21 January 2016, Reuters, U.S. appeals court declines to block Obama carbon emissions plan. In a big victory for the Obama administration, a U.S. federal court on Thursday rejected a bid by 27 states to block its Clean Power Plan, the centerpiece of its strategy to combat climate change by reducing carbon emissions from power plants. A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit issued a brief order denying an application seeking to stay the rule while litigation continues. The states, led by West Virginia, and several major business groups in October launched the legal challenges seeking to block the Obama administration’s proposal to curb carbon dioxide emissions from power plants. More than a dozen other states and the National League of Cities, which represents more than 19,000 U.S. cities, filed court papers backing the Environmental Protection Agency’s rule. The rule aims to lower carbon emissions from the country’s power plants by 2030 to 32 percent below 2005 levels. It is the main tool for the United States to meet the emissions reduction target it pledged at U.N. climate talks in Paris last month. For President Barack Obama, executing his climate change strategy would be a legacy-defining accomplishment. “We are confident that the plan will reduce carbon pollution and deliver better air quality, improved public health, and jobs across the country,” the White House said in a statement on Thursday. The court action means the regulation remains in place but it is not the final word in the legal fight. The appeals court still has to hear oral arguments on June 2 and decide whether the regulation is lawful. Read More here
Category Archives: The Mitigation Battle
21 January 2016, Climate News Network, Carbon capture plans need urgent aid. Call for governments to give financial backing for technology that could help save the world from overheating by preventing CO2 escaping into the atmosphere. Governments may no longer be investing in the capture of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. But a new study says that doesn’t mean it’s a bad idea. It argues that the world just needs to think harder and spend more to make the technology work because, to contain climate change, it may prove the only realistic and affordable way to dramatically reduce carbon emissions. Many governments appear to agree, and include carbon capture and storage in their plans to keep the world from dangerous climate change, But, at the same time, many are abandoning many trials that are needed to make it work. David Reiner, senior lecturer in technology policy at the University of Cambridge Judge Business School, argues in the new journal Nature Energy that stopping trials is foolish. Effective answer In a world addicted to fossil fuel energy, but threatened with catastrophic climate change driven by the greenhouse gas emissions from those same fossil fuels, he says that one effective answer would be to capture the carbon dioxide before it gets into the atmosphere, and then store it. He writes that the only way to find out how to do this is to spend billions on a range of possible attempts at carbon capture and storage (CCS), and then choose the best one. “If we are serious about meeting aggressive national or global emissions, the only way to do it affordably is with CCS,” Dr Reiner says. “But, since 2008, we have seen a decline in interest in CCS, which has essentially been in lock step with our declining interest in doing anything serious about climate change.” Just before the UN climate change summit in Paris last December, the UK government cancelled a £1 billion competition to support large-scale demonstration projects. Since 2008, other projects have been cancelled in the US, Canada, Australia and Europe. Read More here
18 January 2016, The Conversation, Heading north: how the export boom is shaking up Australia’s gas market. You might have missed it, but last month something unusual happened in Australia’s eastern gas market. Gas in a major pipeline that normally flows from north to south started flowing in the opposite direction for the first time. This seemingly small change reflects big upheavals in Australia’s gas market as exports expand significantly. At Gladstone, Queensland, coal seam gas companies have invested around A$80 billion in equipment to chill gas to -160℃ and convert it to liquefied natural gas (LNG). This liquefied gas is then loaded onto ships and sold to overseas customers. Exports are well underway with over 80 70,000-tonne LNG cargoes loaded in 2015. As shown in the following chart, eventually three times as much gas will be exported from Queensland in the form of LNG each year as has historically been used in all of eastern Australia. Read More here
15 January 2016, Renew Economy, Australia snubs 1st major post-Paris summit after killing renewables target. ABU DHABI: Australia has chosen not to send any government representatives to the first major post Paris climate change conference, as new data confirms how the Coalition government has effectively killed the renewable energy target as an effective policy mechanism. In 2015, the world invested a record $US329 billion in renewable energy. But in Australia, the RET – the country’s primary policy mechanism – has attracted just $15 million in investment in nearly two years. The data, from Bloomberg New Energy Finance, confirms that since the Abbott government announced its review into the RET in early 2014, the scheme has been at a standstill. That remains the case – even though renewable energy certificates have jumped to record levels of $74/MWh – because utilities and financiers refuse to sign contracts, due to the lack of policy certainty and because they believe that the Coalition could change the target again. Indeed, more than half Australia’s investment in renewable energy in 2015 (of $A4.1 billion) comes from households and businesses, who spent $2.2 billion in 2015 adding rooftop solar PV to their home and commercial premises. Read More here
