Month: December 2020

The $226-billion New York State Common Retirement Fund is undertaking a review of all energy companies it is invested in, to assess their readiness for the energy transition and dump those considered riskiest in climate-related investment. As it pledged on Wednesday to transition its portfolio of holdings to one with net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2040, the pension fund—the third-largest in the U.S. after CalPERS and CalSTRS of California—said that it would complete by 2025 a review of all its holdings in energy companies to assess “their future ability to…

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Pakistan’s Prime Minister, Imran Khan, announced over the weekend that as part of a number of efforts to counteract the effects of climate change, his administration will not approve new coal-fired power generation projects. “We have already scrapped two coal power projects which were supposed to produce 2,600 megawatts of energy. [We have] replaced them with hydroelectricity,” Khan said during his address at the Climate Ambition Summit 2020, which was hosted virtually by the United Nations, the United Kingdom, France, Chile and Italy. Khan also talked about ‘indigenous coal’ and said that his…

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KARACHI: The atmosphere was electrified in the headquarters of Tesla on the battery day held on September 22 as expectations were high that perhaps their charismatic CEO Elon Musk had found a secret recipe to make cheaper, reliable and safest batteries. So far, the company’s stock has surged 10 times in a span of just one year and is now trading at $600 after split with price-to-earnings ratio of 1,280. (Yes, there is no typo). However, what we learnt in the event broadcast live were lots of futuristic plans ranging…

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Long considered to be the ‘food basket’ of South Asia, Punjab is the most agriculturally productive region in the Indo-Gangetic plain. Unlike the spring harvest which brings beautiful colours and festivals such as the Baisakhi Mela, the autumn harvest results in a gloomy ambience, which engulfs the region in hazardous smog. The R-Smog Report of 2018 indicates that air pollution in Punjab originating from vehicular traffic and industrial emissions is reaching its peak – emanating from agricultural sources and meteorological conditions during the October and November harvests, giving rise to low hanging air…

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This comes on the heels of over Rs2.3 trillion circular debt in the power sector as of Sept 30, 2020, and about Rs350bn circular debt in the gas utilities — Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited (SNGPL) and Sui Southern Gas Company Limited (SSGCL) — up from Rs1.2tr and about Rs120bn in 2018, respectively. The federal cabinet will meet on Tuesday. Prime Minister Imran Khan will preside over the meeting that has seven agenda items relating to filling of top positions — chief executives, managing directors and boards of directors —…

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