Happy Monday and welcome back to the Green New Spiel, the newsletter bringing you the latest stories and developments in the world of clean-tech, green energy and other climate related news.
We are back with some fascinating stories for you - as ever do let us know if there are topics you would like us to cover more of.
This week on the Green New Spiel:
🇨🇦🔥 Canadian wild fires and climate change
🌊 Caring for our oceans
🔋 Invinity trialling their flow batteries
🙋Pulling back the windfall taxes
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🇨🇦🔥 Canadian wild fires and climate change
Canada is on track to see a record area of pristine nature burned by forest fires this year. Outside of the immediate impact, cities such as Toronto and New York are feeling the heat with deadly levels of smoke pollution.
What is shocking is that more than 2,000 of the forest fires are thought to have been started by humans. To make matters worse, experts believe that some modern practices of suppressing fires have stopped the natural manner in which firebreaks have been historically used to reduce wildfire spreads.
Can we pin some of the blame on climate change? Whilst it is hard to connect any one singular fire to climate change, Canada has indeed seen hotter and drier springs: the province of Halifax saw temperatures reach 33C last week, c. 10 degrees higher than normal for the time of year, making fires much more likely.
🌊 Caring for our oceans
The Environment Agency Abu Dhabi (EAD)’s coral restoration program has started coral nurseries to combat the high levels of coral bleaching caused by rising sea temperatures, which are devastating the ability for corals to support the ecosystems that depend on them.
The EAD’s nurseries create ideal conditions for the coral, regenerating them and planting them back in the ocean once mature. The UAE lost up to 70% of their corals in 2017 due to rising temperatures, but interestingly, according to the EAD, 40% - 50% of the corals survived the second bleaching event of 2021. Hopefully more of the regenerative work can help spread heat-resistant strains of coral over the coming years, supporting ecosystems and human communities who are dependent on the health of the ocean.
🔋 Invinity trialling their flow batteries
Invinity Energy Systems is gearing up to deploy its flow battery prototype in British Columbia, Canada. The main difference between conventional and flow batteries is that energy is stored in the electrode material in conventional batteries (think metal), while in flow batteries it is stored in electrolyte liquids.
Whilst there are some potential benefits with flow batteries, such as longevity and reduced fire risk, they do still see the challenges of typically being less power dense, cost more and take up more space than traditional batteries. It will be fascinating to see how the pilot testing goes.
🙋Pulling back the windfall taxes
The reduction in the windfall tax rate on oil and gas producers is expected to be implemented in the near term as energy prices stabilize. The REA however argues that these same benefits should also apply to renewable energy, which is the cheapest form of domestic electricity generation.
As the EU looks to remove their windfall tax on renewable energy and the US has introduced the hugely popular IRA funding, the UK would be at risk of missing out of critical infrastructure investment without such a move.
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Ciao,
Carlo and Rob