Taking into account health and environmental damage, wind and solar power from new plants in Europe is actually cheaper than energy from coal and nuclear power plants, according to a new report.

Many people find it difficult to calculate the true cost of their electricity. Special duties, taxes and subsidies all add up to influence prices, not to mention the environmental and health costs that aren't included in the final calculations.

Researchers from Green Budget Germany (GBG) have taken a closer look at these extra costs in a recent study. Their work calculated, among other things, the environmental and health expenses related to available energy sources.

The row within the UK government over energy policy has been reignited ahead of the party conference season, with the former Tory environment secretary Lord Deben taking on George Osborne over the controversial role of gas.

The row is crucial because the outcome of the war within the cabinet over whether gas should be favoured above renewable energy, as the chancellor wants, will determine the shape of the UK's energy infrastructure for decades to come. Hundreds of billions of pounds in potential investment also hang on the result.

A new species of monkey has been identified in Africa, only the second time such a discovery has been made on the continent in 28 years.

The identification of the monkey in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) is significant, as identification of mammals new to science is rare.

Lesula (Cercopithecus lomamiensis) has a naked face and a mane of long blond hairs, and is described by the researchers who identified it as shy and quiet. It lives on the ground and in trees in a 6,500 square mile habitat of the lowland rainforests in the centre of the DRC between the middle Lomami (the inspiration for its name) and the upper Tshuapa Rivers. Its diet is mostly fruit and vegetation.

(Reuters) - Japan's government said it intends to stop using nuclear power by the 2030s, marking a major shift from policy goals set before last year's Fukushima disaster that sought to increase the share of atomic energy to more than half of electricity supply.

Japan joins countries such as Germany and Switzerland in turning away from nuclear power after last year's earthquake unleashed a tsunami that swamped the Fukushima Daiichi plant, causing the worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl in 1986. Japan was the third-biggest user of atomic energy before the disaster.

In abandoning atomic power, Japan aims to raise the share of renewable power to 30 percent of its energy mix but will remain a top importer of oil, coal and gas for the foreseeable future.

Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda's unpopular government, which could face an election this year, had faced intense lobbying from Japan's main business federation to maintain atomic energy and also concerns from its major ally, the United States, which supplied it with nuclear technology in the 1950s.

The government announced the policy after a meeting of key ministers finalized the decision.

All but two of Japan's nuclear 50 reactors are idled for safety checks and the government plans to allow restarts of units taken off line after the disaster if they are deemed safe by a new atomic regulator.

Japan's growing anti-nuclear movement, which wants an immediate end to the use of atomic power, is certain to oppose any such proposal to secure electricity supplies by restarting reactors.

By applying a strict 40-year limit on the lifetime of reactors, most will be shut down by the 2030s.