While the Ganges is sacred but heavily polluted, the Chambal’s ‘cursed’ but pristine waters have proved a blessing for locals
Cold-blooded gharials, a crocodile-like species unique to south Asia, catch the last of the day’s warmth as a setting sun paints the sky crimson above the Chambal river.
Two jackals and a jungle cat scuttle up thorny ravines that box in the expansive blue water, while the orange-beaked Indian skimmer bird glides overhead.
Continue reading...An elephant calf was coaxed out of Dipor Bil, a lake in north-east India, after it became separated from its mother. Officials managed to encourage the animal out of the water and into the safety of the forest, although it had yet to be reunited with its mother
Continue reading...The former vice-president has yet to put forward a plan to address global warming, which polls suggest is the single most important issue for Democrats
Climate change is transforming life by redrawing coastlines, turning vast areas of forest into infernos, stirring enormous storms and spreading exotic diseases. An indirect casualty of this upheaval could be Joe Biden’s hopes of becoming US president.
Biden, frontrunner in the polls to secure the Democratic nomination, has not laid out a plan to address the crisis.
Continue reading...Plans to create octopus farms in coastal waters round the world have been denounced by an international group of researchers. They say the move is ethically inexcusable and environmentally dangerous, and have called on private companies, academic institutions and governments to block funding for these ventures.
The researchers say that farming octopuses would require the catching of vast amounts of fish and shellfish to feed them, putting further pressure on the planet’s already threatened marine livestock.
Continue reading...Britain’s net zero by 2050 goal may have impact on whether existing policies are reassessed
Britain’s move to “net zero” carbon and the declaration of a climate emergency in parliament will be “given careful consideration” in deciding whether to grant a review of Heathrow airport’s expansion, the government has said.
The new approach falls well short of any commitment to review Heathrow’s expansion, but means the decision on whether to grant campaigners’ request for a review will include the net zero target and the climate emergency among its criteria.
Continue reading...US reportedly opposed deal, which follows concerns that villages in Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia had ‘turned into dumpsites’
Almost all the world’s countries have agreed on a deal aimed at restricting shipments of hard-to-recycle plastic waste to poorer countries, the United Nations announced on Friday.
Exporting countries – including the US – now will have to obtain consent from countries receiving contaminated, mixed or unrecyclable plastic waste. Currently, the US and other countries can send lower-quality plastic waste to private entities in developing countries without getting approval from their governments.
Continue reading...About 2.8 planets would be needed if rest of world followed suit, biocapacity data shows
Europe is using up natural resources so quickly that the planet’s ability to replenish itself over the year would be exhausted by this Friday if everyone consumed as much, a new analysis has found.
It would take 2.8 planets to extend the EU’s rate of consumption of fuels, food, fibres, land and timber to all the world’s people, according to data collected by WWF and the Global Footprint Network.
Continue reading...Ports of Rotterdam, Antwerp and Ghent to pipe greenhouse gas into vast under-sea cavities
Three of the largest ports in Europe – Rotterdam, Antwerp and Ghent – are to be used to capture and bury 10m tonnes of CO2 emissions under the North Sea in what will be the biggest project of its kind in the world.
The ports, which account for one-third of the total greenhouse gas emissions from the Belgium, Netherlands and Luxembourg region, would be used to pipe the gas into a porous reservoir of sandstone about two miles (3km) below the seabed.
Continue reading...Scientists have identified a spike in ‘vagrant’ species of fish including damselfish, wrasse and triggerfish
Warming ocean temperatures have been blamed for luring tropical fish thousands of kilometres into New Zealand waters, threatening vulnerable native species as they compete for resources.
Scientists have identified increasing numbers of what they call “vagrant” species rarely seen in the New Zealand’s oceans and said their extended visits were raising concerns about how the islands’ unique local wildlife would adapt.
Continue reading...Environment Agency calls for urgent action to protect country from river and coastal floods
Entire communities might need to be moved away from coasts and rivers as the UK takes urgent action to prepare for an average global temperature rise of 4C, the Environment Agency warned.
The agency said on Thursday that difficult decisions would have to be taken in the coming years to make sure the UK was resilient amid flooding that would not be held back by higher land defences.
Continue reading...‘Extreme, huge, and existential’ threat posed by climate change must be a central consideration when distributing aid
The British government’s aid spending is failing to recognise the “scale and urgency” of the climate change challenge facing the world, MPs warn.
Climate change must be placed at the centre of aid strategy and funding, if it is to address the seriousness of threats facing developing countries, the committee said. It urged a minimum spend of £1.76bn annually and a halt to funding fossil fuel projects in developing countries, unless they can demonstrate they support transition to zero emissions by 2050.
Continue reading...Report calls for change of priorities and culture to avert catastrophic biodiversity loss
Governments need to ramp up investment in nature restoration and raise the tax burden on companies that degrade wildlife, according to recommendations made to the G7 group of rich nations.
The proposals are part of a growing debate on how to radically change humanity’s relationship with nature in the wake of a new UN mega-report that showed an alarming decline in the Earth’s life-support systems.
Continue reading...Mathew Talbot of Coldstream Guards died on deployment in Malawi, MoD confirms
A British soldier has died while on anti-poaching operations in Malawi, the Ministry of Defence has said.
It is understood Mathew Talbot, of the 1st Battalion Coldstream Guards, was on a patrol when he was killed by an elephant. He was on his first operational deployment when he died on 5 May, according to the MoD.
Continue reading...Almost 600 conservation experts have signed a letter by the wildlife charity WWF, published to coincide with UN report into loss of biodiversity
Almost 600 conservation experts have signed the Call4Nature open letter written by wildlife charity WWF, which is being published to coincide with the IPBES report (see letter below).
Continue reading...Scientists reveal 1 million species at risk of extinction in damning UN report
Human society is in jeopardy from the accelerating decline of the Earth’s natural life-support systems, the world’s leading scientists have warned, as they announced the results of the most thorough planetary health check ever undertaken.
From coral reefs flickering out beneath the oceans to rainforests desiccating into savannahs, nature is being destroyed at a rate tens to hundreds of times higher than the average over the past 10m years, according to the UN global assessment report.
Continue reading...Residents of the town on the banks of the Mississippi River have watched as family members and neighbors have been lost to cancer. Official figures show the risk of cancer from toxic air is 50 times higher in Reserve than the national average. Feeling neglected by politicians, they are fighting back against the chemical plant has been emitting chloroprene into the air for half a century
Continue reading...Pacific island nation is on the frontline of climate change but locals must fly to Fiji if they want to buy sunscreen
As the midday sun beats down on Tuvalu, a slim slice of golden sand in remote Oceania, locals seek shelter under palm trees by the lagoon’s edge or retreat to the dark interiors of their homes. There is little else they can do to escape the sun’s powerful rays because there is no suncream in the entire country, despite strident efforts by locals to obtain some.
Tuvalu is the fourth smallest country in the world and located halfway between Australia and Hawaii in the Pacific Ocean.
Continue reading...In Chile the beloved native bee is venerated as carrying the spirit of the dead, but its numbers are dwindling as farmers use imported species infected with parasites to pollinate crops
The first time José Montalava saw the world’s largest bumblebee he was six years old and visiting his grandfather’s house in rural Chile. “It was in the tomato patch, a huge, loud, fluffy orange thing buzzing around. I remember trying to grab it, but it kept getting away, although it looked too heavy to fly,” he recalls.
During Montalava’s childhood, these giant golden bumblebees (Bombus dahlbomii) – which can measure up to 40mm and have been dubbed “flying mice” – were a common sight in the town where he grew up in central Chile. “It’s such a striking, charismatic, colourful bumblebee that used to herald spring,” says the 36-year-old entomologist. “Now it’s totally disappeared from my hometown and many other areas.”
Continue reading...In an election focused on climate change, the Greens should be surging. But pressure is building inside the beleaguered party
It’s a climate change election but the political party with the utmost ambition on climate – yes, the Greens – is somehow on the outer. Flagging in the polls, cold-shouldered by Labor, the Greens have spent the campaign jostling elbows with a bunch of high-profile independents in the inner cities and battling the alt-right in the Senate.
Greens leader Richard Di Natale gave a rousing speech to the National Press Club on Thursday, pumped after an Easter family road trip from Melbourne to Brisbane with his predecessor Bob Brown’s Stop Adani convoy which will finish in Canberra on Saturday. Di Natale rattled off a list of impressive achievements in his first full term as leader of the Australian Greens, including paving the way on marriage equality, the banking and disability royal commissions, Medevac laws and a national anti-corruption body. Electorally, however, there is little sign the Greens are about to reap the rewards of its “thought leadership” among the parties.
Continue reading...‘We are in trouble if we don’t act,’ say experts, with up to 1m species at risk of annihilation
The world’s leading scientists will warn the planet’s life-support systems are approaching a danger zone for humanity when they release the results of the most comprehensive study of life on Earth ever undertaken.
Up to 1m species are at risk of annihilation, many within decades, according to a leaked draft of the global assessment report, which has been compiled over three years by the UN’s leading research body on nature.
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