EU/ERBD News
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Record floods in Australia are causing catastrophic damage to infrastructure in the state of Queensland and have forced 75% of its coal mines, which fuel Asia’s steel mills, to halt work, Reuters quoted the state’s premier as saying. The flooding has affected an area the size of France and Germany. 2010 was exceptional for natural disasters...
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By Greenbang on Tuesday, 29th June 2010
If ever a time called for creative financing, now — 2010 in the UK — is the time.
It’s a classic case of immovable object (the need to cut fossil fuel energy use and carbon emissions) meets unstoppable force (the government’s decision to slash the deficit with a £40 billion austerity...
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The earth struck back this year, according to the Associated Press. Earthquakes, heat waves, floods, volcanoes, super-typhoons, blizzards, landslides and droughts killed at least a quarter of a million people in 2010 — the deadliest year in more than a generation. And we have ourselves to blame most of the time, say scientists and disaster experts....
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Buoyed by some progress at the UN talks in Cancún, Mexico, the world’s governments face a new battle in Durban, South Africa, between rich and poor nations over slowing climate change, Reuters reported. Governments will try to build on modest agreements to set up a fund to help developing countries adapt to global warming, along with new systems...
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The United States and China have significantly narrowed their differences on the verification of reductions in greenhouse-gas emissions, providing hope that the UN climate-change conference in Cancún, Mexico, can achieve some modest success, The New York Times quoted officials as saying. The overall talks are grinding on slowly. Himalayan residents...
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Timber companies and environment groups unveiled an agreement aimed at protecting two-thirds of Canada’s vast forests from unsustainable logging, the BBC reported. Over 72 million hectares are included in what will become the world’s largest commercial forest conservation deal. A large swathe of the Gulf of Mexico remains closed to fishing as...
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Russia, China and 11 other nations agreed a deal to double the free-roaming tiger population by 2022 at a high-level summit in St Petersburg, Reuters reported. US$350 million will be spent over five years in a bid to reverse the decline that has seen numbers fall to just 3,200 from 100,000 a century ago.
The UN warned that the promises countries...
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Alberta (Reuters) - Canada will phase out older coal-fired power plants to cut the country's greenhouse gas emissions, Environment Minister Jim Prentice said on Wednesday, as it moves to make natural-gas fired plants the new clean-power standard.
Green Business
The new standards, expected to be firmed up by early 2011, will force electricity...
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The United Nations warned that global food prices could rise by as much as 20% next year due to poor harvests and shrinking reserves, reported The Guardian. Authors of the Food and Agricultural Organisation’s biannual update urged countries to prepare for hardship and said more than 70 African and Asian nations would be worst hit.
The EU’s...
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India and the United States have agreed to cooperate on energy projects, including shale gas and clean energy, Reuters reported. The countries are to set up a research and development centre for clean energy in India and provide annual funding of US$5 million each for five years, with matching investment from the private sector. A price on carbon emissions...
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