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Reuters: Almost 50 nations made progress on Friday towards a "Green Fund" to help poor countries fight global warming but hosts Mexico and Switzerland said a full U.N. climate treaty was out of reach for 2010. Environment ministers and senior officials meeting in Geneva also examined how to raise a promised $100 billion a year in climate aid from 2020 -- perhaps from carbon markets, higher plane fares or taxes on shipping -- to be managed by the Fund. "We think we should be able to ...

Business Green: The UK feed-in tariff is going from strength to strength, according to new government figures that suggest the number of eligible installations grew exponentially during August. Government data analysed by renewable energy installation specialist Ownergy reveals that almost 4,000 installations came online, representing nearly double the number of installations completed in July. In total the new installations will deliver 11.28MW of renewable energy capacity, again doubling the ...

Business Green: Australia's leading energy companies today added their voices to calls for the next government to introduce a carbon pricing mechanism as soon as possible, joining a coalition of civil society groups which yesterday issued a statement demanding the introduction of a new climatye change bill. Today's fresh call for action came in the form of an open letter from The Clean Energy Council, which represents most mainstream energy retailers in Australia, including AGL, TRUenergy and Origin, ...

Independent: To avoid being 'greenwashed,' consumers cynical of corporate environmental claims can take a number of steps to ensure they are really buying 'green.' A major barrier in consumers trusting in so-called environmentally friendly goods is the fear of 'greenwashing' - essentially the practice of companies using misleading PR or marketing that creates an erroneous perception of their brands' products as environmentally friendly. As a result of greenwashing, consumers are cynical or in ...

Business Green: The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is planning to introduce further greenhouse gas (GHG) regulations, but will not deliver cuts in emissions on the scale that would have been achieved had Congress approved plans for a dedicated climate change bill. Citing an unnamed official at the agency, Reuters reported yesterday that the EPA is working on new policies to curb carbon emissions following last year's controversial ruling that allows the watchdog to regulate GHG emissions ...

Business Green: EBay has introduced a reusable shipping box for sellers on the auction site, in a move that the company said would not only deliver environmental benefits but would also encourage buyers to become sellers. The "eBay Box" is designed to be reused over and over again, allowing users of the site to significantly cut down on packaging waste. The box is made of 100 per cent FSC-certified and recycled material, printed with water-based inks, and is designed to require minimal ...

AFP: British oil giant BP revealed Friday it has so far spent eight billion dollars to battle the Gulf of Mexico disaster, as its crews retrieved key evidence from the seabed. Robotic submarines recorded the delicate operation as engineers raised a failed blowout preventer from the ruptured well and began lifting it to the surface in order to hand it over to the US Justice Department. The US government is conducting what could be a criminal investigation into the April 20 explosion ...

Independent: The global effort to reach a legally binding agreement on tackling climate change has stalled. There is little prospect of a quick breakthrough when the negotiators reconvene at Cancun in Mexico in December. Nor is it likely that there will have been much progress by the time they meet again in Cape Town a year later. An ocean of ink and a lot of finger pointing has been offered to explain the near collapse of the Copenhagen talks last year. Much attention has been paid to the ...

NYT: An oil rig caught fire in the Gulf of Mexico on Thursday, forcing workers to dive overboard to escape the flames, and sending chills through a region just beginning to recover from one of the worst oil spills in history. For many, the images of smoke and flames engulfing the rig recalled the fire that sank the Deepwater Horizon rig back in April and set off an uncontrollable undersea oil leak that lasted for nearly three months. Yet despite some superficial resemblances to the ...

Guardian

Business Green: The US government has announced almost $9m (£5.8m) of fresh funding to support research into second-generation cellulosic biofuels that do not affect food supplies. The research grants, to be administered by the Departments of Agriculture and Energy, will help to increase US independence from foreign oil, officials said. The two departments will award $8.9m in grants to teams researching how to generate energy from lignocellulosic material. Researchers claim lignocellulosic ...

AFP: Oil giant BP revealed Friday it has so far spent 5.1 billion pounds to battle the Gulf of Mexico disaster, as its crews worked to retrieve key evidence from the seabed. Robotic submarines recorded the delicate operation as engineers sought to raise a failed blowout preventer from the sunken rig to the surface and hand it over to the US Justice Department. The US government is conducting what could be a criminal investigation into the April 20 explosion and subsequent oil spill ...

Press Association: The UK's greenhouse gas emissions have risen in the past two decades rather than declined, because of the carbon "embedded" in imported goods, the government's chief environment scientist has said. Speaking in a documentary to be broadcast on BBC Radio 4 next week, Professor Bob Watson said there was a need to be more open about the rises in emissions generated by-products made in places such as China but destined for the UK market. Under the current system of counting ...

Guardian: In recent years the electronics industry has gained notoriety for creating an endless stream of disposable products that make their way at life's end to developing countries, where poor people without safety gear cut and burn out valuable materials, spilling contaminants into their water, air, and lungs. Solar modules contain some of the same potentially dangerous materials as electronics, including silicon tetrachloride, cadmium, selenium, and sulfur hexafluoride, a potent greenhouse ...

AFP: Proposed US limits on offshore oil drilling could hurt BP's ability to pay for damages stemming from the huge Gulf of Mexico oil spill, a company executive said in an interview Friday. David Nagle, executive vice president for BP America, told the New York Times that legislation pending before Congress could have an impact on the company's ability to compensate losses from the Deepwater Horizon disaster. Of particular concern is a bill passed by the House of Representatives on ...

Carbon Positive: The rate of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon has fallen by almost half over the past year, according to government data. The figures are only preliminary and need to be confirmed with satellite data, but indications are that the estimate of a 47.5 per cent decline in lost forest area in the period August 2009 and August 2010 is close to the mark. Deforestation of tropical forests is a major contributor to greenhouse emissions worldwide. Forest loss adds billions of tonnes of ...

Reuters: The United States reiterated on Friday that it was committed to cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 even though the Senate has failed to pass legislation. "I am in no sense writing off legislation over time. And I'm quite sure the president isn't," U.S. climate envoy Todd Stern told a news conference during two days of talks in Geneva among about 45 nations reviewing climate finance. He said Washington would rely on a combination of regulation by the Environmental ...

Reuters: A website launched on Friday will help track whether rich countries are keeping a pledge to come up with $30 billion in climate aid for the poor, seen by the U.N. as a "golden key" to progress in talks on global warming. The United Nations-backed site (www.faststartfinance.org) so far lists cash promises by 6 European donors including Germany and Britain and 27 recipients from Bangladesh to the Marshall Islands. Many of the developing nations have blank entries on the amount of aid ...

Wheels: Anthony Haines looks toward the imminent arrival of the electric car with enthusiasm and apprehension. Why? As chief executive of Toronto Hydro, he has to run the wires that, in a few years, will charge up the batteries of thousands of cars across the city. And he knows that right now, he can't do it. "If you connect about 10 per cent of the homes on any given street with an electric car, the electricity system fails," Haines told an audience at Ryerson University ...

Vancouver Sun: British Columbians may know that green power is good power, but homeowners are shying away from alternative sources such as solar panels because of high installation costs and the inexpensive option of hydro electricity. The head of a Victoria alternative energy company says that at current energy prices, it makes little sense for homeowners served by the BC Hydro grid to convert to solar power for their home electricity. "You're looking at between 60 and 80 years for a return ...