The European Commission, a Spanish court and people power appear to have won a bizarre battle to keep Europe’s most successful low-emissions zone operating. According to provisional readings, the ‘Madrid Central’ zone in the Spanish capital has achieved more NO2 reductions than any city in Europe since being introduced last year, but the scheme faces being scrapped by a coalition of right-wing parties that formed a majority after May’s Madrid city elections. Transport ModeCarsRelated (...)

Over the past month, the annual slash-and-burn efforts to create agricultural land across Indonesia’s Sumatra and Borneo islands have led to nearly 1,000 wildfires that are generating thick clouds of smoke and haze now blanketing parts of Southeast Asia. Most of the blazes are illegal fires set to clear land for palm oil and pulpwood industries. Malaysia is pressuring neighboring Indonesia to address the wildfires and step up enforcement to prevent future illegal burns. Its air quality has (...)

Anger at the growing environmental and local impact of massive cruise ships has resulted in two important moves to lessen the burden that mega-ships impose on ports. Barcelona has proposed electrifying the city’s docks to reduce air pollution, while the Italian government has suggested re-routing cruise ships out of the historic centre of Venice. In June, T&E published an analysis of cruise ships that shows the problem of toxic sulphur emissions from cruise ships is far worse than for (...)

Multi-million lobbying spending not declared to EU transparency register 19.09.2019 Recent evidence supports widely held suspicions that much larger sums of money are spent by corporations on lobbying than they declare in their entries to the EU Transparency Register. A report by law firm Sidley Austin, published by Bayer, revealed details of a lobbying contract between lobby firm FleishmanHillard and Monsanto, now owned by Bayer, worth €14.5 million. This is many times (...)

Transport network companies like Uber and Lyft may be adding to congestion and emissions, and harming public transport, according to a new American study. The findings are consistent with other studies which show that so-called ‘ride-hailing’ companies have been adding to road traffic and reducing the use of public transport. Transport ModeCarsRelated issuesAir PollutionClimate Change and EnergyPolicy areaEnvironmental (...)

A profile of EU lobbying by the Norwegian fertilizer company 17.09.2019 Gas lobby Lobby groups & tactics Our planet is on fire, and global greenhouse gas emissions continue to increase. However, the resistance is also growing. From 19-25 September, activists will gather at the Free the Soil mass action in Germany in order to tackle one of the drivers of the climate breakdown : industrial agriculture. Norwegian fertilizer (...)