The Newsroom

What We Are Reading

Dr Timothy F. Welch

Why lower speed limits aren’t so radical

Timothy Welch explains how those reduced speed limits won't impact your travel as much as you think they will.

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Tharanya Arumugam

Calling it what it is: Climate Emergency

NEW YORK: United Nations secretary-general Antonio Guterres Wednesday painted a fairly grim picture of the future should countries continue to ignore warnings or delay sustainable climate actions, following his recent visit to flood-hit Pakistan.

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Oliver Milman

Criticism intensifies after big oil admits ‘gaslighting’ public over green aims

Fury as ‘explosive’ files reveal largest oil companies contradicted public statements and wished bedbugs upon critical activists.

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Robin Smit and Nic Surawski

We may be underestimating just how bad carbon-belching SUVs are for the climate – and for our health

Australia’s love for fuel-hungry and fuel-inefficient SUVs is hampering our ability to bring transport emissions down. SUVs make up half of all new car sales last year, a National Transport Commission report revealed this week – up from a quarter of all sales a decade ago. As a result, the carbon emitted by all new cars sold in Australia dropped only 2% in 2021, the report found. Sales of battery electric vehicles tripled last year, but still makeup just 0.23% of all cars and light commercial vehicles on our roads.

MRP™ views:

MRP has observed the trend in SUV sales in Australia and New Zealand, which are similar.  This article well highlights the massive impact SUV have on transport emissions.  Unfortunately, a similar trend is also noticed in the sales of larger EV types, as private car owners have become addicted to the SUV standard and features. And this is completely counterintuitive, as larger SUV type EV have much higher LCA emissions as well, and likely produce as much if not more PM 2.5 particles due to their larger mass compared to ICE SUV.  So while it is somewhat positive for our governments to propose a switch to EV, with the caveat that renewable low carbon footprint energy is 100% available for re charging, on the other hand an unfettered approach to the switch might leave us in the same environmental lurch.
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Marc Daalder

Why we keep accepting new climate extremes

From bugs vanishing from our windshields to a procession of broken climate records, big change comes slowly but is no less important for it, Marc Daalder writes.

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