Jobs and Just Transition

An array of new tax credits for clean energy development and a pledge to secure Canada’s place in a global green economy are at the centre of this year’s federal budget, released Tuesday afternoon by Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, with an estimated $80 billion in multi-year funding for mostly clean energy technologies.

British Columbia’s new energy framework is being hailed as a positive step towards capping oil and gas emissions in the province, but one critic is calling it a “political smokescreen,” coming hours after the approval of a new liquefied natural gas (LNG) project.

Canada and the United States will work together to develop critical mineral supply chains, coordinate efforts on net-zero grid development and electric vehicle charging networks, advance long-duration energy storage, measure and monitor methane and carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels, and promote trade in products like green steel and aluminium in the wake of U.S. President Joe Biden’s visit to Ottawa March 23-24.

With more than 40% of the world’s population already exposed to the worst effects of global heating and “every region in the world” facing increased climate hazards by 2040, scientists warn that better, faster adaptation—and a lot more funding for it—is critical for a liveable future on Earth, especially for the most vulnerable.

Drastically reducing fossil fuel consumption while scaling up renewable energy and energy efficiency is the quickest but also the most affordable path to the rapid, deep emission reductions that can get the climate emergency under control, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concludes in its synthesis report released Monday.

With Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland set to deliver a federal budget next week that’s meant to “invest aggressively” in clean technology, Monday’s synthesis report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) includes some strong guidance on which technologies should qualify for government support—and which ones shouldn’t.

Bailing on an election promise to never again allow drilling on federal lands, United States President Joe Biden has approved a US$8-billion plan to extract 600 million barrels of oil from an ecologically sensitive region in Alaska.

More than 1,550 community solar, battery storage, and hydrogen firms in the United States were rushing to regroup after last week’s collapse of the Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), which had issued them billions of dollars in operating loans.

A Honolulu company is helping low-income families in Hawaii reduce energy costs while contributing to a more sustainable grid—by linking household water heaters to create a virtual power plant, effectively repurposing the ubiquitous appliances into grid batteries.

How is it possible that a year of new solar and wind installations can already deliver more than twice the total peak power capacity it took Canada a century to build? In this book excerpt, author and investigative journalist Paul McKay says it’s partly because renewable production costs per unit are going down as scales and sales go up.

Job opportunities in renewable energy are pulling U.S. workers from the fossil fuel sector, but some worry that the available labour force will still fall short of the Biden administration’s clean energy goals.

Toronto-based battery recycler Li-Cycle has landed a conditional US$375-million loan from the United States Department of Energy, based on its plans to build a new plant in a suburb of Rochester, New York.

Ontario is exploring the possibility of building new, large-scale nuclear plants in order to meet increasing demand for electricity and phase out natural gas generation.

It took Munich Re almost 50 years since, but the world’s largest reinsurance company is taking steps to detach itself not just from coal, oil, and gas. The company announced in October that it will no longer insure new oil and gas projects as of April, 2023.

The public pension plan that manages the retirement savings of 715,000 British Columbians has bought into a natural gas transmission network that is touting a risky scheme to use hydrogen for home heating, despite persistent concerns about the cost, safety, and climate impact of the plan.

A tiny Danish island has completed its journey to becoming the world’s first “renewable energy island,” with its roughly 4,000 residents reducing their emissions to near zero through collective ownership of wind turbines, solar panels, and biomass heating plants.

A clever series of presentation slides at a conference in Ottawa last week placed small communities at the centre of the energy transition and spotlighted Prince Edward Island as Canada’s next source of breakaway climate leadership.

Wind and solar farms with battery backup are both cheaper to build than natural gas power plants in Ontario and Alberta, and the price of the renewable options is expected to fall another 40% by 2035, concludes a report released last week by Clean Energy Canada (CEC).

Canada’s wind and solar capacity grew significantly in 2022, but not enough to hit the growth rate needed to reach net-zero emissions by 2050, new data shows.

Oil and gas production will fall faster than previously expected, renewable energy will grow more rapidly, and global carbon dioxide emissions will drop as a result, according to a new analysis released yesterday by colossal fossil BP.

A new study says virtual power plants (VPPs) and their many benefits for electrical grids are at an “inflection point” as consumer demand and legislation propel a shift to greater electrification.

Alberta’s fraught politics around the upcoming federal just transition bill are intensifying, with provincial opposition leader Rachel Notley urging Ottawa to scrap the legislation and a fossil CEO claiming a just transition really means a boom in oilsands extraction.

In early January, Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson announced the federal government would soon be unveiling its highly anticipated legislation for a just transition, including a plan for helping workers and communities in the oil and gas sector shift into renewable energy industries like wind, solar, and energy efficiency.

Long-duration storage batteries are beginning to emerge as an alternative to expensive, new transmission lines as power utilities shift to renewable energy, and a town in West Virginia is about to gain 750 jobs as a result.

Two legal challenges against the Woodhouse Colliery coal mine in the North West England county Cumbria may determine the country’s future reputation as a climate leader, after a new analysis suggested the mine would release 17,500 tonnes of methane per year.

A first-ever systematic assessment of an oil and gas company’s climate projections shows that Exxon scientists accurately predicted how fossil fuels would affect global temperatures, despite decades of PR activity meant to sow doubt and climate denial.

Innovators motivated by climate change have been shifting hydrogen technology toward low-emission solutions, boosting the potential for green hydrogen to replace fossil fuels in industries like long-haul transport, where few clean alternatives exist.

The U.S. set out to widen more highways, even though traffic planners know it never reduces congestion. Parking lots were falling out of favour, major U.S. subway systems were falling apart, Toronto’s transit plan was falling far short, Toronto’s parking authority fell for the idea of an EV charging network, and urban transit advocates wanted a federal strategy for zero-emission transit, intercity coaches, and rail.

Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault says a new lithium mine in northern Quebec can go ahead with more than 270 conditions to protect wildlife and respect Indigenous use of the lands for traditional purposes.

A group of former oil and gas executives and academics is calling for the industry to pay tens of trillions of dollars through 2050 to take full responsibility for every tonne of carbon it produces.

Off-grid energy from technologies like mini-grids, biofuels, and solar may often go unrecorded, but a new report attempting to fill statistical gaps finds that off-grid renewables capacity has continued to grow, despite challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

A South Korean solar panel maker Qcells said Wednesday that it will invest more than US$2.5 billion to build factories in Georgia in what it says is the largest solar investment in American history.

Suncor Energy and a subcontractor faced 28 charges for safety violations after a bulldozer crashed through thin ice on a frozen tailings pond in January, 2021, killing 25-year-old operator Patrick Poitras. “Someone didn’t do their job and I lost my son because of that,” his dad told CBC. “My son gave his life for that job.”

The millions of North Americans who found themselves shivering through late December’s bitter cold snap can surely thank a meandering polar vortex, but whether and how a rapidly warming Arctic might be involved in these intensifying deep freezes remains a subject of fierce scientific debate.

Sandy Anuras is Chief Technology Officer at Sunrun, a leading home solar, storage, and energy services company in the United States. In this feature interview last fall, she talked about nine million renewable energy jobs to be created over the next decade, a tipping point for rooftop solar, and the opportunities for workers who are too often left behind.

The United States is racing towards a carbon-free grid, but with economic and regulatory hurdles blocking transmission infrastructure, the shift off fossil-fueled power may be too slow to avert the worst effects of climate change.

A new crowdfunding platform that helps individuals invest in projects like community solar could bridge the gap for a growing number of people interested in holding sustainable investments.

Just as a majority Black community in Florida’s Gulf County has begun to envision a “safe, vibrant, and healthy” comeback from the polluted shadow of heavy industry, local officials risk thwarting those ambitions by saying yes to a waterfront gas terminal.

Two of Canada’s biggest pension funds opened the year with new investments in offshore wind and overseas renewable energy projects, after a year of taking sustained criticism for their continuing commitment to fossil fuels. A leading sustainability consultancy profiled Canada’s clean energy powerhouses, Calgary-based ATCO Ltd. bought $713 million worth of solar and wind projects from oilsands operator Suncor Energy, and bids opened for onshore wind projects across nearly 1.7 million hectares of government-owned land in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Canada will see federal just transition legislation early this year that will become a gateway for oil and gas workers to move into green energy jobs, Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson told CBC this week.

Ontario is staring down an electricity supply crunch and amid a rush to secure more power, it is plunging into the world of energy storage—a collection of technologies that is poised to transform the provincial grid and change the way energy is used, bought, and sold by homes and businesses.

The federal government should introduce an oil and gas emissions cap that aligns with a 1.5°C limit on average global warming and creates incentives for innovation without favouring any specific technology, the Commons Natural Resources Committee concludes in a report issued last week.

European Union governments and lawmakers reached a deal Sunday on key elements of the 27-nation bloc’s green deal, reforming the EU’s trading system for greenhouse gas emissions and creating a new hardship fund for those hardest-hit by measures to curb climate change.

Saudi Arabia is building solar panels and promoting electric cars to reduce oil consumption at home, but the kingdom has a different plan for the rest of the world—pushing for policies that sustain and even increase oil dependence for decades to come.

Europe is close to finalizing the world’s first carbon border adjustment tax, after a marathon negotiating session that ended at 5 AM Tuesday.

While the global biodiversity crisis deepens and the COP 15 summit in Montreal enters a final week of high-stakes negotiations, a report this morning points to a yawning gap between the degraded landscapes set aside for restoration and countries’ “aspirational goal” to restore a billion hectares—an area the size of China—by the end of this decade.

A company based in Watson Lake, Yukon has developed a portable solar+storage system with foldable panels to serve extremely cold remote locations.

The skyrocketing price of liquefied natural gas (LNG) is driving down demand in China and India and raising the risk that new import terminals will be delayed or cancelled, according to a new analysis last week by the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA).

Newcomer Davante Lewis, a Democrat backed by an environmental political action committee, easily won Saturday’s runoff for a seat on Louisiana’s Public Service Commission, an obscure regulatory body that has received national attention from media, celebrities, climate activists, and major public utility companies.

Key countries around the world are set to add as much new renewable energy capacity over the next five years as they did over the last 20, as governments look for affordable supplies that can address the overwhelming energy security issues raised by Russia’s war in Ukraine, the International Energy Agency (IEA) says in its Renewables 2022 report released Tuesday.

Ottawa will spend up to C$800 million to support four major Indigenous-led conservation projects across the country covering nearly one million square kilometres of land and water, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced Wednesday.

Canada’s first full-scale electric vehicle manufacturing plant officially opened in southern Ontario on Monday, with the prime minister and the province’s premier saying the launch of the facility marked a national milestone.

Farmers in the United States need more tools and support to be part of the climate solution, say advocates, urging lawmakers gearing up to draft the new 2023 Farm Bill to increase funding for a rural renewables and energy efficiency.

A weekend shooting attack on two electric substations in Moore County, North Carolina, is raising questions about grid security in the United States, after 40,000 people—including seniors and people in need of medical care—lost power amid freezing winter temperatures.

Ontario could cut projected climate emissions 85% by 2035 and reduce its use of carbon-heavy, gas-fired power plants to less than 3% of power production if its grid met rising electricity demand with energy efficiency, solar, wind, and energy storage, according to an analysis released last week by The Atmospheric Fund (TAF).

Russia’s war in Ukraine was the catalyst for a surge in global energy efficiency investments this year, as governments and consumers “turned to efficiency measures as part of their responses to fuel supply disruptions and record-high energy prices,” the International Energy Agency (IEA) says in its Energy Efficiency 2022 report released Friday.

Microgrid and electricity system infrastructure providers are stepping up to support civilians left powerless in the dark and cold, after Russia spent weeks blitzing Ukraine’s grid to demoralize the population and force surrender.

Federal Innovation Minister François-Philippe Champagne was back in Asia last month pitching Canada’s battery supply chain prowess, this time with a new boast in his back pocket.

This year’s devastating floods in Pakistan are one front in our clash with the planetary boundaries that define the rules for everything we do, but the war with nature will come to your doorstep soon, writes Corporate Knights Research Director Ralph Torrie.

After the European Union’s landmark decision last week to bring the shipping industry into its carbon market, Transport & Environment is urging decision-makers to follow suit with air travel.

As Ontario’s newly-minted More Homes Built Faster Act is decried by Indigenous leaders, municipalities, farmers, and health experts alike, elected officials are questioning the “suspicious” link between developer titans buying parcels of protected Greenbelt land and Premier Doug Ford’s push to turn them into housing subdivisions.

Canada’s sixth-oldest family foundation has announced a five-year plan to close its doors after distributing its entire $100-million endowment to help slash the country’s greenhouse gas emissions and build a low-carbon economy.

Two more reinsurers have joined the slew of companies refusing to provide coverage to a proposed US$5-billion crude oil pipeline in East Africa that campaigners say would be disastrous for the climate and to its host countries.

Countries could cut carbon dioxide emissions by 500 million tonnes by 2030—the amount produced by all the cars in Europe today—by adopting heat pump technology that already supplies 10% of the world’s space heating and is poised for faster growth, the International Energy Agency concludes in a report released this week.

Green factories—and the green jobs they bring—are shifting attitudes in some of the most conservative parts of the United States, and the trend is set to accelerate with the Biden administration planning US$25.7 billion in clean manufacturing, much of it in deep-red Republican districts, Bloomberg News reports.

Millions of Ukrainians remained without power amid freezing temperatures over the weekend, after Russia rained missiles down on civilian infrastructure in what was called a bid to “freeze the country into submission.”

The federal government has published details of a new C$250-million grant program that will help families switch from oil to heat pumps, in a bid to drive down home heating costs while reducing planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is proposing to nearly quadruple its calculation of the social cost of carbon, from US$51 to $190 per tonne.

A new screening tool that prioritizes 27,000 disadvantaged U.S. communities for billions of dollars in federal climate and energy investments is being criticized for leaving out racial makeup—one of the strongest predictors of environmental burden—as a criterion.

Provincial energy efficiency programs and national energy savings rebounded after the COVID-19 pandemic, but energy savings for low-income households still need a lot more attention, Efficiency Canada concludes in the latest edition of its annual Provincial Energy Efficiency Scorecard.

Something significant is happening in the desert in Egypt as countries meet at COP 27, the United Nations summit on climate change, veteran climate finance special Rachel Kyte writes in a post for The Conversation.

Six weeks before taking power, Brazilian President-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva on Wednesday told cheering crowds at the UN climate conference, COP 27, that he would crack down on illegal deforestation in the Amazon, revive relationships with countries that finance forest protection efforts, and push to host an upcoming world climate summit in the rainforest.

African petrostates betting on fossil fuel exports for wealth creation and energy security are making an imprudent choice, warns a new report, as the “inevitable and irreversible” energy transition will slash demand, lower oil prices, and freeze investments from international oil companies.

Canada’s economy faces a stranded asset risk of at least C$100 billion when the fossil fuel era comes to an end, says a new report, with further losses as the global energy transition outpaces the country’s climate policy and clean energy investments.

The COP 27 climate summit has been dominated by “false solutions” that ignore the needs of underrepresented people and shun vital principles like energy sovereignty, gender justice, and land rights, according to a panel of community experts on the front lines of the climate crisis.

Higher steel costs and rising interest rates are taking the blame after a small modular nuclear reactor project in Utah reported a cost increase from US$58 to $90 or $100 per megawatt-hour for the electricity it’s meant to produce.

While negotiations at the COP 27 climate summit lag and fossil interests strive to dominate the conversation, countries are announcing side agreements that point toward emission reductions and energy transition in parts of the world that need them most.

A COP 27 panel discussion on accountability for climate action revealed an ongoing disconnect between developed and developing worlds, with the former urging faith in a complex-but-sincere process and the latter expressing significant mistrust and frustration.

Energy imports, energy conservation, new storage capacity, and effective communication helped California avoid blackouts during a record-setting September heat wave.

A new report busts the “fallacy” that boosting gas production in Africa will benefit the continent’s population. Instead, the so-called “dash for gas” will devastate the natural environment, leave local communities powerless, and wreak havoc on the climate, report authors say.

With the partisan tilt of the next U.S. Congress still uncertain nearly a week after midterm elections last Tuesday, a few things are clear: there was no “red wave” propelling Trump-friendly candidates into office, a strong youth vote was a decisive factor in the election result, and climate action was a winning issue for campaigns in several key U.S. states.

An invisible work force of people in the informal economy should receive the same support as fossil energy workers during a just transition to a green economy, says a lawyer with expertise in international environmental, trade and labour law and agreements.

A group of nine climate charities has announced a US$500-million investment over the next three years to support a just transition off fossil fuels in low- and middle-income countries.

With COP 27 host Egypt and 16 other natural gas-exporting governments pledging to plug the fossil energy source as “the perfect solution” to climate change and energy security, critics warned of a “dash for gas” in Africa—a prophecy taking shape this week in Sharm el-Sheikh, where some African countries said exploiting fossil reserves will help lift people out of poverty.

Even if all the world’s current climate commitments are met “in full and on time,” Canada will lose 5.8% of its GDP by 2100—$145 billion in today’s dollars—due to higher temperatures, increased precipitation, and changing weather patterns, finds a new report from the Parliamentary Budget Office (PBO).

Countries across Africa could lose 14% of their per capita GDP to climate change by 2050 and 34% by 2100, even if average global warming is held to 1.5°C, according to a report released this morning at this year’s UN climate conference, COP 27, in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt.

An administrative decision on carbon removals, adopted in the dead of night with no community input, is raising alarm with experts attending the COP 27 climate summit in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt.

The world’s 350 million family farmers and smallhold producers are looking to this year’s United Nations climate summit, COP 27, to help avert a global food security crisis by funding climate adaptation and building “a food system that can feed the world on a hot planet”.

A pitch for private investment in emission reduction projects, including tax credits for renewable energy, low-carbon heating, and clean hydrogen, is one of the highlights of the fall economic statement released Thursday by Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland.

Canadians are being sold on a future of natural gas exports to Europe just as European countries speed up their exit from all fossil fuels, says a leading energy transition researcher who’s just finished a series two-week fact-finding visits to Ireland, Denmark, and France.

Summer heat waves driven by climate change do more than harm health and claim lives, a new study shows. They also blight national economies, and hit the poorest hardest of all.

Brazil’s newly-elected president has vowed to reverse the deforestation of the Amazon that occurred under his predecessor, but a hostile Congress is likely to block his efforts, as are the thousands of Brazilians who say the election was rigged and still others convinced that environmental protections equal lost livelihoods.

The world’s biggest provider of customer relationship management (CRM) software is receiving a mixed assessment after opening a carbon credit marketplace to support climate action.

The Green Municipal Fund (GMF) has identified a half-dozen key steps municipalities can take to tackle the biggest barriers to zero-emission vehicle (ZEV) adoption.

Whether it was pandemic-driven supply chain delays, Russia’s war in Europe driving up grain prices, or flooding in British Columbia disrupting rail lines and highways, the past 2½ years have shone a light on how vulnerable Canada’s food system is to climate change and other global factors.

Oil and gas demand has levelled off, renewable energy costs are falling, and electric vehicles can dominate major markets by 2030, but countries will still need “unprecedented” emission reductions this decade to keep the worst of climate change under control, according to reports by three international agencies released yesterday and today.

The state of New South Wales has contracted energy storage start-up Akaysha Energy to build the world’s biggest battery before Australia’s biggest coal plant shuts. down.

Germany’s global buying spree for liquefied natural gas could double consumer energy prices and cost it hundreds of billions of euros, particularly with renewably-produced hydrogen on track to out-compete LNG on price in as little as a decade, according to two recent analyses.

The Cedar LNG project in British Columbia received some positive regulatory feedback for its plan to produce and export liquified natural gas to Asia, but campaigners and analysts maintain it will undermine Canada’s climate ambitions.

Canada will meet its climate targets and “bend the curve” on emissions, while the United States enacts new incentives to make up for its failure to put a price on carbon, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Tuesday during a last-minute appearance at a climate conference in downtown Ottawa.

Energy transition support in the federal government’s 2022 budget favoured carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCS) over the best opportunities for rapid decarbonization, Iron & Earth Executive Director Luisa Da Silva told a Parliamentary committee Tuesday.

Cities must halve their per capita emissions by 2030 to remain on a 1.5°C trajectory, finds a new report that prescribes low-emissions mass transit, better waste management, decarbonized grids, and energy-efficient buildings as the way forward.

A fuel crisis in Haiti is inflaming security and humanitarian crises, as gangs exploit the country’s oil dependency to pressure interim Prime Minister Ariel Henry to resign after he cut fuel subsidies in September.

Canada is open to supporting “economically feasible” liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects to help countries like Germany reduce reliance on coal in the midst of a global energy crunch, Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland told media Friday, at the close of annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank in Washington, DC.

Nearly a million Canadian households live in energy poverty, the David Suzuki Foundation says, in a new report that urges Ottawa to address this social injustice while setting Canada’s path to net-zero electricity by 2035.

The federal government is busy consulting us now, gathering input from Canadians on policy proposals for a just transition to renewables, a carbon emissions cap for the oil and gas sector, a clean electricity grid, and more. But how well informed do Canadians think they are about these potential solutions?

Green economies and global climate action were on the agenda Tuesday when Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland declared a new era in geopolitics brought on by Russia’s war in Ukraine.

As the United Kingdom pursues fracking as a solution to its energy independence, new analysis finds the country’s power sector can reduce its reliance on gas from 40% to 1% by 2030, with a rapid renewables switch bringing £93 billion (C$142 billion) in savings.

Ottawa will invest $222 million to help a Quebec company increase production of critical minerals for goods such as electric cars and batteries while simultaneously cutting emissions, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Tuesday.

New Zealand’s government on Tuesday proposed taxing the greenhouse gases that farm animals make from burping and peeing as part of a plan to tackle climate change.

Canada’s biggest oil sands companies have benefitted to the tune of $4.3 billion since Alberta handed large corporations a ‘job creation’ tax cut three years ago, but those jobs never materialized, a new study has found.

The United Nations aviation agency has allowed corporate interests to influence the direction of its climate policy, say environmental groups, pointing to new research that finds nearly one-third of delegates at its environmental committee meetings come from aviation or fossil fuel industries.

Even with Europe scrambling to break its dependence on Russian gas supplies, there’s no reason for Canada to subsidize expensive liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects with questionable long-term prospects, says clean growth economist Rachel Samson, vice president of policy at the Institute for Research on Public Policy.

Canada will see C$25 billion in losses per from climate damage as early as 2025, with individual households bearing the worst of these costs, finds a new report the Canadian Climate Institute (CCI).

“To answer a question I am often asked—Yes, we are still happy with the decision, five years ago, to replace our gas furnace with an air-source heat pump,” writes engineer and renewables advocate Bill Nuttle. “It is one of the best decisions we ever made.”

With post-tropical storm Fiona taking its place as one of the biggest catastrophic events in Atlantic Canada history, communities began to pick up the pieces while Prime Minister Justin Trudeau connected the storm to climate-induced mayhem.

As power slowly returns to Puerto Rico in Hurricane Fiona’s wake, pressure is building to wean the island’s grid off its 97% dependence on fossils fuels—towards a climate-resilient distributed system that relies on renewables.

With a new report expected to reveal a massive increase in global oil pipeline construction, an analyst says Canada is running counter to public opinion and wider international trends by adding to the problem.

A U.S. rooftop solar company is facing headwinds as it seeks to build off-grid neighbourhoods that would be less dependent on established utilities.

Canada must make an “audacious and hopeful offer” to oil and gas workers communities with a new Climate Emergency Just Transition Transfer to deliver clean economy jobs, the Commons Finance Committee heard yesterday.

The United States’ Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) could change the landscape of energy economics with its unprecedented support for clean energy sources, says a new report.

Ottawa is promising up to $250 million over four years to help Canadians who currently heat their homes with oil shift to greener—and more affordable—sources like electric heat pumps.

Ensuring that America’s clean energy revolution leaves no one behind will require incentives for domestic production and targeted, collaborative investment in communities most likely to see job losses, two expert authors write.

The World Health Organization and nearly 200 global health associations have endorsed the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty (FFNPT), calling for an end to new fossil infrastructure and a “fair and equitable” phaseout of existing production.

Canada has all the right components to cash in on an electric vehicle battery industry worth C$48 billion per year, but only if governments take ambitious action now to help the sector meet its potential, concludes a new report issued this week.

Replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy will save countries at least US$12 trillion by 2050, an Oxford University research team reports.

Without concerted global effort to rein in global heating, up to 4.4 million acres of U.S. coastal land may slip under rising seas by 2050.

Outdated infrastructure is making America’s electricity grid vulnerable to blackouts in the face of climate change and an ambitious clean energy transition, experts say.

Economic, political, and ecological concerns are driving the creation of renewable energy communities in Central Eastern Europe, but more needs to be done to facilitate these local efforts to democratize energy systems.

Australian states and businesses are moving in step with the country’s new climate policy, making their own leaps to decarbonization after a new climate change law pledged to slash the nation’s carbon emissions 43% by 2030.

Clean energy companies employ more than half of the 65 million workers in the global energy sector, according to an International Energy Agency (IEA) report that urges a just transition to support the “energy work force of tomorrow”.

The incoming British government is committed to building a new generation of nuclear power stations to provide a quarter of the  nation’s electricity. But how it is going to happen remains a mystery.

Solar saved the European Union up to €29 billion in gas imports this past summer, and is poised for “exponential growth” across five of Asia’s biggest economies, according to two separate analyses released last week by the UK-based Ember think tank.

Amid current concerns about the cost of living, the economy, and health care, communicators may not know how to frame their efforts to drum up support for action on climate change and biodiversity loss among receptive audiences, let alone those with a history of hostility to climate action.

Research and development, manufacturing, and infrastructure investment decisions over the next decade will determine how the United States achieves a 100% clean electricity system by 2035, say the authors of a new report that finds multiple pathways to hit the target.

A new analysis has pegged the social cost of carbon at US$185 per tonne, more than triple the figure the Joe Biden administration currently uses.

While luxury car buyers are propelling the electric vehicle revolution in North America, India’s EV transition is rolling forward on cheap and agile two- and three-wheelers.

The Canadian government is asking the public how best to spend $3 billion per year on transit beginning in 2026.

Local partnerships are helping poorer households in the U.S. overcome cost barriers to installing solar panels, making them critical to the Biden administration’s plan to power five million U.S. homes with community solar by 2025.

Despite pledges to phase out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies, the world’s major economies moved to offset rising consumer energy prices in 2021 by nearly doubling consumer supports rather than investing in renewable energy.

After emerging from brutal July heat waves, the United Kingdom is headed for a harsh winter, with an 80% jump in energy bills expected to strain millions of households and businesses.

Floods, droughts, and major storms that wash out highways, damage buildings and affect power grids could cost Canada’s economy C$139 billion over the next 30 years, a new climate-based analysis predicts.

California plans to require all new cars, trucks, and SUVs to run on electricity or hydrogen by 2035 under a policy approved Thursday by regulators that seeks a dramatic cut in carbon emissions and an eventual end to gasoline-powered vehicles.

Using prefabricated materials to build sustainable homes could catch on as a green building practice for affordable housing across Canada, thanks to a pilot project in Regina, Saskatchewan.

China suspended cooperative climate talks with the United States after U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-CA) recent trip to Taiwan, raising questions about what the two countries’ worsening relationship means for global climate action. But contrary to initial worries, some observers are taking hope from a “clean energy arms race” in the making.

A South Korean solar cell giant is planning a US$1.8-billion manufacturing facility in the United States, now that President Joe Biden has signed a climate law that includes credits for making solar panels.

Canada’s East Coast emerged this week as a hotbed of clean energy investment, with a high-profile green hydrogen announcement in Stephenville, Newfoundland by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz augmented—and possibly one-upped—by a new green ammonia project in Nova Scotia and talk of a third production plant in New Brunswick.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz is visiting Canada this week while his country faces a level of energy supply risk that many Canadians would have trouble imagining.

An NDP Member of Parliament is hinting that his party’s continuing support for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s minority government might hinge on a “big financial commitment” to a just transition for fossil fuel workers and communities.

A Gwich’in-owned company in Inuvik, Northwest Territories, is building a one-megawatt solar farm that will reduce the community’s greenhouse gas emissions by 380,000 tonnes per year, cut annual energy costs by $1 million, and improve air quality by replacing local diesel generation.

The transmission organization that operates the United States’ largest multi-state grid has greenlighted a US$10.3-billion investment in high-voltage transmission lines to clear bottlenecks that have impeded nearly 100 gigawatts of new solar and wind capacity.

As the Toronto Community Housing Corporation embarks on an ambitious retrofit that will benefit its tenants and the climate, residents sweltering in a privately-owned low-income building across town are battling a landlord threatening eviction if they turn on the air-conditioning.

U.S. climate hawks declared victory, Congressional Democrats got credit for a newly pragmatic approach to climate action, community campaigners demanded more ambitious action, and attention shifted to implementation after the U.S. House of Representatives passed the country’s $370-billion climate and clean energy plan and sent it to President Joe Biden’s desk for signature.

New solar installations around the world are poised to grow by a “staggering” 30% this year, and the industry can look ahead to double-digit growth each year through 2025, according to a Bloomberg.com analysis that predates the ambitious clean energy provisions in the US$369-billion Inflation Reduction Act adopted by the U.S. Congress last week.

On every energy transition metric that matters, e-bikes leave electric vehicles (EVs) behind in the dust, and policy-makers currently swooning over the latter must take note, says Canadian sustainable design expert Lloyd Alter.

As the global push for a hydrogen economy accelerates, researchers are urging policy-makers to address new knowledge and fill in some profound data gaps, with recent studies revealing the considerable global warming potential of a fuel that many fossils see as their industry’s best hope for a second life.

Tesla Inc. may be considering Ontario as the site of a new Canadian manufacturing plant, Electric Autonomy writes in an exclusive report.

Plans to expand the proposed U.S tax credit on electric vehicle purchases to cover North American-made cars are a boon for the auto sector, says Ontario’s economic development minister, but the province still isn’t planning any buyer incentives for local drivers.

After a marathon series of votes that began just before midnight Saturday, the United States Senate adopted a US$369-billion climate and clean energy plan Sunday afternoon, the country’s biggest-ever investment in climate action.

Heat waves and drought in France are adding to Europe’s energy crisis which began when Russian invaded Ukraine—but the decline in the French electricity production is not just a temporary blip. France’s nuclear industry is in serious trouble.

Homeowners considering rooftop solar to slash their energy bills can turn to a new Forbes guide to solar shingles, listing the biggest names in the market and detailing the pros and cons of solar shingles versus panels.

Koch-funded Americans for Prosperity turned up the heat on swing-vote senators Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema, a wider network of business groups stepped up to defend the deal, and environmental justice campaigners decried concessions to oil and gas as advocates absorbed the details of the $369.75-billion climate and clean energy package announced last week by Manchin and Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer.

The Trudeau government has released a proposed frame for new Clean Electricity Regulations (CER) aimed at bringing the grid’s greenhouse gas emissions to net-zero by 2035. Comments on the plan close August 17.

Solar power is keeping the Texas grid from crashing—despite a sharp increase in energy demand due to record-breaking high temperatures, says an energy expert.

Alberta-based PCL Construction’s 2021 solar construction revenue increased 60% over the previous year, totalling more than half a billion dollars. By the end of 2022, the company expects solar revenue to hit just under $800 million.

Offshore oil and gas activities in Atlantic Canada are a genuine threat to the ocean ecosystem and exacerbate climate change, but the federal government is falling short in its plans to regulate that activity, writes Mark Brooks, senior specialist, oil and gas at WWF-Canada, in a recent post on the WWF blog.

The United States is back on the cusp of the biggest climate investment in its history after Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-NY) and coal state Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV) agreed to a US$370-billion climate and clean energy package, ending months of negotiations on what one elated advocate called the “best-kept secret in Washington”.

A campaign of misinformation is working to undermine a 30% fertilizer emissions reduction target in Canada’s next Agriculture Policy Framework (APF), says a national farmers’ coalition, contending that recently announced emissions policies actually don’t go far enough.

A new survey reveals that less than half of U.S. utility companies are taking steps to reduce emissions, despite roughly 90% citing that activity as a high or moderate priority.

A heat emergency earlier this week in the U.S. Great Plains region forced the operator of the Keystone pipeline, Calgary-based TC Energy, to cut back its flow of what Bloomberg Markets calls a “crucial grade of oil” to refineries.

Rising clean energy investments and an expanding offshore wind sector are pointing toward a new renewable energy boom in India, as the falling cost of clean technologies paired with the global energy crisis siphons investment away from fossil fuels.

Global reserves of oil available for extraction showed a “sizable drop” of 9% last year, in what an analyst at Rystad Energy is calling “good news for the environment” that could still “deal a major blow to energy security”.

Millionaire coal baron Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) played his final card and the White House conceded defeat on ambitious U.S. climate legislation, after the renegade senator declared he wouldn’t support any climate or energy provisions in President Joe Biden’s signature clean energy package.

New wind and solar projects saved countries US$82 billion in fossil fuel costs and will continue to provide badly-needed relief from rising electricity bills, the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) concludes in a report issued last Thursday.

An environmental assessment for a one-gigawatt, 164-turbine wind farm/green hydrogen and ammonia park in rural Newfoundland is generating local concern about potential habitat impacts, while picking up some high-powered support for the community benefits the project would bring.

A leading advocate for Africa’s renewable energy transition is condemning Germany and Italy for pushing to “saddle” African countries with new fossil fuel infrastructure that will drag down their economies.

Most of the world can switch to renewable energy without destabilizing power grids, at low cost, and relying almost entirely on existing technologies, according to a new Stanford University study.

Changes in global oil prices and markets will continue to destabilize jobs in Alberta, and declining oil demand due to the shift off carbon will have job impacts far beyond the province’s fossil sector without the right mix of just transition policies, an Oxford University research team concludes in a paper published this morning in the journal Climate Policy.

Boris Johnson’s imminent departure as British Prime Minister is raising concern that the country will soon begin backsliding on its climate and nature commitments—even if those commitments consisted primarily of grand gestures, with relatively little practical action to back them up.

The electricity system regulator in the United States could help slash inflation and double the country’s renewable energy supply by encouraging technologies to reduce the “absurd” 3.5-year wait times delaying interconnections between regional power systems, the Rocky Mountain Institute argues in a new analysis.

From food production to local bike couriers, degrowth strategies are saving land, work time, and money while meeting basic needs and re-localizing economies, 360info reports.

Substantially strengthening emissions regulations for marine shipping will have a “negligible” impact on freight costs, says a new study from Transport & Environment.

With a disabled oil supertanker in the Red Sea likely just weeks or months away from breaking up or exploding, triggering a $20-billion ecological and humanitarian disaster, countries that could help pay for an emergency salvage plan are saying they can’t find the right budget codes to free up the funds.

Two of Canada’s most influential cities stepped up this week with serious action on the climate emergency, with Calgary adopting a new emissions reduction strategy that includes a 2050 net-zero target and Ottawa endorsing the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty.

The first of our EcoA Tips, a new monthly series in The Energy Mix,highlights a surprising bit of data from a major survey by EcoAnalytics, a non-profit market research initiative that uses data and analysis to strengthen Canada’s environmental movement.

The latest emissions trajectory released by state colossal fossil Saudi Aramco—the world’s largest oil producer—shows a boost in production and no drop in emissions before 2035, casting doubt on the company’s words about net-zero commitments.

A group of 15 trainees will be heading out into the field to begin converting two Alberta oilfield sites into solar farms, after graduating from a rapid upskilling program for fossil industry and Indigenous workers hosted by Iron & Earth and Medicine Hat College.

With the United States Supreme Court widely expected to turn its ideological wrecking ball on the country’s greenhouse gas emission controls, a group of climate scientists is pitching a new approach to regulating carbon as a toxic substance.

The sudden rise in fertilizer prices since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine could have implications for global emissions by reducing how much of it farmers use in their fields. But experts say there’s more to the picture, with non-monetary variables like human capital making a big impact on farming decisions.

The United Kingdom’s shift towards a green economy will alter the nature of existing jobs, not destroy them, but policy-makers will have to ensure that low- and mid-skilled workers are not left behind in a transition that will privilege the higher-skilled and better paid, says a new report.

The decision by mammoth California utility Pacific Gas & Electric to report avoided emissions due to its operations could be a progressive step towards climate accountability, but unofficially framing them as “Scope 4 emissions” could open the door to corporate greenwashing, experts warn.

As wealthy jurisdictions, companies, and people increasingly buy into the private weather forecasting market and its derivatives, questions are being asked about where this leaves less well-heeled, and often more climate-vulnerable, households and communities.

The first major assessment of the costs of climate change to infrastructure across Northern Canada calls for action from all levels of government to bring about “transformative adaptation” and address the dual crises of climate hazards and infrastructure gaps.

As Canada’s oilpatch scrambles to fill 2,000+ job openings created by shifting geopolitical and economic winds, new analysis is calling on governments to ensure workers aren’t unduly disrupted by the country’s climate pledges, and that clean energy jobs are available to groups that have been shut out in the past.

The countries of the world missed an “historic chance for a clean energy recovery” from the COVID-19 pandemic and saw renewable energy stagnate due to a surge of fossil fuel subsidies last year, the REN 21 Secretariat reports this morning in its Renewables 2022 Global Status Report.

Three major oil companies have cancelled plans to drill in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, a sign that fossil fuel exploration is losing ground against United States environmental policy priorities.

Extreme heat and humidity is inhibiting learning and leaving teachers in the United States anxious for the well-being of their students, as researchers estimate that by 2025, one in four public schools in the country will need to install air conditioning or upgrade their existing ventilation systems.

BlocPower’s Civilian Climate Corps provides paid, on-the-job training to New Yorkers who live in neighbourhoods with high rates of gun violence, aiming to start them on their way to a career in the city’s fast-growing green construction and clean energy trades.

As gasoline prices skyrocket in the Sunshine State, so does reluctance to obey hurricane evacuation orders, with a survey finding more than 40% of Florida respondents likely to put their pocketbooks ahead of their personal safety.

Ford’s chief executive says he expects the cost of building electric vehicles to fall to the point that automakers will be battling each other in coming years for sales of EVs priced around US$25,000.

Unprecedented growth in Alberta’s renewable energy sector signifies a vital shift in the province’s energy economy, says the Pembina Institute, but another expert notes that Alberta’s power market also needs to be fixed—so that consumers aren’t overcharged for new grid infrastructure in the renewables boom.

Flower power of a different kind—a flower-shaped solar-powered microgrid, to be precise—stands ready to power a Saskatoon high school, and inspire its students.

An explosion Wednesday at the Freeport gas liquefaction plant south of Houston, Texas has shut down the facility for at least three weeks, bringing new uncertainties and higher costs to global gas markets while plant operators search for the cause of the blast.

A consulting report for Enbridge Inc. estimates the closure of the Line 5 pipeline would lead to an increase of one to two cents per litre in gasoline prices for Ontarians and Quebecers, a revelation that has reignited debate on the true economic impacts of shuttering an aging pipeline with very clear environmental risks.

Canada’s first federal carbon offset market kicked off Wednesday as the final piece of the puzzle in the carbon price for big industry takes shape. Climate activists say it simply makes it cheaper for big industry to keep polluting.

A new study maps out several pathways for the United States to fulfill its pledge to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 50% by 2030, but authors say success depends on making big commitments—now.

A new study dispels concerns that new wind farms will harm communities by lowering property values, showing that the facilities actually raise incomes and home prices in the rural United States.

U.S. President Joe Biden has announced a two-year pause on a controversial tariff that was hobbling his country’s solar panel installation industry and imperiling his administration’s 2035 clean energy goal.

Private investors in rich countries stand to lose more than a trillion dollars on stranded fossil fuel assets as climate policies slash their value, giving them a powerful interest in the transition off carbon, according to new research published in the journal Nature Climate Change.

Canada’s shift to local renewables is in full swing from coast to coast, with Indigenous-owned hydroelectric and heat pump projects afoot in British Columbia, a 21-megawatt solar and storage project under way in Prince Edward Island, and new wind turbines coming to New Brunswick.

Communities near fracking operations and liquefied natural gas (LNG) facilities in the United States are worried that industrial expansion prompted by Russia’s war in Ukraine will bring them increasing and longer-term exposure to health-threatening pollutants. 

Worried about food security and determined to boost resilience while cutting energy costs, traditionally oil-dependent Alaska is looking to develop new microgrids and upgrade existing fossil-fueled ones—with renewables and storage.

The current energy crisis is making “blue” hydrogen derived from natural gas with carbon capture even more impractical than it already was, raising broader questions about the use of gas to produce electricity, a new analysis concludes.

The economic case for climate action might be the line of argument the climate community needs if it hopes to push Ontario toward faster, deeper carbon cuts during the four years of Premier Doug Ford’s second term, Globe and Mail columnist Adam Radwanski suggests in a post-election column.

A transit agency in California is drastically reducing its greenhouse gas emissions, saving money, and creating hundreds of jobs after shifting its entire 87-bus fleet from diesel to electric, 18 years ahead of the state mandate that would have required the new vehicles.

California’s unrelenting drought is straining the state’s resources and inflaming tensions in the legislature, as crucial drought relief policies and action are delayed by competing priorities like the pandemic, homelessness, and wildfires.

Tesla has launched a demonstration project in Texas to show that its Powerwall battery owners can create a virtual power plant that would be able to feed energy back to the state grid.

Climate policy analysts and campaigners were looking to next steps last night as they absorbed the results of a provincial election that delivered a second legislative majority for Doug Ford’s Progressive Conservative government, after the climate emergency barely scratched the surface of the campaign agenda.

With long-term care workers and nursing assistants increasingly taking on the role of first responders during climate-driven disasters like wildfires and heat waves, California has launched a pilot project to train them for the new responsibility, while their union pushes for better wages and benefits to match the added work load.

The U.S. Supreme Court is allowing the Biden administration to use a higher estimate for calculating damages to people and the environment from greenhouse gas emissions, despite a challenge by Republican-led states.

With the provincial election just days away, a business group in Windsor is blaming the Ford government’s hostility to renewable energy for the loss of a C$2.5-billion investment from South Korean chemical giant LG Chem.

Business-as-usual inaction on climate change could cost the world’s economy US$178 trillion by 2070, while a concerted and collaborative global push for net-zero could see $43 trillion in economic growth over the same period, says a new report from the Deloitte Center for Sustainable Progress.

A South Korean solar panel maker announced last Thursday that it will expand its presence in Georgia, building a new US$171-million plant next to an existing factory in Dalton.

Canada can achieve 100% zero-emission electricity by 2035 with an electricity system that prioritizes renewable energy, storage, energy efficiency, and interprovincial transmission and avoids the pitfalls of nuclear generation, fossil gas, carbon capture and storage, and carbon offsets, the David Suzuki Foundation (DSF) concludes in a modelling study released this week.

The senior safety consultant whose high-profile resignation from Shell spotlighted the company’s “extreme harms” to the environment is drawing a sharp contrast between the colossal fossil’s enduring interest in safer work processes and its failure to deliver on its highly-touted emissions reduction plan.

Vancouver’s core-area neighbourhoods are closing in on 15-minute city status, says a new study conducted by Simon Fraser University, largely because a decisive majority of residents can get to their nearest grocery store on foot, and at a relaxed pace.

Environmental degradation and rising insecurity are twin crises that, together, threaten to turn back decades of economic and social progress while governments look away instead of taking action, a new report warns.

The war in Ukraine is increasing gasoline prices in America despite the country’s status as the world’s largest oil producer, demonstrating why the United States “cannot drill its way to energy security” and should instead invest in renewables, writes Princeton University energy specialist Jesse Jenkins.

Researchers are developing mental health resources for farmers facing more unpredictable farming seasons, as climate change increases the intensity and frequency of extreme weather events.

No longer the sole province of tool- and computer-wielding technicians and scientists, climate careers will be increasingly found across all sectors, according to a new generation of young entrepreneurs who are determined to leave the world far better than they found it.

By pushing forward Ring of Fire mining and smelting development projects in northern Ontario, experts say federal and provincial governments are failing to recognize the right to free, informed, and prior consent enshrined in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), ratified by the Canadian government.

A floating tidal energy project in the Bay of Fundy has been successfully connected to Nova Scotia’s grid, an undertaking that marks a milestone for Canada’s marine energy ambitions, say proponents, as the bay’s tidal resources could be harnessed for thousands of megawatts of clean energy in the future.

The international community is gearing for global market shocks after India, the world’s second-largest wheat producer, halted most wheat exports to protect its national food security, while advocates call for greater attention to the entire Southeast Asian region gripped by the same deadly heat wave.

The current narrative linking international human migration with increased security risks should not be accepted at face value, say experts, and policy-makers must focus on building cohesive strategies and support systems for migration within borders in anticipation of large influxes of climate refugees, a conference audience heard last week.

Environmental law charity Ecojustice launched a suit in federal court and local opponents staged a rally outside the St. John’s office of Norwegian state fossil Equinor as opposition to the controversial Bay du Nord offshore oil and gas megaproject entered a new stage.

Greenhouse gas emissions from Ontario’s electricity system are set to increase more than 400% over the next two decades after the Doug Ford government cancelled a major wind farm and 758 smaller renewable energy projects, according to a forecast published by the province’s Independent Electricity System Operator and reported by the Toronto Star.

Campaigners in Australia’s federal election are caught in a balancing act between appeasing the majority of citizens who want the government to prioritize climate goals—and seducing voters in a handful of constituencies where a major source of livelihood is the world’s dirtiest fuel.

New renewable energy capacity will exceed 300 gigawatts this year for the first time, with mounting concerns about climate change and energy security driving an 8% increase over 2021 despite rising costs and supply chain bottlenecks, the International Energy Agency (IEA) reports this week in its annual renewables market update.

Climate change and social equity were both on the curriculum for the designers and builders of two new purpose-built schools in Washington, DC.

Utilities across several states are warning of rolling blackouts caused by electricity shortages, as the United States braces itself for a summer of record-breaking heat waves that will drive up energy demand.

A heavy industry town in British Columbia with an ingrained suspicion of government has decided to say yes to a 100% renewable energy transition by 2050, after a local climate group spent time meeting people where they’re at with curiosity and compassion—a hallmark of the “deep canvassing” technique.

Major geopolitical tensions could be resolved by electrifying transportation, a change that would dilute the concentration of power held by oil producers and redistribute it across producers of solar, wind, and other clean energies, analysts say.

Canada’s electricity system will have to get bigger, cleaner, and smarter to help power the country’s net-zero transition, the Canadian Climate Institute concludes in a collection of three reports issued Wednesday.

The clean energy transition stands to suffer a major blow as wind turbine manufacturers struggle to maintain profitability due to vanishing subsidies, high materials costs, and supply chain issues worsened by the war in Ukraine.

It has been an electric spring for Canada’s automakers, with more than $13 billion promised in just eight weeks to build the needed battery supply chains and shift production from combustion engine to plug-in vehicles.

As an example of what some see as a key piece of the transition to clean energy, a community battery in a Perth, Australia, suburb won over some of the community’s residents by storing electricity from rooftop solar panels to distribute back to the grid.

India enjoyed a record year for new renewable energy capacity in 2020-21, at 13.5 gigawatts, but is still far off the momentum it needs to hit national targets.

Coal power plants face “existential” financial risk as early as 2030 and gas facilities will see their profits disrupted by “major changes to markets, regulation, and business mode” through 2050, according to the latest climate vulnerability assessment published by Fitch Ratings.

The world’s biggest solar+storage project is expected to include 20 gigawatts of solar capacity and 42 gigawatt-hours of battery capacity, enough to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 480 million tonnes per year, according to environmental impact documents filed last week with an Australian regulator.

After persuading his colleagues to support free transit for under-19s and low-income seniors, Victoria city councillor Ben Isitt is working hard to push his city to join the 100 or so municipalities around the world that already make public transit free for all riders.

Russia’s dominant position in the global fuel economy is paying off, after soaring prices doubled the country’s fossil fuel revenues in the last two months—even though volumes are reduced.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has unexpectedly vetoed a bill that would have slashed the rates that utilities have to pay rooftop solar owners who sell their surplus power back to the grid, a move that would have devastated the solar industry in the U.S. jurisdiction known as the Sunshine State.

South Melbourne, Australia-based Montem Resources has announced plans to pursue a renewable energy project at its Tent Mountain site in Alberta’s Crowsnest Pass instead of its planned coal mine, but some environmental advocates remain suspicious of the company’s plans.

In a U.S. state where coal is still king, solar energy is beginning to come on strong, as West Virginia gradually begins to prepare itself for the transition off fossil fuels.

The southeastern United States is seeing a surge in electric vehicle sales, with an increase of 48% last year despite only a modest 3% rise in the overall auto trade.

Canadian professionals, trades, and labourers will urgently need education and retraining to successfully navigate the transition to a net-zero economy, Royal Bank of Canada economists warned in a report issued last month.

For the younger inhabitants of America’s oil boom towns, “future-proofing” their communities by investing in green energy is a necessary adventure, even if it’s “like staring into the abyss” for older residents.

Canada’s latest climate plan makes “overly optimistic” about the role of hydrogen, fails to map out a just transition for fossil fuel workers and communities, relies on “aspirational numbers” for carbon capture and storage technology, and may ultimately fall short of the country’s 2030 emission reduction target, Environment and Sustainable Development Commissioner Jerry DeMarco warned Tuesday.

Binding, science-based climate targets, respect for Indigenous sovereignty, and investment in a “thriving, regenerative, zero-emissions economy” are the top demands from more than 125 organizations that were scheduled to launch the Ontario Climate Emergency Campaign at the provincial legislature later today.

“You’re going to die of old age. We’re going to die of climate change,” chanted a group of Whitehorse, Yukon, high school students who gathered on Earth Day to protest the failure of way too many adults to take the climate crisis seriously.

The vacant strips of land along major highways could unlock a cleaner power grid and promote the uptake of electric vehicles, according to an 81-page feasibility study done for the Minnesota Department of Transportation.

Economic security through a basic income must be at the centre of the just transition off fossil fuels, and Canadians need the wherewithal to build resilience in their own communities, the Green Resilience Project concluded earlier this month, based on a series of 33 local conversations involving more than 900 participants across the country.

Electric vehicle sales grew almost 60% last year but they need to pick up the pace even more to hit the new federal sales mandates expected by the end of this year.

The fertilizer price crunch now plaguing farmers is reminiscent of the 1970s oil shock that led to greater energy efficiency in several industries, and could produce a similar shift in today’s agriculture sector—but that transition will have to be managed carefully to avoid further disrupting the global food supply.

With pre-election announcements in full swing ahead of a June 2 vote, Ontario has shifted its net metering regulations to make it easier for homeowners, farms, and businesses to generate income from rooftop solar or other renewable energy systems by selling surplus electricity back to the grid.

Natural gas-fired power generation in the United States peaked in 2020, and it will continue to fall as it competes with increasingly affordable wind and solar capacity, according to analysts who say renewables’ growth is being “supercharged” by rising fossil fuel costs and disruptions in energy security.

Michigan’s biggest energy supplier will phase out coal in 2025, 15 years ahead of its original schedule, embrace low-carbon electricity options, and donate to a fund for low-income utility customers under a proposed settlement with Attorney General Dana Nessel.

Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault said the Conservatives are lying with allegations of a secret government plan to add a green tax to pickup trucks.

A summary of public opinion research on what Canadians really think about climate change concludes that climate communicators urgently need to provide different audiences with tangible, specific examples of climate solutions, to counter a growing sense that humanity is helpless in the face of the climate crisis.

Limiting leaks from fossil fuel facilities is “low-hanging fruit” for stabilizing atmospheric methane levels, which showed the largest increase on record last year and hit the highest level since scientists began collecting data 39 years ago.

The European Union’s fuel supply options carry different implications for the climate, according to a life cycle assessment released while the continent is rethinking energy policy from between the rock of Russia’s war on Ukraine and the hard place of a looming energy supply crisis.

Canada’s new 2030 Emissions Reduction Plan (ERP) is a comprehensive, ambitious, and transparent policy roadmap for achieving Canada’s climate goals. It uses credible modelling to demonstrate a path to 2030 targets. It’s a big step forward. It’s also not enough, write Dave Sawyer, principal economist, and Dale Beugin, VP of research, at the Canadian Climate Institute.

A new study reconsiders energy efficiency as distinct from its carbon reduction potential and finds that it will still play a critical role in a successful transition to a zero-carbon economy.

Already the largest carbon removal plant in the world, Climeworks can now also claim to have raised the largest sum of any carbon dioxide removal company after investors put up US$650 million to fund the start-ups’s effort to capture more than a million tonnes of CO2 a year by 2030.

Major new dollars for affordable and energy-efficient housing, a C$15-billion fund to accelerate clean investment, and a controversial tax credit for carbon capture and storage (CCUS) technology are among the big-ticket items in the federal budget tabled in the House of Commons yesterday by Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland.

The federal cabinet administered what one critic called a “slap in the face” to climate science with a decision today to approve the massive Bay du Nord oil and gas megaproject off the Newfoundland coast.

As oil and gas prices continue to skyrocket in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Canadian fossil companies’ hopes for a lucrative 2022 are being undercut by labour shortages.

Fossil fuel companies are using stock buybacks to profit from Russia’s war on Ukraine—at the expense of consumers, workers, and just about everyone else, says a new report released by advocacy groups just as the United States holds hearings to scrutinize oil and gas profits.

For the first time in the UN agency’s 34-year history, yesterday’s massive report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) introduces the language of “demand-side” action to the field of climate mitigation, with potential to reduce emissions by 40 to 70% in the places where people live, work, learn, and play.

International cooperation on climate action has grown since the 1997 Kyoto Protocol to yield modest progress, says the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), but stronger collaborations are needed to overcome barriers in countries with limited capacity.

Provincial and territorial energy efficiency programs are failing to reach the 20% of Canadians who are struggling to cover their home energy costs, but federal investment can stop those households from being left behind in the push for net-zero emissions, Efficiency Canada says in a new report.

A spat between the International Energy Agency and a global cartel of fossil producers is breaking out into the open, with the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies accusing the IEA of giving too much credence to the climate emergency and purveying biased data.

While projections show that the transition to a green economy could affect nearly a quarter of all jobs in Canada, experts say supportive policies and retraining can help workers develop new skills and adapt to new sectors.

When lifetime ownership costs are factored in, electric vehicles (EVs) are often significantly cheaper than their fossil counterparts, according to a new report by Clean Energy Canada.

U.S. President Joe Biden brandished one of the biggest weapons in his economic arsenal Thursday in hopes of turning the United States into a leading producer of electric-vehicle batteries and the minerals used to make them.

The fossil and transportation sectors get a relatively free ride and electricity producers do the most to decarbonize in the much-anticipated 2030 Emissions Reduction Plan released yesterday by Environment and Climate Change Minister Steven Guilbeault.

The proposed Bay du Nord offshore oil project in Newfoundland is economically and environmentally “impossible to justify,” writes an environmental advocate, calling the venture’s emissions damaging and unnecessary as Canada lags on climate goals.

Canada’s National Research Council has quietly released a new set of national building codes that show how provincial and territorial governments—which actually hold authority for codes and standards—can make new buildings net-zero ready by 2030.

A new study points to geothermal energy as an untapped resource that could stabilize energy grids and support decarbonization of the world’s megacities, which are seeing increasing energy needs as urban populations rise.

Experts say renewables will be a critical component of India’s climate plan—which rightfully sets its net-zero deadline two decades later than wealthier high-emitters like the United States and Europe—as the country balances urgent climate adaptation alongside pressing support for food security.

An agreement by a Michigan public utility to expand its low-income efficiency programs and study how the energy burden of vulnerable households can be reduced is being hailed by environmental justice advocates as a crucial move towards fighting energy inequality.

The United States Department of Energy has chosen 14 host communities for technical assistance, in a bid to discover how energy storage can increase resilience and reduce costs in underserved communities.

Toronto-based Element Fleet Management has created a roadmap to help clients switch to battery-electric vehicles in response to growing investor pressure to cut carbon emissions.

Bitcoin miners claim they can help stabilize Texas’s vulnerable electricity grid, but they can also be a drain on utilities as they cash in on the state’s cheap energy.

Canada’s long-awaited 2030 Emissions Reduction Plan (ERP) must set legally-binding limits for the oil and gas industry that are “coherent with national targets”, since “other sectors would be required to do even more for Canada to achieve its target” if fossils failed to pull their weight, the country’s Net-Zero Advisory Body said in its official advice to the government earlier this week.

Canada’s first electric vehicle battery plant is coming to Windsor, Ontario, prompting the beleaguered auto sector to herald the news as a sign of better days ahead.

Iron & Earth has launched a new online tool to help Canadian fossil fuel workers move into careers in the net-zero economy, matching their skills to trades and administration positions in wind, solar, energy efficiency, electric vehicle charging, and more.

Many Alberta youth view their home province as backward-looking and intolerant of diversity, and are leaving in droves in search of more progressive communities, says a new report by the Canada West Foundation.

The federal Liberals and New Democrats must make good use of the next three-plus years of political stability by embracing more decisive climate action than they promised in the supply and confidence agreement (CSA) unveiled yesterday, leading climate policy analysts have told The Energy Mix.

Canada is one of 19 oil and gas-producing countries that must reduce production by three-quarters this decade and phase it out completely by 2034 to keep a 1.5°C climate future within sight, while allowing less wealthy, more fossil-dependent economies more time to catch up, according to a new analysis released this week by the United Kingdom’s Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research.

Canadian cities already have the authority to take bold action on climate solutions, and the world’s best municipal climate leaders have shown how other communities can cut their emissions and embrace climate and environmental justice, former Toronto mayor David Miller told an online community meeting in Ottawa Monday evening.

The Biden administration’s climate plans have one less constraint after a 5th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling stayed a Louisiana District Court’s order preventing agencies from considering the social cost of carbon.

An announcement that Germany’s emissions increased last year has put pressure on the country to expand its renewable energy infrastructure or risk delaying its climate goals.

Flying less is currently the only path to rapid reduction in aviation emissions, and will remain so for longer than necessary if the aviation industry fails to grasp that its survival depends on embracing climate-friendly technological innovation, a veteran climate and aviation analyst warns.

The United Kingdom could eliminate all need for imported Russian gas this year and cut average home heating costs by £150 by embracing insulation and heat pumps, encouraging consumers to change their energy habits, and relying more on renewable energy, the E3G climate consultancy concludes in an analysis released last week.

Business leaders from the United States and Canada are again wading into the fray over Line 5, citing the energy crisis brought on by Russia’s war in Ukraine to accuse the state of Michigan of dragging its heels to keep the controversial cross-border pipeline in a state of legal limbo.

The hybrid work week—with employees commuting to the office only occasionally—is not enough to limit corporate carbon footprints in a post-pandemic reality. Experts say progress to cut emissions could be held back if larger questions of evolving employee behaviours, efficient use of indoor space, and impacts on cities are not addressed.

A Conservative member of Parliament from New Brunswick is raising eyebrows on both sides of the aisle by calling on the province to abandon its own carbon tax system and adopt the federal floor price on carbon.

Economy ministers across the European Union have adopted the world’s first carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM), bringing the continent one step closer to a levy on imports in emissions-intensive industries like electricity, steel, cement, aluminum, and fertilizer.

Canada’s prime minister and Ontario’s premier announced millions in funding support for domestic hybrid car production this week, but both leaders dodged questions on the possibility of incentives to help Canadians buy them.

Royal Bank of Canada, Shopify, and Bullfrog Power Inc. have signed a deal to buy a combined 90,000 megawatt-hours per year from a Berkshire Hathaway wind power project in southeast Alberta.

Two recent reports have raised questions about California’s carbon cap-and-trade program, concluding that the system worsens environmental justice disparities and could undermine progress towards the state’s emissions reduction targets without effective policy reforms.

Virginia’s Republican governor is going all out to withdraw from a multi-state carbon reduction initiative, even after the program netted the state US$74.2 million for flood protection and low-income energy efficiency programs.

Steelworkers in Regina and politicians at all levels were scrambling to assess the local implications Friday after the federal government extended its Ukraine sanctions list to include Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich, a close associate of Vladimir Putin and part owner of the steel mill that produced pipe for the Trans Mountain and Coastal GasLink pipelines.

An April 30 deadline for the federal government’s just transition consultation, announced as part of a virtual roundtable last Thursday, is being taken as a sign that Ottawa will be getting started on legislation to help fossil fuel workers and communities navigate the shift off carbon, more than two years after then-environment minister Jonathan Wilkinson’s pre-pandemic promise to make it happen.

With the war in Ukraine triggering a secondary crisis in gas heating costs across Europe, “tackling poor quality homes in marginal constituencies could swing election success,” the United Kingdom’s Energy & Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU) concludes in a report released last week.

A group of 16 community renewable energy co-ops from seven provinces is fighting an uphill battle for recognition, nearly a month after urging the federal government to make it easier for Canadians to invest in locally-owned and -generated electricity.

With extreme weather wreaking havoc on power lines, experts are turning their attention to emerging transmission technologies, and have named four companies to watch as the United States ramps up renewables-based electrification.

A recent solar technology breakthrough from UK scientists brings “wearable solar” one step closer to commercial production and could greatly expand the amount of solar power generated by weaving the microscopic technology into daily living.

About four dozen communities across Canada are planning events tomorrow to get action on the Trudeau government’s long-standing promise to introduce a Just Transition Act, aimed at priming fossil fuel communities and workers for the transition off fossil fuels.

Advocates are urging Ottawa to fully and rapidly phase out all financial support for fossil fuel development—at home and abroad, abated and unabated—to correct Canada’s abysmal record of being the worst climate performer of all G7 nations since the landmark Paris Agreement was adopted in 2015.