All articles by Katie Kouchakji
Katie Kouchakji is an Auckland-based freelance journalist, specialising in climate change policy and the low-carbon transition. She has been writing about energy and climate change for over 15 years, including for Environmental Finance, Carbon Pulse, the International Bar Association and FORESIGHT.

Katie Kouchakji
@carbonqueen79
Opinion: the climate is changing faster than we are
All around the world, people are experiencing extreme weather events, exacerbated by global warming – and still progress towards a decarbonised world feels far too slow.
COP27: A little less conversation, a little more action, please
Aside from the historic agreement on loss and damage, the Sharm El Sheikh climate talks outcomes are underwhelming and were rightly met with weak applause from weary negotiators.
Australia gets serious on climate action
Only four months into its term, the new Labor government in Australia has adopted the country’s first significant climate legislation in a decade.
Opinion: Record profits give oil majors an opportunity to invest in the energy transition. They’re blowing it.
It is okay to be outraged at the record-high profits oil majors are reporting, but the real source of ire is the ploughing of money back to shareholders or into new fields at a significantly larger scale than into clean technologies.
Opinion: US Supreme Court EPA ruling hamstrings domestic climate action – but what about the rest of the world?
The Supreme Court may make it more challenging for the US to meet its climate ambitions, but that is no excuse for the rest of the world to abandon or weaken efforts.
The end of Australia’s climate wars?
More is at stake in Australia’s 21 May federal election than who will be prime minister, with the winner to determine the country’s climate future.
The climate risk for hydropower
With climate change set to bring more severe and frequent storms to some parts of the world and an increased risk of drought to others, the risks to countries which rely on hydropower differ – as do the responses.
Do renewables need carbon markets?
With the dramatic fall in the cost of renewable energy technologies, two of the voluntary carbon market’s leading standards decided at the end of 2019 to exclude such projects – but are carbon markets the best way to incentivise renewables to begin with?
Carbon-neutral LNG: Transition fuel or greenwashing?
Shipments of carbon-neutral LNG have been on the rise in recent months, prompting accusations of greenwashing and misleading claims.
Australia’s energy transition steams ahead while prime minister grapples with net zero
Australia’s power sector is decarbonising as the country explores alternatives to fossil fuel exports, but without a net-zero goal and policies to drive mass deployment of clean energy technologies, these may falter, experts warn.