Category Archives: Environment

Labor governments push for national road-user charging after Victorian EV decision

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Treasurer Tim Pallas says refunds being considered after high court ruled charge was unconstitutional

Labor governments in three states are pressing the commonwealth to consider national road-user charging, after the high court struck down Victoria’s electric vehicle tax.

On Thursday the Victorian treasurer, Tim Pallas, said the government will consider refunding a tax paid by electric vehicle owners after the high court deemed it invalid, but suggests registration costs could rise or a national levy could be implemented in its place.

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‘Steve Bannon is watching us closely’: Naomi Klein on populists, conspiracists and real-world activism

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Author speaks candidly about a ‘mirror world’ that feeds our anxieties, distorts reality and fuels the polarisation of society

Naomi Klein is aware that her new book, Doppelganger, looks strange. A distorted picture of her face stares at you from the front cover. “Everyone who holds it looks like they’re holding my severed head, including me. It feels like Macbeth,” she says. Her laugh punctures the quiet communal space we’re sitting in on the first floor of a London hotel in late September.

But the weirdness is intentional. It’s supposed to capture what she’s writing about – a mirror world where her sense of self becomes distorted. Her starting point is her very own doppelganger, the writer Naomi Wolf. For more than a decade Klein has repeatedly been confused with Wolf. What at first irked her became more frustrating – destabilising, even – as it moved to social media and Wolf dived full on into conspiracy culture, allying with the far right in the process. The two are so frequently mixed up that social media algorithms began to autocomplete Klein’s name when people were writing about the latest thing Wolf had said or done.

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Drought turns Amazonian capital into climate dystopia

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Forest fires leave Manaus with second worst air quality in the world, while low river levels cut off communities

A withering drought has turned the Amazonian capital of Manaus into a climate dystopia with the second worst air quality in the world and rivers at the lowest levels in 121 years.

The city of 1 million people, which is surrounded by a forest of trees, normally basks under blue skies. Tourists take pleasure boats to the nearby meeting of the Negro and Amazon (known locally as the Solimões) rivers, where dolphins can often be seen enjoying what are usually the most abundant freshwater resources in the world.

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Low income UK homes ‘should be given free heat pumps’ to meet climate targets

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Advisers say government should cover cost of replacing gas boilers with pumps in more than 2m homes

More than 2 million low-income households should be given a free electric heat pump to replace their gas boiler if the UK hopes to meet its legally binding climate targets, according to the government’s advisers.

Britain’s official infrastructure tsars have called on the government to spend up to £4bn every year for the next 12 years to cover the full cost of heat pump installations, and support energy efficiency improvements, for 1.5 million households on lower incomes in England.

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UK infrastructure needs much more investment, say government advisers

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National Infrastructure Commission says public transport, home heating and water networks all in need of renewal

The UK’s infrastructure needs a big cash injection, with public transport, home heating and water networks all in dire need of renewal, independent government advisers have said.

The investments, of about £30bn a year from the taxpayer and £40bn to £50bn a year from the private sector, would result in savings to the average household of at least £1,000 a year, higher economic productivity, and a better quality of life in the future, the National Infrastructure Commission said.

Substantial investment in public transport for England’s biggest cities must be accompanied by restrictions on car access to alleviate congestion.

Hydrogen must not be used for home heating, despite government enthusiasm for the technology. Hydrogen should be exploited for use in heavy industry.

People on lower incomes should have heat pumps installed free, while the other two-thirds of households should receive subsidies of £7,000 each for their installation. Upgrading homes with high levels of insulation is not needed before installing heat pumps.

Water meters should be compulsory for households and businesses.

No new waste incinerators should be built, and recycling rates need to improve.

The decision to cancel the northern leg of HS2 was “deeply disappointing” and “leaves a major gap in the UK’s rail strategy”. Armitt said it would result in an “overload” of the west coast mainline, or encourage more people and freight on to the roads.

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Australia must urgently adapt to extreme weather or face soaring premiums, insurers warn

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Exclusive: Assistant treasurer says insurers warned government ‘you’ve got five years’ to reduce vulnerability to climate crisis

Global insurers say Australia is running out of time to reduce its vulnerability to the climate crisis and faces higher premiums for households and businesses.

“They said, ‘you’ve got five years basically’,” said the federal assistant treasurer, Stephen Jones, who led a delegation last month to insurance centres in London and Munich.

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Malawi swelters in record heat with temperatures nearly 20C above average

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Climate crisis blamed for extreme heat in African country, which has recorded temperatures of 43C

Malawians endured the country’s hottest weekend on record, with temperatures reaching nearly 20C above the seasonal average.

The heatwave began last Thursday with the government warning people to stay out of the sun, to keep hydrated, and avoid alcohol and caffeine. Some school buildings in the south of the country were evacuated, and children were taught in the shade of playground trees.

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EU to crack down further on microplastics after glitter ban

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The European Commission aims to cut plastic pellet pollution by 74% by the end of the decade

The EU has announced further plans to crack down on microplastics after its ban on glitter came into force.

The proposal, which tackles tiny pellets used in nearly all plastic products, aims to cut plastic pellet pollution by 74% by the end of the decade. Overall, it would lead to a 7% reduction in Europe’s microplastic pollution, according to the European Commission.

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Water level at Amazon port in Brazil hits lowest point in 121 years amid drought

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Port in Manaus records lowest water level since 1902, leaving boats stranded and unable to deliver food and water to remote villages

The water level at a major river port in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest has hit its lowest point in at least 121 years, as a historic drought upends the lives of hundreds of thousands of people and damages the jungle ecosystem.

Rapidly drying tributaries to the mighty Amazon river have left boats stranded, cutting off food and water supplies to remote jungle villages, while high water temperatures are suspected of killing more than 100 endangered river dolphins.

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Georgia refuses to release evidence from police shooting of Cop City activist

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Experts say decision not to make evidence available to family of Manuel Paez Terán or public sets ‘frightening’ precedent

The state of Georgia is refusing to release evidence tied to the police shooting and killing of an activist protesting a police and fire department training center known as “Cop City”, prompting concern from police accountability experts who say this sets a “frightening” precedent .

District attorney George Christian released a 31-page report earlier this month concluding that the 18 January shooting of Manuel Paez Terán, or “Tortuguita”, was “objectively reasonable”. Paez Terán was one of a small group of “forest defenders” camping in a wooded public park to protest Cop City, planned for a separate part of the forest south-east of Atlanta, Georgia, less than a mile away. Dozens of officers from multiple agencies raided the park; the state claims Paez Terán fired a gun first, prompting six officers to shoot the activist. The activist sustained 57 gunshot wounds and died nearly instantly.

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Revealed: how a little-known pollution rule keeps the air dirty for millions of Americans

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Major investigation shows local governments are increasingly exploiting a loophole in the Clean Air Act, leaving more than 21 million Americans with air that’s dirtier than they realize

A legal loophole has allowed the US Environmental Protection Agency to strike pollution from clean air tallies in more than 70 counties, enabling local regulators to claim the air was cleaner than it really was for more than 21 million Americans.

Regulators have exploited a little-known provision in the Clean Air Act called the “exceptional events rule” to forgive pollution caused by “natural” or “uncontrollable” events – including wildfires – on records used by the EPA for regulatory decisions, a new investigation from The California Newsroom, MuckRock and the Guardian reveals.

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Weather tracker: Florida struck by twin tornadoes

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Storms down power lines and rip off roofs. Elsewhere, windy conditions forecast for UK this week

Two tornadoes swept across parts of Florida last Thursday, causing extensive damage to many homes and businesses in Crystal River and Clearwater. Trees and power lines were downed, with walls and roofs ripped from buildings. The tornadoes produced wind gusts of 115mph and 125mph respectively, according to the US National Weather Service, making them EF-2 tornadoes on the Enhanced Fujita scale. This scale is used to classify a tornado based on the wind gusts measured over a 3-second period, with EF-0 being the lowest and EF-5 being the highest. An EF-0 tornado has wind gusts of 65-80mph, with wind gusts exceeding 200mph in an EF-5 tornado. No injuries were reported after the Florida EF-2s.

Meanwhile, unusually windy conditions are forecast to develop across the North Sea later this week as areas of low pressure push northwards across France, through the Channel and towards the UK and Ireland. By Thursday and Friday, gusts of 70-80mph are possible in the North Sea bringing large waves and potential disruption. Wave heights of more than 7 metres are possible between Norway and Scotland. Strong winds are also likely to affect eastern Scotland and many eastern counties of England, with an increased risk of some damage to trees. The winds will be from an east to south-easterly direction as opposed to the usual south-westerly direction that prevails across north-west Europe.

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‘Can we save the wild salmon of Iceland?’: Björk releases ‘lost’ song to fight fish farming

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The Icelandic singer discusses her collaboration with Rosalía and how artists pick up on the environmental emergency

Iceland’s fish farming industry is “a couple of wild guys who want to make money quick and sacrifice nature”, the Icelandic singer Björk has said before the release of a “lost” song to help fight the increasingly controversial practice.

In an interview with Guardian Seascape, she added that artists were often the “canaries in the coalmine” of environmental emergencies because it was their job to be sensitive.

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NSW government axes dozens of environmental roles in ‘backward step’

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Exclusive: Coalition accuses Labor of hypocrisy and says delay in rewarding farmers to protect nature is a ‘disgrace’

The New South Wales government has quietly cut dozens of environmental roles, including Indigenous officers, and delayed a plan to reward farmers to protect nature – moves described by critics as “hypocritical” and a “significant backward step”.

The cuts were revealed in a “change management plan”, obtained by Guardian Australia, and affect about 28 existing staff and 38 roles in total. They follow last month’s budget, the first by the Minns Labor government since its election in March.

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Dominica’s mountain chicken frog disappears in ‘fastest extinction ever recorded’

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Ecological calamity on the Caribbean island demonstrates how quickly wildlife can be destroyed, scientists say

They were once so numerous they were cooked as the national dish of Dominica. Every year, thousands of mountain chicken frogs, roasted with garlic and pepper, were eaten by islanders and tourists.

Two decades later, the animal – one of the world’s largest species of frog – has in effect disappeared from the Caribbean island. A series of ecological disasters has reduced its former healthy, stable population of hundreds of thousands of animals to a total of 21 frogs, according to scientists’ most recent survey.

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Scientists build traps to manage UK’s rising number of Chinese mitten crabs

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Voracious, furry-clawed crustaceans are being controlled ‘to protect the environment’

It is classified by conservationists as one of the 100 worst invasive alien species in the world. Now, a group of scientists are hoping they have found a way to deplete the UK’s rapidly growing Chinese mitten crab population and prevent the crustaceans, which can grow bigger than a 10-inch dinner plate and have distinctive furry claws, from “eating us out of house and home”.

The group has constructed and installed the UK’s first Chinese mitten crab trap at Pode Hole in Lincolnshire, to catch the voracious predators as they migrate downstream to mate.

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Australia may increase standard car parking spaces as huge vehicles dominate the streets

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Critics say boom in sales of SUVs and dual-cab utes has been disastrous for safety and the environment – and car parks may be at risk of collapse

Parking spaces in Australia may soon become bigger as a response to the nation’s love affair with SUVs and large cars, but planners fear parking lots are at risk of collapse under the weight of increasingly enormous vehicles.

For the past few decades, the standard size for car spaces on streets and in parking lots has been 5.4 metres long and 2.4 to 2.6 metres wide – big enough to allow a Ford Falcon or Holden Commodore to park comfortably.

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‘It was a plague’: Killarney becomes first Irish town to ban single-use coffee cups

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A blanket ‘bring or buy’ reusable scheme has been introduced in the town, which was getting through 23,000 cups a week

Killarney used to accept it as a price of being a tourist town: ubiquitous disposable coffee cups spilling from bins, littering roads and blighting the area’s national park.

The County Kerry town went through about 23,000 cups a week – more than a million a year – adding up to 18.5 tonnes of waste.

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‘It’s a poor product ’: leading UK chefs join campaign to cast farmed salmon off menu

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Ethical concerns over sustainability and welfare have seen venues offering new choices to ubiquitous ‘chicken of the sea’

Salmon has undergone a rapid transformation in recent decades. Once a special treat, it is now ubiquitous. From drinks reception canapés to wedding functions, Christmas smoked salmon or simply wrapped in foil and baked on a week night, salmon is everywhere.

Scotland is world renowned for salmon production, and the fish makes up 40% of its total food exports; it is also Britain’s most valuable food export. Healthy, low in saturated fats and high in omega-3, salmon is a success story.

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Australia news live: Minns says NSW police response to pro-Palestine rally will be ‘reasonable and proportionate’; voice referendum latest updates

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Follow today’s news live, including the latest updates on the voice referendum

A strong no vote could hold back reforms in Indigenous affairs, Wyatt says

Ken Wyatt said he doesn’t think the government has made a mistake deciding against legislating the voice if the referendum is defeated, but he fears what a strong no vote will mean for the future of Indigenous affairs:

We’ve got to respect what Australians are saying if there is an overwhelming no majority …

The fear I have now is with a strong no, whether the government will become reticent to be adventurous on doing significant reforms in the future in the Aboriginal affairs portfolio, and on programs and policies that could reshape the landscape of Aboriginal affairs and the way in which Aboriginal people access the plethora of services that we all take for granted across this nation as our inherent right.

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