Today’s top five climate change stories chosen by RTCC
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(Pic: Kevin Dooley)
1 – Three is the magic number for Beijing
Beijing has today become the third Chinese city to launch a carbon trading scheme to cut its greenhouse gas emissions per unit of GDP to 40-45% below 2005 levels by 2020, with first trades reported to have gone through at 50 yuan ($8.20) per permit, where each permit represents one tonne of CO2, says Reuters. State-owned oil and gas company Sinopec Corp and investment bank CITIC Securities each bought 20,000 permits.
2 – Poland plans 2014 fracking drive
Poland will begin commercial production of shale gas next year, the Deputy Environment Minister said Wednesday, becoming the first European country to use the controversial technique known as fracking, according to Phys.org. Testing to determine how much gas was produced by the well is still ongoing, however, and the company plans to drill another test well in the region.
3 – Jordan constructs $290 million wind farm
Jordan is set to build its first utility-scale wind farm at a cost of $290 million. The 117 megawatt Tafila Wind Farm is poised to increase the country’s total power capacity by 3%, displacing 235,000 tons of annual CO2 emissions, says Business Green.
4 – Barbeques culled in Chinese war against CO2
Beijing is waging a war against air pollution, and it is doing so one barbecue at a time. Authorities in the capital have destroyed more than 500 open-air barbecues over a three month campaign “to cut PM2.5″ — the tiny particulate matter in the air that can enter deep into the lungs, says the Guardian.
5 – Universal electricity access to cost $800 billion per year
The World Bank and United Nations today appealed for $600-$800 billion a year to provide electricity for the poorest nations but said there would be no investment in nuclear power, says The Business Standard. This would be needed to meet the campaign target of universal access to electricity, doubling energy efficiency and doubling the share of renewable energy by 2030.