Exclusive: Looming auction to earmark £1.5bn to put power generators on standby and keep the lights on
The billionaire West Ham United investor Daniel Křetínský and Swiss commodities giant Vitol are among bidders hoping to land hundreds of millions of pounds in subsidies to keep the lights on in Great Britain.
National Grid’s electricity system operator is preparing to announce successful bidders in a “capacity market” auction this month for 2026.
Continue reading...Scathing allegations, which company rejects as ‘baseless’, will hamper access to Wall Street but surging coal price will ease burden, experts say
The ability of Adani Group to raise money will be curbed after scathing allegations in a report by an activist US short-seller, although surging coal prices that underpin the Indian conglomerate’s contentious Queensland operations will help alleviate some pressure, analysts say.
Adani, which operates the Carmichael coal and rail project via its rebranded subsidiary Bravus, is the target of US investment firm Hindenburg Research, which alleges the company has engaged in a “brazen stock manipulation and accounting fraud scheme”.
A private company called Carmichael Rail and Port Singapore Holdings with ties to Adani paid A$147m for unspecified “work in progress” assets from the Australian operations, without a detailed description.
The same private company paid A$155m for the right to use the rail facilities at the Queensland operation.
The private Carmichael company also received A$100m from an Adani subsidiary to pay off debt.
Continue reading...Stephen Fry, Emma Thompson and Mark Rylance add their voices to Richard Curtis’s Make My Money Matter campaign
Famous names including Stephen Fry, Emma Thompson and Mark Rylance have joined activists and businesses in calling on the UK’s big five banks to stop financing new oil, gas and coal expansion.
Make My Money Matter, a campaign set up by Richard Curtis, the screenwriter, director and Comic Relief co-founder, has written to the chief executives of HSBC, Barclays, Santander, NatWest and Lloyds to urge these banks to “stop financing fossil fuel expansion”.
Continue reading...Miners to be required to set aside up to 10% of production for domestic users, state energy minister Matt Kean says
New South Wales will require thermal coalminers reserve as much as 10% of their output for domestic coal-fired power stations and other users in a bid to share the burden more fairly among producers.
The move, announced on Thursday, is the latest government intervention in energy markets in a bid to limit price increases and avoid a repeat of last June’s supply shortages that helped trigger a suspension of the national electricity market.
Continue reading...‘Cease and desist’ letter signed by over 650,000 people sent to oil and gas CEOs follows removal of Greta Thunberg from coal protest
Hundreds of thousands of young climate activists have said they will continue “protesting in the streets in huge numbers” against fossil fuels, a day after Greta Thunberg was removed by German police from a condemned village atop a massive coal deposit.
In a cease-and-desist letter to the CEOs of fossil fuel companies, youth campaigners accuse them of a “direct violation of our human right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment, your duties of care, as well as the rights of Indigenous people”.
Continue reading...Ratcliffe-on-Soar to be kept viable until late 2024 after ministers make request prompted by energy crisis
A Nottinghamshire coal-burning power plant will stay open for two years beyond its planned closure date after a call from ministers prompted by the UK’s energy crisis.
Ratcliffe-on-Soar had initially been pencilled in to shut in 2022, but last year said it would have an initial extension until 31 March 2023.
Continue reading...Plan that is key to Albanese government’s 2030 target will focus on emissions intensity to encourage cleaner practices rather than cutting production
Australia’s big polluting sites will have to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by nearly 5% a year but will face no limits on the use of carbon offsets under the Albanese government’s plan to deal with industrial emitters.
The climate change minister, Chris Bowen, on Tuesday released the government’s plan to revamp the safeguard mechanism, a Coalition policy that was promised to limit emissions from more than 200 industrial facilities, but in practice has failed.
Continue reading...Queensland Resources Council says industry would welcome restrictions easing but new long-term customers since found elsewhere in Asia
Australia would benefit from a lifting of China’s ban on its coal but any gains would likely be modest as miners have largely redirected supplies elsewhere, analysts said.
Shares of ASX-listed coalminers shot up on Wednesday after reports China was considering lifting its restrictions on coal imports from Australia from April. The ban was imposed in mid-2020 amid deteriorating bilateral relations that have since begun to improve.
Continue reading...Federal and state governments have agreed to pay producers compensation for pre-existing supply contracts exceeding the cap
Anthony Albanese has rejected suggestions of a potential $450m payout to Rio Tinto and its partners for the Gladstone power plant, which could push coal price cap compensation to more than $1bn.
Albanese told Channel Seven’s Sunrise the federal government expects the cost “will be nothing like the sort of figures” reported for Gladstone although Queensland premier Annastacia Palaszczuk later appeared to confirm the figure was possible, as a maximum.
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Continue reading...Waratah Coal lodges application to overturn recommendation that lease and approvals be refused
A company owned by Clive Palmer is seeking to overturn a landmark ruling that found its plans to dig Australia’s largest thermal coalmine in central Queensland would infringe upon the human rights of future generations and exacerbate the climate crisis.
The coalition that first brought the case court – led by young First Nations women and environmentalists – is vowing to defend last month’s ruling, which they describe as “the most significant decision on climate change and human rights in Australia”.
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Continue reading...Exclusive: Cameron Dick urges resources council to stop risking coal’s social licence with ad campaign as royalty rise is here to stay
The Queensland treasurer, Cameron Dick, says the state will not back down on recent coal royalty increases, warning the mining lobby its multimillion-dollar advertising campaign opposing the changes may harm the industry.
Dick met with the Queensland Resources Council this week to ensure it was “under no misapprehension” the government would stay the course on the new progressive royalty tiers, which increase when prices are unusually high and companies are making windfall profits.
Continue reading...Report by Australia Institute finds a windfall profits tax could collect almost all this money for public use
Coal exporters from Australia reaped as much as $45bn in windfall gain in the 2021-22 year, with a similar bonanza likely this year, offering governments a budgetary boon for those willing to grasp it, the Australia Institute has said.
In a report released on Thursday, the institute’s economists said Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and subsequent disruption to energy markets alone had delivered between $13bn and $23bn of gains to coalminers. All up, those gains totalled between $39bn and $45bn.
Continue reading...Three campaign groups challenge plans to award up to 130 new licences for exploration
The UK government is facing a fresh challenge in the courts over plans to award up to 130 new licences for North Sea oil and gas exploration, in the latest attempt to stop ministers’ proposed expansion of the country’s fossil fuel production.
Three campaign groups have written to the business secretary, Grant Shapps, explaining the grounds on which they consider the latest offshore oil and gas licensing round to be unlawful. They call for the decision to award the new licences to be reversed, arguing that new oil and gas exploration and development is incompatible with the UK’s own rules and international climate obligations.
Continue reading...Mine could affect Britain’s climate commitments, which some believe could help get decision struck down
The government has given the green light to a new coalmine in Cumbria, the first in the UK for more than 30 years, but already moves have begun to challenge the decision before construction work can start.
Climate campaigners are examining the decision with a view to a legal challenge, based on the UK’s national and international legally binding climate commitments.
Continue reading...Report by Deloitte warns biggest risk to jobs in the state is a carbon-fuelled economy
A Queensland government-commissioned report by Deloitte says there could be “significant” declines in wellbeing, assets left stranded and a stagnating economy if the state doesn’t quickly transition to renewables.
The report by the global accounting giant, obtained under the state’s right to information regime, also suggests Queensland could have a bright economic future should it rapidly decarbonise in coordination with the rest of the world.
Continue reading...The state’s treasury does not expect the taxes to make a significant impact on investment decisions
The Queensland government’s imposition of higher royalties for coal producers and China’s ban on imports from Australia are having little impact on super profits, despite a campaign against the taxes by the industry.
The state’s coal industry is a clear winner from the global energy shock as the world looks for new supplies, according to data released by the Queensland Treasury.
Continue reading...Queensland’s Gladstone council is pinning its hopes on a 10-year energy transition plan, amid concerns for its future in a net zero world
The 6.30am twin-engine service from Brisbane to Gladstone on Monday morning is chock full of blokes in hi-vis and heavy boots.
But this week federal public servants, journalists, renewable energy advocates and the Queensland energy minister joined the usual crowd of Fifo workers descending on the town.
Continue reading...Critics says India’s plans to increase coal production to 1bn tonnes a year are environmentally devastating and unnecessary
Three days before India’s environment minister boarded a flight to Egypt for this year’s UN climate summit, Cop27, the country’s finance minister was busy with a new announcement.
“India needs greater investment in coal production,” said Nirmala Sitharaman at the Delhi launch of India’s biggest ever coalmine auction, where 141 new sites for coalmines will be sold off to the highest bidder.
Continue reading...Environmental groups call on Queensland government to end exemptions, with six mining ventures already given green light
At least eight coalmining projects in Great Barrier Reef catchments and floodplains have been exempted from requiring environmental impact statements by the Queensland government, with six already gaining state environmental approval.
A coalition of environmental groups that includes the Australian Conservation Foundation, Birdlife and the Queensland Conservation Council is now lobbying the Palaszczuk government to end such exemptions.
Continue reading...President not expected to attend summit but critics cast doubt on veracity of pledges the country could make
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Mexico, one of the world’s biggest greenhouse gas emitters, is expected to announce a hotchpot of old, inadequate and undeliverable climate pledges that will leave its Paris pledges in tatters, experts have warned.
Climate action has nosedived under the leadership of Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who had to be blocked from rolling back Mexico’s modest Paris greenhouse gas targets by the country’s supreme court, and emissions are rising.
A reduction in methane emissions from the state-owned oil company, Pemex – an important but existing target for which Pemex has been fined for non-compliance.
A 1,000MW state-opened solar plant – construction is already under way for a 180MW project, and the government had previously already ruled out further investment to expand the energy potential.
A lithium commitment. Mexico has the ninth-largest identified deposits of lithium – a crucial mineral for electric vehicles and other green technologies – but there has been no government investment so far in advancing extraction, and none is currently being mined. Experts say the country is years away from producing its first gram of lithium.
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