David Fickling

There have been 25 conferences under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change since the body first met in 1995. Over that period, some 894 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide, about 37% of all greenhouse pollution in human history, has been emitted. What makes anyone think that…

Our energy system is built upon a mountain of waste. Believe it or not, that’s a good thing. Look at the journey that power takes to your plug socket from its original source, and you’ll find excess and overcapacity every step of the way. All electricity grids are designed with a reserve margin …

A villain is emerging in China’s efforts to rein in its energy prices: inefficient, power-hungry industry. With flooding in the coal hub of Shanxi province driving prices up to 1,508 yuan ($234) a metric ton even as the government tries to kickstart extra production, further measures are clearly…

The cash crunch faced by property developer China Evergrande Group in recent weeks has drawn comparison to the 2008 financial crisis, when seemingly minor turbulence in real-estate finance blew up into an economy-destroying hurricane. There’s an even better candidate for a 2008-style emergency in…

Never let a good energy crisis go to waste. That’s been the maxim of lobbies on each side of the climate debate as power prices have spiked and blackouts spread from Australia, to Texas, and the UK in recent years. Those who rightly wish to speed the transition away from fossil fuels see the…

In the days before Covid, I’d often get frustrated by the response that doctors would give when I turned up at their clinics with some infection or other: “It’s just a virus,” they’d say. As someone who’s long been fascinated by the detective work that goes into tracing the origins and history…

Since breaking above $100 a metric ton in May, the price of coal at Australia’s Newcastle port — a benchmark for Asia, which consumes about three-quarters of the world’s soot — has gone almost vertical, hitting a record $173.10 a ton Thursday. The key regional contract for liquefied natural gas,…

In an industry facing its biggest crisis since the dawn of jet aviation, Qantas Airways Ltd. has been having rather a good pandemic. It’s the return to normalcy it needs to worry about. Shares rose 3.5% Thursday, the biggest increase in a year, in spite of the announcement of a A$1.83 billion (…

My hometown of Sydney is a divided city. Never more so than now, in the grip of a Covid-19 outbreak that’s overwhelmed its complacent sense of having escaped the pandemic. In the east, suburbs close to the beach and the cooling breezes of the Pacific are the playgrounds of the affluent. Further…

Australia is joining the list of countries refusing to provide a home to the proceeds of foreign political graft. If the changes are to do any good, it’s going to have to take a harder look at the corruption in its own backyard, too. The country will introduce laws this year to impose Magnitsky…