Experts and agencies have overwhelmingly deemed the plan not to be credible. And burning more coal and gas in the medium term only leads one way
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Let’s not waste time with niceties: the Coalition’s nuclear plan is a fantasy. The vision laid out on Friday by a quartet of opposition frontbenchers is not going to eventuate, regardless of the result of the next election.
That’s not because nuclear energy is necessarily a terrible idea, in a global sense. While waste is an issue, nuclear plants offer zero-emissions power and will be needed in places with fewer energy options. But the claims put forward by the opposition – that Australia needs nuclear, or could have it in the way the Coalition describes – do not stand up to scrutiny.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
12/13/2024 - 09:00
12/13/2024 - 06:00
Chevron spent billions trying to destroy him after he won the largest pollution case in history. It’s time for Biden to end this nightmare
It’s a tale as old as time: an underdog fighting for what’s right, and a powerful giant doing everything it can to stop him. Yet in today’s America, the giants don’t lose – they rig the system to crush anyone who dares to challenge them.
That’s exactly what happened to Steven Donziger, a well-known human rights lawyer who stood up to oil giant Chevron. After helping Indigenous and farming communities in Ecuador secure a historic $9.5bn judgment against the company for decades of environmental destruction, Chevron retaliated with a vicious legal campaign designed not just to discredit him, but to ruin his life.
Jim McGovern is a congressman from Massachusetts
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12/13/2024 - 05:48
‘Clean power 2030’ plan will speed up planning and give energy secretary final say on major infrastructure projects
The UK will not face blackouts under Labour’s proposed shake-up of energy supply, Ed Miliband has said, as he unveiled plans to boost clean power by the end of the decade.
The energy secretary insisted the transition away from fossil fuels was “unstoppable.”
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12/13/2024 - 05:26
Find is ‘hopeful sign’ the species, one of world’s largest and rarest freshwater fish, is not at imminent risk of extinction
Six critically endangered Mekong giant catfish — one of the largest and rarest freshwater fish in the world — have been caught and released in Cambodia, reviving hopes for the survival of the species.
The underwater giants can grow up to 3 metres long and weigh up to 300kg. They are found only in south-east Asia’s Mekong River but in the past inhabited the entire 3,044-mile (4,900km)-long river all the way from its outlet in Vietnam to its northern reaches in China’s Yunnan province.
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12/13/2024 - 05:00
Amid Italian island’s worst drought, towns such as Troina are fighting for survival as supplies run dry and tensions rise
An ancient Sicilian proverb goes like this: “When water to two fountains flows, one will stay dry – that’s how it goes.” The residents of the small town of Troina in the heart of Sicily, struck by a long and unprecedented drought, perhaps understand its meaning better than anyone else. When authorities decreed that the little water left in their dam should be shared with the villages of another province, they took action, and, on 30 November, occupied the distribution centre of the reservoir, blocking access.
“It’s a war between the poor; we are aware of it,” says Salvatore Giamblanco, 66, owner of a bed and breakfast in Troina. “But we had no other choice. The dam is drying up. We have difficulty finding water for ourselves. I had to cancel numerous reservations due to the lack of water. If we also have to share what little we have with other towns, we will all be left dry.”
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12/13/2024 - 03:10
Action helps thwart advance of invasive yellow-legged hornet that can kill 50 bees a day and has devastated honeybee colonies in France and Italy
Rapid action against an invasive bee-killing hornet has stopped its spread in the UK despite suitable climate and habitat for the insect, a study has found.
Research led by the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (UKCEH) looked at how suitable European countries were for the yellow-legged or Asian hornet to become established, and how they might have spread without action.
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12/13/2024 - 00:00
Energy secretary to set out plan to boost renewable energy supply, such as building canopies of solar panels on outdoor car parks
Ed Miliband has pledged to bring in “the most ambitious reforms to the country’s energy system in generations” as he presses ahead with plans to accelerate the development of onshore windfarms in England.
The energy secretary is to set out the government’s “clean power 2030” plan on Friday, including measures to boost the UK’s renewable energy supply such as building canopies of solar panels on outdoor car parks.
Reforming the system for connecting new projects to the national grid to prioritise the most viable projects;
Speeding up decisions on planning permission by empowering planners to prioritise critical energy infrastructure;
Expanding the renewable auction process to allow funding to be secured before planning permission in an effort to stop delays and get more projects connected;
Allowing households to get access to cheaper tariffs at different times of day.
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12/12/2024 - 14:59
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Peter Dutton says nuclear ‘will make electricity cheaper’ but critics say Coalition costings a ‘fantasy’
The glaring gaps and unanswered questions in the Coalition’s nuclear plan and costings
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Bowen lashes Coalition plan to keep ageing coal-fired power stations open beyond middle of next decade
Under the Coalition’s plan, ageing coal-fired power stations would stay open beyond the middle of the next decade when most of the operators say they’ll have to shut – is that realistic?
The biggest threat to reliability in our energy system is coal-fired power now. We are dealing with … outages, breakdown, on a daily basis and that is what is the biggest threat to the reliability of our energy system and it’s a recipe for blackouts to keep ageing coal-fired power stations in the grid for longer.
What they have also done is very clearly in their costings of their own policy rejected the CSIRO and Aemo’s work. Now, CSIRO and Aemo have been talking about the cost of nuclear since way before we were in office as being the most expensive form of energy available.
Fundamentally what the Coalition is asking the Australian people to believe is this: that they can introduce the most expensive form of energy and it will be end up being cheaper. It won’t pass the pub test. It won’t pass the sniff test because it is just a fantasy.
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12/12/2024 - 11:59
Scientists have today announced the discovery of a species of lipstick vine completely new to science, from the depths of the Philippine rainforest. The team of botanists made the discovery during an expedition to the remote Barangay Balbalasang rainforest on the island of Luzon in 2022. This almost impenetrable wilderness takes days to reach and has to be hacked through by a machete. The team stayed with the Banao Tribe, an indigenous community who protect their local forest.
12/12/2024 - 09:00
Changing state guidelines to lift the wind speed at which turbines start spinning won’t notably affect energy generated, government consultants say
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Victoria will consider changing windfarm guidelines after government research found lifting the wind speed at which turbines start spinning could significantly reduce bat deaths without notably affecting the energy generated.
Ecologist Emma Bennett has estimated between 25,000 and 50,000 bats die annually from collisions with the about 2,300 wind turbines operating in Victoria.
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