” she says. “However, we have been at the mercy of the international media that does not show the complexities of our challenges. My approach has been to tell a story from my perspective, not based on cliches often covered by foreign photographers.”

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Nearly 100 birds are being ‘headstarted’ to boost numbers as species vanishes from lowland England

An evocative peeping echoes across a large, sunny aviary. The distinctive call of the curlew comes from dozens of chicks, who strut through long grass squabbling over a much-prized worm.

The scruffy-looking chicks with the beautiful voices may be the best hope for the endangered species, whose numbers have halved in the past 25 years as it vanishes from lowland England.

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Makers of the €250,000 Lightyear 0 hope to convince drivers it can be a viable climate-friendly alternative

Winding past the ochre-coloured plateaux of the Bardenas Reales natural park in northern Spain, Roel Grooten nudged me to take my foot off the accelerator.

The car continued to barrel down the open stretch of road, its speed dipping only slightly. “It keeps on going,” said Grooten, the lead engineer for the Dutch car company Lightyear, as we whizzed through the lunar-like landscape. “What you feel is nothing holding you back. You feel the aerodynamics, you feel the low-rolling resistance of the tyres, of the bearings and the motor.”

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We must work with local communities to restore key species on a global scale if we are to tackle the climate and biodiversity crises gripping the world

• Read more in our Wild world series

There are few places in the world as majestic and full of wonder as Ecuador’s Galápagos Islands. From the rosy-hued pink iguanas on the northern rim of Wolf Volcano to the iconic Pinzón giant tortoise on Pinzón Island to the black-tipped reef sharks feeding off Floreana Island, we have both found boundless inspiration in exploring the islands that led Charles Darwin to develop his groundbreaking theory of evolution nearly two centuries ago.

We have both also witnessed a more recent rapidly evolving process in the Galápagos based on a shared vision of restoring the profusion of life that the archipelago is renowned for. This process is rewilding, a positive reframing for nature conservation. There is an idea that rewilding involves restoring nature at the expense of people, but we believe it is all about effectively integrating ourselves within the ecosystems that sustain us – to work with, rather than against, nature to create thriving and resilient ecosystems for the benefit of all.

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I remember chilly trips to the beach in Fife, and my first visit to the Mediterranean. The association of heat with pleasure is hard to shake

I never saw my mother in a swimsuit, and I only once remember my father in one. In Fife in the 1920s, when both of them were young, sun-worshipping had yet to catch on. When my father swam, he swam in rivers, and then warmed himself up with a brisk towelling. My mother, who never learned to swim, would enjoy a day on the sands with tea brewed over a fire and sometimes a dance or two, if anyone had a squeezebox and the rain held off.

My parents remembered these things fondly during my childhood, when we might spend a summer afternoon on the local beach – it was only a 15-minute walk away – sometimes with relatives: cousins, a grandfather, uncles and aunts. Meteorology was less reliable then, and there seemed to be little question of adults “dressing for the weather” other than carrying a tightly folded plastic mac, which removed the precautionary need for a proper raincoat neatly arranged over the forearm.

Ian Jack is a Guardian columnist

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

The European Parliament this week approved a raft of measures to reform the EU ETS and advance the European Commission's monumental Fit for 55 climate policy package. Now that the dust has settled somewhat after hundreds of amendments were adopted by the full legislature, and with the file now set to move to trilogue negotiations between the Parliament, Commission, and EU member states, Carbon Pulse had a dozen analysts weigh in on the main aspects of what was agreed by MEPs.

Switzerland on Friday approved a bilateral agreement with Thailand, enabling the Southeast Asian nation to sell it carbon credits to help meet its Paris Agreement emissions pledge.

Compliance entities continued to raise their California Carbon Allowance (CCA) net length, while speculators reversed course and added length, taking advantage of CCA price weakness amidst declines across financial markets, according to US Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) data published Friday.

A member of California's Air Resources Board (ARB) spoke up for more stringent targets for the state's LCFS during the second day of the board's 2022 Scoping Plan meeting Friday, while others said they were concerned about the plan's heavily reliance on carbon capture.

Dutton’s choice to continue a policy of wrecking in energy highlights the challenge Albanese has in seeking to end the destructive decade

Every time I think my job is too hard and I need to retrain as a florist, I think of the poor officials who have served during the climate and energy policy wars – smart people held hostage by a public policy atrocity.

Back in July 2018 – when Malcolm Turnbull and Josh Frydenberg were attempting to land the national energy guarantee (Neg), wedged uncomfortably between post-truth rightwingers and state governments increasingly annoyed about being conscripted to an omnishambles – the Energy Security Board (ESB) ran out of patience.

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