Nationwide Renewables

https://nationwide-renewables.co.uk/nationwide-renewables-wins-prestigious-eupd-installer-award-for-the-uk/

We are thrilled to announce that Nationwide Renewables has won the prestigious EUPD Installer Award for the UK! This accolade reflects our unwavering commitment to excellence in solar panel installations and sustainable energy solutions. Thank you for your continued support! 🌎💡

A former energy minister has said he will quit as a Conservative MP over new legislation "that promotes the production of new oil and gas".

Chris Skidmore has said he will resign when parliament returns next week over the Offshore Petroleum Licensing Bill.

The senior Tory had already announced his intention to stand down at the next general election, but bringing this forward will trigger a by-election in his Kingswood constituency in Gloucestershire.

That seat is being abolished at the election in constituency boundary changes, meaning whoever takes his place could be an MP only for a matter of months, with Rishi Sunak expected to go to the polls in the second half of this year.

Announcing his decision on social media, Mr Skidmore said: "The bill would in effect allow more frequent new oil and gas licences and the increased production of new fossil fuels in the North Sea.

"I can no longer stand by. The climate crisis that we face is too important to politicise or to ignore."

The Offshore Petroleum Licensing Bill will allow oil and gas companies to bid for new licences to drill for fossil fuels every year.

The government argues it is important for domestic energy production but it has been widely criticised by climate groups.

Mr Skidmore, who has been critical of his party's green record before, warned MPs who vote for the legislation that the future will judge them "harshly".

He said: "It is a tragedy that the UK has been allowed to lose its climate leadership, at a time when our businesses, industries, universities and civil society organisations are providing first-class leadership and expertise to so many across the world, inspiring change for the better.

"I cannot vote for the bill next week. The future will judge harshly those that do.

"At a time when we should be committing to more climate action, we simply do not have any more time to waste promoting the future production of fossil fuels that is the ultimate cause of the environmental crisis that we are facing."

Mr Skidmore said he would resign the Conservative whip to make him an independent and quit as an MP "as soon as possible".

He confirmed to the PA news agency that he would quit "next week when Parliament is back", with the Commons still on its Christmas recess until Monday.

Source: Sky News

We know all of you love the ocean as much as we do! So in the spirit of helping to keep plastic out of our ocean we have curated an ocean-friendly holiday gift guide! 🎄🌊

Share your favourite ocean friendly gift ideas below! 🎁

Renewables generated more of the EU’s energy last winter than fossil fuels for the first time ever, according to energy think tank Ember.

A 7 per cent decrease in the demand for energy saw fossil fuel generation drop by 12 per cent compared to 2021. Coal power fell by 11 per cent and gas by 13 per cent despite fears that EU countries might turn to coal as the bloc tried to wean itself off Russian gas.

Among the 18 EU countries that still use coal power, 15 reduced their coal generation last winter. Poland and Germany - the biggest users of this fossil fuel - made up 70 per cent of the reduction. In Poland, coal reached a new low in the electricity mix, falling below two-thirds of all power generation for the first time ever.

And Portugal saw the biggest percentage drop of any EU country after it phased out its only remaining coal-fuelled power plant in winter 2021.

Ember’s analysis shows that renewables like wind and solar produced more energy than fossil fuels for the first time ever from October 2022 to March this year. They made up 40 per cent of the EU’s energy compared to 37 per cent from fossil fuels.

The think tank also says that coal and gas generation would have declined even further if not for extended outages in France’s nuclear network.

Ember analyst, Dr Rosslowe, says that to keep power supply stable, the EU needs to divorce fossil fuels as quickly as possible.

Nearly every EU member state reduced the demand for electricity last winter. But only Romania, Slovakia and Greece achieved the voluntary target of 10 per cent that was set by emergency EU legislation last year.

On average, demand fell by 6.2 per cent between November and March saving electricity worth €12 billion.

All EU countries met mandatory targets to reduce consumption during peak hours by 5 per cent - except for Ireland.

Recent Eurostat figures revealed that in the second half of 2022, average electricity prices reached a record high.

After a significant increase in cost that started before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, prices skyrocketed at the end of the year. Household electricity costs rose in all EU member states except Malta and the Netherlands.

Source: Euro News

The European Parliament voted on Wednesday to ensure a large number of products on the EU market are deforestation-free, a huge step forward when it comes to tackling environmental destruction.

Companies will have to prove that what they sell has no link to deforestation from 2021 onwards, both in Europe and throughout the world.

The list includes palm oil, coffee, soy, wood, cattle, cocoa, rubber, charcoal and printed paper, as well as derived products, such as beef, furniture, or chocolate.

"We are losing every year around 10 million hectares of forests all over the world and this instrument is going to halt that, at least our part in the complicity in that deforestation because our shelves are currently filled with chocolate, coffee, etc., soy products that contribute massively to the forest destruction - around 10% of this 10 million yearly," Christophe Hansen MEP told Euronews.

However, many products are not included in the list, something that could change in the future.

"We have been from the Parliament side pushing for more and more ambition. We wanted to extend the territorial scope to other wooded lands. This has not worked, but we have a review clause after one year to eventually include this, secondly, we have a review clause after two years where we could include additional products, such as maize, but as well ethanol, for example, bioethanol that is produced out of sugar cane.

"So, these products are on our radar and the European Commission needs to assess them. It makes sense to include them. So, I think we need to have a regulation that is applicable in the first place and then over time you can strengthen it once it is up and running."

Companies will have to provide information to the relevant EU authorities, like geolocation coordinates, from which satellite images of the area can be assessed for any possible forest degradation or deforestation.

If they fail to comply with the rules businesses can be fined.

Protecting the rights of indigenous people is another requirement for products entering the EU market.

Once the rules come into force, businesses and traders will have 18 months to implement them.

Source: Euro News

It cannot be right to manufacture billions of objects that are used for a matter of minutes, and then are with us for centuries. – Roz Savage

The UK government has admitted that its revamped net zero strategy will fail to meet its 2030 emissions cuts target, according to reports. The new energy plan, which was released on Thursday and runs to more than 1,000 pages, sets out how the UK will cut emissions by 68% by 2030 and reach net zero by 2050. However, the government concedes that the policies will only achieve 92% of the required emissions cuts for the 2030 target, assuming all proposed cuts are made and carbon capture technology is effective. Friends of the Earth's Mike Childs has described the concession as "deeply troubling."

The release of the strategy comes nine months after the High Court ruled that a previous version breached legally-binding emissions targets. Under a 2018 law, the UK government must reach net zero by 2050, but Friends of the Earth, ClientEarth and The Good Law Project legally challenged the government's strategy, arguing that it failed to explain how the carbon budget targets would be met. The High Court agreed, ruling that the lack of transparency was illegal, and gave the government until 30 March 2023 to revise its strategy.

The new strategy includes £20bn investment in carbon capture technology, which would see carbon dioxide stored under the North Sea floor, and £240m earmarked for 20 hydrogen projects. By 2024, car manufacturers must ensure that at least 22% of cars and 10% of vans are electric, and there will be £800m in capital funding to facilitate this. Other initiatives include extending a heat pump subsidy scheme and supporting offshore wind farms. However, critics argue that the policy lacks ambition, with recycled pledges and inadequate investment.

The opposition party has also criticised the plan, with Labour's climate and net zero spokesperson, Ed Miliband, saying that "all of the policies, all of the hot air, don't meet the target they promised on the world stage." The Good Law Project has suggested that it may consider launching further legal action after scrutinising the detail of the policy.

Source: Euro News

Plastic pollution is becoming an increasingly pressing issue, and the use of fossil fuels in traditional plastics is a major concern. However, bioplastics, which are derived from natural sources such as agricultural crops, have faced criticism for their reliance on arable land usage — and often questionable biodegradability.

In Lorient, in western France, Ocean met with Stéphane Bruzaud, a researcher at the Université Bretagne Sud on a mission to find a better solution.

An expert in biobased and biodegradable plastics, he's leading a local research team that works with partners across Europe in the EU-funded Nenu2PHAr research project, developing new biopolymers using microscopic marine organisms.

"We can see these small pieces of plastic that we have just found on the beach. And the problem is that these plastics will last for a very long time. They will gradually decompose into very small plastic particles, which are called microplastics, and these microplastics, besides polluting our environment, have also now entered our food chain."

"As part of the Nenu2PHAr project, we are working with marine bacteria that we have collected off the coast of Brittany, on molluscs such as cockles or clams. We use the bacteria with algae, and in particular, microalgae that are grown at the CEA in Cadarache, and thanks to that we can extract starch and sugars," Stéphane Bruzaud explained.

"This combination of sugar extracted from microalgae and marine bacteria makes it possible to develop fermentation processes that allow us to produce so-called bio-based plastics, meaning plastics made from renewable resources — with sugar from microalgae and marine bacteria taken from the seafloor — to produce biodegradable plastics which have actually been shown to rapidly biodegrade in the marine environment."

"Biodegradable plastic materials, in my opinion, are only intended to replace plastics in some niche markets. We shouldn't aim to develop biodegradable plastics for all intents and purposes. Collecting and sorting the waste remains the first priority."

"As for biodegradable plastics, they provide a solution when their use is justified — when they are used in direct contact with the environment, the marine environment in particular, or for uses in which plastics will inevitably end up in the environment," he added.

Source: Euro News

Solar panels are being rolled out “like carpet” on railway tracks in Switzerland.

Swiss start-up Sun-Ways is installing panels near Buttes train station in the west of the country in May, pending sign-off from the Federal Office of Transport.

As the climate crisis demands that we speed up Europe’s energy transition, developers have been seeing new potential in unusual surfaces.

Roadsides, reservoirs and farms are all finding space for solar systems. And Germany’s Deutsche Bahn is also experimenting with adding solar cells to railway sleepers.

But Sun-Ways is the first to patent a removable system, with the help of EPFL, the Swiss federal technology institute in Lausanne.

“That is the innovation," co-founder Baptiste Danichert tells the Swissinfo news site. And it’s a crucial one since railway tracks need to be cleared from time to time for essential maintenance work.

The Swiss company, based in the western town of Ecublens, has devised a mechanical system to install its removable solar panels.

A train developed by Swiss track maintenance company Scheuchzer will travel along the rails, laying photovoltaic panels as it goes. It’s just “like an unrolling carpet", says Sun-Ways.

The specially designed train uses a piston mechanism to unfurl the one-metre-wide panels, pre-assembled at a Swiss factory.

Electricity produced by the PV system will be fed into the power grid and used to power homes as feeding it into railway operations would be a more complicated process.

The start-up has big ambitions for its eco-innovation. In theory, panels could be rolled out across the entirety of Switzerland’s 5,317 kilometre-long railway network. The photovoltaic cells would cover an area around the size of 760 football fields.

Sun-Ways estimates the national rail network could produce one Terawatt-hour (TWh) of solar energy per year, equivalent to around 2 per cent of Switzerland’s total energy consumption.

Once its train has left the station, the company wants to go transnational - extending into Germany, Austria and Italy.

The company still has a lot to prove with its pilot project near Buttes, however.

Source: Euro News

"This has to be a world in which people live rather than die; a sustainable world. It could be great." - Dame Vivienne Westwood

Capturing Europe’s excess heat could power most of the region, a new report has urged.

Excess heat is the world’s “largest untapped energy source,” a report from global engineering company Danfoss has estimated.

According to its findings, the EU wastes 2,860 TWh a year in excess heat.

This nearly matches the EU and the UK’s total demand for heat and hot water, which is approximately 3,180 terawatts per year.

Supermarkets, factories, data centres and wastewater facilities generate vast amounts of wasted heat. So do industries like chemical manufacturing and steel production.

According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), increasing energy efficiency could reduce CO2 emissions by an additional five billion metric tonnes per year by 2030.

“In terms of energy security, these energy savings can help avoid almost 30 million barrels of oil per day (triple Russia’s average production in 2021) and 650 billion cubic metres (bcm) of natural gas per year - around four times what the EU imported from Russia in 2021,” the report reads.

We don’t have to invent any new technology to capture this heat - just implement the solutions that have already been invented.

Excess heat that has already been released can be captured by heat-recovery technology like heat pumps.

Another solution is to prevent the release of this heat in the first place. Appliances like air conditioners can be built to run more efficiently, thereby releasing less energy.

In some places, such technology is already in use. Technological University Dublin uses the excess heat from an Amazon data centre to warm its student accommodation.

In Norway, the world’s first land-based lobster farm uses heat from a data centre to heat the water it grows lobsters in.

In many cities, the main sources of excess heat are highly concentrated. On average, 78.8 per cent of excess heat generated by cities like Amsterdam, Berlin, Warsaw, and Brussels comes from the town’s top three sites alone, the report claims.

This means it would be relatively simple to integrate these facilities into a district energy system that draws from a number of different heat sources.

Source: Euro News

A Chinese pangolin has been born at a European zoo for the first time.

Welcomed into the world at Prague Zoo, the pangolin baby is the first of her critically endangered species to be born in captivity in Europe.

The tiny scaly-skinned mammal - nicknamed “Little Cone” because she resembles a spruce cone - is doing well after some initial troubles, the park said on Thursday.

For the first few days after the baby female was born on 2 February, zookeepers were worried because she was losing weight.

It transpired that her mother, Run Hou Tang, didn’t have enough milk.

Following consultations with experts from Taiwan, a programme of artificial feeding with milk from a cat was introduced and the mother was stimulated to produce more of her own.

That turned things around, with the zoo now expressing cautious optimism about the pup, who is yet to be officially named.

“We have only overcome the first hurdle and others are still waiting for us," zoo director Miroslav Bobek said.

Little Cone was born weighing just 135 grams, slightly less than a cricket ball. Adults can reach up to around 7kg.

The Chinese pangolin is native to southern China and southeastern Asia and is one of the four pangolin species living in Asia, while another four can be found in Africa.

Prague received the rare animal from Taiwan last year, becoming only the second European zoo to keep the species.

Guo Bao, the male pangolin, and Run Hou Tang both came from the Taipei Zoo, the leading breeder of the mammals that are hunted heavily for their scales and meat.

It’s estimated that almost 200,000 were trafficked in 2019 because of the scales that are used in traditional medicine in Asia and elsewhere.

Pangolins difficult to breed in captivity because they require a special feed that includes drone larvae and need a particular humidity and temperature in their enclosure.

Source: Euro News

Our company has been awarded the "Renewables Energy Specialist of the Year" at the Yorkshire Prestige Awards 2022-2023, and we couldn't be prouder.

This recognition is a true testament to the tireless efforts of our team to deliver innovative and sustainable energy solutions for our clients. We are thrilled to be recognized for our commitment to making a positive impact on the environment, and our dedication to building a more sustainable future.

We couldn't have achieved this milestone without the dedication and passion of our team, and I want to thank them for their hard work and unwavering commitment to excellence. This award truly belongs to every single one of them.

As we look to the future, we are committed to continuing our work in providing effective and sustainable energy solutions to our clients. We believe that our industry has an important role to play in creating a better world, and we are determined to be at the forefront of that movement.

“If you don't like the way the world is, you change it. You have an obligation to change it. You just do it one step at a time.” - Marian Wright Edelman

"Just because you’re trash, doesn’t mean you can’t do great things. It is called a Garbage CAN... NOT a Garbage CANNOT" - Oscar The Grouch

Don't throw your rubbish away... It can do great things! 🌱♻️

Fancy a filling bowl of ‘Yucky Shards?’ You should head to the newly opened Plastic Bag Store.

The store - a custom built public art installation and film experience - features thousands of products made entirely from discarded plastic.

Its shelves are lined with items whose names are intended to mimic real-life products such as "Yucky Shards" (Lucky Charms), "Bitz of Plastic Crap" (Ritz Crackers) and "Bagemite" (Vegemite).

Creator Robin Frohardt says the project - currently open in Ann Arbor, Michigan - is designed to encourage visitors to think more about the enduring impact of single-use plastics.

"I got the idea many years ago after watching someone bag and double-bag and triple-bag my groceries," she explains.

Humans have swamped the world’s waterways and oceans with damaging plastic debris. More than 90 per cent of the world’s seabirds have plastic in their guts.

The hardy material is fossil-fuel intensive to produce - and takes millions of years to decompose.

Of the 10 billion tonnes of plastic that have ever been created, a whopping 6 billion sits in landfill sites or pollutes the environment.

According to Worldwatch Institute, a US based environmental research organisation, Americans throw out 100 billion plastic bags per year.

Recycling can help mitigate some of the worst effects of plastics. Yet a 2022 report by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) found that just 9 per cent of plastic is successfully recycled.

The Plastic Bag Store in Ann Arbor, Michigan will be open until 5 February.

It is presented via a partnership between the University of Michigan Museum of Art, University Musical Society, University of Michigan Arts Initiative and Graham Sustainability Institute.

Tickets are $30 (€27) for general admission. Student tickets cost $12 (€11).

The show premiered in Times Square in 2020. It has since made stops in Los Angeles; Chicago; Austin, Texas; and Adelaide, Australia.

At specific times throughout the day the store will be transformed into a stage for a series of short films. These pieces reveal the dangers of plastic waste and its consequences for future generations.

Source: Euro News

The future of the Earth lies in our hands — hands that have proven capable of healing when we invest in our planet.

In 1985, physicist Johnathan Shanklin compiled data from the previous decade and published findings that shocked the world: the ozone layer was being depleted. Over the course of the preceding years, the UV radiation hitting our Earth had increased significantly, indicating a hole in the atmospheric shield protecting us. Without action, global temperatures would rise an additional 1 degree Celsius by 2050 and millions of cases of skin cancer and cataracts would plague society.

On September 16th, 1987, just two years after Shanklin’s publication, The Montreal Protocol was implemented. Governments around the world met and agreed to policies aiming to regulate the production and use of ozone-depleting chemicals that were causing the damage. Since then, amendments have been made to completely phase out these chemicals.

Now, nearly 40 years later, those efforts have proven successful. A scientific assessment backed by the United Nations reported that the ozone layer is mending, with the hole over Antarctica expected to be patched by 2066. What could be considered one of the greatest ecological victories of our time, the restoration of the ozone layer, is proof that we hold the power to enact real change. When we as governments, businesses, and citizens have a political will strong enough to place our trust in climate science, collectively organize humanity, and invest in our planet, we can make reparations.

That’s not to say it will be easy. Just with current climate policy, the Montreal Protocol did not occur without opposition. Many authoritative figures of the time disputed the science behind the ozone depletion, claiming researchers merely wanted more investment money or to propagate a political agenda. Regardless, the need for immediate action empowered people to fight for our Earth. They managed to get it done, and so should we.

We are all responsible for the future of our Earth and only together will we be triumphant in the battle against climate change.

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A draft European Union law will require companies to back up green claims with evidence.

The proposal will clamp down on companies promoting their products as "climate neutral" or "containing recycled materials" if such labels are not substantiated.

The draft document aims to fight misleading environmental advertisements.

"By fighting greenwashing, the proposal will ensure a level playing field for businesses when marketing their greenness," said the draft, which could still change before it is published.

The attempt to stamp out greenwashing comes after a European Commission assessment of 150 claims about products' environmental characteristics in 2020 found that more than half - 53 per cent - provided "vague, misleading or unfounded information".

The proposal would fact-check these claims by imposing reporting requirements on different companies.

EU countries would have to ensure environmental claims are proven against a science-based methodology, such as a "product environmental footprint" framework that tracks environmental impacts across 16 categories including the air and climate change.

Under the proposal, companies that claim their product has a positive environmental impact must also disclose if this causes an negative impact in another area.

Claims based on promises of future environmental performance must be backed up by milestones the company will achieve by specific dates.

Companies whose claims rely on buying carbon credits to offset their own environmental impact would have to disclose this.

EU countries would need to establish a system to verify companies claims, and impose penalties for non-compliance.

The draft said the move would help consumers identify which products are truly eco-friendly and give proper credit to firms whose products have real environmental benefits.

The draft rules would cover all products and services sold in the EU, unless they are covered by comparable EU rules. "Green" investment products are already regulated by EU's taxonomy, a controversial labelling system facing legal challenges from the Austrian government and campaigners for allowing gas and nuclear energy to be labelled as green.

Source: Euro News

The environment is where we all meet; where we all have a mutual interest; it is the one thing all of us share. – Lady Bird Johnson

Over the last 12 years, citizen scientists around the world have been gathering data on the constellations they could see. In total, they submitted more than 50,000 ‘naked-eye’ observations between 2011 and 2022 as part of the Globe at Night project.

A recently published analysis of this data found that the reported changes in visibility were the equivalent of a 9.6 per cent increase in sky brightness every year.

If the sky continues to brighten at this rate, a child born today will be able to see less than half of the stars now visible by their 18th birthday.

“The rate at which stars are becoming invisible to people in urban environments is dramatic,” says Christopher Kyba, lead author of the study.

Across much of the planet, the sky continues to stay light long after the sun has set. This artificial twilight - known as skyglow - has serious consequences for the environment.

The brightness of the sky is usually measured using satellites which are sensitive to light shining straight upwards. They report a much smaller 2 per cent increase in sky brightness.

The study’s authors were surprised by the results that came from human observations.

Kyba explains that it is “horizontally emitted light that accounts for most of the skyglow.”

“So, if advertisements and facade lighting become more frequent, bigger or brighter, they could have a big impact on skyglow without making much of a difference on satellite imagery.”

On a clear dark night, the researchers say the human eye should be able to see thousands of stars. But less than 30 per cent of people around the world are able to get a clear nightly view of the Milky Way.

It shows that pollution is blocking the starlight and sunlight that biological systems on earth have evolved to rely on. This can have a negative effect on human health, increasing our risk of sleep disorders, obesity and depression. It also impacts wildlife, for example by drawing pollinating insects to artificial lights instead of plants.

The study’s authors note that existing attempts to limit the problem, such as laws in France that force offices and shops to turn off lights at night, are not stopping it from getting worse.

©️ Euro News

Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree. – Martin Luther King Jr