In a previous column (July 22) I pointed out that, since switching coal-fuelled power plants to natural gas cuts CO2 emissions in half, exporting liquified natural gas (LNG) to displace coal both benefits our economy and reduces global emissions.
Also: that since converting gasoline and diesel-fuelled vehicles and ships to natural gas cuts emissions by 25 per cent, providing incentives to achieve that could substantially decrease domestic emissions, as well.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/
Europe’s power crisis was just a matter of time – and that time has come. Natural gas and electricity prices are setting record highs virtually every day, and businesses and households have gone from getting annoyed to being terrified as the bills land like hand grenades.
The continent’s power system was an accident waiting to happen, in good part because its purported virtues – vast amounts of climate-friendly renewable energy and waning numbers of climate-unfriendly coal-fired plants – were less robust than advertised.
London (CNN Business)European natural gas prices have soared so high that hundreds of millions of people could be facing cold homes or inflated energy bills over winter. There’s also fears of a knock-on impact as carbon dioxide used in food production — a byproduct of fertilizer made with natural gas — also gets more expensive.
Politicians are blaming the surge in prices on an increase in natural gas demand as the world wakes up from the pandemic, supply disruption caused by maintenance, and a less-windy-than-usual summer that saw a drop in wind-generated power.
The Narwhal
As the federal election looms, leaders of all political stripes are promising to increase the zero-emission transportation sector through incentives and investments as a key tool to tackle the climate crisis. But there’s a catch.
Positioning Canada as a leader in electrifying the transportation sector also means increasing mineral extraction to fuel that growth. Batteries that propel electric vehicles are powered by minerals like lithium, cobalt, graphite and nickel.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/
Canada is suddenly headed toward a national quota for electric vehicle sales. Mere months ago, the governing Liberals were still reluctant to commit to a so-called zero-emissions vehicle (ZEV) mandate.
They were deferring to an auto industry that strongly opposes the policy, claiming it would hurt both consumer choice and domestic manufacturing. Now, courtesy of an election campaign in which parties are trying to prove their climate credibility, a surprising cross-partisan consensus has emerged.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/
The Liberals are putting a distinctly green lens on their plans for job creation and economic growth, with promises to accelerate the transition toward a low-carbon economy if the party forms government after the Sept. 20 election.
The party platform, published Wednesday, promises a range of new green economy measures, including a 30-per-cent tax credit for clean technology investments and $2-billion to retrain oil and gas workers. It also pledges new strategies for clean-energy home renovations, aimed at kickstarting a “vibrant retrofit economy.”
The IPCC has gone code red for humanity. They have hit their loudest alarm bells. Wow. Grab your masks, and head for the exits. This is scary stuff. What dire happening could justify the IPCC reaching for the greatest alarm? There are only two possibilities.
Either Joe Biden has uttered a comprehensible sentence without outside assistance, or, the world is doomed. It has to be the latter because the former is unthinkable.
Before I get to this crisis I should point out that most of us sentenced to work in the news media know what those initials, IPCC, stand for. Contrary to the impression you’d get from reading the newspaper or listening to the news, most ordinary Canadians do not. Which is just one way of saying, they have lives. And allow me to whisper, they probably own pickup trucks.
PERTH (miningweekly.com) – The critical minerals sector is poised to become a major benefactor of the increase in global demand for solar power, advisory firm Wood Mackenzie (Woodmac) said this week.
A new report from Woodmac has shown that solar power would have a significant impact on demand for aluminium, copper and zinc, with the usage of all three metals in the sector set to double by 2040.
However, as governments fulfill their commitments to limit global warming to 2 °C and beyond, the need for solar power will become greater and demand for several base metals is expected to surge.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/
Alberta’s premier says it’s impossible for people living in a cold, northern climate like Canada to abandon fossil fuels, despite the dire conclusions of an international climate change report.
While the United Nations’ Secretary General said the report should sound a “death knell” for coal and fossil fuels, Premier Jason Kenney said demand for the subterranean fruits of this oil-rich province isn’t going anywhere.
“The notion that we can shut off a major, industrialized economy with the flick of a switch is patently unrealistic,” Kenney told reporters at a news conference at an Edmonton brewery on Monday.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/
U.S. President Joe Biden and the major U.S. automakers have pledged to set a target for electric vehicle sales of 50 per cent of total purchases by 2030, highlighting the steady (and heavily subsidized) trend toward decarbonized and electrified developed world economies.
The global research team at Bank of America Securities is attempting to identify the biggest corporate beneficiaries of the electrification movement, recommending stocks across industry sectors and including a significant number of Canadian companies.
BofA strategist Thomas Thornton, in a recent research note, raised his 2025 EV sales forecasts from 4.5 per cent to 7 per cent of total sales; by 2030, he now expects EVs to account for 20 per cent of total sales, up from 12.5 per cent.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/
President Biden on Thursday unveiled a far-reaching, multipronged plan to make U.S. cars and light trucks more fuel-efficient and to begin a shift to electric vehicles over the coming decade.
The move marks one of the administration’s most consequential pushes so far to combat climate change and tackle the nation’s biggest source of greenhouse gas emissions.
The suite of new goals and mandates, forged after months of talks with car manufacturers, autoworkers and environmental groups, is meant to transform the kind of vehicles Americans drive and to reduce the country’s reliance on fossil fuels.
Deb Haaland is the U.S. Secretary of the Interior.
As I travel throughout America, I am filled with hope as I see businesses open and communities recovering. Thanks to President Joe Biden’s leadership in passing the American Rescue Plan and making progress in defeating COVID-19, economic growth is up and unemployment is down.
The nation’s ongoing economic recovery is opening opportunities to help stabilize and empower workers who have been facing economic instability since before the pandemic.
During my trip to Schuylkill County earlier this month, I saw firsthand how hardworking coal communities here in Pennsylvania helped power our country, but are now facing significant challenges in restoring their community environments and retooling toward developing a robust and sustainable clean energy future.
In 2019, China for the first time generated more emissions than the entire developed world combined
Whenever human-induced climate change is discussed during Canada’s upcoming federal election, keep in mind the country that matters most on this issue is China and the fossil fuel that matters most in China is coal.
The reason is that whatever China does makes whatever Canada does irrelevant in terms of greenhouse gas emissions.
That’s because coal — not oil — is the most carbon intensive fossil fuel and the main contributor to global emissions. In China, coal-fired electricity supplies 57% of its energy needs. In Canada it’s 7.4%.
While we’ve been busy beating up on Albertans and their oil, Beijing has been laughing at us
After having ransacked the economies of the world’s liberal democracies and wrecked what is still quaintly called the “rules-based international order,” Xi Jinping’s police state in Beijing has now made it abundantly clear that under Xi’s supreme-leader command, the People’s Republic is determined to seize the global agenda on climate change.
And if the world responds with Canadian-style accommodation and capitulation, Beijing will persist in its ambitions — even to the point of taking the global climate hostage while the rest of us, as well as the Chinese people, suffer the consequences of catastrophic climate change.
More heat domes, more apocalyptic floods, more ruinous ecological collapse.
BHP plans to install two solar farms and a battery storage system to power the Mt Keith and Leinster mines at its Nickel West operations in Western Australia.
The clean energy sources are expected to cut emissions from electricity at the two mines by 12 per cent based on its 2020 financial year levels.
The Northern Goldfields Solar Project will include a 27.4-megawatt solar farm at Mt Keith, and a 10.7-megawatt solar farm and 10.1-megawatt battery at Leinster to reduce diesel and gas power.
