Green groups are sounding the alarm on prospects for a new global pact to protect nature, due to be finished at December's COP15 summit, after last week's extra negotiating session in Nairobi failed to make clear headway on many important issues.

The inclusion of indigenous rights and gender equality in the draft deal was welcomed - but key goals of conserving at least 30% of the planet's land and seas by 2030 and boosting finance to halt and reverse damage to biodiversity remain divisive.

Top officials at the U.N. Convention on Biological Diversity acknowledge there is still significant work to do to reach an ambitious deal at COP15 - now rescheduled for Montreal due to pandemic restrictions in host nation China - but say they are optimistic.

Environmentalists, on the other hand, take a dimmer view.

Marco Lambertini, director general of WWF International, warned the chance of securing an ambitious agreement is "hanging by a thread".

"We risk facing a 2030 world with even less biodiversity than we have today, driving entire ecosystems to collapse. That is just unacceptable," he told our correspondent Michael Taylor.

Nowhere are human pressures on the world's precious but under-valued ecosystems felt more keenly than in the tropical forests of Latin America.

This week, we bring you two stories from Ecuador's rainforest, showing how indigenous people are working to keep their territories and natural riches safe from mining and dirty fuels.

Melissa Godin tells the story of how three solar boats - a local design topped with protective roofs covered in solar panels - now ply a 67-km (40-mile) stretch of the Pastaza and Capahurari rivers, connecting nine Achuar indigenous communities.

The vessels allow communities without motorised boats to travel more swiftly, and others that had been using diesel engines to cut costs, move quietly and better protect their waterways from pollution.

And Kimberley Brown talked to the indigenous Shuar people, in the Cordillera del Condor mountain ranges in Ecuador's southern Amazon, about their fight to protect their land, forests and rivers from the creeping spread of the mining industry as it feeds a global green transition, hungry for minerals to build electric cars, solar panels and batteries.

"Here we have waterfalls, rivers, medicine. Here we have meat. For us (mining) isn't development. For us, the forest is life, it is the market," said Josefina Tunki, a prominent voice against mining as president of the Shuar Arutam People.

We also take a look at how low-carbon economies will require policy interventions to make sure energy savings and cleaner transport are available to all who want to follow a greener lifestyle - but are struggling to afford it.

In Europe, our Brussels correspondent Jo Gill reports on how home owners are struggling to find information and financial support to undertake renovations such as adding building insulation, which could cut both their bills and energy use - crucial as gas prices rise, in part spurred by the Ukraine war.

Ideas - from training frontline workers like nurses to advise the energy-poor on measures to cut bills, to cheaper mortgages for more energy-efficient properties - are starting to take off, but aren't yet meeting the scale of need.

And Carey L. Biron takes the temperature of a new $2.5-billion push by the U.S. government to expand electric vehicle charging access in “underserved and overburdened communities”, as it aims to spur the construction of a half-million new public EV chargers by 2030.

As Gil Scott-Heron sang: "The revolution will put you in the driver's seat."

See you next week,

Megan

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