Category Archives: Environment

Yellowstone national park closed after record rain and major flooding

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All entrances to national park blocked off as floods inundate roads and bridges, and some houses swept completely away

Yellowstone national park has closed down in the face of extreme weather that caused major flooding after record levels of rainfall.

The surging floodwaters had pulled houses into rivers and forced rescues by air and boat, but they have now begun to slowly recede, leaving tourists and others stranded after roads and bridges were knocked out by torrential rains that swelled waterways to record levels.

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Arizona wildfires: intense conditions send smoke plumes billowing into sky

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Crews battled the gusty winds as the Pipeline fire exploded to more than 24,000 acres by Tuesday morning

Fueled by gusty winds through drought-stricken remote terrain, wildfires burning north of Flagstaff, Arizona, exploded in size on Monday, with officials estimating more than 24,000 acres (9,700 hectares) had been blackened by Tuesday morning.

Fire crews battling the blaze have faced intense conditions that have caused extreme fire behavior and sent enormous smoke plumes swirling into the sky.

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Brazil envoy apologises to Dom Phillips’ family for saying bodies had been found

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Ambassador ‘deeply sorry’ for ‘information that did not prove correct’ as search continues for missing journalist and colleague

The Brazilian ambassador to the UK has apologised to the family of Dom Phillips for incorrectly telling them his body had been found in the Amazon along with that of his missing travelling partner Bruno Pereira.

On Monday morning an embassy official called Phillips’s brother-in-law and sister to inform them that the bodies of the British journalist and Brazilian Indigenous expert had been found tied to a tree, one week after the pair vanished on the River Itaquaí.

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Maasai leaders ​arrested in protests over​ ​Tanzanian game reserve

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Dozens wounded in clashes with police over eviction from ancestral lands to make way for hunting and safaris

Ten Maasai leaders were detained and more than 30 people wounded during violent clashes with police in northern Tanzania on Friday, as they protested against eviction from their land to make way for a luxury game reserve.

One police officer was reportedly killed in the clashes and hundreds of people are in hiding after the protests in Loliondo, which borders Serengeti national park.

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India takes tough stand at climate talks as Delhi endures brutal heatwave

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As capital swelters, India urges rich countries to provide funds to help deal with effects of climate crisis

Throughout the day Virender Sharma splashes water from a bucket on to the sheet he has pulled over his lilies, tuberoses, carnations and gerberas in an attempt to protect them from the hot, dry wind sweeping through Delhi.

But the street flower seller’s attempts to protect his produce is futile. Since the onset of a brutal heatwave in mid-March, his income has dropped by 60%.

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Australia news live updates: Queensland on brink of power outage as eastern states battle big chill; WA to shut state-owned coal plants

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Penny Wong to visit New Zealand foreign minister; at least 31 Covid deaths. This blog is now closed

Lack of reserve notice from energy regulator

It’s going to be a long day by the looks of it when it comes to “lack of reserve” notices and intervention by the Australian Energy Market Operator, such as this early one in NSW:

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Western Australia to become coal-free by 2030 with Muja power station to be shut down

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Mark McGowan says state’s two remaining coal-fired power stations are becoming less viable due to rise of renewable energy

The Western Australian government will shut its last coal-fired power unit before the end of the decade and spend an extra half a billion dollars to foster new jobs for displayed workers, the state government said.

Later this year, the first of the state-owned 854-megawatt Muja power station’s units near Collie, south of Perth, will close, with the entire plant to be shut by 2029. The nearby 340MW Collie plant will exit the market by the end of 2027, the premier, Mark McGowan, said in a statement on Tuesday.

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Africa must forgo gas exploration to avert climate disaster, warn experts

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Call comes after former UN climate envoy urged African countries to exploit their natural gas reserves

Africa must embrace renewable energy, and forgo exploration of its potentially lucrative gas deposits to stave off climate disaster and bring access to clean energy to the hundreds of millions who lack it, leading experts on the continent have said.

Their call came as the UN secretary general, António Guterres, warned that exploring for gas and oil anywhere in the world would be “delusional”.

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Declassified files reveal British interest in Falkland Islands oil

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Ministers keen to claim UK right to potential deposits before and after 1982 war with Argentina

British ministers were keen to exploit oil around the Falkland Islands before and after the 1982 conflict, declassified British government documents show.

In a previously unpublished letter, the former chancellor Norman Lamont said the revenues from Falklands oil should go to the British government, not the Falkland islanders.

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We needed China deal to protect ‘domestic security’, says key Solomon Islands official

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Exclusive: Collin Beck, who is believed to have been involved in negotiating the pact, offers most comprehensive defence yet of the controversial deal

The controversial security deal struck between Solomon Islands and China that caught the western world off guard was needed to maintain internal security and help fight climate change, a leading Solomon Islands official has said, defending his country’s right to choose its allies.

Speaking to the Guardian in his first interview since the deal between China and Solomon Islands was leaked, Collin Beck, the permanent secretary of foreign affairs and a senior figure in the Solomons government, also said Australia should question whether it had been “fair” to Solomon Islands in its intense scrutiny of the deal.

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Record flooding and mudslides force closure of Yellowstone national park

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The entire park, spanning parts of Wyoming, Montana and Idaho, will remain closed to visitors as officials assess damage to roads and bridges

Record flooding and rockslides following a burst of heavy rains prompted the rare closure on Monday of all five entrances to Yellowstone national park at the start of the summer tourist season, the park superintendent said.

The entire park, spanning parts of Wyoming, Montana and Idaho, will remain closed to visitors, including those with lodging and camping reservations, at least through Wednesday, as officials assess damage to roads, bridges and other facilities.

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UN appeals to public for $20m to stop feared catastrophic oil spill from tanker

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Vessel off Yemen with more than 1m barrels of oil aboard has been stranded for six years and is close to breaking up

A rare UN appeal to the public to raise $20m is to be launched on Tuesday in an attempt to prevent an environmental catastrophe caused by the potential break-up of an oil tanker off the coast of Yemen.

The money is needed to offload more than 1.14m barrels of oil that have been sitting in the decrepit cargo ship, Safer, for more than six years because of an impasse between Houthi groups and the Saudi-backed government over ownership and responsibility.

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Fury as government waters down post-Brexit food standards

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Strategy described as ‘missed opportunity’ as final wording merely commits to ‘considering’ animal welfare

Animal welfare campaigners, food policy experts and farmers have reacted with fury after the government watered down post-Brexit trade deal standards in its food strategy, released on Monday.

In a version of the strategy leaked to the Guardian on Friday, the government committed to making it easier for countries to import goods if they have high animal welfare standards.

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Bolsonaro says ‘something wicked’ done to Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira

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Brazil president comments on journalist and Indigenous expert’s fate amid unconfirmed claims bodies have been found in Amazon

The Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro, has said he believes “something wicked” was done to the missing British journalist Dom Phillips and the Brazilian Indigenous expert Bruno Pereira, amid unconfirmed claims their bodies had been found in the Amazon.

British relatives of Phillips said they had been contacted by the Brazilian embassy in London on Monday morning and informed that two unidentified bodies had been found during the search operation.

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Electricity consumers in Queensland cut use to avoid blackouts as NSW and Victoria face shortages

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Market operator in talks with large consumers as country faces energy crisis mainly due to poorly performing coal-fired generators

Some of Queensland’s biggest consumers agreed to cut their power use on Monday to help the grid avoid blackouts, and similar requests could be made in New South Wales and Victoria on Tuesday if regulators maintain forecasts for potential electricity shortfalls.

The Australian Energy Market Operator (Aemo) on Monday afternoon started talks with big consumers under its Reliability and Emergency Reserve Trader (Rert) scheme to head off a gap projected at one stage to be 1,454 megawatts in Queensland at 5.30pm.

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More than 15,000 sheep drown after live export ship sinks in Sudan

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Ship Badr 1 sank in Red Sea port of Suakin early on Sunday, prompting environmental concerns

A ship crammed with thousands of sheep sank on Sunday in Sudan’s Red Sea port of Suakin, drowning most animals onboard but with all crew surviving, officials said.

The livestock vessel was exporting the animals from Sudan to Saudi Arabia when it sank. “The ship, Badr 1, sank during the early hours of Sunday morning,” a senior Sudanese port official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. “It was carrying 15,800 sheep.”

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Food plan for England condemned by its own lead adviser

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Henry Dimbleby says government’s response to his review of food system shows no vision and ‘is not a strategy’

The government’s lead adviser on food issues has condemned what ministers have billed as a landmark national plan to combat food poverty and obesity, saying it is “not a strategy” and warning it could mean more children will go hungry.

Henry Dimbleby’s verdict is further bad news for Boris Johnson as the white paper is a direct response to last year’s wide-ranging review of Britain’s food system, which was led by the restaurateur.

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Hope of finding Dom Phillips alive has gone, say mother-in-law and wife

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The British journalist was travelling in the Amazon with Indigenous expert Bruno Pereira when they went missing

The wife and mother-in-law of missing British journalist Dom Phillips have said their hopes of finding him alive had gone, in a heartfelt and heart-breaking message that paid tribute to him and his travelling companion Bruno Pereira.

Phillips, a longtime contributor to the Guardian, and Pereira, an experienced Indigenous advocate, went missing on 5 June in a remote part of the western Amazon.

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US temperatures hit record levels as south-west bakes in heatwave

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Phoenix reported 114F, Las Vegas soared to 109F and Denver hit 100F, while inland areas of California reached triple digits

A dangerous heat swept across the American south-west over the weekend as potentially deadly heat set temperatures soaring to record levels in numerous major US cities in the region.

Phoenix, Las Vegas, Denver and California’s Death Valley all posted record temperatures on Saturday.

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Malaysia’s ‘mystery hybrid monkey’ could be result of habitat loss

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Researcher says proboscis monkey may have mated with silver langur when unable to reach female of own species

The emergence of a “mystery monkey”, believed to be a rare hybrid of two distantly related primates, highlights the importance of protecting habit connectivity, according to a researcher who studied the animal.

The female monkey first attracted attention in 2017, when photographs taken of it along the Kinabatangan River in Sabah, Malaysia, were uploaded to social media wildlife photography groups.

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