Tactical speech to pre- empt GOP

Last night President Obama gave his final State of the Union address before the elections. He used a good part of it to try to pre-empt attacks on his energy and environmental agenda from the Republicans.

But Obama in a tactical play chose to co-opt the Republicans’ pro-oil and natural gas position rather than defend his own green agenda, as environmental groups had hoped. Read the rest of this entry »

Just4theplanet has been a keen supporter of bio fuel initiatives as an alternative to fossil fuels. Biofuels are any kind of fuel made from living things, or from the waste they produce. Today, the use of biofuels has expanded throughout the globe. Some of the major producers and users of biogases are Asia, Europe and America

Now a New Zealand company supplying biofuels to Virgin has raised US$55.8m in a funding round intended to accelerate the development of next-generation integrated biorefineries.

LanzaTech uses a patented fermentation process to convert gases, including those derived from industrial and biomass sources, into fuels, avoiding the “food versus fuel” tensions faced by first-generation biofuels Read the rest of this entry »

Ecotricity aims to make a splash with new marine energy business

Ecotricity has confirmed it has entered the marine energy sector, announcing ambitious plans to install 200 SeaRaser wave power devices off the UK coast within the next five years.

The company believes the 240kW device has the potential to produce electricity at just 2p per kilowatt hour (kWh), which is not only significantly lower than the government’s projections for all other renewable energy technologies, but also undercuts new nuclear power, which is estimated to cost 10p/kWh, and natural gas power which costs 8p/kWh. Read the rest of this entry »

Reports suggest Conservatives and Lib Dems are already clashing over controversial plans for new airport

The coalition is set to face the most high profile test to date of its commitment to a low carbon economy, after it was confirmed the government will launch a formal consultation on controversial proposals for a new airport in the Thames Estuary.

Dubbed “Boris Island”, after its most prominent supporter, the Mayor of London, the proposed airport will face intense opposition from conservation groups concerned about the impact on millions of birds in the area and environmental groups who argue airport expansion runs counter to the UK’s goal of slashing carbon emissions by 80 per cent by 2050. Read the rest of this entry »

Threatened surge in coal emissions

With countries abandoning nuclear power in the wake of the Fukushima disaster there is likely to be a massive increase in coal use that could have devastating consequences for the fight against climate change.

That was the stark message delivered today at the World Future Energy Summit in Abu Dhabi by Fatih Birol, chief economist at the International Energy Agency (IEA), who warned that those countries now committed to phasing out nuclear power are likely to see greenhouse gas emissions rise in the short to medium term Read the rest of this entry »

Just days after announcing a new target to recycle more than half the country’s waste, the Welsh government has confirmed it is already seeing 49 per cent of the nation’s waste recycled as of last summer.

The new quarterly recycling figures for July to September 2011 show that Wales produced 388 thousand tonnes of municipal waste – five per cent less than the waste produced in the same period in 2010 Read the rest of this entry »

Ryanair yesterday announced it would become the first airline to highlight the cost of compliance with the EU’s emissions trading scheme (ETS) by introducing a €0.25 per passenger levy on all bookings made from next Tuesday.

The company predicted purchasing EU carbon allowances to cover its greenhouse gas emissions will cost between €15m and €20m this year and as a result argues that the new levy is necessary to cover the cost of what it describes as “the EU’s new eco-looney tax”. Read the rest of this entry »

A Malagasy-German research team has discovered a new primate species in the Sahafina Forest in eastern Madagascar, a forest that has not been studied before. The name of the new species is Gerp’s mouse lemur (Microcebus gerpi), chosen to honour the Malagasy research group GERP (Groupe d’Étude et de Recherche sur les Primates de Madagascar). Several researchers of GERP have visited the Sahafina Forest in 2008 and 2009 to create an inventory the local lemurs Read the rest of this entry »