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Daily Briefing |

TODAY'S CLIMATE AND ENERGY HEADLINES

Briefing date 25.03.2019
Sir David Attenborough to present climate change documentary

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News.

Sir David Attenborough to present climate change documentary
BBC News Read Article

The natural history presenter Sir David Attenborough is to front a “one-off film” about climate change on BBC One, BBC News reports. [Plans for the film were first reported by Carbon Brief in October]. The documentary “will focus on the potential threats to our planet and the possible solutions”, “show footage showing the impact global warming has already had” and also “feature interviews with climatologists and meteorologists to explore the science behind recent extreme weather conditions”, BBC News writes. Entitled “Climate Change – The Facts”, the film is part of a rolling season of programmes, under the banner Our Planet Matters, the Guardian says. The paper notes a shift in tone of BBC nature documentaries: “Whereas earlier work in the genre…looked at the world with wonder, more recent shows seeking to highlight and reverse environmental damage have adopted a graver tone”.

Elsewhere, the Scotsman reports that Attenborough has said that he will attempt to convince “blind” Donald Trump that climate change is a real threat, in reference to his upcoming eight-part series on Netflix, called “Our Planet”. Attenborough said: “I have no idea as to whether I could convince him, but it would be cowardly not to take up the challenge, would it not?” The Mirror also has the story.

Fracking plan ‘will release same CO2 as 300m new cars’
The Observer Read Article

The UK government’s fracking plans “would release the same amount of greenhouse gas emissions as almost 300 million new cars”, according to new research by the Labour Party, picked up in the Observer. The analysis “fatally” undermines ministers’ “obligation to tackle the escalating climate crisis”, the Observer says. Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn is quoted by the Observer saying: “The Conservatives’ fracking plans will damage our environment and fly in the face of community opposition…There is a clear alternative to fracking. Clean, renewable energy is the future of our economy.”

In other news about fracking, the Times reports that the Scottish Parliament has been advised that it has the legislative power to ban fracking. Aidan O’Neill, QC, who was commissioned by Friends of the Earth Scotland, urged the Scottish Government to pass a fracking ban, suggesting that doing so would reduce the likelihood of successful legal challenges from companies with an interest in the industry. Press Association also carries the story.

UK eighth best placed large nation in clean energy race
The Daily Telegraph Read Article

The UK is the “best placed large country” in the race to switch from fossil fuels to low-carbon energy sources, the Daily Telegraph reports. A study of 115 countries by the World Economic Forum (WEF) ranked the UK as eighth in its preparedness for the energy transition, behind Sweden, Switzerland, Norway, Finland, Denmark and Austria. “The UK’s success is being undermined by the largest greenhouse gas emitters – including the US, China, India and Russia – whose progress on energy transition has stalled”, the Daily Telegraph writes. The WEF warns that the world’s energy systems are no more environmentally sustainable than they were five years ago.

Russia floats first law to regulate CO2 emissions
Climate Home News Read Article

The world’s fifth-largest emitter is considering legislation that would give the government powers to regulate CO2 and create carbon markets, Climate Home News reports. The draft bill – drawn up by the Ministry of Economic Development – is under consultation and faces “stiff opposition inside and outside” the Russian administration. Climate Home News explains: “The framework includes different regulatory mechanisms, such as a cap and trade system of emissions permits and tax breaks for companies reducing or capturing their emissions…Specific targets for particular sectors are not included”.

Fossil fuel industry must contribute towards £44bn climate change damage in UK each year, campaigners say
The Independent Read Article

The UK’s fossil fuel industry causes “at least £44bn pounds of damage” each year, according to a new estimate by environmental campaigners, reported in the Independent. Friends of the Earth used an average “social cost of carbon” in its analysis and based its estimate solely on the contribution the industry makes to climate change, excluding other damaging consequences like the effects of air pollution. The green group is calling for a new carbon tax to be levied on the companies, so they can contribute to the clean energy transition. Mike Childs, head of policy at Friends of the Earth, tells the paper: “If you pollute you pay. It’s a simple fix to help avoid catastrophic climate breakdown. For decades the oil, coal and gas industry has extracted, processed, sold and profited from fossil fuels…It’s time the industry is held to account for the range of damage it causes.”

Greenpeace unmasked in bid to switch off ageing power plants
The Sunday Telegraph Read Article

The campaign group Greenpeace is one of the financial backers of a court case in which EU judges have “pulled the plug” on more than £1bn in power plant subsidies, the Daily Telegraph reports. [Carbon Brief reported the details of that EU ruling at the time]. Greenpeace has confirmed that it is “now funding further legal action in the English courts”, by backing a challenge to the subsidy scheme from Tempus Energy. The subsidy scheme “is designed to secure electricity supplies until renewable sources can produce more power”, the Daily Telegraph explains. The piece continues: “Tempus and its backers are hoping to overturn a scheme which allows ageing power plants to compete for supply contracts worth billions of pounds”, arguing that the scheme “favours fossil fuel generators at the expense of new challengers”.

Comment.

Climate change fears spur investment in carbon capture technology
Leslie Hook, Financial Times Read Article

A feature in the Financial Times examines the success of a trio of startups running Direct Air Capture (DAC) facilities, that work by running giant fans that pull “air across a contact surface that binds with the CO2 molecules”, in order to store CO2. The machines “have become one of the hottest areas of climate-related investment in recent months”, energy correspondent Leslie Hook explains, and “have attracted more capital and attention since global emissions hit a new high last year, despite the high cost and limited commercial markets for the technology”. Julio Friedmann, a researcher at Columbia University’s Center for Global Energy Policy, in quoted in the piece: “Three years ago, people were like, you are investing in pixie dust and unicorns…It has changed because companies now recognise that climate change is a threat, and they see this as an essential mitigation tool”. However, Hook notes that: “the technology is still so immature that many believe the type of DAC technology which ultimately wins out could be very different from the systems being tested today”. Hook travelled to Switzerland to get a closer look at one of the facilities, Climeworks, that was also profiled by Carbon Brief in 2017. In a similar vein, Axios has an article suggesting that carbon removal startups are “having a moment”.

Copenhagen wants to show how cities can fight climate change
Somini Sengupta, The New York Times Read Article

“Can a city cancel out its greenhouse gas emissions?”, asks the New York Times’ climate reporter, Somini Sengupta. “Half of humanity now lives in cities”, Sengupta writes, and so “the big fixes for climate change need to come from cities too”. She considers the case study of Copenhagen, the Danish capital that intends to be net carbon neutral by 2025 – “meaning it plans to generate more renewable energy than the dirty energy it consumes”. “Copenhagen’s goal to be carbon neutral faces a hurdle that is common around the world: a divide between the interests of people who live in cities and those who live outside”, Sengupta says. “A municipal government can only do so much when it doesn’t have the full support of those who run the country….Transportation accounts for a third of the city’s carbon footprint”, and yet the national government recently lowered car-registration taxes, “in a move that its critics say encouraged private car use”.

Science.

Global rules mask the mitigation challenge facing developing countries
Earth's Future Read Article

Meeting the Paris Agreement’s goal of limiting global warming to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels poses the greatest challenge in the developing world, a study says. The research uses modelling to study what each country would need to achieve in order to reach the Paris target. “Our results suggest that even if the US, EU, China and India could strengthen their NDCs by 2050, the rest of the world (RoW) is required to immediately change from their current course to a very rapid decrease in emissions reaching almost zero emissions by 2030, to achieve the Paris 2015 goal,” the authors say. “The greatest mitigation challenges lie in the developing world.”

Impacts of sulfate geoengineering on rice yield in China: results from a multi‐model ensemble
Earth's Future Read Article

Releasing aerosols into the stratosphere in order to reflect away the sun’s rays could boost rice yields in China, a study finds. A modelling study shows that using this technique, a type of “solar geoengineering”, could increase rice yields by around 5%, when compared to a scenario where the technique is not used. The study’s simulation assumes that global temperatures rise by 2-3C by 2100 (“RCP4.5”).

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