Seven out of 10 companies believe that climate change has the potential to significantly affect their revenue, with over half saying that it was expected within five years.
Based on responses from 2,415 companies, made up of suppliers and 52 major buying businesses, the research by the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) and Accenture found the risk of supply chain failure was “intensified by a chasm between the sustainable business practices of multinational corporations and their suppliers”.
Kids leaving their school lunches uneaten beware! The Chinese government has been advised to criminalize the wasting of food.
Yuan Longping, described by Xinhua as China’s most famous agricultural scientist, made the proposal on China Central Television last week. “I am proposing that the government make (regulations and policies) to encourage people to despise the waste of food and to treat it like a crime,” said Yuan.
Asia is at the center of the changes that will alter the global map of energy trade over the next five years. That's the official line from the International Energy Agency (IEA) as it calls the future changes in international supply and demand of energy “vast”.
The IEA adds that if Asian countries summon the political will to liberalize the energy markets and makes the investment environment attractive, and then then the region can be “rich” in renewable energy. It notes that huge hydropower projects have already boosted that capacity but points to geothermal power as being far from exploited to its full potential.
The Philippines is sitting on vast renewable energy potential of more than 250-GW of power that could save money, generate jobs and make electricity available and affordable to more Filipinos, according to Greenpeace.
In a new report, Green Is Gold: How renewable energy can save us money and generate jobs, the NGO says the Philippines economy stands to benefit from massive renewable energy investments and does not need to rely on outdated and destructive fossil fuels.
World leaders attending the World Economic Forum in Davos this week were given the stark news that USD700 billion annual spend on green investments is required to save the planet from the harsh realities of climate change.
The figure – which amounts to USD14 trillion between now and 2030 – will be needed to meet global energy demand and avert the economic challenges that will be created by untracked climate change.
The Asia Pacific region still has significant potential for deployment of solar technologies, according to a new report by Navigant Consulting which looks at solar opportunities in various regions around the globe.
In the past, with the exception of Japan, solar has primarily been deployed in off-grid applications in Asia Pacific, the report says, but this is changing rapidly. In particular, moves by governments in the US and Europe to counter the dumping of solar components have led to a renewed determination by the government of China to increase domestic deployments.
New research might hinder the future commercial financing of carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology for coal stations in India and China. The study, published in the journal Energy Policy, says that contrary to other research, it estimates that the cut in overall emissions from coal-fired power stations would be 70 percent, rather than the more commonly accepted 90 percent figure.
From the University of Bath's Institute for Sustainable Energy and the Environment, the research concludes that other factors in producing and moving coal to power stations, would ultimately reduce the effective carbon reductions.
It is early days yet but the new research that shows that black carbon, more commonly known as soot, could be contributing twice as much to global warming than previously thought, and may have a future impact on climate talks. It has also been found to be affecting rainfall patterns on the Asian monsoon more than previously thought.
Particles from diesel engines, wood burners and coal fires, according to the research published in the Journal of Geophysical Research-Atmospheres, have a total warming effect greater than methane and two thirds that of carbon dioxide. That was almost double the effect estimated by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 2007.
China leads the world in investing in the protection of its watershed, according to a new study by US-based NGO Forest Trends. The report, State of Watershed Payments 2012, is described as an effort to globally track the size, scope, and direction of investments in watershed services as well as the ecological infrastructure from which they flow.
The study was dominated by looking at China and the US which had 61 and 67 programs of the 205 tracked, respectively. China accounted for 91 percent of the 2011 investment, supported by government money.
Beijing has proposed unprecedented new rules governing how China's capital reacts to hazardous air pollution, as deteriorating air quality continues to raise ire among the city’s 20 million plus residents.
The new Air Pollution Control Regulation will formalize previous ad-hoc measures by targeting vehicles, factories and even outdoor barbecues, and warns of large fines for those who break the rules.
A top environmentalist has hailed draft measures to clean up Beijing's air as a major breakthrough after record-breaking smog continues to besiege the city - but residents seem less impressed.
When it comes to polluted cities Asia leads the world. While Beijing was hitting the headlines for all the wrong reasons as pollution rose to ‘off-the-scale’ levels, and Hong Kong’s government was revealing plans on how it is going to tackle the city’s pollution, there are a number of other cities throughout the region, which are in an even worse state.
While you may think Mongolia is all about un-spoilt wild landscapes and horses with little pollution, the latest data released by the UN Agency World Health Organization points to Mongolia’s capital, Ulaanbaatar, as the world’s most polluted city.
At yesterday’s opening session of 19th Mekong River Commission (MRC) Council Meeting, being held in the Laoation city of Luang Prabang, heated debate occurred over the host country’s construction of the Xayaburi Dam and its plans to build a cascade of dams on the Lower Mekong River.
According to participants at the meeting, MRC governments disagreed about the prior consultation procedures and how they had been applied in the case of the Xayaburi Dam. The Cambodian delegation asserted that Laos had misinterpreted the Mekong Agreement and that the prior consultation process had never been completed.
Hong Kong’s new Chief Executive C Y Leung made a range of sweeping promises in his maiden policy address today aimed at tackling the city’s pressing environmental issues, including the city’s stifling air quality and absence of any real efforts towards nature conservation.
"For the well-being of future generations, the government and the community must commit to improving the environment. To tackle key issues such as waste management and air quality requires us to make choices," Leung said
With governments in industrial nations slashing subsidies for technologies ranging from wind turbines to solar power and biomass, clean energy investment slid 11 percent last year.
However, booming solar and wind installations were still seen in countries like South Africa, Japan and most importantly, number-one spender China, according to data released yesterday by Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF).
A major international study scheduled for release at the 1st GLOBE Climate Legislation Summit to be held in London over the next two days will show that 32 of 33 major economies, led by China and Mexico, have progressed or are progressing significant climate and/or energy-related legislation.
The report, produced by the Global Legislators Union (GLOBE) in partnership with the Grantham Research Institute at the London School of Economics and supported by the Climate & Development Knowledge Network (CDKN), shows that 18 countries made “significant” progress in 2012.
Four years after it was supposed to have cleaned up its act ahead of the 2008 Olympics, Beijing has in recent days been experiencing some of the worst air pollution ever recorded.
Official measurements of PM2.5, the fine airborne particulates that pose the largest health risks, rose as high as 993 micrograms per cubic meter in the Chinese capital on Saturday, compared with World Health Organization guidelines of no more than 25. It was as high as 500 at 6am on Monday morning.
A two-day ministerial-level meeting of the Mekong River Commission (MRC) in the Laotian city of Luang Prabang next week is set to put trans-boundary co-operation to the test and with critical decisions to be made on the fate of the Mekong River, vital to the livelihoods of 60 million people.
Ahead of the MRC, which takes place on the January 16-17, the WWF is warning that representatives from Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam must put derailed decision-making on Mekong River mainstream dams back on track or risk sabotaging management of one of the world’s great rivers.
Chinese solar manufacturers are definitely one sector that will not be unhappy to see end of 2012 as it was the most difficult year to date, according to solar market research company ENF.
Despite the upbeat announcement of higher than expected Q4 shipments for Yingli Solar, launching it into the world number 1 spot ahead of Suntech Power, few companies had much to celebrate during the past 12 months.
Attracted by seemingly massive demand and profits, too many new manufacturers flooded into the industry in 2011, with the number of core solar chain producers (ingot, wafer, cell and panel) rising from 807 manufacturers to 901.
Maersk Line, the world’s biggest container-shipping company, has fired a warning shot across the bows of the Hong Kong Government, threatening to stop using cleaner fuel at port in Hong Kong next year if there is no regulation in place mandating that all shipping lines do the same.
The Danish shipping line has been a prominent supporter of the Fair Winds Charter, a voluntary scheme by the Hong Kong shipping industry to use fuel of 0.5 percent sulphur content or less “to the maximum extent possible” while at berth in Hong Kong from 1 January 2011 to 31 December 2012.
With the year barely out of the gates, reports indicate a bumpy road ahead for palm oil producers, heavily concentrated in Malaysia and Indonesia, with demand faltering and further pressure being brought on the industry by environmentalists.
Bloomberg reported today that a survey it had done suggest palm oil stockpiles in Malaysia were near record highs in December with inventories at about 2.53 million tonnes, barely changed from the 2.56 tonnes of the previous month.
This report by the World Bank spells out what the world would be like if it warmed by 4 degrees Celsius, which is what scientists are nearly unanimously predicting by the end of the century, without serious policy changes.
Companies in Asia reveal expectations that regulations that could lead to rising costs for reporting and reducing GHG emissions will also be the main sources of climate-related business opportunities.
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