In the aftermath of the Nov. 3 election, President Donald Trump has tried every trick in the book to avoid facing the reality of his loss. A barrage of lawsuits accompanied by disinformation campaigns has attempted to cast doubt on the legitimacy of the election.

But a close look at regulatory actions and executive moves shows that, even as Trump makes a show of refusing to concede or transition power to the incoming Biden administration, his team is pushing through a slew of last-minute rules and regulations.

Many of these changes will harm the environment and public health.

It isn't surprising that an administration that has attempted to roll back more than100 environmental protectionsin the past four years would step up its assault in its waning months. But that doesn't make the continued attacks any less important. Here's some of what's at risk:

1. Tribal lands

Tribes and environmental groups have fought for decades against a proposed copper mine in an area of Arizona known as Oak Flat, which is a sacred site for a dozen tribes, including the San Carlos Apache.

Now the Trump administration is pushing to fast-track a deal that would transfer ownership of the land, which is in the Tonto National Forest, to Resolution Copper, a firm owned by mining companies Rio Tinto and Billiton BHP.

"Last month tribes discovered that the date for the completion of a crucial environmental review process has suddenly been moved forward by a full year, to December 2020, even as the tribes are struggling with a COVID outbreak that has stifled their ability to respond,"an investigationbyThe Guardianfound. "If the environmental review is completed before Trump leaves office, the tribes may be unable to stop the mine."

2. FERC shakeup

Just days after the election, Trump switched up the leadership of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which has a hand in regulating hydroelectric projects, as well as interstate transmission of electricity, oil and natural gas.

Chairman Neil Chatterjee was replaced by fellow Republican James Danly, who has amore conservative viewon federal energy policy.Chatterjee, once known as a "coal guy," had recently advocated for policies supporting distributed energy and for regional grid operators to embrace carbon pricing as a market-based solution for addressing climate change.

3. Hamstringing LWCF

The Great American Outdoors Act, a major conservation bill signed into law in August, allocated $9.5 billion to help fix national park infrastructure and permanently fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund.

But despite (falsely) hailing himself as a conservation hero at the law's signing, Trump has already begun undermining the legislation's effectiveness. An order signed by Interior Secretary David Bernhardt on Nov. 9 allows state and local governments to veto any land or water acquisitions made through the fund.

Chris D'Angelo at HuffPostcalled the movea "parting gift to the anti-federal land movement." Montana Sen. Jon Tester, who advocated for the Land and Water Conservation Fund,wrote a letterto Bernhardt urging him to rescind the order. "This undercuts what a landowner can do with their own private property, and creates unnecessary, additional levels of bureaucracy that will hamstring future land acquisition through the Land and Water Conservation Fund," he wrote.

In another blow, officials and conservation groups in New Mexico were surprised to learn thatnone of their projectsproposed to receive funding through the Land and Water Conservation Fund were selected by the Department of the Interior. Some believe the move is political retribution for being critical of the Trump administration and its policies.

4. Dam raising

On Nov. 20 the Trump administrationfinalized a planto raise the height of Northern California's 600-foot Shasta Dam by 18.5 feet, which would allow for more water storage. The reservoir feeds the federally run Central Valley Project, which funnels water hundreds of miles south to cities and farms. That includes the politically connected Westlands Water District in the San Joaquin Valley, which formerly employed Interior Secretary David Bernhardt as a lawyer and lobbyist.

The state of California has strongly opposed the effort to raise the dam's height because it would flood the McCloud River, protected as wild and scenic. Conservation groups also say the plan would threaten endangered species such as Chinook salmon, delta smelt and Shasta salamanders.

California Rep. Jared Huffmancalledit the "QAnon of water projects, meaning it's laughably infeasible and just not real."

The staunchest opposition has come from theWinnemem WintuTribe, which lost 90% of its sacred sites with the construction of the dam and faces the loss of its remaining sites and burial grounds if the reservoir is expanded.

5. Pesticide changes

The Environmental Protection Agency announced on Nov. 20 it was taking away a tool states can use to control how pesticides are deployed. The action could furtherendanger farmworkers and wildlife.

ASection 24 provisionof the Federal, Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act lets states set stricter restrictions on federally regulated pesticides in response to local needs and conditions. But after numerous states sought to limit the use of the weed killer dicamba, the agency will now no longer allow states to set more protective rules for any pesticides.

6. Migratory birds

A gutting of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918 took a big step forward at the end of November, clearing the way for the administration to finalize the rule change by the end of Trump's term.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Servicereleased its Final Environmental Impact Statementto redefine the scope of the law to no longer penalize the energy industry or developers for "incidentally" killing migratory birds.

The agency's own analysis found that the rule change would "likely result in increased bird mortality" because without penalties companies wouldn't take additional precautions to help make sure birds aren't killed by their operations.

That's already proving true. "Since the administration began pursuing its looser interpretation of the law in April 2018, hundreds of birds have perished without penalty, according to documents compiled by conservation groups this year,"TheWashington Postreported.

7. ANWR auction

The Bureau of Land Management announced on Dec. 3 that oil and gas leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge would go on sale on Jan. 6, following a shortened time frame for the nomination and evaluation of potential tracts to be drilled.

"Once the sale is held, the bureau has to review and approve the leases, a process that typically takes months,"TheNew York Timesreported. "But holding the sale on Jan. 6 potentially gives the bureau opportunity to finalize the leases before Inauguration Day. That would make it more difficult for the Biden administration to undo them."

Despite the fact that the Trump administration is intent on opening the door to drilling in the 1.6 million-acre coastal plain one of the wildest places left in the United States it's still unclear how interested the oil industry will be. Or how readily they'll be able to finance their operations. All themajor U.S. bankshave said they'll no longer fund new oil and gas exploration in the Arctic.

8. Dirty air

One week into December, the administration finalized its decisiondeclining to enact stricter standards for regulating industrial sootemissions.

This came despite the fact that the administration's own scientists found that maintaining the current limits on tiny particles, known as PM 2.5, results in tens of thousands of early deaths each year. And despite the fact Harvard researchers found that those who have lived for decades with high levels of PM 2.5 pollution are at agreater risk of dying from COVID-19.

9. Border wall

The incoming Biden administration has vowed to not build another foot of the border wall, but the borderlands ecosystem remains under threat as the Trump administration is continuing to push ahead.

In some cases wall builders are even attempting to speed up the work.

"That's happening from the Rio Grande Valley of Texas to Arizona's stunning Coronado National Memorial and Guadalupe Canyon, a wildlife corridor for Mexican gray wolves and endangered jaguars,"NPR reported. "At $41 million a mile, the Arizona sections are the most expensive projects of the entire border wall."

In Arizona they're needlessly razing vegetation andblasting mountainsfor roads in remote areas to help enable construction that likely won't even take place.

10. Harming whales and dolphins

Trump may be leaving office, but marine mammals won't be able to rest easy. NOAA Fisheries issued a rule on Dec. 9 allowing the oil and gas industry to harm Atlantic spotted dolphins, pygmy whales, dwarf sperm whales, Bryde's whales and other marine mammals in the Gulf of Mexico while using seismic and acoustic mapping, including air guns, to gather data on resources on or below the ocean floor.

In an effort to further efforts for oil and gas drilling, nearly 200,000 beaked whales and more than 600,000 bottlenose dolphins could be "disturbed." And "pygmy and dwarf sperm whales are expected to be harassed to the point of potential injury, with a mean of 308 whales potentially harmed per year, according to the final rule," E&E Newsreported.

11. More lease sales

The Arctic isn't the only place where the rush is on to exploit public lands. On Dec. 9 the Bureau of Land Managementupdatedan environmental assessment for a2013 plan for leasesto extract climate- and water-polluting tar sands on 2,100 acres in northeastern Utah. But then just days late it hit the pause button on the effort.

While that one may be on hold, the administrationdidkick off the sale of leases for oil drilling on4,100 acres of federal land in California's Kern Countyon Dec. 10. The first such sale in the state in eight years could be canceled by the Biden administration and if not, would face legal challenges from environmental groups.

12. Cost-benefit rule

One of the administration's biggest parting gifts to industry the "cost-benefit" rule was finalized on Dec. 9. It would require the EPA to weigh the economic costs of air pollution regulations but not many of the health benefits that would arise from better protections.

"In other words, if reducing emissions from power plants also saves tens of thousands of lives each year by cutting soot, those 'co-benefits' should be not be counted," in the EPA's new analysis, theWashington Postexplained.

The rule would be a big blow to efforts to improve public health and curb pollution.

"The only purpose in making this a regulation seems to be to provide a basis for future lawsuits to slow down or prevent future administrations from regulating," Roy Gamse, an economist and former EPA deputy assistant administrator for planning and evaluation,told Reuters.

Slowing down the Biden administration will continue to be a big part of Trump's last month in office along with the finalization of more rule changes to add insult to injury.

Legal expertshave begun mapping which rollbacks will be quick and easy to undo and those that will take sustained effort. But one thing is certain: There's a long road ahead to reverse dangerous regulations, restore scientific integrity and make up for lost ground on climate change, extinction and other cascading crises.

Read the rest here:
12 Trump attacks on the environment since the election - Salon

New regulations will commence on 1 January 2021 to impose statutory requirements for land access agreements, including standard minimum protections, and prescribe further circumstances for compensation to landowners.

Following extensive stakeholder consultation with pastoral lease holders, petroleum companies and peak industry bodies, the NT Government has endorsed the new Petroleum Regulations 2020 in order to implement a number of recommendations of the Independent Scientific Inquiry into Hydraulic Fracturing in the Northern Territory and provide better certainty for the petroleum industry and landowners alike.

The new Regulations will commence on 1 January 2021 and will repeal the Petroleum Regulations 1994.

Land access agreements

Under the new Regulations, an interest holder must not commence regulated operations on any particular area of land from 1 January 2021 without having a land access agreement in place with the landowner / occupier with a registered interest (designated person), which has been approved by the Minister for Mining and Industry. It will be an offence to commence regulated operations on land without having an approved land access agreement in place. Regulated operations are operations for which an exploration permit, retention licence or production licence is required under Petroleum Act 1984 (NT) (the Act), other than preliminary activities.

A land access agreement must at least contain provisions that address each of the 25 standard minimum protections prescribed in Schedule 2 of the Regulations. The standard minimum protections relate to, amongst other things, minimum notice periods, access points, rehabilitation and remediation, compensation for drilling and for decrease in value of land and a general obligation to make good.

An approved land access agreement is not required:

Existing land access agreements and transitional period

Where regulated operations have commenced prior to 1 January 2021, a 12-month transition period will apply and a land access agreement approved under the Regulations does not need to be in place in order to continue those operations during the transition period. However, some form of agreement between an interest holder and a designated person about land access needs to be in effect during the transition period in order for those operations to continue during that period.

After the end of the transition period, an interest holder will need to have a land access agreement in place, which has been approved by the Minister under the Regulations, in order to continue regulated operations. A party to an agreement entered into before 1 January 2021 may, during the transition period, apply to the Minister to register that existing agreement about land access as an approved agreement under the Regulations. In this case, the Minister is not required to be satisfied that the agreement meets the standard minimum protections and only needs to be satisfied that the agreement makes reasonable provision about access to land for the purposes of carrying out regulated operations.

If satisfied, the Minister can register the agreement and it is taken to be an approved land access agreement under the Regulations that continues for the balance of its term. Where the Minister refuses to register the existing agreement, the party who submitted the agreement for registration may apply to the Civil and Administrative Tribunal for review of the Minister's refusal.

Initiation of negotiations on new land access agreements

In order for an interest holder to initiate the process of negotiating a land access agreement, the interest holder may give a negotiation notice in the approved form to each designated person for the area of land to give notice of the interest holder's intention to obtain a land access agreement.

The negotiation notice must include details about the land to be accessed, the petroleum interest, the proposed regulated operations, the maximum period of access, the interest holders contact details, a request to negotiate a land access agreement and a statement that the interest holder will cover the reasonable costs necessarily incurred in connection with the negotiation between the parties. The interest holder may also provide a draft land access agreement with the negotiation notice.

Once a negotiation notice has been given, the interest holder and the designated person must take reasonable steps to negotiate a land access agreement (in good faith) within a period of at least 60 days from when the designated person received the negotiation notice. This period can be extended by agreement.

The interest holder must pay the reasonable costs of the designated person incurred as a consequence of participating in the negotiation for a land access agreement within 30 days after a request for payment is made (subject to the commencement of Tribunal proceedings because of a dispute about those costs). These costs include:

Alternative dispute resolution (ADR)

Where the interest holder and designated person cannot agree on a land access agreement within the negotiation period (ie at least 60 days or a longer agreed period) the interest holder may give notice in the approved form requesting agreement from the designated person to participate in an ADR process (other than an arbitration). This includes using a facilitator or mediator to achieve a negotiated outcome for entering into a land access agreement. The interest holder may specify the period within which the ADR process is to occur which must be a period of at least 14 days (nominated period). The interest holder must provide a draft access agreement for the ADR process.

If an agreement has not been reached on an ADR process and the facilitator or mediator to be used by the end of the nominated period, the interest holder or the designated person may apply to the CEO of the Department of Industry, Tourism and Trade for the appointment of a member of the Mediators Panel (being a panel of mediators appointed by the Minister and published on the Department's website) to conduct mediation.

If an interest holder commenced negotiations about land access before 1 January 2021, the interest holder may also apply to the CEO to appoint a member of the Mediators Panel to conduct a mediation under the Regulations. For these pre-existing negotiations, the CEO may appoint a member of the Mediators Panel if satisfied:

Similar to the initial negotiation process, the interest holder is to pay the reasonable costs of the designated person to participate in an ADR process as well as the costs of the agreed facilitator / mediator or the CEO appointed mediator (as the case may be) (ADR Convenor) within 30 days of a request for payment (again, subject to the commencement of Tribunal proceedings because of a dispute about those costs).

If after a period of at least 30 days from a date fixed by the ADR Convenor a negotiated outcome for a land access agreement is not achieved and either:

the ADR process is terminated and the interest holder may apply to the Tribunal for a determination about the terms of the land access agreement to allow for access by the interest holder. In making such a determination, the Tribunal must take into account and apply the standard minimum protections.

Approval of an agreed land access agreement

Where a land access agreement is successfully negotiated, an interest holder may apply in the approved form to the Minister for the approval of the land access agreement. The land access agreement does not allow the interest holder to access the relevant land until it has been approved by the Minister.

A land access agreement that has been determined by the Tribunal after the termination of an ADR process (as noted above) is taken to be an approved access agreement (and does not require approval of the Minister).

The Minister must make a decision about the application for approval of a land access agreement within 28 days after receiving the agreement or within a longer period as the Minister may reasonably require. The Minister may decide to approve the land access agreement or, if not reasonably satisfied that the land access agreement at least meets the minimum protection requirements, give notice to the parties that the land access agreement may be varied and resubmitted for approval.

If a varied land access agreement is resubmitted, the Minister may decide to approve or refuse the land access agreement.

The interest holder may apply to the Tribunal to review a decision of the Minister to refuse to approve a land access agreement.

Registration and variation of a land access agreement

An approved access agreement must be registered and included in a register to be maintained and updated by the Minister.

There is an ability to vary an approved land access agreement in accordance with the terms of the access agreement, by an agreement between the parties or by determination of the Tribunal (after an ADR process is conducted). A land access agreement that is varied (other than by the Tribunal) needs to be approved and registered by the Minister. A refusal by the Minister to approve a varied land access agreement is a reviewable decision and the party who submitted the variation for approval may apply to the Tribunal for review.

Preliminary activities and aerial surveys

As noted above, an approved land access agreement is not required to carry out preliminary activities or aerial surveys. For these activities, the interest holder must give notice to the designated person, at least 14 days prior to commencing the relevant activity.

Preliminary activities are preliminary or preparatory activities that are associated with the commencement of regulated operations and that have no impact, or only a low impact, on land. These include:

Compensation to landowners

Under the Act, a holder of a petroleum interest must pay to the owner of the petroleum interest land and any occupier who has a registered interest in the land, compensation for:

The new Regulations prescribe that compensation must be paid with respect to:

These matters are contained within the standard minimum protections (being matters that must be addressed by an approved land access agreement). The method of compensation is to be determined by agreement between the landowner / occupier and interest holder or, if they are unable to agree, by the Tribunal.

Offences

In addition to it being an offence to commence regulated operations on land without an approved land access agreement, it will also be an offence (amongst other things):

Read more:
Statutory land access agreements and new compensation rules for NT petroleum operations: what you need to know for 2021 - Lexology

Depending on the earbuds, set up could be as simple as bringing the Bluetooth accessory near your Android phone. This is made possible by Fast Pair, which Google updated in recent weeks to take after iOS.

Since Fast Pairs launch in 2017, the process has started with a standard notification that includes a thumbnail of the device in question. Appearing at the top of your screen, a simple tap would initiate pairing and then provide a confirmation.

Google has tweaked the set up experience so that it now features a tall sheet sliding up from the bottom. The name of your device is centered above, while a bigger picture and Connect button appears below. Once paired via Bluetooth, you have the option to continue Setup or Close.

Androids new Fast Pair design, which was quietly introduced in November (or earlier), very much takes after iOS and AirPods. There is a clear advantage to this approach as pairing new accessories should be a very prominent event. Compared to a notification, youre less likely to miss or swipe away a bottom sheet.

Meanwhile, Google has improved on the experience. This UI appears when setting up a new Fast Pair accessory for the first time with your phone. Android still uses a compact notification to note the battery status of each item (earbuds and case), while Apple opts for bringing up the entire sheet to show percentage. The smaller alert is also leveraged for re-pairing accessories, especially on phones and tablets already signed-in to your Google Account.

With the launch of the Pixel Buds earlier this year, Google introduced a slew of related features, including Find My Device integration, low battery alerts, and button customization.

Thanks Michael, Dee!

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Check out 9to5Google on YouTube for more news:

Go here to read the rest:
Androids Fast Pair UI for setting up headphones updated to look like iOS - 9to5Google

Supplied

Forest & Bird says the Selwyn District Council has done nothing to stop illegal farm conversion at Acheron Terrace.

Conservationists are calling for responsibility for native habitat protection to be taken away from poorly performing local councils.

Forest & Bird has released an image of the Acheron terraces, in inland Canterbury near Lake Coleridge, where it says a swathe of native tussock land has recently been sprayed, cultivated and converted to green pasture.

Canterbury regional manager Nicky Snoyink said she first raised the alarm with the Selwyn District Council in May, but despite following up several times throughout the year the council has failed to require the landowner to stop clearing native plants.

Its really frustrating that councils in the Canterbury region continue to be unwilling to protect rare habitat in the region, despite being provided with photos of clear deliberate damage, she said.

READ MORE:* Forest and Bird urges Timaru District Council action over vegetation clearance* Waitaki District Council criticised over lack of action on indigenous vegetation clearance* Native habitat 'under attack' nationwide as offenders face little consequence, data shows

The Acheron Terrace was a really important and special place because it was part of an intact dry tussock grassland, home to native insects, lizards, and birds.

It is increasingly under threat from development, so I was really shocked to see part of it had been so quickly converted to green grass for more intensive sheep and cattle grazing.

David Walker/Stuff

Forest & Birds Canterbury-West Coast regional manager Nicky Snoyink.

Snoyink said Forest & Bird investigated illegal habitat clearance around the country earlier this year, and found landowners were largely able to get away with damaging native foliage, with very few councils willing to intervene.

This was not the only time she had raised concerns about this with the Selwyn council, she said.

In 2019, more than 40 hectares of mature matagouri shrubland was sprayed along the roadside on private land that was the gateway to Korowai Torlesse Tussocklands Park, Snoyink said.

But the Selwyn District Council is uncertain whether it breaches their rules, so have opted to take an educational approach with the landowner.

Forest & Bird/Supplied

Forest & Bird says 41 hectares of matagouri was sprayed and killed in one incident in 2019. Pictured is matagouri in the upper Waimakariri Basin.

The second site is part of an agreement with Environment Canterbury (ECan) for gorse control, which does allow spot spraying.

Nature in New Zealand is down to the wire, Snoyink said.

If councils are unwilling to put good rules in place or properly enforce the rules they have, then we have to either accept the local extinction of our native species, or give the responsibility for protecting wildlife to an independent, properly funded organisation that can and will do their job.

LUZ ZUNIGA/Stuff

Lindy Kelly drove through Nelson in her ute to raise awareness of her battle to protect historic bush on her farm.

The council's response to Snoyinks complaint about the Acheron terrace landowner said no action was taken because the pasture improvements were in an area previously developed for grazing, albeit through a less intensive process.

There is no doubt that indigenous species have been removed as part of the recent development, however, our operative District Plan rules do allow for this to occur within an area of improved pasture.

Proposed District Plan rule changes would help remedy the situation, the council said, by stopping places with naturally occurring indigenous species falling under the improved pasture definition.

Stacy Squires/Stuff

A Selwyn District Council spokesman says the Acheron terrace land had already been developed for grazing in the past.

In earlier correspondence about the matagouri incident, the council said it had multiple meetings with the landowners, and told them to consult both ECan and the council about any future spraying.

A council spokesman told Stuff due to the timing of Forest & Bird releasing this information, staff involved with handling their complaints were not available to respond.

We do investigate every complaint we receive and work with Environment Canterbury and the landowners to ensure the rules are upheld and achieve a positive outcome in the long-term.

We also continue to work with Forest & Bird on these issues, including providing full responses on what actions we have taken and what we are legally able to do in these cases.

More here:
Canterbury council under fire after native grassland converted to grazing - Stuff.co.nz

This is a country that has a forestry vocation, says Jos Miguel Orozco, professor of forest governance and policy at Bogots Francisco Jos de Caldas District University.

High-altitude Andean forests, low-altitude basal forests, cloud forests, dry forests, mangroves: 52% of Colombias landmass is covered in forest, and it is the second most biodiverse country in the world, home to 58,312 known species. The highest concentrations of biodiversity occur in the Amazon and Pacific regions, which together are home to 80% of the countrys forests.

Indigenous reserves steward 46% of Colombias forests, and Afro-Colombian communal territories account for 7.3%. About 16% fall under the protection of the countrys 59 national parks. These three systems have the highest levels of protection and some of the best conservation outcomes.

And yet, Colombias forests are also being chopped down at an alarming rate.

Colombias Institute of Hydrology, Meteorology and Environmental Studies (IDEAM) monitors deforestation in the country and shows how deforestation went from 123,841 hectares (306,017 acres) in 2015, soaring to its highest-ever level of 219,552 hectares (542,525 acres) in 2017 before dropping to 158,894 hectares (392,636 acres) in 2019.

In 2016, the Colombian government signed a historic peace accord with the FARC rebels, ending more than half a century of civil war that left 260,000 people dead and 5 million people internally displaced. A consequence of the conflict was that Colombias forests remained relatively well-preserved, with the FARC rebels strictly controlling deforestation so as to conceal their movements and the illegal mines and coca plantations that financed most of their operations. With the groups disbandment, things have changed.

The last five years coincided with the time period denominated as post-conflict, and what we saw at the beginning of this era was the huge increase in the problem of deforestation at the national level, Orozco says.

FARCs demobilization left a power vacuum that is now being fought over by other illegal criminal groups like paramilitaries, ELN guerrillas and FARC dissidents who refuse to disarm.

The highest levels of deforestation are in the Amazon, home to two-thirds of Colombias forests, with 70% this deforestation related to land grabbing driven by illegal groups linked to illicit activities. These activities include illegal logging, mining (especially for gold and cobalt), coca cultivation to make cocaine, and clearing of forest for pasture and land speculation often also done to launder money earned from illicit operations.

Between 2000 and 2018, IDEAM identified 11 high deforestation nuclei (HDN): areas in the country with the highest levels of deforestation, also associated with a lack of state presence, weak socioeconomic indicators, and some of the highest levels of violence and poverty.

According to the National Department of Statistics (DANE), in 2018, Colombias national multidimensional poverty level was 19.6%, rising to 39.9% in rural areas. In the HDNs, it was calculated at 53.1%, increasing to 62.7% in rural areas.

This situation is ideal for fomenting illegal activities, but also for the expansion of other activities in the region that drive deforestation, including agriculture, cattle ranching, mining, and building roads and infrastructure that provide easier access to forests and bring new waves of occupiers.

In 2017, the government defined344 municipalitiesin the country as zones most affected by the armed conflict. These are regions that have experienced the highest levels of violence, criminal activity and displacement. A hundred and twenty of the HDNs fall within these conflict-affected zones, showing how, with the resurgence of violence after the peace accord, many of the drivers of deforestation are linked to regions where the dynamics of violent conflict are still playing out.

These dynamics have also spilled over to affect those protecting the forests and natural resources. Global Witness ranked Colombia as the most dangerous place in the world in 2019 to be an environmental defender, with the most recent casualty being an environmental official, Javier Francisco Parra, who was murdered on Dec. 3 in the Amazon.

Environmental defenders could benefit from the implementation of the Escaz Agreement. This is the first environmental human rights treaty for Latin America and the Caribbean, and was signed by Colombias President Ivn Duque in December 2019, but still needs to ratified by the countrys Congress. Yet this process has stalled as the presidents own party has been pushing back against the agreement, saying it will jeopardize Colombias sovereignty and put the brakes on development projects.

In addition to trying to crack down on illegal activities, the Colombian government, with support from international partners, has identified the need to support the economic empowerment of communities in these rural areas, tying these initiatives into the countrys international agreements relating to forests.

Colombia, as a signatory to the New York Declaration on Forests, aimed by 2020 to halve natural forest loss and by 2030 to reach net-zero deforestation, meaning that any loss of forest will be offset by the replanting of native forest.

But Colombia missed the 2020 target, with deforestation in the first quarter of 2020 exceeding the total for the whole of 2019. Still, in November 2020 the government announced that it would increase its greenhouse gas reductions from its initial target under the Paris climate accord, from 20% to 51% by 2030. The government plans to meet this target by transitioning to clean energy and transport, reducing deforestation and planting 180 million trees by 2022 a commitment made by Duque at the Davos summit in January 2020.

Tropical forests remain one of the most efficient sinks of greenhouse gas emissions, and the REDD+ mechanism was launched to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from deforestation and forest degradation by having industrialized countries pay developing countries to preserve their forests.

Colombia built its REDD+ initiatives on the back of a large-scale program called Visin Amazona, which focuses on the Amazon region and aims to provide jobs, improve environmental governance, and promote Indigenous participation in a region where more than half the forests fall within Indigenous reserves.

Norway, Germany and the U.K. have been supporting these efforts through a payment-for-results agreement called the Joint Declaration of Intent, which has paid $85 million to the Colombian government since 2015 and renewed a pledge in 2019 for an additional $366 million. This agreement became even more lucrative when, in late November 2020, the Norwegian government doubled its payout to $10 per hectare of tropical forest conserved.

Viviana Zamora, technical adviser to the ProBosques project of the German cooperation agency GIZ, says forest conservation in Colombia has been given a major boost thanks to the agreement, as IDEAM received large amounts of funds to improve its monitoring capacity, allowing it to detect changes in forest cover, analyze the causes and agents of deforestation as well as the level of forest emissions that are necessary for payment under REDD+.

Zamora also says that although an international carbon market has not yet been fully established, the REDD+ program has provided a means to support the forest economy through mitigation and adaptation processes, also helping to improve income and employment for communities living in these areas that are threatened by deforestation and more affected by the armed conflict.

Since taking office in 2018, the Duque administration has initiated or bolstered several policies and strategies, including the National Development Plan 2018-2022, to integrate key aspects of the Joint Declaration of Intent.

The government also established an agricultural frontier in 2018 to stop the continued encroachment of farms into wilderness areas; put in place zero-deforestation agreements with the palm oil, dairy, meat and cacao industries through Tropical Forest Alliance (TFA); and implemented a green growth policy that proposes a transition to a model focused largely on the forest economy, green businesses, and the bioeconomy.

Other strategies to halt deforestation, like the military operation Artemisia, launched in 2019 to crack down on illegal miners and loggers, have had mixed results. In September 2020, Fundacin Ideas para la Paz released areportnoting the operation had increased the risk for other environmental defenders such aspark rangers andnoting that it didnt focus on the sophisticated networks and powerful interests behind the deforestation, but rather the vulnerable communities in these zones.

In October 2020, Colombias National Planning Department (DNP) released a draft policy for the control of deforestation and sustainable forest management. While the action plan still needs to be finalized, the document aims to create an interdepartmental approach including the ministries for theenvironment, defense, agriculture, justice and technology, as well as the agencies for land and environmental licenses, stateprosecutors, IDEAM and the National Parks Authority to deal with the multifaceted issue of deforestation while growing the green economy.

The document emphasizes the huge economic potential of the forests in the country. It notes that only about 500 plant and animal species out of the thousands recorded in the country are used for some sort of economic activity. It also estimates that, in 2017, the supply of forest products and their derivatives generated about $1.4 million, or about 0.52% of the countrys GDP. The DNP looks to boost these numbers, noting that the European Unions bioeconomy sector contributed 9% to its GDP in 2014, generating 18.6 million jobs and $2.6 billion in sales.

The environment ministry, working environmental authorities and partners such as the FAO and WWF, are supporting community forestry projects, which combine forest conservation with economic and employment generation for the communities that live in them.

Heart of the Amazon is a Visin Amazona initiative funded by the Global Environment Facility and implemented by the World Bank, which aims to prevent 9.1 million hectares (22.5 million acres) of deforestation in part by supporting community forestry projects in an important transition zone connecting the Amazon and the Andes mountains.

The project has already seen major success with 115 campesino families who were previously involved in planting coca now conserving 21,000 hectares (52,000 acres) of forest and sustainably harvesting Amazonian species as camu camu and asa.

For us a success is that today local communities believe that it is possible through community forestry to resolve social issues, says Luz Marina Mantilla Crdenas, director of the government-backed Amazonian Scientific Research Institute (SINCHI), in an interview with Mongabay.

For decades SINCHI has been doing research to developing ways to cultivate Amazonian plant and animal species economically, with part of its mission now to develop the bioeconomy. The institute has also been an integral part of Heart of the Amazon project, conducting a 20-year study in the region showing how agroforestry and sustainable forestry practices can prevent and control deforestation.

A lot of SINCHIs success in that we connect the dots, we dont commercialize but we look for who can commercialize the products, because we are interested in completing [the value] chain, Crdenas says.

The DNPs policy document tries to be more intersectional, widening its focus and looking at the long-term and structural issues, says Rodrigo Botero, director of the Amazon-focused Foundation for Conservation and Sustainable Development (FCDS). However, he says it is more focused on the economists vision that the problem is in searching for the productivity of the forests, rather than placing sufficient emphasis and effort on how to resolve the issues of access and rights to the land and the forests in these areas.

Colombia remains one of the most unequal countries in the world, where less than 1% of the population owns more than 50% of productive land. This was the primary issue that fueled the civil war, and rural land reform and access to land were key aspects of the peace accord that ended it. Yet, according to a 2020 KROC Institute report, only 3% of the 104 rural reform and access-to-land commitments have been completed, while 34% have not yet been started, 52% have begun minimally, and 10% are partially done.

Manuel Rodrguez, a professor, former environment minister and founder of the National Environmental Forum, told Mongabay in an interview that there is a lot of potential to develop the economy sustainably, especially in terms of agriculture and ecotourism. But Colombia, like most of Latin America, still has profoundly extractivist development plans, with most of the countrys GDP coming from mining and oil, he said.

A 2020 article in the Journal of Political Ecology argues that the government appears to be embracing REDD+ and international financial support to protect forests and build peace, yet simultaneously supporting natural resources extraction in the form of mining, infrastructure and industrial agriculture. This, it says, creates contradictory policies that incentivize environmental degradation. It cites as an example how 18 protected areas overlap with 29 oil blocks currently in operation, and another 12 reserved and 15 available oil blocks.

All this ultimately puts Colombia at risk of missing its climate and conservation targets. Rodrguez says that if Colombia really wants to make its sustainable development agenda more than rhetoric, the country will need a much more ambitious forest policy.

Banner image caption: Red passion vine flower in the Colombian Amazon. Image by Rhett Butler/Mongabay.

See more here:
Colombia's forests lurch between deforestation and the hope for a sustainable future - Mongabay.com

Kristi and Brian Anderson have some thoughts about how the first year of Californias get-tough-on-utilities approach to preventing wildfires is going: Badly. Very badly.

The Andersons, who live in Bonny Doon, nestled in the mountains near Santa Cruz, lost their home four months ago in the CZU Lightning Complex fires.

But their plight only got worse after the fires were out. They returned to their property to find that Pacific Gas and Electric crews had felled 20 trees on their 2-acre lot, toppling 100-foot Douglas firs and leaving them where they fell.

In an attempt to clear vegetation from around power lines, the workers cut down old-growth redwoods, and in some cases simply sawed off the tops of the beloved giants, creating a horrid Dr. Seuss kind of tree, Kristi Anderson said. It makes us sick to our stomachs.

Worse, after spending weeks clearing away the remains of their incinerated home, Brian Anderson arrived at his property to find a huge pile of trees atop a new trailer pad where he and his family were planning to live while their new home was being built.

Facing a potential bill for tens of thousands of dollars, the couple are wondering who is going to pay for the cleanup after PG&E left the piles of timber and woody debris that are themselves fire hazards.

Utility companies are carrying out numerous tasks to prevent wildfires, from ramping up line inspections to replacing antiquated equipment. But critics say that PG&E and other electricity providers should be focusing less on the cheap stuff, like cutting trees, and more on upgrading its thousands of miles of old lines and aging equipment.

Its been a long-standing problem with PG&E, instead of doing the responsible thing and investing in their infrastructure, they want to just do vegetation management, said Assemblymember Mark Stone, a Monterey Bay Democrat whose district includes Santa Cruz.

This is just a shortcut. Its part of their approach, taking the easiest path possible by cutting a bunch of trees and looking like they are doing something, while avoiding the bigger issue of infrastructure improvement.

PG&E this year managed vegetation along 1,861 line-miles at a cost of almost $500 million, the company says. More than half of PG&Es area is in high fire-threat zones, with 5,500 line-miles of electric transmission and 25,500 line-miles of distribution equipment.

PG&E this year also added 43 safety devices along transmission lines, upgraded 62 substations and replaced poles or covered lines along 370 miles, according to the company. That leaves no documented plans for upgrading thousands of miles of lines, poles and other equipment in the coverage area, although some projects will be completed over the next 40 years.

The companys combined fire mitigation costs this year are an estimated $2.5 billion.

Upgrading equipment, such as burying power lines, is significantly more costly for companies, so vegetation management is an appealing alternative. Burying lines costs more than $2 million a mile.

In previous years, the crews removed downed trees. But now contractors working for PG&E tell homeowners they have to leave larger trees on the ground because the timber is the residents property and may have commercial value.

You just dont see someone doing a project and leave all the logs on a site. Thats just not normal, said Angela Bernheisel, a Cal Fire division chief in the Santa Cruz area.

The Andersons said they were still putting out small flareups from the wildfires hot spots during the time the trees were left on their property.

A PG&E spokeswoman said that U.S. Forest Service research categorizes log stacks as posing a low fire risk.

But the practice, known as Whack and Stack, contributed to the 2007 Angora Fire around Lake Tahoe, according to research by Timothy Ingalsbee, executive director of the Oregon-based group Firefighters United for Safety, Ethics and Ecology.

They are little fire bombs waiting to ignite. They can burn for hours, said Ingalsbee, a former federal firefighter and wildland fire ecologist.

The plight of the Santa Cruz County residents is not the outcome that the Legislature envisioned last year when it created the Wildfire Safety Division within the Public Utilities Commission to review and approve the fire-mitigation plans of state electric providers.

With 1 in 10 wildfires caused by utility equipment, it was clear that companies needed to do more to prevent fires.

The new division is trying to hold utilities accountable, but herding large, powerful companies that cling to old practices is daunting. The Wildfire Safety Division approved most of the utilities plans this summer with some modifications. And, like a long-suffering teacher attempting to soften the blow, the agency sent along this report card: Most utilities demonstrate a need for improvement.

Caroline Thomas Jacobs, director of the new Wildfire Safety Division, is overseeing a department that did not exist before 2019.

The reality is it was a massive task to undertake. Theres been lots of opportunity to trip up. The proof will be in the pudding, she said.

Thomas Jacobs said it was clear that most companies plans leaned heavily on vegetation management, but the utilities havent fully explained why.

We told them, You guys have to get together and develop a study, and tell us why enhanced vegetation management is the way to go here. They need to better articulate how they think through all the alternatives before they decide on a specific mitigation activity. They have to think it through and not just pick the easy button and the cheapest approach, she said.

In other words, for the first time, the state will require utilities not only to do more robust fire mitigation work, but also to document what benefit each project would bring.

Because the companies plans lack clear metrics for determining their chances of success, the PUC on Thursday extended the companies deadline to June for providing the information.

PG&E officials declined to comment about the concerns that they are relying too heavily on cutting trees and delaying the more expensive equipment upgrades.

Other companies also are focusing heavily on fuel reduction projects around their equipment.

Southern California Edisons plan, for example, set a 2020 goal to inspect 75,000 hazardous trees for possible removal, check vegetation growing along 3,000 circuit-miles, clear brush from around 200,000 poles and expand buffer zones around some equipment in high fire-risk areas.

Santa Cruz County officials call the PG&E crews tree-removal work reckless, worrying that it increases the risk of erosion and mudslides when winter rains begin.

We are in the midst of serious debris flow preparation. There is high potential for people whose homes didnt burn to now be in a danger zone. The water supply for Santa Cruz County is at risk, said county Supervisor Ryan Coonerty. If they had worked with the county, Cal Fire and property owners, we could have done this in a safe and effective way. But they have made the fire hazard worse.

As residents called to complain, Santa Cruz County reached out to the state for help. Cal Fire sent letters to PG&E. noting hundreds of violations of the state Forestry Practices Act, which could lead to millions of dollars in fines.

And in late November, the California Coastal Commission sent the company a notice of violation for unpermitted work clearing about 6 miles of trees in the coastal zone. The agency is working with PG&E so it can obtain the proper permission to construct erosion control measures and stabilize roads damaged by its heavy equipment.

The utility maintains it does not need permits to remove vegetation for fire mitigation work that is mandated by state law.

PG&E disagrees with the characterization that our tree removal work is illegal. We understand the County, agencies and community concerns regarding this emergency hazard tree removal work and are committed to continuing to address these items with all stakeholders while prioritizing public safety, prompt restoration of electric service and environmental stewardship, PG&E spokeswoman Mayra Tostado said in an emailed statement.

The company is not alone in running afoul of state agencies while performing fire mitigation work. In November the Coastal Commission fined the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power $1.9 million for similar transgressions.

Much about firefighting is harsh on a landscape. Apart from the fires annihilation, bulldozers and other heavy equipment used to combat fire can reshape and scrape soils and clog waterways, often leaving lasting impacts. Post-fire work also can leave a trail of damage.

Some of these guys on the powerlines are going for overkill, with minimum supervision and no ecology, former firefighter Ingelsbee said.

The companies are allowed to pass on the costs of equipment upgrades to ratepayers.

There is little evidence that clearing vegetation is the most cost-effective approach. They are charging Cadillac prices for a jalopy, said Loretta Lynch, former president of the Public Utilities Commission.

Its not just PG&E all the wildfire mitigation plans are about their bottom line, not what will mitigate wildfires. The record is really clear: Its an environmental catastrophe.

Adding to heartbreak and stress Lad Wallace thought himself lucky: There were 51 homes in his Bonny Doon neighborhood before the fire, and his was one of only 13 that survived. But the privately maintained road leading to his property was destroyed by trucks operated by PG&Es tree crews, the same crews that came on his property without his permission and left his land strewn with felled trees.

A couple of years ago PG&E did some tree removal, Wallace said. In those cases, they removed everything they cut. This time they cut it and left it where it lay. Getting rid of trees is not an insignificant cost.

PG&E is mucking it up and making things worse, said Pat Veesart, an enforcement supervisor with the Coastal Commission, which regulates activities in the coastal zone. Historically, they have cleared 65 to 75 feet (from power lines). In this case they have cleared as much as 200 feet, exceeding what would be considered normal power line maintenance. We are very concerned about damage to creeks and erosion.

Crews told the Andersons that their trees had commercial value, but no local buyers want Douglas fir, especially since the company short cut the logs. The old-growth redwoods they cut were dropped and left in a messy stack, Brian Anderson said.

Meanwhile, the couples misery mounts. They were grinding their teeth at night and now wear mouth guards. Their doctor prescribed medication for sleep and stress.

This whole tree issue comes on top of heartbreak and stress from the fire, Kristi Anderson said. Its fighting and bureaucracy all the time, it takes a lot of energy. There is no pocket in anybodys insurance policy that covers tree debris removal. We cant afford to move. We have a mortgage. Im a public school teacher how do I feel right now? Not great.

Julie Cart writes for CalMatters a nonprofit, nonpartisan media venture explaining California policies and politics.

See the original post here:
Whack and stack: PG&Es toppling of trees creates new hazards - San Francisco Chronicle

News from the front desk, issue 510: If youre a greenwash spin-cycle merchant of high order and you think 2020 was hard on the bones, get set for an even tougher year ahead.

From what we can tell from the tea leaves shaping up at the end of the year from hell (for most of us), 2021 will be the year that patience, excuses and moderation will be thrown out the window or at the very least made to perch precariously on a ledge at great altitude.

At close of year, we had one of the most admired sustainability architects on the planet, Norman Foster, forced to uncouple his studio from Architects Declare. The studio was a founding signatory.

The shock waves of this, from the agitation of younger radical architects forming a sub set or breakaway from the official AD, is a neat summation of whats going on here.

Like the biography of Jim Morrison (The Doors) says No-one gets out of here alive.

There is no excuse. If we dont pull out fingers out, we will end up with Morrison in a Parisian graveyard, dead from causes not quite specified.

This is serious.

Its the young people talking and quite frankly they dont care about the convenience or uniquity of our travel bug. They dont care about glamour or position or prestige or tradition. They just want to have a life, preferably one as close as possible to that of the older folk now defending their past habits of indulgence with a touch of indignant affront.

If its starting to look like the #MeToo moment for architecture and development, you might be right.

There are a thousand reasons to love and defend the work of Foster + Partners. And its not really about that studio at all.

This is about all of us and the decisions we each need to make. As the Australian arm of AD said, its about a journey we all need to take together and a conversation. As the British AD said, its not about berating anyone. We need to talk about sustainability.

In a recent survey of companies in the Asia Pacific, Sandpiper Communications and PublicAffairsAsia found a massive 74 per cent of corporate reputation managers face internal pressure to overpromote sustainability and ESG achievements, placing them at risk of mispresenting how sustainable they are.

Dont for a minute think that the greenwash police wont be watching closely.

Like most of us, Australasian Centre for Corporate Responsibility director of climate & environment Dan Gocher is happy to see the back end of 2020.

But from a government climate action perspective, its hard not to see momentum coming from the international commitments out of Japan, China, South Korea and now the US under President-elect Joe Bidens ambitious climate regime.

Gocher suspects resistance from the Australian government on a net zero target wont last much longer given these external pressures.

On the corporate side, theres been a wealth of companies committing to net zero, including the usual suspects such as Santos and Origin Energy. This is a promising development but the absence of short-term commitments to reduce emissions is a problem.

Many companies have declared where the finishing line is but not offered details about how they might iteratively get there.

From investors, Gocher expects more major investors to follow the lead of AwareSuper by divesting from carbon intensive companies. The unique move by the super giant last month slashed its emission by 40 per cent overnight by divesting from 60-odd companies.

I think youll see more of that from bigger investors. Weve already seen that from smaller funds, Future Super and the like, but [AwareSuper] is the first genuinely large investor.

But what exactly are our plans for avoiding temperatures so high it will be hard for humans to survive? In some tropical climates, for instance, even at moderate temperatures, high humidity can stop the human body from self-cooling by perspiration. Some wit in the New Scientist named this thermogeddon.

According to Rod Simpson who recently completed his term at the Greater Sydney Commission and is now running Simpson + Wilson architects, focused on work in Western Sydney, there are great plans for more trees to cool the vast districts, but we need to go further.

Trees might lower ambient temperatures by around 2 degrees, but in an area that experienced 50 degrees last summer at Penrith and 47 degrees last month in November at Badgerys Creek, that wont exactly turn the tide.

Its the impact on peoples health and on liveability that concerns Simpson most.

We already know about the food deserts in the sprawling western suburbs where there is take away food at one end, a megalithic shopping centre at the other, and pretty much nothing in between.

There needs to be a resilience plan, Simpson says. Does your building have battery backup if the grid fails? We need human emergency response plans to help vulnerable people.

Is there a cool refuge within walking distance, as in some countries, if your house fails to protect you? Maybe a pool.

Theres also the need for better insulated houses. So many vulnerable people live in houses built in the 60s that have poor insulation and are expensive to heat and cool.

Landcom earlier in the year brought out an encouraging and creative guide for cooling cities, covered in this article, Landcoms patterns for cooling the commons in Western Sydney. Among a range of ideas was the notion that outdoor activities could be refocused around cooler evening hours.

On the commercial front, Craig Roussac from Buildings Alive has been saying during the year and again this week that while the ambition from property companies to set net zero targets is impressive, clear pathways is what we need now.

Hes keen to see buildings and cities themselves to become part of the grid scale solution. That is using buildings to use most of their energy precisely when the sun is shining.

Point Advisory NSW managing director Alan Dayeh says 2021 will be the year where property companies might start taking a long cool look at their tenants and their connection to carbon intensive sectors.

How might this risk might affect rental streams and returns?

Dayeh reckons leaders will keep nudging into the tenant space to manage emissions profiles, which has not traditionally been an easy source of emissions to control.

Something else that will be watching with interest is how climate-ready asset portfolios will be valued going forward. His bet is a growing appetite to buy climate ready or resilient assets.

Another big watch factor is how property will contribute to the circular economy.

The sector has done well to ensure that construction waste is not going to land fill, that has been really good, the next frontier is the operational base, and how property companies are helping with that part of the puzzle.

Can we get material near to where we construct developments? Can we get waste materials used in road base? Can we use remanufactured materials for developments?

He also expects to see more businesses finding ways to make recycling and reuse a financially savvy option.

Matt Kean, fresh from his pinup status in the TFE offices for his great work on energy as the NSW energy and environment minister, has now been redeployed to lend some brand reconstruction to LNP stablemate John Barilaro, leader of the NSW Nationals.

The job seems to be to cobble up a koala rescue package along the lines that farmers will be paid to not chop down trees that these cuddly things need to survive (and hopefully to not shoot any more environmental officers trying to stop land clearing).

But what if the farmers soon decide that they will chop down all the trees unless paid not to? Its these kind of twist to a well meaning idea that we need to be careful of.

The alternative is to simply stop people chopping down trees.

But where would this leave a political agenda that refuses to impose any rules on anything unless its to stop the banks avoiding fossil fuel investments?

This kind of dilemma is not one faced by NSW Building Commissioner David Chandler, who says that for now hes posting photos of shoddy work he comes across in his inspections online.

Next year, he will publish the names.

Chandler, in case youve been asleep for a few years, is the man whos single handedly starting to reverse the shoddy building practices that have plagued consumers since they removed council building inspectors and allowed the cowboys of the industry to self-regulate.

We say single handedly because any number of previous government inquiries or ministers or government officials have failed to shift the dial even a fraction on this issue. And Chandler is starting to have real impact.

In a recent social media post, Chandler pinged what should be unpingable peoples toilets. Yes, he did folks. He went into a site in eastern suburbs sanctuary for the elite Bellevue Hill to photograph site toilets and dumpsters. Why? Because it tells him so much about the attitude of the builders.

Builders who do not care about their workforce are unlikely to care about compliance with design and Australian Standards, he says.

Readers should be in no doubt about how forcefully I expressed my dissatisfaction with the amenities present on this site. All were paraded through both portaloos I inspected. Most wonder why I go straight to site amenities and rubbish dumpsters to form my initial and mostly, lasting impression of a site. When site facilities are offered in this condition guess?

In this instance there was no water for hand washing, and in the other toilet the waste tank was full.

Was it unseemly or unfair to point out one bad site among many?

Get used to it, says our next contender for the pinup board.

At the Green Building Council of Australia theres a positive expansionary mood afoot.

Davina Rooney who took the reins as CEO in June 2019 is well on the way to throwing open the doors of sustainability to housing and the consumer market. A big focus is making tools easier to access and when we spoke to her last week shed just concluded a partnership agreement with Microsoft to digitalise the back end of Green Star.

During the year, she said there was demand for more urgent action on climate change and if we want to grow at scale, we need to take everyone with us.

The big questions are how to broaden things and make offerings more relatable.

Especially in a time when so many people are talking about healthy buildings. Its about reaching the consumer through the broad scale housing mark and Rooney for one is excited to be involved in the consumer side of sustainability. Which essentially means taking the friction out of participation and making things easier for everyone, she says.

Children and schools will be a bigger focus. Can we expect better homes and better schools when people spend 90 per cent of their time indoors?

We should be setting up a future where things are better, Rooney says.

In the new year this will include a television show, which will clearly make green buildings even more aspirational.

If you read the global tea leaves, the big question is where is sustainability going globally and how does that relate to Australian pathways?

Personally, were looking at you, PM Scott Morrison.

ClimateWorks Australias CEO Anna Skarbek is another keen observer whos finishing the year more upbeat than she expected.

Theres good momentum in the finance sector, she says, after sitting on the steering committee for the Australian Sustainable Finance Initiative, which delivered the Australian Sustainable Finance Roadmap last month.

This includes great recommendations such as transforming remuneration to align with sustainable long-term outcomes, implementing product design principles and improving climate risk disclosure.

It will be useful resource that follows the lead of other jurisdictions around the globe, Skarbek says.

Shes also hopeful about decarbonisation given every sector has the technology it needs to get to net zero,including the built environment.

What technology needs is a bit of market momentum and then it can keep going.

Theres already consumer sentiment, where they do prefer a carbon neutral option, and the theres a net zero emission option in every sector.

So the task now is to normalise it, and make it widespread. That will take some proactive buyer and policy settings in the coming few years.

She might be optimistic but shes still realistic about the scale and urgency of the challenge.

If we miss this moment, weve really locked in more emissions than is safe, so if we can get that moment converted into serious momentum, Im actually quite optimistic.

To those who point to the cost of saving the planet, we say this. After the financial tsunami of losses caused by the pandemic on the earths inhabitants and that of the GFC, you are hereby silenced.

What was the impact? Not much. We learned to print money and woke up to the magic (it must be said) of modern monetary theory (MMT) and wondered why no-one thought of it earlier.

Just make sure youre printing the money yourself, not borrowing from some pugilistic nation with lots of guns, make sure you have a robust central bank with firm control of the interest rate levers to stem inflation if it should rear its ugly head. And make sure you control the script writers of the hieroglyphics of debt formulae.

As one economist told The Fifth Estate on the eve of the GFC, debt, in theory, can be extrapolated out to hundreds of years if not infinity.

Think about it: whats stopping us doing that, if people lender and borrower can each live, be housed, clothed and fed, and can then be free to spend the bulk of their energy and creativity defending the planet.

Santa, all we want for Christmas is some MMT.

Read the original:
On why 2020 was just practice for the 2021 greenwash police and better news - The Fifth Estate

Cars

Published on December 25th, 2020 | by Johnna Crider

December 25th, 2020 by Johnna Crider

The folks over at Tesla Magazine,a France-based news site that covers all of Elon Musks companies, recently got to experience and test drive the Ford Mustang Mach-E. Armand Taeb, CEO of Tesla Magazine, told me that their full review will be out next month, but was delighted to share a sneak preview with CleanTechnica as well as his thoughts on Fords newest electric vehicle. (Side note: We missed an opportunity to test drive the vehicle in California and are in the process of arranging a test drive in Florida.)

The car has a unique interior. The arrangement of the door handle to enter the vehicle is striking because of its particularity: you have to press a button which unlocks the door the small handle is only used to pull the door. Inside, Ford has tried to minimize buttons, but not as much as Tesla in its Model Y. Most of the controls are through the large center display in the center of the dashboard, with fabric accents on top, Taeb told me in an email.

The quality of the finishes is clear nothing to complain about on that side. In addition, the driving position of this model is lower than an SUV, which gives the impression of driving a bigger car. Finally, with an average consumption of 23 kWh per 100 km, the 88 kWh battery would give a range of 382 kilometers.

Taeb also spoke about some of the nuance of the vehicle. Fords Mustang Mach-E allows you to drive with just one pedal, limiting the use of the brakes, as you can with a last-generation Nissan Leaf an interesting option, which can be turned off. Just like the sound produced by the car: in Unbridled mode, a synthesized engine sound is heard when you accelerate. It can be off to appreciate the silence of electric driving.

Earlier this month, our own, Steve Hanley shared his thoughts on Autoblogs experience with Ford Mustang Mach-E, pointing out that even though it could be considered a worthy competitor for the Tesla Model Y, it probably wont suck sales away from Tesla in a notable way. On the other hand, if Ford produced enough, it could really cut into the sales of some gasoline-powered crossovers, like the Ford Edge.

All photos, including the featured image, are courtesy of Tesla Magazine and are used with permission.

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Tags: Ford, Ford Mustang Mach E, Ford Mustang Mach-E Reviews, Tesla Magazine

Johnna Crider is a Baton Rouge artist, gem and mineral collector, member of the International Gem Society, and a Tesla shareholder who believes in Elon Musk and Tesla. Elon Musk advised her in 2018 to Believe in Good. Tesla is one of many good things to believe in. You can find Johnna on Twitter at all hours of the day & night.

Continue reading here:
Early Test Drive Of The Ford Mustang Mach-E From Tesla Mag - CleanTechnica

The Trump administration doubled its orders from Pfizer and Moderna this month to 200 million doses each. But both vaccines are given as two doses per person, meaning the U.S. supply will only cover 200 million of the nation's 250 million adults. Authorizing more vaccines for emergency use could immediately increase that stockpile, and also help ensure sufficient vaccine when inoculation is allowed for teens and children.

Johnson & Johnson is preparing to release the first efficacy data on its shot, which is given as a single dose, in January. AstraZeneca could also release more data as early as next month from its late-stage trials, officials with the federal government's Operation Warp Speed said recently. (The company said in a statement that it has "no further updates on the US specific trial.")

An early frontrunner in the global vaccine race, AstraZeneca has sold more shots worldwide than any other manufacturer. Between agreements with the World Health Organization, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness and Innovation and the Serum Institute, a mass manufacturer in India, the British drugmaker has promised nearly 1 billion shots to other countries not including the 300 million it pledged to the U.S.

AstraZenecas vaccine is vastly cheaper than others and much easier to ship and store than vaccines such as Pfizers, that require ultra-cold freezers or dry ice. That makes it an appealing option for hard-to-reach areas in the U.S., as well as lower-income countries with less advanced infrastructure.

But the outlook for the company's vaccine is hazy after AstraZeneca reported last month that nearly 3,000 trial volunteers in the U.K. were accidentally given a half-strength first dose. The regimen proved 90 percent effective in early data, beating the 62 percent efficacy of two standard doses. Some vaccine experts think the lower dose's success could be a statistical fluke, since 3,000 people is a small slice of the tens of thousands of people enrolled in the company's trials; others say it could indicate a clearly better option.

AstraZeneca would still have to fully test the lower dosing regimen before applying to the Food and Drug Administration for emergency-use authorization. The agency is also requiring that drug companies follow at least half the trial volunteers for two months after their last dose.

A company spokesperson said that there is "nothing to share on U.S. filing plans at this time."

But the FDA's minimum criteria for seeking authorization do not tell the full story of a vaccine's value, said Peter Hotez, a virologist and dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at the Baylor College of Medicine.

Initial efficacy over the first two months is only one of several aspects that requires consideration," said Hotez, who is also developing a potential coronavirus shot with partners in India. Other vaccines may offer advantages in terms of durability of protection, tolerability, safety, suitability for children or adolescents, and for that well require additional vaccines.

Pfizer and Moderna only recently started studying their vaccines in children as young as 12 years old, and no manufacturer has begun trials in children even younger. Regulators have also called for more data in pregnant women and for certain risk factors like heart disease, diabetes and other illnesses that could affect the immune system. Health experts say that a vaccine that may only work moderately overall may be best for key subpopulations, such as pregnant women.

The latest news in health care politics and policy.

And some of the vaccines still in development may prove easier to manufacture, transport or administer than the Pfizer and Moderna shots.

Both of those authorized vaccines use relatively new messenger RNA technology to instruct cells to make a protein found on the virus, which revs up the body's immune system. J&J and AstraZeneca use a more traditional method, in which small bits of DNA from the coronavirus are edited into a weakened version of another virus called an an adenovirus. When the adenovirus enters cells, they read its DNA and produce a protein found in the coronavirus.

One theory about the AstraZeneca dosing confusion is that a full dose of the adenovirus triggered too big of an immune response so the body didnt have time to learn much about the coronavirus it was meant to protect against, said Rasmussen. There is still value in having that information, because maybe [AstraZeneca] can start assessing that half-dose regimen.

But the AstraZeneca data could present a quandary for FDAs independent vaccine advisory panel, which has been meeting publicly to discuss each candidate in a bid to boost transparency and public confidence. The company has said that combined results so far from its Phase III trials show its vaccine to be 70 percent effective. But the two dosing regimens tell different stories: 90 percent is basically comparable with the existing vaccines; 62 percent is not.

You cant reasonably combine data from two different dosing strategies, two different dosing intervals and two different placebo groups, Paul Offit, a vaccine expert at the University of Pennsylvania who sits on the FDAs expert panel, the Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee.

It also presents a sticky situation for the largest national vaccination plan in history. While the two vaccines authorized now have nearly identical efficacy and safety profiles and use the same technology, having a more varied roster of vaccines would be harder to distribute fairly.

There are obvious ethical issues: If one vaccine is more effective than the others, who gets what, right? said Philip Landrigan, director of the global public health program at Boston College, who stressed the importance of clear federal planning if that happens. Transparency and openness have another benefit beyond just ensuring that the system works well it could persuade people who are reluctant to get the vaccine.

Read more:
The first Covid vaccines were triumphs. What if the next are only OK? - POLITICO

Coronavirus has changed lives and industries across the UK, accelerating fundamental shifts in behaviour and consumption that were already on their way. Debates about home working, preserving local high streets and the ethics of air travel were bubbling away before coronavirus rampaged across the world, but the consequences of the worst pandemic in more than a century have either settled those arguments or boosted the momentum behind certain lifestyle changes. Here we look at how those debates have been changed or resolved by Covid-19.

Coronavirus wont kill cinema, but it will forever change the movie-going experience. This year the global box office is likely to be just a quarter of the record $42bn (31bn) set in 2019 and UK cinema admissions are set to hit their lowest level since records began.

At the start of the pandemic theatre owners were confident that once the virus had been tamed, the blockbusters and their fans would return. However, Hollywood studios, fearful of empty seats making for box office flops, spied an unprecedented chance to bypass cinemas and make films available via streaming services. This has broken the sacrosanct tradition of months of big-screen exclusivity, outraging theatre owners who rely on that model to make their businesses viable.

Warner Bros has said its entire slate of 21 films, from Dune to The Suicide Squad, will debut on its streaming service, HBO Max, at the same time as in US cinemas next year. The same thing has already happened to Wonder Woman 1984, which was simultaneously released to US theatres and living rooms on Christmas Day. A precedent has been set over separating cinema release from streaming availability.

Cinema still has a role to play. The economics of blockbusters, which cost hundreds of millions to make and distribute, means films of such scale need the multimillion-dollar returns from the big-screen global box office. But in the future it is likely that movie fans will no longer have to wait endless months before streaming the latest blockbuster from their sofa. Mark Sweney

Rail was regarded as a privatisation too far even by Margaret Thatcher, before her Conservative successors went ahead in 1994. Then state spending on the industry vastly increased after Railtrack collapsed and the infrastructure behind it was brought under government control as Network Rail, although the franchise owners who operated the trains remained privately controlled.

Private train operators liked to take credit for the passengers who flocked back in record numbers; but most voters still backed nationalisation, polls showed. Even though a decade of intermittent franchising troubles showed reform was desperately needed, and the government had to step in twice to take over the east coast mainline, only Labour under Jeremy Corbyn gave a full-throated commitment to return the rest of rail into public hands.

But Covid-19 and lockdown restrictions meant passengers all but disappeared for parts of 2020. Following years of unresolved debate and inquiry over the best format for the industry, franchises were summarily scrapped overnight in March. Emergency contracts are more or less embedded until 2022: the industry now runs on Treasury cash, and is likely to do so for some time to come. British Rail may be history but nonetheless, by July the Office for National Statistics had reclassified the industry as, de facto, renationalised. Gwyn Topham

At the start of the millennium the Labour government concluded expansion of Heathrow was the answer to airport capacity constraints, granting planning permission which was overturned by the coalition in 2010. After another commission re-examined all the options, a third Heathrow runway was again approved by MPs in 2018.

A legal challenge to the policy on environmental grounds was first rejected, then upheld on appeal, before finally being dismissed by the supreme court this month.

In the long term, the climate crisis arguments might indeed prove the most compelling. But for now it is coronavirus that has all but swept aside the arguments for expansion. At its peak, Heathrow was constrained to its maximum permitted movements: a plane taking off or landing every 45 seconds, and passenger numbers growing beyond 70 million a year only through bigger, fuller planes.

Yet Novembers traffic figures showed only a tenth of the usual number of passengers passing through, leaving the airport using only one runway. Given the potential for a permanent decline in long-haul and business travel since the world turned to Zoom, the airport may struggle to present a compelling business case for expansion for some time to come. Gwyn Topham

The tumbleweed bowled down high streets this year as home working supercharged the growth of online shopping, with Debenhams and Topshop-owner Arcadia among the big casualties. And the shift is clear. In the third quarter of this year, 27% of retail sales were online compared with 18% the year before, according to the Office for National Statistics.

The pandemic pressed fast-forward on the painful restructuring process of an industry where fewer stores are needed to meet the needs of shoppers in the internet age. With each year more clothing, homeware and food will be bought online. This will create jobs for delivery drivers and in warehouses but not in shops, which employ around 3 million people across the UK.

What will happen with these empty stores? Rents have fallen sharply as landlords adjust to the post-pandemic reality, and changed working patterns show how neighbourhoods can blossom when people live and work nearby. This creates opportunities for businesses with the right offer and cost base. For instance, empty department stores are being converted into flats, food halls and crazy-golf courses. The high street is dead, long live the high street but not as we knew it. Zoe Wood

Technology rode to the rescue for British businesses when they had to send their staff home in the spring. High-speed internet, video-conferencing, chatrooms: everything required to work remotely was already widely available.

As a result, the year of working from home has generally been considered a great success. Banks are leading the drive for a permanent shift with Lloyds Banking Group and Barclays reviewing the amount of office space they use and Standard Chartered permanently shifting to flexible routines. Google and Facebook, which have substantial workforces in the UK, will embrace partial homeworking permanently.

But working from home isnt without its challenges. The impact on creativity, loss of interaction and serendipitous conversations, and lack of support for younger staff, are all cited as good reasons to return to offices. Workers juggling childcare and their job, and employees living in cramped flats, have also missed their desks.

Nonetheless, it appears that home working has been a bigger hit in the UK than elsewhere. British office workers were spending an average of 2.7 days per week at home in November, according to the US bank Morgan Stanley, compared with 2.1 days in France and Italy, and slightly less than that in Germany and Spain. Research found that UK workers spent just over a third (39%) of their working hours in the office in November, lagging the European average of 56%. The trend looks set to continue, with UK employees expected to request flexible working for 2.3 days per week, more than in the other four European nations. Joanna Partridge

Any lingering doubt that the UKs wind turbines and solar farms can provide a backbone for the electricity system were cast aside during the pandemic as renewable energy set new records through the year.

The collapse in energy demand following the lockdown of office blocks, schools and restaurants combined with the UKs bright, breezy weather helped renewable energy make up almost half of all electricity in the early months of the year. New records for solar power and wind generation followed in June and December respectively.

Stephen Stead, a director at energy provider SSE, said the low electricity demand levels in 2020 gave us an unprecedented peek at a future electricity market dominated by renewables and we learned that we can do it.

Wind and solar power will be able to play an even greater role in the future as investment in battery storage and flexible energy use becomes the norm. But in 2020 renewables proved they are already prepared to exceed expectations. Jillian Ambrose

The move to cashless payments accelerated this year, partly because so much spending moved online, and partly because of fears of infection through notes and coins. The contactless limit was raised to 45 and many outlets went cash-free.

According to the ATM provider Link, in the first full week of the spring lockdown withdrawals fell by 57% in value compared with the same week in 2019. Numbers went up as restrictions were eased, but by October the value of cash withdrawals was still down by 30% year-on-year.

However, throughout the year there have been queues outside banks, and the Bank of England has reported that the value of notes in circulation has increased since March, to approaching 80bn. In the days prior to Novembers lockdown, cash withdrawals surged.

There is still a core of people who use and depend on cash, and holding physical money seems to be a safety measure for some. Early on in lockdown, a Link survey found 14% consumers were keeping more cash at home in case of emergencies. The decline of cash as a payment method has been speeded up, but there is still a long way to go before we give it up. Hilary Osborne

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