In an “exclusive”, Reuters reports that “India plans to stop building new coal-fired power plants, apart from those already in the pipeline, by removing a key clause from the final draft of its National Electricity Policy (NEP), in a major boost to fight climate change, sources said”. The newswire adds that “the draft, if approved by the federal cabinet chaired by prime minister Narendra Modi, would make China the only major economy open to fresh requests to add significant new coal-fired capacity”. It quotes a “government source” saying: “After months of deliberations, we have arrived at a conclusion that we would not need new coal additions apart from the ones already in the pipeline.” The Reuters article continues: “The new policy, if approved, would not impact the 28.2GW [gigawatts] of coal-based power in various stages of construction, the sources said…The draft, India’s first attempt at revising its electricity policy enacted in 2005, also proposes delaying the retirement of old coal-fired plants until energy storage for renewable power becomes financially viable, the sources said.”

Meanwhile, in contrast, Bloomberg covers a new report by the Indian power ministry’s Central Electricity Authority. The outlet says: “Coal will remain India’s largest source of electricity generation by 2030 and additional new plants will be required, even as the nation adds record clean energy installations to hit climate targets…’Availability of affordable and reliable electricity is a key factor in sustainable growth of the country,’ Ghanshyam Prasad, the authority’s chairperson, said in a report. Coal will account for about 54% of electricity generation in 2030 and as much as 46GW of additional capacity will be required alongside new renewables, the authority said in the report published Thursday. The fossil fuel currently accounts for almost three-quarters of generation and mines are striving to dig out material at a record pace to avoid shortages that caused blackouts in recent summers. Installations of solar, wind, hydro, biomass and nuclear plants will reach more than 500GW by 2030, an almost tripling of current levels, and account for 64% of the country’s generation capacity.”

The Times joins many outlets in covering fossil-fuel giant Shell’s latest quarterly results: “First-quarter profits at Shell have risen to a record $9.6bn as a strong performance from its secretive energy trading business helped to outweigh a fall in oil and gas prices,” says the newspaper, adding: “The oil major revealed the profit jump and then immediately rewarded investors by announcing it would buy back $4bn of its own shares over the next three months, after a $4bn buyback over the previous quarter. The buybacks come on top of a $2bn quarterly dividend. However, the results triggered fresh calls for tougher windfall taxes amid the continuing cost of living crisis.”

The Daily Mirror covers the story on its frontpage under the headline: “Obscene.” Inside, the article says: “Fatcat energy firms faced fresh fury yesterday after Shell posted record profits of £7.6bn in three months. Rishi Sunak’s refusal to hike windfall taxes was blamed for the rampant ‘profiteering’…It comes after BP revealed on Tuesday it made £4bn profit in the same period, as homes up and down the country faced sky-high energy bills with no end to the financial misery in sight…The pair are far from alone in coining it in thanks to soaring wholesale prices after Russia’s war in Ukraine, fuelling the surge in inflation and putting ordinary ­households under intense financial pressure. Yesterday, Norwegian energy firm Equinor – which has sparked ­controversy for developing the Rosebank oil field 80 miles north-west of the ­Shetland Islands – announced profits of £9.bn for the same three months. An accompanying editorial in the Daily Mirror says: “These firms have no more shame about earning money from bloodshed than they have about profiteering as the elderly freeze. They have given lavish returns to shareholders when greater investment in alternative energy would help limit global warming. The Tories could have imposed a proper windfall tax to help families in full poverty. Instead, they have stood on the sidelines as the oil and gas bosses stuff their pockets with ever more undeserved riches.”

An analysis by City AM’s Nicholas Earl says: “While these companies are still making mega profits, it is unclear if they are unearned, or simply reflective of massive companies operating in a generally lucrative sector with high demand, powered by expertise and trading experience…Their profits are now being driven as much by business acumen as circumstance. So, while a windfall tax was a valid position last year, it is not immediately obvious this is still the case. Rather than toughening the levy, it might be time to consider a price floor – or even removing it altogether.”

A new report published by the World Bank urges Brazil, reports Reuters, to accelerate investments towards renewable energy sources because “climate shocks could push millions of Brazilians into extreme poverty by 2030”. The newswire adds: “Brazil is in a strong position to source more renewable energy as almost half of its energy supply, including over 80% of its electricity, already comes from renewables, compared with world averages of between 15% and 27%, the report added. ‘To take full advantage of its (low-carbon) potential, Brazil would need net investments of 0.5% of its annual GDP each year between now and 2050,’ said Johannes Zutt, World Bank country director for Brazil.”

Germany is calling on China to increase its efforts in developing renewable energy and providing financial support for climate protection in poor countries, writes Bloomberg. Jennifer Morgan, Germany’s special envoy for international climate action, says that China needs to “do more in terms of its climate commitments”, it reports. The outlet adds that she says that her recent conversations with Chinese officials have “centred on what more they can do”, including “becoming a donor to multilateral funds”, adding that “those were good, solid, constructive conversations, but not easy”. Another Bloomberg story also covers her statement. 

Meanwhile, the South China Morning Post writes that several technologies, such as “carbon dioxide capture” and “energy-efficient iron ore reduction”, are being trialled for decarbonising steelmaking, one of the world’s most carbon-intensive industries, according to the consultancy firm McKinsey. It highlights that China’s steel sector is also testing similar technologies as it strives to meet its carbon peaking target before 2030.

Finally, the Voice of America carries an article titled: “Why China is investing in Africa’s green energy future.” Lei Bian, a policy researcher at the London School of Economics and Political Science, is quoted saying: “Chinese overseas renewable energy investments aim to deliver China’s international climate commitments of accelerating the energy transition away from fossil fuels in Africa, China’s largest trading partner.”

A solar farm near Bristol has become the UK’s first to connect directly to the national grid, reports the Times, “opening a way to unblocking bottlenecks in renewable energy schemes”. The newspaper continues: “To date, the hundreds of solar farms and 1.2 million homes with rooftop solar panels have been connected to the electricity grid’s equivalent of A-roads, called distribution networks. However, the 50MW [megawatt] Larks Green solar farm, capable of powering 17,000 homes, has instead been connected to the transmission network, the motorways of the electricity system. Solar power is the cheapest electricity technology in many countries and the fastest-growing electricity source globally. But the UK has lagged behind on solar installations since David Cameron’s government cut incentives to householders and developers…The new link is a rare bright spot amid wider energy concerns about grid connections forming a bottleneck for renewable energy companies.

Solar industry figures said that years-long delays were normal to enable projects to start producing clean electricity. Some developers are routinely being told they will have to wait until the 2030s, and in one case a company was told it would have to wait until 2037. Ministers recently promised to introduce reforms to speed up connections, but are yet to provide details.”

Meanwhile, in other UK news, the Daily Telegraph reports that the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT), a motoring lobby group, has warned that demand for electric cars “will slip this year as the higher cost of vehicles and energy prices deter buyers”. The SMMT says that car sales rose 12% last month as buyers capitalised on the availability of stock after three years of inconsistent supply. “While sales of electric vehicles (EVs) rose 59% last month, manufacturers now believe battery-powered cars will account for 18.4% of the year’s sales, down from 19.7%,” adds the newspaper. Similarly, the Times runs a story under the headline: “Energy cost and chargepoint anxiety dampen electric vehicle demand.”

An editorial in the New York Times begins: “To tap the potential of renewable energy, the US needs to dramatically expand the electric grid between places with abundant wind and sunshine and places where people live and work. And it needs to happen fast. The government and the private sector are investing heavily in a historic shift to electric-powered vehicles, heating systems and factories, including hundreds of billions of dollars in federal spending approved last year as part of the Inflation Reduction Act. But without new power lines, much of that electricity will continue to be generated by burning carbon. Unless the US rapidly accelerates the construction of power lines, researchers at Princeton University estimate that 80% of the potential environmental benefits of electrification will be squandered.” The article continues: “The most important change necessary to overhaul the permitting process is to put a single federal agency in charge of major transmission projects. Congress has empowered the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to approve major natural gas pipelines, which helped to expedite construction during the fracking boom. It ought to be at least as easy to build renewable energy projects…[The] Balkanization of the electric grid keeps costs unnecessarily high and makes it harder for utilities to meet surges in demand. In February 2021, more than 100 people froze to death in Texas, in part because the local grid operator, the Electric Reliability Organization of Texas, had limited capacity to draw power from neighbouring grids. Congress can encourage a greater spirit of cooperation and help to combat climate change by mandating a minimum transfer capacity for each grid. Congress and the Biden administration have taken a series of promising steps toward ending the nation’s dependence on carbon. But the absence of a plan to build a new electric grid is a critical hole in that emerging strategy. Without decisive action, they will waste a precious chance to limit climate change.”

Meanwhile, an editorial in the Los Angeles Times says that “replacing the Chevy Bolt with electric SUVs would be a climate tragedy”. It adds: “Last week, General Motors chief executive Mary Barra announced the company will end production of the Bolt at the end of the year as it reconfigures the Michigan plant where it is made to build large battery-powered pickup trucks. Not only does it echo GM’s decision a generation ago to kill off the EV1, its first fully electric vehicle, but the Bolt’s demise is a disappointment for consumers and a step backward in the fight against climate change, including President Biden’s goal of cutting the nation’s air pollution in half by 2030. Discontinuing a small, lower-cost EV like the Bolt to make room for bigger, more expensive models will make it harder for Americans to afford to go electric. This is the wrong direction to be heading when the US needs to replace polluting gas- and diesel-powered cars and trucks with clean, zero-emissions vehicles quickly.”

Finally, the Economist carries a feature headlined: “The green revolution will stall without Latin America’s lithium.” It explains: “Over half of the world’s lithium, a metal used in batteries for electric vehicles, can be found in Latin America. The region also has two-fifths of the world’s copper and a quarter of its nickel. Recently delegations from the United States and the European Union have flocked there partly to secure resources that will be needed in the energy transition, and to diversify their supply away from China…Yet Latin America stands out for the speed with which countries are wielding state control…Much of this is due to the fact that a wave of recently elected left-wing governments are now in power in the region. They want to do things differently from the past, when wealth from raw materials ended up abroad or lining the pockets of crony-capitalists…If forecasts are right, then the green transition could be continent-changing.”

The Times columnist Emma Duncan writes: “Britain has been doing pretty well at transitioning from fossil fuels to clean energy. Over the past few decades, it has decarbonised faster than any other rich country. Much of that was down to Margaret Thatcher’s dash for gas, but the speedy growth of renewable energy generation – mostly wind – has also been a big contributor. That has been driven not just by the country’s conveniently blowy aspect on the edge of one of the world’s great oceans, but also by government policy backed up by subsidies…The cheapest way of generating renewable energy in Britain is to build wind turbines on high ground. But because people don’t fancy seeing them on the skyline, the government has in effect introduced a moratorium on building them onshore…Now that they have successfully retarded the development of wind energy, opponents of building anything larger than a rabbit hutch have turned their attention to solar farms…The nimbys who matter most are, of course, Tories, because they have most of the power. It is they who bear most blame for the paucity of housing and infrastructure. But Greens and Lib Dems share responsibility. They may not have a cat’s chance in hell of governing these days, but by threatening to take votes from the Tory party they influence government policies.”

The Daily Telegraph has published the latest comment piece platforming its army of climate-sceptic columnists. This time it is the turn of Janet Daley who opines: “The climate protest movement has reached the advanced stage of fissiparous breakdown remarkably quickly.” In contrast, the Guardian carries a feature by Damien Gayle which examines “will France’s model of radical climate protest catch on?” He writes: “As climate protests hot up around the world once again, eyes have been turning to France as the country taking it to its most radical extent. This month, Andreas Malm, the human ecologist and author of the climate activist bible How to Blow Up a Pipeline, said in an interview it was France that was seeing the most exciting developments in environmental protest.”

A new study finds that invertebrates living in icy alpine rivers will lose much of their habitat as glaciers continue to retreat, even “becom[ing] functionally extinct” if the glaciers vanish entirely. Using species-distribution models, projections of future glacier coverage and likely future river pathways, researchers quantify the effect of melting glaciers on the populations of 15 different invertebrates across the Alps.  They identify some areas that will “offer climate refugia for cold-water specialists”, but note that much of this area is not currently designated as protected. They conclude that “alpine conservation strategies must change to accommodate the future effects of global warming”.