Overemphasis on innovation and carbon removal risks distracting from main goal of stopping use of fossil fuels, say scientists
Machines to magic carbon out of the air, artificial intelligence, indoor vertical farms to grow food for our escape to Mars, and even solar-powered “responsible” yachts: the Cop28 climate summit in Dubai has been festooned with the promise of technological fixes for worsening global heating and ecological breakdown.
The UN climate talks have drawn a record number of delegates to a sprawling, freshly built metropolis, which has as its centrepiece an enormous dome that emits sounds and lights up in different colours at night. The two-week programme is laden with talks, events and demonstrations of the need for humanity to innovate its way out of the climate crisis.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
12/09/2023 - 23:00
12/09/2023 - 17:41
Ted O’Brien declares global climate summit ‘the nuclear Cop’ despite only 11% of nations backing the pledge
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The federal Coalition has declared at the Cop28 climate summit that it will back a global pledge to triple nuclear energy if the opposition leader, Peter Dutton, becomes prime minister, but will not support Australia tripling its renewable energy.
Speaking on the sidelines of the conference in Dubai, the opposition’s climate change and energy spokesperson, Ted O’Brien, also said a Coalition government would consider supporting Generation III+ large-scale nuclear reactors, and not just the unproven small modular reactors it has strongly touted.
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12/09/2023 - 12:23
But country’s climate envoy, Xie Zhenhua, would not say whether it would support phase-out wording in climate deal
Cop28 live – latest updates
China would like to see nations agree to substitute renewable energy for fossil fuels, the country’s chief climate official has said, as nations wrangled over the weekend on the wording of a deal on the climate crisis.
Xie Zhenhua, China’s climate envoy, would not be explicit on whether China supported or opposed a phase-out of fossil fuels, which more than 100 governments are pushing for at crucial climate talks, the Cop28 UN summit.
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12/09/2023 - 11:31
Distraught homeowners in Hemsby write farewell messages on houses affected by coastal erosion
The demolition of five seaside houses has begun in Norfolk after coastal erosion put them at risk of collapsing on to the beach below.
Distraught homeowners in Hemsby wrote farewell messages on their houses before workers began demolishing one house on Saturday. “Gone but not forgotten” was scrawled on one seafront property.
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12/09/2023 - 10:01
Climate activists likely to be concerned by another fossil fuel-reliant country taking over summit presidency
Azerbaijan has been announced as the host of next year’s climate summit after fraught negotiations.
Under UN rules it was eastern Europe’s turn to take over the rotating presidency but the groups need to unanimously decide on the host. Russia had blocked EU countries and Azerbaijan and Armenia were blocking each other’s bids.
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12/09/2023 - 09:00
Over the next few editions of World Ocean Radio we will be discussing a recent publication entitled “A Forgotten Element in the Blue Economy: Marine Biomimetics and Inspiration from the Deep Sea,” authored by Robert Blasiak from the Stockholm Resilience Center in Sweden. The article identifies seven broad categories of biomimetic design: adhesion, anti-fouling, armor, buoyancy, movement, sensory, and stealth. In this 3-part series we'll discuss each with examples of application, technological invention, and as effective solution models for response to negative human intervention and climate change, and for ocean protection and conservation.
12/09/2023 - 06:50
Continent’s chief negotiator says an agreement for fair and equitable funding is a matter of life and death
Cop28 live – latest updates
Fair and equitable finance for climate adaptation is a matter of life and death for the African continent, but talks at Cop28 so far have failed to deliver, the chief negotiator for the African group has warned.
Adaptation is being discussed as part of the global stocktake (GST), the assessment of where the world is on delivering the commitments made in the 2015 Paris agreement. The long-awaited global goal on adaptation (GGA) – a collective commitment proposed by the African group in 2013 and established under the Paris agreement – to drive political action and finance for adaptation on the same scale as mitigation, is also due to be completed in Dubai.
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12/09/2023 - 06:15
UK’s former climate chief Alok Sharma says phase-out crucial to limit global warming to 1.5C
Failure to agree a phase-out of fossil fuels at the UN Cop28 climate summit would push the world beyond the crucial 1.5C temperature limit and into climate breakdown, the UK’s former climate chief has warned.
Alok Sharma, who was president of the Cop26 summit in Glasgow, said it was vital that governments made a clear commitment in the next few days to eliminate coal, oil and gas.
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12/09/2023 - 04:00
Guerrilla leader turned president says, faced with having to reduce their carbon consumption, upper classes fear ‘the barbarians are coming’
Middle-class fears of losing a high standard of living because of green policies is driving the rise of the far right across the world, the president of Colombia has warned.
In a wide-ranging interview with the Guardian at the Cop28 UN climate summit, Gustavo Petro, Colombia’s first leftwing president, said the world had to find carbon-free ways of being prosperous, and that his country’s rich biodiversity would be the basis of its wealth after phasing out fossil fuels.
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12/09/2023 - 04:00
Exclusive: freedom of information request reveals ministers rejected plan to make pledge legally binding
The UK government has no plans to meet its target for everyone to live within a 15-minute walk of a green space, the Guardian can reveal.
Ministers have also scrapped an idea to make the target for access to nature legally binding, a freedom of information request submitted by the Right to Roam campaign shows.
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