AFP UK

Governments should avoid using general subsidies as a way to soften the blow from recent high energy prices, the IMF said Wednesday.

Broad subsidies are expensive, so policymakers instead should use targeted aid to help low income families most impacted from the recent surge, Paulo Medas, of the IMF’s Fiscal Affairs Department said.

Generalized energy subsidies “benefit rich households who don’t need the support,” making them very costly, Medas told reporters.

In addition, “they are not friendly to the environment, in fact they lead to very negative incentives.”

The IMF recommends “using more targeted support to those that are more vulnerable, and the hardest hit” including cash transfers or subsidizing electric bills for low income families.

Oil prices have been surging in recent weeks to the highest levels seen in years, pushing above $80 a barrel, which has added to worries that inflation may be moving higher permanently.

Medas said the increase was expected to some degree as global demand rebounded amid the recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic, but he underlined the IMF’s push for countries to move to more green energy.

“The reality is that we have faced these large volatilities in oil and gas prices for a long time. And the only way to deal with this in a permanent way” is to invest more in renewable energy, he said. 

“This is going to be the only way to build a resilient economy, and protect households from the volatility in oil and gas prices.”

“Star Trek” actor William Shatner is set to boldly go where no 90-year-old has gone before when he blasts off to space Wednesday on Blue Origin’s second crewed mission.

The Canadian — who will forever be known to the sci-fi show’s legion of “Trekkies” as Captain James Tiberius Kirk — will launch from the company’s West Texas base at 9 am (1400 GMT), after a day’s delay due to high winds.

He will be joined on the New Shepard rocket by Blue Origin executive Audrey Powers, Planet Labs co-founder Chris Boshuizen, and Glen de Vries, a co-founder of clinical research platform Medidata Solutions.

The crew’s roughly 11-minute hop beyond the Karman Line — 62 miles (100 kilometers) into the air, just beyond Earth’s atmosphere — and back down again with a parachute landing in the desert is a replay of Blue’s maiden human flight in July.

That trip, which included company owner Jeff Bezos of Amazon, was seen as a breakthrough moment for the nascent space tourism sector.

This time around, nearly all attention will be focused on Shatner, who at 90 will become the oldest-ever astronaut, despite an appearance that suggests a man who could be decades younger. 

The intergalactic voyages of the “Star Trek” Enterprise ship, commanded by Captain Kirk, helped turn American attention to the stars as the US space program was in its infancy.

“Captain Kirk… represents ‘the final frontier’ perhaps more than anyone else for a couple different generations of people, in the US and worldwide,” screenwriter and ‘Trek” historian Marc Cushman told AFP.

Shatner, who’s also known for his roles as lawyer Denny Crane in “Boston Legal,” among many others, has spoken in the past about having a difficult relationship with “Star Trek” and its fan culture.

But in recent years, the actor has leaned into the fame brought about by his most famous role. 

“It looks like there’s a great deal of curiosity in this fictional character, Captain Kirk,” he said in a video released by Blue Origin Tuesday. “Let’s go along with it and enjoy the ride.”

– Space tourism heating up –

For Blue Origin, meanwhile, a second mission in less than three months represents another step forward as it tries to establish itself as space tourism’s leading player.

Boshuizen and Vries will bring the company’s total number of paying customers to three — though prices haven’t been disclosed.

The competition is raging.

Virgin Galactic, which offers a similar experience of a few minutes’ weightlessness and a view of the Earth’s curvature from the cosmos, launched its founder Richard Branson in July, a few days before Bezos.

And in September, SpaceX sent four private citizens on a three-day trip whizzing around the planet — an altogether more ambitious, but also likely far more expensive endeavor.

“We’re just at the beginning — but how miraculous that beginning is, how extraordinary it is to be part of that beginning,” said Shatner in his video message.

For many space enthusiasts, Shatner’s voyage is a fitting coda for a pop culture phenomenon that inspired generations of astronauts, scientists and engineers.

The show has had a long-running association with NASA, whose scientists were sent early scripts to vet their accuracy, according to Cushman, the writer.

“Those scientists, as well as nearly everyone at those space agencies, were avid Star Trek watchers, and they well understood that the popularity of the series helped spark growing interest and funding for the space program,” he said.

Another mega-fan: Bezos himself.

Amazon’s Alexa system was said to be inspired by the conversational computer in Star Trek, and Bezos — wearing heavy makeup sporting an egg-shaped head — appeared in a cameo in the 2016 film “Star Trek Beyond”.

“Star Trek” actor William Shatner is set to boldly go where no 90-year-old has gone before when he blasts off to space Wednesday on Blue Origin’s second crewed mission.

The Canadian — who will forever be known to the sci-fi show’s legion of “Trekkies” as Captain James Tiberius Kirk — will launch from the company’s West Texas base at 9 am (1400 GMT), after a day’s delay due to high winds.

He will be joined on the New Shepard rocket by Blue Origin executive Audrey Powers, Planet Labs co-founder Chris Boshuizen, and Glen de Vries, a co-founder of clinical research platform Medidata Solutions.

The crew’s roughly 11-minute hop beyond the Karman Line — 62 miles (100 kilometers) into the air, just beyond Earth’s atmosphere — and back down again with a parachute landing in the desert is a replay of Blue’s maiden human flight in July.

That trip, which included company owner Jeff Bezos of Amazon, was seen as a breakthrough moment for the nascent space tourism sector.

This time around, nearly all attention will be focused on Shatner, who at 90 will become the oldest-ever astronaut, despite an appearance that suggests a man who could be decades younger. 

The intergalactic voyages of the “Star Trek” Enterprise ship, commanded by Captain Kirk, helped turn American attention to the stars as the US space program was in its infancy.

“Captain Kirk… represents ‘the final frontier’ perhaps more than anyone else for a couple different generations of people, in the US and worldwide,” screenwriter and ‘Trek” historian Marc Cushman told AFP.

Shatner, who’s also known for his roles as lawyer Denny Crane in “Boston Legal,” among many others, has spoken in the past about having a difficult relationship with “Star Trek” and its fan culture.

But in recent years, the actor has leaned into the fame brought about by his most famous role. 

“It looks like there’s a great deal of curiosity in this fictional character, Captain Kirk,” he said in a video released by Blue Origin Tuesday. “Let’s go along with it and enjoy the ride.”

– Space tourism heating up –

For Blue Origin, meanwhile, a second mission in less than three months represents another step forward as it tries to establish itself as space tourism’s leading player.

Boshuizen and Vries will bring the company’s total number of paying customers to three — though prices haven’t been disclosed.

The competition is raging.

Virgin Galactic, which offers a similar experience of a few minutes’ weightlessness and a view of the Earth’s curvature from the cosmos, launched its founder Richard Branson in July, a few days before Bezos.

And in September, SpaceX sent four private citizens on a three-day trip whizzing around the planet — an altogether more ambitious, but also likely far more expensive endeavor.

“We’re just at the beginning — but how miraculous that beginning is, how extraordinary it is to be part of that beginning,” said Shatner in his video message.

For many space enthusiasts, Shatner’s voyage is a fitting coda for a pop culture phenomenon that inspired generations of astronauts, scientists and engineers.

The show has had a long-running association with NASA, whose scientists were sent early scripts to vet their accuracy, according to Cushman, the writer.

“Those scientists, as well as nearly everyone at those space agencies, were avid Star Trek watchers, and they well understood that the popularity of the series helped spark growing interest and funding for the space program,” he said.

Another mega-fan: Bezos himself.

Amazon’s Alexa system was said to be inspired by the conversational computer in Star Trek, and Bezos — wearing heavy makeup sporting an egg-shaped head — appeared in a cameo in the 2016 film “Star Trek Beyond”.

The global transition to clean energy is still far too slow to meet climate pledges and risks fuelling even greater price volatility, the International Energy Agency warned on Wednesday.

“We are not investing enough to meet for future energy needs, and the uncertainties are setting the stage for a volatile period ahead,” said IEA chief Fatih Birol.

“The social and economic benefits of accelerating clean energy transitions are huge, and the costs of inaction are immense.” 

In its annual World Energy Outlook report — published just weeks before the COP26 summit in Glasgow — the IEA calculated that investment in clean energy projects and infrastructure would need to be more than trebled over the next decade if those pledges are to be met.

At the summit, countries will come under pressure to commit to decisive action to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, as pledged in the landmark 2015 Paris climate agreement.

– Is 1.5C still achievable? –

The IEA — which advises developed countries on energy policy — said that renewables such as wind and solar energy continued to grow rapidly, and electric vehicles set new sales records in 2020, even as economies were bent under the weight of Covid-19 lockdowns. 

However, “this clean energy progress is still far too slow to put global emissions into sustained decline towards net zero” by 2050, which the agency believes will help limit the increase in global temperatures to 1.5C.

The agency analysed two possible scenarios. 

The first looked at the measures governments had already put in place or specific policies they were actively developing. 

And while almost all of the increased energy demand until 2050 could be met by low emissions sources, annual emissions would still be roughly the same as today as developing economies build up their nationwide infrastructure, the IEA said.

Under this scenario, temperatures in 2100 would be 2.6C higher than pre-industrial levels. 

The second scenario looked at promises made by some governments to achieve net-zero emissions in the future, which would see a doubling of clean energy investment and financing over the next decade.

If these pledges were fully implemented in time, demand for fossil fuels would peak by 2025, and global CO2 emissions fall by 40 percent by 2050, the IEA said.

Here, the global average temperature increase in 2100 would be around 2.1C, which would represent an improvement, but would still be way above the 1.5C agreed under the Paris accord, it concluded. 

– ‘Bumpy ride’ –

“Reaching that path requires investment in clean energy projects and infrastructure to more than triple over the next decade,” Birol said. 

“Some 70 percent of that additional spending needs to happen in emerging and developing economies.”

The IEA argued that the extra investment might be less of a burden than some might think. 

“More than 40 percent of the required emissions reductions would come from measures that pay for themselves, such as improving efficiency, limiting gas leakage, or installing wind or solar in places where they are now the most competitive electricity generation technologies,” it said.

The report also highlighted that insufficient investment was contributing to uncertainty over the future. 

“Spending on oil and natural gas has been depressed by price collapses in 2014-15 and again in 2020. As a result, it is geared towards a world of stagnant or even falling demand,” the IEA said.

“At the same time, spending on clean energy transitions is far below what would be required to meet future needs in a sustainable way.”

That means energy markets could face a “bumpy ride” if investment in renewables is not increased, the IEA said.

The global transition to clean energy is still far too slow to meet climate pledges and risks fuelling even greater price volatility, the International Energy Agency warned on Wednesday.

“We are not investing enough to meet for future energy needs, and the uncertainties are setting the stage for a volatile period ahead,” said IEA chief Fatih Birol.

“The social and economic benefits of accelerating clean energy transitions are huge, and the costs of inaction are immense.” 

In its annual World Energy Outlook report — published just weeks before the COP26 summit in Glasgow — the IEA calculated that investment in clean energy projects and infrastructure would need to be more than trebled over the next decade if those pledges are to be met.

At the summit, countries will come under pressure to commit to decisive action to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, as pledged in the landmark 2015 Paris climate agreement.

– Is 1.5C still achievable? –

The IEA — which advises developed countries on energy policy — said that renewables such as wind and solar energy continued to grow rapidly, and electric vehicles set new sales records in 2020, even as economies were bent under the weight of Covid-19 lockdowns. 

However, “this clean energy progress is still far too slow to put global emissions into sustained decline towards net zero” by 2050, which the agency believes will help limit the increase in global temperatures to 1.5C.

The agency analysed two possible scenarios. 

The first looked at the measures governments had already put in place or specific policies they were actively developing. 

And while almost all of the increased energy demand until 2050 could be met by low emissions sources, annual emissions would still be roughly the same as today as developing economies build up their nationwide infrastructure, the IEA said.

Under this scenario, temperatures in 2100 would be 2.6C higher than pre-industrial levels. 

The second scenario looked at promises made by some governments to achieve net-zero emissions in the future, which would see a doubling of clean energy investment and financing over the next decade.

If these pledges were fully implemented in time, demand for fossil fuels would peak by 2025, and global CO2 emissions fall by 40 percent by 2050, the IEA said.

Here, the global average temperature increase in 2100 would be around 2.1C, which would represent an improvement, but would still be way above the 1.5C agreed under the Paris accord, it concluded. 

– ‘Bumpy ride’ –

“Reaching that path requires investment in clean energy projects and infrastructure to more than triple over the next decade,” Birol said. 

“Some 70 percent of that additional spending needs to happen in emerging and developing economies.”

The IEA argued that the extra investment might be less of a burden than some might think. 

“More than 40 percent of the required emissions reductions would come from measures that pay for themselves, such as improving efficiency, limiting gas leakage, or installing wind or solar in places where they are now the most competitive electricity generation technologies,” it said.

The report also highlighted that insufficient investment was contributing to uncertainty over the future. 

“Spending on oil and natural gas has been depressed by price collapses in 2014-15 and again in 2020. As a result, it is geared towards a world of stagnant or even falling demand,” the IEA said.

“At the same time, spending on clean energy transitions is far below what would be required to meet future needs in a sustainable way.”

That means energy markets could face a “bumpy ride” if investment in renewables is not increased, the IEA said.

New Zealand put forward a raft of carbon-cutting plans Wednesday, ranging from reduced car usage to making ebikes more accessible to meet its target of becoming carbon-zero by 2050.

But the proposals, which come ahead of the COP26 climate meeting of world leaders in Glasgow at the end of this month and are a forerunner to the government’s emissions reduction plan next May, drew immediate criticism.

New Zealand is under pressure to do more to curb carbon emissions, which are increasing, but the discussion document made little mention of agriculture which contributes 48 percent of its greenhouse gas emissions.

Environmental group Greenpeace said the document was “full of meaningless waffle” that did little to broach the conversation on reducing agricultural emissions.

Climate activists Generation Zero called it a “disgrace” that failed to meet “unambitious emissions budgets, completely ignores agriculture — which makes up half of our emissions”.

However, Climate Change Minister James Shaw said there was “an entire work program” dealing with the agricultural sector and “we didn’t want to waste people’s time by including things that have either already been consulted on or have other kind of engagement processes elsewhere.”

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the plans would reduce emissions and “can also create jobs and new opportunities for Kiwi businesses and our economy”.  

The document comes almost two years after New Zealand passed its Zero Carbon Act and a year after it declared a climate emergency.

Ardern has previously described action on climate change as a matter of “life or death” but has been called out by Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg, who accused New Zealand of being “one of the world’s worst performers” on emission increases. 

“People believe Jacinda Ardern and people like that are climate leaders,” Thunberg said last month.

“That just tells you how little people know about the climate crisis. Obviously, the emissions haven’t fallen. It goes without saying that these people are not doing anything.”

Many of the initiatives contained in the discussion document are from the Climate Change Commission report presented to the government earlier this year, including a 20 percent reduction in the use of cars by 2035. 

In the same period, it wants to reduce emissions from transport fuels by 15 percent, make public transport cheaper and more accessible, and introduce incentives for those on low incomes to buy electric vehicles.

Other ideas include the development of low-emission fuels, such as bioenergy and hydrogen, eliminating the use of fossil gas, reducing food waste and encouraging composting.

Daily exposure to phthalates, a group of chemicals used in everything from plastic containers to makeup, may lead to approximately 100,000 deaths in older Americans annually, a study from New York University warned Tuesday.

The chemicals, which can be found in hundreds of products such as toys, clothing and shampoo, have been known for decades to be “hormone disruptors,” affecting a person’s endocrine system.

The toxins can enter the body through such items and are linked to obesity, diabetes and heart disease, said the study published in the journal Environmental Pollution.

The research, which was carried out by New York University’s Grossman School of Medicine and includes some 5,000 adults aged 55 to 64, shows that those with higher concentrations of phthalates in their urine were more likely to die of heart disease.

However, higher concentrations did not appear to increase the risk of death by cancer.

“Our findings reveal that increased phthalate exposure is linked to early death, particularly due to heart disease,” said study lead author Leonardo Trasande.

“Until now, we have understood that the chemicals connect to heart disease, and heart disease in turn is a leading cause of death, but we had not yet tied the chemicals themselves to death.”

Trasande cautioned, however, that the study does not establish a direct cause and effect relationship between phthalate exposure and death, in part because the specific biological mechanisms of that relationship are unclear.

“Our research suggests that the toll of this chemical on society is much greater than we first thought,” Trasande said, adding that it “is undeniably clear that limiting exposure to toxic phthalates can help safeguard Americans’ physical and financial wellbeing.”

Other studies have already linked phthalates to more than 10,000 deaths per year associated with reduced testosterone levels in adult men.

The study added that the economic loss due to phthalates is between $40 billion and $47 billion — more than four times what was previously estimated.

President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday announced a plan worth 30 billion euros ($35 billion) to re-industrialise France on the basis of innovative and green-friendly technologies including electric cars, hydrogen fuel and efficient nuclear plants.

Six months before a presidential election and one month ahead of a UN climate summit, Macron said France had taken key decisions “15-20 years later than some of our European neighbours” and now needed “to become a nation of innovation and research again”.

The spending was to address “a kind of growth deficit” for France brought on by insufficient investment in the past, he told an audience of company leaders and university students at the Elysee Palace.

France, he said, needed to return to “a virtuous cycle” which consisted of “innovating, producing and exporting and in that way finance our social model” as part of a new “France 2030” plan.

Over the next decade, France would aim to become a global leader in green hydrogen, which companies and governments are increasingly putting at the centre of efforts to de-carbonise economic sectors that rely most on fossil fuels for their energy needs.

France would get two electrolysis giga-factories for hydrogen production, as part of eight billion euros of investment in the energy sector.

He said that following the Covid-19 pandemic, “which put us face to face with our vulnerabilities”, France had to work towards French and European productive autonomy.

France also needed to invest heavily in medical research, Macron said.

After the global Covid-19 outbreak, French pharma giants were unable to come up with a vaccine, unlike biotech startups BioNTech and Moderna.

The aim was now for France to develop “at least 20” biotech drugs against cancers, as well as against emerging and chronic illnesses, including those associated with ageing, Macron said.

“We need to concentrate all our efforts on this objective,” he said.

– A new revolution –

A French presidential official, who asked not to be named, said Macron had laid out the plan in the wake of the coronavirus crisis “which showed our vulnerability and our dependence on foreign countries in some key sectors but also the importance of innovation which can change everything.”

French officials believe that France needs to act rapidly to close the gap and not surrender more ground to emerging powers, notably China.

French carmakers, which Macron said had suffered “cruelly” over the past 30 years, should redirect their efforts towards cleaner vehicles, with a target of putting two million electric or hybrid cars on the roads.

France would also invest “massively” to get the first low-carbon aircraft into the air with the help of European partners, he said.

Macron said France would also spend one billion euros by 2030 in “disruptive innovation” to produce atomic power, notably by designing compact nuclear reactors known as “small modular reactors” (SMRs) with improved nuclear waste management.

Disruptive innovation was also needed in agriculture, where two billion euros would be earmarked for new technologies, he said, especially in robotics.

– ‘Macronian propaganda’ –

France should start “a new revolution” in food production which should be “healthy, sustainable and traceable”.

Agriculture would become cleaner, phase out “some pesticides”, enjoy greater productivity and develop “bio-solutions” that would be “more resilient and more solid”, the president said.

Close to six billion euros were meanwhile earmarked for France’s electronics sector with the aim of doubling production and “secure” the country’s supply needs for microchips.

Opposition figures were quick to criticise Macron for the timing of the announcement, with Marine Le Pen, his far-right challenger in the April 2022 presidential election, saying he was “making promises that his successor has to keep”.

Leftist candidate Jean-Luc Melenchon called the speech “Macronian propaganda”, while NGO Greenpeace meanwhile accused Macron of subscribing to a logic that “always delays any real transition and continues to produce as if the planet’s resources were infinite”.

A powerful 6.3-magnitude earthquake struck off the Greek island of Crete Tuesday, the Athens Observatory said, with initial media reports suggesting no one was hurt.

The quake — the second strong tremor to hit Greece’s largest island in just over two weeks — struck at 0924 GMT with an epicentre in the sea 405 kilometres (250 miles) southeast of Athens and 24 kilometres from the village of Zakros, the Observatory said in a statement.

It had a depth of less than nine kilometres, the observatory said.

Local media said it was felt on Crete and on the Dodecanese islands in the Aegean Sea, with worried residents gathering on the street. The neighbouring island of Karpathos was shaken by a 4.5-magnitude undersea quake minutes later.

“The epicentre is in the sea, far from inhabited places,” Greek seismologist Gerassimos Papadopoulos told Skai radio.

Civil protection agency spokesman Spyros Georgiou told AFP that the Tuesday tremor had partially collapsed a village church and caused landslides on rural roads.

The civil protection agency said in a statement that Greek police land units and helicopters were patrolling the area, while the coastguard was on the watch for possible tsunami activity.

Papadopoulos added that the Tuesday tremor had a different epicentre than a strong 5.8-magnitude quake on September 27 which killed one person, injured nearly a dozen others, and damaged hundreds of buildings on Crete.

Over 3,000 homes were deemed unsafe following last month’s quake, and dozens of businesses were knocked out. Many people are still staying in tents and containers.

Efthymis Lekkas, the head of Greece’s quake protection agency, told Skai radio that the two earthquakes were not related.

Greece is located on a number of fault lines, and is sporadically hit by earthquakes. 

The last deadly quake in the country occurred on March 3 in the central town of Elassona, killing one person, injuring 10 and causing major damage.

Last October, a magnitude 7.0 hit in the Aegean Sea between the Greek island of Samos and the city of Izmir in western Turkey.

Most of the damage was in Turkey, where 114 people were killed and more than 1,000 injured. 

In Greece, two teenagers were reported dead on Samos.