Josh Gabbatiss
@Josh_Gabbatiss
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Climate policy correspondent @CarbonBrief 🐸 [email protected] ✉️
@joshgabbatiss.bsky.social
Joined May 2015
NEW: More than 3/4 of prisons in England & Wales face a “high risk” of overheating in the next 15 years, according to government data obtained by FOI. This interactive shows how prisoners will bear the brunt of heatwaves & floods as the world gets hotter➡️
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I'm proud to announce a project that has been nearly 22 years in the making: . Josh'es [sic] Book of ANIMALS 🦭. Since the age of nine I have been writing and illustrating my own animal encyclopedia, and as of last week I can confirm that it is finished.
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I've returned to my parents' home in West Oxfordshire this Christmas to find people angry and worried about the future of the village. Why? Because they say "Europe's biggest solar farm" is about to be built on their doorstep. 🌞a festive thread🌞. 1/
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UK energy use is incredibly unequal. The top 10% of earners use more energy *on flights* than the bottom 20% use in a year. Their holidays and business trips burn through all the energy the poorest fifth use for power, heating, fuelling cars etc. 1/
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Thanks to @dorrismccomics for a birthday card that neatly summarises my career in journalism for the past year or so.
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What about food security? People have told me they're worried about losing quality land to solar. The panels will cover 1000ha, which is about 0.5% of Oxfordshire's farmland. Developers say the solar will power the equivalent of 100% of Oxfordshire's homes. A fair exchange?. 8/
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Punchy stuff from Lord Deben on UK oil and gas. “It's not going to change my mind on the facts because you tell me some people don’t like it…We're not going to save the world from its destruction unless we set an example". "That means we cannot allow further development of oil"
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One claim is that solar will cause "a significant reduction in biodiversity" despite developer plans for new wildflower meadows and woods. Without getting too George Monbiot i have my doubts about how biodiverse these fields are (although i did scare these deer out of a hedge).7/
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But is its size a problem? What is it replacing?. Oxfordshire is 75% farmland, of which two-thirds is for growing wheat, barley and other crops. The solar will be on some of this arable land. When opponents say it's destroying "the countryside", this is what they mean. 6/
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Landowners/farmers often want these projects because they are a good way to supplement their income, on top of growing food. Soils can recover, sheep can graze between the panels. More in this recent @CarbonBrief article. 10/.
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And finally, solar is cheap - and getting cheaper! More renewables will cut energy bills for people in Oxfordshire and the rest of the country. ends/.
Pssst!. Solar is now 88% cheaper than thought a decade ago, UK govt says – half its estimated cost of new gas power. Just running a gas plant in Feb 2022 is costing around FOUR times as much as we'd pay for new solar or wind. Thread with charts + FAQ. 1/.
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But there was still one page left. The book was meant to end with our closest cousins, the apes. But for some reason it went back in storage, still incomplete. So now, with this final drawing of a chimpanzee this 2 decade project is complete! If anyone wants to publish it lmk 🦧
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For the first time ever in UN climate negotiations #LossAndDamage finance has made it onto the agenda at #COP27 . This is a historic moment. Small island nations have been raising this issue for 30+ years, and now it has happened after a concerted push from developing countries
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Heat pumps and electric cars don't work very well in cold weather, says Ross Clark. That's why the sun-kissed land of Norway has more heat pumps and electric cars per capita than any other nation 🇳🇴 🌞
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But to my mind the best arguments are:. The UK needs to build loads of solar - ground and rooftop - to meet its net-zero target, end reliance on fossil fuels and tackle climate change. The government is aiming for a 5x increase from ~14GW today to 70GW🟡in 13 years time. 14/
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no. NO. did the picture editor for this piece think i was doing a little celebratory fist pump?
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A big emphasis from campaigners is putting solar panels on roofs *instead* of in fields. But to get the equivalent amount of power you would need to install 3.5kW of solar panels on *every house in Oxfordshire*. 12/
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Pakistan minister @HinaRKhar delivers strong #LossAndDamage message highlighting limits to adaptation:. “There’s no country in the world, even a 1st world country, which can build this type of infrastructure resilience within its systems…where 1/3 of your country is underwater".
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Deeply depressed at the thought of every centrist dad in the country confidently telling their mates down the pub that 2C of warming isn't a big deal, because they heard Bill Gates tell Alastair Campbell as much on The Rest is Politics.
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Also this Natural England map suggests the farmland quality at the site is "good to moderate" 🟢 or "poor" 🟡 but not "very good" or "excellent" 🔵. 9/.
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At this point there are some quite obvious jumps in time. Periods where I went months without touching my animal book. Still, I dragged myself away from whatever I was doing in my teens to crack on with the finale: Mammals. 🐘
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THREAD: I'm pleased to reveal a new @CarbonBrief project that's been months in the making. Using our database of 1364 UK newspaper editorials we have analysed how press attitudes to climate & energy have changed in a decade. The results may surprise you.
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New climate finance delivery plan confirms what we already knew: the $100bn target for 2020 has been missed, probably by a fair bit. Worse, it's not expected to be met for another two years.
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I've made it into COP29!. I'll be focusing on climate finance, and specifically the new collective quantified goal negotiations. As ever, drop me a message or email if you want to grab a coffee and talk 🤑
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This is so tragic
This photo thaken by Justin Hofman (NHMWPY finalist) for SeaLegacy shows the very real impact our waste can have on our ocean. #wpy53
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The creatively-titled Botley West solar farm would apparently have a capacity of 840MW - enough, the developers say, to power 330,000 homes. This is about the same as a medium gas-powered plant and would boost the country's solar capacity by about 6%. Sounds good?. 2/
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Gradually I made my way through the mammals. 🐴🐗🦊🦫🦥🦬🐪🦏🦛🦇. But then, with only 3 pages to go I just stopped. I went to university, and the animal book was too precious to move to a different city.
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You can tell that I was in it for the long haul because instead of going straight for the big charismatic species I started with corals, worms etc. I copied the format i saw in other animal books (my rivals), working my way from "simple" animals all the way to apes . 🪸➡️🦍
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Made it into #COP27!. I'm keeping a particularly close eye on #LossAndDamage and climate finance 💰. Give me a shout if you want to chat or grab a coffee ☕ . Or come and find the @CarbonBrief gang in the office on the upper floor of the media centre
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One factor is that one of the landowners is the Blenheim Estate (Blenheim being seat of the Duke of Marlborough, Churchill's birthplace). There's anger at the perceived hypocrisy of the local lords of the manor, who have apparently failed to build solar on their new housing. 11/
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After years of neglect, I made an effort during the first Covid lockdown to get those final pages done. I worked through some of the more obscure mammal groups - tree shrews, elephant shrews, flying lemurs. And I ticked monkeys off as well - the end was in sight! 🐒
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Replacing the fuel in UK planes ✈️ with hydrogen would require more than 2x as much renewable power as the country currently generates. This rises to 5x as much for other alternative fuels. And we would still need a whole electricity system to power everything else. 1/
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Looks like golf isn't the only elite activity that takes up far more space than solar power in the UK. Grouse shooting uses at least 53x more land, and 18x times more if future solar projects are included. More on solar land use here:.
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Of course the other issue, perhaps the main one, is how the solar farm looks. Despite its size, from what i can see most of it will only be visible from roads or to those walking through it . But it's hard to argue with people living right next to the site. 13/
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Of course every section ended with an index, in case any of my readers wanted to find something specific.
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First off: The project certainly is big. I’ve seen other proposals reported as “UK’s biggest solar farm” but it looks like this one could actually be up there. And yes, it is bigger than the biggest currently in Europe (590MW). Although i doubt that will be true for long. 5/
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I can't remember the exact timescale for all these bits but judging by the drawings I think this period was my most prolific. I covered all the major invertebrate groups, and tried to be a bit experimental with what I was including on each page. 🦑🦞🐚🕷️🐌🐞🦟🪱
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Big 24 hours for #LossAndDamageFinance . 🇺🇳 UN chief calls for tax on fossil fuel firms to pay for loss and damage.🇩🇰 Denmark becomes first UN member to pledge loss and damage funds.🇵🇰 Climate minister from Pakistan [G77 chair] says loss and damage must be on COP27 finance agenda.
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So far, 26 countries have joined a call for a complete phaseout of fossil fuels at #COP28 (not just "unabated" ones). Almost none of them produce fossil fuels in any significant quantities. The exception is Colombia 🇨🇴 - which produces roughly 1% of the world's fossil fuels.
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Not according to some locals, who say this "ocean of glass and metal" will:. ↔️ Be too big.🪲 Destroy biodiversity.🌳Destroy "the countryside".🌾Take good farmland. Most say they generally support solar but. 🏠 It should be on roofs instead. 3/
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Gates: "The really bad stuff is if you let it go, say above 3C or if you live near the equator and you’re dependent for your food on yearly harvests, you have no savings.". I wonder how many millions of people in the world would fall into that category?.
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. and reptiles. By this point the pages are getting a bit neater, and the drawings perhaps a little better. 🐍🦎
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COP29 is kicking off and the biggest issue on the agenda is climate finance. Nearly 200 states must agree on a new goal to help developing nations tackle climate change. They disagree on nearly every issue. I've outlined key disputes & dividing lines ⬇️.
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NEW: There's been a flurry of "loss and damage" pledges from rich nations at #COP27 – totalling $300m+. This $ is going towards a mix of initiatives, only some of which directly support climate victims. By far the most funded is the insurance-based German/V20 "Global Shield".
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"Birds" is maybe the weakest section - quite text heavy in an effort to fill up space. I was probably in my early teens at this point and I think I was keen to get to the end. 🐦🦅🦆🦢🦉🦚🦜🦤🦃🕊️
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I took a look at Shell's first ever 1.5C scenario and found that it is. remarkably similar to its “well-below 2C” scenario. Oil, gas, coal, solar. all basically unchanged. The key difference: A new forest the size of Brazil to suck up the extra CO2.
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NEW - Austria 🇦🇹 has become the latest rich nation to pledge #LossAndDamage finance at #COP27 : $50m. By my count the governments that have done so are:. 🇩🇪 $170m.🇧🇪 $2.5m.🇩🇰 $13m.🏴 $8m.Wallonia,🇧🇪 $1m. Total: $244.5 . A small amount, but also worth looking closer at the pledges.
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I've been blown away by the response to my Book of ANIMALS 🐸. It has been delightful to receive so many kind words from friends and strangers, and to hear about your childhood obsessions. Bizarrely, I'm in the Sunday Times today talking more about it ➡️.
I'm proud to announce a project that has been nearly 22 years in the making: . Josh'es [sic] Book of ANIMALS 🦭. Since the age of nine I have been writing and illustrating my own animal encyclopedia, and as of last week I can confirm that it is finished.
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To understand global south anger at the COP29 climate finance goal it's crucial to understand two key numbers. "At least" $300bn/year - developed nations agreed to "take the lead" in mobilising this for developing countries. $1.3tn/year - a wider, vaguer goal. Sounds big! But.
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Local Conservative MP @robertcourts (who replaced David Cameron when he stepped down in 2016) has also come out against this project. He joins many of his fellow Tories, and indeed PM Rishi Sunak, who have said they oppose new solar projects on UK farmland. 4/
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There's an organised movement in the UK trying to stop the construction of new solar power 🌞. At its heart is some climate and environmental misinformation that’s reminiscent of past efforts to block renewables in the UK. 🤔 Let's take a closer look… . 1/
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☀️Hello friends ☀️ A bit of job-related news. Next week I will be joining @CarbonBrief as a climate journalist. Sad to be leaving my wonderful colleagues at The Independent, but excited to get stuck in and sort out all this climate change business.
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Lord Deben says Defra has no programme to reach net-zero by 2050. “This is remarkable given its role, and somewhat surprising.”. That said, he says CCC has had a “rather curious” relationship with this department. “We’ve had ministers who didn’t believe in climate change.”
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Die! You Net Zero Tyrants is the name of my new climate sceptic post-rock group
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Speaking on Radio 4's Today programme she also points out that the number of people affected by floods in Pakistan is equivalent to 10m more people than the entire population of Australia – the same as the population of Malaysia or Saudi Arabia.
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I'm at #COP28 🫠. I'll be closely following loss & damage, climate finance and adaptation. Let's grab a chat/coffee/both to talk about these things and any other interesting stuff going on!
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EU climate chief Frans Timmermans just announced they are open to a loss & damage fund - with caveats. He says it is "unacceptable" that large emerging economies don't have to provide cash. "I think everybody should be brought into the system on the basis of where they are today"
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sorry I don't want to go on about this but the fact that the prime minister is leading on saying he is "stopping" policies like meat and flight taxes - which do not exist and never have - is so revealing. it's pure culture wars and nothing else.
We will never impose unnecessary and heavy-handed measures on you, the British people. We will still meet our international commitments and hit Net Zero by 2050.
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The most important climate election of the year is drawing to a close in Brazil 🇧🇷 . A victory for Lula will hopefully mean a victory for the Amazon rainforest - and therefore the entire world.
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Asked about the term "unabated", EU climate chief Wopke Hoekstra says “we need to phase out all fossil fuels". "Some sectors…are very hard to abate, but it does not mean that where it is possible companies or countries can get away with CCS-ing themselves out of the problem”.
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Samoa🇼🇸 says they are "a little confused about what just happened" - the package of climate measures at #COP28 was just launched by the UAE when small-island states were not in the room.
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Shell has released its latest vision of how the world could stay below 1.5C of warming. New @CarbonBrief analysis shows that it requires oil & gas growth to end *immediately*. This comes as the oil firm floats plans to. pump more oil. So what's going on?.
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Right-leaning UK newspapers have published at least 10 editorials over the past week raging about Keir Starmer's plan to end new oil and gas exploration in the North Sea. They are trying very hard to frame the policy as "extreme" and "dangerous".
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Lord Deben berates notorious climate sceptic Lord Peter Lilley when he questions restricting oil supply. “You're right that we should be reducing our need for fossil fuels…but you personally haven't helped us on that. On every issue that we've raised you've tried to hold us up"
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Contrary to some efforts to paint them as litterbugs, there were even crews scrubbing the pavements clean before they left #ExtinctionRebellion
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"Father of global warming" James Hansen has based his press conference around the ok boomer meme. #COP25
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There was disappointment that the final COP28 outcome didn't include stronger language on "phasing out" fossil fuels. But it's important to note that some global north nations e.g. 🇺🇸pushing for such language actually plan to increase their own fossil fuel production this decade
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If you don't fancy reading this 18,000-word piece @DrSimEvans and I have spent months working on, I have summarised it neatly in a haiku:. Hydrogen can be.A way to cut out carbon.But only sometimes.
NEW | In-depth Q&A: Does the world need hydrogen to solve climate change? | @DrSimEvans @Josh_Gabbatiss @tomoprater @joegoodman94 (1/5)
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NEW analysis shows the scale of fracking lobbying by the UK press. Numbers of pro-fracking editorials in right-wing papers surged to record highs in 2022. The Sun printed more than half of them: an incredible 💥32 editorials💥 pushing for fracking. 1/
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Heat pumps: “the central technology in the global transition to secure and sustainable heating” according to @IEA . ♨️ Global sales up 13% in 2021 🌍 and 35% in EU 🇪🇺.♨️ On track for a record year in 2022.♨️ Very high penetration in cold nations 🇳🇴🇫🇮. 1/.
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The UK's biggest humanitarian programme for Afghanistan has been reclassified as a climate aid project. £150m from a project providing emergency food, shelter and healthcare now counts towards the UK's "climate finance" goals. @CarolineLucas asks a simple question: Why? . 🧵
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Electric car sales in Europe will surge to record levels this year, according to the @IEA . That's despite the many, many column inches in recent weeks dedicated to the "slump" in electric car sales across the continent.
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NEW - Developed countries spend over TEN TIMES more on their military than on climate finance for developing countries. £1,242bn military spending in 2022.£97bn est. climate finance in 2022. Chart by @tomoprater
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🚗"Explosive" growth in electric car sales mean these vehicles cut global CO2 emissions by 80m tonnes last year. However. 🚘 Rising sales of big, energy-hungry SUVs mean their global emissions rose by 70m tonnes. So the SUVs almost cancel the EVs out.
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I actually didn't realise oil companies were saying the quiet part loud quite to this degree.
Occidental Petroleum Corp CEO Vicki Hollub:. “We believe that our direct capture technology is going to be the technology that helps to preserve our industry . This gives our industry a license to continue to operate for the 60, 70, 80 years. ". 😬😬😬
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One interesting point from these emails obtained by @CarbonBrief is the insight into the mindset in No 10 around climate science. Just two years ago you have No 10 asking: are the IPCC "scientists or not" and are their reports "worth taking note of"?.
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Lots of talk at #COP27 about expanding the list of climate $ donors. The implicit target is China, the world's largest emitter. Developed countries have apparently suggested broadening donor base to "high income" countries. This would cover 🇮🇱🇰🇷🇦🇪🇸🇦🇨🇱🇶🇦🇸🇬. But not China! 🇨🇳. 1/.
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Confused about who to vote for to tackle climate change? The new IPCC report has you covered. 🟥"Left-wing parties tend to adopt more pro-climate policy positions.". 🌱"On average, a higher share of green parties in a parliament is associated with lower greenhouse gas emissions."
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New IPCC report out today. Things are looking bleak, but if we really, really, REALLY try hard we can avoid some of the most devastating impacts of climate change. This is the biggest news story in the world and I'm proud to work somewhere that puts it on the front page.
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Maybe I'm wrong but I don't think running an old man over with your car is a reasonable response to the council introducing traffic restrictions? I don't feel like "green zealots" are to blame here?
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Jordan Peterson told Joe Rogan that more people die falling off roofs installing solar panels than from nuclear power and I thought ya know what, he might actually be right about something. But then I checked and no, he is indeed wrong, according to @OurWorldInData
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NEW: I've spent a year investigating the cash the UK spends on climate action in developing countries 💰🌍. An FOI revealed the government is veering off track from a pledge to spend £11.6bn over 5 years. Spending now needs to double in the coming years.
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In his opening speech, #COP28 president and oil CEO Sultan Al Jaber 🇦🇪 tells everyone that "it is essential that no issue is left off the table". "And yes. We must look for ways, and ensure, the inclusion of the role of fossil fuels."
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Climate finance talks at #COP29 off to a rocky start as developing countries unanimously rejected the text proposed as a starting point for negotiations. They have asked the co-chairs overseeing talks to prepare a new text before the negotiators meet again.
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Gates: “The world does not end at 2C…We will get there, there’s no stopping us passing 2C. In temperate zone countries in terms of your overall economy or livelihoods it’s actually not a gigantic thing…You have to pay to make various changes, you have to have air conditioning.".
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Small island countries often say they have been asking for #LossAndDamageFinance for more than 30 years. For the 2nd piece in @CarbonBrief's loss and damage week I've traced the history of this idea from its inception, as the world prepares for #COP27.
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Easy to miss amid the flurry of depressing environmental news coming out of the UK, but the government's tree-planting goals are slipping out of reach. Latest stats show rates have flatlined, despite the Conservative pledge to reach 30,000 new hectares a year by 2024.
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5 Big Oil companies made $195bn last year. That's A LOT of money. With that kind of cash you could conceivably. 🦟Eradicate malaria. or. 🌊 Pay for last year's worst extreme weather damage. or. ⚡️ Provide near-universal electricity access to Africa. chart made w/ @joejgoodman
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Many of the biggest new oil and gas fields from the past two years have been discovered by companies with net-zero targets.
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More poorly informed takes on climate from @RestIsPolitics. Rory Stewart says climate finance for developing countries is "completely the wrong way" to "stop global warming". Instead G20 should have met for a couple more days to "try to crack this". A few problems with this. .
🗣️ @RoryStewartUK: “The world is literally frying!” 🌍. 🗣️ @CampbellClaret: “They wanted 1.3 trillion per year!” 💰. Rory and Alastair discuss the recent #COP29 summit in Baku and how best to tackle the ever-growing threat of climate change with @FuseEnergy #ad
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Oil-and-gas firms have seen a surge in profits this year, linked to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Profits for 15 oil majors in Europe and North America have increased more than 2x. At #COP27 , some are eyeing this $$$ as a source of money for the victims of climate change.
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"There is a massive greenwashing exercise at play" at #COP27 says @TasneemEssop from @CANIntl . She says there are even more fossil fuel representatives here than there were at COP26, where they outnumbered any single country's delegation.
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