Category Archives: Energy

Africa can become a renewable energy superpower – if climate deniers are kept at bay

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Nigel Lawson’s thinktank is pushing dirty energy on the continent with the greatest capacity for creating clean fuel

The power of climate science denial in the UK, thankfully, has been in retreat over the past decade. Nigel Lawson’s Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF) may still boast a prime Westminster address, but its influence has waned. In fact, its decline aptly mirrors the fortunes of the coal industry, including US titans such as Peabody Energy, which saw its share price plunge 99% between 2008 and 2016 before filing for chapter 11 bankruptcy.

With countries rightly phasing coal out of their energy mix, the GWPF has turned its sights on Africa to peddle its misinformation about the merits of burning fossil fuels. It has published a new report, derisively titled Heart of Darkness: Why Electricity for Africa is a Security Issue, and launched a glossy website for “energy justice”, which uses the language of climate justice campaigners to try to undermine renewable energy.

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Battery firm chooses Welsh site for Britain’s first gigafactory

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Startup firm Britishvolt, serving energy storage and electric cars, plans 30GWh battery plant at Bro Tathan

A startup company with plans to build Britain’s first gigafactory to make batteries for electric cars has chosen a site in south Wales for the plant after discussions with the Welsh government.

Britishvolt, which in May launched an ambitious effort to create a £1.2bn factory, has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Welsh government ahead of signing a lease for a former Royal Air Force base at Bro Tathan business park, south Wales.

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Tensions mount as Ethiopia allows dam across Nile headwaters to fill

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Egypt fears hydroelectric project will restrict limited waters on which its population depends

Ethiopia has allowed a controversial dam built across the headwaters of the Nile to fill with rain water, raising tensions with Egypt and Sudan.

The huge hydroelectric project on the Blue Nile, known as the Grand Renaissance dam, is at the centre of Ethiopia’s plan to become Africa’s biggest power exporter, but Egypt fears already limited Nile waters, on which its population of more than 100 million people depends, might be restricted.

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Governments put ‘green recovery’ on the backburner

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G20 countries aim their pandemic bailout spending at fossil fuel industries, leaving Paris climate change targets in doubt

Governments are spending vastly more in support of fossil fuels than on low-carbon energy in rescue packages triggered by the coronavirus crisis, new data has shown, despite rhetoric from many countries in support of a “green recovery”.

Data from the Energy Policy Tracker, a new research effort by several civil society groups, shows that at least $151bn (£120bn) of bailout cash has been spent or earmarked so far to support fossil fuels by the G20 group of large economies. Only about a fifth of this spending is conditional on environmental requirements such as reducing greenhouse gas emissions or cleaning up pollution.

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Iran denies latest blast reports and accuses west of disinformation

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Tehran says incident in early hours in garrison town of Gamdareh was a power outage

Iran has denied reports that fresh mysterious explosions have rocked two towns close to Tehran, accusing the west of waging psychological warfare by spreading false messages on social media.

Reports suggested that the blasts had occurred in the early hours of Friday in Gamdareh, a residential town that houses a number of military garrisons, including bases of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), and in Shahr-e Qods. Officials insisted the reports were false but accepted there had been a power outage.

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Petrol sold to Nigeria from Europe ‘dirtier’ than black market ‘bush’ fuel

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Samples from illegal refineries in Niger delta found to be of a higher quality than imported petrol in new analysis

Black market fuel made from stolen oil in rudimentary “bush” refineries hidden deep in the creeks and swamps of the Niger delta is less polluting than the highly toxic diesel and petrol that Europe exports to Nigeria, new laboratory analysis has found.

Shell, Exxon, Chevron and other major oil companies extract and export up to 2m barrels a day of high quality, low sulphur “Bonny Light” crude from the Niger delta. But very little of this oil is refined in the country because its four state-owned refineries are dysfunctional or have closed.

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‘New deal’ risks fuelling emissions and eroding building standards

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Green campaigners and housing experts warn Boris Johnson’s recovery plan could swiftly become a liability

Boris Johnson’s plan to build tens of thousands of new homes risks locking in high carbon emissions for decades to come, if they are built to today’s poor efficiency standards instead of being designed for net zero carbon.

The prime minister’s plans to “build, build, build” form the centrepiece of his “new deal” to lift Britain’s economy out of the coronavirus recession. About £12bn will go to building 180,000 new homes to relieve the housing crisis, while new hospitals and schools will be constructed to improve degraded public services.

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How do you deal with 9m tonnes of suffocating seaweed?

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Across the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean, scientists are developing alternative sustainable solutions to the golden tide of Sargassum

The Great Atlantic Sargassum Belt, first detected by Nasa observation satellites in 2011 and now known to be the world’s largest bloom of seaweed, stretches for 5,500 miles (8,850km) from the Gulf of Mexico to the western coast of Africa.

Millions of tonnes of floating Sargassum seaweed in coastal waters smother fragile seagrass habitats, suffocate coral reefs and harm fisheries. And once washed ashore on Mexican and Caribbean beaches, this foul-smelling, rotting seaweed goes on to devastate the tourist industry, prevent turtles from nesting and damage coastal ecosystems, while releasing hydrogen sulphide and other toxic gases as it decomposes.

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Chesapeake Energy, fracking pioneer, files for bankruptcy owing $9bn

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The Oklahoma City-based company helped turn the US into a global energy powerhouse but ran up huge debts in the process

Chesapeake Energy, the shale gas drilling pioneer that helped to turn the United States into a global energy powerhouse, has filed for bankruptcy protection.

The Oklahoma City-based company said on Sunday that it had been forced to enter chapter 11 protection because its debts of $9bn were unmanageable.

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France’s oldest nuclear reactor to finally shut down

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Environmentalists have welcomed news that the 43-year-old Fessenheim reactor will close, nine years after it was first planned

France’s oldest nuclear power plant will shut down on Tuesday after four decades in operation, to the delight of environmental activists who have long warned of contamination risks, but stoking worry for the local economy.

The Fessenheim plant, opened in 1977 and already three years over its projected 40-year life span, became a target for anti-nuclear campaigners after the catastrophic meltdown at Fukushima in Japan in 2011.

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Britain beyond lockdown: can UK become cleaner?

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As Covid-19 accelerates the shift towards renewable energy, Jonathan Watts hears how this change risks causing intergenerational injustice in Aberdeen

Like many young people in Aberdeen, Mike Scotland dreamed of a well-paid job on a rig in the North Sea, in the oil and gas field that has made his home town a boom town for most of the past 40 years.

In February the 28-year-old landed the position he had wanted with Shell, and he was due to take a helicopter to the Shearwater platform in July once he had completed training.

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Papua New Guinea chiefs call for halt to plan for country’s largest ever mine

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Locals say the Sepik river region must be protected from ‘exploitation and destruction from outsiders’

Chiefs from 28 haus tambarans – “spirit houses” – representing 78,000 people along Papua New Guinea’s remote Sepik river have formally declared they want a proposal for the country’s largest ever mine halted.

PanAust, an Australian-registered miner ultimately owned by the Chinese state-owned Guangdong Rising Assets Management, has proposed building a gold, silver and copper mine on the Frieda river, a tributary to the Sepik.

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Huge fire breaks out at India gas well blowout

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Fire has reportedly spread to homes near well that has been leaking ‘uncontrollably’ for two weeks

A massive fire has broken out at an oil field in north-eastern India, after gas that had been leaking for two weeks ignited, sending plumes of smoke and flames into the sky, and reportedly setting fire to nearby homes.

Five deaths in the area are being investigated for potential links to the gas well, which has been leaking “uncontrollably” for two weeks, according to Oil India, the state-owned company managing the oil field.

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Renewable energy stimulus can create three times as many Australian jobs as fossil fuels

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Government spending on clean energy would deliver 100,000 new jobs, EY assessment finds

Stimulus programs backing clean energy as a path out of recession would create nearly three times as many jobs for every dollar spent on fossil fuel developments, according to a financial consultancy analysis.

The assessment by professional services firm Ernst & Young (EY) says a government focus on renewable energy and climate-friendly projects to drive the economic recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic could create more than 100,000 direct jobs across the country while cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

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EU’s greenhouse gas emissions continue to fall as coal ditched

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New figures for 2018 show 2.1% drop on previous year in switch to renewables

Greenhouse gas emissions in the EU continued their fall in 2018, the latest year for which comprehensive data is available, according to a new report from Europe’s environment watchdog.

Emissions fell by 2.1% compared with 2017, to a level 23% lower than in 1990, the baseline for the bloc’s emission cuts under the UN’s climate agreements. If the UK is excluded, the decline since 1990 was smaller, standing at 20.7%.

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UK approval for biggest gas power station in Europe ruled legal

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High court rejects challenge after ministers overruled climate objections of planning officials

The UK government’s approval of a large new gas-fired power plant has been ruled legal by the high court. A legal challenge was brought after ministers overruled climate change objections from planning authorities.

The plant, which is being developed by Drax in North Yorkshire, would be the biggest gas power station in Europe, and could account for 75% of the UK’s power sector emissions when fully operational, according to lawyers for ClientEarth, which brought the judicial review.

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Deputy PM ‘very concerned’ over reports China’s power plants warned not to buy Australian coal

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Michael McCormack says trade minister and diplomats are trying to fix the issue

Deputy prime minister Michael McCormack is concerned coal exporters could face a tougher time selling the commodity into China.

There are reports the Chinese government is warning state-owned power plants not to buy new shipments of Australian thermal coal and instead favour domestic products.

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Polémico proyecto de fracking en Argentina amenazado por la pandemia de coronavirus

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El confinamiento y la caída del precio del petróleo ponen en juego el futuro de un enorme yacimiento petrolífero argentino

En las próximas semanas, se esclarecerá si el mundo vuelve a los combustibles fósiles tras la pandemia o si da un paso adelante hacia una economía limpia, mientras el FMI (Fondo Monetario Internacional) y Argentina deciden si van a continuar ofreciendo su apoyo a los inmensos yacimientos de petróleo y gas de Vaca Muerta, en Patagonia.

El objetivo del proyecto es explotar el segundo depósito más grande de esquisto del planeta (después de la Cuenca Pérmica, en Texas), pero su futuro es incierto debido al confinamiento forzoso provocado por COVID-19, que ha causado el descenso más drástico en el precio del crudo de los últimos treinta años.

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Makeshift oil refineries a necessary evil for locals in north-west Syria

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Toxic fumes and repiratory disease among hazards facing people reliant on informal processing plants for work and fuel, study finds

Black pools, long trenches and charred earth have become common sights in the fields of north-west Syria, signs of an informal oil economy that has developed during the war.

Despite damaging both the environment and health, up to 5,000 backyard oil refineries, crucial to the livelihoods of besieged Syrians, have cropped up in recent years, identified through satellite imagery in a report by open source investigators Bellingcat.

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Supertankers drafted in to store glut of crude oil

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Ships able to carry 2m barrels chartered for $335,000 a day to store oil unwanted during the Covid-19 pandemic

Giant oil tankers are being used to hold record amounts of crude at sea due to a global oversupply that threatens to overwhelm the world’s storage facilities.

A record 160m barrels of oil has been stored in “supergiant” oil tankers outside the world’s largest shipping ports following the deepest fall in oil demand in 25 years because of the coronavirus pandemic.

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