Germany decides against outright fracking ban
Climate and energy news
The Next Climate Policy Fight Could Be All AboutAirplane Emissions
While some airlines have cut emissions, others’ emissionshave increased, a new report shows. As a consequence, overallaviation emissions were the same in 2013 as they were a yearbefore. There are a number of ways airlines can improve fuelefficiency, thereby reducing carbon emissions and costs, such asadding a gear to turbofan engines, replacing engine parts, usingbiofuels, or market-based measures like cap and trade.Environmental groups are pledging to intensify their push on theEnvironmental Protection Agency to regulate greenhouse gasemissions from aircraft, Climate Progress reports.
Poll: 67 Percent Of Americans Would Pay HigherPrices To Cut Power Plant Emissions
67 percent of Americans support federal regulations torestrict carbon emissions from the nation’s power plants, even ifit raises their electrical bills, a new poll shows. It also shows75 per cent support tax rebates for the purchase of solar power orfuel-efficient vehicles, and 62 per cent support requiringelectrical utilities to get at least 20 per cent of their powerfrom green sources.
Climate Investments ‘Falling Short’ of 2°CGoal
The International Energy Agency estimates more than $1trillion a year needs to be invested in clean energy annually ifthe world is going to prevent warming of more than 2°C abovepre-industrial levels. But investments fell by about $28 million in2013, compared to a year before, according to a new report by theClimate Policy Initiative.
Report Maps Out Decarbonization Plan forU.S.
The U.S. is fully technologically able to reduce itsgreenhouse gas emissions 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050,according to a new report by the Deep Decarbonization PathwaysProject. It provides a roadmap to make that “80 by 50” goal areality. Making the U.S. nearly free of carbon dioxide emissionsover 35 years requires three major changes: a rapid rise in energyefficiency, electric power generation becoming zero-carbon, and andend to the use of oil and natural gas for cooking andheating.
Acid Maps Reveal Worst of ClimateChange
How much more acidic have the oceans become? New maps byColumbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory bring tovisual life a problem just as invisible as the excess carbondioxide piling up in the atmosphere for the past couple ofcenturies. They show that cumulatively the oceans have absorbed atleast 150 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide.
NOAA: Globe sets 5th hottest-month record of2014
Last month set the fifth hottest month record this year,according to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration data.”It is becoming pretty clear that 2014 will end up as the warmestyear on record,” Deke Arndt, climate monitoring chief for NOAA’sNational Climatic Data Center, tells AP. “The remaining questionis: How much?”
Climate fund receives $9.3bnpledge
21 countries have pledged around $9.3 billion to the UN’sthe Green Climate Fund. Hela Cheikhrouhou, the fund’s executivedirector, described the pledges as “game-changing”. The US hadalready pledged $3bn and Japan $1.5bn. Germany and France havepromised about $1bn each, and Sweden more than $500m million. TheUK’s $1.1 billion pledge is about twice its fair share,according tosome metrics, theTimesreports. Smaller amounts wereoffered by countries including Switzerland, South Korea, theNetherlands, Denmark, Norway, Mexico, Luxembourg and the CzechRepublic. We summarise thedetailof the pledges here.
China’s growing demand for Turkmenistan’sgas
China is planning on pouring billions into Turkmenistan’senergy sector just so it can boost its own gas supplies. To cutemissions and clean its air, China aims is to reduce its dependenceon coal and switch to alternative energy sources like gas. It alsoplans on ramping up its nuclear energy production. But it could bestymied by the slow pace of its nuclear reactor programme, withsafety concerns still holding back new approvals, Reutersreports.
Climate and energy comment
Hinkley Point C: the colossus Whitehall wants butis struggling to believe in
“Experience suggests that the construction of the firstnuclear reactor constructed in Britain for quarter of a century -located on the Somerset coast – will not be straightforward”, theGuardian says. But EDF says it is learning from past mistakes anddrawing on the UK’s experience of hosting the Olympics to make surethe planned plant at Hinkley Point gets built on time and budget.By the end of next year, EDF expects to have 2,000 workers on site,moving up to 5,600 at peak time, and is aiming for 24 per cent ofrecruits to come from Somerset and 34 per cent from within a90-mile radius. The government is watching closely, Reutersreports.
Fracking debut of Ineos boss points to lessgassing and more drilling
Energy company Ineos is hoping to crack the UK’s shale gasmarket. It plans to give six per cent of its gas revenues tolocals, and two-thirds directly to landowners. “A few hundred quida year per homeowner could be enough to buy support in poor partsof the country”, the FT suggests. Though it won’t win over the UK’s”footloose environmentalists”.
New climate science
Warmer and wetter winters: characteristics andimplications of an extreme weather event in the HighArctic
Environmental Research Letters
As in other parts of the world, extreme warm spells aregetting more frequent in the Arctic as a result of climate change.A new study examines the impact of one such event in High ArcticSvalbard in January-February 2012. The team recorded temperaturesup to seven degrees Celsius, record-breaking precipitation andwarming of permafrost down to five metres depth. The impacts ofmore such extreme warm events would be serious for Arcticecosystems and society, say the researchers, affecting localmobility, tourism and causing death to wild reindeer by blockingaccess to food.