A Heat Wave Bakes Europe, Where Air-Conditioning Is Scarce

LONDON — Never in recorded history has Paris been hotter than it was on Thursday, when the temperature neared 110 degrees. The same was true of Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands, as a dangerous heat wave scorched Western Europe.

Air conditoning is scarce in Europe.

Parisians could be seen plunging fully clothed into the fountains of the Trocadéro, Viennese cooled themselves in municipal misters, and Amsterdamers dangled their feet in a repurposed kiddie pool at a cafe. But here is what is far less likely to be seen: air-conditioners.

That’s because the technology that transformed American homes and offices over the last century still gets a chilly reception in much of Europe.

Read the story from The New York Times by Iliana Magra, Elian Peltier and Constant Méheut  - “A Heat Wave Bakes Europe, Where Air-Conditioning Is Scarce.”

Climate crisis blamed as temperature records broken in three nations

Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands have recorded their highest ever temperatures as the second extreme heatwave in as many months to be linked by scientists to the climate emergency grips the continent.

 Water is sprayed on a taxiway at Schiphol
airport in Amsterdam during extreme heat.

The Dutch meteorological service, KNMI, said the temperature reached 39.2C (102.5F) at the Gilze-Rijen airbase near Breda on Wednesday afternoon, exceeding the previous high of 38.6C set in August 1944.

In Belgium, the temperature in Kleine-Brogel hit 38.9C, fractionally higher than the previous record of 38.8C set in June 1947. Forecasters said temperatures could climb further on Thursday.

Germany’s national weather service, DWD, said it believed a new all-time national high of 40.5C – 0.2C higher than the record – had been set in the town of Geilenkirchen near the Dutch and Belgian borders, but had still to confirm it.

Read the story from The Guardian by John Henley - “Climate crisis blamed as temperature records broken in three nations.”

The Dutch Have Solutions to Rising Seas. The World Is Watching

ROTTERDAM, the Netherlands — The wind over the canal stirred up whitecaps and rattled cafe umbrellas. Rowers strained toward a finish line and spectators hugged the shore. Henk Ovink, hawkish, wiry, head shaved, watched from a V.I.P. deck, one eye on the boats, the other, as usual, on his phone.

90 percent of the city of Rotterdam lies below sea level,
 leaving many residential areas vulnerable to a rising ocean.

Mr. Ovink is the country’s globe-trotting salesman in chief for Dutch expertise on rising water and climate change. Like cheese in France or cars in Germany, climate change is a business in the Netherlands. Month in, month out, delegations from as far away as Jakarta, Ho Chi Minh City, New York and New Orleans make the rounds in the port city of Rotterdam. They often end up hiring Dutch firms, which dominate the global market in high-tech engineering and water management.

That’s because from the first moment settlers in this small nation started pumping water to clear land for farms and houses, water has been the central, existential fact of life in the Netherlands, a daily matter of survival and national identity. No place in Europe is under greater threat than this waterlogged country on the edge of the Continent. Much of the nation sits below sea level and is gradually sinking. Now climate change brings the prospect of rising tides and fiercer storms.

Read the story by Michael Kimmelman in The New York Times - “The Dutch Have Solutions to Rising Seas. The World Is Watching.”

Dutch public trains now powered entirely by wind

Netherlands public transport trains to be
running entirely on wind power in 2017.

As of the beginning of 2017, all public transport trains in the Netherlands are being powered entirely by renewable energy sources, namely wind power.

Dutch railway company NS has announced all of its fleet of electric trains now run on 100 per cent renewable wind power.

In 2015, Dutch railway companies, of which NS is the largest, collaborated with energy company, Eneco, to reduce emissions.

Read the ClimateAction story - “Dutch public trains now powered entirely by wind.”

Dutch parliament votes to close down country's coal industry

Five Dutch coal-fired power stations were closed
 last year but the country still has another five
 plants in operation, three of which came online in 2015.

The Dutch parliament has voted for a 55% cut in CO2 emissions by 2030, which would require the closure of all the country’s coal-fired power plants.

The unexpected vote on Thursday night by 77 to 72 would bring the Netherlands clearly into line with the Paris climate agreement, with some of the most ambitious climate policies in Europe.

It is not binding on the government, but the Liberal and Labour parties say they will now push for speedy implementation of the motion.

Five Dutch coal-fired power stations were closed last year but the country still has another five plants in operation. Three of these came online in 2015, and have been blamed for a 5% rise in the country’s emissions last year.

ReadThe Guardian story - “Dutch parliament votes to close down country's coal industry.”

Tim fills the room with his knowledge

Tim Baxter at the Carlton Connect Initiative
yesterday - imposing knowledge.

Tim Baxter is not an imposing man, but his knowledge fills the room.

And just yesterday that room was the LAB-14 lecture theatre at the University of Melbourne’s Carlton Connect Initiative.

The researcher and teacher from university’s Melbourne Law School (MLS) discussed the topic “Are Commonwealth climate targets legally negligent? An Australian Urgenda”.

Tim's research interests are diverse but centre around climate change law, broadly construed to include corporate social responsibility, torts, planning law and administrative law, as well as the more traditional concern with United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change-led processes and domestic climate politics.

He is currently undertaking a thesis at the Melbourne Law School entitled “Justiciability and the environment – Challenging current conceptions of separation of powers in light of existential environmental threats” which is being supervised by Professor Lee Godden and Associate Professor Jason Varuhas.

Yesterday, he said that those eager to know more about the ideas behind his thesis should follow him on Twitter - @climatecaseAU.

Tim’s thesis seeks to unpack the legal hurdles which might prevent the Commonwealth being found liable in negligence for their insufficient efforts to mitigate climate change.

The thesis was inspired by the judgement of The Hague District Court in Urgenda Foundation v Netherlands.

As well as teaching into Corporate Law at MLS, Tim also teaches Planning and Urban Sustainability through the university’s Faculty of Architecture, Building and Planning.

Netherlands on brink of banning sale of petrol-fuelled cars

The charging of an electric car will be a more
common sight when the Dutch Government
bans fossil-fuelled cars from 2025.

Europe appears poised to continue its move towards cutting fossil fuel use as the Netherlands joins a host of nations looking to pass innovative green energy laws.

The Dutch government has set a date for parliament to host a roundtable discussion that could see the sale of petrol- and diesel-fuelled cars banned by 2025.

If the measures proposed by the Labour Party in March are finally passed, it would join Norway and Denmark in making a concerted move to develop its electric car industry.

Read the Independent story - “Climate change: Netherlands on brink of banning sale of petrol-fuelled cars.”

Netherlands solar 'road' working better than expected

T

he Netherlands made headlines last year when it built the world's first solar road - an energy-harvesting bike path paved with glass-coated solar panels.

Now, six months into the trial, engineers say the system is working even better than expected, with the 70-metre test bike path generating 3,000 kWh, or enough electricity to power a small household for a year.

Science Alert reports: “"If we translate this to an annual yield, we expect more than the 70kwh per square metre per year," Sten de Wit, spokesman for SolaRoad, the group behind the project, told Tarek Bazley at Al Jazeera. So just imagine the potential if we covered all our roads in the stuff.

Read the Science Alert story - “The solar road in the Netherlands is working even better than expected”

Australia's politicians in denial need to watch what happened in Dutch court

A

ustralian politicians in denial over global warming need to take note of what has happened in the Netherland.

ClimateProgress reports that a Dutch court has ordered the government to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 25 percent compared to 1990 levels by 2020 in order to preserve the low-lying Netherlands and protect its people from the dangers of global warming.

Australia’s Prime Minister, Tony Abbott and his Coalition counterparts who constantly bleat about keeping Australians safe, need to pay attention as the implications of the court’s findings are that it’s illegal to knowingly ignore the dangers of global warming.

Read the ClimateProgress story - “A Dutch Court Just Did The Unthinkable On Carbon Emissions”.

Netherlands court action on climate change means "this is what we did"

H

ow many of us wonder what will say in answer to our children’s questions about when we knew about climate change and what did we do about it?

Kelly Rigg - this is
what  we can say.

A story from the Huffington Post blog wonders, “Since the days of Watergate, the question "What did he know, and when did he know it?" has been a key litmus test for assessing guilt and innocence. Forty years later that question is now being asked in relation to climate change.”

Writing in the blog, Kelly Rigg says, “Where I live, in the Netherlands, a landmark case will be heard in the Den Haag District Court on Tuesday. The Urgenda Foundation is suing the Dutch government for knowingly endangering its citizens by failing to prevent dangerous climate change.”

Pointing to the many actions of Urgenda Foundation, Kelly writes, “That way, when our children ask what we knew and when we knew it, we can also tell them what we did about it.”

Read Kelly’s story here: “Landmark Dutch Lawsuit Puts Governments Around the World on Notice”