Breaking Waves: Ocean News

Residents in western Louisiana say giant liquified natural gas plants are making their home a sacrifice zone ‘Inexcusable’: should climate hypocrites get the petrostates label? Revealed: wealthy western countries lead in global oil and gas expansion To witness how the United States has become the world’s unchallenged oil and gas behemoth is to contemplate the scene from John Allaire’s home, situated on a small spit of coastal land on the fraying, pancake-flat western flank of Louisiana. Allaire’s looming neighbor, barely a mile east across a ship channel that has been pushed into the Gulf of Mexico, is a hulking liquified natural gas (or LNG) plant, served by leviathan ships shuttling its chilled cargo overseas. Another such terminal lies a few miles to the west, yet another to the north. The theme continues even in Allaire’s seaward vista – alongside a boneyard of old oil rigs, a new floating offshore LNG platform is in the works. Continue reading...

The country has long been the world’s biggest market – but the government’s interest is more geopolitical than environmental When Kenzi, an advertising worker in Shanghai, bought an electric vehicle in November she wasn’t even thinking about the environmental benefits. She had read Elon Musk’s biography and thought the Tesla 3 looked good. She also knew that if she bought an EV she could bypass the long wait and cost of getting licence plates, which are rationed by the government. “It’s not easy to get a licence plate in Shanghai, but you get a licence for free when you buy an EV,” she said. Continue reading...

Exclusive: UK campaigners say it is ‘unacceptable’ no nature assessments were made on bee-killing Cruiser SB The Conservative government did not carry out a legally required assessment of how greenlighting the use of a banned pesticide, described as a “death blow to wildlife”, would affect some of the most important nature sites, documents have revealed. The previous government gave emergency approval this year for sugar beet farmers to use Cruiser SB for the fourth year in a row. Continue reading...

Crown estate reward for Dan Labbad comes amid doubling of profits on back of offshore wind developments King Charles’s property management company has given its chief executive a pay increase of almost 20% after tripling his pay packet over the previous three years. The crown estate, the royals’ ancient portfolio of land and property across England and Wales that includes the seabed around its coasts, paid Dan Labbad almost £1.9m for the last financial year amid a rise in profits powered by offshore wind developments. Continue reading...