Lords committee calls for creation of advisory groups to tackle the pollutants, which may increase risk of heart disease and premature deathLight and noise are neglected pollutants" that are causing significant harm to human health and can cause premature deaths, a group of peers have said.The science and technology committee of the House of Lords has called on ministers to do more to tackle these pollutants, which it claims are poorly understood and poorly regulated". Continue reading...

Report finds government goal to plant 30,000 hectares of woodland by March 2025 unlikely to be achievedThe government has met less than half of its annual tree-planting target in England, MPs have found, putting net zero ambitions at risk.The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) this year published what it called ambitious" nature targets, a requirement under the Environment Act, including the goal of planting 30,000 hectares of woodland by March 2025. A report by the environmental audit committee (EAC) of cross-party MPs has found that this target was unlikely to be met. Continue reading...

Timothy Shaddock, 54, and his dog Bella disembark tuna trawler that rescued him after a storm damaged his yacht and forced him to live off raw fish and rainwater

Arizona state capital suffering from longest heatwave in 50 years; Italian hospitals see rise in urgent cases due to hot weather

Whiskey Flat, once known for gold mining and wild west movies was covered again by previously drought-stricken Lake IsabellaAfter California's severe drought resurfaced a historic settlement from the depths of Lake Isabella, the ghost town of Whiskey Flat has once again returned to the water.Whiskey Flat, once known for gold mining and wild west movies was covered again by the previously drought-stricken lake in central California, SFGate reported. Lake Isabella's water levels had been low for years until this winter's onslaught of rain, highlighting the toll the climate crisis has had on the reservoirs and lakes that serve crucial roles in the state's water system. Continue reading...

Study identifies about 900,000 households with service lines definitely or possibly made of lead, a known neurotoxinOne in five New Yorkers may be drinking lead-contaminated water, a new report has found.Roughly 900,000 households - or 21% of the city's residents - live in properties with lead or possible lead service lines, the pipes that provide city water to individual properties. Lead can leach into the water from the pipes as the water travels through them. Continue reading...

Court told wild camping is not open-air recreation as park authority appeals against recent banWild camping is not recreation because sleeping is not an enjoyable activity, lawyers acting for a wealthy landowner said in court while defending a judge's decision to ban the activity on Dartmoor national park.In a packed courtroom at the Royal Courts of Justice in London on Tuesday, lawyers for the Dartmoor national park authority (DNPA) brought an appeal against the decision to ban backpack camping on the common land. The case hinges on whether wild camping counts as open-air recreation" as allowed in a 1985 law. Continue reading...

Britain's neglect of nuclear industry has been a colossal mistake' says energy ministerGrant Shapps has condemned the neglect of Britain's nuclear industry as a colossal mistake" as he earmarked 20bn for a fleet of new reactors - but admitted it would take six years to even make a decision on giving projects the green light.The government formally launched Great British Nuclear (GBN), an independent body designed to aid the delivery of new projects, on Tuesday. Continue reading...

Rural Fire Service warns residents to get ready for upcoming season and not be complacent after three wet years

Conservationists utterly elated' at arrival of first offspring since release of 25 of the eagles on Isle of WightA white-tailed eagle chick has hatched in England for the first time in more than 240 years, and conservationists are utterly elated" by the new arrival.White-tailed eagles were once widespread across England but were widely persecuted by humans, and the last record of a pair breeding was in 1780. Since 2019, 25 of these eagles, which are Britain's biggest bird of prey, have been released to the Isle of Wight as part of an effort to bring back long-lost species. Continue reading...

Decades after a chilling racist massacre, Tulsa's Greenwood district was bulldozed for I-244 - but a new plan aims to reverse its punishing effectsTwenty-five years before Don Shaw was born in Greenwood, a white mob invaded the Tulsa neighborhood and killed more than 300 people. Much of the tight-knit community was burned to the ground, including his grandfather's pharmacy.But when Shaw was growing up in the 1950s and 60s, few people wanted to talk about the massacre - perhaps in part because much of the damage was no longer visible. Continue reading...

Queensland government considers options after 24-year-old was attacked on beach at K'gari/Fraser Island by at least three dingoes on Monday

Palm oil plantations have fragmented Sabah's rainforest but land corridors let pygmy elephants and orangutans roam againIn 2011, the German conservationist Robert Risch was hiking along the banks of a river at the northern limits of Tabin wildlife reserve, home to pygmy elephants, orangutans and the Bornean banteng, an endangered species of wild cattle. Risch was expecting to see long stretches of wilderness but instead saw a swathe of palm oil plantations and electric fences.I found elephant tracks coming from Tabin following the river to the north until they reached the electric fence. Then the tracks turned around back to Tabin," says Risch. No choice." Continue reading...

A month of floods, fire and heatwaves from Rome to Chile Continue reading...

Labor's energy minister to unveil decarbonisation plans for six areas of the economy in Sydney speech

Chinese counterpart Xie Zhenhua seeks common ground' in first key summit between two largest carbon emitters since US-Beijing freezeJohn Kerry, the US climate envoy, has called for more rapid action to confront the climate crisis in a crucial visit to China that is taking place against a fraught backdrop, with both countries currently baking under record heatwaves and Kerry facing hostile opposition from Republicans back home.Kerry's meeting with Xie Zhenhua, his Chinese counterpart, for three days of formal talks in Beijing is the first substantive summit between the world's two largest carbon emitters on the climate crisis since relations were frozen last August, when Nancy Pelosi, the then-House of Representatives speaker, visited Taiwan, a move condemned by China's leadership. Continue reading...

Great British Nuclear created to deliver government's commitment to boosting electricity generation, in part through smaller reactorsThe UK government is to offer grants of 157m as part of its launch of a new body to support the nuclear power industry.Great British Nuclear (GBN) will be tasked with helping deliver the government's commitment to provide a quarter of the UK's electricity from nuclear energy by 2050. Continue reading...

Man in Houston died in house without air conditioning; mercury in parts of Italy is close to hitting 45C as wildfires ravage Greece and Spain

World's biggest olive producer, Spain, on course for second bad harvest in a row, raising fears of gaps on shelves and even higher pricesThe olive oil industry is in crisis", and the heatwave in southern Europe is threatening to inflict the second bad harvest in a row and gaps on shelves this autumn.After a spring heatwave affected flowering in Spain, which produces about half of the global olive crop, the harvest was forecast to be only 28% up on last year, which was the worst in almost a decade. Continue reading...

Reporting of climate crisis has been lousy for years, experts say, in a country where rightwing press has been dominantItaly is sweltering in abnormally high temperatures, but its media appear to be more interested in how the extreme heat is being reported in the foreign press than delving deeply into the effects in a country deemed to be among the most vulnerable in Europe to the climate crisis.Over the weekend, several outlets picked up on reports on Italy's heatwave in leading foreign news websites - including the Guardian, the Times and the BBC. They were particularly fascinated by a headline in the Times calling Rome - where temperatures are forecast to reach highs of 43C on Tuesday - the Infernal City", a play on the nickname Eternal City". So much so that it was still a talking point come Monday. Continue reading...

People were ordered to leave their homes south-east of Athens on Monday as a wildfire fanned by strong winds burned nearby vegetation. The blaze was raging close to buildings in the village of Kouvaras, about 27km (17 miles) from the Greek capital, and threatening other settlements, the civil protection service said. In Kalyvia, horses were evacuated from stables that had caught light

Officials issue air quality advisories across US and with nearly 900 forest fires - many of them out of control' - burning to the north

Limiting demand of richest 20% saves seven times greenhouse gases required to meet needs of poorest 20%, researchers find

Record heat in Europe is part of a pattern of more intense heatwaves made more likely by climate breakdown

Water firm says dealing with 2022's record-breaking heatwave and other weather events cost it 17mSouth East Water has reported a pre-tax loss of nearly 75m, which it blamed in part on the cost of dealing with last year's extreme weather events" including the record-breaking heatwave.The water firm, which supplies 2.2 million customers in Kent, Sussex, Hampshire, Berkshire and Surrey, said the weather events cost it 17m. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Leaked document falls far short' of what is needed to safeguard lives and livelihoods from heat, drought and storms, say expertsThe government's new plan to cope with the climate crisis has been condemned as very weak" by experts, who say not enough is being done to protect lives and livelihoods.Responding to the document, which was leaked to the Guardian, one highlighted its failure to adequately protect people in the UK from extreme heat. The heatwave in 2022, when temperatures surpassed 40C for the first time, led to the early deaths of more than 3,000 people, wildfires, buckled rail lines and farmers struggling with drought. Southern Europe is currently in the grip of a searing heatwave. Continue reading...

Unwitting whale advocates and rightwing thinktanks create the impression that offshore wind energy projects endanger cetaceansOne night in late March, J Timmons Roberts, a professor of environmental studies at Brown University, stepped in to a high school gymnasium in a small seaside town in Rhode Island. He was there to speak at a town hall aimed at allaying concerns about a local offshore windfarm.In the front row, he noticed a woman dressed as a whale, holding a sign that read Save Me!" Continue reading...

Ollie and Harry Ferguson from Aberdeenshire took inspiration for 12,500-mile journey from Ross scientific expedition of 1839-43A pair of model ships built by two young brothers have launched on a mission to circumnavigate Antarctica, in what is thought to be a world first.Ollie Ferguson, 13, and his younger brother Harry, 11, from Turriff in Aberdeenshire, took inspiration from the Ross scientific expedition of 1839-43 where HMS Erebus and HMS Terror discovered the Ross ice shelf. Continue reading...

Asset management firms accused of sacrificing climate action by voting against shareholder resolution at Chevron and ExxonMobilSome of the UK's largest investors have backtracked on their support for a shareholder resolution that would force the big oil companies to cut their carbon emissions, according to a campaign group.Asset managers at Legal & General, abrdn and Janus Henderson voted against the climate resolutions put forward by Follow This, a Dutch shareholder activist group, at the annual general meetings of the US oil companies Chevron and ExxonMobil this year, having voted in favour of them in previous years. Continue reading...

Analysts call on government to make pumps mandatory for all new homes and scale up grants for installation in existing propertiesThe UK is lagging far behind France and other EU countries in installing heat pumps, research has shown, with less than a tenth of the number of installations despite having similar markets.Only 55,000 heat pumps were sold in the UK last year, compared with more than 620,000 in France. Twenty other European countries also had higher installation rates than the UK. Continue reading...

But Dale Vince's Ecojet plane will run on kerosene-based fuel in 2024 to enable quick start to projectThe green energy tycoon Dale Vince is planning to launch Britain's first electric airline in a move designed to prove polluting industries can decarbonise.Ecojet, styled as a flag carrier for green Britain", will launch early next year with a 19-seater plane travelling on a route between Edinburgh and Southampton. Continue reading...

Researchers argue that industry claims about benefits of more flights should be taken with pinch of saltClaims that airport expansion will help grow the UK economy should be treated with scepticism, according to a report that finds air travel does not increase productivity or growth.Declining business travel and lower wages in aviation undermine claims made by the industry for the value of increased air connections, say researchers at the New Economics Foundation. Continue reading...

South-west and parts of the west hardest hit amid warnings to take heat seriously' as Phoenix temperature to rise to 118F SundayMore than 100 million people, around a third of Americans, were under extreme heat advisories this weekend and that record-breaking heat was expected to continue into the new week.There were advisories from coast to coast, with the south-west and parts of the west hard hit and officials warning that conditions could get worse in Arizona, California and Nevada. Continue reading...

Chris Gloninger wove the reality of global heating into his forecasts in the conservative heartland of Iowa. Not everyone was receptiveIt was a brave, if perhaps scientifically obvious, experiment - to convey messages about the unfolding climate crisis via the regular local TV weather forecasts seen by viewers in the conservative heartland of Iowa. It culminated in the meteorologist involved receiving death threats and exiting the state.Chris Gloninger, who is 38, has been obsessed with the weather since he was a child, when Hurricane Bob crunched into his New York state home town, parlaying this into an itinerant career as a TV meteorologist in cities such as Milwaukee and Boston, where he pioneered at NBC 10 what he thinks was the US's first regular broadcast segment on climate change, in 2010. Continue reading...

Petros Chrysafis helps Californians like the wildlife they live with' by taking a unique approach to deterring livestock killingsPetros Chrysafis has always had a fascination with predators, but he never thought he could make a career out of it. Then he helped a friend solve a chicken-stealing coyote problem. Word spread. Now he runs a one-man predator detection and deterrence" business in California's Central valley and Sierra Nevada mountains.His job is an odd combo of forensic scientist, homicide detective, set designer and negotiator. Typically when he first meets his clients, they are ready to find and kill the predator that's been attacking their livestock. His goal is to offer an alternative: coexistence. Continue reading...

Dedication of the 3-mile loop to Winston Walker comes after a push to make national parks more inclusiveAs a nature loving little girl, Jessica Newton never understood why the faces on information boards in the state and national parks she visited looked nothing like her.My parents would take me to these places and the platforms would tell you about a trail, or a person, but I'd never see anyone that looks remotely close to my color," she said. Continue reading...

Energy firms have made record profits by increasing production of oil and gas, far from their promises of rolling back emissionsIt was probably the Earth's hottest week in history earlier this month, following the warmest June on record, and top scientists agree that the planet will get even hotter unless we phase out fossil fuels.Yet leading energy companies are intent on pushing the world in the opposite direction, expanding fossil fuel production and insisting that there is no alternative. It is evidence that they are motivated not by record warming, but by record profits, experts say. Continue reading...

More than 100 companies are set to send a letter to the PM voicing fears about the disastrous effects of Britain's overreliance on gasMore than 100 of the UK's biggest energy companies will tell Rishi Sunak this week not to back off the green agenda after a report by the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) warned of catastrophic effects on the economy of continued overreliance on gas.The energy sector is becoming so alarmed at what it sees as the Sunak government's mixed messages on switching to more renewable energy that big UK companies are ready to go public with a letter to Downing Street within days. Continue reading...

Once the preserve of farmers, now the dog trials, sheep shearing and food stalls are starting to appeal to everyoneOne of the highlights of the Great Yorkshire Show for Bridlington farmer Geoff Riby - other than his ram winning the Beltex male champion in the sheep class competition - was watching Lorenzo the Flying Frenchman perform in the main ring at the Harrogate show ground.Riby has exhibited at the fair since 1972 and has seen this annual event evolve from an industry trade fair promoting tractors to the sort of festival that would feature one of France's most skilled equestrians on the bill. Continue reading...

Anticyclone Caronte could send thermometer to 48C/118F as Mediterranean heatwave intensifies Read more: Acropolis closes to protect touristsA fierce anticyclone named after Cerberus, a three-headed monster-dog that features in Dante's Inferno, had not even ended before Italians were warned that a more intense one called Caronte, or Charon, who in Greek mythology was the ferryman of the dead, was on its way.Italy sweltered in temperatures reaching highs of 38C over the weekend, while Caronte will grip the country from Monday, sending the mercury beyond 40C in central and southern regions, with the islands of Sicily and Sardinia possibly hitting a peak of 48C. Continue reading...

First-aid workers drafted in to treat visitors suffering effects of 48C - 118F -temperatures at the country's most visited monumentThe Greeks know a thing or two about heat, and they know a thing or two about dealing with it. But last week saw heat of an altogether different order.Temperatures were of such magnitude that they called for measures never before seen in a country that prides itself on being the first in Europe to have appointed an official dedicated solely to dealing with the challenges of global heating. Continue reading...

Soaring hurricane-cover premiums are bad news for the state's homeowners - and Ron DeSantis is accused of dragging his feetHouseholds in Florida, the third most populous state in the US, have been grappling for some time with a property insurance crisis that is making home ownership unaffordable for many. After at least six insurers went insolvent in Florida last year, Farmers on Tuesday became the latest to pull out of the Florida market, saying in a statement that the decision was based on risk exposure in the hurricane-prone state.Climate change is threatening the very existence of some parts of Florida. And the costs are already being felt by Floridians. At the end of 2022, average annual property insurance premiums had already risen to more than $4,200 in Florida - three times the national average. Continue reading...

Video of capture of Burmese python measured at 19ft - as long as an adult giraffe is tall - was posted on InstagramA snake believed to be the longest invasive Burmese python ever recorded was captured by two Florida hunters after a mighty struggle.Stephen Gauta and Jake Waleri caught the humungous reptile in Big Cypress national preserve near the Everglades in southern Florida earlier this week after it lunged at Waleri, 22, who then wrestled it back to the ground. Continue reading...

Zachariah and Mary Ben were struck by the lack of of fresh and local foods near them, so they began growing their own cropsThere's a paleontological site in the center of Zachariah and Mary Ben's family farm plot. Or, at least there is if you're their two-year-old son, Yabiitoh. Neon-colored pterodactyl and stegosaurus toys lay strewn about between freshly sprouted Hopi red dye amaranth and Navajo white corn. As the Bens plunge corn jabbers - a hand-held farming tool - loaded with Oaxacan green corn seeds into the New Mexico soil, Yabiitoh ditches the dinosaurs and races across the farm lot.Just a few miles north of Shiprock, New Mexico, on land long stewarded by the Navajo (or Dine) people in the fertile valley of the San Juan River, Zach and Mary tend the land where they grow produce for their baby food company, Bidii Baby Foods. Continue reading...

Rome, Florence and Bologna among areas affected as forecasters say Sicily and Sardinia could face record 49C temperaturesSixteen cities across Italy have been issued with red alerts as southern Europe continues to experience fierce heat and faces the possibility of record-breaking temperatures.Rome, Florence and Bologna are among the areas affected by the heatwave, with forecasters suggesting that Sicily and Sardinia could see temperatures climb as high as 49C (120F), which would be the hottest ever recorded in Europe. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Former envoy raises concerns over possible deliberate defunding of climate diplomacy under Sunak government'The UK Foreign Office has said it does not know how many of its officials and diplomats are working on climate change and energy issues, in response to freedom of information requests.The government has frequently described itself as a world leader on climate issues and the Foreign Office recently stated that climate change remains an area of utmost importance and is a central focus of our diplomatic relations on a daily basis". Continue reading...

After years of underinvestment, reservoir has had to be topped up from estuary, raising health concernsMore than half of Uruguay's 3.5 million citizens are without access to tap water fit for drinking, and experts say the situation could continue for months.Some had predicted the crisis years ago when pointing out the vulnerability of the single reservoir supplying water to the metropolitan area around the capital, Montevideo. Continue reading...

LGA says single-use e-cigarettes are a litter blight and cause problems in bin lorries and recycling centresCouncils are joining paediatricians in calling for a ban on disposable vapes owing to the environmental damage they cause and the soaring number of young people taking up the addictive products.The Local Government Association (LGA), which represents councils in England and Wales, said urgent action was needed to save taxpayers' money - as single-use e-cigarettes are costly to recycle without going through special treatment - protect the planet and keep children safe. Continue reading...

Licensing for scallop dredging and trawling must comply with National Marine Plan after judicial review by Open Seas charityThe Scottish government should stop approving licences for fishing vessels using methods believed to cause harm to habitats, a charity working to protect marine life has urged, after a court declared a routine licensing decision to be unlawful.Scotland's highest court ruled that the Scottish government had failed to act in accordance with Scotland's National Marine Plan (NMP) when varying fishing licences last December, after a judicial review by the conservation charity Open Seas. It is legally obliged to act in accordance with its environmental duties, as stated in the NMP, when making these decisions. Continue reading...