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Renewing the mandate is not simply about maintaining a UN mechanism but ensuring that the voices, rights and struggles of peasants remain visible and recognised.

The post LVC Calls on the UN Human Rights Council to Renew the Mandate of the Working Group of Experts on UNDROP appeared first on La Via Campesina - EN.

On a spring day earlier this year, 10 men stood on the rooftop of a door manufacturing facility in the central Ukrainian town of Bila Tserkva, surveying the rows of solar panels that surrounded them. Since Russia invaded in 2022, the town has endured repeated attacks, triggering mass power outages. For the factory, which supplies doors to homes and businesses, keeping production going had become extremely challenging. The outages were particularly brutal in the winter, when limited power supplies led to rolling blackouts across the country.

Some days, the employees burned discarded wood in a fireplace to keep the warehouse warm. The facility has backup generators, but they were expensive to run. Tired of relying on a grid that was being routinely bombarded by Russian missiles, Yaroslav, the facility’s owner, decided to switch to solar earlier this year.

Switching to solar energy will enable them to “further expand our capacity and be a bit more independent from the general grid,” he said. “It will be cheaper, more economical, and more ecological.” (Yaroslav requested that Grist use only his first name and withhold details about the facility for fear of Russian retaliation.)

In the spring, he contacted Yasno, a private Ukrainian electricity and gas supplier, to install solar panels on his rooftop. Yasno’s clients pay for the panels to be installed, often with the help of a government program that covers some of the installation expenses. Ukraine created incentives to encourage businesses to switch to renewable energy, like the “Affordable Loans 5-7-9” program, which offers loans to purchase solar panels and other equipment. The preferential loans have interest rates of 5, 7, or 9 percent, depending on the type of business, and can cover up to 80 percent of the installation costs.

Yasno will ultimately decide where to station hundreds of solar panels on the warehouse rooftop and install them. The project is one of dozens that the company has undertaken across the country. In the past two years, it has installed solar panels at 117 sites with a combined capacity of 23 megawatts. The company paused its work for the first two years of the war, but resumed operations in the summer of 2024.

Workers install solar panels on the roof of a door manufacturing facility in Bila Tserkva, Ukraine, in 2026.
Anna Conkling

Volodymyr Hershtun, a service maintenance manager with Yasno who led the project in Bila Tserkva, said that Ukraine is rapidly developing its renewable energy portfolio in part because the country needs to be resilient as it continues to face a barrage of Russian attacks.

“The enemy is trying to destroy energy infrastructure, and we are building what is very easy to restore,” he said. “And those same systems can store electric energy.”

Before Russia’s invasion, Ukraine relied on a highly centralized electricity system dominated by nuclear power. More than half of the country’s electricity came from four nuclear power plants, while natural gas and coal generated roughly a quarter of the energy mix.

A damaged solar panel remains on a roof of a residential house after a Russian drone strike in August 2026 in Mykolaiv, Ukraine. Global Images Ukraine via Getty Images

Renewables made up a small share of the energy portfolio, though the country had been rapidly expanding its solar generation in the years leading up to the war. The surge was driven by the country’s “green tariff” program, which encouraged households and businesses to produce solar and wind power through guaranteed above-market payments for electricity. Ukrainian law guarantees the tariff until 2030, and lawmakers have described the program as a step toward integrating the country into the European Union’s energy market.

Those government incentives led Ukrainian businesses to install about 8 gigawatts of solar by 2022. But Russian attacks on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure over the past few years have upended that model. Since the invasion, missiles and drones have repeatedly struck power plants, substations, and transmission lines, leaving millions without electricity during the coldest months.

Roughly 30 percent of the installed solar capacity and most of the country’s 36 wind farms in the south were either destroyed, fell under Russian occupation, or are unaccounted for. The Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in southeastern Ukraine has also been shut down and under Russian control since the invasion began. Given the legacy of Chernobyl, many Ukrainians live with the fear of another nuclear disaster.

The repeated attacks on the grid have caused prolonged power outages. Parts of Kyiv continue to ration electricity with scheduled power outages that can last for hours. Ukraine’s National Bank has said that Russia’s energy infrastructure attacks this year have worsened the electricity deficit assumptions, raising them from 3 percent to 6 percent.

With the vulnerabilities of relying on large, centralized power stations exposed, Ukraine has begun accelerating its shift toward smaller, distributed sources of electricity that are harder to knock offline. ​In 2025, the Solar Energy Association of Ukraine estimated that 1.5 GW of new solar capacity was built — almost double the prior year’s total — and it expects 2026 installations to at least match that pace.

“Renewables have become the very obvious choice for Ukraine when the full-scale invasion started and when Russia started deliberately and heavily attacking the energy infrastructure, especially the centralized generation facilities,” said Anastasia Vereshchynska, the director of the European-Ukrainian Energy Agency, a nonprofit that works with energy efficiency and renewable resources in Ukraine.

The investments are likely to help Ukrainians weather brutal winters. Last year, as temperatures dropped to -1 degree Fahrenheit, Russia’s bombardments caused widespread electricity and heating outages. Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital, had just half the electricity supply it needed to weather the winter, and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy declared a state of emergency.

Volodymyr, a taxi driver in Kyiv who asked that his last name be withheld for safety reasons, told Grist in May that during last winter’s attacks, his apartment building lost power, leaving him and his family without heating and hot water. Fortunately, he said, his apartment faced south and received sunlight most of the day, keeping it relatively warm.

In an attempt to minimize the effects of outages, the building’s management company has since decided to install solar panels on the roof to help keep the boiler turned on and operate the elevators. The installation is part of the 5-7-9 program.

“It’s a cool thing that the government covers at least part of the cost,” said Volodymyr. “In emergency cases, during power outages, you could turn to the solar panels. There is no harm to the planet. It’s a good thing.”

A photovoltaic power station at the industrial site of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in 2025. Volodymyr Tarasov / Ukrinform / NurPhoto via Getty Images

The need for renewable energy is especially critical in communities closest to the war’s frontlines. As Russian forces advance, towns and villages are increasingly cut off from the energy grid as attacks destroy power lines, and the threat to maintenance workers makes repairs difficult or impossible. Some villages in particular have become so dangerous that repairs cannot be conducted, leaving residents without electricity and access to the outside world.

In those communities, volunteers and nongovernmental organizations have stepped in to install solar panels and battery systems that can power homes and businesses. ​Denny Ugorchuk, the founder of Kosmo Tabir, an NGO that works to help villages access solar energy, said that much of the funding for large projects comes from the help of international partners in the West, while local donations from Ukrainians help fund smaller projects. In one village, solar panels installed at a private residence gave a 50-year-old woman access to online university classes.

In Ukraine, solar panels are a “basic human right,” said Ugorchuk. “People should have access to communicate with one another — you can call a doctor, the police, and it helps you feel safe.”

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline As Russia attacks Ukraine’s grid, solar offers a path to resilience on Sep 16, 2026.

Let’s put this summer’s extraordinary heat in perspective.

Last week, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration confirmed what so many Americans suspected, that the heat has been extra unbearable lately: This meteorological summer, which runs from June through August, was the hottest on record for the contiguous U.S., beating the previous champions of 1936 and 2021 by 0.4 degrees Fahrenheit. Compared to the average over the 20th century, this summer was 3 degrees hotter, with August specifically climbing even higher at 3.5 degrees. Across the pond, Europe has been suffering under one heat wave after another, which have killed more than 25,000 people this year.

Blame the sun for doing what it’s been doing for billions of years, but also blame human-driven climate change. According to an analysis released today by the research group Climate Central, this summer 293 million Americans, or 86 percent of the population, sweltered through at least 30 days of risky heat. (Meaning those that were hotter than 90 percent of previous days in a given area.) In Asia, some 2.8 billion people faced the same exposure. Of the top 10 most unusually hot countries globally, seven were in Europe, which remains the fastest-warming continent.  

“The numbers are just really mind-boggling,” said Kristina Dahl, vice president for science at Climate Central. “Extreme heat on its own can cause health problems, but it can also exacerbate a lot of underlying health conditions.”

Courtesy of Climate Central

This summer, the average American suffered about 26 days with temperatures strongly influenced by climate change, the report found, but some regions were hit harder than others. Four of the five states with the most risky days were in the west: New Mexico, Nevada, Colorado, and Utah. Colorado’s plight has been especially glaring, as its summer temperatures were 4.4 degrees F above normal, followed by Utah and Nevada, both at 3.8 degrees.

Still, Europe takes the crown as the fastest-warming continent, and it certainly showed this summer. (As we reported last month, the heat pushed electrical grids to their breaking points, but solar power swooped in to save the day.) This is due in part to the region’s proximity to the Arctic, which is warming far faster than the rest of the planet — as more sea ice disappears, it exposes darker waters that absorb more of the sun’s energy. A stranger factor is an unintended side effect of clean air policies: While they’ve massively benefited public health, they’ve also reduced the atmospheric particulate matter that reflected solar energy back into space. “As we clean up our industrial processes and we have less aerosols in the atmosphere, which is the case in much of Europe, we’re unmasking that climate signal,” Dahl said. “Europe’s experiencing more of the full brunt of climate change because of that.”

Courtesy of Climate Central

In Europe and beyond, rapidly climbing temperatures are creating a public health nightmare that got even scarier this summer. Climate change isn’t just making heat waves hotter, it is extending them. At the same time, nights are warming faster than days. So with day after day of relentless heat, and less of a cooldown at night, the human body doesn’t get a chance to recover. “When you don’t have the ability to cool off at night, your body is storing some of that accumulated heat from the daytime and carrying it over into the next day,” Dahl said.

Extreme heat can kill on its own, of course, but it can also exacerbate heart and lung conditions. This is especially dangerous for farmworkers and other outdoor laborers, who return to work in the morning carrying the heat effects of yesterday’s shift. The elderly are also at high risk, as their bodies aren’t as efficient at cooling themselves. 

And now the world is staring at what could turn out to be an incredibly strong El Niño, the band of warm Pacific water extending from South America. This is adding still more heat to the atmosphere, and played a part in driving up temperatures this summer, the analysis found. But scientists worry that as El Niño continues to develop, next year’s summer could be even hotter. “It’s still an event that’s taking shape,” Dahl said, “so it’s nowhere near its peak.”

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Yes, this summer really was as hot as you think it was on Sep 16, 2026.

With age, I’ve become more aware of the world’s complexity but also better equipped to come to simple, albeit painful, conclusions: We need to replace fantasies of endless growth with ideas about managing the contraction.

My family has feared water, depended on it, and moved uphill from it for four generations. The watching was never the point. What we did with what we saw was the point.

With the tenacity of salmon swimming home, Un-dam the Klamath is liberating their river before our eyes.

Solar recycling hopeful says it is "losing an insane amount of money" waiting for the federal government to restart its mysteriously suspended pilot program.

The post Solar recycler losing “insane amount of money” and about to shed staff as PV pilot program remains suspended appeared first on Renew Economy.

Gas drilling and lower-volume fracking near the North York Moors National Park should not go-ahead because of flaws in the official environmental assessment, a consultation has revealed.

Photo: DrillOrDrop

The Environment Agency (EA) has said it is minded to grant an environmental permit to Europa Oil & Gas for the proposal at Burniston, near Scarborough.

But participants in a final public consultation urged the EA to withdraw its draft decision. They said the EA should refuse or defer the permit until issues had been fully addressed through “robust, site-specific and independently verifiable evidence”.

The EA’s draft decision document, published on 3 August 2026, has been criticised for containing incorrect, inconsistent, incomplete and missing information, a DrillOrDrop analysis has found.

There are also concerns that it relies excessively on information that would be supplied after approval and that permit conditions were being proposed to overcome a lack of information about environmental risk.

“Questions unanswered”

Burniston Parish Council has asked the EA to reconsider a dozen issues and urged it to organise a village public meeting to listen to local concerns, before making a final decision.

The council’s chair, Richard Parsons, said in a consultation response:

“Burniston Parish Council do not consider that the current draft decision provides sufficient reassurance that the proposed activities can be carried out without unacceptable risks to groundwater, the wider water environment, air quality, local communities and the sensitive environment surrounding the site”.

Cllr Parsons added:

“Many of the questions still have not been answered, leaving too many doubts and a lack of any factual evidence that proves the environmental safety of this community.”

He said:

“The draft decision has not yet demonstrated that this high threshold has been met. Crucial information, that should clarify many of the questions that have remained unanswered by the applicant, remains unavailable, despite this project having already been in the public domain for well over two years.”

The EA has a responsibility “to be satisfied that the proposed activities can be carried out without causing an unacceptable risk to people or the environment”, Cllr Parsons said.

He said:

“If the Environment Agency cannot presently determine, from the available evidence, whether groundwater, air quality and other environmental receptors will be adequately protected, then the legal and technical basis for granting the permit should be reconsidered”.

Planning permission for the Burniston proposal was refused by North Yorkshire Council earlier this year. Europa has said it is considering an appeal. The environmental permit is separate from the planning process.

Incorrect and unclear information

Europa intends to use a lower-volume form of fracking to release gas at Burniston from the primary target, the Carboniferous sandstones. The company has said it plans four fracking treatments, each pumping 300m3-500m3 of fluid into the reservoir at pressures high enough to fracture rocks.

The EA described this operation as a proppant squeeze or reservoir stimulation and referred in the draft decision to “squeezing a small volume of oil-based fluid” into the formation (p4, Reservoir Stimulation).

We asked the EA for confirmation that oil-based fluid would be used in the proppant squeeze and what the regulator meant by “small”.

The EA told us

“The reference to the use of an oil-based fluid is a typographical error.

“No oil-based muds or fluids are proposed to be used at Burniston (Cloughton-2), and this will be corrected in the final version of the decision document.

“As no oil-based fluid is proposed, questions relating to the proportion of oil-based fluid injected are not applicable. The correction does not alter the assessment of the proposed operation.”

We asked for clarification about whether the final document would refer to a “small volume” of any fluid used in the proppant squeeze. If that wasn’t the case, we asked again how the EA defined “small”.

The EA replied:

“We can confirm that the final decision document will not refer to a “small volume” of any fluid used in the proppant squeeze. The reference to oil-based fluid was included in error and will be removed from the final decision document.”

At the time of writing, the EA has not corrected the references in the draft decision document, which remains open for consultation until 23 September 2026.

The draft permit also referred incorrectly to plans to “stimulate oil production”. The Burniston proposal is for gas appraisal, not production.

No 3D seismic survey

The EA acknowledged in its draft decision document that Europa had not yet carried out a 3D seismic survey around the proposed wellsite.

It commented that this was “unusual”. But it said 2D surveys covering the site and 3D surveys to the south and west provided “sufficient information to enable a decision to be reached”.

This has concerned some consultation participants.

Burniston Parish Council said:

“the lack of any such data means that no one knows, with any certainty the construction of the land below us and the effect hydraulic fracturing will have. Europa Oil and Gas Ltd have not provided the data and appear to expect the Environment Agency to make crucial decisions on the environmental impact of the process without providing the evidence.

“As there is no current seismological data in this application, the effect cannot be predicted. No-one knows if the land at the site and surrounding it, subject to the environment licence application, is suitable nor what harm may be caused.”

One consultation participant said:

“Because the applicant has failed to provide a robust seismic risk assessment that rules out threats to nearby residential structures, it is unsafe to grant this permit.”

One participant said:

“I ask the EA to explain how it has established that the geological structure is sufficiently understood to permit a high-pressure proppant squeeze.”

The EA has said no proppant squeeze would be authorized in the secondary targets, the Kirkham Abbey and Brotherton Limestone, because insufficient information had been provided by Europa.

But one participant asked:

“If the geological information was insufficient to permit stimulation of the secondary formations, I ask the EA to explain why it considers the geological and geo-mechanical information sufficient to establish safe fracture containment within the primary Carboniferous sandstone targets.”

Europa told DrillOrDrop it was waiting to see whether it got planning permission through an appeal before arranging the 3D seismic survey. The company also confirmed that no investor was in place to pay for the 3D survey. Europa announced nearly a year ago it was seeking investment of about £800,000 to fund the 3D survey.

The company also said the EA had set a pre-operational measure in the permit (8) which requires the verification of local fractures and faults through the drilling process.

Another consultation participant recommended the EA delay the permit decision until a hydraulic fracture plan (HFP) was published for Burniston. This is required before any form of fracking is carried out onshore and aims to predict and mitigate any induced seismic activity.

The participant told the EA:

“I urge you to insist on seeing the Hydraulic Fracture Plan before making a final decision on this application and to carefully examine the fundamental information it contains to determine its environmental acceptability.”

Chris Garforth, chair of the Frack Free Coastal Communities steering group, said:

“We are concerned that the EA is prepared to issue the Environmental Permit without having seen evidence of faults / geological structures around the well bore and fracking sites. It seems crazy to us that the EA can tell them it’s fine to go ahead and drill, then collect the data from the drilling which will show whether or not it is safe to frack.

“Reading the decision document and the draft permit, it is clear that the EA is prepared to issue the permit and for Europa to carry out the first phase of the development (drill the well) before Europa draw up a plan for monitoring seismicity, or provide an updated Gas Waste Management Plan (Schedule S1.3B in the draft permit) – both of which are major concerns for the local community and on which they sought assurances in the EA’s consultation last year on the Environmental Permit application.

“The EA even admit that the absence of 3D data is ‘unusual’ but that has not stopped them from saying it’s safe to go ahead and drill.

“The timescales indicated in the Schedule also suggest that there could be several months delay between (a) drilling and (b) fracking and testing, giving the lie to the bland schedule of phases set out in the planning application.”

See more details on the HFP at the end of this article.

Behind closed doors

Professor Garforth said his group was also concerned about lack of transparency on the seismic survey:

“By the time Europa do carry out the seismic survey, the data/data analysis will not be in the public domain nor subject to public scrutiny.

“They will only do the survey if they get planning permission (i.e. after a successful appeal), by which time the EA is already likely to have granted them an Environmental Permit.

“The NSTA, which will consider the Hydraulic Fracture Plan, does its work behind closed doors without the public consultation and scrutiny required of planning authorities and the EA.”

Burniston Parish Council has also raised concerns about openness.

It said:

“The reasoning, evidence and uncertainties must be transparent.”

It said the EA should:

• Make evidence supporting the draft decision publicly available
• Clearly identify significant assumptions
• Explicitly acknowledge uncertainties
• Publish responses to substantive objections
• Make monitoring data accessible to the public
• Consult the public on any future variation of the permit

Several substantial responses to the public consultation are not accessible to the public because they were sent as attachments and not published online.

Uncertainty

One consultant participant said:

“[the] Draft decision seems premature as underlying uncertainties have yet to be resolved”.

Burniston Parish Council said the permit should “not depend excessively on information to be supplied after approval” (see also 3D seismic survey and HFP).

The council asked the EA to identify every matter that remains to be addressed after the permit is granted and explain why that information was not required before the draft decision was made.

It said the EA should not rely on modelling, predictions and monitoring by or interpreted by the operator. The council called for the publication of independent verification and results.

The council said:

“The site is located in a sensitive coastal area, close to residential communities and important environmental and landscape assets. In such circumstances, uncertainty should not be treated as evidence that no risk exists.

“Where there are credible uncertainties concerning groundwater, geological pathways, well integrity, emissions, waste management and the consequences of the proposed stimulation operation, the Environment Agency should apply a genuinely precautionary approach.”

Another consultation participant raised Europa’s estimate that 50%-70% of fracture fluid would remain in the rock formation. The participant asked:

“how has the EA demonstrated that retained fluid cannot migrate through natural fractures, previously unidentified faults or artificially created fractures into other formations or groundwater-bearing strata?”

Inconsistency

One consultation participant complained about inconsistent figures for the height of the permitted fractures.

In the draft decision document, the EA said the fractures would range from 65m-80m vertically.

But elsewhere in the document, the EA said the proppant squeeze was designed to extend 85m above and below perforations in the wellbore.

Specific concerns

Burniston Partish Council identified other concerns including:

Groundwater pollution risk: The EA must explain clearly how it had resolved its earlier objection because of an unacceptable risk of groundwater pollution. It must also demonstrate how it was satisfied that the well would provide adequate protection through the operational life and after abandonment.

Uncertainty over fracking: The EA should demonstrate that it had adequately assessed the likely extent and orientation of induced fractures and issues including the possibility of induced seismicity and fractures interacted with natural faults.

Lack of baseline data: Before any work began, the EA should ensure that robust, independent and publicly-available baseline monitoring was undertaken on surface and groundwater, methane, air quality, naturally-occurring geological contaminates.

Methane emissions: The EA should not assume emissions will be negligible because the operation is described as temporary.

Flaring waste gas: Flaring proposals during testing and production failed “to meet strict modern interpretations of minimising environmental waste”. The parish council said:

“The public should be able to see the evidence on which the Environment Agency has concluded that the proposed controls are sufficient.”

Waste management: The council said no waste management plan should rely on assumptions that have not been adequately tested against actual geological and operation conditions at the site.

Groundwater monitoring arrangements: The council said these had been insufficient defined so “the public is being consulted on a permit without being able to assess whether the monitoring system will be capable of detecting pollution promptly.”

More on HFP and 3D licence commitments

Europa told DrillOrDrop that local faults and fractures would be confirmed through the HFP to “verify that there are no material changes to the conceptual model before any proppant squeeze operations are authorised”.

The company added:

“A 3D seismic survey is required under the Hydraulic Fracture Plan and will be carried out before any proppant squeeze operation is conducted, ahead of that operation and assuming planning and other permissions are granted.”

DrillOrDrop has established that an HFP does not require a 3D seismic survey. The EA told us:

“There is no formal requirement in legislation or guidance for a 3D seismic survey to accompany a Hydraulic Fracture Plan.

“A 3D seismic survey is typically used to characterise geological structures at depth and can form part of the wider evidence base used to support the assessment of the subsurface. “However, while the Hydraulic Fracture Plan requires sufficient information to demonstrate the geological setting, faulting, and fracture behaviour at depth, it does not prescribe how this information must be obtained. As such, the use of a 3D seismic survey may support the Plan, but it is not a specific statutory or regulatory requirement.”

The Burniston 3D survey is a work commitment in Europa’s licence agreement for PEDL343 with the NSTA.

The NSTA told us operators could choose when to carry out licence commitments. It also said:

“It is important to note that commitments can be varied depending on the circumstances of the individual licence/field.”

In 2018, a legal challenge on licence commitments ruled that PEDLs were private contractual licence and that clauses or conditions could be changed if the parties agreed. In the Burniston case, the condition of a 3D survey could be removed if Europa and the NSTA agreed.

Stories for an emerging food system Channel Comment brendan 16th September 2026 Teaser Media

For renters watching rooftop solar spread across the neighbourhood, Australia’s energy transition can feel frustratingly distant. The case for legalising plug-in solar and batteries is now clear.

The post The case for plug-in solar and batteries has never been clearer – and renters deserve it appeared first on Renew Economy.

Since 2020, Australia's subsidies for fossil fuels have totalled almost six times the amount given in aid to the Pacific, Tuvalu's climate and environment minister says.

The post Pacific aid “doesn’t really matter” next to Australia’s fossil fuel subsidies, Tuvalu climate minister says appeared first on Renew Economy.

One minute, Victoria's new energy minister was promising industry stakeholders that Labor will hold the line on renewables. The next minute, her boss was saying the exact opposite.

The post Labor loses its spine on renewables as premier throws new energy minister, and transition, under the bus appeared first on Renew Economy.

• Car insurance and gas are both up over 50 percent since 2019, making the annual cost of owning a car nearly $6,000 a year. And that’s on top of payments, which now average $765 a month for new cars and $542 for used. (CNBC)
• Cities should be setting aside money for infrastructure maintenance. (Governing)
• The Federal Transit Administration awarded $233 million in grants for station accessibility (Transportation Today), including $20 million for Green Line station upgrades in Cleveland (Axios).
• New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani unveiled a new Vision Zero plan that includes lowering speed limits near schools, infrastructure improvements at intersections, speed-limiting devices on city-owned vehicles and potentially higher tolls for oversize vehicles. (NY Times)
• New Jersey is considering building its first true bus rapid transit line. (NJ.com)
• Boston bike advocates are underwhelmed by Mayor Michelle Wu’s track record on bike safety projects. (WCVB)
• Phoenix is starting an on-demand van service and expanding RAPID bus service. (KJZZ)
• Raleigh churches are considering turning their usually empty parking lots into affordable housing. (WUNC)
• Somebody was caught on video in Seattle driving at freeway speeds along a walking and biking trail parallel to I-90. (Seattle Bike Blog)
• Vancouver reopened Granville Street to cars after the World Cup ended, but the successful experiment could lead to pedestrianizing it permanently. (CBC)
• Biking and walking are booming in Limerick. (Independent)

First battery units arrive at what will be the biggest storage facility in Australia's most advanced renewable grid with a share of 75 per cent wind and solar.

The post First battery modules arrive at biggest storage project to date in Australia’s most renewable grid appeared first on Renew Economy.

Individual states may choose their own path on reliability and market design details as consultation on regulatory reforms continue, says one energy expert.

The post “A lot of unknowns:” Why states may go their own way in “balkanisation” of Australia’s main grid appeared first on Renew Economy.

Pooja Kishinani and Satakshi Gupta

An interview with Yuri Tuma, a multidisciplinary Brazilian artist, researcher, and co-founder of the Institute for Postnatural Studies (IPS) a Madrid-based institute working at the intersection of art, culture, and ecology. The IPS uses artistic …

Irrigating U.S. crops prevents higher greenhouse gas emissions by avoiding land conversion, groundbreaking new research by Colorado State University shows.

Should I stay or should I go?

Australia will miss its 2030 climate targets unless more renewable energy projects move beyond the planning phase and start getting built.

The post Enough wind and solar in pipeline, but not enough actually being built to meet 2030 target, scorecard finds appeared first on Renew Economy.

The U.S. Forest Service is rewriting its longstanding Travel Management Rule, which determines where off-road vehicles (ORVs) can travel across national forests and grasslands. This is the tool that land managers use to designate areas and trails for motorized use while also setting aside areas for human-powered recreation, wildlife habitat, and preservation of cultural sites.

The Trump administration wants to change—for the worse—how Utahns and other visitors experience national forests throughout the state, from the Wasatch Front to the redrock country outside of Escalante, Kanab, and Moab. The proposal places a heavy thumb on the scale to prioritize ORV use at the expense of all other uses and values, including the protection of wildlife, cultural sites, healthy streams, and the solitude of wild places. This will not improve access to public lands, but it will make the experience worse for all users, including hikers, bikers, hunters, anglers, and ORV riders.

The Forest Service is accepting public comments through Wednesday, September 23. Please tell the agency to protect national forests by keeping the Travel Management Rule intact!

Elk Ridge, Manti-La Sal National Forest. © Scott T. Smith

 Among other things, the Forest Service’s proposal would:

• Allow motorized vehicles everywhere on national forests and grasslands except where they are specifically prohibited, flipping longstanding policy.
  
  
• Force every forest or district to reconsider each year whether non-motorized trails, roads, and areas should be open to motorized vehicles.
  
  
• Create new pathways to expand ORV use with less public review.
  
  
• Eliminate the “minimization criteria,” which require the agency to locate motorized areas and trails to minimize damage to wildlife habitat, soils, watersheds, and vegetation and to minimize conflicts between different users.

In Utah, national forest lands help connect Bureau of Land Management landscapes proposed for wilderness designation in America’s Red Rock Wilderness Act. These include the important watersheds of the Manti-La Sal, Dixie, and Fishlake National Forests.

There are already hundreds of thousands of miles of Forest Service roads nationwide, and they’re facing a $9 billion maintenance backlog. Added to that is a $300 million Forest Service trail maintenance backlog and a $29 million recreation backlog. An expanded route system will only exacerbate these problems.

Both the proposed Travel Management Rule change and the proposed rescission of the Roadless Rule (see our alert from earlier this week) are part of the administration’s systematic dismantling of the rules and safeguards that keep national forests healthy and safe for the benefit of all. Undoing these rules will bring increased chaos and uncertainty for everyone who uses national forests.

Click here to submit your comments by September 23

The post Tell the Forest Service to Keep the Travel Management Rule appeared first on Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance.