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Updated 2025-07-08 19:16
Back to the land: are young farmers the new starving artists?
A small but growing movement of millennials are seeking out a more agrarian life but the reality of life on the land is not always as simple as they hopedEight years ago, Liz Whitehurst, then 25, was working in digital communications at a policy organization in Washington DC and dreaming of life outside a cubicle. She started exploring a different kind of existence by volunteering on local farms. When the farmer who provided the locally sourced vegetable box she signed up for invited her to work the fields one day, she was starstruck. “You’re my hero,” she recalls telling the farmer. “I want your life.”Today, she has it. Whitehurst grows a wide array of produce on Owl’s Nest Farm, set on a few acres in Upper Marlboro, Maryland (she bought it from that same farmer). Whitehurst grows sweet potatoes, peppers, tomatoes, cucumbers and squash – everything is handpicked. She also provides greens to a local pizza kitchen which was recently named one of the best new restaurants in the country. Continue reading...
'I feel conned': garden bridge donors plan to sue over failed scheme
Private funders owed about £7m from charity behind abandoned London projectThe charity behind London’s garden bridge project faces being sued by wealthy donors who fear their money might not be returned even after the much-criticised scheme collapsed, with a loss to taxpayers of almost £50m.One individual donor claimed the money he gave to the Garden Bridge Trust had been “pissed down the drain by a bunch of incompetents”, and that he wanted it returned. Continue reading...
London's new official plan for cycling is bold but has a major flaw
With no new infrastructure or funding, questions remain on how to genuinely democratise cycling in a big cityLondon has a new official plan for cycling. It’s full of bold statements of intent and has some interesting ideas. That’s the good news. Here’s the drawback: within the 59 glossy pages I could detect no new plans for cycling infrastructure.This all might seem a bit niche, not to say London-centric. But there is a wider lesson here: if cities are to truly move ahead in making cycling everyday and for everyone, good intentions aren’t enough. It involves political boldness, and taking risks. Continue reading...
Brexit worries and bad weather cloud the Christmas high street
UK consumers are reining in spending as economic uncertainty dents footfall and hits salesRetailers vying for customers in the last full week of trading before Christmas are in for a tough time according to the latest predictions, with footfall expected to fall by about 3% this week as cash-strapped shoppers rein in spending.The forecast by retail analysis firm Springboard adds to the bleak picture facing the sector in the key festive trading season, as consumers uncertain about what Brexit will mean for the economy and their finances cut back on gift-buying this year. Continue reading...
Blackcurrant crops hit by milder winters, study shows
Researchers warn rising temperatures will cause plants to flower later and die soonerMilder winters driven by climate change will hit blackcurrant crops, with plants producing fewer and lower quality fruit, according to a new study.Like many other fruit and woody plants, blackcurrants need a period of chilling before they start to grow in spring. This reduces the risk of frost damage to new buds and makes sure they burst rapidly in the spring and flower together when there are plenty of pollinators such as bees around. Continue reading...
At last, divestment is hitting the fossil fuel industry where it hurts | Bill McKibben
Trillions of dollars of investments are being taken out of carbon-intensive companies. Governments must now take noticeI remember well the first institution to announce it was divesting from fossil fuel. It was 2012 and I was on the second week of a gruelling tour across the US trying to spark a movement. Our roadshow had been playing to packed houses down the west coast, and we’d crossed the continent to Portland, Maine. As a raucous crowd jammed the biggest theatre in town, a physicist named Stephen Mulkey took the mic. He was at the time president of the tiny Unity College in the state’s rural interior, and he announced that over the weekend its trustees had voted to sell their shares in coal, oil and gas companies. “The time is long overdue for all investors to take a hard look at the consequences of supporting an industry that persists in destructive practices,” he said.Related: The Guardian view on global warming: time is running out | Editorial Continue reading...
Make climate crisis top editorial priority, XR campaign urges BBC
Extinction Rebellion group call on BBC to tell ‘full truth about ecological emergency’Climate campaigners are calling on the BBC to declare a climate emergency and make the issue its top editorial priority.In a letter published in the Guardian, the new civil disobedience group Extinction Rebellion (XR) says the BBC, “as a respected media voice in the UK, needs to play a key role in enabling the transformative change needed”. Continue reading...
UN climate accord 'inadequate' and lacks urgency, experts warn
Agreement will fail to halt devastating rise in global temperature, say scientistsThe world has been put on notice that its best efforts so far will fail to halt the devastation of climate change, as countries came to a partial agreement at UN talks that failed to match up to the challenges faced.Leading figures in climate science and economics said much more must be done, and quickly, to stave off the prospect of dangerous levels of global warming. Continue reading...
UK fracking policy faces court challenges
Friends of the Earth granted judicial review it hopes will help alter planning rulesMinisters face a pair of legal challenges to their planning rules on fracking this week, from a national environmental group and the son of fashion designer Vivienne Westwood.The government used its revamped planning rulebook to tell local authorities in July that they should recognise the benefits of shale gas and facilitate its extraction. Continue reading...
Former fossil fuels lobbyist to head interior department as Zinke exits
David Bernhardt’s new job means top two US environmental agencies will be helmed by people once paid by industryRyan Zinke’s exit as interior secretary elevates a former lobbyist to the job, meaning the top two US environmental agencies will now be run by people previously paid by industry.The deputy secretary, David Bernhardt, will take over at least temporarily when Zinke steps down at the end of the year. He also could be in the running to head the department permanently. And at the Environmental Protection Agency, the acting administrator, Andrew Wheeler, who was a coal lobbyist, will be nominated to keep the post. Continue reading...
What was agreed at COP24 in Poland and why did it take so long?
Fractious UN climate change talks ended with a deal on putting the Paris agreement into practice – but much else left unresolved
I led the National Park Service. Zinke's resignation leaves lasting damage
Hopes were high for the interior secretary’s tenure. But profiteers and climate deniers quickly changed thatWhen President Trump’s new secretary of the interior Ryan Zinke rode a horse across the National Mall to the steps of his new office, there was cautious optimism, as a western congressman who professed to idolize Teddy Roosevelt seemed like a solid choice to govern 20% of the land base of the United States.In the unforgiving milieu of Washington DC, Zinke and the “horse he rode in on” were subjected to withering ridicule. As the 18th director of the National Park Service (NPS), where I oversaw over 400 national parks and the equestrian patrol of the National Mall who accompanied the new secretary, I chalked it up to a publicity stunt. Continue reading...
Sellafield boss warns on nuclear clean-up
Falling revenues from waste reprocessing have led to a financial black hole for the Nuclear Decommissioning AuthorityThe government body given the job of cleaning up Britain’s old nuclear power stations has warned that taxpayers will have to help plug a looming multimillion-pound gap in its finances left by shrinking revenues.David Peattie, chief executive of the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, said revenues would fall more than 10% annually in coming years due to the end of an era of nuclear waste reprocessing. One plant ceased operations in November and another will stop in two years. Continue reading...
Why 2m kilos of Christmas cheese will end up in the bin
... and how to cut back on your household’s wasteIt was once a simple choice of stilton or cheddar with a few grapes on the side and the pleasure of assembling a course that requires no cooking.But for many households the Christmas cheeseboard has become an elaborate affair – often resulting in a vast amount of waste. Now, as a new survey estimates that 2.2m kilograms of cheese from the festive dining table will be chucked in the bin this year, specialists are urging shoppers to aim for a “zero waste” cheeseboard. “If you buy cheese that tastes amazing you’re far less likely to waste it,” said Dominic Coyte of Borough Cheese Company. “In my house I tend to end up with lots of small bits left, so I grate and freeze it. Freezing can affect the texture so it loses its rigidity, but it’s still good to use for cheese on toast or in sauces or gratins. The remainders of a boxed soft cheese can also be baked in the oven with garlic, rosemary and white wine – day-old bread with a bit of bite is ideal for dipping in it.” Continue reading...
Labor fails to commit to Newstart increase despite promising voters a 'fair go' – as it happened
Bill Shorten announces new Environment Act and says he wants ‘an Australian republic with an Australian head of state’. This blog is now closed
To take on climate change, we need to change our vocabulary
When we talk about saving the planet, we employ the narrative of war. Does it only deepen our divisions?Each dead house fly was worth a quarter, my mom told us kids, but I never earned any money. Every time I cornered a fly, I pictured goo marks left on the wall – spots splayed with tiny black guts and twisted legs. My halfhearted swats gave even the most sluggish fly time to escape.That I genuinely couldn’t hurt a fly might have been something I picked up in church. I grew up attending a Mennonite congregation in Indiana. We weren’t the bonnet-wearing, buggy-riding sort, but we embraced some traditions, like the Anabaptist teaching of nonviolence. This sometimes expressed itself in an instinct for conflict avoidance. Continue reading...
Progress and problems as UN climate change talks end with a deal
Nations agree on implementing 2015 Paris agreement, but put trickiest issues on back burnerThe UN climate change talks ended late on Saturday night in Poland with a deal agreed on how to put the 2015 Paris agreement into action, but with other contentious problems left to be resolved next year.Countries thrashed out the complex details of how to account for and record their greenhouse gas emissions, which will form the basis of a “rulebook” on putting the Paris goals into action. But difficult questions such as how to scale up existing commitments on cutting emissions, in line with stark scientific advice, and how to provide finance for poor countries to do the same, were put off for future years. Continue reading...
Court cites Dr Seuss's The Lorax in rebuke to US Forest Service
Federal court in Virginia says officials were trusted to ‘speak for the trees’ as it tosses out pipeline permitA federal court in the US has cited the classic Dr Seuss children’s book The Lorax as it lambasted the US Forest Service for granting an energy company permission to build a natural gas pipeline across two national forests.“We trust the United States Forest Service to ‘speak for the trees, for the trees have no tongues’,” the three-judge panel of the fourth US circuit court of appeals in Virginia wrote this week as it threw out the permit. Continue reading...
Sellafield, former star of the nuclear age, scrubs up for a different future
When uranium was scarce, reprocessing was all the rage. Two decades on, the Cumbrian plant, though still a major source of jobs, has outlived its missionDeep in the heart of Sellafield, Britain’s biggest nuclear waste site, a small piece of history is playing out. Technicians are about to use a huge amount of force to slice nuclear fuel into thin sheets, so that it can be dissolved in nitric acid, then chemically separated into uranium (for power stations), plutonium (for bombs) and highly radioactive waste.But first they face a computer-says-no moment. Taut minutes pass as on-screen red boxes indicate issues with the shearing machine, which is safely ensconced behind a metre of leaded glass. Finally, the boxes turn green. Continue reading...
Legal plastic content in animal feed could harm human health, experts warn
Small bits of plastic packaging from waste food make their way into animal feed as part of the UK’s permitted recycling processPlastic traces in animal feed could pose a risk to human health and urgently need to be the subject of more research, experts have told the Guardian.Their comments came after British farmer Andrew Rock contacted the Guardian, having noticed plastic shreds in his animal feed. Rock was told by the suppliers that this was a legal part of the recycling process that turns waste food, still packaged, into animal feed. Continue reading...
'Extinction is not an option': the $1bn push to save orcas in Washington
Governor proposes destroying dams, repairing habitats and limiting whale-watching in bid to save struggling creaturesFive months after twin tragedies cast a spotlight on the state’s ailing orcas, Washington plans to spend more than $1bn to stave off extinction.If enacted, a proposal from the governor, Jay Inslee, would knock down two dams, repair habitat and place a three-year ban on orca watching. Crucially, Inslee hopes to shore up salmon runs that feed the orca while cleaning and quieting the waters in which they live. Continue reading...
The week in wildlife - in pictures
Bird battles, snoozing seals and mischievous macaques in this week’s gallery Continue reading...
Waitrose to ban glitter from own-brand products by 2020
Retailer says it will find other ways to make products sparkle in effort to stem plastic wasteWaitrose has joined the crackdown on glitter by pledging to ban it from all own-brand products by 2020.The supermarket chain said its own-label cards, wraps, crackers, tags, flowers and plants will either be glitter-free or use an environmentally friendly alternative. Continue reading...
Supermarket shoppers urged to serve ‘wonky’ Christmas dinner
Stores selling stubby sprouts and curvy carrots in attempt to reduce festive food wasteSupermarkets have increased their efforts to reduce the national food waste mountain at Christmas by offering shoppers edible produce nearing the end of its shelf life, as well as “wonky” sprouts, carrots and parsnips.The wonky or “ugly” lines were being offered at cheaper prices in an effort to stop the rejection or waste of fruit and veg that was misshapen, had growth cracks or was much smaller or larger than average. Continue reading...
Poland's deadly addiction to coal – in pictures
Coal, known as ‘black gold’ in Poland, has helped the country achieve energy independence. However, the high-polluting fuel has been linked to serious diseases and premature death. With COP24 climate talks under way in Katowice, pressure grows on Poland to reduce its reliance on the fossil fuel. But with 100,000 coal-dependent jobs in the country, switching to alternative sources of energy carries great economic risk. Here, Violeta Santos Moura explores the problem in her essay Dark Clouds
Can Poland wean itself off coal?
Climate experts say the renaissance can be stopped but change must happen now – and the main obstacle is at the top
Trump science adviser casts doubt on links between pollution and health problems
Comments by science review board chairman add weight to fears that Trump administration is aiming to discredit research to justify scrapping regulationsA conservative science adviser to the Trump administration is casting doubt on longstanding research linking fossil fuel pollution to early deaths and health problems, worrying environmental experts.At a meeting to review air pollution science compiled by staffers at the Environmental Protection Agency this week the advisory board chairman, Tony Cox – a consultant and statistician who has worked for the industry and criticized EPA standards – questioned whether soot from coal plants and cars can be directly blamed for asthma and cardiopulmonary problems. Continue reading...
Tropical Cyclone Owen will wreak havoc across Queensland, residents warned
Annastacia Palaszczuk says state has done all it can to prepare for severe category-four stormCyclone Owen will “wreak havoc” across Queensland, with remote communities braced for 280km/h winds and much of the state on flood alert, the premier has said.Annastacia Palaszczuk said the state had done all it can to be ready for Owen, which is expected to hit as a severe category-four storm late on Friday or early on Saturday. Continue reading...
Pacific nations under climate threat urge Australia to abandon coal within 12 years
Frustrated leaders appeal to ‘all OECD countries’ to phase out use as Australia signals support for new plantsPacific countries vulnerable to climate change have urged Australia to abandon coal power generation within 12 years, and to prohibit new coal plants or expansion of existing plants.The call from 15 small Pacific island states came one day after the Australian government called for expressions of interest in new power generation projects, indicating it would be prepared to use taxpayer money to underwrite new coal plants. Continue reading...
UK bids to host 2020 UN climate change summit
Chile and Costa Rica thought to be considering alternative bids after Brazil withdrew offerBritain is bidding to host the UN climate change conference in 2020, the biggest since the Paris agreement was signed in 2015, as part of the government’s aim to be seen as a green leader.The conference will mark a vital deadline for countries to comply with their commitments on reducing greenhouse gas emissions and move on to tougher targets for the decade to 2030, and so it is likely to be a fractious affair. Continue reading...
Shark numbers decline by up to 90% in five decades off Queensland coast
Researchers conclude the most likely cause for the dramatic declines is commercial fishingShark numbers along the Queensland coast have declined by more than 90% for some species in the past five decades, according to new research that calls for better protections for sharks in Australian waters.University of Queensland and Griffith University researchers analysed shark control program data to measure changes in shark populations along the Queensland coastline in a 55 year period. Continue reading...
Sheffield council holds out olive branch over tree-felling plans
After months of protests, council says it won’t fell 87 trees earmarked for chopSheffield city council has pledged to save nearly 100 trees that were marked for felling as it sought to defuse a bitter row that sparked scores of arrests and months of protests.The council has been locked in negotiations with campaigners over the future of its controversial scheme to fell thousands of trees to improve the condition of the city’s streets. Continue reading...
Cyclists 'exposed to less air pollution than drivers' on busy routes
Study shows people in cars and buses spend longer in toxic air, as do walkers on main roadsCyclists are the least exposed to air pollution on daily commutes into a congested city centre, research has shown. People in cars and buses spent longer in toxic air, as did walkers unless they made detours to avoid main roads.The work, conducted in Leeds, supports the investment in cycle lanes to both reduce air pollution by cutting vehicle journeys and improve citizens’ health. It also found that air pollution reached relatively high levels inside cars, echoing a recent warning that cars are “boxes collecting toxic gases”. Continue reading...
Global warming should be called global heating, says key scientist
UK Met Office professor tells UN summit Earth’s ‘energy balance’ is changing“Global heating” is a more accurate term than “global warming” to describe the changes taking place to the world’s climate, according to a key scientist at the UK Met Office.Prof Richard Betts, who leads the climate research arm of Britain’s meteorological monitoring organisation, made the comments amid growing evidence that rising temperatures have passed the comfort zone and are now bringing increased threats to humanity. Continue reading...
Black lung disease is still killing miners. The coal industry doesn't want to hear it
Today’s black lung rates are higher than 50 years ago, affecting men as young as their 30s, and in Kentucky their right to decent healthcare is being curtailed
'Death sentence': butterfly sanctuary to be bulldozed for Trump's border wall
More than 200 species make their homes at America’s most diverse sanctuary, but construction through the reserve could begin in February
Banks urged not to fund coal power as government moves to underwrite projects
Activist groups warn providing finance for coal-fired power stations is inconsistent with banks’ commitments to Paris agreementEnvironmental and progressive activist groups are urging Australia’s major banks and financial institutions not to fund new coal projects now that the Morrison government has flagged taxpayer assistance for power generation.The Australian Conservation Foundation, GetUp, Greenpeace, Environment Victoria, the Australian Youth Climate Coalition, the Australian Centre for Corporate Responsibility and the Australia Institute wrote on Thursday to chief executives of the major lenders, warning the provision of finance for new coal, or retrofits of old coal-fired power stations, would be inconsistent with their public commitments to the Paris agreement. Continue reading...
Australia’s carbon emissions highest on record, data shows
If emissions continue at current rate, Australia will miss Paris target by 1.1bn tonnes, Ndevr Environmental predicts
Labor won't rule out using 'accounting tricks' to meet emissions reduction targets
Mark Butler says party will make decision on using carryover credits from the Kyoto protocol after Paris ‘rule book’ establishedThe shadow climate minister Mark Butler has not ruled out using carryover carbon credits from the Kyoto protocol to help Labor meet its more ambitious emissions reduction targets in the event it wins the next election.Butler expressed reluctance about using accounting tricks as part of Labor’s climate policy arsenal, but told the ABC he would not make a decision about whether carryover credits were in or out until after the Paris rule book was established. Continue reading...
Australia turns back on allies as it refuses to cut emissions above Paris pledge
EU and 27 countries vow to toughen commitments as environment minister’s address at COP24 UN climate change summit accused of flying in face of realityAustralia will not commit to larger carbon emissions reductions above its Paris agreement target, despite a coalition of former allies and Pacific neighbours urging greater cuts.In Paris in 2015 Australia was a part of a bloc of countries called the “High Ambition Coalition”, which includes the UK, the EU, New Zealand, the Marshall Islands and Fiji. Australia is outside that bloc now. Continue reading...
Climate change talks lead to heightened pledge to cut emissions
EU, Canada, New Zealand and developing countries to keep global warming below 1.5C
The Guardian view on global warming: time is running out | Editorial
Rightwing nationalism threatens the global solidarity needed to avoid a climate catastropheGlobal warming is a crisis for civilisation and a crisis for life on Earth. Human-caused climate change was behind 15 deadly weather disasters in 2017, including droughts, floods and heatwaves. The world’s leading climate scientists, in a special report for the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), have warned that there is only a dozen years for global warming to be kept to a maximum of 1.5C. To meet that target, global carbon emissions need to drop by 45% by 2030. Instead they are going up. We need radical, urgent change. So it is appalling that negotiators in Poland at the 24th Conference of the Parties, or COP24, are finding it so hard to push ahead with implementing the climate deal signed three years ago in Paris.This is largely because rising rightwing nationalism has vitiated the global solidarity needed to avoid a catastrophe. Under the Paris agreement, effective action to tackle climate change requires global cooperation on three fronts: first, nations set demanding carbon-reduction targets for their own societies; second, countries are held accountable for meeting these targets through surveillance mechanisms; and third, rich states provide cash for poorer ones to transition to a carbon-free future. Yet none of this is possible when the most important actors on the world stage think that the chief business of the nation state lies at home. The biggest problem is the US president, Donald Trump – a longtime climate-change denier. While negotiators were discussing how to lower carbon emissions, Mr Trump’s officials unveiled two schemes promoting fossil fuels. The US’s rogue behaviour has encouraged others to behave badly: notably Saudi Arabia, which played a key role in attempts to wreck the summit’s “welcoming” of the IPCC report. Last month, Brazil’s president-elect, Jair Bolsonaro, chose as his foreign minister a climate-change denier, and the nation has pulled out of hosting COP25. The top European leaders – Emmanuel Macron, Theresa May and Angela Merkel – are inwardly focused, leaving Poland, the current talks’ host, to sing the virtues of its large coal stocks. The other big players are India and China: the latter has the global heft but is not internationally deft; for the former, the opposite is true. Continue reading...
We need a non-proliferation treaty for fossil fuels | Letter
‘Peaceful use’ of fossil fuels could mean their continued but decreasing extraction, within enforceable limits constrained by the Paris agreement goals, writes Hugh RichardsIn the face of the emerging climate emergency (Letters, 10 December) and projected unconstrained growth in global fossil fuel use, this is a plea for people with relevant expertise and influence to take forward the idea for a “non-proliferation treaty” (NPT) for fossil fuels, floated by Andrew Simms and Peter Newell (theguardian.com, 23 October) and supported by Bill McKibben, Naomi Klein and others (Letters, 30 October).The analogy between fossil fuels and fissile nuclear materials is imperfect, but it should not be overlooked that the nuclear NPT promotes cooperation in and equal access to “peaceful use” of nuclear technology. “Peaceful use” of fossil fuels could mean their continued but decreasing extraction, within enforceable limits constrained by the Paris agreement goals, and an offsetting role for carbon capture and geo-sequestration (funded by fossil fuel producers). Safeguards and oversight could be provided by a new United Nations monitoring agency, akin to the International Atomic Energy Agency, which could also administer a global fossil carbon budget. Continue reading...
Coalition signals it will provide taxpayer support for new and existing coal plants
Morrison government specifies generation projects will need to be coal, gas, batteries or pumped hydro to be eligible for underwritingThe Morrison government has sent a clear signal that it is prepared to provide taxpayer support for both new and existing coal plants, opening registrations of interest in its controversial new power generation underwriting program.With the government accelerating to cover off major announcements before the Christmas break, the energy minister, Angus Taylor, will on Thursday use an event at a hydro power station in Tasmania to outline the terms of the new program and urge proponents to get their bids in over the summer break – before 23 January. Continue reading...
Neil Young's made a start, but the arts must do more to oppose dirty money | Molly Scott Cato
Galleries and arts promoters should be made to feel too ashamed to take money from industries linked with climate breakdownThose attending the COP24 climate negotiations in Katowice, Poland, this week have been greeted by a bizarre sight: an artistic celebration of one of the main fuels responsible for destroying the global climate. Katowice is the centre of Poland’s coal industry, and despite hosting a conference that represents the last chance saloon when it comes to taking meaningful action on climate change, local politicians pride themselves on the black stuff. Perhaps we could have expected no different when the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change decided on such an inappropriate venue and to allow coal companies to sponsor the talks.If we do make it through climate change with some form of civilisation intact, we will look back at some of the things we are doing now with the moral repugnance we feel towards slavery. There are legitimate parallels here. Climate change will most hurt those yet to be born. Our failure to make the dramatic changes needed to our economy and society means we are behaving as if we own the lives of future generations and have a right to steal their lives from them. Continue reading...
Facebook among firms named on Myanmar human rights 'dirty list'
Forty-nine companies accused of human rights and environmental abusesFacebook is among a number of companies from the US, UK, France, Switzerland and China named on a “dirty list” of corporations accused of involvement in human rights and environmental violations in Myanmar, or of doing business with the country’s military, which is accused of genocide.A list of 49 companies, compiled by the pressure group Burma Campaign UK, reveals the global breadth of international organisations that have continued to provide arms, infrastructure, technology, engineering and expertise to the Burmese military, or supported projects that have been accused of causing environmental destruction, such as hydroelectric dams and jade mines. Continue reading...
As climate change bites in America’s midwest, farmers are desperate to ring the alarm
‘The changes have become more radical’: farmers are spending more time and money trying to grow crops in new climatesRichard Oswald did not need the latest US government report on the creeping toll of climate change to tell him that farming in the midwest is facing a grim future, and very likely changing forever.For Oswald, the moment of realisation came in 2011. Continue reading...
Shenzhen's silent revolution: world's first fully electric bus fleet quietens Chinese megacity
All 16,000 buses in the fast-growing Chinese megacity are now electric, and soon all 13,000 taxis will be tooYou have to keep your eyes peeled for the bus at the station in Shenzhen’s Futian central business district these days. The diesel behemoths that once signalled their arrival with a piercing hiss, a rattle of engine and a plume of fumes are no more, replaced with the world’s first and largest 100% electric bus fleet.Shenzhen now has 16,000 electric buses in total and is noticeably quieter for it. “We find that the buses are so quiet that people might not hear them coming,” says Joseph Ma, deputy general manager at Shenzhen Bus Group, the largest of the three main bus companies in the city. “In fact, we’ve received requests to add some artificial noise to the buses so that people can hear them. We’re considering it.” Continue reading...
Australia likely to use controversial Kyoto loophole to meet Paris agreement
New Zealand urges others not to meet emissions pledge with ‘dodgy accounting’, but UN rules unlikely to prohibit using carryover creditsAustralia appears likely be allowed to exploit a controversial climate loophole, using carryover carbon credits from the Kyoto protocol to meet its Paris agreement targets.New Zealand has already ruled out using the carryover credits, saying it would discourage other countries from the practice. Continue reading...
US accused of obstructing talks at UN climate change summit
Vanuatu’s foreign minister says worst offenders on global warming are blocking progressThe United States and other high carbon dioxide-emitting developed countries are deliberately frustrating the UN climate summit in Katowice, Poland, Vanuatu’s foreign minister has said. His warning came as Pacific and Indian ocean states warned they faced annihilation if a global climate “rule book” could not brokered.In a bruising speech before ministers and heads of state, Vanuatu’s foreign minister, Ralph Regenvanu, singled out the US as he excoriated major CO2-emitting developed countries for deliberately hindering negotiations. Continue reading...
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