Australia’s parliament on Tuesday passed a landmark carbon tax legislation that will force the top 500 polluting companies to pay A$24 per tonne for carbon emissions from July 1 next year.

The Clean Energy Act, which includes investments in renewable energy sources, would result in the continent country cutting its carbon emissions by 160 million tonnes in 2020 — equivalent to taking 45 million cars off the road, and continuing to cut emissions each year to achieve an 80 per cent reduction over the 2000 levels by 2050. “We will do this by putting a price on pollution, fostering renewable energy technologies, encouraging energy efficiency and creating opportunities to reduce pollution on the land,” Prime Minister Julia Gillard said. “Today, Australia has a price on carbon as the law of our land. This comes after a quarter of a century of scientific warnings, 37 parliamentary inquiries and years of bitter debate and division.”

Australia passes carbon tax law

State-run Coal India Ltd​ (CIL) is staring at a longer delay in the appointment of a chairman to oversee the miner after the coal ministry sought the scrapping of a panel of two candidates for the post and proposed widening the search to include individuals outside the company and the government.

Search for new CIL chief to drag on as ministry wants panel scrapped

BANGALORE: Why is it that toothpaste in India is still sold in glossy paper boxes? Isn’t it known that these boxes are hardly of any use and 99% of them are junked? Criminal wastage of paper, and by extension wood, was the topic of debate at a panel discussion on ‘Extended producer responsibility’ , as part of Bengaluru Recycling Habba 2011 on Monday.

 Eco experts brainstorm on green hazards

Deaths and health problems from floods, drought and other US disasters related to climate change cost an estimated $14 billion over the last decade, researchers said on Monday.

 Health cost of 6 US climate disasters: $14 billion

New Delhi: The US expressed concern over certain Indian policies that it says inhibit investments by foreign firms, keen on collaboration with local companies, in renewable energy and clean technologies.

 US raises concerns about India’s solar tech policies

To ease the coal shortage faced by thermal power plants in the state, APGenco will procure 70 million tonnes of coal in addition to the existing supply of 50 million tonnes from the Singareni Collieries Ltd.

70m tonnes of coal to ease power crisis

Zee News: The global output of heat-trapping carbon dioxide jumped by the biggest amount on record, the U.S. Department of Energy calculated, a sign of how feeble the world’s efforts are at slowing man-made global warming.

The new figures for 2010 mean that levels of greenhouse gases are higher than the worst case scenario outlined by climate experts just four years ago.

 Biggest jump ever seen in global warming gases

Earth Times: Flecks of soot from a smoky open stove in India blacken more than just the roofs of the hut it is smoldering in. Fine particles of such smoke lodge deep in the lungs of women preparing meals, gifting them a dark scourge of ill-health and premature death. That same black soot floats higher into the air, where it helps to change the way clouds form – and so to warm the climate. Some specks may even end up coating ice in the frozen extremes of the planet, dulling their pristine surfaces, and hastening the melt of glaciers and ice-caps.

 Clean stoves could save lives and maybe the climate too

Telegraph: And why?” my wife Lucy demanded yesterday as she peeled off her gardening gloves, “are my clematis and roses in full bloom on November 1, and why am I still being bitten by gnats and midges?” Standing in shirt sleeves and muddy-kneed cords, brandishing a pair of secateurs, she sounded cross. “I’m supposed to be putting the garden to bed for the winter, not admiring summer flowers and swatting bugs.”

 Climate change affects the seasons: autumn doesn’t know if it’s coming or going

AMRITSAR: A ban on cars on pilgrimage routes, provision of fresh water for pilgrims, and planting of thousands of trees around sacred sites – these were some of the initiatives which the founder members of the Green Pilgrimage Network pledged to implement at Assisi, informed project manager, EcoSikh, Ravneet Singh on Sunday.

 Green Pilgrimage Network aim for car-free routes