Founded over a decade ago, Climate Home News is a leading independent digital media outlet covering climate change. We aim to be the go-to newsroom for a global community seeking to understand the political, social and economic drivers of the climate crisis and responses to it.

As efforts toward a just energy transition expand in the Global South, we plan to bring the latest developments across Africa to our international audience of professionals working on climate and energy issues.

In this new reporting role at Climate Home News, the successful candidate will produce regular news stories and features covering energy transition on the African continent and at the global level, working closely with our editors.

We seek applications from well-connected journalists with a few years’ experience, capable of proposing story ideas, cultivating sources, analysing data, and delivering accurate copy in English. Our reporters are also expected to align with our rigorous and ethical journalistic standards.

Salary range: USD25,000-30,000 per year depending on experience and location

Location: 100% remote working (based in Africa – some travel will likely be required)

Term: Full time for a 12-month fixed-term freelance contract, with a possibility of renewal

Application deadline: September 1, 2024

Responsibilities:

• Identify high-impact stories on the politics of the global and African energy transitions of interest to our specialist audience
• Produce weekly news stories and regular features, under the supervision of our news editor and general editor
• Cultivate sources in the energy sector and explore varied reporting techniques including data analysis, field visits and analysing company reports and documents
• Contribute to Climate Home’s popular weekly newsletter
• Use reporting skills to produce multimedia content for social channels, including video scripts and infographics
• Seek out and develop reporting and publishing partnerships with African media outlets to increase our reach and impact

Requirements: 

• At least three years of media reporting experience
• Spoken and written fluency in English
• Self-starter who is comfortable interacting with everyone from local communities to governments and businesses
• Ability to work remotely and coordinate tasks with an international team

Desirable qualifications:

• Experience working in the international field
• A track record of interest in climate change and energy issues
• Experience with investigative and accountability reporting
• Languages other than English
• Proficiency in photography and video

How to apply:

Please send a full CV, a cover letter and links to three recently published samples of your work using this form. The deadline for applications is Sept. 1, 2024.

Note that applicants selected for interview will first be asked to complete a short writing test.

As an organisation committed to diversity and inclusion, we particularly welcome applications from citizens of African countries, women and non-binary people.

Due to an expected high number of applications, we will only be able to respond to those we would like to pursue (this will be no later than mid-September). Thank you for your understanding.

The post Climate Home News is hiring! Apply to be our new energy transition reporter (Africa-based) appeared first on Climate Home News.

New data from a Transition Minerals Tracker compiled by the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre (BHRRC) shows that more than 630 allegations of human rights violations have been associated with minerals mining since 2010. Of those, 91 were made in the last year alone.

The tracker monitors human rights abuses associated with the extraction of seven minerals including copper, lithium and bauxite, which is new in this year’s update. These elements are essential for the production of solar panels, wind turbines, electric vehicles and electrification more broadly.

The latest BHRRC data points to widespread violations of Indigenous peoples’ rights – such as forced relocation, water pollution and denial of access to traditional land – as well as attacks on human rights defenders and workers’ rights abuses.

BHRRC also registered 53 allegations of work-related deaths since 2010, with 30 percent of those newly reported in 2023.

Supply chain FAQ: What you need to know about critical minerals

Caroline Avan, BHRRC’s head of natural resources and just transition, said the situation is not improving. “The sector is blatantly failing at protecting those who generate its profits, and this is only the tip of the iceberg,” she said.

“We are probably only capturing a fraction of abuses because we rely on public data and so many issues don’t get reported,” she added. The BHRRC gives companies an opportunity to respond to the allegations it documents.

Just ten companies are associated with more than half of all allegations registered since 2010 – including China Minmetals, Glencore, Grupo Mexico, First Quantum Minerals and Solway Group – while 46% of the total originated in South America.

Allegations of human rights abuses linked to transition minerals by category 

Source: Business & Human Rights Resource Centre

Avan explained that many abuses follow a pattern that begins with environmental violations –  such as water or soil pollution – compounded by inadequate consultation with local communities, which then leads to protracted conflict.

This has been the case at the Las Bambas copper mine in Peru, now owned by MMG Ltd – whose major shareholder is China Minmetals Corporation (CMC) – and formerly controlled by Glencore. It received the most allegations of rights abuses not only in 2023, but across the tracker’s full 13-year monitoring period.

The mine’s infrastructure, activities and expansion plans have led to a series of social and environmental impacts, provoking protests and blockades by Indigenous communities. Most recently, last November, 1,500 workers went on strike to ask for a larger share of profits.

CMC, MMG and Las Bambas have not responded to the BHRCC over the reported allegations.

New global principles

The persistence of human rights abuses in mineral mining is set to attract more attention, with the International Energy Agency estimating that mineral demand for clean energy applications is set to grow by three and a half times by 2030.

The BHRRC’s report notes that the mining sector is under pressure from civil society, Indigenous peoples and global policymakers alike to strengthen human rights protections.

For example, the new EU Batteries Regulation, adopted last July, obliges end users of battery minerals to carry out thorough supply chain due diligence.

“We are seeing the automotive industry asking more of the upstream mining sector, and that is good news,” said Avan. “But we are not seeing enough from the renewable energy sector in terms of asking mineral suppliers to ensure their operations are not linked with abuses.”

Days after climate talks, US slaps tariffs on Chinese EVs and solar panels

Last month, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres launched a high-level Panel on Critical Energy Transition Minerals tasked with developing a set of global principles to “safeguard environmental and social standards and embed justice in the energy transition”.

Guterres said supply chains must be “managed properly” to ensure that developing countries get a fair share of benefits and that the environment and human rights are protected.

“Too often, production of these minerals leaves a toxic cloud in its wake: pollution; wounded communities, childhoods lost to labour and sometimes dying in their work. And developing countries and communities have not reaped the benefits of their production and trade,” the UN chief said in comments at the launch.

“This must change… The race to net zero cannot trample over the poor,” he added. The panel is expected to deliver initial recommendations ahead of the UN General Assembly in September.

In Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijan’s net zero vision clashes with legacy of war

The BHRRC’s Avan told Climate Home it was “concerning that countries in the Global North are rushing to sign strategic partnerships with resource-rich countries in the Global South because they want to secure their mineral supply chains, but the companies who will be involved in delivering those minerals are not asked much in terms of requirements for human rights protections”.

For companies, recommendations from the centre’s new report include adopting human rights policies and giving affected communities access to the benefits and governance of projects.

Avan said government regulation and better business practices are essential “to ensure that the global energy transition is a just one, centred on respect for human rights, fair negotiations and shared prosperity”.

“The alternative is rising resistance, conflict, and distrust – all threatening to slow the pace of the transition,” she added.

(Reporting by Daisy Clague, editing by Megan Rowling)

The post Calls for responsible mining fail to stem rights abuses linked to transition minerals appeared first on Climate Home News.

Steep cuts in CO2 emissions, mainly from burning fossil fuels, will be needed in the coming years if targets to limit a global rise in temperatures and prevent runaway climate change are to be met, scientists have said.

“Far from falling rapidly – as is required to meet the global climate goals set out in the Paris Agreement – CO2 emissions reached a new record high,” the IEA said in a report.

Global emissions from energy rose by 410 million tonnes, or 1.1%, in 2023 to 37.4 billion tonnes, the IEA analysis showed.

A global expansion in clean technology such as wind, solar and electric vehicles helped to curb emissions growth, which was 1.3% in 2022. But a reopening of China’s economy, increased fossil fuel use in countries with low hydropower output and a recovery in the aviation sector led to an overall rise, the IEA said in its report.

Moves to replace lost hydropower generation due to extreme droughts accounted for around 40% of the emissions rise, or 170 million tonnes of CO2, it said.

“Without this effect, emissions from the global electricity sector would have fallen in 2023,” the IEA said.

Energy-related emissions in the United States fell by 4.1% with the bulk of the reduction coming from the electricity sector, according to the report.

In the European Union emissions from energy fell by almost 9% last year driven by a surge in renewable power generation and a slump in both coal and gas power generation.

In China, emissions from energy rose by 5.2%, with energy demand growing as the country recovered from COVID-19-related lockdowns, the report said.

China, however, also contributed around 60% of global additions of solar, wind power and electric vehicles in 2023, the IEA said.

Globally electric vehicles accounted for one-in-five new car sales in 2023, reaching 14 million and up 35% on the level of 2022.

The post Global energy-related CO2 emissions hit record high in 2023 – IEA appeared first on Climate Home News.

The “UAE consensus” did not go so far as to call for a “phase-out” as more than a hundred countries wanted. It settled on “transitioning away from fossil fuels in energy systems”.

Still, after coal was targeted for a “phase-down” two years ago in Glasgow, it extended that scrutiny to the oil and gas sector.

Cop28 president Sultan Al Jaber brought down the gavel on a deal late Wednesday morning, one day into overtime. “We have language on fossil fuel for the first time ever,” he said, to applause.

One delegation not joining in the ovation was Saudi Arabia. Oil-exporting states fought hard against the phase-out language that appeared in earlier drafts.

Many emerging economies were also wary of signing up to quit fossil fuels, given limited finance on the table to support cleaner development paths.

Dubai deal: Ministers and observers react to the UAE consensus

Samoa complained they were not yet in the room when the deal was adopted. Small island states had pleaded for a rapid fossil fuel phase-out to hold global warming to 1.5C, seen as critical for their survival.

Excerpt from the global stocktake text agreed at Cop28 addressing fossil fuels

The energy package included a push to triple renewable capacity and double the rate of energy efficiency improvements by 2030. It called for accelerating the implementation of technologies like carbon capture, utilization and storage, “particularly in hard-to-abate sectors”.

Controversially, it cited a role for “transitional fuels”, which can be taken to mean fossil gas.

Attention now turns to the next round of national climate plans which, the deal says, should align with limiting global warming to 1.5C. But the pathway to do so is vanishingly small.

The post No ‘phase-out’, but Dubai deal puts oil and gas sector on notice appeared first on Climate Home News.

With vast sunbaked, windswept deserts and 2.5 million people, the southern African nation has plenty of renewable resources to go around. 

Meanwhile rich, densely populated Europe, South Korea and Japan are crying out for clean fuel to decarbonise hard-to-electrify sectors like fertilisers, steel and shipping. Their net zero plans depend on it. 

Keen to secure pole position in the global race for green hydrogen, last year the EU began reaching agreements with prospective producers. One of the most trumpeted deals was signed with Namibia on the sidelines of Cop27 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt. 

“We want to fight climate change. We want to have clean energy. And as I said, you have all the resources in abundance. So let us team up,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said in the direction of her Namibian counterpart, hailing the partnership as a “big win-win situation for all of us”. 

Tapping into solar and wind energy for export is central to President Hage Geingob’s economic strategy. Namibia is seeking $20 billion of investment in green hydrogen – more than its entire GDP of $12 billion in 2022. Government authorities are negotiating funding options with the EU. 

As with any heavy industry, though, the hoped-for boom will come at a cost to local communities and ecosystems. The benefits to ordinary Namibians are less certain. 

Namibia is planning a series of projects to catapult the country into becoming a major green hydrogen exporter. (Credit: Fanis Kollias/Spoovio)

In a months-long investigation, Climate Home News and Oxpeckers visited the site of the flagship project, a $10 billion complex near the southern coastal town of Lüderitz, which is being developed by a Namibia-based company called Hyphen Hydrogen Energy.

The reporter on the ground found a community largely in the dark about the development and nervous about the impact on fishing and tourism. Experts shared frustration at the secretive tender process, scepticism about job prospects for Namibians and concerns for the area’s unique wildlife. 

The green hydrogen complex 

Perched between the Namib desert and the Atlantic Ocean, Lüderitz is named after a German colonist. It was the centre of a diamond rush in 20th century and of a colonial history that repressed indigenous Africans. Germany officially apologised in 2021 for colonial-era atrocities, recognising them as “genocide”. 

Today, its Art Nouveau architecture, fresh seafood and wildlife draws a modest number of tourists, who can visit ghost towns abandoned after the diamond rush. The town is surrounded by the Tsau//Khaeb National Park, home to seals, penguins, flamingoes and ostriches. The park and surrounding lands are off-limits to residents to prevent illegal diamond mining. 

Green hydrogen is set to to transform the character of this small enclave once again. 

Hyphen’s plans show an initial 5GW of wind turbines and solar panels to supply power, according to the project’s factsheet published by the Namibian government. In this arid region, a desalination plant is needed to supply fresh water. An electrolysis plant will split the water into hydrogen and oxygen, before the hydrogen gas is converted into liquid ammonia. A new deepwater port will accommodate tankers to ship the end product around the world. The company aims to produce 300,000 tons of ammonia a year, commissioning the first phase by 2026, Hyphen’s website says. 

To build all this, Hyphen expects to bring in 15,000 workers, roughly doubling Lüderitz’s population. Lüderitz Town Council is planning a new town in the desert to house the influx, immediately south of the historic Kolmanskuppe ghost town. 

An opaque tender process 

“We were a little surprised at the government’s choice of a partner,” said Phil Balhao, an opposition party member of the Lüderitz Town Council.  

Other bidders like South Africa’s Sasol and Australian Fortescue Future Industries had an “established track record” that “seemingly just got ignored”, he said. 

The tender process was overseen by the Namibia Investments Development & Promotions Board (NIDPB), which sits in the president’s office. In September 2020, the board appointed James Mnyupe as green hydrogen commissioner. It launched the first call for proposals in early 2021. 

In a televised speech, Mnyupe said the tender was exempt from public procurement rules. Instead, he cited tourism and conservation laws as the basis to hold a closed selection process. 

Graham Hopwood, director of the Institute of Public Policy Research, a public-interest think-tank based in Windhoek, was not impressed.

“With such a major and strategic project, there needs to be transparency and accountability from the outset. The fact that this project is mired in secrecy is raising red flags,” he said.

The Namibian government published a list of six bidders, who submitted nine bids between them. However, the content of the bids was not made public, nor the reasoning for Hyphen’s selection. 

Hyphen said this was standard practice, given the commercially sensitive data contained in the bids. They added the process was “competitive”. 

“It would be irresponsible and to the detriment to the development of the Hyphen project and Namibia’s broader green hydrogen industry for it to publish commercially sensitive agreements in the public domain that competitor projects/countries could use to compete against Namibia,” Hyphen said in a statement. 

The Namibian government said the tender was “conducted with the utmost transparency and fairness”. 

They said that the three-person bid evaluation committee did a “detailed and comprehensive evaluation” of the proposals, supported by independent experts from the US government’s national renewable energy laboratory and the EU’s technical assistance facility on sustainable energy.

Who is Hyphen? 

Hyphen is a joint venture between two companies – Enertrag and Nicholas Holdings Limited. 

Enertrag, owned by a 59-year-old East German nuclear physicist called Jörg Müller has a long track record of building renewables. It is pursuing green hydrogen projects across the world in Uruguay, Vietnam and South Africa. 

Nicholas Holdings Limited is a company registered in the British Virgin Islands, which owns its stake in Hyphen through a special purpose vehicle based in Mauritius. The ultimate owner of the company is a South African investor called Brian Myerson.

The CEO of Hyphen is South African businessman Marco Raffinetti. 

Myerson is a South African who spent decades as an investor in the UK, where he made headlines for battling the business establishment.

In 2010, Myerson was found by a panel of top UK lawyers to have behaved dishonestly in averting a takeover of Principle Capital, the investment firm he co-founded.

The Takeover Appeal Board found that Myerson and co-conspirators made a “deliberate attempt to circumvent” rules around taking over companies and then attempted to cover up their rule-breaking when the authorities began to investigate. He was banned from getting involved in mergers for three years. 

Dishing out the punishment, the panel said it was only the second time it had done so, which it said, “is some indication of the extreme nature of the sanction”. 

A spokesperson for Hyphen, Enertrag and Nicholas Holdings Limited described this incident as a “historic matter” over “an alleged technical infringement” which “remains contested”. It should not be used to draw conclusions about Myerson’s character, they argued. 

They added that the Takeover Appeal Board had no formal regulatory powers and UK financial regulators took no action in respect of the alleged breach of the rules. 

A spokesperson for the Namibian government said it these were “historical legal matters, that to best of our knowledge have since been resolved”. 

Myerson’s previous ventures on the African continent include a failed bid to scale up bioethanol production in Mozambique. Like today’s green hydrogen push, this was driven by EU demand: in 2007, the bloc set a to blend a percentage of biofuels into petrol. Investors piled into Mozambique, touting it as a “biofuels superpower”.

Myerson set up Principle Energy, based on the Isle of Man. It made bold promises to plant sugarcane over 20,000 hectares of land, build one of the top production facilities in the world and employ 1,600 people. Then the global bioethanol market collapsed and by 2013 the company closed, having planted just 136 hectares, according to a report by GRAIN. 

His involvement in Hyphen is likely to be of concern, said IPPR’s Hopwood, adding Hyphen’s leadership was “questionable”.

Use of tax havens

Myerson’s investment in Hyphen is structured through the British Virgin Islands and Mauritius. Both rank poorly in the Tax Justice Network’s financial secrecy and corporate tax haven indexes. 

Raffinetti said that Mauritius and the British Virgin Islands were “tax neutral jurisdictions with efficient financial markets”. A lot of infrastructure investment in Africa goes through Mauritius, he said, and investors are subject to tax in the countries where they are registered. 

Tax Justice Network analyst Bob Michel said that investment into Africa goes through Mauritius because of its tax rules. “Mauritius is a corporate tax haven,” he said.

“(Mauritius’) domestic tax regime combined with its vast tax treaty network allow third country investors to use it to siphon profits from operations in Africa with the least of taxes paid in the countries where the operations take place,” Michel said by email.

A spokesperson for the Namibian government said it was “aware of the jurisdictions through which certain Hyphen shareholders hold their equity in Hyphen”.  

The spokesperson added: “Should [the Namibian government] come across any conduct that is unbecoming of its laws and global best practice, rest assured [we] will take the necessary swift corrective action.”

Great expectations 

Raffinetti, Hyphen’s CEO, previously developed gas power and rooftop solar bids in South Africa. The Richard Bay gas project he co-led is facing legal challenge by environmental activists due to its climate impact.

Wearing glasses and a black turtleneck, Raffinetti joined a video call with Climate Home in late October. He warned interviewers the internet might cut out due to the power cuts his native South Africa is plagued with.

The interview was granted, through a PR agency, on condition Hyphen could vet the quotes used. Some of the more colloquial soundbites reporters transcribed came back replaced with cautious jargon, and an admonition to put everything in its full context. Hyphen separately responded in writing to detailed concerns raised by sources.

“There’s an enormous amount of expectation in Namibia around this project. So there’s a huge amount of media attention,” Raffinetti said in one approved quote. “As the first large-scale project in Namibia’s green industrialisation strategy, we have an enormous obligation to get it right.”

Biodiversity concerns 

Dr Jean-Paul Roux, a retired marine biologist working in the area for decades, pointed to where the Luderitz peninsula ends at Angra Point. It is the northernmost tip of the Karoo ecosystem, he explained, unique to southern Africa.

In the dry summer season, the desert landscape looks drab and lifeless. Winter rains bring a green explosion of rare plants such as the endemic Lithops optica, a tiny succulent that gets as old as 90 years. 

“Here you can find up to 1,000 different plant species in just one square kilometre, some so small no bulldozer operator will even notice them,” he said. He spots signs of hyenas and porcupines. 

This is the area earmarked for the deepwater port, desalination and ammonia plants. 

Roux said the development would have a massive impact on Shearwater Bay and the adjacent Sturmvogelbucht, a lagoon teeming with flamingos and a heavy-sided dolphin population that he has been studying for years and visits every day. 

“This is the only place along the southern African coast where you can watch them from your car,” he said as this smallest of all dolphin species approached to within a few meters of the beach. He fears that once developers start blasting rock for the port construction, dolphins will leave and never return. 

The Tsau//Khaeb National Park is classified by Namibia’s Ministry of Environment and Tourism as a biodiversity hotspot. (Credit: Fanis Kollias/Spoovio/Luderitz Marine Research)

Dr Antje Burke, a veteran botanist, is working as a consultant to Hyphen. She said at a conference of the Namibian Scientific Society in July that Hyphen was trying to avoid the most sensitive areas, but “one big problem” is that a species of parsley “overlaps almost completely with the concession area”. 

She added that “even more concerning” was the future development plans. “The Hyphen project is developing the service infrastructure really keeping the future developments in mind… That means the entire area will be developed.”

Burke indicated some adjustments that could mitigate the environmental impact.

“No green energy project can be implemented without some environmental impact and Hyphen’s objective is to minimise environmental impacts to the largest extent possible,” Hyphen CEO Marco Raffinetti said in an interview with Climate Home. 

The company has hired consultancy SLR to prepare an environmental and social impact report and lead a “comprehensive stakeholder engagement process”, Hyphen added in a written statement.

Consultants are currently gathering meteorological data and reporting a baseline of wildlife and plants in the area, SLR reports say. The formal environmental impact study is expected to start next year, the official documents add.

A group of Flamingoes at a lagoon within the Tsau//Khaeb National Park in Namibia, where green hydrogen developments are meant to ship the gas to the EU. (Photo: John Grobler)

Loss of access 

Aside from the northern end of the bay, the peninsula is the only publicly accessible area of the Lüderitz region. The rest is Sperrgebiet or “forbidden area” – a legacy of the diamond rush. 

Some of Hyphen’s infrastructure will reduce public access to the peninsula. Hyphen’s Raffinetti said this was “unavoidable” as it was “the only location feasible for a deepwater port”. 

The other access to the sea is the four-kilometre Agate Beach to the north of the enclave, downwind from the last few local fishing factories and an overflowing municipal sewage plant. 

Residents fear this would impact lobster fishing and rock angling. Crayfish fisheries, one of the area’s tourism attractions and an informal source of income would also be affected, locals said. 

“The people in the township’s poorest areas [have] got nowhere else to go. They are going to strip this bay [Agate beach] clean of everything,” said Gerd Kessler, a fourth-generation Buchter as locals call themselves, referring to a potential concentration of fisheries in the area.  

As owner of Five Roses Aquaculture and three smaller oyster-breeding operations, Kessler employs 100 people. 

Felsenkirche, a Lutheran church built in 1912 in Lüderitz. (Photo: SkyPixels/Wikimedia Commons)

A massive new seawall and harbour at Angra Point could have unpredictable impacts on currents in the bay, he cautioned. When the existing shallow port was expanded in the late 1960s by filling in the channel between the town and Shark Island, the sea quickly stripped away the town’s little beach inside Robert Harbour. 

Kessler’s biggest concern was how Hyphen planned to dispose of the brine from their desalination plant. “You can’t just dump that anywhere, you have to make sure you use the currents to disperse it,” Kessler said. 

Questionable job prospects 

Hyphen expects to create 15,000 jobs in the construction phase and 3,000 to operate the finished complex. It is aiming for 90% of these jobs to go to Namibians, and 30% to youth. 

There is a huge skills gap, Namibian business groups warned. 

“We do not even have a category for petrochemical or petroleum engineers at the moment,” said Sophia Tekie, chairperson of the Engineering Council of Namibia (ECN). “If we have any, they are registered as [one of 40] chemical engineers.” 

“Although the ECN has 2,015 registered engineers in eight disciplines at present, about 30 to 40% of them were already retired and only did part-time consultancy work,” said her predecessor, Markus von Jeney. 

Local construction capacity did not look much better: according to Bärbel Kircher, director of the Construction Industry Federation (CIF), their membership had declined from 480 companies in 2015 to 240 member companies, operating at only 50% capacity, she said.  

“Currently, our local contractors are largely displaced by foreign contractors, excluding them from opportunities. This is often due to conditions set by external financiers,” said Kircher.  

In the past, the country has struggled to complete large projects due to corruption charges.  

Since 2013, the Namibian Ports Authority, the National Petroleum Corporation of Namibia and the Ministry of Agriculture have borrowed over N$21 billion (about US$400 million each, mostly from the African Development Bank) for infrastructure projects, including the 3MW Neckartal dam.  

The Namibian High Court declared the dam was commissioned in 2008 under corrupted circumstances. The project was eventually completed at three times the original price in 2017. 

Namibian construction companies were not likely to benefit from the green hydrogen projects, the CiF said. “The current procurement methods and trends do not provide a promising outlook for the future,” said Kirchner. 

Hyphen said the company would implement “targeted training interventions at various levels” including “specialized Masters’ programs, internships and apprenticeships”. 

The Karoo ecosystem is unique to Southern Africa. The Tsau//Khaeb National Park is a biodiversity hotspot hosting a part of this ecosystem. (Photo: John Grobler)

European support 

Under the memorandum of understanding signed in Sharm el-Sheikh, the EU will provide technical expertise, trade incentives and, crucially, help to secure infrastructure finance. 

Moments after von der Leyen and Geingob inked their deal, the European Investment Bank promised loans of up to €500 million ($528m) for renewable hydrogen investments in Namibia. “Let’s bring flesh to the bone,” the bank’s chief Werner Hoyer told the audience. 

Shortly after the event, Hyphen announced that it had “signed a €35 million agreement with the European Investment Bank to finance the early development of our project”. This was somewhat premature. The bank had supplied a letter of intent, not a firm commitment of funding. 

Since the initial announcement, European institutions, Namibian government officials and private actors have been working out the details of the partnership. 

Hyphen is looking for €100 million to start work on the project.

“We have been very grateful to the EIB and the European Commission for making available the initial funding to share the early development risk,” said Raffinetti in late September, suggesting a firm commitment from the European backers. 

The Hyphen CEO went on to outline what the deal with the EIB should look like: a €10 million ($10.5 million) grant – “still to be finalised,” he added – and a €25 million ($26.4 million) “soft loan”, meaning it would come with favourable terms for the company.

An EIB spokesperson said no agreement has been signed yet. “We are in the process of completing our due diligence, after which the project will be presented to the EIB’s governing bodies for approval,” they said.

“Potential financial support at this early stage would be for site studies and feasibility studies. Any support for implementation will be conditional to the project complying with the Bank’s environmental and social (E&S), procurement, compliance and other standards,” they added.

Namibia’s president Hage Geingob, EIB president Werner Hoyer, Belgian prime minister Alexander de Croco and EU president Ursula von der Leyen announcing the EU green hydrogen partnership with Namibia at Cop27. (Photo: EIB)

On top of the cash injection, the EU’s international partnership division could provide a first-loss guarantee. If the project does not go to plan and the borrower cannot pay back its debt, the EU will pick up the tab – or at least part of it. 

Without the “bedrock” of public money it would be impossible to lure in commercial lenders and leave a huge funding gap, Raffinetti said. 

A European Commission spokesperson told Climate Home that “at present, there is not yet any financial assistance under the EU budget mobilised in favour of the Hyphen project”.

The Netherlands is also supporting the project. Dutch companies like the Port of Rotterdam and gas pipeline operator Gasunie see a business opportunity to offload the green ammonia from ships and pipe it to industry inland.

In June, green hydrogen commissioner Mnyupe told a national newspaper that the Dutch government had given Namibia a €40m grant to develop green hydrogen. He said the government would use €23m of this to buy a stake in Hyphen.

The Dutch said the money was not Namibia’s to spend. The €40m grant comes from Invest International, a public fund set up in 2019 to advance Dutch interests abroad and promote economic growth in the developing world. 

Invest International’s lead on hydrogen Bart De Smet told Climate Home that the €40m grant will be distributed by a fund manager independent of the Namibian government and won’t necessarily go to Hyphen. 

Who benefits? 

The big question for Namibians is whether the inevitable disturbance of a unique ecosystem and small-town culture will be worth it. 

The Namibian government is taking a 24% stake in Hyphen through its sovereign wealth fund. It is expected to raise further revenues through taxes, royalties, land rental and environmental levies on the project, Hyphen said. 

“The benefit for the country in terms of economic upliftment is enormous. Because Namibia is only 2.5 million people. So if you’re successful, your impact on each human being’s life can be enormous,” Raffinetti said. 

Patrick Neib, an unemployed resident of the Nautilus township behind Luderitz, could certainly use some upliftment. He moved to the area in 2015 in search of a better job that has yet to materialise. 

Like many residents, he found out about Hyphen from social media. Most of Hyphen’s public meetings took place in Keetmanshoop, the regional capital 350 km away. 

The secrecy and technical jargon used by Hyphen and its consultants made it impossible for the ordinary layman to understand or access any opportunities, Neib said.  

“There is just no public discussion about the benefits for ordinary people like me, or what price we are to pay for green hydrogen development,” he said. “My question is, who or what is really behind all of this?” 

This story was reported in collaboration with Oxpeckers Investigative Journalism Centre and was supported by a grant from Journalismfund Europe.

The post Shades of green hydrogen: EU demand set to transform Namibia appeared first on Climate Home News.

From 2015 to 2020, Mazibuko held public office as a councillor in the Emalahleni Local Municipality. Now, through a a non-profit called Bullet Mkabayi Foundation, she has actively lobbied against the rapid deployment of renewables and the country’s planned coal phase out. 

“We have been lobbying, and will continue to lobby our people to say: reject this thing. It is not going to work for us,” Mazibuko told Oxpeckers and Climate Home News. 

South Africa is at the heart of one of the most ambitious energy transition deals in the world — an $8.5 billion partnership with a group of wealthy countries, among them the US, UK and EU. The Just Energy Transition Partnership (JETP) seeks to phase out coal in the country by 2035. 

But the nation’s coal sector has exerted a significant pushback to this plan, partnering with politicians and even managing to water down or delay key policies, such as the Climate Change Bill and the Carbon Tax Act. 

Local business group tries to keep South Africa’s coal plants alive

Mazibuko, for example, has held meetings with political leaders such as the Mpumalanga Premier Refilwe Mtshweni-Tsipane, and members of the Department of Mineral Resources and the Presidential Climate Commission. She defends a continued use of coal. 

“Coal lobbying has the greatest impact on green energy investments by increasing uncertainty and thus reducing the appetite of investors to invest in green energy,” said Mary Stewart, chief executive of climate consultancy Energetics.

South Africa currently relies heavily on coal for about 70% of total electricity production. The country is also one of the top five coal exporting countries in the world, hosting an influential coal mining industry. 

Several major companies with stakes in the coal sector have kept fossil fuels in their corporate planning. The petrochemical company Sasol, for example, claims to lead development of a “gas economy”, while South Africa’s public electricity company Eskom plans to “repower” stations using gas, according to their 2021 sustainability report.  

Coal lobby 

Progress on South Africa’s energy transition depends on phasing out 14 existing coal-fired power plants, as well as accelerating the deployment of renewable energy. But the coal sector has so far resisted this transition. 

During discussions on South Africa’s Climate Change Bill, a landmark climate legislation still in public hearings, at least four groups -including the country’s own Eskom- made attempts to weaken penalties for polluters, according to a report by climate think tank InfluenceMap. 

The mining industry was the strongest supporter of coal, as multinational companies Anglo American and South32 all participated in lobbying to water down climate legislation in South Africa, the report shows. 

In earlier discussions on the Carbon Tax Act, industry lobbyists pushed for a low tax on greenhouse gas pollution, which ultimately passed in 2019 at a rate of around an $8 per tonne of carbon dioxide. This is much lower than the $40-80 per tonne recommended by the climate think tank Carbon Market Watch to achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement. 

At the time, The Minerals Council South Africa, which represents mining companies employing 450,000 people, said the tax was “a wrong method at the wrong time”. 

Industry executives hold similar views on the role of coal in the upcoming years. Mike Teke, CEO of Seriti Resources, owner of six coal mines around Emalahleni that supply Eskom, defended the expansion of their coal business while building renewables. 

One of its subsidiaries, Seriti Green, announced in February 2023 the development of a 155MW wind farm due to come online by 2025. The project, however, will serve to power about 75% of the electricity required in its own coal mines. 

“We’re building wind turbines. However, I want to be clear, we will continue building our coal business at the same time as building our renewables business,” he told Oxpeckers and Climate Home News. 

Mike Tete, CEO of Seriti Resources, plans to expand coal mining activities and power it with renewables.

Uncertain investments 

Lobbying for coal interests has a long history in South Africa, according to Wikus Kruger, research lead and lecturer on power-sector investment in sub-Saharan Africa at the Power Futures Lab, based at the University of Cape Town’s Graduate School of Business. 

The “minerals-energy complex”, a powerful grouping of business and political leaders related to the coal sector, has influenced decision making since the apartheid time, Kruger said. Today, it has kept an active pushback against the coal phase-out. 

By 2018, South Africa’s public electricity company Eskom had aligned with different political currents, but “coal mining for electricity generation continued to dominate”, according to research published by Oxford University Press. 

Policy certainty is essential for investors to pour money into green energy in South Africa, climate futures analyst Nicholas King told Oxpeckers and Climate Home. But recent events have kept policy decisions far from certain in the country. 

South Africa’s ageing coal-fired power plant fleet has caused an energy crisis all over the country, with blackouts more than tripling in 2022 compared to 2021.

As a result, president Cyril Ramaphosa said in a statement to the nation that he would consider delaying coal-fired power plant decommissions. Rich donor countries, on their part, said they were “understanding” of the crisis but warned about the risk of backsliding on the energy transition. 

“You need a clear picture… a roadmap,” King said. “No one’s going to want to invest if the old and really malfunctioning coal-fired power stations are going to have their length of life extended.”

Uncertainty on renewable retraining frightens South Africa’s coal communities

Still committed 

In spite of the current energy crisis and pressures from the coal sector, the government remains committed to South Africa’s decarbonisation targets, said project management unit head Rudi Dicks.

Dicks said any revision to the decommissioning schedule would be informed by a comparison of the costs of refurbishing older coal-fired power stations with the cost of investing in its replacements, including renewables, batteries and gas.

Still, extending the coal-fired power plants’ lives, as well as building new coal-fired power plants, are options being pushed by government factions, specifically in the Department of Mineral Resources and Energy, which has a strong interest in coal, said Brett Cohen, climate and energy consultant at the Department of Chemistry at the University of Cape Town. 

“The bulk of the pro (coal) lobby is within Mpumalanga; it is people who are concerned about job losses and economic impact,” Cohen said. “There hasn’t been a clear policy signal from the government for renewables, that’s why it has been difficult to invest in renewables in South Africa.” 

King, on his part, said clarity will be key to guarantee renewable growth in the country. “The longer we resist the changes, the more it’s going to be problematic for us to attract that investment, and investors will go to countries that are willing to transition,” he concluded.    

This story was published in partnership between Oxpeckers Investigative Environmental Journalism and Climate Home News, and produced with the support of the Pulitzer Center 

The post South Africa’s coal lobby is resisting a green transition appeared first on Climate Home News.

Nelly Sigudla, a qualified fire watcher and part-time control room operator at Duvha power station in Mpumalanga, South Africa’s energy capital, worries for her future, when her main source of income gets unplugged.

The mother of four children lives in Benicon Park, an informal settlement next to the coal-fired power station, which is scheduled to be decommissioned by Eskom – South Africa’s public electricity company – between 2031 and 2034.

Like many employees in the coal-mining industry, Sigudla fears her qualifications won’t be enough in the near future, when renewables take over coal as South Africa’s primary source of new energy, risking becoming unemployable.

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The country, which depends on coal for about 85% of its electricity, is home to one of the largest energy experiments in the world: an $8.5-billion deal with a group of rich nations – including the United States, United Kingdom and the European Union – to transition towards renewable energy.

For solar panels and wind turbines to operate, South Africa will have to redirect coal workers towards new jobs in the renewable energy sector, such as construction, electrical engineering and information technology.

But an investigation by Oxpeckers Investigative Environmental Journalism and Climate Home News found a major skills gap in coal-reliant communities and a lack of clarity on how funds for reskilling will be implemented.

Sigudla said the transition to green energy sources in Mpumalanga is difficult to welcome. From a community perspective it could bring even more poverty. The region has a soaring unemployment rate of 38%, and more than 100,000 jobs depend on coal.

“When the renewable sector kicks in, what fire am I going to watch?” Sigudha asks. “No one has come to the communities to tell us about new skills programmes that we can follow to acquire skills that will be needed in future.”

Reskilling programmes

The Just Energy Transition Investment Plan (JET-IP), a document that is guiding South Africa’s move to renewables, includes an investment of nearly R2.7-billion ($151 million) for reskilling programmes across the country.

In Mpumalanga, R750-million ($42 million) is allocated to “investing in youth” – including education, training, work experience and placements – and R5.6-billion ($310 million) to “caring for coal workers”, which includes re-skilling, redeployment, placement and temporary income support.

Funds would not only come from the JET partnership, but also from government budgets, venture capital and multilateral banks.

According to the JET-IP, the government plans to set up a national skills hub to advise on reskilling needs, and R1,6-billion ($89 million) will be allocated to creating pilot training centres known as “skills development zones” in Mpumalanga, Eastern Cape and Northern Cape provinces.

These pilot zones will be run by technical colleges and support the development of new skills and courses, aiming to “ enhance the employability of graduates”, says the JET-IP.

One of the options to set up facilities for the training centres is to use old decommissioned coal plants. This was one of the options for the Komati power station, the first one to shut down, in October 2022, according to a recently published report by environmental justice organisation GroundWork.

But details about how these training centres would actually become operational are scarce.

Development zones

Blessing Manale, spokesperson for the Presidential Climate Commission (PCC), an independent multi-stakeholder body established by President Cyril Ramaphosa to oversee the country’s transition, was unable to indicate when the skills development zones will start operations.

Additionally, he acknowledged that skills development is severely under-prioritised, adding “all stakeholder groups have raised this as a fundamental weakness in the JET-IP”.

“In the PCC’s view, much work needs to be done, both to quantify the needs for skills development, and to upskill the workforce and new entrants – in particular youth and young women,” Manale said.

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Manale added the transformation of technical and vocational colleges, typically aimed at adults looking for new technical skills, is “fundamental”. The PCC is rolling out a new programme on skills for the energy transition along with the departments of education and energy, he said. 

But there needs to be more clarity on the skills needed for the decommissioning of coal-fired plants, he said.

“This gives rise to questions around who will actually provide the training required for upskilling workers in the coal value chain, design curricula for educational institutions where skills development will take place, and how this can be funded,” Manale told Oxpeckers.

For workers in the coal industry such as Nelly Sigudla (above), the transition to green energy sources in Mpumalanga is difficult to welcome. (Photo: Ashraf Hendriks)

Vocational training

Mpumalanga has three technical and vocational education and training (TVET) colleges that fall under the department of higher education and training (DHET). They focus on “preparing students to become functional workers in a skilled trade”.

These colleges, based in Ehlanzeni, Gert Sibande and Nkangala districts, provide practical skills training for the mining and fossil fuel industries, among other courses. At the start of the year, the department reported that more than 500,000 students had enrolled at TVET colleges countrywide.

Oxpeckers and Climate Home reached out via email to all three TVET colleges, as well as the DHET and several other tertiary institutions in the province, to understand how skills development courses currently on offer could be applicable to the green energy sector. Similar questions were also sent to Eskom’s Academy of Learning and the South African Renewable Energy Technology Centre. Despite follow-up phone calls, no responses were received at the time of publication.

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The curricula of the TVET colleges and other educational facilities needs to change to achieve the energy transition, said professor Victor Munnik, co-author of the Contested Transition report recently released by GroundWork.

Training and reskilling for renewables must be “fit for purpose”, he said. “It should be aimed at a society that lives on renewable energy and understands how it works. There are specific specialised skills involved; for example, for the grid to become a smart grid it has to integrate a lot of IT technologies.”

Changes in the education system need to include school courses “to prepare young people not just to work in the new economy but to actively shape it and be part of it”, Munnik said.

Wendy Poulton, secretary general of the South African National Energy Association, added that there is a scarcity of specialist technical and managerial skills in the renewable energy sector. “This will require the education, training and upskilling of engineers and technicians to shift into renewables,” she said.

Happy Sithole, NUM health and safety chairperson in the Highveld region and an Eskom shop steward, says he has no knowledge of skills development zones in Mpumalanga. (Photo: Ashraf Hendriks)

Union concerns

The regional chairperson of National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) in the Mpumalanga Highveld region, Malekutu Motubatse, is concerned that the current courses offered at TVET colleges and other education facilities still produce learners that will be unemployed in the near future.

Next to each power station there is a coal mine that is used for the purpose of providing coal to the power station, he said. “So the reskilling should be a reskilling of everyone. If the government is talking about reskilling, who is going to be reskilled, Eskom employees or mine employees? Let’s assume that it talks to Eskom employees, then where does it leave the coal mine workers?”

Happy Sithole, NUM health and safety chairperson in the Highveld region and an Eskom shop steward, believes not many artisanal coal miners - who conduct small scale mining - will be employed in the renewables sector.

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“We are talking about artisans, a job that pays well. If you change from coal to renewables, what’s going to happen to them?”

Sithole said he has no knowledge of skills development zones in Mpumalanga: “We find ourselves trying to understand what this is, because as NUM we have not seen any development.”

NUM is also unaware of a training facility that is supposed to be set up at Komati power station, which was decommissioned in October 2022 and is punted as a model for repurposing, Sithole said.

“We have not heard of Komati becoming a training facility. All we know about Komati is that there is intent to demolish it. There’s a lot of information that needs to be cleared up, and it’s difficult to get answers,” he said.

Gaylor Montmasson-Clair, a senior economist at Trade & Industrial Policy Strategies (TIPS), an economic research institution, said Eskom’s skilled workforce has a higher chance of finding alternative jobs in other industries, such as electricians, for example.

But coal miners might not have the same luck. “To be blunt, we must stop the delusion that the bulk of the people who are employed in coal mining are going to be employed in renewable energy. That narrative just makes no sense,” Montmasson-Clair said.

Duvha power station, located in Mpumalanga, South Africa, is scheduled to be decommissioned between 2031 and 2034. (Photo: Ashraf Hendricks)

Construction jobs

Peter Venn, chief executive of Seriti Green, said the transition will create more jobs in the construction sector in the coming years. “We see a positive job growth in the renewable space for the next 10 years through the construction period,” he said.

Seriti Green is an offshoot of a mining company and will soon begin construction on South Africa’s largest wind farm in Mpumalanga, with power supply due to come online by 2025.

With Seriti being on both sides of the transition from coal mining to renewable energy supply, Venn emphasises the importance of training programmes for the skills required in the renewable sector.

“The Cape Peninsula University has partnered with Komati power station and Eskom to deliver skills in Mpumalanga. And there are other organisations offering significant renewable energy skills,” he said.

“Renewables require across-the-spectrum skills. All the back-office skills are required, civil and electrical skills are required; it goes into IT, security, data analytics, preventative maintenance,” Venn said.

Middelburg resident Emanuel Marutle says the current education system is not even able to provide skills for learners to work in the coal-mining sector, making a transition towards renewables even more difficult.  (Photo: Ashraf Hendriks)

Young workers

According to the PCC, workers in the coal-mining sector are relatively young, with a median age of 38 years. About 90% of those employed in Mpumalanga are semi-skilled (74%), or low-skilled (17%) workers.

The urgency for the skills they will need to diversify is heightened by the fact that transition planning is developing in the context of already high unemployment, poverty and inequality, the PCC says.

“These dynamics make skills diversification more complex as the just transition ought to manage job losses and create employment opportunities in a country with an unemployment rate of 33.9%,” said Manale.

Emanuel Marutle, a resident of the coal fields in Middelburg, told Oxpeckers he is worried the education system in Mpumalanga doesn’t have the resources to help affected community members gain practical skills to weather the transition.

“The current education system is not even able to provide skills for learners to work in the coal-mining sector, so how will it equip people with the skills needed in the renewables sector?”

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Marutle said during a community consultation about the transition held “by government people from Johannesburg” in 2022, locals were promised that people from their municipality would be taken to undergo training for the renewable sector. This has not happened, he said.

Given Masina, another local and a member of the Khuthala environmental group, said he hasn’t heard anything about any reskilling, training, or skills development in Mpumalanga.

“Our kids are studying in the fields of coal, but coal is dying. People will be left without knowing what they can do,” he said. “If people are skilled, they can transfer skills to other people in the communities so that they have chances of being employed.”

This investigation by Climate Home News and Oxpeckers Investigative Environmental Journalism was produced with the support of the Pulitzer Center, and is part of a series on South Africa's Renewables Revolution.

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“Houston, we have a problem,” Sultan al-Jaber, chief executive of Abu Dhabi National Oil Company and president-designate of the COP28 climate summit, said to loud applause from the nearly 1,000 attendees of at the CERAWeek energy conference.

“Energy leaders in this room have the knowledge, experience, expertise and the resources needed to address the dual challenge of driving sustainable progress while holding back emissions,” Jaber said in his speech to an audience that included OPEC Secretary General Haitham Al Ghais and U.S. climate envoy John Kerry.

Jaber and Kerry, who strode to the stage and shook Jaber’s hand when the speech ended, left the room together. The two held a meeting ahead of the conference on Sunday.

“Look forward to working together to deliver ambitious action on clean energy transition and align the oil and gas sector w/ 1.5C imperatives,” Kerry later tweeted.

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Jaber was a controversial pick to lead the COP28 climate summit because his country is an OPEC member and major oil exporter. The United Arab Emirates is only the second Arab state to host the conference, after Egypt in 2022.

He called on his peers to get behind efforts to limit global warming. “Alongside all industries, the oil and gas needs to up its game, do more and do it faster,” Jaber said.

The UN-backed climate change conference’s recent inclusion of oil and gas representatives is a far cry from 2021 summit, where energy companies complained they were shut out of the event.

Jaber’s appointment as COP28 president last year fuelled activist concerns that the oil industry was hijacking the world’s response to the global warming crisis.

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Some activists demanded he give up his ADNOC role to steer the event. Jaber’s COP28 presidency involves shaping the conference agenda and negotiations between governments.

But others say the whole energy industry needs to be involved in the energy transition. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine sparked an energy crunch that underscored continued dependence on fossil fuels and vulnerability to supply disruptions.

On Monday, Jaber emphasised that he would “consult and convene” with all members of the energy world.

“This industry must take responsibility and lead the way,” he said of the oil and gas sector. “Let’s remember that progress is made through partnership not polarisation.”

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An estimated 1,400 families could be displaced by the Mphanda Nkuwa hydropower project due to be built across the river in what would be Southern Africa’s largest dam. Another 200,000 people could be affected downstream.

The government of Mozambique has touted the 1.5GW Mphanda Nkuwa dam, in the district of Marara, Tete province, as key for the southern African nation to address energy poverty and reach its goal of universal energy access by 2030.

But environmental groups say the dam threatens to negatively impact local communities and ecosystems. Local people told Climate Home News they haven’t been consulted on the project and have only heard about it through non-official sources.

Moreover, climate impacts and increasingly erratic rainfall risk making the project unviable, scientists say.

In spite of outcry from local people and green groups, both the World Bank, through its private investment arm the International Finance Corporation (IFC), and the African Development Bank (AfDB) are supporting the project and pushing for the dam’s construction.

The project is expected to “accelerate the transition to clean energy to combat climate change in Southern Africa,” said IFC.

The Mphanda Nkuwa hydro project site is located in the Zambezi river (Photo: International Rivers)

In May last year, the two development institutions acted as advisors to develop the dam, hoping it will become “attractive to reputable developers, financiers and investors to ensure competitive and least-cost power for Mozambique and the region,” AfDB said in a statement.

Sources told Climate Home that the European Union and the European Investment Bank (EIB) have considered getting involved, but have not yet made a final decision.

At the end of 2022, Mozambique became Africa’s newest gas exporter despite 72% of its population having no electricity access. The Mphanda Nkuwa dam is the country’s largest venture into renewable energy and is designed to supply power domestically.

Yet, studies have shown that large-scale hydro may not be as clean as previously thought. While considered a source of low-carbon energy, large hydropower projects emit significant amounts of methane, a greenhouse gas 80 times more potent than carbon dioxide.

The social impact of large hydro projects has also been criticised for violating indigenous peoples and local communities’ rights, and increasing the risk of over-topping and flooding for people living downstream.

The Chirodzi-Nsanangue community during a meeting with Justiça Ambiental (Photo: Justiça Ambiental)

Dam for development 

The government of Mozambique has earmarked the Mphanda Nkuwa project as a national priority in the country’s energy master plan. It’s also a priority investment for the Southern Africa Power Pool Plan.

The dam will be built in the lower part of the Zambezi river basin, around 60 km downstream from the existent giant hydropower plant at Cahora Bassa, known as HCB. Under current plans, the project is expected to reach financial close in 2024 with commissioning to start in 2031.

Government officials, the IFC and AfDB say that Mphanda Nkuwa is key to bringing energy and development to Mozambique.

“The project reinforces our efforts to combat climate change in a region that is desperately short of power but equally in need of transformation and a just energy transition,” said Kevin Kariuki, AfDB’s vice president for power, energy climate and green growth.

Carlos Yum, managing director at the project’s office under Mozambique’s energy ministry, said that Mphanda Nkuwa will support the country’s industrialisation and provide “reliable transmission infrastructure”.

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Resettlement anxiety

The Mphanda Nkuwa project is poised to result in the eviction of farming communities from their land. But people in the affected areas told Climate Home that nobody has yet come to inform them about the plans or seek their consent.

“No one has ever sat down with us to explain about the project or about our rights,” said Horlando Elias Djaquissone, who has lived in the Chacucoma community for 14 years.

The community of Chirodzi-Nsanangue, in Marara district, lies at the heart of the project area. Fisherfolk, artisanal miners and farmers who “rely on the river and its banks for everything” have the most to lose, says a report sent to the EU and EIB by environmental group Justiça Ambiental (JA), which is part of Friends of the Earth International.

The group estimates that more than 1,400 families living in the region could be displaced, and a further 200,000 people living in the delta area would be affected.

A fisherman in the Zambezi river in Mozambique, a sector that is threatened by the Mphanda Nkuwa hydro project (Photo: Justiça Ambiental)

Farmers in the communities of Chacucoma and Nhahacamba live off growing maize on small-holding plots, fishing and artisanal mining, as well as raising cattle, goats and chicken.

But the province of Tete does not have plenty of arable land to resettle the communities of mostly subsistence farmers, the report highlights.

And it’s not the first time some communities have been asked to move. 15 years ago, a coal mine in Marara resettled farmers to infertile lands where they couldn’t grow crops, and where housing conditions were unsafe. In the 1970s, the HCB dam, developed under Portuguese colonial rule, displaced around 30,000 people in the region.

Cornélio Juliano Pacate, of Chacucoma, who sells fish and produces crop all year round, fears he might lose his livelihood if he is resettled. “I don’t want to leave because there might be problems where [the government] will relocate me to,” he told Climate Home.

A preliminary assessment carried out by TMP Systems, a development consultancy agency, suggested the project could see an increased cost of $1.3bn due to resettlements negotiations and social disputes around displacements.

Wrong direction

Civil society groups have been sceptical about the benefits and sustainability of the project.

The country already produces enough energy to meet domestic needs, but most of Mozambique’s population cannot access electricity, said Anabela Lemos, director of Justiça Ambiental.

Electricity is one of Mozambique’s largest exports. In 2021, it came third after aluminium and coal, and generated nearly $570m in revenue. Last November, the country exported its first liquified natural gas (LNG) to the European market.

“The vast majority of Mozambique’s energy output is exported to South Africa at prices that are unfavourable to us, and what we import back is largely used by industry rather than by people,” Lemos said.

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Under current plans, the energy generated by the Mphanda Nkuwa dam will be channelled by transmission lines to Mozambique’s capital Maputo, which is located 1,500km away from the project site.

Because Mozambique’s population is widely dispersed and two thirds of its population live in rural areas, “it makes no sense to invest in transmission lines that cover long distances,” Lemos argued. Instead, the government should  “promote local solutions adjusted to the potential of each place,” she said.

Climate shocks

The Zambezi delta is under severe threat of droughts worsened by climate change, which researchers think could grow even worse after accommodating another large dam in its basin.

Along its course, the river is already powering around 5GW through the Kariba dam, between Zambia and Zimbabwe, and Mozambique’s HCB, also in Tete province. As the impacts of climate change become more pronounced, there is a serious risk that the lower Zambezi will not be able to provide the best conditions for the 1.5GW hydro plant to function.

A farmer along the banks of the Zambezi river in Mozambique, a sector threatened with displacement to new infertile lands (Photo: Justiça Ambiental)

A 2012 study by advocacy group International Rivers found that climate change could reduce water availability in the basin and risk hydropower production. According to the study, rainfall levels could decrease up to 15% over the next century.

Meanwhile, rising temperatures could lead to more evaporation, said Miguel Uamasse, researcher at Eduardo Mondlane University, in Maputo, who has studied the impact of climate change in Mozambique’s hydro landscape for years.

Less rainfall coupled with increased evaporation “will result in lower river flow and lower revenue from energy production,” Uamasse said.

Losses on the local ecosystems and on the Zambezi delta will be “irreversible,” Lemos added, explaining that the dam will alter and disrupt sediments in the river. This will affect the “productivity of the floodplains, the soil and the health of the vegetation,” she said.

“Here, I am doing fine,” said farmer Tafere Juliano, who lives by the river margins. “I don’t know if there will be enough water for my animals to drink wherever they put me,” she added, in anticipation of her resettlement.

Community members argue they can only leave their homes given fair compensation – a matter yet to be determined.

Fungai Caetano contributed to report this story.

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“Coal is the heritage of this province, it is the backbone of our economy. It’s an undeniable fact,” says Philani Mngomezulu, founder of an established community-based greening project in the municipality called the Khuthala environmental group.

According to Mngomezulu, almost 80% of the more than 80,000 residents working and generating income in Ermelo are employed at Eskom and Transnet, the state-owned energy and transport companies. Camden is one of 12 coal power stations in Mpumalanga scheduled to be decommissioned in the coming years, most of them by 2035.

“As an environmental group, we are clear about the impact of coal on our environment, in particular climate change and pollution. However, as the community of Ermelo we will only be in agreement with the energy transition if it is going to impact positively on the local people,” he says.

Ermelo and other coal-mining regions in Mpumalanga province are at the frontline of South Africa’s Just Energy Transition (JET) process, which aims to repurpose coal power plants and coal-mining lands to greener energy. But coal workers are still hesitant and have said to feel left out of the country’s energy transition.

Lack of consultation

According to Mngomezulu, however, the people of Ermelo are in the dark when it comes to the transition because the government is not bringing consultations to the communities.

“We’ve been saying to the presidential climate commission [PCC] that they must come and do a proper consultation in Ermelo because people here are dependent on coal, so if we are going to shut down the power stations and any other coal mines without informing the community, that’s a bit unfair,” he said.

The PCC is a multi-stakeholder body set up by President Cyril Ramaphosa to “oversee and facilitate a just and equitable transition towards a low-emissions and climate-resilient economy” in South Africa.

Thulani Madlala, a ward councillor in the Msukaligwa municipality, says he is waiting to see how the transition will assist the local poverty-stricken people.

“We are waiting for the JET to be explained to the masses of our people on the ground. We hope that this programme doesn’t negatively affect the unemployment rate that is already here because, if that’s the case, our people are going to be against the transition,” Madlala says.

Meanwhile, Ermelo communities are living in “energy poverty: most of our informal settlements don’t have electricity, so they rely on coal, and some are able to profit from coal sales”, he says.

‘Causing havoc’

Data collated by the Oxpeckers’ #MineAlert tool shows that at least 227 government-licensed coal mines surround Ermelo. The area is also home to more than 3,000 small-scale artisanal miners who contribute to the local economy, pay rent, buy clothes and provide jobs.

Given Masina says the downside of phasing out coal is that businesses such as his will have to close. He started a coal yard in Wesselton, Ermelo’s satellite township, in 2011 that sells coal to community members and he employs people from the community.

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Masina says they had not heard anything from the government about consultations with the community. “Look, if they decide to phase out coal, this means I will also have to retrench the employees I have so far employed.”

“There is no doubt that this transition is causing havoc in South Africa. At the moment, power stations are being bombed because of this transition that is not being explained properly to the people of the country,” Masina says.

In December, the government deployed troops to at least four Eskom power stations after a series of incidents of theft and sabotage.

Employment opportunities

The JET plan, released in 2022, states that more than half the youth in Mpumalanga communities are unemployed and the coal value chain decline will further narrow employment opportunities as the sector downscales.

It shows that the coal sector provides direct jobs to almost 90,000 people in mines and power plants in the province, and indirect jobs for people who provide goods and services to the coal sector, which supports a significant portion of induced jobs and other economic activities.

Power utility Eskom says the implementation of JET is envisaged to create some 300,000 jobs in the renewables value chain. “This represents a net jobs gain,” said an Eskom spokesperson in response to Oxpeckers’ questions.

Given Masina says his coal yard will have to close and retrench employees from the local community (Photo: Thabo Molelekwa)

Research by the Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies published in 2022 indicates that in South Africa as a whole, job creation through renewables could exceed anticipated job losses in the coal sector.

However, in Mpumalanga, not all job losses in the fossil fuel sector can be replaced by clean energy jobs. Under an ambitious decarbonisation scenario, these net losses can be minimised.

The report states the two most important technologies for the energy transition in Mpumalanga will be wind and solar PV energy, which will also make the largest contributions to job creation: up to 43,000 jobs in solar PV and 28,900 jobs in wind energy by 2030.

Reskilling programmes

While people on the ground who spoke to Oxpeckers are unaware of reskilling programmes, Eskom says people employed at power stations due to be decommissioned are “being trained to obtain skills in the renewable industry so they may be able to manufacture, install and service the renewable energy components required to operate the repurposed power stations.”

“To achieve this end, and in partnership with the Cape Peninsula University of Technology’s South African Renewables Energy Technology Centre and recognised labour unions represented at Eskom, Eskom has established an accredited training centre at the Komati power station,” an Eskom spokesperson who asked not to be named said in response to Oxpeckers questions.

“Those whose skills are required at other coal-fired power stations get transferred to those stations to meet the staffing requirements there. As part of the shutdown plan, extensive socio-economic studies were conducted which included widespread consultation with all communities around the affected power stations.”

And most importantly, he said, Eskom assures all its employees that “no Eskom employee will lose their jobs because of the JET”.

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The spokesperson said employees who no longer work at Komati had either resigned, retired, or were transferred to other stations.

“Eskom plans to use its limited funding to catalyse the construction of renewables plants across the country,” the spokesperson said. “This is demonstrated by the leasing of land at Eskom power stations to allow private participants to rapidly bring online new generating capacity, inter alia.”

Unions sidelined

Michelle Cruywagen, the just transition and coal campaign manager at environmental justice NGO Groundwork, says unions set out processes for a just transition in 2018, “but the business and mining sectors didn’t really come on board in assisting with facilitating the transition, even though they are obliged to do so legally through the social and labour plans”.

“This can be coordinated through the minerals council [a mining industry employers organisation], and the unions who generally negotiate wages and retirement plans should have been leading the way forward,” she says.

Cruywagen maintains that the consequences now are that the transition is not being managed properly, and the job losses aren’t being mitigated because of a lack of management and political will, which puts communities in a vulnerable position.

“It’s fine to reskill people, but employment is actually the thing that people need,” she says. “Part of what we’re pushing for is to get local government involved so that they drive the message, raise awareness and facilitate engagement on the issues of a just transition at a local level.”

Thabo Molelekwa is a freelance health and environmental journalist, and an Associate of Oxpeckers Investigative Environmental Journalism. This investigation was originally published in Oxpeckers and was supported by the African Climate Foundation’s New Economy Campaigns Hub.

The post Coal communities fear South Africa’s clean energy transition appeared first on Climate Home News.

In recent weeks, oil and gas companies have reported bumper profits. BP reported profits of $8.45bn between April and June this year – more than triple the amount it made at the same time last year. Exxon Mobil, Chevron, Shell and Total reaped $51bn between them and returned $23bn to shareholders in dividends and buybacks, according to Reuters.

“This grotesque greed is punishing the poorest and most vulnerable people, while destroying our only common home,” Guterres said during a media briefing on Wednesday. “I urge all governments to tax these excessive profits, and use the funds to support the most vulnerable people through these difficult times.”

The IMF agreed that governments should shield the most vulnerable from price hikes but discouraged broader consumer subsidies.

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Living costs for European households will rise by 7% on average in 2022, the IMF projects, with the poor hardest hit.

Several European governments have used price controls, tax cuts and subsidies to ease the impact of inflation – in some cases funded by windfall taxes.

In a blog post, Oya Celasun, assistant director of the IMF’s European department, wrote that policymakers “should allow the full increase in fuel costs to pass to end-users” to encourage energy savings and moving away from fossil fuels.

“Governments cannot prevent the loss in real national income arising from the terms-of-trade shock,” said Celasun. She added that governments should provide targeted relief for the most vulnerable groups, for example in the form of income support.

Fully offsetting the cost of living increase for the bottom 20% of households would cost governments 0.4% of GDP on average for the whole of 2022. It would cost 0.9% of GDP to fully compensate the bottom 40% of households, the IMF calculates.

“The IMF and UN are both clearly conscious of the need to protect the most vulnerable consumers but they disagree on who should bear the costs of doing so,” Olena Borodyna, a transition risk analyst at ODI, told Climate Home News. 

“Fundamentally, the two have a different position on how to encourage low-carbon transition – the IMF prefers market solutions and wants to incentivise consumers towards energy efficiency. The UN, on the other hand, is siding with the position of climate activists and politicians who are making a moral case for taxing fossil fuel companies amid the cost of living crisis,” Borodyna said.

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“The UN and IMF stances on the energy crisis are refreshingly compatible. We need both: windfall taxes on oil and gas profits; and a shift to policies that subsidise people, not energy,” Chris Beaton, the lead for sustainable energy consumption at the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD), told Climate Home News. 

“Energy subsidies are notoriously awful as a way to provide social assistance, disproportionately benefitting the people who buy most oil and gas (typically higher income groups) and locking in wasteful carbon-intensive consumption,” said Beaton.

More effective and fairer policies for tackling energy poverty include swapping subsidy spending into public services such as health and education or providing low-income households with cash transfers, he said. “This empowers people to put assistance into whatever part of their budget they find most useful, and can work as a short-term crisis measure.”

“The IMF might make a good economic point, and governments should not rush to give out blanket support measures to wealthy businesses and consumers that do not need them, but they are completely tone deaf in terms of implications for consumers experiencing the impact of the energy crisis,” Ipek Gençsü, senior research fellow at ODI, told Climate Home News. 

“The problem is that it’s not just the low-income that are currently suffering, it is a much bigger segment of the population. So supporting consumers is easier said than done in the current crisis,” she said.

It is a reminder that the most vulnerable “live at the mercy of price volatility of fossil fuels,” said Gençsü. “The sooner we can move away from use of fossil fuels, and also reduce energy waste, the better… The companies that continue to benefit from fossil fuels at a time when they are leading us to climate disaster, must be the first to help pay for the transition.” 

The post UN, IMF disagree on who should foot the bill of the energy crisis appeared first on Climate Home News.

Farmers from the northern states of Punjab and Haryana are demanding the government repeals laws passed in September that introduced market reforms on the sale of crops. They have organised a nationwide protest on 6 February, when they plan to barricade major highways for several hours. In recent weeks tensions have escalated, with violent clashes between police and farmers.

The government says the new agricultural laws will enable farmers to set their own prices and sell their crops to large companies, such as supermarket chains — doing away with government-regulated wholesale markets where farmers are guaranteed a minimum price.

Changing weather patterns, coupled with unsustainable practices, have led to failed harvests and shrinking incomes for millions of families across the country.

The protestors fear government reforms will allow companies to drive down prices, making it even harder for them to make a living. 

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Agriculture is the primary livelihood for around 58% of India’s 1.3 billion population. The average annual income of a farming family in over half of India’s states was a mere 20,000 rupees ($271) in 2016, according to an economic survey.

“Farming has become a loss-making proposition. As a result farmers who provide for the entire nation are heavily indebted. Not only are they at the mercy of banks and loan sharks, but also the vagaries of weather and the market,” the All India Kisan Sangharsh Committee, which represents over 150 farming unions, said in a statement.

Climate change has made rainfall increasingly erratic.

“Weather patterns are changing and the monsoon is becoming more unpredictable,” Debajit Palit, a director for rural energy at The Energy and Resources Institute in Delhi, told Climate Home News. “You used to know how much rain would happen on a given day. Now it suddenly rains so much that there is a flood.”

A 2017 study published in the journal Nature found that extreme rainfall events tripled between 1950 and 2015 — a trend that scientists have linked to global warming. Charity Christian Aid estimated intense flooding in India between June and October 2020 cost $10 billion.

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Unpredictable weather patterns have forced farmers to delay their harvests, bore deeper into the ground to extract water and intensify their use of toxic fertilisers, said Palit. 

In Punjab, known as India’s “bread basket”, farmers have access to free electricity to pump water for irrigation. Without having to bear the cost of energy, they have dug deeper into the water table.

An electricity cap could incentivise farmers to use energy more efficiently and diversify their harvests beyond water-draining crops such as rice and sugarcane, said Palit.

“When the farmers start paying, they will start valuing the electricity,” he said, adding that farmers should receive welfare benefits in return. 

Switching to less water-intensive crops such as maize and millet is the only way to reverse the damage and create a more sustainable agricultural system, Palit added. India’s ministry of agriculture has previously identified pulses and oilseeds as alternatives to the common rice-wheat cropping system.

“It will be best for farmers and the environment as a whole to shift away from paddy cultivation to other high value crops,” he said. 

Crop diversification would also solve the issue of stubble burning, which farmers do to quickly clear the soil for the next growing season. Farmers in northern India burn an estimated 23 million tonnes of straw from their rice harvests every year, according to the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center. Stubble burning in Punjab and Haryana shrouded Delhi in smog in recent years, sparking a public health emergency.

John Kerry promises ‘significantly’ more climate finance at adaptation summit

Youth climate activists from around the world have expressed their support for Indian farmers on social media. 

Swedish activist Greta Thunberg wrote on Twitter: “We stand in solidarity with the #FarmersProtest in India.” She shared a “toolkit” of advice to those taking part in the protests. 

I still #StandWithFarmers and support their peaceful protest.
No amount of hate, threats or violations of human rights will ever change that. #FarmersProtest

— Greta Thunberg (@GretaThunberg) February 4, 2021

Ugandan youth activist Vanessa Nakate also spoke out in support of the protests. 

The people united will never be defeated #FarmersProtest

— Vanessa Nakate (@vanessa_vash) February 3, 2021

Earlier this week Delhi authorities imposed a 48-hour internet shutdown in response to the farmers’ protests. 

US vice-president Kamala Harris’ niece, Meena Harris, condemned the standoff between police and farmers on Twitter. 

“We all should be outraged by India’s internet shutdowns and paramilitary violence against farmer protesters,” she said. 

Meanwhile in the UK, farming union the Landworkers’ Alliance wrote a public letter, calling on the government to support Indian farmers by banning the export of pesticides and engaging directly with farming unions in India.

The post Indian farmers head for showdown with government over agricultural reform appeared first on Climate Home News.

The decision was met with widespread anger by environmental campaigners, who say that it will increase greenhouse gas emissions, destroy biodiversity in the Pilliga forest and damage groundwater supplies used by farmers.

It comes as the Australian government pursues a “gas-fired recovery” from the coronavirus crisis. In September, prime minister Scott Morrison described gas as a “critical enabler of Australia’s economy”.

“To help fire our economic recovery, the next plank in our JobMaker plan is to deliver more Australian gas where it is needed at an internationally competitive price,” he said. 

After a decade-long campaign, Santos was given the green light by NSW’s independent planning commission on Wednesday. “Following its detailed deliberations, the commission concludes the project is in the public interest and that any negative impacts can be effectively mitigated with strict conditions,” the commission said. 

In its pitch to the commission, Santos said the A$3.6bn project ($2.6bn) would deliver “more affordable, secure, cleaner energy” and supply up to half of the energy needs in New South Wales, the country’s most populous state.

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Around half of Australia’s gas reserves need to stay in the ground if global warming is to stay below 2C this century, according to analysis from the Australian National University.

Gas is commonly touted as a cleaner fuel than coal, because it emits around half the carbon dioxide when burned for energy. But methane leaks – or fugitive emissions – during extraction, processing and transport can worsen the fuel’s climate impact.

Glen Klatovsky, energy strategist at Climate Action Network Australia, told CHN that fugitive emissions are a big concern. “If fugitive emissions are around 3%, then gas becomes as bad as coal,” he said.

The Narrabri project, which involves drilling down on around 850 coal seam gas wells across a 95,000 hectare area, could lead to large volumes of saline, contaminated water, and the destruction of native vegetation, Klatovsky said. Gas drilling also introduces weeds and pest species to the region, he added. 

Richard Denniss, chief economist at The Australia Institute, told Climate Home that plans for a gas-driven recovery are driven by “the government’s political need to simultaneously signal that it is moving away from coal but not moving away from the extractive industries more generally”.

In August, minister of energy and emissions reduction Angus Taylor introduced a bill to change the investment mandate of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC) which would enable Australia’s green bank to use its Grid Reliability Fund for gas power projects by defining them as “low-emissions technologies”.

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In Morrison’s national energy address in September, he said there was “no credible energy transition plan for an economy like Australia that does not involve the greater use of gas”. Morrison said that Australia would expand its renewable capacity by adding 12.6 GW but the primary focus of the recovery would be unlocking more gas, describing it as “the perfect complement to solar and wind”.

The government continues to back controversial coal mine expansion, with Morrison saying in his address that “coal will continue to play an important role in our economy for decades to come”.

Coal is Australia’s second-largest export industry – in 2019 the country exported A$14bn ($10bn) worth of coal to China alone. But China’s recent carbon neutrality pledge leaves Australia economically vulnerable, Australia’s former top climate diplomat Howard Bamsey told the Sydney Morning Herald.

This week the Queensland government announced that it had signed a deal with mining company Adani to defer royalty payments of A$271 million ($195 million) on a mine in central Queensland.

“Yet again we see Adani being given a free ride and a secret deal,” said Rod Campbell, research Director at The Australia Institute, said in a statement on Thursday. “Subsidising new coal is the last thing Queensland should be doing as global coal demand declines in the wake of the pandemic and in response to climate action.”

Australia came under fire earlier this week for not taking part in the UN biodiversity summit or signing a leaders’ nature pledge which outlined a 10-point plan to halt global biodiversity destruction. A government spokesperson said Australia would not agree to environmental targets “unless we can tell the Australian people what they will cost to achieve and how we will achieve it”.

“Australia is in a biodiversity crisis. The recent bushfires resulted in the death of approximately 3 billion native animals. Australia refuses to be held responsible for our global responsibility,” said Klatovsky.

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Coal use should peak by 2020 to limit warming to 2C, says IEA (Pic: Flickr/Martin)

By Megan Darby

39 countries have submitted climate action plans to the UN to date, while others are developing policies to offer in the coming months.

These include targets to curb greenhouse gas emissions and form the basis of a global climate pact to be struck in Paris this December. The goal is to limit warming to 2C above pre-industrial levels.

But these policies will collectively only eke out the 2C carbon budget by eight months to 2040, according to the International Energy Agency.

In a special report on climate change released Monday, analysts warned much deeper carbon cuts were needed to prevent catastrophic climate change.

“A transformation of the world’s energy system must become a uniting vision if the 2C climate goal is to be achieved,” they said.

Report: World’s carbon emission growth levelled off in 2014

The IEA’s “bridge scenario” maps out a path to peak global emissions around 2020, much earlier than currently forecast.

It does not achieve universal access to modern energy, but an extra 1.7 billion people have electricity and 1.6 billion have clean cookstoves by 2030.

This means making buildings, vehicles and industry more energy efficient; cutting methane emissions from oil and gas production and increasing investment in clean energy.

Fossil fuel subsidies and inefficient coal-fired power stations should be phased out.

Critical challenge

Energy accounts for around two thirds of global greenhouse gas emissions, making it critical to efforts to clamp down on climate damage.

Historically, economic growth has been driven by burning fossil fuels, a trend that is slowly starting to shift.

In 2014, for the first time in at least 40 years, emissions stayed flat while global GDP grew 3%. Energy intensity – the volume of energy used for each unit of economic growth – fell 2.3%.

Renewable sources accounted for nearly half of new power installations, while economies like China shifted away from dirty industry.

That allowed some “decoupling” of growth from climate pollution, despite persistent fossil fuel aid outweighing carbon prices.

The IEA reported 13% of energy-related carbon dioxide emissions came with consumer subsidies averaging US$115 a tonne.

Carbon markets, meanwhile, covered 11% of emissions with an average price of just US$7/t.

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As of 14 May, countries responsible for a third of energy-related emissions had put forward pledges to steer that sector in a greener direction.

The European Union would become “one of the world’s least carbon-intensive economies,” the IEA said, with its promise to cut emissions 40% from 1990 levels by 2030.

The US “would deliver a major reduction in emissions” with its target of 26-28% from 2005 to 2025, while China’s intention to peak in 2030 is “an important change in direction”.

However, the emissions pathway still commits the world to an estimated 2.6C of warming by 2100 and 3.5C in the longer term.

Report: UN to present new ‘streamlined’ climate text in July

In Paris, the IEA said countries need to create the conditions to ramp up ambition.

There must be “a strong process” for monitoring national performance against climate goals, it said. “Evidence of tangible results will give the necessary confidence to all countries and energy sector stakeholders that everyone is acting in harmony.”

Targets should be revisited every five years to give an opportunity to embrace developments in low carbon technology and practice, the IEA recommended, in a “virtuous circle”.

It supported a long-term emissions goal, such as that championed by the G7 last week, to “provide greater ease and certainty in expressing future policy”.

The G7 emphasised a need to decarbonise the economy “over the course of this century”, which would effectively spell an end to fossil fuel use.

The post Energy ‘transformation’ needed to save climate, says IEA appeared first on Climate Home News.

Pic: Chuck Coker/Flickr

By John McGarrity

Investment in low carbon sources of energy will fall well short of what is needed to stave off climate change unless a breakthrough is reached in stalled UN climate talks, the IEA said in a report on Tuesday.

In a major report highlighting trends in energy spending, the Paris-based agency said $53 trillion will need to be funnelled towards lower carbon energy and efficiency over the next two decades in order to limit a rise in global temperatures to below 2C.

A total of $1.6 trillion was spent on all types of energy extraction, generation and distribution last year, the IEA said, but just $250 billion (16%) of this was directed towards renewables and energy efficiency, around $50 billion less than in 2011 as investment stalled in some countries and the costs of solar technology declined.

“The investment path that we trace in this report falls well short of reaching climate stabilisation goals, as today’s policies and market signals are not strong enough to switch investment to low-carbon sources and energy efficiency at the necessary scale and speed,” the IEA report added.

The agency, which represents members of the OECD, said a clear steer from government and the imposition of high costs on extracting and burning fossil fuels would be essential so that low carbon energy can be made sufficiently attractive to investors.

Spending on renewables and energy efficiency will need to almost treble to $730 billion a year by 2030 for the world to make a decisive move away from fossil fuels.

If the world’s major emitters do manage to agree policies that can cap a temperature rise to 2c, then $300 billion of fossil fuel investments would be rendered as stranded assets, the report adds.

The report came as policymakers and energy companies digested the publication of proposals by the US Environmental Protection Agency to curb emissions from the country’s electricity sector, particularly from coal-fired power stations, while China on Tuesday said it would set an absolute cap on carbon emissions from 2016.

UN climate talks in Bonn this week – which are aimed at preparing the ground for a climate deal next year in Paris – will try and make progress on how the world can slow investment in fossil fuels and scale up spending on renewables.

But the IEA noted that governments are finding it increasingly difficult to agree clear policies that would prompt a major shift to low carbon technologies because of demands by energy consumers for lower energy prices and growing public concerns about subsidies for renewables.

Governments negotiating at Bonn this week still bear most of the responsibility for driving investment in low carbon technologies, rather than markets, the IEA said.

“In many countries, governments have direct influence over energy sector investment, for example, through retained ownership of more than 70% of global oil and gas reserves or control of nearly half of the world’s power generation capacity, via state-owned companies,” today’s report said.

But the IEA noted that governments are finding it increasingly difficult to agree clear policies that would prompt a major shift to low carbon technologies because of demand for low energy prices and concerns about the level of subsidy needed for renewables.

Signals

“Against this backdrop, there is a risk that policymakers fail to provide clear and consistent signals to investors, with particular impacts on low-carbon technologies that depend, for the moment, on policy support,” the report said.

The IEA’s report is more grist for the mill for investors who are pressing governments to back up carbon trading with ambitious targets.

“Where carbon isn’t priced, where the price is weak or where fossil fuels are subsidised, the incentive to make this switch is much reduced. A strong carbon price which boosts investment will also reduce the need for fossil fuel imports and strengthen regional energy security, said Stephanie Pfeifer, Chief Executive of the Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change.

The group represents 88 of Europe’s largest investors with assets worth €7.5 trillion.

The post Show us the money if countries are to curb climate change: IEA appeared first on Climate Home News.

Air pollution is an increasing concern in China, leaving a haze hovering over most cities (Pic: Daniele Dalledonne/Flickr)

By Gerard Wynn

China’s policymakers are testing the potential for radical cuts in carbon emissions from the energy and industrial sectors, using an energy analysis tool developed in collaboration with Britain.

Britain developed its own “2050 Pathways” calculator in 2010, to allow academics and policymakers to test the potential for radical national carbon cuts in the wake of the UK’s ambitious Climate Change Act.

The country has now helped China develop its own version, in collaboration with the Energy Research Institute (ERI).

ERI is based within and provides advice to the country’s powerful energy policymaking body, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC).

The “China 2050 Pathways” tool is based on unpublished national energy and industrial data.

“The data for this calculator is from the institute and many experts give us their suggestions,” said Zhang Bo the developer of the pathway, at the “China 2050 Pathways Development Group”, in a brief email correspondence with RTCC.

The Chinese carbon pathways calculator certainly does not express government policy, but it does allow researchers and policymakers to test the carbon emissions outcomes of different policies.

The calculator allows scientists to test a range of scenarios based on renewable technologies, demand and global factors

Zhang has developed his own, “Zhang Bo” pathway which appears to test an ambitious combination of energy and industrial policies which lead to sharp cuts in carbon emissions.

His pathway experiments with high levels of installed solar power and low levels of coal by 2050, for example.

The resulting carbon emissions trajectory sees carbon emissions peak at 8.3 billion tonnes in 2025, before falling rapidly to just under three quarters of present levels by the middle of the century.

The big, unknown question is how far such experiments might influence actual policy.

Optimistic scenarios

The calculator calculates carbon emissions trajectories according to one of four scenarios for each of many variables, across energy, transport, industrial and urban sectors.

The most “pessimistic” scenario sees greenhouse gas emission rise from 7 billion tonnes in 2010 (an under-estimate even compared with CO2 emissions data from BP), to 9.3 billion tonnes in 2015, and peak at 16.2 billion tonnes in 2045.

That scenario assumes very low or zero uptake of low carbon technologies.

For example, it assumed less solar photovoltaic capacity in 2050 than the country already has, according to data from the European Photovoltaic Industry Association, at 10 gigawatts in 2050 compared with 19.6 GW at the end of 2013, respectively.

The most “optimistic” scenario used by the calculator sees emissions peak now, and fall to 6.9 billion tonnes in 2015, and continue to fall thereafter, to 1.8 billion tonnes or just a quarter of present levels by the middle of the century.

The scenarios assume the most ambitious uptake of low carbon energy and reduction in fossil fuels, according to technical possibilities without accounting for economic cost.

For example, it assumed an installed hydropower capacity of 694 GW by 2050, compared with around 300 GW now, and compared with a generating capacity of the massive Three Gorges Dam of 22.5 GW.

The calculator provides a detailed overview of each variable.

“In 2050, (hydrowpower) capacity reaches 690 kilowatts, the maximum capacity theorised for hydroelectricity in China,” it says of the most ambitious hydropower scenario, for example.

The post China policymakers test radical cuts in carbon emissions appeared first on Climate Home News.

(Pic: MHX/Flickr)

By Gerard Wynn

“Deep renovation” of buildings could slash EU dependence on energy imports, according to energy consultants Ecofys.

Dependence on Russian gas is a critical political issue in the European Union in the wake of the Ukraine crisis, which has limited the bloc’s room for foreign policy manoeuvre.

The European Commission is presently drafting a note on how to reduce energy dependence; a draft version says that efficiency improvements could energy use in the building sector by up to three quarters.

Ecofys looked specifically at natural gas consumption, and estimated that building upgrades could cut the sector’s gas use by 95% by 2050.

It estimated that the alternatives, such focusing domestic renewable energy supply or increasing domestic shale gas production, would be more expensive, in its report, titled “Deep renovation of buildings – an effective way to decrease Europe’s energy import dependency”.

Demand in the building sector is responsible for about 40% of energy consumption in the EU, including a third of natural gas.

“Deep renovation is a suitable way forward, not only for reduction of EU’s dependency on imports, but also for generating significant greenhouse gas emission reductions and energy savings, while providing a strong impetus for economic recovery and job creation,” said the report.

It defined deep renovation as a steady annual improvement in the efficiency of building envelopes and the use of decentralised renewable power.

The building sector consumes about 60% of all imported gas, the Ecoys report calculated.

Deep renovation could cut gas consumption in particular through a switch to electric heating powered by renewable power, displacing gas and coal, and through massive improvements in efficiency to reduce overall energy use.

By 2040, indigenous supplies of natural gas within the EU, as of 2011 levels, would be sufficient to cover all building sector needs.

The report compared the costs of deep renovation, at 2-9 euro cents per kilowatt hour (kWh) saved, with the generation costs of renewable power at 5-18 cents, to suggest that efficiency was a more cost-effective technology.

The Ecofys report was commissioned by Eurima, the European Insulation Manufacturers Association which represents the interests of producers of insulation materials in Europe.

The post Building upgrades can slash EU gas use by 95% appeared first on Climate Home News.

Source: Flickr/eyeweed

By Gerard Wynn

Coal prices will fall this year, Bank of America Merrill Lynch said in a global research report on Thursday, citing ramped up supply from Colombia and weak Chinese demand.

Lower global coal prices would consolidate the superior profit margins for European power generators burning coal instead of natural gas.

That in turn will add upward pressure on carbon emissions.

Disruption of gas supplies from Ukraine in the recent crisis would not European drive demand for coal, because of superior profits already compared with gas.

“European generators are already maxing out coal burn capacity due to a huge margin difference favouring coal over gas,” Bank of America Merrill Lynch said in its research note. “Another bad year for king coal.”

Coal fall

Global coal prices would fall in the near term, following an end to disruption of Colombian shipments by US-based mining company Drummond, and weak demand in China.

“Near term we see downside to prices both in Europe and Australia, stemming from a return of Drummond exports from Colombia, affecting European prices most, and weakening demand from China, affecting Australian prices most.”

“We expect front prices in Europe to touch below $70/mt at some point during Q2 as Drummond resumes exports to Europe from late March.”

Drummond halted all exports from Colombia in the first week of January, after it failed to meet new standards which banned the use of barges and cranes to load ships, in rules aimed at preventing spillage and pollution at sea.

Exports from the fourth largest supplier of coal worldwide were also disrupted last year by a string of industrial strikes.

“We expect Colombian exports for the full year to rise to a new high this year as disruptions ease and the Cerrejon mines continue ramping up their expansions, barring further disruptions of course,” the investment bank said.

That would add to continuing strong exports from Australia and South Africa.

Chinese demand, meanwhile, was weakening as a result of plans to cut coal’s share of energy use in a bid to improve air quality in cities, and could weaken further depending on the country’s macroeconomic outlook.

Carbon emissions

Bad news for coal is bad news for carbon emissions in Europe, since lower prices push coal-fired electricity onto the grid in place of gas, which emits about half as much carbon dioxide.

Britain’s carbon emissions rose more than 4% in 2012, mostly because more coal-fired electricity generation.

“There was a large increase (32 per cent) in coal consumption in power stations with a corresponding decrease (30 per cent) in gas consumption, driven by relatively high wholesale gas prices,” the Department of Energy and Climate Change said in February.

“These changes resulted in an increase of around 10 per cent in emissions from electricity generation.”

Low prices have seen a similar replacement of gas with coal in Europe’s biggest economy, Germany, where profit margins from burning gas, called spark spreads, are negative, leading to the closure, mothballing or sale of gas-fired power plants.

German coal-fired power generation rose by 7.7 terawatt hours in 2013, compared with a drop in gas-fired power generation of 10.5 TWh, according to the Fraunhofer Institute.

The post “Maximum coal burn” to continue in Europe, says BofAML report appeared first on Climate Home News.

(Pic: Flickr/Apple94)

By John McGarrity

Tokyo will meet carbon reduction targets without the need to use carbon credits in its emissions trading scheme, mainly as a result of increased energy efficiency after the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster threatened a crunch in power supply.

Japan’s capital, one of the world’s largest cities, became the first urban area in Asia to impose emissions caps and carbon trading at the start of the decade, blazing a trail for other cities that are using the market to control climate-changing gases.

But big cuts in emissions through energy efficiency – spurred by a 2011 catastrophic Tsunami and subsequent meltdown of a nuclear reactor – is a timely reminder of how random events and changing government priorities can blunt the effectiveness of emissions trading schemes.

“Setting an ambitious cap for emissions schemes is crucial. Carbon markets should really take the lead in reducing emissions at least cost, but also work in parallel with other policies rather than compete with them” said Sarah Deblock, European Policy Director with the International Emissions Trading Association.

Report: Fukushima to use 100% renewable energy by 2040
Report: Japan proposes huge smart meter roll-out to cut emissions

By 2015 EU member states are likely to agree how energy efficiency measures, potentially binding renewables targets and a 40% reduction in emissions by 2030 will work alongside its emissions trading scheme, the world’s largest.

Before it formulates how to speed up power saving measures in the 28-nation bloc, the European Commission next month will outline in greater deal the lessons learnt from the EU’s current policies, which failed to meet a targeted 20% improvement in energy efficiency.

The EU’s executive is well aware of the potential for unexpected events to wreck its emissions trading scheme, as targets for the current phase were set before a deep economic downturn at the end of the previous decade prompted plunging demand for energy.

Although surplus of permits is viewed as the main reason for a collapse in carbon prices in Europe, advances in energy efficiency also curbed the appetite for power, analysts say.

Other emissions trading systems will have to calibrate multi-pronged efforts at cutting emissions alongside trading and see if caps on emissions have been set at a level that provides an economic incentive to cut emissions.

China’s pilot emissions trading schemes, which are a testing ground for a possible national carbon market, will also have work alongside other policy tools aimed at reducing the country’s reliance on coal and curbing worsening pollution.

Banking

Energy efficiency is a major priority in China, which aims to cut energy intensity by around 4% a year through rolling out smart meters and tightening standards in new buildings.

For most of China’s schemes, details on the cap are unclear and most permits are handed out for free, fuelling expectations of surplus.

In Tokyo, the main priority to conserve energy through measures such as LED lighting, low-carbon buildings and smart meters, helped  achieve a 22 percent reduction in emissions compared with the year 2000, the base year.

That means a target to cut 25% by 2014 will likely be met without the need to buy emissions permits at all, which will be banked into a future, and likely, tougher trading phase.

The Japanese capital’s annual emissions are around 60 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent, around the same amount emitted by Denmark, but the government has balked at introducing a nationwide carbon trading scheme following the huge convulsions in the country’s energy industry after Fukushima.

A closure of the country’s nuclear power plants for safety checks meant Japan had to burn more gas and coal, almost all of it imported, worsening its balance of payments deficit.

The post Tokyo to reach CO2 targets without its carbon trading scheme appeared first on Climate Home News.

Source: Flickr/slynkycat

By Sophie Yeo

The Pentland Firth could generate enough tidal energy to power half of Scotland, say engineers.

A new assessment estimates that the water rushing between Orkney and mainland Scotland could produce 1.9 gigawatts of power.

This would take the Scottish Government almost halfway towards achieving their goal of 100% clean energy by 2020.

The Pentland Firth has some of the highest tides in the UK. The flow of water is particularly rapid as the tide shifting from the Atlantic into the North Sea is forced through a narrow eight-mile channel.

The researchers who worked on the study believe that as much as 4.2Gw could be captured by placing turbines across the width of the channel. Of this, they predict 1.9Gw could be used, as the technology is not 100% efficient.

The study builds on earlier attempts to calculate the potential power that could be harnessed by the Firth. Previous estimates range from 1 to 18Gw. Alistair Borthwick from the University of Edinburgh says that their calculations give the most accurate impression to date of the true scale of the tidal power to date.

He says: “Our research builds on earlier studies by analysing the interactions between turbines and the tides more closely.

“This is a more accurate approach than was used in the early days of tidal stream power assessment, and should be useful in calculating how much power might realistically be recoverable from the Pentland Firth.”

The study outlines areas where turbines should be located in order to maximise the area’s potential.

The Crown Estate, which owns the land, announced in 2010 that it had awarded development rights to a number of companies for eleven energy projects in the area, with a total capacity of 1,600 Mw. It is the first to be made available for commercial scale wave and tidal development in the whole of the UK.

In September, the Scottish government gave the go-ahead to power company MayGen to build six demonstration turbines on the site, generating 9Mw of power. During the first phase of the plan, they hope 86 turbines will be installed – enough to power 42,000 homes.

Professor Guy Houlsby of the University of Oxford, who took part in the assessment, said: “The UK enjoys potentially some of the best tidal resources worldwide, and if we exploit them wisely they could make an important contribution to our energy supply.

“These studies should move us closer towards the successful exploitation of the tides.”

In 2012, renewable energy provided 40.3% of Scotland’s electricity. The development of the Pentland Firth could therefore be the push the Scottish government needs to allow them to hit their 100% renewables goal by 2020.

The post Pentland Firth tidal stream could provide half Scotland’s energy appeared first on Climate Home News.

By Ed King

News of cuts to UK wind and solar subsidies were once greeted with howls of anguish from the renewables industry.

But today’s announcement that support for onshore wind and solar power will be trimmed from 2015 has received a surprisingly warm welcome from analysts and green groups.

Underlying all of this is a growing confidence in the green sector, and a belief that it will soon be able to compete with traditional forms of energy: coal, oil and gas.

“Today is actually a good news day for renewable electricity and renewable heat,” said Dr Nina Skorupska, head of the UK Renewable Energy Association.

“The real reason that support for solar and onshore wind will go down is that they are leading the race for cost-competitiveness with fossil fuels.”

Her counterpart in the solar industry, Paul Barwell from the STA, agrees.

“The strike prices clearly show this is a technology on track to compete with fossil fuel prices. This is fantastic news for the public as solar will deliver clean power at a very stable price, with no unexpected cost fluctuations.”

Helping hand

Strike prices are what the government says it will pay per unit of energy, and are set significantly higher than the usual value of energy, giving investors in new forms of energy some certainty.

And as cost reductions are achieved these subsidies need to be cut “to avoid excessive and unnecessary increases in the costs of energy services,” recommends the International Energy Agency.

In the case of the UK it seems we’re heading towards that point, so much so that even Greenpeace’s Doug Parr seems relaxed about the cuts.

“Today’s cuts to onshore wind and solar support schemes show how quickly the cost of clean energy technologies are falling,” he said in an emailed statement.

Parr also points out that by 2017, the price of onshore wind will be cheaper than nuclear, and is likely to get cheaper in the coming decades.

It’s worth adding that the strike price for offshore wind, a rare energy sector where the UK is a world leader, was actually increased today in an effort to attract new investment.

The costs of installing, maintaining and transmitting electricity from turbines at sea are far higher than their land-based cousins, making it unlikely they will become cost competitive in the short-term.

The Carbon Brief website has a more detailed analysis of what this means for the UK renewables industry, which appears well on course to hit an EU target of 15% energy from clean sources by 2020.

And a bullish UK energy and climate chief Ed Davey said today “additional investments of up to £40 billion” by 2020 were expected, suggesting clean energy capacity could double to 40GW by the same year.

So is everyone a winner?

Guy Newey from the centre-right thinktank Policy Exchange says subsidy cuts are good news for consumers and efforts to address climate change.

“The cheaper these things are, the more likely we are to decarbonise,” he says, but adds “overall, not much has changed.”

Energy and banking analysts like Peter Atherton from Liberum remain unconvinced (see tweet below)

@NickMolho @REAssociation well coal is down 40%, so not winning that cost race. Wind costs are not falling anything like predicted.

— LiberumAtherton (@LiberumAtherton) December 4, 2013

Without an effective price for carbon, gas is still the cheapest way to generate electricity, with coal not far behind.

But costs are falling. Is that because of state intervention or despite it? It seems what the industry craves above all is less tinkering.

“All politicians need to understand that uncertainty spooks investors and it is the consumer who bears that cost,” says Maf Smith from RenewableUK.

“Voters support the development of on and offshore wind, so we now need a period of calm and consistency from Government.”

The post Are cuts to UK renewable energy subsidies good news? appeared first on Climate Home News.

By Nilima Choudhury

A mobile and web app has been developed for US consumers and businesses eager to reduce their carbon footprint from electricity use.

Built by Boston-based Emission Information, the app tells users whether their electricity is being produced by solar, nuclear or coal power.

A spokesman told RTCC they hope the device will help increase public awareness of the types of energy used to create electricity.

“We believe that making carbon emissions from electricity use available to consumers and businesses on a real-time basis is a paradigm shift in thinking which can modify behaviour and dramatically increase awareness of how individual behaviour impacts our environment,” they said.

It will allow households to increase their energy use when the cleanest forms of electricity generation are online, buy, for example, setting washing machines to start their cycle at a particular time.

EI claims its localised, hourly greenhouse gas emission information apps are more precise than the existing methods of estimating carbon footprint from electricity use.

Its predictions are based on the types of electricity generation scheduled for distribution in a certain geography, at a certain time.

The app will be available to consumers in November 2013.

The post Carbon footprint reduction app launches in US appeared first on Climate Home News.

Bristol University researchers say the the potential for this technology around the world could be unlimited (Pic: UWE)

By Nilima Choudhury

Scientists from the University of West England in Bristol have developed an innovative way to charge electrical appliances including a mobile phone, with urine and even poo.

They have developed a “biological battery” where the microbial fuel cell (MFC), converts human waste and soil into electricity, via the metabolism of live microorganisms.

“Essentially, the electricity is a by-product of the microbes’ natural life cycle, so the more they eat things like urine, the more energy they generate and for longer periods of time,” Dr Ioannis Ieropoulos, an expert at harnessing power from unusual sources using MFC, told RTCC.

He said his team started out using sewage from the local treatment plant.

“Playing with waste water for so long it was only natural we started to play with urine,” said Dr Ieropoulos.

“In the US and we’ve been asked the question of can you deal with faeces – so far we’ve been dealing with urine but we understand there’s going to be a point where we have to test a mixed waste stream”.

Last year, four girls exhibited a urine-powered generator where one litre of urine provided six hours of electricity at Maker Faire Africa, a pan-African gathering of manufacturers and inventors, in Lagos.

The project has been funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), the Gates Foundation and the Technology Strategy Board.

Bringing to market

“For the developing world this is something we’re aiming to have in two to three years’ time,” said Dr Ieropoulos.

He expects to use locally-sourced material in order to keep costs down for customers.

Although the charging unit has only been tested on a Samsung mobile phone, Dr Ieropoulos said in time, the technology could be used in conjunction with other models, especially as manufacturers are always working to reduce power requirements.

“This [experiment] would not have been possible four or five years ago when phone batteries were hungrier – so the electronics industry is cutting back on its power requirement and this is a god send as far as we’re concerned because we’re trying to meet those requirements.”

VIDEO: Mobile phone runs on urine power 

The post Urine-powered mobile phones could soon be in the shops appeared first on Climate Home News.

The EU is facing a €1 trillion funding gap for energy infrastructure if it is to keep the lights on and hits its 2050 climate change targets, according to new report.

The House of Lords EU sub-committee for Agriculture, Fisheries, Environment and Energy calls on governments to look at how they can encourage the necessary investment.

The EU has pledged to reduce its emissions by 80% by 2050. With many nations scaling back their nuclear energy plans and the use of cheap coal on the increase, €1 trillion in infrastructure will be required to secure supply without toppling greenhouse gas targets.

“It is clear to us that investment is urgently required, notably in a low carbon, interconnected and innovative energy system, that makes us less reliant on imports of highly volatile and dirty fossil fuels,” said Lord Carter of Coles.

€1 trillion is required over the next decade to get EU energy infrastructure up to scratch, according to the report

“Such investment would help to deliver secure and low carbon energy, boost European economic growth, and stabilise household and industrial costs.

“The value of energy companies has slumped since 2008, the public purse is severely constrained, but more than enough money is around in the investment community,” he added.

Filling the gap

Phil Grant, partner, energy advisory service at Baringa Partners agrees that there are funds available. He says it’s a case of easing the concerns of nervy investors, wary about sinking money into new projects that carry all the associated risks.

“The issue is not a lack of capital, and nor is it a lack of credible projects – but in bridging the gap between the risk and return expectations of developers and investors in the early project development stages,” he told RTCC.

“Across the EU we are reliant on these new projects being developed in order to overcome security of supply concerns in the longer term,” he said.

“There is a valid question as to whether the member states’ fiscal policies or other institutional intervention can be used to mobilise the early stage development capital that is required, before lower cost private sector capital is deployed as projects become operational.”

The report also recommends regulation to encourage carbon capture and storage and the exploitation of shale gas in the EU.

Other recommendations from the Committee include:

• better use by Member States of fiscal policies to unlock investment

• the Commission and Member States working with large-scale investors, including pension funds, to highlight the investment opportunities within the energy sector

• assessments by the Commission of the impact of national energy policies on neighbouring Member States, based on obligatory annual reporting by Member States

• a regulatory approach to boosting carbon capture and storage

• development of a regulatory structure for the exploitation of shale gas in the EU

• a greenhouse gas reduction target of 40% compared to 1990 levels, in line with an 80% reduction by 2050

• the development of electricity interconnections between Member States

• better public engagement on the benefits of new energy infrastructure

• avoiding excessive reliance on capacity mechanisms, such as that proposed in the UK, to pay companies to guarantee a supply of energy;

• that the UK government also examine the potential for a regulatory framework to increase gas storage

The post EU facing €1 trillion energy investment black hole – report appeared first on Climate Home News.

The European Energy commissioner has called for the creation of an EU energy market stretching from Iceland to North Africa and the Atlantic to Azerbaijan.

Günther Oettinger told an EC conference this week that the EU should pursue renewable energy from geothermal sources in the north, offshore wind in the west and backed up with a secure supply of gas from a number of sources including the Caspian Sea.

“I think the internal energy market in the next couple of years we’ll have more partners, Caspian countries, Norway, Switzerland perhaps even North Africa will one day be part of our market place,” he told delegates.

“The internal market gives us many advantages. It creates competition, transparency, better security of supply and leads to a situation where we no longer need state aid. The market will use supply and demand to regulate and fund itself,” he said.

“Some member states have only one energy supply route. they are islands. We must ensure they have choices so that they can’t be blackballed. This is an issue of solidarity,” said Oettinger.

Oettinger also called on the 27 member states of the EU to liberalise their energy markets to ensure its 500m residents feel the benefit of their purchasing power in their electricity bills.

The meeting of industry representatives, NGOs and policymakers in Brussels focused on plans for a European Supergrid and better gas supply lines, despite it receiving a drastic funding cut in the latest European budget.

The EU supports the Nabucco Pipeline project to transport gas from the Caspian Sea through Turkey and eventually on to Austria, bypassing Russia.

Geothermal electricity from Iceland could one day be piped into an EU supergrid (Shutterstock/Johann Helgason)

In February the EU budget for energy connections was cut to €5bn having originally been €12bn.

The long term plan is to connect the solar rich south and the windy north so that when excess electricity is generated in one region it can be sold elsewhere. It is not uncommon for wind farms on remote parts of the UK to be cut off when they produce power in times of low demand.

Ilesh Patel, a partner at Baringa Partners told RTCC that cut is unlikely to have much effect on the plans.

“I’m not sure if we should read too much into it. I always have this figure of €200bn in my mind of the infrastructure investment that is required in major European transmission networks,” he said.

“Even €12bn was a relatively small amount. There is plenty of room for private sector investment, in fact it is absolutely required. In the end the [budget] reduction is disappointing but I’m not sure it is going to materially change the thinking here,” he added.

Fire and ice

A proposed cable from Iceland to the UK could carry excess geothermal power from the tiny volcanic country, to the UK and eventually, the rest of Europe via the Supergrid.

Speaking at the Icelandic Geothermal Conference Oettinger said: “Geothermal fits perfectly into our renewable strategy, into our technology ambitions, into our internal market ambitions. EU businesses and consumers are waiting for solutions that geothermal can bring.”

With Europe potentially adopting a 40% emissions reduction target for 2030, clean energy from all sources will be welcome, but grid upgrades are needed to make the most of the clean energy that is available.

“The climate policy is the main driver here. We need the new grid in response to renewable energy developments and low carbon generation. That’s the aggregate driver and that’s why the grid needs to step up and respond to that and develop,” said Patel.

Last week engineers in Germany reported that they had found a way to solve the clean energy conundrum of providing power all the time using intermittent renewables that tend to depend on wind, sunshine and rainfall.

By combining the output of a number of solar, wind and biogas plants the grid can be provided with stable energy 24 hours a day without fear of blackouts, according to the Fraunhofer Institute for Wind Energy and Energy System Technology (IWES) in Kassel.

The Desertec Foundation is developing plans to build large solar energy farms in North Africa that can then be joined to Europe’s electricity grid.

The post Commissioner calls for expansion of EU energy empire appeared first on Climate Home News.

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Friday 21 December

Last updated: 0940

UK: The Department for Energy and Climate Change said in the last quarter in the UK the amount of electricity generated by offshore wind increased by 54% while onshore wind went up by 38% due to increased. Despite over 600 new turbines being built to October this year renewable energy still makes up just 12% of British supply.  (the Telegraph)

Worldwide: National laws, rules and regulations on cutting carbon emissions are doing more to tackle climate change than international agreements, according to research from the London School of Economics and Globe International. (Business Day Live)

US: A coalition of green groups has called on President Obama to ramp up climate change efforts in his second term. The BlueGreen Alliance sent a letter to Obama urging him to give climate change a high profile and continue setting air pollution limits. (The Hill)

Worldwide: Global temperatures are forecast to be 0.57 degrees above the long-term average next year, making 2013 one of the warmest years on record, according to the Met Office. (Reuters)

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Monday 5 November

Last updated: 1700

UK: The Department for Energy and Climate Change may have received a major boost to its negotiating position over the country’s Energy Bill and the chief executives of RenewableUK, the Nuclear Industries Association, and the Carbon Capture and Storage Associations formed an unlikely coalition, writing to energy and climate change secretary – as well as the prime minister, deputy prime minister and chancellor – backing the bill’s decarbonisation target. (BusinessGreen)

Australia: Whatever their political persuasion, people are more likely to believe that climate change is caused by humans if they find out most climate scientists believe this is the case, according to new research from the University of Western Australia. (Phys.org)

UK: The last of the 17 climate change campaigners that perched on a power station tower as part of the ‘No Dash for Gas’ campaign ended their protest today when they abseiled down the tower to be arrested. Lasting a week, it was the longest occupation of a plant in the UK to date. (Guardian)

China: State subsidies will be offered to shale gas developers in China, in a bid to encourage energy firms to boost production of the unconventional gas resource, according to the government. (Reuters)

Worldwide: The world is headed for 6°C of warming by the end of the century if governments do not increase the ambition of their emissions reduction targets, according to an assessment of current pledges by the consultancy Pricewaterhouse Coopers.

Arctic: The spring snowpack in the Arctic is disappearing at a faster rate than anticipated by climate models, warns a new study from Environment Canada. The researchers say this could have implications for wildlife, vegetation and ground temperatures. Snowpack forms as layers of snow accumulate and is an important water resource for streams and rivers. (the Montreal Gazette)

US: Superstorm Sandy may force New York to consider a host of ideas to make the city less vulnerable to future extreme weather events. Ideas on the table include fortress-like barriers and offering a buy-out to people to move out of flood-prone areas. (Guardian)

Taiwan: The country has become the latest to join the global movement to reduce carbon emissions. This year Taiwan’s executive Yuan – the executive branch of the government – has approved national climate change adaptation guidelines covering disasters, essential infrastructure, water resources, land use, the energy sector, agriculture and biodiversity. (Swazi Times)

Italy: As the country sets out to cut €14 billion from its annual bill for energy imports by 2020 – a target set out in its proposed national energy plan –it looks to boost crude oil production by 150%. The government estimates the increase in output could provide 7% of Italy’s energy requirements and create 25,000 new jobs. (Guardian)

EU: A new coalition aimed at advancing a low-carbon energy policy for Europe launched in Brussels last week. The group unites energy majors – including Alpine Energie, DONG Energy, First Solar, GE Energy and Shell – to promote what they call the “ideal partnership” between gas-fired and renewable energy portfolios. (Euractiv)

The post New York considers all options to make city safe following Sandy appeared first on Climate Home News.

Climate change wasn’t mentioned in the third and final Presidential debate, making it the first time in nearly 25 years it was missed off the agenda.

In a year where the US saw a once-in-a-generation drought and the world watched Arctic summer sea ice reach its lowest extent since records began, it seems strange that the issue has not come up at all in the debates and very little in the whole election.

In the US environmental campaigners have been calling for the candidates to end the ‘climate silence’ and make their stance of the issue known to voters. The League of Conservation Voters launched a petition to put pressure on the moderators of the debates to ask a climate question.

But while the words climate change may have been missing from the debate, related topics have been dealt with in depth. We’ve selected five topics where climate change was mentioned – indirectly or otherwise.

The two candidates head to the poll on November 6 (Pic: WACP/Flickr & White House)

1) The Arab Spring

What was said: Romney – “With the Arab Spring, came a great deal of hope that there would be a change towards more moderation, and opportunity for greater participation on the part of women in public life, and in economic life in the Middle East. But instead, we’ve seen in nation after nation, a number of disturbing events.”

Link to climate: Researchers are become ever more aware of the role of climate change as a ‘threat multiplier’ and while climate change itself was not responsible for the Arab Spring, the consequences of climate change. These include rising food and fuel prices and are expected to have had some impact on the uprisings, and are expected to continue to exacerbate political conflicts in the future.

2) Overseas Aid

What was said: Romney – “One, more economic development. We should key our foreign aid, our direct foreign investment, and that of our friends, we should coordinate it to make sure that we – we push back and give them more economic development. Number two, better education. Number three, gender equality. Number four, the rule of law. We have to help these nations create civil societies.”

Link to climate: Experts predict that, globally, climate change financial aid for developing countries will need between $37 and 50 billion per year to 2030 and could reach $75 to 100 per year by 2050. In President Obama’s 2013 fiscal year budget, $469.5 million of foreign aid was pledged directly for climate change projects. It has also been a controversial topic in the US, with the US Senate calling for all funding to climate change and food security programmes to be cut in 2012.

3) Energy independence

What was said: Obama – “Doing everything we can to control our own energy. We’ve cut our oil imports to the lowest level in two decades because we’ve developed oil and natural gas. But we also have to develop clean energy technologies that will allow us to cut our exports in half by 2020. That’s the kind of leadership that we need to show.”

Link to climate: Choices of energy will be crucial for countries meeting their carbon reduction targets worldwide and energy has been a huge issue this election. Each candidate promised an ‘all of the above’ strategy. They both say that the US must continue to invest in oil and gas exploration, as well as modern renewables. Obama has also made several mentions in the three presidential debates calling for better energy efficiency, while Romney has attacked what he has referred to as ‘Obama’s war on coal’. He claims EPA efficiency measures are leaving new coal powers stations impossible to operate.

4) The rise of China

What was said: Romney – “I look around the world; I don’t see our influence growing around the world. I see our influence receding, in part because of the failure of the president to deal with our economic challenges at home; in part because of our withdrawal from our commitment to our military in the way I think it ought to be; in part because of the turmoil with Israel.”

Obama – “Well, I think it will continue to be terrorist networks. We have to remain vigilant as I just said. But with respect to China, China is both an adversary, but also a potential partner in the international community if it’s following the rules. So my attitude coming into office was that we are going to insist that China plays by the same rules as everybody else.”

Link to climate: Over the last few years the US and China have emerged as the main protagonists of the international climate debate, involved in a stand off where each country has waited for the other to make the first move. Last year in Durban, China made that move as they showed willingness to be included in a new global climate agreement. Head of the UNFCCC Christiana Figueres has warned the US that they risk being left behind on the global stage.

On the other side of this issue is trade. The two countries are involved in a heated battle over solar technologies. Last year US solar-panel manufacturers filed a petition against the Chinese solar industry for providing billions of dollars in subsidies as well as cash grants and tax breaks to the industry. These subsidies have meant Chinese manufacturers have been able to export their products into the US and the EU at competitive prices, squeezing the domestic markets.

This is all part of a wider trade dispute between the two countries.

5) Support for cleantech

What was said: Romney – “I have the kind of commitment to ensure that our industries in this country can compete and be successful. We in this country can compete successfully with anyone in the world, and we’re going on. We’re going to have to have a president, however, that doesn’t think that somehow the government investing in car companies like Tesla and Fisker, making electric battery cars. This is not research, Mr President; these are the government investing in companies. Investing in Solyndra. This is a company, this isn’t basic research. I want to invest in research. Research is great. Providing funding to universities and think tanks is great. But investing in companies? Absolutely not.”

Link to climate: Investing in clean-tech will be vital if the world is to wean itself off fossil fuels. Over the period of the three debates, this issue has come up in many different forms. Obama called for an end to the $4 billion per year given to oil companies in the form of subsidies, while Romney accused the President of ‘picking the losers’ with the government’s investment in renewable companies – particularly Solyndra.

The Obama Campaign has defended his stance on climate change telling The Hill website “Whether it’s on the stump or at the White House, President Obama has long focused on ways to develop clean energy as a core economic pillar. By advocating for the growth of renewable energy, as he did in Tuesday’s debate, President Obama has continually called for action that will address the sources of climate change.”

The post Why climate change was not ignored in the US Presidential debate appeared first on Climate Home News.

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Latest news – Friday 7 September

1600: New research suggests deforestation could significantly reduce rainfall in the Earth’s tropical regions.

This could have major implication for farmers in these areas, such as the Amazon and Congo forest basins, as well as reducing hydro-electricity output.

1500: As the concern over food production grows, attentions turn to Europe’s pollinators including bees and hoverflies.

Pollinating insects contribute to agriculture production of 84% of European crops – either partly or entirely – and the value of these insects has been estimated at €22 billion a year inEurope.

1400: Firms are quickly catching on to the fact that the best way to market sustainable living is not to lecture but to nudge people into changing behaviour and making sustainability fun, says business writer Oliver Balch.

1300: Edward Cameron and Yamide Dagnet from the World Resources Institute offer a comprehensive look at where countries stand following the Bangkok talks and what’s next ahead of the COP18 conference at the end of the year.

1200: The one billionth certified emission reduction credit under the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) will be issued today, according to the UN climate secretariat (UNFCCC).

1100: BusinessGreen provide a round-up to Obama’s speech last night, and the lines he drew between himself and Mitt Romney on the environment and energy.

1000: Scientists in the Arctic are warning that the record-breaking melt seen this summer could be part of an accelerating trend with profound implications.

Researchers from the Norwegian Polar Institute said impacts could be felt in Europe and beyond. They expect to see much more precipitation in Northern Europe, while warning Southern Europe could become drier.

0900: New Zealand’s High Court has dismissed a challenged launched by climate change sceptics against a government research agency’s findings that the temperature had risen in the past century. The court backed the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research’s conclusion that New Zealand’s climate warmed almost 1°C between 1909 and 2009.

0830: Geologists from the British Geological Survey say warm water held in a network of disused coalmines could supply 40% of Glasgow’s heating. The technique has said to have already been demonstrated locally in one of Glasgow’s housing projects.

Accepting his party’s presidential nomination at the Democratic National Convention, President Obama called the 2012 election a pivotal moment in the battle against climate change, criticising Republicans who say global warming is a myth.

African farmers are finding new ways to cope with drought, erosion and other effects of climate change but will need even more techniques to thrive in an increasingly unpredictable environment, say scientists.

A survey of 700 households in Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda and Tanzania found many smallholders are now planting more drought-resistant and faster-growing crops to ensure harvests continue.

Top tweets

Not quite as exciting as @leodicaprio‘s hybrid, but still good… ‘Green’ #Pope presented with #electric car bbc.in/TusK0C via BBC

— Lang Banks (@LangBanks) September 7, 2012

bit.ly/P6CDAtWe are loosing ground with man-made deserts overrunning fertile #land & subsistence #farmers in SSA among most affected

— Luc Gnacadja (@LucGnacadja) September 7, 2012

President Obama: “My plan will continue to reduce the carbon pollution that is heating our planet—because climate change is not a hoax.”

— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) September 7, 2012

Thanks @barackobama for telling it like it is on #climate change.

— Kelly Rigg (@kellyrigg) September 7, 2012

The post Climate Live: Glasgow’s disused mines to heat the city, African farmers find ways to tackle drought and Obama says climate change is “not a hoax” appeared first on Climate Home News.

Obama hits back saying climate change will not just go away if we deny it (Source: Pete Souza/White House)

Hitting back at criticism from the Republican election campaign, President Obama has told an audience of students that “denying climate change won’t make it stop.”

Speaking to a crowd at Iowa State University, just 10 weeks before voters go to the polls on 6 November; Obama asked students what energy future they would prefer.

He said: “Will this be a country that keeps moving away from foreign oil and towards renewable sources of energy like wind and solar and biofuels. Energy that makes our economy more secure, but also makes our planet more secure?

“You believed four years ago that we could use less foreign oil and reduce the carbon pollution that threatens our planet. And in just four years, we’ve doubled the generation of clean, renewable energy like wind and solar.”

Referring to the latest changes to fuels standards announced by his administration this week, Obama added: “We developed new fuel standards so that your car will get nearly 55 miles per gallon by the middle of the next decade. That’s going to save you money at the pump.

“That will reduce greenhouse gas emissions by a level roughly equivalent to a year’s worth of emissions from all the cars in the world.”

While energy remains a priority topic for the candidates going into the election, the latest comments from Obama follow criticism that not enough emphasis is being placed on climate change in the election campaign.

While Obama has used several high profile interviews to mention the topic, the climate does not appear to be a top priority for his election, while Romney has claimed he does not know what is causing global warming.

For many environmentalists neither candidate has placed enough emphasis on the topic in the election build up. This week, the League of Conservation Voters launched an online petition urging PBS’s Jim Lehrer – the moderator of the first presidential TV debate – to ask a climate-related question.

Related Articles: 

The United States of Climate Change #1: Wind, jobs and washing machines in Iowa

What a Romney-Ryan era could mean for climate change

Will Obama run a green election campaign?

The post Obama tells crowd: “Denying climate change won’t make it stop” appeared first on Climate Home News.

The United States is often the central battleground for the climate debate.

The US hit the headlines this summer with record breaking temperatures, drought and wildfires.

Many scientists – including those from the UK’s Met Office and the USA’s National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration – warn are more likely with advancing climate change.

And the events this summer could be changing public opinion on climate change in the US with a University of Texas poll in July showing 70% of American’s now believe the planet is warming.

With the country heading towards an election in November, environmentalists remain on their edge of their seats to see how the outcome of the elections could impact the country’s climate policies both domestically and internationally.

On the ground across the country, however, young people and students aren’t waiting for politicians or climate sceptics to catch up and are already driving sustainability at their colleges and on their university campuses.

Formed in 2008, by Chris Castro and Hank Harding, two students at the University of Central Florida, IDEASforUs aims to drive innovation and empower students and young professionals.

As part of RTCC Youth Series, I spoke to Castro about the group’s projects, climate change in the US and taking IDEAS global.

What is your group doing and what areas of work do you focus on?

IDEAS is a youth led sustainability movement and we’re basically comprised of chapters at different US universities, K-through-12 schools and some communities. Our purpose is basically to empower youth and emerging professionals to become change agents for sustainability.

I am the co-founder of this movement and I started the first chapter of IDEAS at my university, the University of Central Florida (UCF) four-years-ago in 2008. I was a sophomore and I was really interested in getting students engaged in the environment and sustainable development.

We didn’t have the concept of replicating and making a movement, we just really wanted to be sustainable on our campus and be action orientated and implement projects. Over time different friends of ours at different universities we’re saying “you guys are making real big headway, we either want to partner our organisations that are doing similar things so we can be a part of your movement or create a new chapter”.

IDEAS UCF, UF, FIU at the Southeast Student Renewable Energy Conference (SSREC) (Source: IDEASforUs)

We have grown to 25 universities in the US and just recently in May we became an accredited NGO through the United Nations’ Department for Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) – and we are also getting accredited through UNEP. Basically with that accreditation through DESA we were able to have a presence at the Rio+20 Summit.

In addition to that we were at the World Youth Congress that was two weeks prior to Rio+20 in Brazil and we were at the UN Youth Blast, so we had a presence for those three weeks. We had a number of different leaders who were in Rio and looking to partner with different youth and host projects. Because of that trip, in the past month we have been talking with youth leaders from more than 10 different countries whether they are already existing organisations or again a youth leader looking to start a chapter of IDEAS.

We are talking to people in Nepal, in Nigeria, two in Ghana, in Sweden, Columbia, Panama, Haiti and so the point is we are coming together to share best practices and initiatives, and actual solutions that youth can implement in their campus or in their community to progress themselves towards sustainable development.

It is very exciting, over the last four years we’ve developed nearly 40 different projects and these are projects where students have been empowered and have taken on a leadership role and have actually created an initiative. Once an initiative is successful at one university we create a tool kit and then add it to the toolbox of IDEAs organisations for all of our chapters to pick and choose from.

All of the initiatives fit into five categories – we call them the five pillars of sustainability – energy, water, food, waste and ecology. Our initiative focuses on the five pillars and they focus on youth empowerment and basically active citizenship to get people involved on campus.

IDEAS FIU hosts the Kill-a-Watt Energy Challenge educational seminar in the dorms (Source: IDEASforUs)

One project which is very popular, and continues to expand, is called Kill-a-Watt. It is basically an energy competition for on campus dormitories and on campus residents. We take it a step further and add interactive educational seminars throughout the competition and host a coming together at the end. We compare behavioural change to see if that has an impact. We have seen incredible savings.

At UCF for example in the three-month competition we saved $41,000 and 441,000 kilowatt hours of electricity in one three-month competition. Because of that, the US Department of Energy came down and did an entire video about the competition and how we are engaging youth to save energy on our campuses.

That initiative spread and is now at over five different university chapters. On average we are saving at least $21,000 for every two to three month competition and we have seen a lot of universities take our model. So we have created a tool-kit, a step-by-step guide, so a student could read it and go through the process of setting up a similar competition on their campus.

Another really important project that has been popular for more of our international chapters has been something we call Innovations Think-Tank. This is a concept where we are bringing together campus students, community stakeholders, and professionals – anybody who is interested – multi-disciplinary people. We are going through a strategic process where we breakout and we identify challenges and solutions for the major problems that we are facing in our communities.

We like to focus on the five pillars but we have seen that the Innovations Think Tank can also be for a wide range of things. It could just focus on policy or the challenges of education and the whole point is really to come together with this group to identify challenges, stakeholders and then the solutions to addressing those. It has been amazing.

Now we are doing global, virtual, Innovations Think-Tanks with our partners in Nepal. We are also doing one for the Africa Youth Conference and we are going to be doing them via Skype so youth from different parts of the world can communicate, we can share the challenges that we are both facing in different socio-economic areas and can come up with solutions together.

We encourage our chapters at universities to host these once a month because it is a great way to develop new ideas. That is basically the whole point of our organisation.

Another big initiative that is pretty popular is this concept of up-cycling. Up-cycling has been an initiative where people have really come together at the universities to create new ways of doing things. One that is popular is T-totes. We take t-shirts and using solar power and completely off-the-grid energy we sew them to create tote bags. We aim to completely eliminate single use plastic bags and offer people a complete solution on a campus where they can up-cycle a t-shirt that is in the bottom of their draw that they will never use again and they can now use that to have one less plastic bag when going to the grocery store.

We do campaigns where people bring us 50 plastic bags and they get a free T-tote and they get to actually create this by themselves, right there with the help of us. The cool part if our chapters get really innovative with this idea of T-totes. Some of them will go out and fundraise for a solar panel so they can do it completely with solar. Some will create a bicycle turbine connected straight to the sewing machine and as you pedal it is going up and down. So we really try to make it interesting and give it to the chapters to be creative and create new concepts of up-cycling.

IDEAS attends the Bonoroo Music Festival as "Eco Change-Agents" for the sustainable section (Source: IDEASforUs)

We actually won a competition because the T-totes competition was through Campus Progress or the Centre for American Progress, a pretty large organisation here in the US and we received best campaign of the year for that.

Up-cycling also goes into other products. We take juice cartoons and turn them into wallets; we take plastic bags that we make into bracelets.

One more I would like to highlight is called IDEAS for ARTS. ARTS stands for Artistic Representation Towards Sustainability and our concept here was we need to start engaging other people in different disciplines, not just environmental or biology majors or people studying physics or engineering. We need to start getting the artists, the lawyers, and the educators on board with this movement.

One of our members who is an inspiring artists said ‘Look I am going to start a competition called IDEAS for ARTS’. We call out to our art schools and art departments to host the competition with our local museum of art in our local community and we basically encourage youth and artists to make art which focuses on sustainability using different mediums – oil painting, up-cycling projects, theatre, different things.

That has really started to take off. We did an amazing one here in Orlando; it has started to spread to Tallahassee and other schools. Everybody loves art and it is a great way to promote sustainability and at the same time have a really good time.

What results have you seen from your work so far?

There are now over 4,000 different members who are engaged with IDEAS. We started as a group of 10 people at UCF and over four years we have grown to over 4,000 members.

People have graduated and created initiatives – for example the IDEAS for ARTS. There is an initiative called Ecosystem Facilitation that people have taken to now create a company out of. So we are starting to see that these cool activities and programmes are now turning into potential entrepreneurial opportunities for some of the students. The economic situation right now really sucks and the way we are going to get out of it is small businesses and innovation and entrepreneurship.

We are starting to foster and encouraging new initiatives which are turning into new non-profits and that are even turning into for-profit ventures. We have five incubations of new companies that are spawning out of IDEAS so I think that is an incredible metric.

Then with Kill-a-Watt for example, we have saved over all of our chapters over $100,000 on utility bills at these universities. So we are helping to reduce carbon emissions, we are helping to engage students at the university and then save energy – ultimately to save money.

I could go into tonnes of trash we have removed from clean-ups and stuff like that – we hundreds and hundreds of pictures of us doing clean ups – but those some of our main metrics.

What are the challenges you have faced in your work?

IDEAS For Education initiative helps incorporate sustainability into K-12 schools (Source: IDEASforUs)

This group – believe it or not – has not been funded for four years. This has been a movement fuelled by what we call passion for change. A student who is just fed up by the fact that we have all of these challenges and no one is doing anything about it.

One of the major challenges is sustaining this. I personally have a full-time job, I work 40 hours a week for my own energy company at the same time I come home and work another 40 hours a week to continue this movement.

We are starting to get into the realm where we are starting to get donations and we are looking towards grants and foundations as well but the biggest hurdle in this movement for the past four years has been funding and has been the financial resources to sustain us because it has been completely volunteer based from our board of directors to the chapter leaders at each one of these universities.

It is incredibly inspiring – people will get empowered at the fact that there is nothing coming out of this other than sheer passion for change and wanting to make a difference in our communities.

I think another challenge we have faced is predominately at a campus level at each one of our chapters, administration. It has been about getting through the loop holes and the red tape to become a registered organisation or it has been about trying to implement campus policy which will shift our campuses to becoming more sustainable.

For instance there is a campus policy that we focus on called the Student Green Energy Fund and this is an incredible concept – we have about 17 universities trying to push this. The whole point is to create a tax on students. It sounds kind of crazy but we wanted to tax ourselves 75 cents per credit hour – a full time student is about 12 credit hours here so about $10 a year – that would pool money strictly for energy efficiency and renewable energy projects on campus.

Now at the University of Central Florida where I graduated that would generate $990,000 a year for these projects.

The hardest part is that in the past three years we have been butting heads with the board of trustees and the board of governors in the state of Florida to actually pass this through the legislation system.

It has been a hurdle to deal with the administration when passing student referendums. Student government put out polls and we pass 86-90%. Students want this tax implemented on them but the administration is saying ‘no thank you we do not want to tax you guys more.’

They’re here saying we are not progressing because we don’t have funding, we are here saying we have a solution, we will fund ourselves and we will pay more to go to the school and it is not working out.

It has been a hurdle but we are actually making progress and this year looks like the year we are actually going to get one or two universities to pass the fund, make a showcase model and then in the coming years really spread it across universities around the world.

What support have you seen for your activities?

We have had some great support. Although the administration has been a hurdle, at times the administration has been our best friend. And really what we have found is that partnering with certain campus departments, whether it is the energy department, the landscape department, partnering with those departments allows us to make a connection and push forward with initiatives which we know are going to make true change.

Just recently this past year we have been really reaching out to our local politicians and legislators who have partnered with us on many campaigns. For example our commissioner here in our county has hosted a lot of different projects and programmes with us. So they help us out with the funding, bringing out volunteer support, and we go out within a community and do an environmental restoration.

It has been really great to work and negotiate with city officials and commissioners who really have a say in how we are going to move our cities forward.

In addition our former governor, Bob Graham in the state of Florida, he has recently jumped on board with IDEAS as almost like an advisor for us and he is helping us to make connections with different state congressmen and senators so that we can begin moving forward.

IDEAS hosted the 1st-ever 350.org International Climate Day of Action (Source: IDEASforUs)

Other organisations, other non-profits and NGOs, such as 350.org, tcktcktck, Avaaz, Peacechild International out of the UK. All of these are partners of ours who we have got some incredible support from – not funding wise but programme wise – partnering on different campaigns which are getting our word out their and getting IDEAS out there to the world.

What impacts are you already seeing in the country from climate change?

In the US we are currently having problems with wildfires that we are experiencing at the moment and are tracing back towards drought and things like that – that has been a big thing. On the lake here we have heard a huge debate about corn and how the ethanol industry, the cattle industry and the food industry are all competing for this one crop that is doing horrible in this climate right now. Food and fuel are big deals.

In Florida in particular where I am there is an extreme amount of salt water intrusion into our aquifer. Florida has a fresh water aquifer under us and limestone in between and there is a lot of intrusion going in areas such as Palm Beach and South Florida where their wells are coming up with salt water. This normally would never have happened. This is in the past two to three years that we have seen a huge amount of salt water intrusion into the coast of Florida and obviously that is dealing with sea level rise and a number of other implications.

More RTCC Youth Profiles:

Profile #8: Why education is key to developing climate awareness in Ghana

Profile #7: Why Indonesia’s biodiversity is at the front line of the fight against climate change

Profile #6: Meet the African coalition that brings together 54 countries to tackle climate change

What would be your vision for the world in 2050?

The challenges that we are facing today and that we are going to be facing in the decades to come are primarily going to need to be focused on and attacks by our youth. Not even necessarily our generation but also the ones that are coming.

We are kind of in the middle at the moment. We are in this tipping point where our generation needs to be the ones to lay the groundwork for the generations to come and I think that the next people to come – those who are not even born to 10 years old – are going to be some of the major change-makers.

As far as what I would like to envision. For one I am huge on energy so I would like to envision a majority of our energy from around the world to be coming from renewable and alternative sources. I think that our energy crisis must be interdisciplinary and it must be integrated into a localised energy source – whether that is solar in your region, wind in your region, geothermal over here. It needs to all come together. We are too stuck on the silver bullet right now on the fossil fuels powering everything.

Energy, in my opinion, will be one of the biggest hurdles of what we are actually facing because it is so connected to water, food, and our waste stream. It really encompasses a lot.

I think the 2050 goal is obviously over 50% renewables. We need to be at 80% in my opinion, but realistically if we hit 50% renewable by 2050 that would be huge. Right now we are at less than 10% and with the corporations and the industries that are running this world right now it is very difficult to sway them so they see an economic benefit in investing in these technologies and completely transitioning our worlds.

IDEAS UF hosting Canoe Clean-ups in Rattlesnake Creek (IDEASforUs)

I think we need to incorporate more than just GDP into our economic systems for our countries. Obviously people’s happiness is a big one as well as nature’s happiness and the quality of the nature environment around us needs to be integrated into our GDP. That obviously needs to include our carbon emissions because right now that isn’t being included and that is one of the major problems.

Reinventing what GDP means and including ecological aspects and social aspects and not just the economic will be a major tipping point for progressing towards sustainability.

I think if we can tackle those two things the 21st century won’t be as grim as it is looking right now.

What would help your group move forward in its work?

One thing is visibility to the world. At this point we have some very cool, creative solutions that we want the global youth to get a hold of. We want them to know that they can be empowered to make a change and see the same results that we are seeing across the world.

That is why we are reaching out to youth movements in different countries. In Ghana, Nigeria, Nepal and we are not only partnering with one organisation but we are looking for a group or coalition of organisations to work with to disseminate this information and these solutions.

Obviously funding is another and finding true foundation and true partners who see the absolute need for this and the importance of getting youth engaged in this movement and really putting their money where their mouth is and allowing me and the rest of our team and the rest of other youth in the world and focus in on this for our life goals.

I would love to this to be my career goal for the rest of my life. Maybe it is because I am a founder of it and I want to see it continue to move. It is tough right now.

Continuing to make relationships with other non-profits, other NGOs and other corporations even who are willing to help us to grow and in creating new solutions all over the world.

Why did you get involved in the group? What do you think youth bring to the climate debate?

I personally got into this movement when I had a choice to make – I was undeclared at my university to tell you the truth. I had to make a choice of what to pursue and I looked back on my childhood and I fortunately grew up on a palm tree farm and my family still owns and operates an exotic palm tree farm. My entire life growing up I was not only connected to the natural world, grew my own crops and sold them, but I was also connected to the oceans – I am a surfer and a diver.

My sophomore year I had a decision to make and I stumbled on a new programme at my university that focused on environmental studies and sustainability and for some reason I had a calling. The first class I took I knew I had made the right choice.

I followed my passion. People don’t do that today and that is exactly what I did and because of it I have had opportunities at the US Department for Energy, I worked for my university and now I work for the county and there are so many things that have come from following that path.

My really good friend Hank Harding – the other co-founder of IDEAS – and I both had the same vision and I think when you have a teammate or somebody else who has the same vision it is a lot easier. We encourage people when they are starting new chapters to build a team. Before you start doing anything, build a solid team.

IDEAS at Greenwaves III Sustainable Music & Arts Fesival (Source: IDEASforUs)

I think that the youth’s major difference is creativity. We are not hindered by the norms of our world. We don’t completely understand everything that is going on and if anything that is an incredible benefit because we think completely differently. We are thinking completely outside of the box and we are not looking at things in the same parameters in which our world functions. The solutions that we need to solve today are not going to be solved by thinking in the same box as our problems. We must come at them with a completely unique innovative approach and great new ideas.

That was our drive in creating this, if we focus on the youth who have that potential we could actually come up with solutions and we have seen success from them.

We still have the ambition I feel – even with all the negativity and the constraints – to think outside and see how can we solve it.

More RTCC Youth Profiles:

Profile #5: Bangladeshi youth fight to give world’s second most climate vulnerable country a voice

Profile #4: Nepal’s youth fight to save Himalayan paradise from effects of pollution and climate change

Profile #3: Canada’s climate coalition on taking on the Tar Sands lobby and fighting for Kyoto

The post Youth Profile #9: Young entrepreneurs driving sustainability at US campuses appeared first on Climate Home News.

Europe is unlikely to experience a shale gas boom similar to that witnessed in the US, according to a UK-based energy investor.

A surge in drilling for shale gas has allowed the US to cut its foreign imports of fossil fuels and lower prices for consumers.

A shale gas rig in the US. The number of operating shale gas drills in the States topped 1600 in August 2008. (Source: Flickr/Nicholas_T)

“I wouldn’t completely write-off shale gas development in Europe, but certainly the scale and speed at which it happens will not be like in the US,” said Chris Rowland, an associate at UK-based investment firm Ecofin, which handles $1.9bn in assets.

“It’s a good fuel for reducing emissions but not a good fuel for decarbonizing,” he told Reuters.

There have been claims of large finds of shale gas in Poland, France and the UK but so far regulation has restricted exploration to test wells and trials.

EU Energy Commissioner Günter Oettinger said in July that he wished Europe would accept more risks with its exploration of unconventional fossil fuels and offshore drilling.

It has been speculated that news of large shale gas finds are being used as leverage in wholesale gas price negotiations with Russia, a key supplier for the EU.

Opposition to shale gas drilling centres on the “fracking” process which uses pressurised fluids to release gas trapped within rock formations. There are fears about the scale of methane leaks from drill sites. There are also fears over the potential pollution of water resources.

Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas and could make the emissions associated with shale gas larger than estimated.

The US recently lowered its emissions from the power sector pointing to the replacement of coal with gas, which burns cleaner, as the main reason.

Yesterday, US presidential nominee Mitt Romney released his energy policy, which includes accelerating shale gas development further and expanding offshore oil drilling.

Related stories:

Gas and climate change: Can we drill our way out of four degrees?

EDF: Cut the leaks or gas has no part to play in fighting climate change

Earthquakes lead to calls for US fracking shutdown

The post No US-style shale gas boom for Europe, says energy investor appeared first on Climate Home News.

– The day’s top climate change stories as chosen by RTCC
– Tweet @RTCCnewswire and use #RTCCLive hashtag
– Send your thoughts to ts@rtcc.org
– Updated from 0900-1700 BST (GMT+1)

Latest news – Thursday 23 August 

1725 Green entrepreneurs in the UK are in for a boost. The Department of Energy and Climate Change has announced a modest but welcome funding package of £16m for low carbon technologies.

1630: Having already relocated an estimated 1.3m people, the Three Gorges Dam could now dislodge more after a series of landslides along the banks of its reservoirs. Tens of thousands of residents, including some who have already been dislodged once by the project, are to be moved due to “geological hazards“.

1530: The Sierra Club have released a response to the Romney energy plan. They say:

“Mitt Romney has devised an energy insecurity plan that would make us even more dependent upon oil, coal, and gas companies while ignoring climate disruption, economic growth, and the health and well-being of the American people. 

Does anyone really think that the winning economy of the 21st century can be built on 19th century fossil fuel technology? Romney’s plan is an anchor to the past. The future America deserves is one in which energy doesn’t cost lives, and no one has to choose between a good job and good health.”

1430: Mitt Romney’s energy independence plan has been released:

Energy Policy White Paper 8.23

1325: The co-chairs of the Green Climate Fund Board will be Australia and South Africa. The decision was made at the first meeting of the board which got underway in Geneva this morning.

In Geneva, Australia and South Africa have been elected to co-chair the #GCF Board. Still unclear whether and how observers can participate.

— Hardeman (@Hardeman) August 23, 2012

1200: Wind turbine makers Vestas has shed another 1,400 jobs (brining total redundancies for the year to over 3,700) following a quarterly pre-tax loss. 1100: The world’s first community-owned tidal turbine is set to be built and deployed in Scotland, according to First Minister Alex Salmond. 1000: East Midland and Bournemouth airports in the UK have become the first in the country to achieve “carbon neutral” ground operations. Both airports implemented a series of carbon reduction programmes over the last six years. 0900: One of the UK Government’s most senior scientific advisers has said the hope of restricting the average temperature rise to 2°C was “out the window”, and that the rise would be as high as 5°C. He also called on the Chancellor, George Osborne to back efforts to cut the country’s CO2 emissions. 0830: Following months of delays the first meeting of the UN’s Green Climate Fund begins today in Geneva. The fund is meant to be the biggest funding route for the $100 billion a year that developed countries have pledged by 2020 to help poor nation adapt to climate change. However, it is expected that key decision such as where the fund should be based, who should run it, how it will operate and how it should raise funds could still be months away. The first meeting is expected to deal with the process – including discussion on how to choose a location for it and how to appoint co-chairs. Rapid warming over the Antarctic Peninsula over the last 50-100 years has contributed to ice shelves collapse, says scientists, warning future warming could destabilise ice shelves thousands of years old. US Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney is expected to lay out policies today which will aim to make North American energy independent by 2020. The plans will include a sharp increase in the production of oil and natural gas on federal lands as well as off the US coast. Top Tweets

A very interesting question: should TV #weather presenters be talking about #climate change? huff.to/O2VGJH — Ben Cubby (@bencubby) August 23, 2012

Will #climatechange undo decades of progress on global #poverty? New research looks at the possibilities: bit.ly/ReLxMW — WB Poverty Reduction (@WBPoverty) August 22, 2012

394 out of 406 local authorities saw carbon emissions go up from ’09 to ’10. Not hugely surprising, though, considering recession & national — Adam Vaughan (@adamvaughan_uk) August 23, 2012

Picture of the Day

Nasa images show the difference between the Mississippi River between spring 2011 – when it swelled to historic levels – and 2012 when it reached record-low levels.

Mississippi River, 2012 (Source: NASA Landsat 7)

Mississippi River, 2011 (NASA Landsat 5)

Reading List

The island nation Palau fights back against climate change.

The post Climate Live: Romney sets out plan for US energy independence, Green Climate Fund board meets and risks of rapid warming to Antarctic Peninsula appeared first on Climate Home News.

The subsidy for the US wind energy sector will not be allowed to expire, Senate Majority leader Senator Harry Reid has said.

Speaking at a clean energy summit in Las Vegas, Democrat Sen. Reid said work to renew the Production Tax Credit (PTC) before it runs out at the end of the year is under way.

“We will get it done before the end of the year, I’m very confident,” said Reid. “We may even get this done before the election.”

Video: Senator Reid’s speech at the National Clean Energy Summit

Presidential candidate Mitt Romney has said that he would not renew the PTC.

It is estimated that the loss of the PTC could cost 30,000-37,000 of the 100,000 jobs in the US wind sector.

A bi-partisan Senate finance committee voted 19-5 in favour of the scheme in early August.

With wind energy jobs prominent in key Republican heartlands, there is support on both sides of the political divide.

Sen. Reid, who is frequently outspoken, also commented on continued debate amongst US media and the public about the existence of climate change. Recent extreme weather has increased awareness and “belief” in climate change.

“…Despite having overwhelming evidence and public opinion on our side, deniers still exist, fuelled and funded by dirty energy profits,” said Reid.

“These people aren’t just on the other side of this debate. They’re on the other side of reality. It’s time for us all – whether we’re leaders in Washington, members of the media, scientists, academics, environmentalists or utility industry executives – to stop acting like those who ignore the crisis or deny it exists entirely have a valid point of view. They don’t.”

The post Congress will renew US wind energy subsidies, says Senate Majority Leader appeared first on Climate Home News.

At 2150 on Sunday evening, a select group of people will await the starter’s pistol for the men’s 100m final in the Olympic stadium.

Judgment will be made on years of preparation and the line between success and failure is a narrow one.

Usain Bolt performs his trademark lightening bolt celebration, but will he creating electricity problems for the UK? (Source: Flickr/Brunel University)

The group in question is of course the capacity forecasting team at the National Grid, which manages the UK’s electricity and gas networks.

The men’s 100m final is a Sunday like none other.

So far your personal list of Olympic highlights is probably dependant on your nationality. If you measure it by its effect on the electricity grid, Danny Boyle’s opening ceremony is hard to top.

However, the effect might be counter-intuitive.

When the Queen made her TV skydiving debut at around 2130 during the opening extravaganza, National Grid says there was a drop in power demand of 1800MW compared to a normal Friday night, as people gave up more energy intensive activities to park themselves in front of the TV. That’s enough to power Liverpool, a city of 470,000 people.

At the end of the ceremony, closer to one in the morning, demand was up 1600MW as the audience swapped bed for TV.

So during the 9.8 or 9.7 seconds that it takes Usain Bolt or Yohan Blake to win the gold (you heard it hear first), the network gets a brief reprieve while nobody dares leave the TV to put on a power hungry kettle or sort a load of laundry.

However, Sunday night is typically a quiet one for the grid so the normal patterns are  are likely to be disturbed.

“Sunday night when people tune in for the final, followed by a drop in demand whilst the audience watches the event, followed by another pick up when the race finishes,” a spokesperson for National Grid told RTCC.

“Traditionally for a Sunday night there would be a drop at this time in the evening as people go to bed but because the coverage is going on through the night the usual pattern will change,” she added.

Check out the power demand of the key Olympic venues live

The post Will Usain Bolt cause a UK energy crisis during the 100m final? appeared first on Climate Home News.

Mexico is a country leading the way on climate change action.

Earlier this year it became the second country to pass comprehensive legislation to cut emissions.

As well as legally binding emissions goals, Mexico’s climate change bill, which was passed in April, encourages a voluntary carbon emissions trading market, and gives the energy ministry authority to establish policies and incentives to promote low-carbon technologies.

When the country held the G20 meeting last month, outgoing President Calderón insisted on the environmental agenda being a priority at the talks, which were held just before the Rio+20 summit.

In the second of the series RTCC is running on Youth Climate groups from around the world, we talk to Christopher Córdova, Director of PIDES International (Plataforma Integral de Desarrollo Sustentable) to find out what it is like to be part of the youth climate movement in Mexico.

What is your group doing and what areas of work do you focus on?

PIDES NGO is based in Mexico City but we have a team spread in 14 countries and we have developed many different projects. We have projects on climate change mitigation in Mexico for instance and now we have a very big project for testing an international theoretical model in different places – in Qatar and in Costa Rica.

We wish to test a theoretical model which tries to explain how the green economy transition can be fast-tracked, in the local, the national and the international realm.

This big project is led by PIDES International. PIDES NGO manages the project in Mexico and our branch of it PIDES International manages all the international projects, so the projects which are not based in Mexico. We also have a research centre – a youth led research centre which is called the Junior Observatory of Sustainability.

This research centre publishes reports and also special and also special research about climate change, about youth participation, about sustainable development, about the green economy transition etc. For instance we have this research now which is called ‘Paths to Sustainability in the Middle East’.

So we have many different projects, some theoretical and some practical on all of these issues – mainly youth, sustainability, green economy and climate change.

We have had representatives in COP16 which was in Mexico. We led a youth event at COP16 in Mexico – the Climate Village. We were the organisation that was leading that youth event, supported by Mexico’s government. Then we were in South Africa also, invited by the Mexican government too and we sent a person also to this year’s Rio Summit and shortly we will send another representative to Qatar for COP18. So we have been involved in those international negotiations processes.

But we also have these other projects. Our focus is on the practical projects rather than only following the negotiations and all of that. And also we have this focus on being a bridge of communication among governments and civil society. So we are not only interested in representing civil society before governments but being a youth led bridge, a youth led channel of communication. We really want to continue to strengthen our communications schemes between Civil Society and governments internationally.

What results have you seen from your work so far?

We are just finishing a project in Mexico this month called ‘Bet for Climate’ – it was financed by GIC, the cooperation institution of the German Government and the German Embassy in Mexico. That project was aimed to lower the carbon footprint of different High Schools in six states of Mexico. So by lowering the carbon footprint the students could bet to local governments that they could lower their carbon footprint faster and more efficiently than the local government itself.

So it was a very very good strategy for strengthening the idea of the power of organisation and the power of youth, building the confidence of those students and also helping them to organise practical projects aimed to lower carbon footprints no matter where they are.

It was in the schools this time but later on they can direct this carbon footprint lowering strategies in all of the institutions and the idea of building this bridge with government – with local government particularly – and also spreading this idea that it is not government alone that needs to lower the carbon footprint of a given country, a given state or a given province but that it is the whole of society that is responsible for that.

Also in terms of research and publishing we have published a lot of books by our research pillar and these books have reached what we consider a wide audience – other organisations are now using some of our categories, some of our theories. We have a theory of the notion of sustainability and now the theoretical model of the ICPS (Integral Cooperation Platform for Sustainability) model which has been designed and tested by PIDES International in collaboration with ISPA-NET Consulting (Integral Sustainable Policy Alternatives – New Economic Tools) which is the consultancy that we work with.

We have seen results also in our reach in lectures. We have lectured in 11-12 countries – I have personally presented lectures in nine countries – and have presented more than 70 lectures. And we have reached a wide public in those presentations – mainly students but there have also been policy makers, in particular local policy makers. That is another result that we can count as part of our permanent programme of training and capacity building.

And now with PIDES International with this pilot programme with the ICPS model for the National Integral Programme for Sustainable Development which is going to be tested in Costa Rica and in Qatar over the next two years.

What challenges have you faced in your work? What has or hasn’t worked?

The group hold lectures and talks in countries across the world

I believe that one of our biggest challenges has been to make our point to explain to youth, to civil society in general, to NGOs in different countries that it is not government’s responsibility.

It is everyone’s responsibility to transition to a low carbon world economy, to sustainable development and to implement all of those measures. I think there is some misleading information about who is responsible for our current unsustainable patterns of production, distribution and consumption of goods and services.

A lot of people from civil society think that it is all governments’ fault and they do not consider their own responsibility in consumption for instance. That has been a very hard part, maybe one of our greatest challenges, in trying to explain that it is everyone’s responsibility and trying to be clear enough in how to share that responsibility and what is to be done by government, what is to be done by companies and the business sector, what is to be done by civil society, what is to be done by youth etc.

We have found that the best way to overcome this is by completing the circle that goes from research, from theory to practice. That is why we are not an NGO that only focuses on practical solutions or implementing solutions but also about theorising and generating ideas that we think are integral and also sustainable and through creating first the theory in the paper, in the document, publishing it, spreading it through a lecture, getting the feed-back from the public, publishing again and then closing the circle by implementing that solution in a particular project.

What support have you seen for your activities?

Thanks to this idea of having both theory and practice in the same organisation and also being open to collaboration with governments and companies I think we have seen quite a lot of support and we are very grateful. Through embassies, individual diplomats, companies, universities, research centres and cultural institutions, national governments, local governments environmental agencies etc we have seen quite a lot of support because we have offered this alternative of bringing both theory and practice within the same solution.

They have seen that we are, yes, young people and, yes, civil society but we know what it takes to produce a public policy for instance. So governments see that we understand their language. And young people understand that we understand their language. It is a very nice scheme that has worked for us.

What are the impacts you are seeing in your country and local area from climate change?

Yes there are many. I will just mention two which are most representative. Mexico is a big country with a huge climate diversity and a huge ecosystem diversity and biodiversity too. It is one of the 17 mega-diverse countries in terms of biodiversity in the world. So it is very complex.

In the south there is a lot of water and there is a more humid climate. Both have been changing quite a lot. The rain for instance in the province of Tabasco in the past – 50 years ago – it could rain almost all year round and now there is a rainy season. So that has definitely changed the ecosystems. Also there are hurricanes in the south of Mexico which seem to be stronger every year and this causes huge damages to the coastlines of the south of Mexico.

Mexico is already feeling the impacts of climate change (Source: tjschloss/Creative Commons)

On the other hand in the north, at the beginning of this year there was a huge shortage of water and a big, very intense drought. It was very severe for food production in the north. The north of Mexico is much more arid, and has a lot less water than the south, but this year it was very very intense. It was way more intense than expected and it really impacted food production and some isolated communities really had a lot of problems in terms of food security.

What is your vision for 2050? How do we get there?

We are seeing at the very centre of the climate problem, the climate reality there is the issue of climate financing. The thing is we are not getting even 10% of the resources that we need to mobilise in order to really tackle climate change, so that is a huge thing. And our current mechanisms are never going to produce the amount that we require to really stop climate change. So initiatives like AOSIS, the Alliance of Small Island States [a coalition made up of those states imminently threatened by climate change], it is really like a desperate call for the international community to start acting in a really comprehensive way on this and at the very centre is the issue of finance.

So by building this strategy of the ICPS model we aim to start discussing seriously the issue of financing. Because as many experts have stated this is not an environmental problem. This is a political problem. And the political problem is resource allocation and before that actually getting enough resources. That is why we are developing this model intended to produce international solutions as well as producing the required resources financing those solutions.

What we are saying is that by 2015 we need to have a solution for financing. That is the most important part.

What would help your group moving forward in the future?

For our strategy for the ICPS model we will actually require – we do not require it now because we are just finishing the preparation process. But we will require it as soon as it is launched officially, we will require two things.

One, once the strategy is finished, we will need $5 million in order to create a world awareness campaign in media which will be celebrity led. We will ask celebrities all around the world to lead this media campaign in order to get the 3% of global GDP that we need to finance sustainable development and to eradicate extreme poverty.

In order to get to that we are seeing that the world needs a voluntary tax on most of its goods and services but with full operational rules which include full transparency in the resource allocation ands also the governments should not be in charge of allocating the resources.

So in a few months we will be looking for this $5 million and we will be looking for exposure – a lot of exposure internationally in order to foster our strategy of the IPCS model because we think that it is a model which will really help to transform the economy.

Why did you get involved in the climate movement? What do you think youth groups bring to the debate?

Since 2008 the group has been working to raise awareness for climate change

On the institutional side PIDES has been working for three years and we are totally passionate about these issues of sustainable development. It has been a very rich process because one thing has led us to the other. Our research has brought us to the point of applying solutions. And from implementing the solutions we have got the feedback from thousands and thousands of people, very valuable feedback which has inspired us much more.

Form the personal side. I did my first lecture when I was 14 and my first book was published when I was 15 so I was involved in all of these issues from a young age. Since then I have had this beautiful opportunity of travelling the world, presenting my books. I am very grateful for the governments who have supported by work and who have invited me to come to their countries to present – Indonesian government, Mexican Government, Moroccan Government.

I think there are two aspects. Firstly youth will inherit the world, they will inherit the world of the future. But I think there is a deeper aspect and that is that we were born and we are reaching adulthood in the age of information. That makes us one state ahead of the other generations before us. In the age of information, it is proven to be far more valuable than any other resources. Information is so important and it is the youth who are use to it and are used to accessing it. This gives us the possibility of really transforming reality – we are the insiders of the information era and the previous generations are the outsiders.

But the problem is that rather a lot of young people out there who do not have this access. The gap between the young who have access to information and those who do not is even wider than those separating different generations. Unless we close that gap it will be bad for the future. We have to reduce these inequalities. We have to share information and share the opportunity of accessing information – but it is huge challenge to close that gap. We have to strive to bring information tools – along with better living standards – to those who still live without this access.

Related Video: Members of PIDES talk to RTCC at the Durban Climate Talks about the work they are doing in explaining the dangers of climate change and environmental degradation to youth in Mexico…

The post Youth Profile #2: How PIDES are working on practical solutions to climate change in Mexico appeared first on Climate Home News.

1. The world still believes in Common But Differentiated Responsibility

Small islands and oceans both got a boost at Rio+20 (Source: Rafael Avila Coya)

This week RTCC dissected the text to find out exactly what the consequences of it would be for climate change.

Small island states and the oceans received a boost while the increased use  and cost effectiveness of renewable energy was promoted.

Perhaps most importantly, the text brings back into play the principles of Common But Differentiated Responsibility. This short phrase means some countries have a greater duty to pay for the damage to the earth than others – usually the ‘developed’ world.

It’s an intensely controversial topic – that has dominated the last three major climate conferences – so the fact CBDR made it into the final Rio+20 text is significant.

But not everything or everyone made the cut. We analysed what was omitted from the text.

The green economy, finance or state commitments countries are all missing – key components of any future climate deal.

2. Rio+40 could look very different

With the Earth Summit seen by many as a colossal failure, NGOs and Trade Unions called for civil society to ‘mobilise’ for change.

Could we soon see a new era for civil society with a place at the negotiating table?

Youth and Civil Society groups staged a walk out at the conference to protest against governments lack of action (Source: Youth Policy)

Monique Barbut from the Global Environment Facility (a key UN Financial mechanism) called for more synergy to be created between the three Rio Conventions on climate change, biodiversity and desertification. All fighting the same problem – so let’s fight as one!

Meanwhile Carbon War Room chief and former President of Costa Rica Jose Maria Figueres has said that negotiators should not be involved in the process for more than four or five years to ensure we have a group of negotiators who are ‘connected to reality’.

3. Business leads on sustainable development

Greenpeace chief Kumi Naidoo slated politicians in Rio for being in the pockets of the corporations, but the conference did demonstrate the work that businesses large and small are doing to drive sustainability.

Take wind energy giants Suzlon, or Airbus – who told us about their plans to run a ‘perfect flight’ on 50% biofuels.

But what is the motivation of business to get involved in these talks? For Norine Kennedy from the US Council for International Business the answer is simple: “Business cannot succeed in societies that fail.”

4. The UK sees boost in renewables, but also in emissions 

The UK has a long way to go on its climate and energy policies (© UN)

Meanwhile, outside of the world of negotiations, new figures from the National Office of Statistics looking at the UK’s energy and environment performance were a mixed bag.

While some progress have been made on renewables, forestry and fossil fuel use, the country is still not meeting its emission targets.

This was a warning echoed by the UK’s Committee on Climate Change this week, as they said Britain could face missing climate goals because the economic slump, not proactive policy, has been the main reason behind the greenhouse gas emissions fall seen in recent years.

5. Australia’s outback could bear brunt from climate change

New research this week from the University of Adelaide warned that South Australia’s Arabunna region could be one of the worst hit regions from climate change, as it becomes hotter and drier.

Damage in the area could include bushfires, dust storms and drought and could impact local food sources, warned the report.

It urged urgent work to set up adaptation plans, and said working alongside the indigenous communities in the area would be vital in doing this.

The post A week in climate change: Five things we learnt appeared first on Climate Home News.

Figures released by the UK’s Office of National Statistics find mixed results for the country’s environmental performance.

The figures measure a variety of areas, from coal and gas use, energy consumption, emissions, renewable energy sources, forestry and environmental taxes.

It builds up a picture generally of the direction the country is moving in both in terms of energy and in terms of greenhouse gas emissions.

RTCC’s environmental report card aims to assess the environmental performance of the UK.

How well is the UK performing when it comes to the environment and climate change? (© UN)

Use of fossil fuels and greenhouse gas emissions output

The UK’s use of coal halved between 1990 and 2010 (from 66.2 Mtoe to 32.5 Mtoe) and its use of natural gas almost doubled in the same period. A similar switch was seen between petrol and diesel.

Other fuels fell by 20.8% driven by decreases in fuel oil, gas oil and coke despite an increase in aviation.

While greenhouse gas emissions were down on 1990, they saw an increase of 3% from 2009 to 2010 to 664 million tonnes of CO2e.

Grade:

While the move from more carbon intensive fuels such as coal to alternatives such as gas can be viewed as a positive step, the huge increase in natural gas is still a negative for climate change, and greenhouse gas emissions saw a rise from 2009.

Energy consumption

Energy consumption increased by 3% compared with 2009. While this was below the levels between 1995 and 2008, it is still an increase of 1.9% from 1990. Consumption from households was the biggest contributor to the rise, followed by manufacturing (although this was down on 1990 levels), transport and communication and trade – all sectors driven by consumer wants and needs.

There was also a 3.8% increase in the direct use of energy from fossil fuels between 2009 and 2010.

Grade:

Energy consumption in many sectors continues to rise, or has not declined. Much of this is down to consumer lifestyles and day-to-day living with household’s energy consumption the highest. While manufacturing had seen a decrease on energy consumption since 1990, it still remained the second biggest user of energy.

Renewable energy use

The use of energy from renewable and waste sources grew five fold between 1990 and 2010, and in 2010 it accounted for 3.2% of total energy consumption. An increase of 6.8% was seen between 2009 and 2010.

This increase was driven by road transport biofuels and wood energy consumption. In a similar trend to energy consumption, it was the use of renewables by households which was the major contributor to this figure, followed by use in the electricity, water and waste industry groups.

Grade:

Figures on renewables provide evidence of a positive trend in production of clean energy, however these figures continue to full short of the potential for renewable energy in the UK, particularly technologies including solar, wind and hydropower which currently only account for 17% of renewable energy generation.

Environmental taxes

The government raised £43.3 billion from environmental taxes in 2011 – 2.9% of GDP. This was £1.2 billion more than in 2010 and more than double that raised in 1993.

Broken down this included £33.5 billion in energy taxes, £5.8 billion in road vehicles taxes and £4.0 billion in other taxes – including air passenger duty, landfill tax, and aggregates levy.

Grade:

While environmental tax revenue has increased, as a proportion of GDP it has fallen since 1993. Poor explanations of what is and is not a ‘green’ tax have created unnecessary opposition. Innovative funding sources have so far been ignored. 

Forestry conservation

Forestry cover across the UK increased by 0.3% last year. In March 2011, 12.7% of the UK land area was covered in woodland, two and a half times the area covered in 1924.

This can largely be explained by new commercial conifer plantations from the 1950s and 1980s and the switch from the National Inventory of Woodland and Trees to the National Forestry Inventory – which includes greater coverage.

The estimated market value of UK woodland increased 69% to £9 billion in 2011 compared to 2008, while the UK consumption of wood products decreased in 2011 after rising in 2010.

Grade:

The trend towards woodland coverage being increased, along with the value of such woodland is a positive step.  

The post UK’s energy and environment report card appeared first on Climate Home News.

The compromise text proposed by Brazil at the Rio+20 summit has been harshly criticized by Greenpeace and labeled an abject failure.

Greenpeace wants heads of states to show real leadership when they start discussions in Rio on Wednesday. (Source: Maria Elisa Franco)

With negotiations faltering the Brazilian Government produced a compromise document that is set to form the backbone of discussions by heads of states and ministers at the high-level segment, beginning on Wednesday.

“What we have on the table here is an abject failure of responsibilities from governments. If this text gets adopted we are facing a future of pollution plunder and destruction,” Daniel Mittler, Political Director at Greenpeace International told RTCC.

“This is a tragic document, an insult to our children and an abject failure of our governments.”

One anticipated outcome of the Rio+20 Summit was agreement to end, or at least reform, fossil fuel subsidies. However, based on the current document, this appears to be unlikely.

“The text on fossil fuel subsidies is risible,” said Mittler. “It has no definition of what they call ‘inefficient fossil fuel subsidies’, it has no targets, no timetable, it doesn’t commit to anything. It’s very upsetting and surprising that though many governments are desperate to deliver on the needs of their people, they are not even taking the most obvious choice, which is to stop lining the pockets of multinational oil companies, who really do not need the money.”

Fossil fuel subsidies in 2012 are estimated at $775bn.

“It’s a sign of how the polluters are in charge here at Rio+20. Governments are listening to the polluters that are benefitting from the current status quo rather than listening to the people, who want transformative change,” said Mittler.

“It’s companies like Shell that that are pushing our governments not to phase out fossil fuels fairly and justly over a clear timeline. It’s companies like them that have to take the blame. In that sense it is unfair that all the blame is put on the governments.”

While he welcomed some significant progress on the establishment of expanded ocean protections, he noted that some ideas that had formulated at the original Earth Summit in 1992, such as the replacement of GDP as the main measure of development, were yet to bear fruit.

“We have to remember that there were many things that were not great about the outcome of the 1992 Earth Summit. For example governments pretended that nuclear power was part of the sustainable development agenda, we’re not nostalgic for 1992.

“But if those that were there could see what was going on now they would be disappointed and aware that on many issues, we’re not going forwards but backwards. This summit could very well be known as Rio minus 20.”

National delegations will discuss the comprise agreement today, two days after it was supposed to be finalized ahead of the high-level talks.

The post Greenpeace: “Polluters are in charge at Rio+20” appeared first on Climate Home News.

The US military is set to be blocked from investing in the use, or development of biofuels until they are cheaper than fossil fuels.

Critics say that without military investment, that threshold will not be reached.

The US military is experimenting with biofuels at sea, in the air and on land. (Source: Flickr/familymwr)

A bill to cut biofuel investment has now passed through two hurdles, a Senate Budget Committee by 13 votes to 12, and the House of Representatives (299-120) but could now be vetoed by President Obama.

The Whitehouse has said that it could wield its veto stating that failure to “procure alternative fuels…would further increase American reliance on fossil fuels, thereby contributing to geopolitical instability and endangering our interests abroad”.

The US Navy is responsible for many of the largest biofuel trials in the world.

Its efforts have contributed to a huge drop in the cost of the fuel bringing it close to cost competiveness with fossil fuels.

The Navy reportedly paid $424 per gallon for biofuels in October 2010 but just $26.67 in December 2011.

All three branches of the US military are interested in sourcing aviation fuel from biological sources.

The Army is already road testing its Warrior vehicles with hybrid, fuel cells and alternative fuels.

“I think the Pentagon should continue to invest in biofuels,” Mark Udall, US Senator (Democrat-Colorado) told Platts Energy Week. “In the long run, it’ll be cheaper. The forces we have to deploy overseas to protect oil supply lines can be reduced. As fossil fuel prices increase – and they will – having a competitor in the essence of biofuels will be important.

“I’m convinced that, over time, the price of these biofuels is going to drop dramatically. We should, I think, in the overall R&D budget for the military, make this kind of investment.”

As well as a key source of research the Department of Defence is also a big customer for the industry purchasing 450,000 gallons of biofuels for fighter jets in 2011.

The Department of Defence has set itself a target to supply 25% of its energy from renewable sources by 2025.

VIDEO: Rear Admiral David W. Titley explains why climate change is taken seriously in the US Navy…

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