The reason fossil fuel firms are not trying to reduce their carbon emissions could be due to uncertainty on climate and energy policy, suggests the Economist in a recent editorial.

The paper cites cuts in renewable energy support schemes as one of the elements influencing investors. “Companies are betting that government climate policies will fail.”

This is exactly what EWEA has been warning for many months:

“The financial and economic crisis has provoked a wave of uncertainty across the European Union since 2010, with national governments making damaging retroactive changes to policies and regulations for wind energy.”

The Economist added that in mid-April the European Parliament voted against attempts to shore up Europe’s emissions trading system, the world’s largest carbon market, against collapse.

Fiddlers Ferry power station, UK

Coal-fired power stations cost the European Union up to €42.8 billion a year in health costs associated with coal-fired power stations, a new report says.

The study — ‘The Unpaid Health Bill: How coal power plants make us sick’ — also found that EU-wide impacts amount to more than 18,200 premature deaths, about 8,500 new cases of chronic bronchitis, and over four million lost working days each year.

Published by the Health and Environment Alliance (HEAL), the study said the figures for mortality increase to 23,300 premature deaths, or 250,600 life years lost, while the total costs are up to €54.7 billion annually when emissions from coal power plants in Croatia, Serbia and Turkey are included.

The use of coal in power generation in Europe is on the rise again and that there are about 50 new coal power plants currently in the pipeline, said the study.

Maria van der Hoeven, IEA

The continued expansion of wind power, coupled with a decrease in costs for the emissions-free electricity-generating technology, was one of the few positive notes in a new International Energy Agency (IEA) report on efforts to create a low-carbon world.

The IEA report, which was presented in India last week to the Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM), said that wind power capacity grew by 19% from 2011 to 2012 despite ongoing economic problems.

In its report, Tracking Clean Energy Progress, the IEA described onshore wind power as “one of the most cost-competitive renewable energy sources” and noted generation from 2000 to 2011 increased by 400 TWh (+27% per year), reaching an estimated 435 TWh in 2011.

By 2017, the report said, onshore wind generation is expected to reach almost 1,000 TWh.

New York City

Wind energy could play a major role in providing all the power needed for the entire state of New York by 2030, according to a new academic study.

New York’s power demand for all sectors in 17 years time could be met, in part, by 4,020 onshore 5-megawatt wind turbines and 12,770 offshore 5-MW machines, the study by researchers from Cornell, Stanford and the University of California-Davis found.

Harnessing power from water and sunlight would also be part of the alternative energy plan for New York, which has close to 20 million people and is the third most populated state in the US.

“Converting to wind, water and sunlight is feasible, will stabilize costs of energy and will produce jobs while reducing health and climate damage,” study co-author Mark Jacobson, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at Stanford, was quoted as saying.

More than two-thirds of Americans want the US to place more emphasis on generating domestic energy using wind power, according to a new Gallup public opinion poll.

Published 27 March, the poll results noted that 71% of those surveyed said the nation should put more emphasis in the future on developing wind power. When broken down by political ideology, the poll results showed 83% of those who identified as Democrats favoured more wind power, while 59% of Republicans felt the same way.

“Far fewer want to emphasise the production of oil (46%) and the use of nuclear power (37%),” an accompanying Gallup press release said. “Least favoured is coal, with about one in three Americans wanting to prioritise its domestic production.”

“Republicans and Democrats disagree most on the priority that should be given to oil as a future energy source — with 71% of Republicans wanting more emphasis placed on it, compared with 29% among Democrats,” the press release said.