EU/ERBD News
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January 25, 2012 A global environmental update US president Barack Obama pledged support for his country’s shale-gas boom, but said the government must focus on safe development of the energy source, Reuters reported. In his annual state-of-the-union address, Obama pressed again for ending tax breaks for the oil and gas industry, while adding that he would...
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An international team of scientists says global warming can be slowed in the short run – preventing millions of deaths from dirty air – by reducing methane and soot, according to the Associated Press. The researchers said soot causes rainfall patterns to shift, and reducing it would lessen droughts in southern Europe and parts of Africa and also...
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Countries attending the UN’s Rio+20 meeting in Brazil in June will be asked to sign up for 10 new sustainable development goals and promise to build green economies, The Guardian reported a draft agenda document as saying. The participants in the first Earth Summit in 20 years also will be asked to negotiate a new agreement to protect oceans, approve...
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Petrol stations were blockaded and tyres set alight as hundreds of Nigerians protested against the removal of fuel subsidies that saw petrol prices more than double at the start of the new year, CNN said. Rich in oil reserves, Nigeria has poor infrastructure and, according to UN figures, its impoverished citizens live on less than US$2 a day. Royal Dutch...
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China's 12th 5 year plan Energy efficiency and the use of Renewable Energy resources has been indicated as a key area for China to develop and invest. This Focus has created excellent business opportunities for ABB Automation in China. With the rapid industrialization of China over the years ABB has been an important player in the Energy efficiency and Renewable...
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International airlines lost their legal challenge to the European Union’s planned expansion of its carbon cap-and-trade system, Bloomberg News reported. The European Court of Justice upheld the validity of the plan to impose emissions curbs on flights to and from EU airports starting next year. US airlines and others argued that the EU plan was unlawful. ...
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Canada has been widely condemned as “irresponsible” and “reckless” for pulling out of the Kyoto Protocol a day after committing to a future legally binding deal at UN climate talks in Durban, The Guardian reported. China, which agreed for the first time to legal limits on its greenhouse-gas emissions, denounced Canada’s...
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A global legally binding deal on climate change is likely to be “beyond our reach – for now”, UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon told delegates at climate talks in Durban, The Guardian said. Saying he was looking for only “incremental advances”, Ban cited “grave economic troubles in many countries”, as well as “abiding...
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The world is getting hotter, with 2011 one of the warmest years on record, and humans are to blame, the World Meteorological Organisation said. In a statement released to coincide with UN climate talks under way in Durban, South Africa, the WMO said the warmest 13 years of average global temperatures have all occurred since 1997, contributing to extreme weather...
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As governments prepare to gather in Durban for the latest round of UN-led climate change negotiations, new figures cited by AP showed global warming gases in the world’s atmosphere have hit record levels. Concentrations of heat-trapping carbon dioxide are up 39% since the start of the industrial era and have now hit 389 parts per million, the World Meteorological...
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