LONDON, Feb 27 (Reuters) – European Union industrial
carbon emissions rose by up to 2.4 percent last year, analysts
surveyed by Reuters estimated, below the market cap and keeping
the 27-nation bloc on track to meet its 2020 climate target.

The EU’s emissions trading scheme (ETS) limits the emissions
of over 12,000 installations, including power plants and
factories, and covers over 40 percent of the 27-nation bloc’s
total emissions.

LONDON, Feb 19 (Reuters) – Britain must not lose its
lead in the development of marine energy like it did with wind
power, and should focus on reducing costs and setting ambitious
deployment targets beyond 2020, a report by a parliamentary
committee said on Sunday.

Seven out of the eight large-scale prototype wave and tidal
devices installed worldwide are in the UK but are not expected
to make a large contribution to its energy mix before 2020.

LONDON (Reuters) – The clean energy sector is unlikely to sustain its frenzied rate of investment growth and looks set for consolidation led by Asian players, said Gil Forer, head of global cleantech at Ernst & Young.

“The (renewables) space has grown dramatically in the last seven to eight years. No industry can continue to grow indefinitely at such rates, there is always a point of correction,” he told Reuters on Wednesday.

LONDON, Feb 13 (Reuters) – Global warming will get
worse as agricultural methods accelerate the rate of soil
erosion, which depletes the amount of carbon the soil is able to
store, a United Nations’ Environment Programme report said on
Monday.

Soil contains huge quantities of carbon in the form of
organic matter. which provides nutrients for plant growth and
improves soil fertility and water movement.

LONDON (Reuters) – Britain will urge businesses and governments to start accounting for natural capital as an additional way of measuring economic activity at a U.N. sustainability summit in June, its environment minister said on Thursday.

This could mean moving towards a concept of GDP+, or measuring the use or loss of natural resources like water, agriculture and forests to gauge economic activity, in addition to relying solely on economic output.

LONDON, Feb 8 (Reuters) – A new type of solar cell
which could boost the efficiency of solar panels by over 25
percent compared to silicon-based cells has been developed by
British scientists, but they need another two or three years to
assess whether it is commercially viable.

Scientists at the University of Cambridge have developed a
hybrid solar cell which is capable of converting 44 percent of
sunlight into electrical power, 29 percent more than traditional
cells’ capability of 34 percent, they said in the journal
NanoLetters on Wednesday.

LONDON, Feb 1 (Reuters) – UK company Highview Power
Storage plans to develop a commercial facility which uses liquid
air to store renewable energy after a pilot project was
successful, the firm told Reuters on Wednesday.

One of the problems facing wind power development is how to
store surplus energy when the wind is strong and release it when
the weather is calm.

LONDON (Reuters) – The world is running out of time to make sure there is enough food, water and energy to meet the needs of a rapidly growing population and to avoid sending up to 3 billion people into poverty, a U.N. report warned on Monday.

As the world’s population looks set to grow to nearly 9 billion by 2040 from 7 billion now, and the number of middle-class consumers increases by 3 billion over the next 20 years, the demand for resources will rise exponentially.

LONDON (Reuters) – Global renewable energy deals climbed 40 percent to a record high of $53.5 billion last year from $38.2 billion in 2010, as solar, wind and energy efficiency overtook hydropower as the main deal drivers for the first time, a report said on Monday.

Historically, hydro power has dominated renewables deal flow, but deals worth $1 billion or more in wind, solar, biomass and energy efficiency have outnumbered hydro by seven to one, the PriceWaterHouse Coopers report said.

LONDON, Jan 30 (Reuters) – Global renewable energy
deals climbed 40 percent to a record high of $53.5 billion last
year from $38.2 billion in 2010, as solar, wind and energy
efficiency overtook hydropower as the main deal drivers for the
first time, a report said on Monday.

Historically, hydro power has dominated renewables deal
flow, but deals worth $1 billion or more in wind, solar, biomass
and energy efficiency have outnumbered hydro by seven to one,
the PriceWaterHouse Coopers report said.