The Australian - AGL blamed for June gas shortfall

The Australian - Rising costs hit resources projects

Larvatus Prodeo - Innovative rural energy policy from the Greens

Farming Renewable Energy proposes a three-stage process to help struggling farmers become renewable energy generators, supplementing their income, revitalising their communities with jobs and investment, and keeping regional Australia alive.

The first stage is overlaying maps of climate vulnerability with maps of renewable energy resources and identifying the areas where there is a strong overlap. For solar, in particular, this will be considerable. Once there is an indication of areas, a process of consultation would begin, drawing together the communities with the industry and the three levels of government. This is about identifying specific regions which want to take up the offer, and developing the vital relationships to make it happen.

Finally, Renewable Energy Development Zones would be declared, where large-scale investment would be attracted by the highly streamlined approvals process (because much of the work would already have been done), existing relationships and, importantly, government investment (using funds gathered via emissions trading permit sales) to support skills development and paying for high voltage interconnectors to the main electricity grid where necessary.

Howe Street - New Zealand Goes for the Green

New Zealand legislators are trying to completely ban dirty power plants in the small island nation in less than 20 years. The government is hard at work on a 10-year ban of the construction of any new coal or gas power plants.

The country is hoping to have 90% of the country's power generated by renewable sources by 2025. According to Bloomberg, state-owned power plants in New Zealand are already banned from building gas-fired plants. Soon, a decision will be made on whether to extend this ban to private companies. It's an ambitious plan. And a sign of the worldwide attitude changes on the future of fossil fuels and those pesky carbon emissions.

Of course, a plan like this would seem wacky in the U.S. — or impractical, in the least. After all, New Zealand already gets almost two-thirds of its electricity from wind, hydro and geothermal sources. Here in America, we not only consume more energy, but we produce most of our electricity in dirty coal plants.

If nothing else, the sheer expense — both economical and environmental — of fossil fuels will ultimately force our hand. Laws like those being pondered by New Zealand legislators will slowly make their way across the Pacific. Some are already washing up on the California coast…

The Age - Australia lags in green investment: report

NZ Herald - Transpower's 'bully tactics' outrage landowners

SMH - Imagine traffic taking a breather

"We should celebrate walking. All the great cities of the world are walkable," said Mr Scruby, adding that the retail sector stood to benefit from the extra pedestrian traffic. "What's the most valuable commercial real estate in the city? Pitt Street Mall. Why? Because it's walkable."

Crikey - Nats stick to the script, shameless pork handouts ensue

SMH - Danger zone dispute on road to nowhere fast

Stuff.co.nz - Oilseed on the way back

The Age - Vaile in $24m biofuel pledge

A RE-ELECTED Coalition would put $24 million towards expanding the ethanol industry and finding new plant materials from which to make biofuels. The announcement comes a week after the head of one of Australia's biggest biofuel manufacturers shut two plants, accusing the Government of "indifference" to the industry.

The Australian - ExxonMobil LNG plan in PNG rated tops

THE ExxonMobil-led plan for a liquefied natural gas development in Papua New Guinea is the most robust LNG project in the region and is facing the least barriers to success, JPMorgan says. Reporting on proposed LNG developments in and around Australia, JPMorgan yesterday said that not all of the projects racing to supply a tight market will be delivered on time. “We do not see the proposed new Australian LNG capacity coming online by 2015 as planned, given market and resource constraints," JPMorgan analysts reported.

The second phase of Woodside Petroleum’s (ASX: WPL: quote) Pluto project and its Sunrise development in the Timor Sea were both wildcards, JPMorgan said, that could be developed quickly if one major issue is resolved, but could otherwise remain stalled indefinitely. If Woodside’s current exploration program found about 4 trillion cubic feet of gas to feed Pluto 2, then the development could proceed very quickly. Otherwise gas from the Chevron Corp Wheatstone field could be used to drive the project.

JPMorgan said Sunrise is also a high quality project and would proceed quickly if the East Timor Government agrees that the processing plant is located in Australia rather than East Timor. Beyond these projects, JPMorgan said the most likely projects to be developed were Gorgon, Ichtchys and Browse, in that order.

Gorgon, a joint venture between Chevron, Royal Dutch Shell and ExxonMobil, has been facing significant hurdles but is now overcoming some of these after securing environmental approvals. The Ichtchys project is owned by Japan’s Inpex Holdings and France’s Total SA, and JPMorgan said environmental approvals could still be a hurdle for the development. Browse is a joint venture between Woodside, BP, BHP Billiton (ASX: BHP: quote), Chevron and Shell. JPMorgan said it didn’t see Chevron or Shell supporting the development of Browse ahead of the Gorgon project, in which they have larger shares, and that the pair have veto rights over the Browse project.

Santos’ plans for an LNG project at Gladstone in Queensland that is fed by coal seam gas required a joint venture partner with LNG experience and could slip beyond 2015, JPMorgan said.

And BHP and Exxon’s Scarborough project has a good-sized gas resource but the gas is dry and in deep water, which affects project economics, JPMorgan said.

ABC - Robots deployed to measure climate change

Doctor Wijffels says the Argo data also allows Australian scientists to predict droughts, because cooling in the Indian Ocean stifles rainfall on the east coast.

"We know that rainfall in south-eastern Australia is affected by the Indian Ocean, and what we're hoping is that as our seasonal climate forecasting systems get better at exploiting Argo data, get better at incorporating it, that the accuracy of the predictions will go forward and get better," she said.

While weather forecasters have had to use what has happened in the past to predict the intesity of cyclones, Professor Roemmich says data from the Argo program will give a real time prediction of just how bad storms will be.

"We know that when a tropical cyclone rapidly intensifies, its heat source is the upper ocean, and so if we track the temperature structure of the upper ocean, then we know something about the potential of a tropical cyclone to become much stronger," he said.

"For example, people have done retrospective studies of cyclones like Katrina that devastated New Orleans in the US and have shown that it was the cyclone passing over a very warm water in the Gulf of Mexico that led to its very strong intensity."

The Age - People power and power failures

Stuff.co.nz - Aussie brewers save water as drought bites

The Australian - BHP's Kloppers denies thermal coal unit sale

Singapore Peak Oil - LNG Will Not Provide Energy Security For Singapore

Peak Energy - Tapping The Source

Peak Energy - Sharing The Joy Of The Green Economy

(Hat Tip Dave B)