Water companies have logged five sewage spills a day, every day, for a decade, analysis by the Observer shows
Water companies in England and Wales have averaged five serious sewage spills into rivers or seas every day over the past decade, the Observer can reveal.
Analysis of Environment Agency data has found that the 10 firms recorded 19,484 category 1-3 pollution incidents between 2013 and 2022, the most recent year recorded, an average of one every four and a half hours.
Continue reading...Coalition proposal would cost a minimum of $116bn – the same as Labor’s plan for almost 100% renewables by 2050, the Smart Energy Council says
The Coalition’s pledge to build seven nuclear reactors as part of its controversial energy plan could cost taxpayers as much as $600bn while supplying just 3.7% of Australia’s energy mix by 2050, according to the Smart Energy Council.
The analysis found the plan would cost a minimum of $116bn – the same cost as delivering the Albanese government’s plan for 82% renewables by 2030, and an almost 100% renewable energy mix by 2050.
Continue reading...Exclusive: State department official urges politicians to do ‘the right thing’, citing ‘collective responsibility’
A senior US official has urged Australia and other countries not to back away from their 2030 climate commitments, insisting that “we all have a collective responsibility for the planet we live in”.
The message from Australia’s top security ally contrasts with rhetoric from the opposition leader, Peter Dutton, who claimed on Saturday the Labor government was “appeasing the international climate lobby” and “global climate activists”.
Continue reading...Study suggests exposure to chemicals manufactured to resist water and heat likely to affect health of offspring
New research has found for the first time that PFAS “forever chemicals” accumulate in the testes, and the exposure probably affects children’s health.
The toxic chemicals can damage sperm during a sensitive developmental period, potentially leading to liver disease and higher cholesterol, especially in male offspring, the paper, which looked at the chemicals in mice, noted.
Continue reading...Opposition leader tells Liberal party officials that state premiers ‘won’t stop us’ and labels Anthony Albanese a ‘child in a man’s body’
Peter Dutton has vowed a Coalition government would override the states’ legislated ban on nuclear power, telling party officials on Saturday that state premiers “won’t stop us”.
The opposition leader made the comments in an address to the federal Liberal party council in Sydney, where he escalated his attacks on Anthony Albanese. He called the prime minister a “fraud” and a “child in a man’s body” that is “still captured in his university years”.
Continue reading...Labour leader says he would refuse to participate in negotiations for another independence referendum if he is elected PM
Speaking of Nigel Farage: the Reform UK leader has praised the misogynist influencer Andrew Tate for being an “important voice” for the emasculated and giving boys “perhaps a bit of confidence at school” in online interviews that appear to be aimed at young men over the past year.
The Guardian’s Rowena Mason and Ben Quinn report:
Continue reading...We unpack the questions that remain about the Coalition’s plan – and the contradictions in their messaging
The opposition leader, Peter Dutton, claims his nuclear power plan would underpin local economies and energy security for “another 80, up to 100 years” – but the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, claims the Coalition’s long-awaited idea has “fallen apart within 24 hours”.
Questions remain about the cost, type, output and design of the reactors. There has been opposition from state premiers and from the owners of the proposed sites, who don’t plan to sell.
Continue reading...Missisauga officials have twice forcibly cut Wolf Ruck’s grass and billed him, after he decided to rewild his garden
Most mornings, Wolf Ruck walks the mown paths in his yard in Mississauga, Ontario, watching for insects landing on the goldenrod, birds feeding on native seed heads, and chipmunk kits playing in the tall grass.
The septuagenarian artist, film-maker and former Olympic canoeist began rewilding his garden with native plants three years ago, as part of a growing movement across Canada towards replacing water-thirsty lawns with “naturalised gardens”.
Continue reading...This blog is now closed.
Australia needs more gas supply on east coast, Albanese says
Anthony Albanese is speaking to the ABC from Devonport.
We’ll work those issues through with Aemo.
We need more gas supply. We announced our future gas strategy a short while ago because we understand that we need more supply. Gas has an important role to play in manufacturing in particular. But also in providing firming capacity for the renewables rollout.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Chris Skidmore, ex-energy minister, says Rishi Sunak’s bid to turn net zero into culture war issue is ‘greatest tragedy of his premiership’
The Conservatives’ former net zero tsar has revealed that he intends to vote Labour for the first time because Rishi Sunak has been “siding with climate deniers” to politicise the energy transition.
Writing exclusively in the Guardian, Chris Skidmore, a former energy minister, said he could not back the Tories, who had argued that net zero was “a burden and not a benefit”, a decision that he said would cost it votes.
Continue reading...Hugh Durrant-Whyte says 2045 is a realistic timeframe, adding it was likely to be ‘more expensive than anything else you could possibly think of’
Australia would need “many decades” to develop the regulations and skills to operate a nuclear power plant, and the experience gained at the existing Lucas Heights facility won’t help much, according to New South Wales’ chief scientist and engineer.
Hugh Durrant-Whyte said he stood by comments made to a 2019 NSW upper house inquiry into uranium mining and nuclear facilities that running a plant and its fuel supply chain would require skills “built up over many decades”.
Continue reading...Experts predict major electricity price hikes if opposition proposal to slow rollout of large-scale renewable projects goes ahead
Australians’ annual household power bills could increase by hundreds of dollars, and up to $1,000, under a Coalition plan to slow the rollout of large-scale renewable energy and use more gas-fired electricity before nuclear plants are ready, analysts say.
As Peter Dutton faced cross-party resistance to his announcement that he would go to the next election promising to eventually build seven nuclear plants, energy market analysts warned the Coalition’s proposal would probably lead to a significant rise in prices over the next decade, before a nuclear industry came online.
Continue reading...Two Just Stop Oil activists broke into private airfield at Stansted airport on Thursday before targeting jets
Just Stop Oil activists have sprayed orange paint over private jets at Stansted airport on the airfield where Taylor Swift’s plane is stationed, the environmental group has said.
Two activists, Jennifer Kowalski, 28, a former sustainability manager from Dumbarton, and Cole Macdonald, 22, from Brighton, broke into a private airfield in Stansted at 5am on Thursday before targeting the jet.
Continue reading...Researchers find extreme heat four times more likely than at turn of millennium and urge reduction in fossil fuels
The deadly heatwave that scorched large swaths of Mexico, Central America and the southern US in recent weeks was made 35 times more likely due to human-induced global heating, according to research by leading climate scientists from World Weather Attribution (WWA).
Tens of millions of people have endured dangerous day – and nighttime temperatures as a heat dome engulfed Mexico – a large and lingering zone of high pressure that stretched north to Texas, Arizona and Nevada, and south over Belize, Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador.
Continue reading...‘We want this to be on the bucket list of visitors from around the world because it is so special globally,’ environment minister says
Australia has taken the first steps to nominating parts of Cape York for recognition as Unesco world heritage.
The area features 17,000 year-old rock art – some of the world’s largest – and is home to more than 300 threatened species, including the green sawfish, Cape York rock wallaby and southern cassowary.
Continue reading...With lagoons once choked by rubbish, pressure from the appalled community led the government to ban certain single-use products
For generations, the people of Erakor village in the Pacific nation of Vanuatu would pass their time swimming in the local lagoon. Ken Andrew, a local chief, remembers diving in its depths when he was a child, chasing the fish that spawned in its turquoise waters.
That was decades ago. Now 52, Andrew has noticed a more pernicious entity invading the lagoon: plastic.
Continue reading...Environmentalists hail decision to end practice in five years but aquaculture industry warns of 6,000 jobs at risk
Canada will ban open-net pen salmon farming in British Columbia coastal waters in five years, the government has announced, a decision that has been welcomed by environmental groups but opposed by the aquaculture industry.
The Liberal government made the decision in 2019 to transition to closed containment technologies to protect declining wild Pacific salmon populations.
Continue reading...Commission recommends 33-point plan to ensure oil giant complies with state climate commitments
The French government should intervene in TotalEnergies and spur faster climate action, a senate inquiry commission has concluded.
The commission, set up to explore ways the state could guarantee that the oil conglomerate complies with French climate commitments, recommended 33 steps the government should take to “encourage a rapid, orderly and effective transition”.
Continue reading...Tony Wood of the Grattan Institute rejects Coalition’s claim electricity prices are high due to Labor’s renewables policy
Peter Dutton’s claim that nuclear energy would lead to cheaper power bills has been rejected by energy experts, with one saying there was “no credible reason” to think adding “the most expensive form of bulk electricity” would cut prices.
They said a range of evidence, including a recent CSIRO analysis, suggested nuclear power would be more expensive than other options, and that solar and wind system under construction – supported by firming technology – was the cheapest option.
Continue reading...Sites named at Collie, Mt Piper, Callide, Tarong, Liddell, Northern energy in South Australia and Loy Yang. Follow the day’s news live
Sussan Ley says Coalition nuclear policy will be a ‘sensible proposition’
I just wanted to return to Sussan Ley’s appearance on Sky News this morning, where she was asked how a potential future Coalition nuclear policy would circumvent nuclear bans:
We’ll work through all that. We have a sensible proposition to put to the Australian people and I know that when we talk about nuclear people are starting to tune in, understanding that if 19 of the 20 biggest economies in the world are using nuclear, if it makes sense for cleaner baseload power, because it’s zero emissions, if it helps us get to 2050 net zero, if it does all of the things that we want it to do in terms of emissions, and in terms of securing affordable cheaper power for Australians … why would people not consider it? And I believe they will.
Now, the government says it’s renewables only. We can see that that’s actually not going to happen. The government talks about hydrogen, it’s not at scale. It’s not even something they can demonstrate works in that short timeframe and they talk about batteries that aren’t going to provide the storage for their renewables.
So, they are in a complete mess over this, and they need to be put on the sticky paper and asked what they are going to do for families, households and manufacturing businesses.
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