2025-06-25 12:12
ATHENS, June 25 (Reuters) - Greece has arrested a Georgian woman suspected of discarding a cigarette that helped trigger one of several wildfires razing land and threatening homes on the island of Chios. Blazes broke out on Chios in the Aegean Sea on Sunday and tore through 10,000 acres of mainly bush and pasture land in three days, Greece's climate crisis and civil protection ministry said on Wednesday. Sign up here. The fire brigade said in a statement that the woman was arrested on Tuesday night and that authorities were still investigating the cause of the fires. The Georgian was charged with unintentional arson, two fire brigade officials told Reuters on condition anonymity. Witnesses saw her drop a cigarette, one of the officials said. Though the wildfires were largely contained by Wednesday, hundreds of firefighters remained on Chios to prevent rekindling and bring all fronts under control, the Greek fire brigade said. At Europe's southernmost tip, Greece is often hit by wildfires during its hot and dry summers, but authorities say the fast-changing climate is fuelling more destructive blazes. The Greek government has paid hundreds of millions of euros in damages related to extreme weather to households and farmers and to update firefighting equipment. It has upped firefighter numbers to a record 18,000 this year in anticipation of a challenging fire season. They will be assisted by 294 firefighters from five European countries from July 1 to Sept. 15. https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/greece-holds-georgian-suspected-fuelling-chios-fire-with-cigarette-2025-06-25/
2025-06-25 12:11
June 25 (Reuters) - State-run Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd (NPCIL) has extended the deadline for proposals from industrial users to set up 220 megawatt electric (MWe) small nuclear reactors, amid growing interest from companies seeking cleaner energy sources. NPCIL has extended the deadline for submitting proposals for setting up Bharat Small Reactors (BSR) in new or existing industries to Sept. 30, 2025, from June 30, the company said in a notice published on Wednesday. Sign up here. The corporation will now open proposals on a rolling basis. NPCIL said several industrial houses have already signed non-disclosure agreements and begun joint work on the BSR model, while others have requested more time to prepare submissions. The move comes as India looks to decarbonize industrial power and meet its net-zero targets, and as part of this push, is overhauling its nuclear liability law to attract foreign and private investment. The country aims to expand nuclear capacity to at least 100 gigawatts (GW) by 2047, up from about 9 GW currently. Under the proposal announced in December, NPCIL will operate the plant, while industries will use the power generated and cover the capital and operating expenses. India currently operates 25 nuclear reactors, contributing about 3% of its electricity. NPCIL is the sole operator of nuclear power plants in the country, but the government has proposed allowing private Indian firms to build nuclear plants and permitting foreign companies to hold up to a 49% stake. https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/climate-energy/indias-nuclear-power-corp-extends-deadline-small-reactor-proposals-industrial-2025-06-25/
2025-06-25 11:38
LISBON, June 25 (Reuters) - Iberia's blackout in April showed that European grids must modernise to cope with more renewable power generation, and Portugal wants the EU to help finance these investments, its energy minister told Reuters on Wednesday. Energy minister Maria da Graca Carvalho said that unlike in the past, when thermal power plants facilitated grid management with their stable supply, more renewable sources such as wind and solar mean more intermittency and decentralised output which are harder to manage. Sign up here. "The blackout made it clear there is a need for greater modernisation, digitalisation of the grids, applying data science, storing data, in order to understand what is happening in a more complex system and reacting to it," she said. "It requires investment and we have been asking the European Commission to guide Europe in this investment and also help co-finance it because it is also a security issue," she said. The Commission has estimated that to meet its clean energy transition targets, EU countries would need to invest 584 billion euros ($679 billion) to expand and modernise electricity grids by 2030. In May, it launched a public consultation to receive input for the future European Grids Package, which is expected to be finalised by the end of 2025. The Spanish government said in a report last week that grid operator Redeia (REDE.MC) , opens new tab had miscalculated the correct mix of energy in the system on April 28, but also blamed some thermal power plants using coal, gas and nuclear, for failing to help maintain an appropriate voltage level. A surge in voltage triggered a cascade of power plant disconnections, ultimately leading to the outage that spread to Portugal. The minister said the report still lacked clarity and Portugal was awaiting an independent report from the European energy regulators' agency ACER to understand what caused the outage and what needs to be done to "avoid future blackouts and, if they occur, to be able to restart (the system) more quickly". ($1 = 0.8605 euros) https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/portugal-says-power-outage-shows-need-eu-help-fund-grid-modernisation-2025-06-25/
2025-06-25 11:31
Commission set to issue guidance on EU's stablecoin rules Interchangeability of EU and non-EU tokens to be allowed ECB has warned of stablecoin risks MILAN, June 25 (Reuters) - The European Commission is set to clarify that the European Union's crypto rules allow stablecoins issued by a company with an EU licence to be treated as interchangeable with those issued by a company's non-EU entities, a source close to the matter said on Wednesday. The Commission will provide the clarification in the near future, the person said, without giving further details. Sign up here. Stablecoins are a type of crypto asset designed to maintain a stable value by being pegged to a traditional currency, like the U.S. dollar. The guidance is the latest in a series of attempts by regulators to grapple with the risks around stablecoins. ECB President Christine Lagarde on Monday told European policymakers stablecoins posed risks for monetary policy and financial stability, urging European lawmakers to introduce legislation backing the launch of a digital euro. The EU in 2023 adopted an extensive set of rules for crypto assets, known as MiCA, under which issuers of stablecoins must receive supervisory clearance to create their tokens in the EU - referred to as e-money tokens (EMTs). EMT-issuers must hold most of the reserves which back those tokens in an EU-based bank, to ensure that they can meet redemption requests from customers who wish to swap the crypto back into fiat currency. In April 2024, France's banking supervisor posed a query which the Commission is now set to answer seeking clarity on whether identical tokens issued by different arms of the same company - one with an EU-licence and one outside the EU - would be considered interchangeable, or "fungible". The European Central Bank has previously warned of the risk of this approach, saying the reserves held in the EU could be used to meet redemption requests by non-EU token holders. This could "risk undermining EU strategic autonomy/sovereignty", it said in a document in April. A European Commission spokesperson said that a run on a "well-governed and fully collateralised stablecoin" was very unlikely. Non-EU holders of a stablecoin which is jointly issued in the EU and outside the EU would make their redemption requests to the non-EU entity, the spokesperson added. "Moreover, issuers of EMTs that also issue fungible tokens abroad can be required to have a re-balancing mechanism to ensure that reserves in the EU match token holdings in the EU," the spokesperson added. The Financial Times first reported news of the guidance from the EU Commission. https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/boards-policy-regulation/brussels-set-disregard-ecb-warnings-over-stablecoin-rules-ft-reports-2025-06-25/
2025-06-25 11:28
BEIJING, June 25 (Reuters) - A tropical depression may hit southern China as early as Thursday, meteorologists cautioned, bringing rain and gales to a flood-hit region still recovering from the impact of Typhoon Wutip two weeks ago. The tropical depression could make landfall somewhere between the island province of Hainan and Guangdong on the mainland on Thursday morning, China's National Meteorological Centre said in an online bulletin on Wednesday. Sign up here. The storm will again test the flood defences of densely populated Guangdong as well as Guangxi and Hunan further inland. Hundreds of thousands of people were evacuated when Wutip tore through the region from June 13 to 15, dumping record rains and damaging roads and cropland. Five people died. China has battled with summer floods for millennia, but some scientists say climate change is resulting in heavier and more frequent rain. Massive flooding could set off unforeseen "black swan" events with dire consequences such as dam collapses, Chinese officials say. Heavy precipitation caused by typhoons will also aggravate seasonal rainfall from June to July, causing bigger-than-expected floods, Chinese meteorologists say. On Wednesday, unusually heavy rains struck Rongjiang in southwestern Guizhou province, half-submerging the city of 300,000 people as fast-rising flood-waters swept away cars, roared into underground garages and malls, and damaged vital infrastructure including its power grid. Affected by the rainfall in Guizhou, rivers in Guangxi downstream remained swollen on Wednesday, state media reported, with one waterway more than 9 metres (30 feet) above levels that are considered safe. China's economic planning agency in Beijing on Wednesday said it had urgently allocated 100 million yuan ($14 million) to assist disaster relief work in Guizhou, and an additional 100 million yuan to Guangdong and Hunan. ($1 = 7.1715 Chinese yuan renminbi) https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/climate-energy/china-reeling-floods-braces-second-tropical-cyclone-two-weeks-2025-06-25/
2025-06-25 11:20
NAIROBI, June 25 (Reuters) - Burundi on Wednesday commissioned the first phase of a $320 million hydropower project financed by lenders including the European Investment Bank, the African Development Bank and the World Bank, according to a statement. Only 6% of the 13 million population have access to power in the small Central African nation, whose generation capacity is roughly 40 megawatts, according to the African Development Bank. Sign up here. The new project, with a combined generation capacity of 49.5 megawatts, involves two plants - Jiji and Mulembwe - developed on two small rivers in southern Burundi. Jiji was commissioned on Wednesday, while Mulembwe will be brought online in a few months, according to a joint statement issued by the lenders, who also include the European Union. "This new capacity will not only improve access to electricity for thousands of people, but will also boost productivity in key sectors such as health, education, agribusiness and ICT," said the statement. Edward Claessen, the European Investment Bank's head of regional hub for East Africa, was quoted as saying the project was part of the EU's strategy to develop clean and sustainable energy infrastructure in Africa to boost decarbonisation efforts. https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/climate-energy/burundi-commissions-first-phase-320-mln-power-project-2025-06-25/
