A major plan to protect nature and fight climate change in the EU is on the brink of being approved after passing through the European parliament yesterday, AP reports. It says: “The nature restoration plan has had a rough ride through the EU’s complicated approval process, and a watered-down version will proceed to a final vote by the EU member states, where it is expected to survive.” Under the law, European nations will have to restore at least 20% of the region’s land and sea areas by 2030, AP says. “But quarrels over exemptions and flexibility clauses allowing member states to skirt the rules plagued negotiations,” it adds. Politico reports that the law “survived” an attempt by right-wing groups in the European parliament to reject the law on Tuesday. It explains: “In a tight plenary vote in Strasbourg, the European Conservatives and Reformists’ push to reject the legislative proposal did not pass, only gathering 273 votes in favour, with 345 against. A second vote, this time on the compromise deal reached on the nature restoration law between the parliament and the Council in November, passed with 329 votes in favour, 275 against and 24 abstentions, effectively saving the legislation.” The text will now be put to a final vote in the Council of the EU, which represents the 27 member states, before being approved, Politico adds. Elsewhere in the EU, Reuters covers an industry report finding “a record year for building new windfarms and a rebound in investments in the sector have raised hopes that the EU may achieve its clean energy targets”.

Shadow energy secretary Ed Miliband has pledged to “rip up” the effective decade-long block on onshore wind if Labour are elected to power, the Guardian reports. Speaking at an energy conference in London on Tuesday, Miliband said that a “culture of inertia and stasis” has blocked renewable energy projects under the Conservatives and that the party will overturn a de facto onshore wind ban “at the stroke of a pen” if it wins the general election, the paper says. The Guardian explains that, in September, the UK government claimed it had lifted the ban on onshore wind in place since 2015, which had allowed a project to be blocked by a single objection. However, “critics argued that the update to planning rules did not go far enough to encourage applications, which the government rejected”, it adds. According to the Guardian, Miliband said: “With a Labour government, you will know as businesses and investors that capricious decision-making will not rule out your technology. The current government could overturn this ban very easily. But there is a culture of inertia and stasis.” The Financial Times also covers Miliband’s address, noting that the former opposition leader said that Labour would be “laser focused” on net-zero despite recently rowing back on its £28bn-a-year green investment pledge. The Daily Telegraph says that Miliband also pledged to carry on with the tax on fossil fuel producers in the North Sea.

In other UK news, the Press Association covers a letter to the government from its independent climate advisers, the Climate Change Committee (CCC), which has warned ministers not to rely on emissions drops resulting largely from the pandemic to meet its future climate targets. PA explains: “The UK outperformed on its legal target to cut emissions between 2018 and 2022, known as the third carbon budget, largely due to external factors including the pandemic. Total emissions over the period were 391m tonnes, or 15%, less than the maximum allowed under the third carbon budget. But the CCC has written to the government warning the UK is ‘substantially’ off track for targets to cut emissions by 2030 and beyond. It should not carry forward any ‘surplus’ emissions from the third carbon budget to help it meet the next set of targets – the fourth carbon budget – for the period 2023-2027, the advisory committee warns.”

Elsewhere, BBC News reports on a Panorama investigation finding the Drax biomass power station in North Yorkshire “has kept burning wood from some of the world’s most precious forests”. It says: “Papers obtained by Panorama show Drax took timber from rare forests in Canada it had claimed were ‘no go areas’. It comes as the government decides whether to give the firm’s Yorkshire site billions more in environmental subsidies funded by energy bill payers. Drax says its wood pellets are ‘sustainable and legally harvested’.” The Times reports that the government is reassessing the viability of a flagship scheme to reduce the energy bills of thousands of homes through better insulation after figures showed that it is progressing so slowly it will take up to 60 years to complete. Separately, the Times reports on new research from consultancy Public First, commissioned by Drax, warning that the UK is approaching an energy security “crunch point” because of delays building new power plants and growing demand. The Daily Telegraph says that the UK is at risk of blackouts from delays to the Hinkley Point C nuclear power station, according to the same research. Another Times story reports that Tata, the Indian conglomerate, has finally confirmed it is to site its £4bn gigafactory in Somerset, promising nearly 4,000 jobs to the region. The FT covers a new survey finding that 63% of UK energy groups have or are considering moving to “more sustainable markets” than the UK. The Daily Express reports that Tory MPs have urged the government to introduce mandatory community benefits to win local support for new renewable energy projects. The print edition of the Daily Express carries a separate warning from Conservative MPs that “solar farms are eating up our agricultural land”.

Peru’s highlands and jungle suffered heavy rains over the weekend, causing the town of Iñapari to flood and leaving at least 800 people affected, El Comercio reports. The rains impacted homes and crops in 43 native communities in the Peruvian jungle, the paper adds. In Argentina, ahead of the harvest season and after three years of drought that has plagued the country, rains started to fall in February, but the situation remains “critical”, according to La Nación. It says the lack of water worries analysts, who project “yield losses”.

Elsewhere, after the forest fires that hit Valparaíso in Chile earlier this month, Valeria Melipillán, the mayor of Quilpué city, called for “a state that adapts…to emergencies”, La Tercera reports. It says Melipillán noted that 21 people died and nearly 1,000 houses were damaged in Quilpué. 

Meanwhile, El Espectador reports that a wildfire hit a region known as Vichada, in eastern Colombia, and has consumed more than 7,000 hectares since Friday, 23 February. It notes that military forces have controlled the fires despite the high temperatures and winds hindering the task. In a second piece, the newspaper adds that there have been 800 forest fires in the country this year, so the ministry of environment has temporarily suspended controlled burnings to avoid more fires. 

Finally, Brazil’s government launched a foreign exchange protection programme to attract investment in energy transition projects, O Globo reports. It says the Inter-American Development Bank will finance the programme with $5.4bn, which will also have a line of credit.

US president Joe Biden pledged on Tuesday to spend $366m to fund 17 clean energy projects in rural and remote areas of the US, Reuters reports. It says that energy secretary Jennifer Granholm told reporters: “These projects overall are going to create more affordable, more reliable energy sources, they will lower families’ energy bills, and they’ll create good paying jobs in their communities…And that is the promise this president sees in clean energy.” The Associated Press reports that the projects will expand access on Native American reservations. It adds that the money for the scheme comes from a $1tn infrastructure law Biden signed in 2021.

Elsewhere in the US, the Hill reports that the top US fossil fuel lobbying group, the American Petroleum Institute, has filed a petition challenging the Biden administration’s pause on new liquefied natural gas (LNG) export approvals. Separately, the Hill reports that temperature records have been broken in states across the country this February.

Brazil’s environment minister Marina Silva has warned that “the world is currently witnessing wars with devastating losses and that significant instability could further arise if governments fail to address climate change issues”, Reuters reports. Speaking at an event celebrating the 200 years of diplomatic relations between Brazil and the US on Tuesday, Silva said that climate change could threaten an affordable food supply for the world, fuelling conflict, Reuters says. It adds: “Silva highlighted that Brazil can contribute to global food security, but the country and the rest of the world must reduce their emissions from fossil fuels to prevent the formation of desert areas, a phenomenon already observed locally.”

Installed wind and solar capacity in China’s “coal-rich” Shanxi province reached “50.9 gigawatts (GW)…accounting for 38.2% of the province’s total [energy capacity]”, reports the state news agency Xinhua. Shanxi has a target for wind and solar to equal 50% of its energy capacity by 2025, the state newswire adds. The state-run China Electric Power News reports, based on the government work reports of Shanxi, Shaanxi, Henan and Shandong provinces for 2024, that “remarkable achievements have been made in energy security and green transformation”. Bloomberg reports that China Shenhua Energy, the country’s “top coal producer”, plans to “cut annual [coal] production by 2.6% from [2023] to 316m tonnes”, as companies reduce operations amid oversupply of the fuel. China Energy Net also covers the news, saying that Shenhua plans to invest 36.8bn yuan ($3.7bn) in coal-related projects. Energy outlet IN-EN.com reports that fourteen regions have released a list of 614 “major wind power projects” that will have “a combined capacity of 96.2 GW” when built. 

BJX News reports that the national development and reform commission (NDRC) and the national energy administration (NEA) have issued guidelines to strengthen the “construction of peak-shaving energy storage” and “intelligent dispatching capabilities for power grids”, advocating for “thorough upgrades in the flexibility of coal-fired power units, aiming to have all existing coal-fired power units revamped by 2027”. IN-EN.com reports that the ministry of finance (MOF) and other government bodies have issued the “notice on regularising management of additional subsidy funds to strengthen renewable energy tariffs”, which calls for grid companies to “review and disburse subsidy funds in strict accordance with current policy provisions” and to “accelerate the review and publication of a list of subsidised renewable energy power generation projects”. Xinhua reports that the central ecological and environmental protection inspection team gave feedback to Fujian province, saying that some industries have been “inadequate in transformation and upgrading [to ‘greener’ systems], and pollution prevention and control measures have not been effectively implemented”. The state-run industry newspaper China Energy News quotes Feng Xiangzhao, a researcher at the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, as saying that the recently-released carbon trading regulations means “there is finally a superior law on carbon trading, ending the situation in which carbon trading is only based on departmental regulations”. It says Feng also said the law clearly delineates legal responsibilities, to “avoid [stakeholders] being both a ‘referee’ and a ‘player’” in the market. 

Elsewhere, the Wall Street Journal reports that increasingly affordable BYD electric vehicles (EVs) will be a “nightmare for foreign competitors – not just for their EV businesses but their legacy gas-powered ones, too”. The New York Times carries a commentary by Robinson Meyer, the founding executive editor of Heatmap, who says that: “[President] Biden must be careful not to…[turn the US] into an automotive backwater of bloated, expensive, gas-guzzling vehicles. The Chinese carmakers are the first real competition that the global car industry has faced in decades, and American companies must be exposed to some of that threat, for their own good.” Politico reports that the UK is thinking about “whether to investigate Chinese state subsidies for EV makers”, according to “two people familiar with the nascent plans”. The Daily Telegraph also reports that the UK is considering tariffs on the “flood of cheap Chinese electric cars”. Finally, the Financial Times quotes Michael Shu, European president of BYD, as saying that “[BYD’s] success is not because of the subsidy, it’s because we have unique technology…and our management efficiency is high”.

For the Guardian, Prof Brett Christophers, a researcher at the Institute for Housing and Urban Research at Sweden’s Uppsala University, warns that the world is relying on private companies to solve climate change and that this “increasingly looks like a mistake, and one that may cost us our planetary future”. He says: “Essentially, the world has bet the proverbial house on the private sector saving the day. The private sector is not seen as part of the answer. It is the presumed answer. But the private sector obeys the profit motive. Unless firms are forced to invest, limited profit opportunities and expectations usually mean limited investment. And in the context of electricity, limited investment in clean power in turn means that we will continue to rely on dirty energy sources – coal and gas – and hence CO2 emissions will continue to grow. And this is exactly what we are still seeing.”

Elsewhere, a Daily Telegraph comment by assistant editor Jeremy Warner claims that the expansion of electric car uptake “risks further industrial destruction” in the UK and Europe.

Using enhanced weathering techniques on the corn belt of the US “has the potential to contribute significantly to net-zero greenhouse gas emissions goals while simultaneously improving food and soil security”, a new study suggests. Enhanced weathering is a carbon dioxide removal (CDR) method that “involves amending farmland soils with crushed silicate rock, typically basalt, a common volcanic rock”, the paper explains. It reports the findings of a four-year field trial across a typical maize-soybean rotation on an experimental farm in the heart of the US corn belt. The trial produced a “conservative” CDR potential of around 11 tonnes of CO2 per hectare per year, the paper says, as well as yield increases for maize and soybean of 12-16% due to improved soil fertility and decreased soil acidification. In addition, the trial produced significant increases in nutrient concentrations, “thus improving or maintaining crop nutritional status”. [The lead author has previously written a Carbon Brief guest post about enhanced weathering.]

New research finds a “remarkable” increase in summer wet-bulb temperature in Europe over the past six decades. Wet-bulb temperature combines temperature and humidity effects and “is a useful indicator for assessing regional and global heat stress variability and trends”, the paper explains. Using observations and reanalysis datasets, the researchers find that European summer wet-bulb temperature has increased by more than 1C in the past 64 years, driven by “both near-surface warming temperatures and increasing atmospheric moisture content”.

Limiting global warming to 2C above pre-industrial levels would prevent a “regime shift” from cold to warm in the Filchner Trough in the Weddell Sea in Antarctica, a new study says. Using a climate model, the researchers investigate the temperature evolution of subsurface waters in the Filchner Trough under four emissions scenarios. They find more frequent “pulses” of warm water intrusions near the Filchner ice shelf under the higher scenarios. Consequences of warming beyond 2C would include “increased ice shelf basal melting, reduced buttressing of fast-flowing ice streams, loss of grounded ice and an acceleration of global sea level rise”, the paper says.